Round 5: Is Carmelo Anthony an Elite Level Player?

Back in March, as a kind of experiment to see just how juiced I could get in head to head combat with a Carmelo Anthony detractor, I was a guest critic on the blog of David Friedman, a very experienced basketball commentator whose mega blog is 20secondtimeout.blogspot.com. I bring this heated debate back to (1)Get us through the dog days of the off-season and (2)To partly make up for me being bogged down in a huge real estate project, which is keeping me away from Nuggets 1 lately.

Enjoy the fight. Here is Round 5:

At 10:36 PM, David Friedman said...

DAVID FRIEDMAN:

Melo would finish behind Kobe, T-Mac, LeBron and Nash because his game is not as well rounded as any of those players' games are. Converting your linear weights numbers to per 48 minute stats does not correct the basic limitation of the linear weights approach, which is how much weight to assign to each component. Also, you did not even include all the categories in your system, leaving out scoring and shooting, which are pretty important.

"Elite" to me means MVP candidate, not just All-Star. If you are just asserting that Melo falls somewhere between 15th and 19th in the NBA in value, I probably could go along with that but I would not define that as "elite."

Camby is a lot more than an "offensively challenged center." Camby ranked fifth in blocked shots and 10th in rebounds in 2003-04. His presence was a major factor in Denver's improvement. Offense is not his primary calling card but he is a good finisher and has a reliable top of the key jump shot. His .477 fg % that year was better than every other Nugget that year except for Nene.

Yes, Nene was on board in '03 but surely it's better to have Nene's offense and Camby's defense as opposed to just having Nene's offense.

I don't know where you got that long quote from (the link didn't work) but it sounds like it was written by Melo's publicist. LeBron had more assists, more steals, more blocks, scored almost as many points and had almost as many rebounds. The Cavs had much more roster turnover during the season than Denver but were on pace to make the playoffs before starting point guard Jeff McInnis got hurt. Lenard's overall field goal percentage was low because he shoots so many threes; he is a three point specialist and he made a reasonable .367 from that distance in '04.

Miller's game is foul line and down in the paint. That is why he does not shoot many threes (less than one attempt per game in '04 and some of those came as end of quarter buzzer beaters). Miller was a major upgrade over the mess that Denver had at point guard in '03. He is a good rebounder and defender. Dave Berri, author of Wages of Wins, would actually argue that Miller is better than Iverson. I don't agree but Denver's record after the Miller-Iverson deal sure is less than inspiring.

There are some contradictions in what you write, because on the one hand you say that Melo is an "elite" player but then you concede that Melo is taking more time to become an "elite" player than LeBron is.

Granted, MJ did not immediately turn the Bulls around but they did improve and his numbers were off the charts compared to Melo's. MJ averaged 28.2 ppg as a rookie while shooting .515 from the field, averaged more rebounds than Melo despite playing shooting guard, had more than twice as many assists and ranked fourth in the league in steals. MJ's rookie performance is one of the best of all-time.

Denver's regular season record with Melo is better than the Bulls' record with MJ during the first three years but the ultimate result has been the same: three first round losses. MJ's Bulls went 1-9 in those series, while Melo's Nuggets went 3-12. Being a "winner," though, is ultimately decided by championships and Melo is nowhere close to leading a team to an NBA title. MJ's playoff averages in all categories during his first three years blow away Melo's averages. Melo has averaged just 18.6 ppg on .362 field goal shooting in the postseason. Those numbers are hardly "elite." They are not even All-Star level--and his defense has been terrible as well.

I don't find Denver's record to be "amazing." The Nuggets have had a lot of talent on their roster the past couple seasons. If you look at preseason predictions, the "experts" actually expected the Nuggets to do even better than they have. My Lindy's previews about Denver were more circumspect because I was not convinced that the talent would work well together (or stay healthy). Still, nothing that Denver has done during Melo's time there strikes me as "amazing"--other than his wretched field goal shooting during the postseason. How can a player who has that much talent--and whose best skill is scoring--shoot so poorly when the games matter the most?

