Will Carmelo Anthony Legacy Significantly Improve with Time?

[The Rebel]

Melo put his stats and money above winning his whole career, he moved to NY for what it would do for his and his wife's career off the basketball court, and as a result he never won ****. The sad part is that Melo was arguably the 2nd most talented player of his generation, he really did have every skill necessary to be the best player on a championship team, but he didn't care enough about it.

Melo will be forgotten over time, just like a lot of very good players that never won and put their money and stats ahead of winning. In 20 years nobody will talk about him, and in 40 years even his most die hard fans will have long forgotten him, that is just the way it goes.

[WintaSoldier1]

It’s gonna improve, soon once shot creation post play(or anything of resemblance of) is deemed effective again or completely dies out. People will go back and say “wow look at Melo, such a great post operator.”

[dhsilv2]

When looking at career accomplishments can you really justify a case for Butler or PG13 as better player than Melo?

Yes 100% I will look at how good these guys were as basketball players and take PG13 and Butler over Melo. I find it insulting to both those guys to even have this discussion. Melo's impact data and even regular box stats are simply nowhere close to as good as his "resume". Nobody should get rated higher because they were incorrectly judge by the media.

As time passes and fans become more analytically savvy, it will only hurt Melo's legacy.

[CharityStripe34]

Per the OP question, I bet 10 years from now basketball will only be a game of 3 pointers (like Pleasantville) and anyone even attempting a layup will be called a dinosaur or a "plumber/fireman" by a 50 year old Reddick. Post-up plays/moves will be considered technical fouls and fineable offenses.

[Meat]

Melo put his stats and money above winning his whole career, he moved to NY for what it would do for his and his wife's career off the basketball court, and as a result he never won ****. The sad part is that Melo was arguably the 2nd most talented player of his generation, he really did have every skill necessary to be the best player on a championship team, but he didn't care enough about it.

Melo will be forgotten over time, just like a lot of very good players that never won and put their money and stats ahead of winning. In 20 years nobody will talk about him, and in 40 years even his most die hard fans will have long forgotten him, that is just the way it goes.

in 20 years his kids and grandkids will, in 40's great grandkids will still be living better than 99.99999% of the population they'll still be thankful and talking about him. what do you think is better for him? that or a ring that'll eventually end up on ebay.

[enigmatics]

Emphatic no.

He was obviously a top shelf scorer, but that was about it. He never rounded out his game and clearly wasn't someone who made the players around him better. He needs to retire. With every new team he joins it makes things even worse.

[Meat]

Emphatic no.

He was obviously a top shelf scorer, but that was about it. He never rounded out his game and clearly wasn't someone who made the players around him better. He needs to retire. With every new team he joins it makes things even worse.

he absolutely made the knicks better

[Joao Saraiva]

I don't think it will improve. With time it will most likely go the other way.

He lacks palyoff success, big moments in the playoffs, he's not clearly the best player on any franchise...

Melo should have put more effort in his rebounding and defense. But he just wanted to put it in the basket. He was even jealous of the rise of Jeremy Lin.

If people expect him to make big contributions off the bench they're in for a disappointment. The max he's gonna make is a big basket or something. No way he's playing significant minutes on a winning team.

[GreatWhiteStiff]

If you look at their stats side by side.... it's hard to tell the difference between Melo and Adrian Dantley

And nobody talks about Dantley as an all time great

Erm, efficiency?

[The Rebel]

Melo put his stats and money above winning his whole career, he moved to NY for what it would do for his and his wife's career off the basketball court, and as a result he never won ****. The sad part is that Melo was arguably the 2nd most talented player of his generation, he really did have every skill necessary to be the best player on a championship team, but he didn't care enough about it.

Melo will be forgotten over time, just like a lot of very good players that never won and put their money and stats ahead of winning. In 20 years nobody will talk about him, and in 40 years even his most die hard fans will have long forgotten him, that is just the way it goes.

in 20 years his kids and grandkids will, in 40's great grandkids will still be living better than 99.99999% of the population they'll still be thankful and talking about him. what do you think is better for him? that or a ring that'll eventually end up on ebay.

The thing is that Melo could have had it all, the money and the championships, what he got paid wasn't the issue, it was the decisions he made that put him in the bad situations.

