Considering how many methods of messaging there are these days, in addition to their split-second transmission, you’d think we’d be better informed. Instead, the preponderance of what’s dispersed is artificial chatter that clearly nobody is held accountable for because the next day new unsubstantiated rumors are circulated by hoopshype.com and other such feral sites.
I don’t believe anything I read. How could I when I scarcely believe half of what I write.
Don’t get me wrong; real reporters almost always break their news over the heart of the plate. Last week, ESPN’s Marc Stein scooped everyone on the NBA buying the Hornets. Last July, ESPN’s Chris Broussard scooped us all, including the TV segment of his nitwork, with the anonymously sourced word LeBron James had chosen Miami.
Broussard did a good job and I told him so. But what about his 20 or so colleagues whose educated speculation had LeBron staying in Cleveland, leaning toward New York, embracing Derrick Rose in Chicago, or falling under Jay-Z’s spell in New Jersey?
Naturally, ESPN took full credit for Broussard getting it right and ignored that its other correspondents had relied on imaginary or spurious sources . . . a concept that unfailingly works well.
No doubt the same fountains of misinformation that frequently play make-believe with ESPN’s Chris Sheridan, whose latest fairy tale had Carmelo Anthony notifying the Nuggets he won’t accept a trade to any team but the Knicks.
While I thoroughly accept the presupposition ‘Melo will want to play in New York until the moment he understands that’s an impossibility unless he opts to become a free agent this summer, Sheridan’s account is such a fake he needs to be called out.
Neither Anthony nor representative Leon Rose has demanded anything of the sort from the Nuggets, or anything at all, for that matter. It never happened!
And that’s not the only part of Sheridan’s yarn that never happened. For months he has claimed the Knicks and Nuggets have discussed various trades, recklessly throwing out the names of Danilo Gallinari, Landry Fields, Wilson Chandler and Anthony Randolph, while pretending Denver may be interested in Eddy Curry’s expiring contract and that New York owns the extraneous wherewithal to acquire a No. 1 pick from a third team to include it in the package.
Sheer nonsense! Every last word!
Which is exactly what a multitude of Knicks fans who’ve weighed in on the hypersensitive subject want to hear.
“Don’t misunderstand, I dig Mr. Anthony’s talents as a scorer,” underlines column contributor Chip Stern. “But, to me, this obsession with big, silicone-stuffed STARS, at the expense of the camaraderie and chemistry we have established, is GROTESQUE.”
With all due respect to the players the Knicks might be prepared to offer, there have been no offers or negotiations because the Nuggets are not interested in the players who’d be available; they already have those positions covered and thus must rebuild their core through the draft should they trade Melo.
My decaying instincts are alerting me that due date is gonna dawn far sooner than the Feb. 24 trade deadline, before the new year, possibly prior to Christmas.
Sure, there’s still a chance Melo will accept the Nuggets’ 3-year, nearly $65 million extension. But what’s going to change over the next few months that’ll influence him to sign something that’s been collecting dust on his desk since last June?
True, ‘Melo might be waiting on rehabilitating Kenyon Martin to fortify the frontline.
More likely, the Nuggets are waiting for the Nets (the Bulls’ aversion to surrendering Joakim Noah seemingly eliminates them as a sincere suitor) to strengthen their original proposal of Derrick Favors and a pair of first-rounders.
Devin Harris was in the packet as well but would have wound up elsewhere since Denver (temporarily) has Chauncey Billups — and Ty Lawson already may be his equal.
Even Sheridan’s invented informants, I suspect, might be able to smell the aroma of a potential Nets deal brewing once Wednesday rolls around and summer free-agent signees are allowed to be traded.
The idea is to upgrade their proposition to a plateau the Nuggets can reasonably justify putting their arms around and marketing to their fans and media.
But before that can officially go down the Nets’ Russian and rap congregation must figure out how to further the fervent recruiting pitch that left LeBron limp.
Editor’s Note: In his column of December 14, 2010, “Knicks Don’t Have Best Shot at ‘Melo”, Peter Vecsey commented on the Dec. 12, 2010 report by Chris Sheridan, at the time a reporter for ESPN.com, that Carmelo Anthony had told the Denver Nuggets that if he was traded, he would only sign a maximum contract extension to the New York Knicks. In strong language, Vecsey expressed his skepticism about the condition but did not intend to suggest and did not suggest that Sheridan had fabricated his story. A lawsuit brought by Sheridan has been settled to the parties’ mutual satisfaction.