Big Game Melo

[SoBeCuse]

Melo had a great year this year, I don't think I'm ready to put him in Durant's class yet. Though maybe if Durant had to play a full season without Westbrook his mumbers would come down a lot. I think Chris Paul is better than Melo, but then again, he's come up short int he playoffs a lot too.

I think Brooks might be a worse coach than Woodson. Derek Fisher played 31 minutes last night. 31 minutes!

Agreed. I give Durant an edge. Some of the moves he can make handling the ball and making tough shots is a thing of beauty. He's a freak with that length and skillset.

 

[SoBeCuse]

I won't take a shot at Melo because he's an elite player and we're still waiting for our NC without him, but calling out Lebron is just stupid. Let's not forget he scored the final 25 (and 29 of the final 30) points in a win against Detroit in the process of going the NBA finals. I'm not a Lebron fan, and I'll jump on the "take that Lebron" bandwagon if the Knicks can make it to and beat the Heat in the Eastern conference finals, but calling out Lebron was dumb.

Seriously. You don't call out James. The guy can control games without scoring. How far he took the Cavs was ridiculous. The guy gets 28/8/8 like every game sleepwalking it seems. Nuts.

 

[NineOneSeven]

Seriously. You don't call out James. The guy can control games without scoring. How far he took the Cavs was ridiculous. The guy gets 28/8/8 like every game sleepwalking it seems. Nuts.

If you watch a Miami game, he literally just doesn't take bad shots. How often does Lebron get double-teamed, try to spin out of it, fades away, and misses a shot? It doesn't happen. The guy will go down as one of the best basketball players of all-time, easily top five. Forget rings (and he will get more, count on that). In terms of pure basketball god-given ability, Lebron James does things on the court that every single basketball fan in the world dreams about being able to do.

 

[CorduroyG]

I think it goes Lebron----Durant/Melo-----the other superstars. Durant played terrible in the final two games against Memphis and got bounced in 5 with no Westbrook...a healthy Durant, I might add. Without Westbrook OKC is the Knicks with Durant as the superstar instead of Melo. Why didn't Durant make everyone else better? Why didn't Durant make Kevin Martin step up? Why didn't Durant will everyone else's shots in? Why didn't Durant make Ibaka and Perkins not get punked by the Memphis bigs? ...These questions are stupid, so why does he media ask them of Melo? Not everyone can have Bosh/Wade and a bunch of knock down shooters at their disposal.

that's why it sux that lebron took the easy way out and teamed up with Wade and bosh. it would have been fascinating to see if lebron was good enough to lead the Knicks or cavs to a championship without forming a dream team. I think it will definitely hurt his legacy. swap melo for lebron do the Knicks win it all this year? who knows

 

[Melancer46]

So?

That isn't good.

 

[Melancer46]

To me, in no particular order, the following guys are definitely above Melo:
LeBron, Durant, CP3

Guys I'd personally put ahead of him, but I understand if some other people don't:
Dwight, Kobe, DWade (combination of offense and defense > Melo's offense), Tony Parker, Kevin Love

...Really though, it's hard to rank guys regardless of their positions because they do completely different things. The only SFs in the league that are better than Melo at this very moment are LeBron and Durant, but the way that Melo is playing will not get it done as far as carrying a team goes.

And looking to the future, there's definitely a bunch of SFs that I'd probably take right now and hope they develop over having Melo right now.

 

[CorduroyG]

a lot of melo bashing for a guy that led his team to 54 wins, a division title, a 1st round playoff win, and is currently 2 wins away from the conference finals. this is with Smith and Chandler playing like doggy doo doo.

 

[SoBeCuse]

a lot of melo bashing for a guy that led his team to 54 wins, a division title, a 1st round playoff win, and is currently 2 wins away from the conference finals. this is with Smith and Chandler playing like doggy doo doo.

No bashing going on. Never has been, imo.

