Carmelo Anthony’s departure from the New York Knicks wasn’t exactly done under the best of circumstances. Anthony and then-Knicks boss Phil Jackson butted heads, and Jackson seemed quite eager to get his then-star out of town. Eventually, a deal was reached, and Anthony was traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder for Enes Kanter, Doug McDermott, and a second-round draft pick.
A whole lot has happened in the years since — Anthony moved around a bunch, Jackson lost his job, and the Knicks have gone through a few overhauls, the most recent of which saw longtime agent Leon Rose become the team’s president. With Rose at the helm, the Knicks have been linked to a number of big names, including a handful of Rose’s former clients.
One such name is Chris Paul, and according to Marc Berman of the New York Post, the possibility exists that the Knicks would receive a whole lot of interest, should that happen, from Anthony, one of his pals and another ex-Rose player.
However, if point guard Chris Paul makes his way to the Knicks via a trade, sources have said Anthony is likely to want to follow. Anthony and Paul are close friends who dreamed of playing together in the NBA and saw their alliance in Houston end prematurely.
Apparently, the Knicks would be “amenable to an Anthony return even without Paul,” per Berman. How a Paul trade would work is unclear, if only because Oklahoma City’s priorities are unknown and they don’t exactly need gobs of draft capital after the Paul George and Russell Westbrook trades. Still, if the Thunder want to embrace a full-blown youth movement, they can certainly get a whole lot for Paul.
As for Anthony, he is an unrestricted free agent, and while he’s no longer the sure-fire All-Star he was during his heyday, he had his moments alongside Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum as a member of the Portland Trail Blazers. At the very least, whenever fans are allowed back in arenas during the 2020-21 season, we’re sure the Madison Square Garden would love to watch Melo suit up for the Knicks again.