Linas Kleiza should be relishing this time – it’s exciting to be competing in the playoffs, especially when your team looks like it can make it all the way to the Conference Finals. Playing with Chauncey and K-Mart in their primes, with a surging Nene, a strong Melo, and a surprisingly potent bench in Carter and Anderson, Kleiza has got to be loving life.

Unfortunately, these days will be over soon. Kleiza’s days as a Nugget are coming to a close. The reasons?

• Chris Anderson – The Bird Man is playing out of his mind, and Denver’s only option will be to resign him. If Anderson continues to put up tremendous performances in playoff games, he might just demand the full mid-level. My guess is that Denver pays Anderson $10-12 million on a fully guaranteed 3 year deal. Considering how close the Nuggets are to exceeding the luxury tax threshold without Anderson’s new contract, Anderson’s gain is Kleiza’s loss.

• Kleiza has been over-hyped by his coach. Karl loves to talk about how versatile and dangerous L.K. can be, yet most of us haven’t seen it in this season. Sure, in years past L.K.’s presence was instrumental (Melo’s 15 game suspension back in the 06-07 season, subbing for K-Mart and Nene on and off for the last 3 seasons, etc.), but this year George Karl raised expectations for L.K. so much that he was bound to dissapoint.

• Kleiza is expendable. A lackluster season, combined with his disappearance during the playoffs, has proven that Linas isn’t needed. It’s unfortunate too – he’s a player that developed in Denver and he’s come up big in the past. If only the NBA wasn’t a business.

• Kleiza didn’t respond well to failed contract negotations. It’s human to be angry and depressed when someone backs off of a $20 million contract offer, but it’s not the best way to respond. Instead of playing poorly to open the season and threatening to go to Europe this year, Kleiza should have been playing as hard as he could have and making it hard for Denver to let him leave. It’s likely that there’s some bad blood all the way around.

The sad part is that Kleiza has the potential to be a 6th man on a good team. There are quite a few teams that could use a versatile bench player with size and three point range, but Denver isn’t one of them. The Nuggets are no longer in need of 3pt shooting with Melo, Billups, and J.R., and they’re no longer concerned with versatility because they have the under-rated Renaldo Balkman waiting in the wings (who’s only earning a couple of million a year).

My prediction: The Nuggets trade Kleiza just before the draft. That will give Kleiza’s new team a chance to extend him the qualifying offer (and therefore all the leverage in the salary negotiations). Kleiza will likely sign a deal for $15 million for 4 years, a fair salary for a bench player with potential.

Hopefully, the Nuggets will get something they need (Jeff Foster) in return.