Goodbye New Jersey, Hello New York: The Carmelo Saga

Ohh where ohh where will Carmelo go, ohh where ohh where will he be?

The countdown is on, Carmelo Anthony is either coming to New York or New Jersey. Carmelo does not want to be a Denver Nugget anymore, and wants to be in the New York area so he can be close to his wife, La La.

The Denver Nuggets are in a tough spot because they could keep him through the rest of the season; however, they would not receive any compensation for his departure. The move they are looking to make is to trade him, which is the only move to make. But where would he land?

I am a fan of no NBA team but I am a huge NBA fan. I am glad that the New York Knicks are finally having some success since the departure of Patrick Ewing, and the idea of Carmelo coming to New York even excites a native of New Jersey like me. Sure Carmelo went to school in Syracuse, the beloved basketball school of many New Yorkers; and if Carmelo came to the Garden, he probably would sell out the arena night in and night out.

However, I know many of you Knick fans are going to hate me for saying this, but Carmelo Anthony is not a good fit in New York. I mean if it isn’t broke don’t fix it.

The New York Knicks are an astounding 22-15, only 7 games behind the Eastern Conference leader. They have a big name in Amare Stoudemire, who is 2^nd in the NBA in scoring with 26.2 points per game (Kevin Durant is 1^st and Carmelo is 9^th). They have a plethora of young talent such as Laundry Fields, Danilo Gallinari, and Toney Douglas, and they have great role players in Raymond Felton, Wilson Chandler, and Ronny Turiaf.

I might have to take the role player title off of Chandler and Felton because both of those players are fitting real well with the system the Knicks are running right now and look like all-stars. Any trade they would have to put on the table for Melo would mess up the team chemistry, and potentially be disastrous for such a spectacular start for the New York Knicks. 

Now the New Jersey Nets are 10-27, basically beyond struggling. The Nets have a lot of young players and draft picks they could get rid of in the supposed 15 player trade to land Carmelo which wouldn’t hurt the team at all. I mean how much worse can it get?

Although it is too late to turn their season around, it is never too late to sell tickets. Fans of the Nets want to see something more than Brooke Lopez and Devin Harris. Sure both of those players are pretty good talents, but the Nets are plain boring plus losing which equals a double negative. That means it’s positive right? Negative. They need Carmelo to at least bring some excitement back to the fans and the Prudential Center.  

Carmelo appears to be too costly for the Knicks to gamble on, so the Nets seem to be the winners of his talents. The bad news for the Nets is that it does seem Melo would be hesitant to sign an extension with the sinking ship. This would leave Melo open next season to sign with the Knicks.

For Nets fans, I guess the glass is half full or half empty depending on how you look at it because at least you would have his services for half a season. Half is better than zero!

The Knicks are making the playoffs this year, but I doubt they will win the NBA championship. If Melo does sign with the Nets without the extension, next season it very well could be, goodbye New Jersey, hello New York, and a championship might grace the big apple once again.