Carmelo Anthony trade: ESPN's Jason Smith predicts Melo will be NY Knick before Christmas

Carmelo.

Last night's Nuggets victory over the New York Knicks gave reporters the opportunity to ask Carmelo Anthony about rumors that he'd soon be playing for the losing squad. He attempted to deflect speculation, but the responses he provided weren't especially convincing to Jason Smith, host of ESPN Radio's AllNight, who predicted that Melo will be in a Knicks uni before Christmas.

Smith made a compelling, common-sense case based on several post-game Anthony quotes -- particularly this one: ""I want to make my family happy. I want them to be comfortable, whether it's here or somewhere else. If your household ain't right, nothing is."

These comments seem to confirm that Carmelo's wife, reality-TV star and spotlight lover La La Vazquez, considers Denver to be a cow town and is pushing her hubby to relocate to a flashier locale. But rather than point the finger at La La, Smith took a more direct route to his conclusion.

After noting that people tend to over-complicate simple situations, he reminded listeners that Carmelo has had a $65 million, three-year contract extension awaiting his signature for months. If he was happy where he is, he would already have signed it, period, Smith argued -- so clearly, he wants to be somewhere else.

That's when Smith declared Anthony would be a New York Knick before Christmas, accompanying his soothsaying with his trademark duh-duh-DUH! musical sting.

Of course, a lot of us thought Melo would already be gone by now -- to the Knicks, to the New Jersey Nets, to somewhere other than Denver. We'll know soon enough if Smith's guess about a landing spot is accurate -- but his logic is impeccable.

More from our Sports archive: "La La Vazquez: Top 5 reasons she should stay in Denver (and convince Melo to stay, too)."