The city of Denver has some beautiful buildings but the architecht of a sports team is the person getting all of the attention today.

With the exception of Allen Iverson, the current makeup of the Nuggets can be traced to one man, Kiki Vandeweghe He was the person who drafted Carmelo Anthony. He signed Kenyon Martin to a $91 million deal. He brought Marcus Camby over in a trade. It is Mark Warkentien's job to build a winner, though the reality is he has to do it with Kiki's players. Although, as Warkentien has seen, while this roster looks impresssive, its actual on court performance is somewhat less than that.

Warkentien decided to start his rebuilding phase of the roster by trading Camby. Two teams, the Clippers and the Grizzlies, had the best chance to obtain Camby. He ended up going to Los Angeles for the chance to swap second round picks in 2010-------still a strange compensation agreement, in my estimation.

While really only two teams had a viable chance to grab Camby, there was one other team that had interest but no real leverage. That team would be the New Jersey Nets. Their General Manager? Kiki Vandeweghe.

The interest in Camby is yet another example of Kiki trying to build his new team with guys from his old team.

The buzz around a possible Carmelo Anthony trade earlier this summer all began when right around The NBA Draft Lottery, the word began to circulate that Kiki was interested in trading for Carmelo, the man he drafted in 2003. He wanted Anthony to follow him to New Jersey. The Pistons and Lakers also had interest. That was rendered a non-issue whe the team told Anthony he was not going to be traded, but you had to notice Vandeweghe's initial interest.

His next attempt to raid the Nuggets team roster was more low-key but much more successful. He was able to sign Eduardo Najera to a contract, taking a fan favorite and hustle player out of the Rocky Mountains and into the traffic of the Turnpike. The move was seen as sound, since Najera is a player who brings high energy whenever he is on the floor, certainly a trait that any team, particularly one building a new foundation, like the Nets, can use.

After missing on Carmelo and hitting on Eduardo, the pursuit of Camby was next. It came up short but Vandeweghe's long term goals became pretty apparent. That is to say, keep doing in New Jersey what he did in Denver and maybe make the Nuggets pay for not seeing his plan through.

See you on Friday. Have a great day.

-"z"