You're clearly missing the point of the hypothetical. The assumption is Snooki does not get shut down and makes 100% of all its shots from 3. Although it cannot do anything else in basketball this truly exceptional skill set in one area is enough to make it the best basketball player in history. This of course is an extreme example just to illustrate a point that great players do not have to be good in every area.
The Clippers of 06 had 3 more wins than the Nuggets, and not even 50 lol. You're passing them off as some sort of juggernaut. "You expected Melo to beat the Lakers? Spurs? The 06 Clippers??" And I didn't say he's bad because he hasn't won anything. It's just one piece of evidence. The main piece being, you know, that he's a horrible defender. Stockton and Iverson were very good defenders, I have nothing against them. They did, however, routinely advance out of the first round lol. Barkley was not, and that's one of the main reasons he and Dirk are only two big men MVPs to never win a ring: they're the only two that don't play defense.
Here's some interesting stats: Uploaded with ImageShack.us As we can see, Allen passes it more but that's because he can't score as well as Martin. ORTG - DRTG is equal. All other stats are almost identical. And I'm not even saying Martin is a hall of famer
No i'm not passing them off as a Juggernaut, but you are passing them off as a joke of a team which they were not. Still though you expected Melo to beat the Spurs and Lakers when he was still a young gun. Which he is now. I think it says it all who is clearly the better player and on another level when Melo is one year younger than Martin and yet has accomplished double what Martin has. So how many times has Martin been past the first round? So I guess Barkley and Dirk are not franchise players and also slightly above Kevin Martin? You do realize that Melo is 26 right? His career barring injury is not close to being over...
If only stats translated into wins..... Like I said ever since he got here. Martin is a all stat all star.
Losing against a crippled Jazz team last year was inexcusable. Having that ad campaign about Utah fans right before the series was McGrady-esque. And Melo's supporting cast has always been pretty strong, so this isn't a KG-with-garbage scenario.
You mean those 8th and 6th seeded teams he was on were strong?The Nuggets didn't have a strong supporting cast until Billups arrived, and that was about 2 years ago. Also remember Melo averaged 30ppg against the Jazz in that series, George Karl was not coaching and I know i'm not the only one that thinks that made a huge difference, the Nuggets seem to be a low I.Q team and that REALLY showed during that series.
Kevin Martin is a high-level specialist. You can't build around him, but he's hard to upgrade. Guys like Kobe, Wade, and Ginobli are not available. Clear upgrades like Monta Ellis and Eric Gordon might be available, but not for cheap and certainly not for Martin. Kmart was brought in to be a complementary piece, either to Yao or another superstar we were trying to trade for. It would be unfortunate to have to package him for a star he was supposed to support, but he is a man without a role here. I get why people like him, but he simply cannot be our best player.
I don't have to. It's obvious you don't watch games. Again, Ray Allen has been a better defender/passer than Kevin Martin has over his career. I don't need stats to tell me that, I've watched both play. In fact, Ray Allen is still a better passer/defender than Kevin Martin.
A revolving backcourt mate of Billups, Iverson, and Andre Miller is not bad. A revolving frontcourt of Camby, Nene, Kmart, and Anderson isn't bad either. And they've had useful role players over the years like Afflalo, JR Smith, and an under control Kleiza. That's not a world beating cast, but it's pretty good. And again, Utah was crippled.
Name one position where Carmelo was worse off than, say, LeBron. Miller/Billups > Mo/Sno Jones/Iverson/Smith > West/Hughes Carmelo < LeBron (ok you win this one) KMart/Nene/Camby > Gooden/Varejao/Z/washed up Wallace Bench is not even close in favor of Anderson, JR, and crew. So once again, he's not even close to superstar category because he can't will teams to victory like real superstars can.
I'm not even mentioning the Utah series though, before Billups these guys were lucky to be the 6th seed, also Melo was a young gun under 25. Did anyone mention Lebron? Lebron is on a whole other tier of elite type of players a guy that can go to the HOF if his career ended right now. This is about Martin and the idea that him and Melo are kinda close to each other or that Martin is on the same level.
That was just an example, let's look at, say, Dirk's 60 win 06 Mavs. Miller/Billups >= Terry Jones/Iverson/Smith > Griffin Carmelo < Dirk (ya he's not SF but just for comparison purposes) KMart/Nene/Camby > Howard/Diop/Dampier I could name many other supporting casts that are worse and led to FAR more success. There's no reason to keep making excuses for this guy, he's not Kobe.
I never said he was Kobe though, just that he's a much better player than Martin. Obviously he's not Kobe, Lebron, or Dirk. All 3 of those guys have won MVP awards and taken their teams to the finals.
Actually, I said Kobe because people always used to make excuses for the him when he couldn't do anything without Shaq. Ok well now that you've said he's not even Dirk, a guy who only plays offense and has been a part of the two biggest playoff collapses I've ever seen, I don't know where to go from here. I guess you win...
I don't know how this got to be a KM versus Carmelo thread, but here is something that is less of a thread-jack: Kevin Martin is #2 in the league in points per shot for guards, and #4 overall at 1.51. http://espn.go.com/nba/statistics/player/_/stat/3-points/sort/scoringEfficiency By that measure, Chauncey Billups is having a monster year at 1.59 points per shot. (Oddly enough, Chauncey's 3p% is the same as his 2p% - 0.434. KM has a .397 and .464) Interesting to note: Courtney Lee is #5 in the league in 3p%. (admittedly a smaller sample at 54 makes)
