Carmelo Anthony is feeling good where he is, in the crisp, clean Rocky Mountain Air. After reaching the NBA West Finals, do the Nuggets have a chance at the ultimate prize?
Melo is happy to have signed a longer contract. He is the only one of the his high-profile draft brethren to do so as LeBron, Wade, and Bosh are all waiting for 2010 free agency. As Yahoo! Sports reports, it made a lot of sense for Carmelo at the time:
Given Anthony’s poor upbringing in Baltimore, his mother, Mary, told her son she didn’t like the idea of leaving nearly $36 million on the table by opting for a shorter contract. Anthony listened and agreed to a four-year deal with an option for a fifth season that totaled $80 million, allowing him to possibly put off free agency until 2012.
Now you’ve got Melo and a stable situation: a top-tier leader at point guard in Chauncey Billups, a somewhat vindicated George Karl at coach, and successful rehabs/rejuvenations/reincarnations Kenyon Martin, Nene Hilario, and Chris Anderson. Factor in a more mature J.R. Smith (he says jail changed him) and you have a pretty solid staring rotation. Anthony must also know that success begets success. Getting to the Western Conference Finals should add confidence to this crew.
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How quickly the mighty have fallen. Like the auto companies, Detroit Pistons basketball has gone from a model of efficiency to a barren wasteland. The exodus of aging stars will help their salary cap, but new additions Ben Gordon & Charlie Villanueva will not add wins.
Remember when you could write-in the Detroit Pistons to the Eastern Conference Finals? That was just a few short years back. The nucleus of Chauncey Billups, Rip Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, Rasheed Wallace, and Antonio McDyees (and one-time All-Star Ben Wallace) made the rough-and-tough Pistons a force in the East. But now, the team has gone in a different direction.
Ben Wallace didn’t feel the love and left for Chicago in 2006. The Pistons held it together as guys like McDyees & Jason Maxiell stepped it up. But desperation (and the beginning of a rebuilding effort) was apparent when team president, Joe Dumars, traded Chauncey Billups for Allen Iverson. The move was “supposed” to be for salary cap purposes. Iverson would hang for a year, then be released to free up cap-space for the 2010 bonanza. The unintended effect was that Chauncey was the glue that held the Piston’s ship together. Iverson was an unmitigated disaster and Chauncey spearheaded a revival in Denver.
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