[JujitsuFlip]

I can't believe the dudes career splits are actually 22.5 PPG 6.2 RPG and 2.7 APG, especially on only 48.5 efg%.

[The High Cyde]

He was good, but he could’ve been great, and he decided that he didn’t want to.

Exciting player to watch in his prime, and very skilled with ball as a scorer, but just not much else. No defense, no rebounding, no playmaking, no leadership even. Never really added to his game and coasted with talent until his body couldn’t keep up and the league passed him by.

If he won he wanted all the credit, and nothing else really mattered to him. He’s the last of the old guard, an archetype you don’t want your young stars to follow.

[SonicMcMahon]

I predict that in the future, great scorers who don't contribute in other areas of the game, will be seen more as role players and less as stars. Bucket getters like Melo are celebrated because we see the big number (ppg) and when we watch games we see every bucket. All the things that Melo sucked at are less visible. We don't all see the lacklustre defensive rotations, we don't all the passes he missed.

We already know scoring specialists don't take you deep in the playoffs. But we keep putting these guys on that level, giving them all-stars and all-NBA looks and it's only late in their career when its more "proven" they don't make your team a contender that we start to turn on them. Scoring bias is real. It's the most visible thing (both watching games and perusing stats) so we overrate it. The game is about scoring, yes, but so much more goes into a team scoring than just the person who puts the ball in the basket. We know this. We understood Nash was a better player than Amar'e, or that Ben Wallace was more valuable than Rip Hamilton. We just forget when a player scores enough points (especially when they can hit tough shots) and we get stars in our eyes,

Melo wasn't a good enough passer for his elite scoring threat to translate into elite team offense. Melo wasn't a good off-ball player so he wasn't boosting other playmakers on his team. Melo was one of the worst defenders in the league, despite having elite athletic tools. Melo was a bucket getter who could also grab rebounds when motivated. But that's not enough to put him anywhere near the all-time great players in this league.

I think the issue is that the media and fans have become obsessed with pointing out everything players can't/don't do as opposed to what they are good at. 99% of NBA players are not going to be elite or even all-star level in all facets of their games. The biggest difference in how scorers are viewed historically is if they win championships.

Carmelo Anthony is one of the best players to ever represent the US Olympic team. He is one of the best scorers the NBA has ever had (if he plays next year, he'll almost certainly pass Shaquille O'Neal for 10th place on the all-time scoring list ABA or NBA; he's currently 8th and would move past Shaq to 7th as far as NBA-only scoring goes).

Scorers can only overcome the bias from media/fans if they win a championship. You mention Ben Wallace who was fantastic defensively, but was worse in every possible aspect offensively than Carmelo is/was defensively or as a passer. But people give Ben Wallace a pass because he was on a winning team. Why is Wallace's defensive dominance more worthy than Carmelo's offensive dominance? Because Melo was on bad teams and Wallace happened to end up on a good one?

I do not see Ben Wallace get ranked above Carmelo Anthony very often. Melo was recently named to the NBA 75 team and Ben was left off. Carmelo was voted to the all-star team 10x (to Ben's 4) and all-NBA 6x (to Ben's 5). I definitely rank Ben higher than Melo, but the wider NBA fan base does not.

Ben's offensive output was so obviously negligible that it didn't really require long analysis or a ton of mention. Carmelo's shortcomings were more subtle and it took us a long time to fully understand those shortcomings and realize how little Melo improved on his non-scoring skills over his career. There was more to talk about.

If the wider NBA fan base and media were consistently ranking Big Ben over Melo, I think you'd have a point. But since that's not the case, I'm unclear what you're trying to say.

Yeah, if I were starting a franchise and had the choice between Ben and Melo, it's Ben 10/10 times. (And the guy can barely make a layup)

[TheHartBreakKid]

I'm trying to leave my feelings and bias aside, and I honesty don't see how legacy improves as time goes. If anything, he is more likely to be be remember as an Adrian Dantley type of player. The player that future generation of basketball fans will stumble upon in basketball reference when looking at this era.


I'm not comparing the two as players, but that's easily what I see his legacy becoming. Some of who saw him play will remember the 2009 Nuggets and how close they were to top the Lakers, with Melo holding his own against Kobe, even that would be a case of selective memory. The reality of it, unfortunately, is that he didn't play winning basketball for the majority of his career, and he didn't prioritize winning with his career decisions.

