NBA epic: Between fantasy and reality, Carmelo Anthony's lonely face is reflected

The Nuggets' front office, rattled by the fading of its star, the 40-year-old frustration in the eyes of a 20-year-old, held an overnight meeting to discuss how to help Carmelo Anthony, the apple of our eye, break through the postseason.

So Iverson, with his furrows, left, and Billups, with his horse face and bald head, arrived.

One of the first things Billups did when he arrived was to find Anthony at the team's first practice. He looked into Anthony's eyes, into the mind of a gifted young man trapped in the fog of life, and offered a word of advice from his soul:

"Don't just try to cheer yourself up. You don't make this team."

Who would have thought that this sentence would become the root of Anthony's illness, or destiny.

Anthony didn't see it that way. Looking at the ring-wielding veteran, Anthony quickly understood the message and decided to take a chance on a championship ring. It couldn't get any worse than a first-round game.

In 2008-09, Anthony cut back on his shooting, dropping to 22.8 points per game and 44.3 percent shooting. That kind of loss of production would be hard for 80 percent of the players in this league to accept, and so would Anthony, but he soon saw the difference.

54 wins, the second-best record in the Western Conference; The first round will have Yao wheat combination of rockets out, broke the first round of the magic spell; The second wheel stopped the rolling wheels of the German chariots, and cut off the calf of the southwest.

This try, try into the Western Conference Finals.

Although he didn't make it to the Western Conference Finals, the trip was worth six games against the NBA champion Lakers. Anthony left the game with his head held high, his heart overflowing with confidence and contentment that he had not seen in a long time. He felt great excitement.

Billups walked over to Anthony, tapped him on the shoulder and told him, "Keep it up next season. We're going to get something."

But the desire and flair for offense are already etched into Anthony's bones, and he can only feel his impact and presence by scoring with explosive power.

In 2009-10, Anthony returned to his old style of play, asking for the ball, shooting, and scoring. Broke his own scoring record with 50 points in a game, was named an All-Star starter, and hit a game-winning shot on Feb. 19, 2010, breaking his opponent's 13-game winning streak.

The credit goes back to Anthony, who was one of the best in the league at one point, and this is a year of opportunity for the Nuggets and Melo.

But George Karl's surgery for throat cancer disrupted the Nuggets' plans, and the defensive intensity of Anthony and his post players gave Millsap too much room to play.

Anthony, who was in the Western Conference Finals last season, is out in the first round again this season.

It wasn't just the cascading drop that upset Anthony, it was the dramatic change that took the world by storm that summer, when old rival lebron joined forces with Dragon King Chris Bosh and Flash Dwyane Wade on the sunlit South Shore, looking like a new world king.

As Anthony was pacing restlessly around the room, the phone on his desk rang. An unknown number, Anthony impatiently picked up the phone, a man's voice on the other end of the line:

"Hey, Cameron, I think you saw lebron's decision. This is New York. Want to go home?"

"Home", a word that many wanderers dream of, opened Anthony's mind's Pandora's box, and one treasure after another was presented to him: high exposure, home, big contract, cosmopolitan city. Anthony's heart was quickly moved, and it was not difficult for him to choose.

The Nuggets wanted to make a last stand, and after laying out countless options that didn't work, they decided to use their final weapon: Do you really want to be here, in the city you've been in for so many years, and the fans in this city who cheer for you come rain or shine?

Anthony smiled, unable to tell whether it was a helpless smile or a soft one. The only thing that was clear was that New York had become an indelible attraction and an outsize leverage.

The Nuggets management saw something, and like Anthony, they shook their heads and let out a deep sigh.

The Knicks acquired Carmelo Anthony from the Nuggets in a half-team deal that, along with Stoudemire, gives the Knicks a shot at the Eastern Conference's Iron throne against Miami's unrivaled Big Three.

Instead, the Knicks didn't make the big splash in the Eastern Conference that they expected. Anthony and Ambrose combined for just 42 wins in their first season together, as Ambrose and Anthony struggled with injuries. And D 'Antoni and Anthony, two men with such similar names, have opened a rift, and the Knicks are on the line.

Jeremy Lin stepped up and pulled the Knicks back from the mire with seven near-miraculous games and seven carries.

Point guard-loving Mike D 'Antoni found a winning formula and decided to put the REINS in Lin's hands.

Once again, Anthony was confused when he was the sharpest knife in the league, an inborn offensive kaleidoscope, an all-star a team would have traded for half a team. D 'Antoni is putting his core in the hands of that Asian guard for just seven games? It's the most slippery thing in the world.

Ridiculous, and the more ridiculous it became, the cracks between Anthony and D 'Antoni began to grow, and it quickly became an "I don't have you" situation.

In this game, the Knicks chose Anthony. Soon after, D 'Antoni was fired and Jeremy Lin left the Knicks when free agency opened this offseason.

Carmelo Anthony was relieved that he was finally the absolute core of the team, free to play like he did in Denver.

