knocking sound

[emachines143]

I have a ka24de motor running in my car and it has about 124000 miles on it. About awhile ago It was running fine until it stalled when i was driving. When i pulled over i tryed to start it again and the only way it started was when i gave it the gas pedal. Im thinking its bc its running rich. when i did start it it would just blow smoke. Not too much but a little. And this was weird, it made this horrible knocking soound and like yesterday i took off the upper guide on the cam and it went away. But when we have the battery on charge, its very slow when it tries to start. Even the spark plugs were out there was still some sort of drag in the engine. Idk if its a starter problem. Its not the fuel pump bc it gushes out a lot of gas when we detached the rubber hose from the metal hose on the engine. So im lost