I have my reservations about Karl as a coach, too, but he has coached a lot longer than Collins did and Karl did take a team to the NBA Finals. The team played much better after he arrived than before.

I don't think that anyone is faulting Melo for not leading Denver to a title. They are faulting him for poor defense, poor shot selection, a reluctance to pass the ball and his poor individual postseason numbers.

You have Boozer as the seventh best player in the league. Sorry, I don't buy it and my reluctance has nothing to do with him playing in Utah. Off the top of my head and in no particular order, Dirk, Kobe, Nash, LeBron, Wade, Duncan, T-Mac, Amare, Yao are definitely better than Boozer. A healthy Shaq is better than Boozer also.

You have Gasol 13th. I don't think so. He's been an All-Star once. Memphis was shopping him before the trade deadline because they think he is soft. He would not crack my top 20.

My evaluation of Melo, Boozer and Gasol has nothing to do with which cities they play in. All three are All-Stars or All-Star caliber; none are top ten, elite, MVP level players, although Boozer may get some low level MVP consideration this year because the Jazz have such a good record.

Name one person who has "mumbled" that Duncan "is not a superstar." He's won two MVPs and three Finals MVPs and makes both the All-NBA and All-Defensive Teams every year. I have stated that I consider him the greatest power forward ever. No one is slighting him based on him playing for San Antonio (maybe for endorsements, but not for MVPs and honors based on merit).

If you think that Akron is "middle -class" and/or LeBron grew up middle-class then you have a lot of research to do. Frankly, I don't see the relevance of how the players grew up when we are talking about their level of play but you are 100% completely wrong about LeBron. What does being Chinese, German or growing up on an army base in Germany have to do with anything? Yao grew up in a Communist country and had to sign away a portion of his earnings to the government. You think it's easier to become an NBA player growing up in China than in the United States? He is a trail blazer.

Read about Bruce Bowen's background. Read about Gilbert Arenas, who was living in a car with his father for a period of time. Plenty of NBA players had living situations that were as bad or worse than Melo's--and why exactly should that be relevant anyway? NBA players are paid based on how they can perform now, not how bad they had it 10 or 15 years ago.

Melo's video appearance was an appalling example of bad judgement, which mirrors the bad judgement that he displays on the court. I laughed out loud when you called the "punch and run" a "brilliant compromise." One, it was a punk move: you don't punch someone who is being restrained and run away under any circumstances. Two, this was another example of horrible judgement. The situation was being defused. Melo was not "standing up" for anything; he was trying to act tough. Were you privy to Melo's conversation with Stern, because you sure state with assurance what was said during their meeting. We've already seen what LeBron would do: last year, Rasheed conked Zydrunas Ilgauskas in the head so hard that blood gushed out. LeBron did nothing, because he is smart enough to understand that his team needs him on the floor playing, not acting like some wanna be tough guy.

LeBron is younger than Melo, as is Amare. Bosh is a young player, as is Dwight Howard. All are receiving better press than Melo because they are playing better and because they have not displayed the poor judgement, on court and off, that Melo has.

Denver is one of the top offensive teams in the NBA and has a below .500 record. If you think that defense is not holding this team back then you are simply not paying attention.

The bottom line of all this is that Melo is an All-Star level player on a mediocre team.


At 7:56 AM, Nuggets 1 said...

NUGGETS 1:

As I said, no matter how you jigger the statistics (no matter what weights you put on the statistics, within reason) Melo is equal to or ahead of Kobe Bryant, Tracy McGrady, LeBron James, Steve Nash, and so forth. Weightings that are biased in favor of rebounding and assists over scoring itself, and there are many of these around, will have Melo as low as the 40th most valuable player in the League, so the defensive bias can get pretty ridiculous. My simple but compelling rankings had Melo 19th if you divide points scored by 2 or 8th if you count points with no adjustment.