On a certain night, Anthony was thinking about how he and lebron played differently. He wanted to connect the team and be a playmaker, but passing the ball wasn't nearly as fulfilling and enjoyable as taking a step and pulling it out.

With three consecutive 40-point games and 28.7 points per game, the offensive phenom won the scoring title for the first time, becoming the Knicks' second leading scorer since Bernard King.

The breakthrough in glory did not lead to the breakthrough in results, and after a 54-win season, the Knicks hit rock bottom in an instant. Ambrose's unhealed injury has been the Knicks' Achilles' heel, and although Anthony broke his own record this season with 62 points per game and averaged 27.4 points per game, it's hard to hide the shame of 33 wins.

Anthony is on the move for the second time. He met with teams this offseason, from the East to the West, from Chicago to Dallas, and the 29-year-old remains the league's most popular player, the go-to scorer.

Unlike the Nuggets, the deep-pocketed Knicks didn't let Anthony slip away, offering him a five-year, $124 million Max contract. Anthony, who wandered around, chose to stay put.

In addition, Phil Jackson arrived in New York, determined to help the Knicks and Carmelo Anthony and bolster his already stellar resume along the way.

The triangle offense, the weapon that helped Bryant and Ganda win the trophy twice, was the key to saving the Knicks.

Phil Jackson is confident in the offensive system that made him famous.

However, as strong as that confidence is, the Knicks' record has been disastrous. With a dysfunctional system and injuries knocking on the door for Anthony to leave, the Knicks plummeted in 2014-15, finishing the season with just 14 wins.

In 2015-16, Anthony returned full of blood, but the system's forced transplant had crippled the team, 33 wins, still the bottom of the Eastern Conference, the Knicks gradually became the joke of the league.

Anthony doesn't care. As long as I'm scoring, there's hope for the team. But he soon found out that the legacy of his injuries was bigger than he had imagined, and he went from being a comfortable 25-plus-plus player to a barely scraping 20-plus-plus player, a change that only he could tell, and Anthony was flustered for the first time.

The Knicks could not stand the prospect of a lackluster future, and decided to completely rebuild, and Anthony became a major concern. Given Anthony's strength and age, the Knicks decided to send him to a team with championship prospects, Melo's day came.

On September 24, 2017, the Knicks traded Carmelo Anthony to the Oklahoma City Thunder, causing a stir in the league.

Melo, who came to OKC, lowered his profile and shot his shots just to get to the next level again. Averaging around 15 shots per game, but struggling with injuries and age and shooting just 40 percent from the field, Melo felt like scoring for the first time.

But what Anthony didn't consider, injuries and age aside, was that the wheels of history were rolling in front of him. In an era where teams don't have the time or space to give stars more than a dozen seconds of individual play, Anthony's style of play will eventually be eliminated from the league if it can't be transformed.

The Thunder were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs, the media began to study everyone on this team, and then they decided to put the blame on Anthony.

The world is more sad than this, in the glory of the full of friends, lonely times, people are separated, perhaps not such an exaggeration, but the media criticism really fell on Anthony.

Everyone knows he's not the reason the team went out of business, but it's hard to find a better person to blame than Anthony.

After all, he hasn't really been successful in the playoffs in a long, long time.

On July 20, 2018, Anthony was traded by the Thunder to the Hawks. Ten days later, the Hawks reached a buyout agreement with Anthony, making him a free agent.

On Aug. 14, 2018, the Rockets reached out to Anthony with Harden, the league's leading point guard, and Paul, a Banana Boat buddy, and the Rockets desperately needed to break the Warriors' grip. Hit it off and Anthony donned the red jersey of Space City.

This time, Anthony has been the scapegoat again after just 10 games, averaging 13 points per game to prove the former scoring champion's strength, but Houston's injuries have pushed Melo into the starting lineup and into the spotlight.

Anthony still scored 28 points on 12 shots in his last few games with the Rockets, but the criticism has grown accustomed to Anthony and Melo is full of blame.

I will see him build, I will see him feast, I will see him collapse. Anthony's pride and pride could not bear the ordeal, and he was a little lost.

On January 22, 2019, Carmelo Anthony was traded from the Rockets to the Bulls. On Feb. 2, Anthony was cut by the Bulls. He never appeared in the NBA again.

Anthony's resume -- 10 All-Star games, four triples, two dubs, one scoring title and three Olympic gold MEDALS -- is impressive enough, but it doesn't seem to be anything compared to Anthony's strength and fame.

Oh, yes, a championship ring.

Anthony has had plenty of good chances, too, only to fall on hard times. He's an offensive genius, but he hasn't been productive; He had good teammates, such as Chauncey Billups, but his form slumped in the second year after the Western Conference Finals.

In the end, it was Anthony who stood up and put the team on his shoulders. But just a person, how can resist the heavy fate, and how contemporary change with each passing day to contend.

Anthony was lonely. His retro style of play brought him glory and defeat. Sometimes it's a fine line between reality and fantasy.

From his couch, Anthony still watches NBA games and follows his friends' teams, but there's no going back to the days of dreadlocks and flying around the hoop.

That can look back, floating life suddenly like a dream.