Portland Trail Blazers point guard Damian Lillard threw a wrench in discussions of potential trades by the New York Knicks, when he and backcourt mate C.J. McCollum pitched star forward Carmelo Anthony into playing for the Blazers.
While the two seemed optimistic about it at first, the feeling was quickly taken away when Melo announced he wouldn't drop his no-trade clause for no other team but the Houston Rockets.
“I didn’t want to press him,” Lillard told Marc J. Spears of The Undefeated regarding Anthony. “I ain’t a big fan of doing all the extra recruiting and all that stuff. And I guess they call it tampering or whatever. It’s not against the rules for us to interact with each other. We all peers, we all play in the same league and everybody hints at playing with each other. ‘What you think about this?’ ‘What do you think about that?’ All that matters is whether it got done or did not get done. Or hasn’t got done, and it hasn’t got done. So, it is what it is…”
Lillard and McCollum eventually faded out in Anthony's pursuit, as the summer took a more silent turn following a myriad of transactions in the first month of free agency.
“I’m not giving up on anything,” Lillard interjected. “I just think I’ve done what I can do. And camp is a few weeks away. And you have to focus on getting ready with who we are, plan on going in as we are. Whatever changes, the front office will be the ones making that change, with the Knicks and our front office or whatever. But I get my mind focused on what I can control at a certain point.”
While it's tough to imagine a 1-2-3 punch that can hold together with the amount of money the Blazers front office has had to shed this summer; it looks more likely that Anthony will enter camp as a Knickerbocker and have to swallow his wishes to seek an exit out of New York for some time.
Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum will enter this season with their hands tied after no major acquisitions were made in the offseason other than drafting rookie center Zach Collins.
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