Nearly three years have elapsed since our Great New York MeloDrama Nightmare ended. Three teams, 13 players, four draft picks plus the right to swap a fifth and $6 million in cash crisscrossed the NBA landscape.
The heavyweights were the Knicks and Nuggets with the Timberwolves needed to facilitate the trade. The crown jewel in the extravaganza was Carmelo Anthony, who joined the Knicks after forcing a trade and signing a three-year, $65 million extension.
“Melo came in at the beginning of the season and said, ‘I want out.’ I thought they did a great job of making the best out of it,” then-Nuggets coach, now ESPN analyst George Karl said of the Denver brass. “They were dealt a nightmare and they turned it into a good dream.”
The Knicks gutted much of the rebuilding done by then-president Donnie Walsh. A future first-round pick didn’t seem as costly then as it does now — but it’s the pick in this year’s talent-rich draft. The Knicks, who had been rebuffed by LeBron James the previous summer, needed star power.
“The one thing, and you guys can’t deny it because you write about it every 15 [expletive] minutes, is New York has to have stars in Madison Square Garden,” Walsh said with a laugh. “When we were building the Knicks at that time we were more concentrated on free agency, not picks.”
Since the trade, the Knicks have gone 123-102, including last season’s 54-victory campaign, with three playoff trips, but only one series victory. The Nuggets have been 137-83 with three first-round playoff failures.
The Knicks traded Danilo Gallinari, Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Timofey Mozgov, a 2012 second-round pick (Quincy Miller), a 2013 second rounder (D-Leaguer Romero Osby), their 2014 first rounder, the right to swap picks in 2016 and $3 million cash to Denver. They also sent Eddy Curry, Anthony Randolph and $3 million to Minnesota. Under the new collective bargaining agreement, teams are limited to spending $3.1 million total per year in trades. And the Knicks’ 2016 pick, whether theirs or Denver’s, now goes to Toronto through the Andrea Bargnani trade.
Denver packaged Anthony, Renaldo Balkman, Chauncey Billups, Anthony Carter and Shelden Williams to the Knicks and a 2015 second-round pick to Minnesota. The Timberwolves sent Kosta Koufos to the Nuggets and Corey Brewer to the Knicks. Balkman, Billups, Carter, Williams and Brewer played a total of 71 combined regular-season games for the Knicks.
So who won the Feb. 22, 2011 trade, beyond Anthony who avoided potential restrictions from the new CBA that summer with the sign-and-trade?
Some observers say the Knicks.
“I always go with whoever gets the star player, the superstar wins the trade,” one veteran assistant coach and scout said. “So the Knicks got the better of the deal.”
Others say Denver.
“Denver won it. It gave them flexibility. They weren’t held hostage. It gave them assets then and going forward,” one rival executive said.
Some insist it came out as a draw.
“It helped both teams. Denver got good players. True, Gallinari is hurt, but Wilson has played well and Mozgov has become a good player,” Walsh said. “The Knicks, they got Melo, the second leading scorer in the league, definitely a guy you can build around.”
But the consensus, really, is wait. That draft pick the Knicks must surrender to Denver could be a lottery selection should the Knicks not make the playoffs. Anthony has indicated he will opt out of his contract and become a free agent this summer. He could walk. He could stay. If the Knicks lose the pick and Anthony, it would be a disaster.
“It can’t be determined until the summer because of the draft pick,” an opposing Eastern executive said. “What happens if the Knicks would get the No. 1 pick?”
That’s just being cruel.
But back when the trade was being plotted for months, the draft picks were the least of the Knicks’ concerns. The plan was to be a legitimate power by 2014 and the pick would be low.
Oops.
“My thinking was the Knicks would be a lot better by this time,” Walsh said.
The wild card for the Knicks were the New Jersey (soon-to-be-Brooklyn) Nets, who came armed with a fistful of first-round picks and assets in their bid for Anthony. For the longest time, then-Denver, now-Toronto general manager Masai Ujiri, who declined comment on the deal, had the Nets on speed dial. Karl wanted the Knicks’ deal. Picks are great, but picks don’t always work out.
“From the standpoint of managing your team, it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in pro basketball. Every day you had that question coming in,” Karl said. “For a coach, you want to keep your team motivated and directed. So how do you answer so they can’t write something that will be distracting to Melo or someone else? You got so tired of the same question. … It just bothered you, it wore thin. It was like picking an open scab every day.”
On Sunday, Feb. 20, 2011, two days before the trade was finalized, the Nets knew their MeloDrama was over. But they kept pushing, hoping to drive up the price for the Knicks.
“I would have to agree with that,” said Walsh, who acknowledged Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov became an unwanted competitor. “He came in and if we didn’t give Denver what they wanted then the threat was Carmelo was going to go to Brooklyn, which in our situation would not have been good.
“So we said it was either, ‘He was going to be in Brooklyn or he’s going to be here.’ I do think the Nets were a viable threat and so we paid a bigger price than we wanted to.”
In an ideal world, the Knicks would have kept their assets and signed Anthony in the summer. But Anthony did not want to risk any new restrictions. And the Knicks didn’t want to risk losing him to the Nets.
“I would have preferred to keep them [players] and get a star. But that wasn’t going to happen,” Walsh said. “I would have preferred Carmelo didn’t force a trade. But he did it for right reasons, so he could get the most money. The collective bargaining was going to change and he thought he might get [hosed]. So he wanted to get traded. If he had just played out his contract and signed with us, it would have been a different deal.”
Remember the whole thing about star power and the Garden. As another rival executive put it, referring to Knicks owner James Dolan, “Let’s just say I think Donnie was under ‘subtle pressure’ to land a star.”
Karl wanted to avoid rebuilding, which was why he liked the Knicks’ offer. And his way worked: the Nuggets completed a 50-win season the year of the trade, were 10 games over .500 in the 2011-12 lockout season and won 57 last year.
“Not at all,” Karl said of his interest in rebuilding. “I really thought in a lot of ways, Masai and the organization wanted to make the New Jersey trade and I wanted to make the New York trade based on the guys like Gallo and Wilson and Timo. We know what they are. They can play. With draft picks, you don’t even know if they can play.
“We just felt … we could still be competitive. Fortunately it worked out for us.”
And for the Knicks — in a way. Gallinari, who has played just 128 of 220 games since the trade (he will miss the entire season with left knee surgery), and Chandler (hip surgery in 2012) have fought injuries. Felton has found his way back to the Knicks (“Not sure that’s a good thing,” the rival GM said with a deadpan). Mozgov has become a contributor. Koufos is gone, Miller plays.
But that draft pick could ultimately determine how history views the deal.
“In the short term, both teams won. The Knicks got Melo, the Nuggets got players,” one veteran scout said. “But this is a great draft and this is where the trade could turn. If the Knicks don’t make the playoffs, they could lose a cornerstone player. And if they also lose Melo, that’s calamity.”