Amare voted All-star starter over Melo

blue steel · Post #1 » by **blue steel** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 9:02 pm

via wiretap

So the forward spots will be a realistic lineup of Amare, Duncan and Yao. I definitely don't think Amare deserves the spot over Carmelo. Dirk probably deserves it more than both Melo and Amare. And if anyone deserves to be an all-star for phoenix, it's Shaq. Amare had a big game early in the season and has just been a whiney baby since then...

Oh well, maybe Melo will get voted in by the coaches but I'm doubting it, his last few weeks of being injured combined with his poor shooting start probably cost him the votes. But Melo has consistently shown us and the rest of the league that he deserves to be an all-star during the second half of the season, and hopefully he does when he returns.

JRMelo15 · Post #2 » by **JRMelo15** » Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:30 pm

I think he'll be voted by the coaches into the game as a sub. A top 4 team in the West has to have at least 1 guy in the All-Star game.

ctorres · Post #3 » by **ctorres** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 12:39 am

Billups likely makes the all-star team over Melo.

legendarywalton · Post #4 » by **legendarywalton** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 12:54 am

ctorres wrote:Billups likely makes the all-star team over Melo.

Seconded. He deserves it too.

Man, I feel so bad for Carmelo, I bet he thought his career would turn out a lot differently than this. I'd say that seeing the rest of his draft class consistently get voted into the game would fuel 'Melo in the future, but he's had so many reasons to elevate his play already and he hasn't responded. Until he is a consistent 20-10 on 47%+ shooting, he'll never get the support he needs for the All-Star game. He's quickly becoming irrelevant with the injuries, suspensions, and inconsistencies of the past years.

JRMelo15 · Post #5 » by **JRMelo15** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 1:01 am

legendarywalton wrote:
ctorres wrote:Billups likely makes the all-star team over Melo.

Seconded. He deserves it too.

Man, I feel so bad for Carmelo, I bet he thought his career would turn out a lot differently than this. I'd say that seeing the rest of his draft class consistently get voted into the game would fuel 'Melo in the future, but he's had so many reasons to elevate his play already and he hasn't responded. Until he is a consistent 20-10 on 47%+ shooting, he'll never get the support he needs for the All-Star game. He's quickly becoming irrelevant with the injuries, suspensions, and inconsistencies of the past years.

You expect a SF to average 10 RPG per game? I'd rather see him go 26-7 than 20-10.

eathy · Post #6 » by **eathy** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 2:07 am

IMO the votes were altered so that Amare can get into the starting lineup, since the ASG is in Phoenix.

nether less i think Melo will make it (he'll be motivated to get some nice numbers and win games), as his only real competitions at the forward spots are Dirk Nowitzki, Kevin Durant, Pau Gasol. I think Dirk is a lock, so Melo should make it over Gasol and Durant.

Nutty Nats Fan · Post #7 » by **Nutty Nats Fan** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 2:22 am

eathy wrote:IMO the votes were altered so that Amare can get into the starting lineup, since the ASG is in Phoenix.

They certainly were. Bowen gained about 900k votes to pass Melo. That's total BS.

pickaxe · Post #8 » by **pickaxe** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 2:23 am

legendarywalton wrote:
ctorres wrote:Billups likely makes the all-star team over Melo.

Seconded. He deserves it too.

Man, I feel so bad for Carmelo, I bet he thought his career would turn out a lot differently than this. I'd say that seeing the rest of his draft class consistently get voted into the game would fuel 'Melo in the future, but he's had so many reasons to elevate his play already and he hasn't responded. Until he is a consistent 20-10 on 47%+ shooting, he'll never get the support he needs for the All-Star game. He's quickly becoming irrelevant with the injuries, suspensions, and inconsistencies of the past years.

I do have one question: how did Artest and Bowen suddenly zoom so far ahead of Melo so quickly? Someone needs to look into how they suddenly jumped above Melo.

All though I agree with the possibility of Melo becoming irrelevant, I don't believe he will allow that to happen. He is still moldable to whatever the team will need, and that actually makes the team more flexible than it might be. Melo has two choices in front of him and he needs to pick the right one.

And you know.....he got injured so really he's been out of the minds of a lot of supporters. Even if he gets voted in....what are the chances he is going to play anyway. Give it to Billups and let Melo think about the fact that All-star and all that is not as important as going far in the playoffs this season. I think it's good for him to be reminded of this by not getting voted in.

legendarywalton · Post #9 » by **legendarywalton** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 3:27 am

AIMelo15 wrote:You expect a SF to average 10 RPG per game? I'd rather see him go 26-7 than 20-10.