[SonicMcMahon]

Tracy McGrady
Ray Allen
Reggie Miller
Gary Payton
Paul Pierce
Jason Kidd
Chris Paul
Paul George
Jimmy Butler
Jayson Tatum
Chauncey Billups
etc

I just don't see how there could be ANY debate about Chris Paul or Jason Kidd (or Gary Payton for that matter either). Those guys are CLEARLY over Melo in my opinion. Paul Pierce too. (Similar to Melo, but I like his all-around game more, and playoff resume)

And Reggie Miller too... that guy's playoff resume just trumps Melo's and I consider him, mind he cliche, more of a 'winner.'

A felow team-hopping mercenary lke Ray Allen? I like him more too... he did more: moved the ball, spread the floor, won a bunch in the playoffs with many different teams.

It's a little trickier with the modern guys like Taytum, George, Butler... but I happen to like each one of them more too. Butler is a gamer who finds ways to contribute when he isn't scoring, George is versatile and plays D, Taytum is jsut getting started.

I like the comparisons from those 80s guys: Wilkins, English , Dantley, King. A proficient scorer who you couldn't really build around because they were average or worse in all other facets.

[ILOVEIT]

One dimensional chucker. A very good one...but that's his legacy.

[tsherkin]

If you look at their stats side by side.... it's hard to tell the difference between Melo and Adrian Dantley

And nobody talks about Dantley as an all time great

Erm, efficiency?

Yeah. Dantley was like Melo... and even with his dramatically-superior efficiency, he wasn't a huge positive for his teams. Lengthy isolation sets which don't involve other teammates well enough aren't really good for total team offense, more so individual stats.

Emphatic no.

He was obviously a top shelf scorer, but that was about it. He never rounded out his game and clearly wasn't someone who made the players around him better. He needs to retire. With every new team he joins it makes things even worse.

"Top shelf" is a little bit hyperbolic. He put up some high-volume seasons, but apart from his first two seasons in New York (which were decent but not amazing), he was about league-average, which is really not good for a volume scorer.

[Meat]

Melo put his stats and money above winning his whole career, he moved to NY for what it would do for his and his wife's career off the basketball court, and as a result he never won ****. The sad part is that Melo was arguably the 2nd most talented player of his generation, he really did have every skill necessary to be the best player on a championship team, but he didn't care enough about it.

Melo will be forgotten over time, just like a lot of very good players that never won and put their money and stats ahead of winning. In 20 years nobody will talk about him, and in 40 years even his most die hard fans will have long forgotten him, that is just the way it goes.

in 20 years his kids and grandkids will, in 40's great grandkids will still be living better than 99.99999% of the population they'll still be thankful and talking about him. what do you think is better for him? that or a ring that'll eventually end up on ebay.

The thing is that Melo could have had it all, the money and the championships, what he got paid wasn't the issue, it was the decisions he made that put him in the bad situations.

they're not bad situations if his goal was to get paid

[raptor jesus]

Yes I think ppl will look at his stats and hold him in higher regard than those who watched his career. Fact of the matter is, he never really led a team anywhere, and he's not one of those guys who suffered bad luck e.g. Nash, Barkley. Some might point to the 2009 ECF Nuggets, but I would contend that Billups was their best player and leader.

[The Rebel]

Yes I think ppl will look at his stats and hold him in higher regard than those who watched his career. Fact of the matter is, he never really led a team anywhere, and he's not one of those guys who suffered bad luck e.g. Nash, Barkley. Some might point to the 2009 ECF Nuggets, but I would contend that Billups was their best player and leader.

He didn't have bad luck? The Nuggets we're missing a starter pretty much every year he was here. Amare had 1 good season in New York and Chauncey blew out his Achilles his 1st year in New York. That is not bad luck?

What about Anthony Carter throwing 2 bad inbounds passes in the final seconds of two conference title games costing the Nuggets both games, that isn't bad luck?

Also anybody that watched that conference finals run that thinks Melo wasn't the best Nuggets player didn't actually watch the games. Billions was the leader, but it was Melo that teams had a constant double if not triple coverage on throughout the playoffs, just like the rest of his time in Denver. The big exception was that we finally had guys who could hit their wide open shots.