 

[OrangeDW]

To me, in no particular order, the following guys are definitely above Melo:
LeBron, Durant, CP3

Guys I'd personally put ahead of him, but I understand if some other people don't:
Dwight, Kobe, DWade (combination of offense and defense > Melo's offense), Tony Parker, Kevin Love

...Really though, it's hard to rank guys regardless of their positions because they do completely different things. The only SFs in the league that are better than Melo at this very moment are LeBron and Durant, but the way that Melo is playing will not get it done as far as carrying a team goes.

.

And Kevin Love has gotten it done as far as carrying a team goes?

 

[Knicks411]

that's why it sux that lebron took the easy way out and teamed up with Wade and bosh. it would have been fascinating to see if lebron was good enough to lead the Knicks or cavs to a championship without forming a dream team. I think it will definitely hurt his legacy. swap melo for lebron do the Knicks win it all this year? who knows

Swap Melo for Lebron and the Knicks are the clear favorites, IMO. I think Miami's offense and overall style of play would be different and less effective with Melo instead of Lebron.

Wade is still a really good player, but he isn't the player he was 3 or 4 years ago. I think having Lebron around has really made things easier for Wade. I think he would be broken down more if he had to carry as much of the load as he used to. He's missed 30 games the last 2 years and he's been battling knee injuries on and off.

I'm not sure I'd take Love over Melo, but in 2012, the player who played the second most minutes on the Wolves was Luke Ridnour. Wes Johnson was third. Derrick Williams was fourth.

 

[OrangeDW]

Swap Melo for Lebron and the Knicks are the clear favorites, IMO. I think Miami's offense and overall style of play would be different and less effective with Melo instead of Lebron.

Wade is still a really good player, but he isn't the player he was 3 or 4 years ago. I think having Lebron around has really made things easier for Wade. I think he would be broken down more if he had to carry as much of the load as he used to. He's missed 30 games the last 2 years and he's been battling knee injuries on and off.

I'm not sure I'd take Love over Melo, but in 2012, the player who played the second most minutes on the Wolves was Luke Ridnour. Wes Johnson was third. Derrick Williams was fourth.

Unless Lebron could heal Chandlers back, and make JR Smith's shots for him, I don't think the Knicks would be in any different of a situation. With the Chandler and Smith who played during the regular season? That's a different story.

The T-Wolves have been a mess, I agree. However Melo gets cut no slack when his supporting cast sucks. In fact he gets blamed for it. Love is very good, but he has had virtually no impact on the T-Wolves status, that's not really debatable. Melo turned the awful a nuggets around instantly, his rookie year.

 

[Melancer46]

And Kevin Love has gotten it done as far as carrying a team goes?

Not saying he has, but I think that his style of play is more likely to result in a a good team being able to make noise moreso than Melo's current style. If Melo can consistently play the way he did the first half of the year when the ball didn't get stuck in his hands for 10-15 seconds at a time, that changes things completely.

And I'm of the belief that if the T'Wolves ever make it through a season healthy, they'll be in the same position that the current Knicks team is in, if not better (and that's with their gaping hole at SG... I don't think they see Alexey Shved as the long-term starter there, but more as a guy that can come off the bench and play PG or SG and play sort of an Evan Turner kind of role).

 

[Knicks411]

Unless Lebron could heal Chandlers back, and make JR Smith's shots for him, I don't think the Knicks would be in any different of a situation. With the Chandler and Smith who played during the regular season? That's a different story.

I'm assuming that at some point JR will start making shots. Chandler; not sure about. But if Melo and Lebron swapped teams then Melo would be playing with a banged up Wade. The Lebron Knicks woul;d be the top seed and would still have no trouble in round 1 and very little trouble in round 2. And Melo's Heat would be probably in a pretty similar spot to where the the Knicks are now, in a battle with Indy.

Btw, do the Knicks and Miami get to swap coaches here or no? Because I would have more faith in Spo than Woodson.

I agree that the Wolves have pretty much sucked, but to be fair, it's not like Melo was the only addition the Nuggets made. Here is their top 8 guys in minutes played.

