(courtesy of Doug Pensinger/Getty Images North America)
In what has taken half of the NBA season, Carmelo Anthony finally got traded to the New York Knicks. Joining ‘Melo are Chauncey Billups, Shelden Williams, and Renaldo Balkman in exchange for Danilo Gallinari, Raymond Felton Wilson Chandler, the Knicks’ 2014 first-round pick, two second-round picks New York acquired from the Golden State Warriors in the David Lee sign-and-trade and $3 million as well as Russian center Timofey Mozgov. Despite only averaging 4.0 points a game with a whopping 3.1 rebounds the 24-year-old St. Petersburg native had a breakout game in later January where he scored a career high 23 points and picked up 14 boards.
Multiple sources reported that Mozgov was the final piece in the trade puzzle with many speculating the rookie might be dealt to New Jersey before all is said and done with the NBA trade deadline looming on Thursday. Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov met with Anthony over the weekend despite publicly pulling out of contention last month. Even with the assistance of Jay-Z, the two could not sway the highly coveted soon-to-be free agent to sign an extension with the Nets to be the star of the Brooklyn bound franchise.
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