New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony. (Photo : Getty Images)
The NBA trade rumors continue to badger the defending champion Cleveland Cavaliers and this time, an old proposal is revived.
The Kevin Love to Carmelo Anthony talks has been a wet dream for fans hungry for a blockbuster trade. The latest is a report from Fox Sports which claims that trading Kevin Love for Carmelo Anthony would make the Cleveland Cavaliers a better challenge for the Golden State Warriors.
Andrew Lynch of Fox Sports did not exactly elaborate on how and why that is the case. "With Kevin Durant in Golden State, the Cavs' current lineup probably won't cut it, so we'd love to see Melo join forces with LeBron and Kyrie Irving to take on the Warriors." Instead, Lynch dealt more with how Kevin Love would fit with the New York Knicks.
Perhaps before there is a serious discussion on whether a trade would benefit the Cleveland Cavaliers, a better question would be whether the trade is actually possible. There are many reasons why the trade would not happen.
For one thing, Anthony has a no-trade clause in his contract so that means he has to give his consent before the Knicks could include him in a trade. On that note, Carmelo seems to enjoy the Big Apple. He did not just force his way out of Denver to win a championship, he also wanted to be in New York, and apparently so does his wife, actress La La Anthony.
If Carmelo wanted a championship, he could have left the New York Knicks as a free agent in 2014 and joined the Chicago Bulls. That team had Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah (now his teammates in the Knicks) when Rose was still a consistent point guard and Noah was not yet ravaged by injuries. They also had Jimmy Butler and Pau Gasol who was still a very serviceable big man.
The Bulls would've kept all those players and only needed to dump players like Taj Gibson and Nikola Mirotic to accommodate Anthony. Despite the hiring of Phil Jackson, Anthony knew that the Knicks could never assemble that much talent during his tenure but he decided to stay anyway.
To be fair, Lynch does admit that this trade is hypothetical and that the Cavs, for their part, is not so keen on trading Kevin Love either. Nevertheless, talks about Love-Melo have re-ignited and has prompted discussions like this.
Will the Cavs actually get better with Anthony? That's highly unlikely as Anthony is a ball-heavy player who thrives in isolation. Love, despite his inadequacies, is actually a better fit alongside LeBron James and Kyrie Irving than Melo is.
If the Cavs would trade Love, it's probably to address their interior defense, which is why they are linked to centers.
