Prime Time: Melo vs PG13

[SharpyShuffle]

I’m a huge PG fan, but even I accept that Melo in his prime was a better player hands down. Melo was unguardable for a period and absolutely the alpha on his team. George is a top 3 #2 option in the NBA, but he was never really an alpha in the way that Melo was. A better comparison would be a prime Melo vs a prime Kawhi. Even though Kawhi has a ring, I would still give it to Melo.

Melo was the 'alpha' because he played with worse players. George was also the alpha in Indiana before he teamed up with bigger stars. Do you think Melo would be the alpha if he was with prime Russ and Kawhi? He wasn't even comfortable competing with Jeremy Lin, lol

[The_Hater]

George is a terrific player but this seems disrespectful to Melo.

It’s not. It’s all perception. Melo just got more press and media attention.

Melo was maybe a top 10 player for 1-2 NBA seasons at most. People don’t realize this. Meanwhile George was top 10:for about 4 seasons and is a 2 way players who is better than Melo at most basketball related activities.

[TTP]

Melo was a legit top 5 player in the NBA at some point in his career. PG never. Easily Melo for me.

I don't think either of those two statements are true.

For one, NBA voters don't seem to agree with you considering Paul George has been 1st team All NBA and Melo never was.

However, I prefer taking a data driven approach.

Paul George is currently #5 in the NBA in 3 year Luck Adjusted RAPM, behind only Giannis, Steph, LeBron, and Kawhi, four other two way players and one of the greatest offensive players in NBA history. He's also #7 in 5 year LA-RAPM.

I don't have access to 3 year data that goes back further than 2012, but I'm fairly certain Melo never ranked in the top 5 during any three year sample of his career. The best I can do is 2012-15 (Melo's age 28-30 seasons). Carmelo ranked #62 over that time period, despite the fact that it included the two best seasons of his career in terms of on/offs.

Individually, here's their LA-RAPM rank by season going back to 2009-10:

Melo Age 25-33 seasons
2009-10: 41
2010-11: 218 (missed 2/3 the season)
2011-12: 94
2012-13: 209
2013-14: 78
2014-15: 172
2015-16: 96
2016-17: Don't have data for this one but his on/offs were terrible so not going to be good
2017-18: 49

PG Age 20-30 seasons
2010-11: 112
2011-12: 24
2012-13: 33
2013-14: 14
2014-15: Missed nearly the entire season
2015-16: 115
2016-17: 35
2017-18: 53
2018-19: 5
2019-20: 47
2020-21: 3

The only season prior to the available sample that Melo had great on/offs was 2008-09, but it's likely not even going to be top 20.

Meanwhile, Paul George has multiple top 5 seasons, and four other seasons that rank above Melo's best season.

RAPM isn't perfect, but it's a better measure of impact than counting stats and it's pretty damning that Melo doesn't have a single elite season show up. Melo actually has 4 seasons between age 23 and 33 where his team played better with him on the bench. Paul George has zero in his entire career (his worst season was breakeven).

Paul George gets pretty underrated because of all the Playoff P memes - he's been an elite player for a while and we're seeing his peak right now.

[TTP]

I’m a huge PG fan, but even I accept that Melo in his prime was a better player hands down. Melo was unguardable for a period and absolutely the alpha on his team. George is a top 3 #2 option in the NBA, but he was never really an alpha in the way that Melo was. A better comparison would be a prime Melo vs a prime Kawhi. Even though Kawhi has a ring, I would still give it to Melo.

Prime Melo better than Prime Kawhi? Wow. I totally disagree.

Not only is Kawhi a way more efficient shooter but Kwahi was a two time defensive player of the year and 7 All NBA defensive teams. In their primes how many things did Melo do better? How many things did KL do better? Defense is not everything but being able to defend is an important part of winning in the playoffs.

P.S. BTW Kawhi actually has 2 rings not 1 but I do not even factor that in to the comparison.

Prime Kawhi > Prime PG > Prime Melo

I don't think it's particularly close either. Peak Kawhi is one of the scariest things to face in basketball these days. I'm pretty sure I witnessed it in the Sixers Raptors series in 2019.

