It’s been a favorite pitch of fans on Twitter and the rest of the Web the past few days: The Knicks send Carmelo Anthony and a first-round pick or two to Cleveland for Kyrie Irving. That way Anthony ends up in a place he said he would go, the Cavaliers get talent to help them remain contenders, and the Knicks get an elite point guard to pair with Kristaps Porzingis. Everyone is happy.
Except it’s not going to happen.
At least not anytime soon.
There are a few reasons, but at the top of the list is Anthony doesn’t want to go to Cleveland, he is focused on Houston (even if the deals to go there are nowhere near done, despite the rumors around the web). There have been multiple reports on this, and I heard the same thing, but Ian Begley at ESPN has the clearest explanation.
Carmelo Anthony’s top destination in any trade, per league sources, is the Houston Rockets. Nothing really has changed since ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported more than a week ago that Anthony still expected the Knicks to carry out their previous plan to trade him to Houston…
All of (the speculation about Anthony going to Cleveland) is, of course, meaningless until one of two things happen:
1. The Knicks decide to include Porzingis in a deal for Irving (unlikely).
2. Anthony decides to move on from the possibility of being traded to Houston and strongly considers playing for a Cavs team without Irving. As of late Tuesday, he wasn’t prepared to do that.
There is zero chance the Knicks will put Kristaps Porzingis in the trade for Irving… well, this is the Knicks, so zero might be too low a number. But it should be zero. Nobody expects this to happen, and if it did Knicks fans would/should revolt.
Even if Anthony relents, this trade does not fit what the Cavaliers want in a deal — they are prioritizing getting a young stud player as part of any trade package. The Knicks don’t have that (outside Porzingis, and they can’t trade Tim Hardaway Jr. until Dec. 15, if anyone thinks of him as a young stud). Anthony to the Knicks makes them older, slower, and probably worse defensively. The Knicks would need to get a third team involved to make a deal that works, which would mean giving up assets (a first-round draft pick, most likely) to make that third team happy.
Anthony could eventually reconsider. Maybe. However, he’s got two years left on his contract and can read all the same tea leaves that Irving can — LeBron James does not seem fully committed to a future in Cleveland. Anything can happen, no decision has been made, but LeBron could well leave Cleveland again. Does Anthony want to be a Cavalier in 2018-19 season without LeBron? No.
Also, if you’re Cleveland, does trading for Anthony make you a bigger threat to the Warriors? A trade straight up for Anthony does not get you younger and more athletic. For one, how does a forward combination of Kevin Love, LeBron, and Carmelo Anthony work? Can you blend that with Derrick Rose at the point? Offensively, Anthony can take Irving’s place as an isolation scorer, just from different areas of the floor that will force Love to adjust. However, defensively… that could be a mess. Even with LeBron and Tristan Thompson, it will be a mess with three negative defenders on the court at the start (and likely finish) of games. You could bring Love off the bench and start J.R. Smith/Iman Shumpert at the two, but this creates its own set of problems. It’s an awkward rotational fit.
There are a lot of reasons but do not expect an Anthony for Irving trade to go down. This trade is ultimately going to be more complicated than that.