If forced to say, I'll say Melo is the 13th best player in the NBA as I write this, with the likelihood in the many years left in his career that he will reach 6th best and the potential that he will reach 4th. I will concede that he has no potential of ever reaching 1st, 2nd, or 3rd right now because he has too many turnovers, has seen his 3-point shot actually get worse, and because he does not play good defense in every quarter yet. On the other hand, his rebounding, passing, and assists are much closer to the LeBron James level this year than last, and unless there is some unexpected development, Melo and LeBron will be extremely close on rebounding and assisting next year or the one after that at the latest. Melo takes a longer view of everything than LeBron does.

Scoring was included, but shooting percentage was not. If you include shooting percentage, Melo goes up, not down, because his accuracy is a strong .473, despite his love of shooting the midrange jumper.

In any event, as I said before, I consider the elite level of any sport to encompass at least the top 5%, which would be at least the top 21 players for the NBA. I'm not a Bush Republican who believes that only the top 1% or 2% matter and that everyone else has moral flaws.

It's interesting that neither LeBron James nor Kobe Bryant agree with your view of the supposed limitations and moral turpitude of Melo. Bryant said recently that Melo represents the best of the next generation of NBA stars, and LeBron was adamant that Melo should have easily been voted into the all star game.

Under your definition of elite, where the player has to be a possible MVP, had Michael Jordan played for the Vancouver Grizzlies, he never would have qualified as elite, because the Grizzlies would still have failed to have a substantial winning record, and I don't think there have been many MVPs who played for losing or mediocre teams. Jordan's assists and scoring would have been less, but I would still have ranked Jordan as elite, but you would not have, partly because of the fewer number of players you allow into the category, had Jordan played for the Grizzlies.

I never said that Camby was or is just an "offensively challenged center" Here is what I said: "He was an offensively challenged center who had just 7.6 points a game. Today he is even better defensively then he was that year, and is now one of the very best defenders in the League, but he is driving Nuggets fans up the wall with his foolish jump shooting." I said Camby is one of the best defenders in the League now, even better than he was in the year before Melo arrived. Although I didn't explicitly state it, the easy and correct deduction from my Camby description is that if he is one the best defenders in the League now, he had to have been at least a good defender in the year before Melo arrived. I love Camby's defense, but he didn't in the pre-Melo year and still does not get the number of easy dunks, layups and tip-ins that many other centers get, particularly centers who play for the top teams of the Western Conference, which it is my duty as a Nuggets analyst to focus on.

Many fans who watch the Nuggets closely have gone apoplectic about Camby's insistence of developing his jump shot and acting on occasion as if he is a point guard, but I say that if a man is that solid on defense, he has the right within reason to try to develop the style of offensive play he is most comfortable with. In summary, overall I am a Camby supporter, but his ppg in the pre-Melo era was miserable, and he has never been a major offensive contributor for the Nuggets, unlike most of the other centers of the top teams of the West.

You said "Being a 'winner,' though, is ultimately decided by championships and Melo is nowhere close to leading a team to an NBA title." But as a reminder, I said that no single player has ever been responsible alone for winning a Championship for his team. Let me quote myself because I think if you ranked my points, this is one of my very most important points in this discussion: "It is that simple; neither Melo, Michael Jordan, nor anyone else can 'lead his team by example and win a Championship without truly skilled and great teammates. This idea that the most great players can take any team they are on and lead them to the promised land is nothing more than an urban legend."