I think Kawhi is on a very short list of players that has the chance to be the best player in the NBA in any given year right now. He makes every team he's on an instant second round team or better and a championship contender every year. That was never the case for Paul George or Melo.

[Ito]

I would take Indiana PG over Melo

[Onlytimewilltel]

I'll take the 2 way, switchable wing. Back when Melo was at his peak we way overrated the importance of isolation scoring and underrated the importance of defensive versatility. Knowing what we know now, Paul George is a much more valuable player archetype.

This. Give me Paul George every day of the week, and twice on sundays. Melo still getting overrated I see. Mr, “Yo they want me to come of the bench, hahah”

[Onlytimewilltel]

I’m a huge PG fan, but even I accept that Melo in his prime was a better player hands down. Melo was unguardable for a period and absolutely the alpha on his team. George is a top 3 #2 option in the NBA, but he was never really an alpha in the way that Melo was. A better comparison would be a prime Melo vs a prime Kawhi. Even though Kawhi has a ring, I would still give it to Melo.

Melo was the 'alpha' because he played with worse players. George was also the alpha in Indiana before he teamed up with bigger stars. Do you think Melo would be the alpha if he was with prime Russ and Kawhi? He wasn't even comfortable competing with Jeremy Lin, lol

Yea seriously. Lol. Melo was super hateful of Lin’s short success, instead of being happy for his teammate. Dudes a bum

[The_Hater]

Melo was a legit top 5 player in the NBA at some point in his career. PG never. Easily Melo for me.

Could you please point out which exact seasons Melo was a top 5 player in the league?

Also, where do you have PG ranked in 2018-19 when he finished top 3 in both MVP and DPOY voting along with being a 1st team all star?

Much appreciated.

[Maverick41]

I look at it this way, if my team needs a 1st option, I choose Melo by a hair. If my team needs a 2nd or 3rd option, I choose PG13 for sure.

[TTP]

I didn't even get into this in my last post but playoff impact looks even worse for Carmelo.

Melo has played 3092 career playoff minutes, and his team is 4.2 points worse when he's on the floor.

PG has played 4222 career playoff minutes and his team is 12.0 points better when he's on the floor.

Even if you exclude the last few seasons where Melo's been dreadful near the end of his career, it's still not close.

[TTP]

I look at it this way, if my team needs a 1st option, I choose Melo by a hair. If my team needs a 2nd or 3rd option, I choose PG13 for sure.

I'd still take PG13 as my first option. He was far more impactful as the first option on the Pacers than Melo ever was at any point of his career, both in the regular season and the playoffs. The data isn't particularly close.

First option PG13 nearly got the Pacers to the Finals multiple times through peak LeBron.

[JN61]

Worth of mentioning is George got these numbers with massive help from Westbrook. Look up how muc Westbrook assisted him that year; 2 made 2 point field goals and 1.7 3 pointers per game. 3.7/9.2 fgm were assisted by Westbrook. That's massive 40% shots assistd he made by Westbrook. And if you include all attempts it is; 5 2pt fga and 4.3 3pt fga. So Westbrook assisted 9.3 out of 21 fga. Which is 44% of shots assisted by Westbrook.

In my opinion Melo was clearly superior. Georges MVP year is byproduct of Westbrook elevating the game of George. OKCs offfense was way less turnover prone and way higher AST% when Westbrook was on the court. Indicating George struggled to lead the offense on his own.

[FutureKnicksGM]

Melo all day. The West was a different beast back then. PG ain't taking those teams any further. For most of Melo's prime, JR Smith was his second option.

[TTP]

Melo all day. The West was a different beast back then. PG ain't taking those teams any further. For most of Melo's prime, JR Smith was his second option.

Who was PG's second option when he took the LeBron Heat to 6 games in the ECF in 2013-14? 33 year old David West that scored 14 PPG that season? And when he took them to 7 in 2012-13?

