FINALLY the Melo drama is over...in the words of Swizz Beats and Jay-Z On To The Next One...who will be next drama?!?! Chris Paul?!?! Brandon Roy?!?! Deron Williams?!?!
As far as the Melo trade is concerned what I am left thinking is that this trade really speaks to the fear the NBA players have regarding how the new Collective Bargaining Agreement will look...
Let's look at this together...
Carmelo wanted this trade now so he could be a Knick and sign the 3 year $65 million extension officially before the current CBA expires on June 30, 2011...For one thing in the new CBA for a player to make $65 mill it will take 5+ years...MAX contracts are likely to decrease in value and length from the current CBA to the new one
Also the new CBA may include a Franchise Tag which would have allowed the Nuggets to place the Tag on Melo and keep him in Denver going forward...(NBA cannot be pleased that the Suns (Amar'e) Raps (Bosh) and Cavs (Bron Bron) all lost their Franchise players with zilch in return)
If you are Melo and want to play for the Knicks why now? (unless afraid of how new CBA will massively favor owners) Firstly as a Nugget he would only have to deal with a sloppy Lakers team and a great Spurs team...that is only 2 contenders to deal with in the West...The East however has Bulls/Heat/Celtics/Magic so why go a worse team that is in a stronger Conference?!?! Also why have the Knicks trade away several role players that could end up being assets as your teammates in a matter of months?!?! This all points to Melo (and his power agent Leon Rose) being very afraid of a new CBA that will heavily favor the NBA owners, not the players...We know that in any labour dispute if one side is looking for major fundamental changes (like the owners are here) then the process is usually drawn out and ugly (example we remember the NHL owners insisted on numerous fundamental changes to their business during their last CBA bargaining sessions...the NHLPA insisted they would never agree to the drastic changes (Salary Cap...Salary roll-backs etc) but at the end of the day in order to resume play the NHLPA agreed to ALL of the changes insisted on by the owners)...In a future blog we will look together at the specific issues coming in the battle of NBA vs NBA Players Association
I do give the Knicks credit here...they learned from the Yankees errors with Cliff Lee...The Yanks refused to include SS prospect Eduardo Nunez (who?!?!) in a package to Seattle in exchange for Cliff Lee at the 2010 MLB Trade Deadline...that allowed Texas to offer 1B prospect Justin Smoak which allowed Texas' offer to surpass the Yanks offer as again and again the Yanks refused to add Nunez to any deal...The Yanks thought that even though they missed out on Lee at the Trade Deadline they would surely be able to sign him in the offseason and have him going forward...what actually happened was Lee helped Texas eliminate the Yanks in the Playoffs, and then he signed for much less with the Phillies in the offseason completely spurning the Yanks...the Yanks miscalculation meant that Lee never became a Yankee so the organization never had a chance to sell him on the fact that New York was the place for him going forward...complete (albeit rare) swing and a miss for the Yanks...the Knicks were not going to go out like that...Other teams had larger offers than the Knicks, but ultimately the Knicks did come to the table with all the players that the Nuggets wanted in return for Melo...Knicks knew all along that Melo was not going to sign the 3 years $65 million extension with any team but them so they knew they did not have to out duel the Nets and Lakers etc for Melo's services, but when push came to shove the Knicks did include all the pieces required to pull the trigger...The draft picks are all 2nd rounders (who cares) and one 2014 1st round pick, but the Knicks will be a Top 5 team in 2014 so that draft pick will suck anyway...
As sick as we all were about hearing/reading about the Melo drama I also have to give the Nuggets credit here too...take a look at the cock soup that teams have rec'd in return lately for Franchise players, then look at the haul for the Nuggs...Denver GM Masai Ujiri did a great job, and likely is not done yet...he now has several additional assets to continue to deal before Thursday's deadline...HEY BRYAN COLANGELO - stop talking to your tailor and get on the damn phones and see about filling some of the NUMEROUS holes that your brutal approach to GMing has created...fingers crossed...
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