Carmelo Anthony guarantees Thunder will be in playoffs
By Dave Daniels
Carmelo Anthony is making a guarantee to the fans in Oklahoma City.
When Carmelo Anthony waived his no-trade clause and agreed to consider the Oklahoma City Thunder as a destination, it was because he knew the team had championship aspirations. He got asked whether the franchise will make the playoffs this week and had a passionate response.
"“We’ll be there. We’ll be there,” Anthony said to ESPN Wednesday. “I think we’re confident enough to know that we’ll be there. Where? We’ll see when that time comes, but I believe we’ll be there. It’s something we planned on doing when we put this team together. It’s something at the beginning of the season, this is what we were looking forward to. This is why we put this team together.”"
The Thunder are fourth in the standings at the moment, and it would take a colossal breakdown for them to miss out on the postseason. But maintaining a high seed means they can avoid the Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets in the first round.
The odd part about that is Stephen Curry’s knee issue. Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said recently that Curry will definitely miss the first round, and that is when Golden State will be most vulnerable. If the Thunder slip to seventh in the standings and face the Warriors in the first round, then that will be a blockbuster series.
Russell Westbrook, Paul George and Anthony, have taken more time than expected to build chemistry, but all of these guys have playoff experience. None of them has won a title, but the same could be said about Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett before they got it done together with the Boston Celtics.
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Anthony has now made the guarantee, and so we’ll see what this group can accomplish if they actually get there.