[SharpyShuffle]

Worth of mentioning is George got these numbers with massive help from Westbrook. Look up how muc Westbrook assisted him that year; 2 made 2 point field goals and 1.7 3 pointers per game. 3.7/9.2 fgm were assisted by Westbrook. That's massive 40% shots assistd he made by Westbrook. And if you include all attempts it is; 5 2pt fga and 4.3 3pt fga. So Westbrook assisted 9.3 out of 21 fga. Which is 44% of shots assisted by Westbrook.

In my opinion Melo was clearly superior. Georges MVP year is byproduct of Westbrook elevating the game of George. OKCs offfense was way less turnover prone and way higher AST% when Westbrook was on the court. Indicating George struggled to lead the offense on his own.

"Point Guards create scoring opportunities and a team is worse when it's $40m PG sits".

Profound analysis.

[triple_threat]

Melo was unguardable in his prime. Could never say the same for play off P.

Well Melo definitely took more shots. PG made a higher percentage of his shots and played both sides of the court.

Who would I chose? It is a interesting question. I'd take whichever was hot but overall I'd lean to the guy that played both sides of the court.

More to stats

[HoustonCougars]

As a guy who loved watching Nuggets Melo play, i would take Paul George by a mile. The difference on defense is huge, while on offense, it's a wash for me. Melo was supremely talented as an iso scorer, but George has has more versatility on offense in terms of passing/playmaking.

[draftnightsuit]

I’ll take the versatile 2-way player over the fake superstar.

On top of that, Melo is just as terrible a playoff player as PG13. 8 first round exits in his prime, 11 overall.

[taikibansei]

I would take PG. Melo's slight advantage on offense over his career cannot offset the huge gap on the defensive end.

The weird thing is, I think Melo would be considered hands down the better player today if he'd committed to playing power forward--something his coaches wanted him to do. In 2012-13, Melo played 78 percent of his minutes at PF, up from 26 percent the prior year. He finished that season third in MVP voting, behind only Kevin Durant and winner LeBron James, and his statistics were superb: a league-leading 28.7 points per game, to go along with 6.9 rebounds and 2.6 assists. More to the point, this was small-ball basketball at it's best. Melo absolutely killed the players trying to guard him in isolation--pfs were too slow and sfs were too weak--and because we had at least three other 3-point shooters out there with him, he couldn't be double-teamed. (Melo also had the speed and strength to defend many PFs--with obvious exceptions.) As a result, the Knicks went 54-28, good for second place in the Eastern Conference and easily the best season of the Melo era.

Sadly, Melo did not want to play PF. Melo wanted to play SF...even though he couldn't guard SFs, even though he was not as effective on offense as an SF (took too many mid-range shots), and (most importantly) even though the Knicks didn't have a PF they could play instead of him who was a net positive on the court. That last bit was key.

The decision to move back to SF was Melo's...and Dolan's. It was to me the most frustrating element of the Melo era (and is yet another reason for my loathing of Dolan).

[JonFromVA]

Worth of mentioning is George got these numbers with massive help from Westbrook. Look up how muc Westbrook assisted him that year; 2 made 2 point field goals and 1.7 3 pointers per game. 3.7/9.2 fgm were assisted by Westbrook. That's massive 40% shots assistd he made by Westbrook. And if you include all attempts it is; 5 2pt fga and 4.3 3pt fga. So Westbrook assisted 9.3 out of 21 fga. Which is 44% of shots assisted by Westbrook.

In my opinion Melo was clearly superior. Georges MVP year is byproduct of Westbrook elevating the game of George. OKCs offfense was way less turnover prone and way higher AST% when Westbrook was on the court. Indicating George struggled to lead the offense on his own.

"Point Guards create scoring opportunities and a team is worse when it's $40m PG sits".

Profound analysis.

Melo didn't mesh well with Iverson, way too much ball stopping. Playing with Billups was much better. And of course everyone remembers Linsanity when it seemed the Knicks played a lot better with an actual PG getting everyone involved then when the offense was focused on Melo.

Maybe there's a specific team construction where Melo would be more valuable as the final piece?

I'm just not sure what that team would be given Melo isn't a more efficient, doesn't play better defense, doesn't uplift his team more, etc, etc.