Juwan Howard
Nene
Junior Harrington
Donnell Harvey
Rodney White
Vincent Yarborough
Nikoloz Tskitisvhilli
Ryan Bowen

These people were the key players on an NBA team. This actually happened. Nene was a rookie and just learning the league, everyone else was pretty much garbage. 4 of those 7 guys shot below 40%. No one, other than Nene, was above 45%. Being kind, they had 2 legitimate NBA players. Here is the top 8 the next year
Melo
Andre Miller
Nene
Voshon Lenard
Marcus Camby
Earl Boykins
Jon Barry
Birdman

With the exception of Nene, they completely turned over their top 8 players and got a ton of really solid players. Not that Melo wasn;'t a huge part of the turnaround, but they completely turned that team over. If Melo was playing with that 03 roster then he's not turning them around.

I had to see what happened with some of those Nuggets guy. Stop reading if you have no interest

Junior Harrington-Was 22 years old that season. Started 51 games and shot 36% from the field. Played 1,000 minutes in the rest of his career. Started 15 games.
Donnell Harvey- Was also 22. Shot 45% from the field (one of their better shooters!) Played in 77 games, starting 27. Started 8 games the rest of his career, was out of the league by age 25. Didn't play 1,000 minutes from 2003 on.
Rodney White- Was 23 years old during the 03 season. (a vet!) Played in 72 games, starting none. Played 58 games the next year, and was out of the league.
Vincent Yarborough-21 years old, played 59 games, starting 39. Never played in the NBA again.
Tskitishvili: Was 19 years old, played 81 games, starting 16. Played another 600 minutes in the NBA after this season, was out of htre league by age 22.
Ryan Bowen: A legit vet, was 27, played 61 games, starting 31. Played for another 5 years,, even starting 30 games.

Basically five of the top 8 players were out of the league within 3 years of 2003, and not because they were old. Pretty amazing

I had to look at the 03 Cavs to compare the teams, I didn't realize they both went 17-65. Here is the top 8 players for the Cavs
Ricky Davis
Z
Jumaine Jones
Carlos Boozer
Darius Miles
Milt Palacio
Dejaun Wagner
Smush Parker

man what a bad team.

 

[CusefanATL]

Since you watched the game so closely, did you notice how Hibbert got two of his fouls due to Melo driving and dishing to Chandler and Martin, who were then fouled by Hibbert? More valuable than an assist, really. Not to mention he drove and drew another foul on Hibbert. His foul trouble was one of the biggest reasons NY won.

Not to mention, George got in foul trouble and got at least a few of them when fouling Melo, including the 5th one that put him on the bench in the 4th.

I'm not sure what those have to do with Melo?

I love Melo and will blindly defend him to any non syracuse fan as if he is my own son. But he has temper tantrums on the court. Its not really debatable.

 

[OrangeDW]

I'm not sure what those have to do with Melo?

I love Melo and will blindly defend him to any non syracuse fan as if he is my own son. But he has temper tantrums on the court. Its not really debatable.

His passes caused those fouls to happen. You were talking about him having zero assists.

If the fouls weren't committed on those plays, he would have had assists on them. But since those fouls led to Hibbert sitting on the bench for awhile, it was better that Melo had 0 assists rather than those 2.

I wasn't trying to debate temper tantrums, because I don't really care.

 

[CusefanATL]

His passes caused those fouls to happen. You were talking about him having zero assists.

If the fouls weren't committed on those plays, he would have had assists on them. But since those fouls led to Hibbert sitting on the bench for awhile, it was better that Melo had 0 assists rather than those 2.

I wasn't trying to debate temper tantrums, because I don't really care.

You are reaching like I have never seen before.

The ball stops at Melo more than any other player in the NBA. That's all that needs to be said.

 

[longislandcuse]

Even with a banged up Wade, the Heat still have Bosh who is better than anyone not named Melo on the Knicks. Lebron also has shooters who actually make open shots. It's easy to have faith in your teammates when every pass you make turns into an assist.

 

[CorduroyG]

Not saying he has, but I think that his style of play is more likely to result in a a good team being able to make noise moreso than Melo's current style. If Melo can consistently play the way he did the first half of the year when the ball didn't get stuck in his hands for 10-15 seconds at a time, that changes things completely.