As a little example, it was Linas Kleiza finally showing alot of skill in shooting the basketball that got the win for the Nuggets on March 11 in Sacramento, not Melo or anyone else "leading the Nuggets to victory by example." Had Kleiza missed most of those shots, the Nuggets would have lost, and he did not make those particular shots out of respect for Melo's great floor leadership or some other abstract thing. He made them because he has been working like hell in practice on his 3-point shot, and he finally had the skill, the poise, and the determination to make them rather than miss them. Now if Kleiza were to continue to play close to as well as he played against the Kings, and the Nuggets were to reach the Western Conference final, folks such as you would end up saying "Wow, Melo really turned it around and led his team to the Conference final". But the reality would be alot more subtle; it would be that it was due to Kleiza and his coaches busting their butts in practice to get Kleiza physically and mentally equipped to hit 3-pointers in high pressure situations. It never ceases to amaze me when a sports analyst ascribes coaching skills (and coaching work) to a player, especially a young player like Melo. Melo can and does set a tone and certain standards of practice and effort, but beyond these atmospherics, players like Kleiza have got to produce individually.

If you think that the Vancouver Grizzlies would have won an NBA Championship (and stayed in Vancouver, no doubt) had Michael Jordan played all his years with them, then I will be truly amazed.

Sorry, the link didn't work because of the bracket at the end. (Even though the bracket is not visible, it still can show up on the paste for some strange reason; the end of the reference should just be nuggets, with nothing after the "s".)

I never even hinted that I was comparing Melo to Michael Jordan. I brought Michael Jordan into my discussion to explain how even one of the all-time best players in history needed and got substantial skilled help in order to win Championships. Had Chicago not made the key 1987-1992 improvements to their team that they made, Jordan alone would NEVER by himself have "led the Bulls to a Championship". And that's why the Nuggets practically bet the ranch on Iverson.

If you don't think Denver's win-loss record transformation in one year from pre-Melo to Melo is amazing, ask around to see how many basketball analysts think that any of the following teams will turn things around in one year, by next year finishing with more wins and losses, and making the playoffs:

Boston
Atlanta
Memphis
Charlotte

Maybe one of these teams will do a one-year turnaround next year, but they are going to have to have an instant elite player from the draft to do it, just as the Nuggets had.

Denver in the pre-Melo year was as bad or worse than any of these four teams this year. The Nuggets that year were 28th out of 29 in 3-point shots, barely ahead of the Jazz. They were 28th out of 29 in field goals, beating Miami by 1 field goal. In total points they were dead last, finishing 115 points behind Miami. The Nuggets and the Heat were way behind every other team in the League offensively that year. There were 10 teams that scored more than 1,000 point more than the hapless Nuggets. Cleveland had 594 points more than Denver had. The Denver defense was better, which allowed the Nuggets to win their 17 games. Now that I have looked into this in even more detail, I am even more amazed than I already was regarding the Nugget's one year turnaround.

As for Denver now, who other than Melo, A.I., and Nene is a reliable scorer, either in terms of points per 48 minutes or in terms of accuracy? J.R. Smith was hitting some threes, but his season has been all but wiped out by the suspension, the George "Scrooge" Karl benchings, and his knee injury. Which Nuggets, other than these four, is not a below average scorer? I would be interested to find out. Most of them, in fact, are way below NBA scoring and accuracy norms, though Kleiza may have raised himself up to below normal at this point.

What talent the Nuggets have has been minimized by the fact that they lead the NBA in turnovers. Turnovers are almost as deadly to winning chances in basketball as they are in football, and the Nuggets have blown more leads than anyone, party because of too many turnovers.

No, unfortunately, unless there is a miracle, the Nuggets are going to need Kenyon Martin back at full strength at PF or an equivalent substitute, and, also, rock bottom minimum, one G-F who can shoot 3's and play defense. Najera absolutely must go. Everyone says "He doesn't score, but he plays great defense". Well if both Camby and Najera play such fantastic defense, then why are the Nuggets just about last in defense? I'll answer my own question: because Najera is overrated on defense and, since in most outings he has the offensive output of a mouse, what does it matter exactly how good Najera is on defense anyway? You can't afford players who end up with 2 or 3 points even though they started.

