Around the League: Week 4 11/16-11/22

[Ring_Wanted]

The older I get, the more I appreciate Melo.

About Porzingis, it's not just the talent. What I really like is his mindset. He is mentally tough, plays with a no-nonsense attitude and it shows that he wants to get as good as possible.

[pickle]

The older I get, the more I appreciate Melo.

About Porzingis, it's not just the talent. What I really like is his mindset. He is mentally tough, plays with a no-nonsense attitude and it shows that he wants to get as good as possible.

melo is absolutely a solid player, but his problems are real. offensively, he's got the complete package, but his efforts on defense are clearly less intense, as well as rebounding. he does not make the players around him better by creating opportunities for them and that for me is the biggest knock on him. if he's not touted as a top 5 talent and gets massive contracts and trade packages thrown at him that breaks the house, then i don't think the negativity around him would be as high. or if he ever played with a good playmaker...

[Ring_Wanted]

Unlike Kevin Garnett for instance, Melo is not an all out all the time kind of player. He is capable of being solid at R+D but won't bust his ass off doing dirty jobs for a hopeless team. You need to give him something to keep him motivated. And let's be real, very few bonafide go-to players actually play honest defense, at least the perimeter oriented ones. And those who do, only go at it when they feel like it. Durant, Westbrook, LeBron, Wade, Rose, Kobe, Iverson, Vince Carter, T-Mac... As for making his teammates better, well, he certainly is not LeBron, but who else can make that claim while scoring at will? Anthony is a scorer period. Durant has the same trait and nobody give him fire for it. The thing is Carmelo is just unguardable for a whole game and if people were salivating about Aldridge, Melo has to turn you on even more.

[pickle]

understood. but some of those stars in your list, notably lebron and kobe (as much as it pains me to say this), are very impactful on the defensive end when they choose to be. i don't think melo has ever managed to be more than serviceable on that end (not that i followed his career closely), so that's a not so great notch in his belt.

in terms of making others better, i totally get the scorer thing. as you said, durant is a scorer too. but when westbrook went down, durant not only managed 30+ ppg but also 6 apg, as i recall. he takes advantage of the double teams or attention from the defense and makes plays for the others on his team. i don't think melo has really shown that. again, i haven't followed him much so maybe i'm wrong. maybe in the one year he played hard he was able to achieve that...?

again, i got nothing against him, just don't think his on-court production has justified putting him in the same statement as other elite guys.

[Ring_Wanted]

For his career (which includes Denver and a WCF trip, apparently forgotten by everybody) Carmelo Anthony gives you 25ppg, 47%2pt, 34%3pt, 81%FT. Great on such volume. More than 6 rebounds and 3+ assists, pretty good for a tweener 3/4 I'd say.

But beyond those already outstanding numbers, it is the way he gets them. There is no offensive area where he is not savant and no range he can't hit. From the post to the three. And he has a go-to move, his baseline attack.

Character related stuff, I can't tell. Many seem to dislike him. Demanding that trade to NY when he could have signed there in three months while keeping all the young talent the Knicks had at the time, now that was a irreflexive decision that made a huge impact on his career and trapped him in stupid poor teams (along with Amare's health).

[pickle]

yeah i appreciate that ring. i don't think melo has ever played with another star who made his life easier in terms of getting offense, you will get no arguments from me on that. i am not judging his career based on just new york though. the way i've been looking at this, a team like we have, with a couple of shoot first guards, probably cannot deal with a guy like melo. could chicago have gotten relevant with him? maybe, when rose was out. but if/when rose got back, it seems gasol was a better fit. i think probably houston was the same situation. for all those teams the summer before last, i probably prefer to get a bosh rather than a melo... because melo doesn't seem to be the type of star who could fit into any situation, thus the "does not make players around him better" moniker. this isn't about his personality or any such thing. maybe those figure into it as well... i was just looking at his basketball skill set...

[Ring_Wanted]

I'd say that Melo is a rigid building block. He has his game and it is your job to surround him with fitting pieces. Usualy that's what you do with franchise players anyway, because not often they are built to play without regard for style or teammates. I guess you'd have to be Wilt, Kareem, Jordan, Shaq or LeBron.

Not happening, but for the record I believe that if Melo got here, our remaining scorers would have little trouble defering to him. Or in other words, he'd show who is the better player and things would be put in his hands. Do you see any of Bledsoe, Knight, Markieff or Warren ever relegating Melo? No chance. The thing is that there is still plenty of room for other talents to do their thing, which is precisely what those NY teams lacked.

[pickle]

absolutely no argument from me that these guys will defer. thing is, knight's defense is pretty awful. i know ish smith is super fast, but he was getting beat so consistently previous to the pelican game too. if our multiple pieces are going to stand around and wait for the ball from melo on offense, so far only bledsoe and chandler are pluses on the defensive side of the ball, so their effectiveness and value go down by a lot when they cannot contribute on the offensive end. if and when we get a number of strong defenders, melo doesn't help turn inferior scorers into more superior ones either. he'd be a great piece in a system where we already have a good passing pg who plays solid defense and a second option waiting to create or knock down open spot up jumpers, a kris middleton type. don't see melo fitting particularly well with what we have now.