Carmelo Anthony and Stephen Curry on the same team sounds like a what-if that could blend timelines. Just imagine: Melo and Steph sharing the floor at Madison Square Garden, rewriting modern basketball history under the brightest lights basketball has to offer. On paper, it sounds like a match made in heaven: two offensive juggernauts, a hungry franchise, and a city obsessed with basketball.

Unfortunately, this never happened, but it doesn’t stop us, or in this case, Anthony himself, from coming up with hypotheticals. In a recent moment on his 7PM in Brooklyn podcast, he was asked what would happen if Curry was drafted by the Knicks in 2009, and he said:

“They have their corner piece of the organization. But mind you, nobody knew Steph was going to be this Steph. Everybody was counting him out.”

Anthony’s not wrong; in his first few years in the league, Curry was hampered by ankle injuries, something that caused him to miss almost an entire year in 2011-12. Back then, relying on Curry was a medical gamble, and a big market like New York has never been known for patience in development.

However, Anthony still considers the alternate-reality idea anyway, and here’s what his cohosts posed: Him, JR Smith, Amar’e Stoudemire, Curry on his rookie deal, all headed by Donnie Walsh, the same president of basketball operations that landed both Stoudemire and Anthony. Could this combination of talent bring a championship to New York?

“We winning the championship with Donnie Walsh,” Anthony said, specifying Walsh, given his disdain for the most well known of Walsh’s successors, Phil Jackson. “Donnie probably wanted Steph in ’09.”

This is a well known fact: Stephen Curry’s father Dell wanted him to go the the New York Knicks, who held the 8th pick in the Draft, but the son was instead taken by the Golden State Warriors with the 7th pick. This was primarily due to the sharpshooter’s fit with head coach Mike D’Antoni’s system, which relied heavily upon shooting and playing fast.

Unfortunately, we never got to see this pairing on the court, so we’ll never know how things would’ve turned out.

Fans Believe a Stephen Curry-Carmelo Anthony Pairing Was Doomed

Social media erupted the moment Carmelo Anthony’s clip hit timelines, and many fans fired back at Anthony’s claims. One fan commented, “Would you have passed the ball 😭,” joking about Melo’s well-known ball-stopping tendencies, as well as a lack of playmaking ability.

During his Knicks tenure, he averaged just 3.2 assists on nearly 20 shot attempts per game, something that would’ve clashed with Curry’s off-ball movement, the skill that makes his current playing style work. No matter how talented, the dynamics would’ve been awkward at best.

Many pointed to how different the Knicks’ environment in the early 2010s was compared to Golden State, with one post reading, “I don’t think he would have let Steph be Steph.”

New York wasn’t known for long-term vision or patience, and the environment with the Warriors let Curry develop freely. Without a system like Warriors head coach Steve Kerr’s motion-heavy offense, fans argued that Curry would’ve been forced into a more traditional, on-ball point guard role, which would limit his greatness.

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Others reminded Anthony that the window would’ve been brutal anyways.

“Prime LeBron existed son,” one viewer wrote.

They indicated that even if the Knicks clicked, they’d have to face the Miami Heat dynasty in the Eastern Conference, and that’s without even mentioning the Indiana Pacers squads in 2012 and 2013. Curry, through his first four years, was not going to be able to keep up with prime LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh.

Some reactions were much deeper than the basketball fit, and more about personality clashes.

“This n—- was mad when J.Lin got sum shine…. Steph would have broke him 🤣🤣,” one observer noted, referencing the rise of Jeremy Lin during Linsanity, with one of the most prominent rumors being that Anthony forced Lin out of New York to the Houston Rockets.

But the most brutal alternate reality theory summed up yet another reason why fans think the entire conversation is pointless anyways.

One fan wrote, “In that alternate reality, Melo still forces the trade anyway, Steph would’ve been packed up to Denver.”

It’s a reminder that Anthony didn’t head to the Knicks in free agency, but as a trade: one that left the team bereft of valuable assets, both in terms of draft capital and young players. In this case, the user suggests that, when Melo forces a trade from the Denver Nuggets, Curry would  likely be asked for in return, given his status as a promising youngster.

It’s this perspective that fans believe would prevent Steph from ever becoming the Stephen Curry we all know today.