No, my friend, I'm afraid if you strip away A.I., Melo, Camby, Nene, and J.R. Smith, the Nuggets are literally pathetic. And I am mad I had to admit that, but it's the truth, and I have to handle the truth.

I didn't say that Melo is taking more time to become an elite player; I said that Melo is taking more time to "solidify his status as an elite player". In other words, it is taking him more time to get a large enough majority to agree that he is an elite player than it really should take, and more time than it is taking comparable players.

By leaving 2-3 rebounds to Camby or Nene that he could get himself, and by leaving a couple of assists per game to Miller and now A.I. that he could get for himself, he is delegating too much for those basketball analysts such as yourself who want an elite player to go full out maximum at all times. But I agree with Melo's philosophy and approach: allow those who rebound the best to rebound, allow those who pass and react to the defense the best to pass and react to the defense, and so forth. He can score every way except from long range reliably, so he logically chooses this specialization for himself.

Voshon Lenard's 2-point shot accuracy in the year he made the shot to keep the Nuggets alive was only .447.

You are right about Melo's bad shooting in two of the three playoff series, and only mediocre shooting in the other one. It is a real mystery. Maybe he lost his confidence because he realized that, unlike with the Syracuse Orangeman, there was no way in hell the Nuggets were going to reach the final four? Good point there, and, if the Nuggets make the playoffs this year, I expect better.

I like Collins as a coach way over Karl; he's more intelligent and has better communication skills. Perhaps most importantly, he never interferes with a player's right to be the final decision maker on what aspects of his game to emphasize on the court. George Karl has dictator tendencies which seem to grow like a cancer during parts of a season, leading to such debacles as the benching of Kenyon Martin during last years playoff series against the Clippers.

Melo's defense is gradually improving. I think his shot selection is ok. I agree with his not passing the ball too much to any Nugget who is well below the average scoring performance for his position; I think it's smart. You get no argument on the poor playoff shooting; like his shrinking 3-point shot, it stands as a mystery and a definite negative right now.

I like Boozer and agree with how the ranking came out; where would the 43-19 Jazz be without him? After Malone and Stockton were done, almost everyone thought Utah would be wretched, but Sloan, Boozer, Okur, and Deron Williams have knocked out any hopes the Nuggets had to repeat as division winners very early in the season indeed. They are every bit as amazing as the Nuggets are; it is the Wolves who were supposed to be ruling the Northwest division these years. And Boozer without a doubt exceeds Melo's and most other top player abilities to explode in any given game, and he can do so as a scorer, a rebounder, and a defender all at once. If Boozer is way down the list, then how are the Jazz 43-19 in the tough Western Conference?

I think Memphis was shopping Gasol because they thought they could rake Chicago over the coals and have a chance for a miracle turnarund next year if they get the 1st or 2nd selection in the draft and it works out for them. Chi-town decided they couldn't quite afford the price. That episode was an indicator of how valuable Gasol is, not how low rent he his.

With regard to Duncan, the cable and network sportscasters were all over him when he choked a little on some free throws and on shooting in a few games during the various seasons the Spurs did not win it all in the last decade. They had him under a huge microscope. (The Spurs have won it all three times with Duncan during his 9 completed seasons.)

And when Duncan criticized himself, it only opened the door for more gratuitous criticism, with sportscasters saying things like "this man wilts under extreme pressure and will not be able to get his team to the winner's circle" and similar goofy stuff. The sportscasters, biased in favor of the big markets, took every opening they got to nitpick about Duncan's minor problems, knowing that his fan base was tiny compared to that of his opponents, and knowing that Duncan was being too much a perfectionist in public.

Akron Ohio
% of Families Below the Poverty Line: 14.0 %
% of Individuals Below the Poverty Line: 17.5 %
Violent Crime per 100,000 inhabitants: 266.4

(LeBron's zip code had even lower poverty, then the city as a whole, so I used the city data to be on the safe side. I wouldn't want to be wrong, you know.

