Boston Celtics center and Eastern Conference All-Star starter Kevin Garnett started his Saturday morning answering a slew of questions about whether he'd consider waiving his no-trade clause to head to the Los Angeles Clippers in a rumored deal for Eric Bledsoe and DeAndre Jordan before the Feb. 21 trade deadline. (The answer, according to Yahoo! Sports NBA columnist Marc J. Spears? A simple "No," followed by, "If it's up to me, I will live and die green.") So by the time he got to the East's practice, he was probably glad to be asked about anything else ... even if the "anything else" was, just three weeks ago, a question that was just as tiresome.
During the shootaround, TNT sideline reporter Craig Sager sidled up to New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony, who'll start alongside Garnett and the Miami Heat trio of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in Sunday's midseason classic, and asked him about whether the dust has truly settled between Anthony and Garnett. As you no doubt remember, the two stars were involved in a Jan. 7 on-court dust-up that wound up heading off-court, as Anthony and Garnett barked at one another by the Celtics' team bus in the bowels of Madison Square Garden. The transportation-adjacent kerfuffle wound up costing Anthony a one-game suspension, but in the aftermath, both Anthony and Garnett insisted there would be no bad blood between them going forward.
Still, with a captive NBA TV audience watching on Saturday, Sager had to ask.
"In the heat of the regular season, obviously, tempers fly and there's a lot of heated arguments," Sager said. "One time during the year, you and Kevin Garnett got into it. As his teammate right now, have you been sharing lockers, sharing stories, getting along with one another?"
Melo immediately turned to call Garnett over.
"I just want to make sure everything's cool with you guys," Sager told Garnett.
"C'mon, man. C'mon, man. C'mon, man," Garnett replied, taking a long hard look at Sager's predictably garish and colorful outfit. "You gonna come in here with that outfit on and ask that type of question."
As Anthony laughed and Garnett tried to walk away, Sager responded in kind.
"Speaking of outfits, why are you tucking in your pants [into your socks]?" he asked.
"Man, me tucking in socks is nothing compared to this right here," Garnett answered.
"What is this, aqua?" Anthony asked, touching Sager's jacket.
"Yeah, or turquoise," Sager responded.
"What was the influence today? What was your motivation for wearing this today?" Garnett asked.
"To wake up," Sager said, eliciting loud laughter from both Melo and KG.
"What kind of answer is that?" Garnett asked.
I'll answer: The perfect kind, KG. Coming from Craig Sager, it's the perfect kind of answer. We're sure Eastern Conference coach Erik Spoelstra is hoping that Garnett and Anthony show the same sort of rhythm and teamwork in attacking the West on Sunday as they showed in attacking Sager on Saturday. (They, and everyone else, will get another opportunity to crush Sager on Sunday — he told the Houston Chronicle's David Barron that his All-Star Game ensemble will be "reflecting" and feature crocodile-tail shoes.)
Video via Beyond the Buzzer.
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