Ryan Ward is a passionate and opinionated sports writer that has dedicated himself to his craft over the past five years writing about all the sports he loves from the US and overseas, from International soccer to NFL football, but with an especially passionate interest in NBA basketball and the Los Angeles Lakers.
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NBA Trade Rumor: Is Carmelo Anthony headed to Los Angeles?
Every single year around this time in the NBA regular season, trade rumors start swirling around the league as teams consider wheeling and dealing before the NBA trade deadline. Usually during this time the best teams in the league stay away from making deals as they are normally content with their squads and don’t want to mess with the team chemistry at the halfway point in the season.
When the best teams in the league do make moves it usually is to pick up a veteran before the playoffs as an insurance policy, but heading towards the Feb. 24 NBA trade deadline, the two-time defending champion Los Angeles Lakers seem like the one team in the league that are destined make a deal.
The one big-name that has been circulating around the NBA as a player that wants out of his current situation is the Denver Nuggets superstar forward Carmelo Anthony. At just 26 years old, Carmelo is a bright young star in this league with a promising future if he can get on the right team.
A few years ago, the Denver Nuggets were arguably one of the best teams in the league after they made a trade before the deadline to acquire Chauncey Billups in exchange for former NBA MVP Allen Iverson. When the deal went down a lot of people wondered why they would get rid of Iverson for Billups, but the trade completely turned the franchise as they finally had a solid floor general at the point guard position.
With Billups running the point and Melo shouldering the offense, the Nuggets made it all the way to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to the eventual NBA champion Lakers. Since then, the Nuggets haven’t really been able to repeat their success in the playoffs and have gotten progressively worse over time.
This season the Denver Nuggets will most likely be playoff bound once again as they currently would have the seventh seed in the West and still have a shot to win the Northwest division title, but it is highly unlikely that Carmelo Anthony will be on the team as he will almost certainly be traded before the deadline.
The one team that has been mentioned as Melo’s likely destination is with the New York Knicks, but he has also been linked to the New Jersey Nets, Houston Rockets and Dallas Mavericks. Even though Melo could still be headed to the Big Apple, the Los Angeles Lakers have gotten in the mix as they have started talking with the Denver Nuggets about a deal involving their superstar.
The deal would send Lakers center Andrew Bynum and possibly some other players to the Nuggets in exchange for Carmelo Anthony. With Bynum being just 23 years old and a two-time champ, the Nuggets feel they can build around this young kid, but the Lakers seem ready to ship him out of town as they are tired of dealing with his injury problems.
At first glance, this seems to be too good to be true for the Los Angeles Lakers as their starting lineup would be extremely talented to say the least. With Kobe Bryant, Derek Fisher, Carmelo Anthony, Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol this team would be close to unstoppable. They would definitely have to strike some team chemistry like the Miami Heat had to with LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade, but if they can do just that, a three-peat might be around the corner.
Whether or not this blockbuster trade goes down remains to be seen, but it will be interesting to see what happens if Melo and Kobe end up teaming up in Los Angeles.
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