NBA Rumors: Banana Boat Buddies Almost Reunited In Cleveland Says Perkins

Carmelo Anthony is still waiting for a call as the 2019-20 NBA season nears. No team has come close to striking a deal with the 35-year-old forward although some believe he may end up with Banana Boat buddy LeBron James in Hollywood.

Seeing how the Lakers are now focusing on getting a big man, adding Anthony to the Lakers roster seems nil. That is unless Los Angeles cuts someone from the current lineup to make room for the scoring forward. As of this writing, nothing has come close to that.

Ironically, this would not be the first time that Anthony was linked to James. Thanks to former Cleveland Cavaliers teammate Kendrick Perkins, a new expose reveals how the three-time NBA champion wanted the Cavs to trade for Anthony. In a tweet, Perkins mentioned how James wanted Melo but the Cavs said no to him.

What is unclear is when this happened. But NBC Sports speculates that this may have occurred somewhere between 2015 and 2017. It was in 2017 where the third overall pick of the 2003 NBA Draft requested a trade from the New York Knicks. He ended up with the Oklahoma City Thunder instead.

During that span, there are a lot of things to digest. One is that had James known that Anthony wanted a trade, the King could have sent feelers to get him to Cleveland. This was about the time before the Cavs landed Kevin Love from the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Had that trade been done, Anthony would have probably savored the sweet success of winning an NBA title in 2016. James, Love and Kyrie Irving were the big three for the Cavs that year before things fell apart the year after. Seeing how the 10-time All-Star has been criticized for sharing the ball, one can just imagine if he would have fit into the Cavs system.

Regardless, all of that is water under the bridge. James is helpless right now trying to get Anthony to the Lakers fold unless something is tweaked for the coming season. All Anthony can do right now is wait for a call. Fellow players feel he can still be of use to other NBA teams but somehow, no ballclub is willing to take that risk.