I definitely don't expect a SF to get those kind of numbers. I was just trying to point out how difficult it will be for him to change the opinions of the general public. The reason I threw out those numbers is because that seems to be the mythical line that players cross at which point they're sure fire max money guys. I also threw it out there because it's fully possibly for 'Melo to do that. He gets one possession a game where he misses two shots and gets two boards. With the right intensity and the lack of a true big man (sorry Nene, I still love you, you're just not "prototypical") Anthony should see games of 12+ boards.

eathy · Post #10 » by **eathy** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 3:33 am

I think Melo has a good chance:

Westerners (T.T)
C - Yao Ming
PF/C - Tim Ducan
PF/C - Amare Stoudemire
SG - Kobe Bryant
PG - Chris Paul
bench:
PG - Chauncey Billups
PF - Dirk Nowitzki
SG - Brandon Roy
PG - Tony Parker
PF/C - Pau Gasol
SF - Carmelo Anthony
C - Shaq/Al Jefferson

notable snubs: Kevin Durant, Shaq/Al J

pickaxe · Post #11 » by **pickaxe** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 4:23 am

Seriously, how did Bowen, even if we accept Artest got in on merit, get more votes than Melo? They only had 400k-800k a couple weeks before.

blue steel · Post #12 » by **blue steel** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 5:22 am

yeah i don't really understand that, i pretty much forgot bruce bowen was still playing basketball.

pickaxe · Post #13 » by **pickaxe** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:25 am

lol yeah that's what I mean.....where did 800k people suddenly decide they liked Bruce Bowen come from?

*edit*

here's the second to last returns, when Bowen had about 509k:

http://www.nba.com/2009/news/01/08/0108 ... index.html

almost famous · Post #14 » by **almost famous** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 7:40 am

The All Star system is so flawed it's ridiculous. Not calling Amare undeserving, but Bowen? How could that happen? Even Artest is enjoying a free ride for his mediocre play. The All Star game has lost all credibility. It's completely sold out into being nothing more than a popularity contest. I feel like I'm the only one who actually votes for only the players he thinks EARNED a spot.

Seriously though, who cares? It's not like Melo deserved to go. Nuggets are where they are with very little help from their "All Star."

DaFan334 · Post #15 » by **DaFan334** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 8:02 am

The numbers really dont make any sense... Did they stop counting votes for Melo when he got hurt and start giving them to everyone else.

Post #16 » by **MHZ** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 8:22 pm

No real surprises with Amare passing him. You had to figure he would with Melo not playing since the last returns. Bowen's pretty hilarious, and Artest is clearly getting the Yao bump.

I have a hard time seeing Melo getting the nod from coaches. Chauncey's a lock. Anybody else hear Reggie Miller last night? Essentially we just take the Spurs and Lakers and combine them for the West, and then take BOS/CLE/ORL and combine them for the East, then play. What a joke. Because that's the intentions of the ASG.

legendarywalton · Post #17 » by **legendarywalton** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 9:01 pm

Anybody else pissed that Nene will never make an All-Star game?

pickaxe · Post #18 » by **pickaxe** » Fri Jan 23, 2009 10:17 pm

legendarywalton wrote:Anybody else pissed that Nene will never make an All-Star game?

I'm really down on that - it's one of those things where Nene really needs to maintain a high level of play for the next 1.5-2 seasons to really catch people's attention. The tough part to take is when less deserving players might get in for bogus reasons like letting a new fan base with limited things to do on the internet vote as many times as they possibly can. Ahem. I think the original fan base is getting snubbed more than anyone here.

And let Yao play - he gets that many votes no matter where they are from that is great. But Bowen? Ok, ok so he got that many votes but who are they from? And how did they appear so quickly? Wouldn't a player like Bowen getting that many votes have the votes more spread out? How does that work?

You know, really the best way to market Nene into the asg at this point is get him involved in the shooting stars or some other misc. competition so people can kind of start saying, "Who is that guy?"

People probably know he exists....but they just haven't had him on numerous highlight reels like we have to see how good he can be.

DaFan334 · Post #19 » by **DaFan334** » Sat Jan 24, 2009 7:33 am

Nene wasn't on the ballot this year because he didn't really play much last year. Still a big issues on the NBAs side, but they had to have the ballots ready by the start of the preseason.

Fan voting in general is a joke though. It needs to be done like the NFL and split it 3 ways, one third fans, one third players, and one third coaches or GMs. Or you could completely eliminate the fan vote all together and make it the press as a third. The current setup is terrible and we will continue to have players that shouldn't be going, that are in the game simply because they are popular, even if they aren't deserving.

Allen Iverson is a clear examples of a player who shouldn't be in the game but is simply because of his immense popularity. He isn't having an all star caliber year, its very clear of that but the system is flawed and there will be this problem until it is fixed.

Melo's 33 point quarter might have saved him with the coaches to vote him in as a reserve, but Ild probably put my money on Chauncey or no Nuggets in the game. Either way, meh... Its a pointless exhibition game, I could really care less as long we nobody gets injured from our team.

JRS-One · Post #20 » by **JRS-One** » Sat Jan 24, 2009 8:00 am

The way I've been saying they need to do it is let the coaches and players vote for the entire 12 man roster for each conference....and then a couple weeks before the game, do an online vote for the fans to pick the starters out of that group of guys. That way everyone on the team deserves to be there, and the fans still get some say.

Or to make it a little more interesting.....let the players/coaches pick 11 guys for each roster, and then do an online vote for the fans to pick the last guy to make each team out of a group of 5 or so guys(per each conference).