Baltimore, Maryland-Melo's Zip Code
% of Families Below the Poverty Line: 37.6 %
% of Individuals Below the Poverty Line: 41.4 %
Violent Crime per 100,000 inhabitants: 837.1

Summary: Melo's city was more than 3 times as violent as LeBron's city, and there were far more middle class people relative to poor people in LeBron's neighborhood than in Melo's neighborhood. The percentage of poor families was 2 1/2 times greater in Melo's neighborhood than in LeBron's neighborhood.

You said: "What does being Chinese, German or growing up on an army base in Germany have to do with anything?"

Answer: Anyone growing up in these places had a lower poverty, a higher income, and a much lower crime environment than Melo had.

China is huge and complicated, but I do know that it is easier to become almost anything you want to be in Europe than it is in the United States. More important for this discussion, it is far easier to become a pro basketball player from a middle income upbringing than it is from a dirt poor, high crime neighborhood upbringing.

You asked: "You think it's easier to become an NBA player growing up in China than in the United States?"

Answer: Yes, it was easier for Yao Ming then it was for Melo.

And a reminder on why it is relevant: Melo's unspeakably bad neighborhood is one of the reasons why there are many others besides yourself who can not accept Melo as a true elite player. Not everyone who does not think Melo is elite may factor in his upbringing, which included no father, by the way. And those who do factor it in may not be conscious of what they are doing. But the bias is there with no doubt. Furthermore, there is to this day a large minority of basketball observers who refuse to consider Allen Iverson, whose neighborhood in Virginia was closer to Melo's than to LeBron's, as an elite player who made true history on the Sixers. And it's funny you mentioned Gilbert Arenas; he's another player I believe is underrated, so it's no surprise to me that he grew up dirt poor.

Although there was all kinds of criticism of Melo regarding the altercation with the Knicks to be heard where I am at usually, everyone agreed that Marty Collins was not at all being restrained when he was punched by Melo. Not in the least. And had Melo not run away at that point, I would not even be following basketball this season, because Melo would have been suspended for the entire season, or almost all of it, anyway.

I calculated that even the huge 15 game suspension ended up costing the Nuggets a relatively small 3 game net loss, and I, for one, am still glad Melo got the punch in on the guy who neck tackled J.R. Smith to the hardwood, thus risking J.R. getting a serious head or spinal cord injury. Without J.R. Smith, the Nuggets have no wild card element that gives them a chance against the top teams in the West. So I'll let you have another laugh and repeat that Melo made a brilliant compromise after Marty Collins and Nate Robinson brought the Bronx or Brooklyn gang alley into the living rooms of basketball fans around the nation.

Melo understood the mentality of Collins and Robinson all too well, given his own back alley upbringing, so he responded in a way that most people do not understand. I did and do understand it, even though I did not grow up in a bad neighborhood.

You said: "Rasheed conked Zydrunas Ilgauskas in the head so hard that blood gushed out". I'm not familiar with the details, but I have a hunch that it was more of an accident than an aggravated flagrant foul.

Melo's judgment is top notch, and I know the real reasons why Melo has little recognition so far and I have stated and proved some of them right here.

You said: "Denver is one of the top offensive teams in the NBA and has a below .500 record. If you think that defense is not holding this team back then you are simply not paying attention."

I said that there is not much offense to be found once you go beyond A.I., Melo, Nene, and J.R.. And I have agreed over and over that the Nuggets are lazy on defense, and that there are some Nuggets who don't have defensive skills, such as Kleiza, Johnson, and Blake. Najera is an overrated defender, and Melo is a little below average some games and average other games on defense.

Our Melo rankings are only about 7-10 players apart, but our reasons and our conclusions are very different, which makes for an interesting discussion.

More installments are coming, to be followed by a new comment by me regarding Melo's coming of age playoff series, and how those like Mr. David Friedman now have to update their views.