And I'm of the belief that if the T'Wolves ever make it through a season healthy, they'll be in the same position that the current Knicks team is in, if not better (and that's with their gaping hole at SG... I don't think they see Alexey Shved as the long-term starter there, but more as a guy that can come off the bench and play PG or SG and play sort of an Evan Turner kind of role).

I'd say what the Knicks have done this yeae (and are still doing, last I checked their season isn't over yet) qualifies as making noise.

 

[Knicks411]

Even with a banged up Wade, the Heat still have Bosh who is better than anyone not named Melo on the Knicks. Lebron also has shooters who actually make open shots. It's easy to have faith in your teammates when every pass you make turns into an assist.

Yeah but that is more about the playoffs so far. The Knicks set the league record for threes made this season (right, or did Houston end up ahead of them?) and Melo averaged 2.6 assists per game.

He's not going to get a lot of assists, period. You can't even compare Lebron and Melo as passers, Lebron got tons of assists with a not very good Cleveland team.

 

[Knicks411]

I gotta say, I love the difference between how Melo and Lebron are compared in the playoffs. Just as an example, Cleveland loses to Boston in 2010. (and by the way, I can't believe that was 3 years ago. Seems much shorter than that) Cleveland has, by far, the best player in the series. Then Boston probably has the next 4 best players. Lebron averages 27-9-7 on 45% shooting. Lebron is a massive choker.

Melo is currently going for 26-8-1 on 41% shooting. And what can you expect out of Melo, his teammates can't make any shots!

The point is not that Melo is a choker. I don't think he is at all. Just pointing out the difference in how things are portrayed.

 

[Melancer46]

I gotta say, I love the difference between how Melo and Lebron are compared in the playoffs. Just as an example, Cleveland loses to Boston in 2010. (and by the way, I can't believe that was 3 years ago. Seems much shorter than that) Cleveland has, by far, the best player in the series. Then Boston probably has the next 4 best players. Lebron averages 27-9-7 on 45% shooting. Lebron is a massive choker.

Melo is currently going for 26-8-1 on 41% shooting. And what can you expect out of Melo, his teammates can't make any shots!

The point is not that Melo is a choker. I don't think he is at all. Just pointing out the difference in how things are portrayed.

Agreed. To be fair though, LeBron quit on his team in 2010.

 

[Knicks411]

Agreed. To be fair though, LeBron quit on his team in 2010.

Yeah the end of game 6 was really weird. But he still put up a 27-19-10 (with 9! turnovers) in that game. Very strange ending though

 

[Fireball Jr.]

And then there was this Game 6 performance against Boston -- 45 points, 15 rebounds, 5 assists -- last year with the Heat down 3-2, on the road, facing elimination, the big mo' on the Celtics' side.

 

[OrangeDW]

You are reaching like I have never seen before.

The ball stops at Melo more than any other player in the NBA. That's all that needs to be said.

Umm, how is it a reach when it's exactly what happened? I mean, since you went back and rewound to watch Melo's "tantrums", I'd think you'd at least notice when he made nice passes too, especially when Hibbert being in foul trouble was THE story of the game.

But they weren't "assists" though, so they don't count I guess.

The ball goes in the basket at the hands of Melo more than any other player in the NBA. That's all that needs to be said.

 

[CusefanATL]

Umm, how is it a reach when it's exactly what happened? I mean, since you went back and rewound to watch Melo's "tantrums", I'd think you'd at least notice when he made nice passes too, especially when Hibbert being in foul trouble was THE story of the game.

But they weren't "assists" though, so they don't count I guess.

The ball goes in the basket at the hands of Melo more than any other player in the NBA. That's all that needs to be said.

You are being way too argumentative. Im not trying to bash Melo.

I hope he wins the series and the champ.

You can count those 2 or 3 plays as assists.. But everyone stats are calculated the same way - Melo has averaged extreme low assists numbers all year and basically his whole career.

IMO, he would be better off involving his team more and becoming more of an all around player.

I am still going to root for him tonight. If that means you proved me wrong, so be it.