Nuggets, Knicks make trade that brings neither closer to a title

I would bet there will be some kind of brake on the free agency process -- certainly a cap on salary increases and probably a limit of maybe six or eight teams a player could negotiate with.

With fewer teams in the bidding, prices would go down, but as long as one of them is the team the player wants to go to, the LeBron circus will reoccur in some instances.

With teams allowed to simply dump players to make cap space, you'll see fewer forced sign-and-trade deals.

I think in years to come we will see the NBA evolve into 4-6 semi all-star teams battling out for the title, a handful of other "competitive" teams, and half the league made up of "Washington Generals."

 

Aren't we there now? Champions since 1983, Stern's first year:

Lakers 8
Bulls 6
Spurs 4
Celtics 3
Pistons 3
Rockets 2
Heat 1 (biggest fix ever)
76ers 1

 

Has the NBA ever not been that?

 

Sure. Eight different champs in the 1970s, including one apiece for the Bucks, Warriors, Trail Blazers, Bullets and Super Sonics. Combined titles for those five franchises since then: Zero.

 

As a Knicks fan, I hoped like hell Melo would go to New Jersey. Why give up that much when he was coming to you at the end of the season anyway?

I know I am being naive, but I really, really, really hope Zeke is not involved (though the handwriting on the wall says otherwise).

 

Yeah, but 1970s basketball sucked because half the talent was in the ABA. Just sayin'.

 

And a considerable amount was in Flint, Mich., in 1976.

 

One question that hasn't seemed to come up yet: How long does FIU and the NCAA put up with that shit??

FIU is 9-17. If I were the president of the university, I would direct our lawyers to prepare a breach of contract suit against Isiah Thomas.

I don't know and don't care what FIU is paying Isiah Thomas, but presumably they are paying him to devote his awesome basketball acumen to making FIU a better team, and quite obviously he has been something less than smashingly successful.

Whatever time he is spending on the phone acting as the tamper-master between Carmelo Anthony and the Knicks is time he ain't spending on the FIU program, and if I were them, I'd sue to take it out of his ass.

If he quit in a huff, who fuckin' cares? He's obviously just coaching the team on a spare-time basis now, why not get somebody who really wants to do it instead of in his spare time between calls to his sack-lickers in the NBA?

Think about it: If he were actually to coach the team into the NCAA tournament, that would mean another full week or so he would have to dick around running practices, coaching games, and other annoying shit like that with the FIU team, which would take away from his precious phone time plotting the glorious future of the Knicks. So how badly do you think he really wants the team to make the NCAA tournament?

 

I read this morning that, with this deal, the Knicks likely won't have the space to sign Williams/CP3 in the future, whenever that may be.

Is this true?

 

The Knicks overpaid at the end game, but with the CBA likely resulting in a lower cap, Melo was going to panic and they would have lost him.

I don't like giving up Felton, because Billups doesn't have the legs to run the offense long term, but the other 3 guys were no brainers. None of the 4 players are going to be top 3 players on an elite team.

Good move -- always get the best player in a trade.

 

You must stop listening to Bill Simmons.

Strangely the key to this deal working now is Billups and not Anthony.

 

I agree. I think the Bulls might make the cut as one of the few teams he actually cares about too.