After months of negotiations and waffling back and forth between either the New Jersey Nets and the New York Knicks, the Denver Nuggets were able to get the offer they wanted and ship Carmelo Anthony to Manhattan to be closer to his wife and maybe play some basketball from time to time.
It’s a complicated trade involving many pieces so I’m not going to go through each piece individually, but I did want to dissect it from both a Denver and New York perspective. But before I do, let’s get this out of the way. I don’t want to simply dissect this trade on paper. It would be far too simplistic and I think there were way too many off-the-court issues involving both teams that were in play here.
For the Nuggets, it was actually really simple. Carmelo Anthony was never going to sign to play there for another three years and they had to get something in return for the superstar.
The hard part for them over the last few months was trying to put doubt into people’s minds about Carmelo’s intentions, thus keeping his trade value as high as possible. The Knicks knew he wanted to be in New York and so did the Nuggets, but it was up to Nuggets’ management to not make it seem so obvious.
For the Knicks, the idea of being a franchise going through yet another year without making the playoffs is just sickening. In order to stay relevant in a crowded sports market, they had to make the big splash. They tried to do that with Lebron James and instead they got Amare Stoudamire. Good player, decent splash. By getting Carmelo, they finally get the splash that they wanted.
The Knicks now join the growing number of teams that are trying to win via star power and not necessarily complete teams. The Boston Celtics proved that lumping Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce could be successful. The Miami Heat have one of the best records in the NBA this year based on their Big 3 of Lebron, D-Wade and Chris Bosh. The Knicks now have the trio two thirds complete with Amare and Carmelo.
Make no mistake about it. Having two of the top 10 or 15 players in the league on the same team makes them a force, but one thing bugs me about this duo as opposed to the previous examples. In Boston and Miami, you have six players that are great individually and have found a way to interact with each other in a way where chemistry and attitude is not an issue.
There’s no doubt that Carmelo and Amare both have exceptional talent, but both have shown less than exceptional attitudes at times during their careers in the NBA. Can the two co-exist and will either of them fight to be the man? It worked in Boston and in Miami, but I’m not sure it’s going to work this time around. Let’s see how this plays out…