Ranking the 75 best players in NBA history for 75th anniversary

Ranking the 75 best players in NBA history: No. 67 – Carmelo Anthony

Career: 2003 – present

Achievements: All-NBA (6x); All-Star (10x); scoring leader (1x); 12th in career points

Carmelo Anthony is the first player on this list who was considered to be cut. In other words, the Top 66 players on this list seemed like locks or something close to it, while these final nine players were chosen from a larger group of “maybes” under consideration. In 6 months if I sat down and did this exercise again, it’s possible all nine of these players could change out with others – the NBA has had a lot of excellent players in its history.

Carmelo Anthony makes the list as an all-time scorer, currently 12th in career points with an outside shot to move into the Top 10 this season, passing Dan Issel (our one and only Dan Issel mention) and possibly Shaq. Through changes in teams and teammates he consistently scored at a high clip throughout his prime, and now has reinvented himself as a microwave scorer off the bench.

Drafted in the same class as Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, Anthony has managed to extend his career by being excellent at one thing: scoring. It’s true that Anthony has never had a true star to play with, as James and Wade did (with each other) or other elite scorers like Kevin Durant or Stephen Curry have. That being said, he made that bed himself to an extent, demanding a trade to New York and hindering their ability to build around him due to giving up the farm to get him. If he wins a title this year with LeBron in Los Angeles it will mean a fascinating addendum to his career.