The NBA trade deadline always brings up rumors from the media and fans about what teams will do, but what if one of the rumors was completely made up? Denver Nuggets coach George Karl admitted to doing just that in the past, hoping to fool the media into reporting on it.
According to Yahoo Sports, Jodie Valade for The Cleveland Plain-Dealer writes that Karl once tried to make up a trade rumor to see if it would end up in the newspapers. Karl said he had a contest with coaching pals about it but he hadn't pulled anything of the sort in "7-8 years," but it's something the media should consider when reporting on trade rumors.
"We make up some trade that never was proposed in 100 years and suddenly it's on ESPN," he said, smiling.
Karl took over the Nuggets in 2005 and over the years many trades and rumors have went down on the team, including the deal that sent Carmelo Anthony to the Knicks. Some other players that were traded or talked about included Marcus Camby, Andre Miller and Kenyon Martin among many more.
The Nuggets have gone 33-19 this year and have been one of the most surprising teams in the NBA. The team is second in the Northwest division behind Oklahoma City and are ranked first in the league in rebounding and third in scoring, averaging over 100 points per game. The team also is ranked second in assists, but the defense has been lacking, ranked 25th in points allowed.