Shading Carmelo Anthony for Having Big Ego, 73YO Enemy Calls It Unfair Comparison to Ex-Nuggets Star

George Karl and Carmelo Anthony have publicly called each other out a few times, even though they were part of the same franchise at one point. Both Karl and Anthony were at the Denver Nuggets from 2005 to 2011. The pair have had their fair share of drama over the years, and it seems like it continues.

The former NBA coach recently posted on X and expressed one of his regrets. Karl admitted that since he is 30 years older than Anthony, his ego should have been much smaller when the duo was on the Nuggets roster. According to Karl, ego “evolves” as people age.

It certainly looks like the American coach is regretting how his time went with ‘Melo’ back in the day when he joined the Colorado-based franchise. Karl took over at the Nuggets in January 2005, after Michael Cooper. He made an instant impact, leading the team to the playoffs after a disappointing first few months in the regular season.

Despite being diagnosed with prostate cancer, Karl continued as the Nuggets’ head coach and even led them to a Western Conference title in mid-2005. Carmelo Anthony was one of the Nuggets’ leaders back then, instantly becoming a fan favorite. Despite forming a solid duo with Karl, Anthony could not always see eye-to-eye with his coach.

The public feud between Carmelo Anthony and George Karl

The Nuggets icon called out his former coach publicly, much to the surprise of the Nuggets fan. It is not every day that we see a player criticize a coach who helped put him on the radar.

“He got the job a couple days before we played Milwaukee Bucks so the whole thing was I’m not coaching no game. My first game I want to be against the Milwaukee Bucks…I really don’t know the game when he came to the team. I’m 21 now. All I know is I got a big-name coach coming. George Karl coached Milwaukee, coached Seattle…you know all of that. We get to Milwaukee after shoot around [he] called me to his room and he tells me, hey man I think you [are] overrated,” Anthony revealed on the ‘7PM in Brooklyn’ podcast.

Karl didn’t respond to Anthony’s claims right away. But the two have been going back and forth on the public forum for a while, and it dates back to Karl’s memoir by David Marchese of The Intelligencer, published in 2016. That was when Karl stated that things that happened off the court were more important for Anthony than what went on the court.

The player requested a trade during the 2010-2011 NBA season, a decision that Karl criticized in January 2024 as well. He did offer to squash the beef in February, and his recent tweet indicates that he regrets the infamous history with Carmelo Anthony.

Stay tuned for more such updates, and to follow what Shaq’s ex-agent, Leonard Armato, has to say about the infamous Shaq-Kobe feud, Caitlin Clark’s Olympic snub, and more, watch this video.