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Melo Can Still Bring A lot Of Firepower To A Team, Says Kevin Love

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15-year veteran Carmelo Anthony has accomplished almost everything you can think of as a  professional basketball player in the NBA.  As a rookie, he was named to the 2003-2004 All-Rookie team.  Since then, he has been named to six All-NBA teams, made ten All-Star teams, won three gold medals with Team USA. The one thing that has eluded Anthony thus far, has been an NBA Championship.  The closes he has been was the Western Conference Finals back in 2009, but Carmelo and Nuggets came up short against Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers.

After the 2010 season,  LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Amare Stoudemire, Dirk Nowitzki, Joe Johnson, Paul Pierce, and Rudy Gay to name a few, were all free agents that summer.  All of these players had to decide where they would be playing the following season.  LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh decided to team up in Miami and would go on to four straight NBA Finals winning two of them.

Back in 2006, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Carmelo Anthony and all the other members of the 2003 NBA Draft class were eligible for an extension. Per Bleacher Reports Howard Beck, LeBron James told his buddies during a conference call to sign a three extension allowing them to become free agents in 2010.

“I think I’m going to do a three-year extension, because in 2010 we can become free agents at the peak, right there in the prime of our career,” said James.

If they the longer deal there was more incentives and guaranteed money, while taking a shorter deal was fewer incentives and guaranteed money.  Ultimately,  Bosh, Wade, and James took the three-year extension worth 60 million dollars and kept their options open. Meanwhile, Carmelo opted to take the max for $80 over five years instead.

“And, uh, Melo,” James said, smiling and chuckling softly, “Melo took the five-year.”

Fast forward nine seasons, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh have multiple champions, while Melo is still looking for his first ring.

In 2017,  the New York Knicks traded Carmelo Anthony to the Oklahoma City Thunder for Enes Kanter, Doug McDermott, and Chicago’s 2018 second-round draft pick, per NBA.com. He would only spend one season in a Thunder’s uniform before being shipped to Atlanta and then waived by the Hawks.

Melo would sign with the Houston Rockets but only played ten games before he was traded to Chicago. He would be waived by the Bulls and currently is still a free agent. There was some chatter from Heavy’s Brandon Robinson and other outlets like ESPN, and TMZ about him heading to Los Angles, but ultimately that did not happen.

According to Fansided’s Blue Man Hoop,  Golden State might need Melo’s service with their bench ranked 29th in the NBA averaging 28.8 points per game.

“It’s not a hidden secret. The Golden State Warriors have one of the league’s worst benches. This is partially due to the fact that they’ve spent such a vast majority of their cap space on their starters that they didn’t save money to improve their bench. There is a player just looking for a chance to compete, would likely the take the minimum, and is one of the league’s all-time best scorers. That player is Carmelo Anthony,” said Blue Man Hoop.

There has been a lot of chatter numerous outlets that Carmelo game doesn’t translate into today’s NBA. Earlier this season a couple of NBA veteran’s weighed in on whether they thought that assessment of Melo was accurate or not.

Here is what Blake Griffin, Hassan Whiteside, Rodney Hood,  CJ Miles, and DeMar DeRozan had to say about Carmelo Anthony.

“Melo is a Hall of Famer, and I think it is funny how fickle today’s world with social media and everything has become what have you done for me lately. I don’t if they remember how good of a player he was and still is. Sometimes it’s the situation; it’s sucks to see as a basketball player to see people act he is something he is not, said Griffin.

“I have a feeling Melo will turn it around.”

“I think the analytics is what did that to him. He is a bucket that is what he is, and I understand the situation went a certain way, but he still is Melo.  He still has a lot in his tank, and he can still play this game. I think situations have gone his way, but the slander, talk is crazy a lot of the time,“ said Miles.

After morning shootaround in Dallas on February 13th, Heat Center Hassan Whiteside had this to say about Melo.

“Wow a Carmelo question, said Whiteside, “Carmelo is a scoring machine.“

“ Yeah definitely, I mean this is a guy who is probably to this today, one of the hardest guys to guard.  In isolation type of situations and he is a legend.  He is one of my favorite players to ever play and it is tough to see him go through what he is going through in the media.  I think he can definitely help a team, especially when playoff time comes when things start to stagnate. He is a veteran, so I hope he lands on his feet,“  Hood told me.

This past week, the San Antonio Spurs were in Dallas to play the Dallas Mavericks.  The Spurs beat the Mavericks 112-105. After the game,  DeMar DeRozan was asked if he was surprised that Carmelo Anthony had not been signed.

“Yes, one of the All-time greatest scorers, Hall of Fame player.  So, it’s definitely crazy not to see him out there, but I’m confident he will be back out there,” DeRozan told me.

Recently the Cavaliers ended a three-game road streak in Dallas, as they took on the Dallas Mavericks.  Before morning shootaround, Kevin Love answered various questions from the media, including one about Melo’s game still being able to translate into today’s game.

“Absolutely! Melo’s game translates, and he is another guy I respect and admired for a really long time.  The way he approaches the game and I think it is always tough to see these savvy veterans get a bad name with a 24-hour news cycle. But Melo can still bring a hell of a lot to a team, and if you get him on the right team, there is going to be a lot of firepower for those guys, Love told me.“

What do you think?

Written by Landon Buford

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