Carmelo Anthony Trade: Don't Be Ignorant, New York Knicks Are Better with Him

Carmelo Anthony has been traded to the New York Knicks.

Finally!

The move that every NBA owner, general manager, player and fan saw coming last summer is complete. At last, all parties can move forward and we no longer have to hear “the latest” on the Anthony trade rumors every five minutes on ESPN’s hourly live SportsCenter broadcast.

A shout out and a job well done to Ric Bucher, Marc Stein, Chris Broussard and every other NBA insider across the map that has been working this story for the past seven months. You’ve all earned your paycheck.

For those unfamiliar with the reported parameters of the deal, it looks like this:

Denver receives Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and a 2014 first-round pick, as well as additional picks and somewhere in the range of three million dollars in cash.

In return the Knicks get Anthony, Chauncey Billups, Shelden Williams, Anthony Carter and Renaldo Balkman.

To spend hours analyzing who got the better of the deal would be foolish because the obvious answer is New York. The Knicks finally got the true superstar they have been seeking for years, one that can bring a coveted championship to Madison Square Garden if the right pieces are added to the puzzle.

They also received a championship point guard in Billups, the 2004 Finals MVP, who has been there and done that.

The Nuggets basically came away with three former starters on a team that sits at 28-26, good enough for sixth place in the Eastern Conference. Chandler, Gallinari, and Felton are nice pieces, but none will ever play in an all-star game or develop into what Melo already is: a bona fide superstar.

You don’t win championships in the NBA without at least one. The Knicks now have two. The Nuggets lost theirs and now have nothing close to resembling one, thus the winner of this deal is clearly the New York Knickerbockers.

Get it? Got it? Good.

What I don’t get is how some extremely credible basketball writers are saying this morning that the Knicks aren’t much better today than they were yesterday. Or how Carmelo is only worth a few extra wins to the Knicks than the old roster would have been.

Here’s my question to Michael Wilbon and John Hollinger: Have you learned nothing from the events of summer 2010?

The first thing every interested individual regardless of credentials had to say was that the Miami Heat would crash and burn because outside of LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh, the Heat were chopped liver.

I, for one, bought into that assertion and so did you. And how dumb have the Heatles made us look thus far as they sit atop the East at 41-15?

Houston Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey pitched to Chris Bosh in the first hour of free agency that a roster comprised of three superstars and ten rookies, has-beens or middling players would max out with a win total of 45.

Morey is great at what he does, but was certainly in the wrong here.

The Heat have three superstars, 41 wins and a legitimate chance to reach the NBA Finals in year one of their experiment.

Houston’s only superstar has appeared in five games over the past two years due to injury, leaving it with a glut of above average role players that have played to a 26-31 record and a 12th place standing in the Western Conference.

Again, superstars find a way to win if they’re really in that class.

Looking at what is left of the Knicks roster and the remaining schedule, I predict New York will win 18 of its final 28 games, which will have them at 46-36 heading into the playoffs.

It’s unlikely that they will pass Atlanta for the five-seed, so the Knicks are looking at either Chicago or Orlando in the first round. Both are serious title contenders, but have flaws that could cost them in a series against a team with Anthony, Amare Stoudemire and Billups.

I put the odds of them advancing into the second round this spring at 35 percent, or about 30 percentage points higher then I would’ve given yesterday’s Knicks.

But like the Heat, this deal wasn’t necessarily made for the present. Owner James Dolan and Head Coach Mike D’Antoni made this happen with an eye on the future.

Because what quality free agent or unhappy superstar wouldn’t want to come to The Garden to chase a title with Anthony and Stoudemire on basketball’s most hallowed playground?

For more, visit my website at www.pointbartemus.com, a sports forum.