NY Knicks Rumors: Carmelo Anthony Trade Talks On Hold, ‘Melo To Stay With Knicks?
The latest New York Knicks rumors suggest that a Carmelo Anthony trade is on pause, while the team contemplates the possibility of moving forward with ‘Melo as a part of the roster. For weeks and months, Anthony has been the subject of NBA trade rumors, and in the most recent speculation, it’s been said he would consider going to the Cleveland Cavaliers or Houston Rockets. New York entered into talks with both teams about making a deal. Of those two teams, Houston seemed to have emerged as a frontrunner in the past week or so, but there were some complications. Now it’s looking like New York is putting things on a temporary hold.
According to an ESPN report on Thursday via Ramona Shelburne and Adrian Wojnarowski, league sources have indicated that New York is halting the trade talks so they can talk things over with Carmelo Anthony about his future. The belief is that the organization wants to see if they can find a way to reincorporate Anthony into their plan, especially now that they have new management in place. The league sources said that New York is backing away from the ongoing trade talks they’ve been engaged in with the Houston Rockets and Cleveland Cavaliers for a month now.
A trade to the Houston Rockets was recently reported via NY Daily News to be at the “two-yard line” in terms of being close to getting done. The rumored deal would have involved four teams participating and Carmelo Anthony winding up as a member of the Rockets. There he would join fellow All-Star players Chris Paul and James Harden to form another new “Big Three” team to contend in the Western Conference. Paul was just sent to the team during a sign-and-trade deal with the Clippers earlier this offseason.
The situation in New York had become dire for Knicks’ players and fans with Phil Jackson as the president. However, Jackson recently exited from that role and the team is now awaiting Sacramento executive Scott Perry to take over the general manager position. All of this has the Knicks’ top basketball executive Steve Mills mulling over whether trading Anthony is really best for the organization. Most likely, the team realizes the value of Anthony in terms of trying to attract another big star to the team in any upcoming free agency period.
Carmelo has now been in the league since 2003 when he was drafted third overall by the Denver Nuggets. He spent his first eight seasons playing in Denver before he was traded to the Knicks during the 2010-11 NBA season. Anthony has racked up 10 All-Star appearances, won the NBA scoring title in 2013, and is a three-time Olympic gold medalist with Team USA. At this point, all that is lacking on his resume is that NBA Championship. Other stars that Anthony arrived in the league with, including LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh, have achieved that.
As mentioned in ESPN‘s report, the Knicks organization had been actively trying to push Anthony away from the team for quite some time now. That could make it difficult for Anthony to want to resolve things amicably and remain part of the team. That especially seems true based on what ‘Melo has seen going on around the league, with other All-Star players heading to new rosters to try to contend for a title. It seems at this point Carmelo probably wants the same thing for his own career, and staying on the current Knicks’ roster doesn’t seem like it will deliver that anytime soon.
[Featured Image by Christian Petersen/Getty Images]
