Carmelo Trade Good For Denver

Personally I think the Nuggets did great with what they got with Carmelo. Every one and their sister knew he wasn't coming back, so their hand was forced and they had to get something for him, or risk pulling a "Cleveland" over the summer.

They did well playing off the Knicks, Nets and whoever else they could interest in trade talk even though it was pretty obvious he was going to NY whether now in a trade or this summer as a free agent.

Do you think Cleveland (and probably to a lesser extent Toronto) management is sitting there going "damn" in seeing what Denver was able to pull off? I'll bet Cleveland wishes they'd pulled the trigger last summer and jettisoned LeBron knowing what they know now.

What was Denver able to get? Wilson Chandler, Danilo Gallinari, Raymond Felton, Timofey Mozgoz, 1st round pick, 2 2nd round picks and $3 million in cash. Just as importantly, they were able to send back some players with contracts they didn't want, so they've freed up their salary cap in order to bring in other players. Will they keep all those players they got in return? Probably not, there's already rumors Denver is looking to move Gallinari and Mozgoz, so they're not done dealing yet.

Is Denver a "better team" right now without Carmelo? No, but they've freed up their cap space and are now able to go into free agency and sign some players. Carmelo had been with Denver for 7 years and in that time, they'd made it out of the first round exactly once so this wasn't some perennial championship team they disassembled here.

Tough getting rid of a star player, but I think Denver did a great job getting something in return.

Bill