Not all games of chicken are made equal. The Denver Nuggets may have a decent vehicle in the contest they’ve got going with Carmelo Anthony, but the New York Knicks just inadvertently threw a wrench into the engine by becoming a good team.
Now that the Knicks are relevant again, of course Anthony wants New York or bust — as has been reported by ESPN. But the tradeoff is that the urgency to bring him to the Big Apple has taken a hit. The competitive Knicks won’t gut their roster, making the Nuggets’ task of getting what they want in return for trading Melo to Manhattan — before he moves for nothing in free agency next summer — that much harder.
Of course, Denver hasn’t lost all of its leverage. Melo needs to sign the Nuggets’ offered $65 million extension unless he’s willing to risk guaranteed cash.
If he doesn’t sign, the Nuggets could still trade him to another team (New Jersey? Charlotte?), and their deadline date is June 30, not the Feb. 24 preferred by the Knicks, who want to dump Eddy Curry and know they need Melo to make the leap from playoff-bound to title contender.
