Idle Trade Talk

It appears as if there's a holiday and tragedy time out being called by Denver on any trade talks involving Carmelo Anthony.  The inevitable trade of Anthony somewhere is a grueling exercise.

Anthony appears to want to play for the Knicks but the unexpected success of the Knicks make a trade increasingly unlikely.  The fact of the matter is that many of the early season trade candidates are becoming stars before our eyes.

Wilson Chandler, Landry Fields, Ronnie Turiaf, and Toney Douglas are all players whose market value has soared.  They used to be talked about as throw ins in trade speculation.

It is hard to imagine Fields being traded under any circumstance this year.  And Turiaf and Douglas won't be traded as contract filler.

As a result my opinion has long been that any Carmelo Anthony trade with Denver will be a mixture of acquiring Anthony and someone else on Denver's roster who is an expensive contract whose exit will yield some financial relief for Denver in addition to some nice players.

JR Smith is the most likely candidate.  Billups, Nene, and KMart are all nearly impossible to package to the Knicks.  And such a trade would signal a desire on Donnie Walsh's part to contend this year before Miami establishes a footprint in the playoffs.

Any deal that involves a second contract will inevitably require either Turiaf or Mosgov's contract being included.  This makes the signing of Earl Barron a reasonable priority going into the trading season.