Getty Carmelo Anthony
Earlier this summer, NBA trainer, Chris Brickley appeared on Power 105’s The Breakfast Club and detailed that Carmelo Anthony wants a farewell tour similar to Miami Heat point guard, Dwyane Wade.
“He’s easily better than 60 percent, 70 percent of the NBA players walking around,” he told the show’s hosts, DJ Envy and Angela Yee.
“It’s just that teams are afraid of ‘I want to be a starter.’ It’s not the case. Melo just wants to have a farewell season, do what D-Wade did. Have a jersey swap. He had a great career, he’s a Hall of Famer. So hopefully that could happen.”
When asked by DJ Envy if Carmelo Anthony could start on an NBA team, Brickley spoke his truth: “Yes,” he said.
“If given the [right] situation.”
Carmelo Anthony hasn’t played NBA basketball since November 8, 2018, in a game against his former team, the Oklahoma City Thunder.
A 10-time NBA All-Star, Anthony signed with the Houston Rockets this summer after clearing waivers in a trade that shipped him from the Thunder to the Atlanta Hawks.
Appearing on Thursday’s episode of The Breakfast Club, Stephen A. Smith weighed in on the matter!
“Alright, you wanna honor him with the Knicks,” he asked.
“Fine! You wanna honor him with the Denver Nuggets? Fine! But that damn national tour throughout the NBA? No. That should be reserved for champions.”
Anthony has averaged 24.0 points, 6.5 rebounds and 3.0 assists in his 16-year career with the Oklahoma City Thunder, New York Knicks, Denver Nuggets and Houston Rockets.
No team has signed him to a deal with training camp about three weeks away.
What’s next?
In an interview with Taryn Finley of the Huffington Post, Melo suggested that he is at peace with the fact he may not play much longer. “I’m sure [retirement is] coming soon,” he said.
“I’d be sitting lying to you if I said it’s not coming soon. I think I want it to come soon. I don’t think I want to do this forever, but because you love it so much, it’s hard to give it up. At the end of the day, at anything you do, when it’s your time to go, it’s your time to go. But as long as you feel good with that.”
“He’s a great player,” New York Knick, Lance Thomas told me in December.
“He’s a great teammate, most importantly he’s a great human being and he’s always been a great advocate for the NBA as a brand. So I just want him to get back on a team and play the sport he loves that’s paved a way for him and his family, and he just loves to play basketball, so I really want him back on a team.”
“His first year in the league, he took a 17-win Nuggets team to the Playoffs in the West as a rookie,” said Fox Sports’ Chris Broussard.
“He is one of the best 300 players in the world that’s not playing,” TNT’s Kenny Smith told me in April.
“You can’t say he’s not one of the best 300 players.”
Dwyane Wade wants Melo to latch on with a team.
And that place is?
“The place that wants him,” Wade told me.
“The place that’s going to allow him to be Melo and understand that he still can play the game of basketball.”