NBA: Would You Want Carmelo Anthony On Your Team?

Around this time of the year, when people are itching for training camps to start again so they can begin to focus on next season, some silly NBA stories circulate. Some are based in a little bit of truth, and some are based on nothing at all.

But given that the NBA draft is done, international competitions are finished and the big free agents have signed new deals with old and new teams, there sometimes isn’t much to talk about. Which is why it didn’t surprise me when there was some chatter that the New York Knicks may be looking to trade Carmelo Anthony in the not too distant future.

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I say it didn’t surprise me because, at this time of year, no topic or player appears to be off-limits. On top of that, given that the Knicks look to be caught somewhere between giving their roster a makeover while also chasing success now with Anthony on the team, it’s no surprise really that his name would be targeted. But it did get me thinking.

If Anthony was made available and your team could theoretically put together a trade package to land the star, would you even want them to do it?

Now, I’ve been pretty harsh on Carmelo before, but I also know that he is one of the greatest pure scorers of his generation. During his time with the Denver Nuggets, he had season averages of 28.9 points (2006-07) and 28.2 points (2009-10). For his career, he has averaged more than 25 points seven times in 13 years.

Before Stephen Curry came along, no star player could get hotter quicker, and pulling up from anywhere around the basket was his thing. He’s been a great player, and I don’t think he’s done being a great player yet either. Although personally I do believe he’s peaked as a star in this league.

But to me, towards the end of his time in Denver, it had become apparent that he possibly was not the superstar some had made him out to be. One conference finals berth is all he has to show from his time there in terms of real team success. Which led me to believe he should have been a part of what Bill Simmons excellently has described for years as second bananas.

Massively important in their own way, particularly on a basketball team, but just not the alpha male.

He should have gone to the Chicago Bulls when presented with the chance last summer, and I think that is something many fans will look back on in years to come as a big “what if” moment in the NBA.

Had Melo gone to Chicago and not been injured just before the All-Star break, forcing him out for the rest of the season, do you think a Kevin Love-less Cleveland Cavaliers could have gotten through the Bulls? With LeBron James on your team anything is possible, but that could have been Anthony’s real moment to shine.

Which brings us back to now, and this moment. For once the Knicks had a productive summer, signing solid contributors like Arron Afflalo and Kyle O’Quinn. Robin Lopez was another really nice pickup, while the hope is that Kristaps Porzingis will morph into a real player in the NBA.

Add a healthy Anthony to that core in the Eastern Conference and you’ve got the makings of a playoff team. It’s just it wouldn’t be much more than that, and at this point in his career, Anthony must surely crave more than simply making the postseason.

Which is likely why these rumors of Anthony being potentially available surfaced. Again there’s no facts to base these allegations off of, and as we know he did turn down a better situation in Chicago to stay in New York.

The fact he has a no-trade clause in his contract as well means he would be in control of any potential move that would be made, meaning he couldn’t be forced to go to somewhere like Philadelphia or Sacramento. Not that that would ever happen.

But if a move did materialize, would you want him on your team? For me, it only makes sense if it’s a contending team he’s going to, otherwise if he went to a team like the Orlando Magic or Charlotte Hornets, he would find himself in a similar situation as he’s in right now.

He would also have to finally admit that his considerable talents, and remember, he is a great offensive player, would be better suited to being the second best player on a team.

Interestingly, this is something point guard Deron Williams has done to an even greater extent this summer. Along with Anthony, I long considered Williams the most overrated player in the league after his move away from the Utah Jazz.

He never did anything to justify his lofty position as a top three floor general in the league while with the New Jersey/Brooklyn Nets, and his fall from grace was swift. So when he was waived earlier this summer, he landed with the Dallas Mavericks and will surely know that his role will be different there.

He won’t be expected to do as much, and I actually think he could have a bounce back season for that reason. Now, Anthony is never going to be waived, forcing him to accept that he would have to change in order to survive in the league, as Williams has now done.

But if he took that attitude and asked to be traded to a contending team, I think we’d finally see the Carmelo Anthony we know exists within him get to play deep into the postseason.

Consider this. Melo has a career average of 25.2 points per game. That’s the 12th-highest of all time. Of the 11 players above him, four don’t have a championship ring (Elgin Baylor, Kevin Durant, Allen Iverson and George Gervin).

Of those four, Durant isn’t finished playing yet, Iverson stuck with the 76ers for too long and was surrounded by a real lack of talent and Gervin was a divisive figure to say the least with his approach to the game (it actually mirrors Melo’s in its apparent player-before-team approach funnily enough).

Which makes the Baylor comparison an interesting one. Sadly for Baylor, he retired early on into the 1971-72 season, leaving a Los Angeles Lakers team that went on to win 33 consecutive games and win a championship. Baylor did however get a ring despite not being a player during that remarkable season.

Although he tried and failed against the Boston Celtics many times in the NBA Finals, he did have the help of two players by the name of Wilt Chamberlain and Jerry West for much of that time.

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So while there’s no doubt Baylor himself would have been a star on any other team in the league back then with those scoring numbers, the fact he played with two more stars meant he was in contention to win almost every year he played professionally.

That’s something Melo has never had the chance to do, and while it was not his fault with the Nuggets, last year he had the chance to leave an average situation in New York and potentially take his name off the list of great players never to win it all.

One final statistic worth noting however, that maybe illustrates more how Melo should find a situation where he is the second-best player on a contending team is terms of Player Efficiency Rating. The league average is 15, and Michael Jordan leads all players with a career average of 27.91.

Anthony has spent his whole career as the franchise player on a team so you’d think he’d crack maybe the top 25 given his amazing offensive skills that require a near constant double team?

Wrong. Anthony sits 41st (with a career PER of 21.18), just behind the likes of Alonzo Mourning and Pau Gasol, and one spot ahead of Manu Ginobili. What do all of those guys around Anthony have in common? They all won titles as the second- (in Ginobili’s rare case, third-) best player on a team.

They accepted who they were and used their elite skill sets to compliment a better player.

Another player just below Anthony is Patrick Ewing (21.01), coincidentally enough somebody who spent most of his career with the Knicks as their best player, and who never won a title. Many feel he too would have been better served as a second option, although there’s no doubting he played for some great Knicks teams.

Certainly more complete than anything Anthony has had to work with so far.

So you see it’s for this reason that I think most fans from most contending teams would jump at the chance to bring the perennial All-Star that is Carmelo Anthony into the fold, despite his perceived selfish approach of trying to shoot his team out of trouble.

Recent injury issues aside, he’s one of the top 10 offensive players in this league over the last decade, and he’s still got the ability to give you 25 points a night. Just don’t ask him to defend for long stretches of time. He’s likely going nowhere but he really should, the Knicks will waste the remainder of his prime trying to put a contending team together. So would you take him?

Next: 25 Best Players to Play for the New York Knicks

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