People are wondering who leaked to ESPN that the Miami Heat are looking to sign Carmelo Anthony in offseason and to keep LeBron, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh. My guess? None other than Heat president Pat Riley.
Who could have plotted a more Machelivian way to jam up the narrative going into a crucial Game 4 than Riles, the Godfather?
I have no doubt the Heat are seriously considering trying to recruit Melo. They pulled off their coup in 2010 by selling LeBron, Wade, and Bosh on the idea that they were in the empire business. You don’t get three of the top 15 players in the league to take pay cuts if your long term plan goes only as far as until their opt-out clause kick in. Whether it was going to be Melo or Chris Paul, the Heat had to have had their sights on 2014 back in 2010.
That being said, signing Melo doesn’t satisfy any of Miami’s shortcomings. I play better defense than Carmelo Anthony and Melo has yet to show that he can play without having the ball glued in his hands at all times. But Miami’s already won two titles without a point guard and post defender.
SBNation did a solid job listing the repercussions for the league if the Heat are able to add to their riches. The collective bargaining agreement that locked the players out for nearly two months in 2011 was designed specifically to prevent another instance of Avengers assembling. Miami keeping their Big Three and adding Melo would be like using a Gameshark on your team’s Franchise mode. You can’t even pull that kind of roster off in a video game.
That same CBA was also put in place to protect the owners from screwing up the market by giving "meh" players elite talent money. Apparently the owners need to protect themselves from overspending on their own front offices, as the Knicks are spending $17 million next year on Phil Jackson and Derek Fisher despite the distinct possibility their only good player will peace out in the offseason.
You haven’t seen $85 million wasted this fast since the 2012 presidential campaign.
The sexiest subplot to this whole episode remains in the front office. Pat Riley and Phil Jackson have had bloodfeud going on five decades and for Riles to poach away Jackson’s only asset would be the most epic of F-Us.
Even if this story is a super-sized nothing burger and the Knicks end up retaining Carmelo, Riles just made Jackson’s life miserable for 11 days. On top of tripping up his rival, Riley has the media busy crunching numbers to see how Miami could pay their Big Four and distracted attention from the possibility of Miami staring at a 3-1 series hole in eight hours.
That begs the question: what does the Godfather have up his sleeve in case that happens?