Houston Rockets welcome Carmelo Anthony with billboard of him in No. 7 which ...
Carmelo Anthony was welcomed at Toyota Center in Houston on Wednesday with a billboard of him wearing a Rockets uniform. Inside the arena was a mural of Anthony holding the Larry O'Brien Trophy in a Rockets uniform with 'The Key to a championship formula,' written alongside him on the wall.
That's all standard operating procedure for teams recruiting prized free agents. But what made this billboard interesting is that Anthony was wearing a No. 7 jersey, which currently belongs to his former Knicks teammate Jeremy Lin.
And it's not just that Lin, who had his breakout moment three seasons ago with the Knicks, would need to be traded in order for Houston to add the cap space to sign Anthony. But the perception was that Anthony was partly responsible for running Lin out of town when the Knicks failed to match the contract offer Houston gave the then restricted free agent.
Lin flourished in Mike D'Antoni's point guard-dominant system while Anthony felt he didn't get the ball enough. Anthony would later deny having any influence in James Dolan's decision not to match the offer to Lin. That ensuing season Anthony finished third overall in MVP voting while leading the Knicks to 54 regular season wins.
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