I want to say the same thing. When I see David Lee is at three, then I stop to look at it furthermore.
Brooks also gives us his iinability to move without the ball. Something Martin does better than almost every player in the NBA and something that would make life much easier for him and Carmelo should they be fortunate enough to play together. Sorry, but I'll take the guy who scores more points per shot attempt and who does it without dominating the ball. I'll also keep the shooting guard who shoots over the PG who shoots (hint: one of them should be passing).
It seems that there are many guys with high TS% or ORTG that are not very good compared to the guys with high NBA efficiency. Many of them don't seem to contribute in anything but scoring. Bill Walker has an incredible ORTG of 118, higher than Martin and Carmelo. However, he contributes less to the game, such as rebounds, steals, assists, blocks. He isn't worth $10-17 mil value of Carmelo or Martin. If the best measure of efficiency is ORTG, then it must not be as important as we would like to think in rating players. Kobe, Gasol, Garnett, and Pierce rank lower than Bill Walker and Martin, and Nene in ORTG, but they were able to lead their teams to the Finals. The other 3 did not do quite so well. http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/w/walkebi01.html
As I mentioned above, it is well-known that low usage players have distorted stats. The point is not that Melo is a bad player. It is that, compared to the other elite players in his salary class, he is low man on the totem pole. That would be fine if there were no salary cap. But an overpaid player can hamstring a team for years. See Tmac, Peja Stojakovic, Kenyon Martin, Mike Dunleavy, etc.
T-Mac had a bad back and played hurt in several games in Orlando and missed several games due to the back injury. He never lead the Magic pas the 1st round. Rockets gave him an extension anyway. Carmelo doesn't have a back injury and took the Nuggets to the Finals. Peja was almost 30 and already going downhill, when they got him from Indiana. He was averaging 16 pts a game with Sacramento and only 19 pts a game with Indiana. Carmelo is in his prime at 26 and an extension would have him playing until 30. Kenyon Martin's career average was 15.1 pts and 7.8 rebounds at the time, compared to Carmelo 25 pts and 6 rebs right now. One, there's a huge difference between a 25 pt elite scorer and a 15 pt mediocre-to-average scorer. Two, Kenyon Martin was a sign and trade for 7 years. Carmelo is on the last year of his contract, and an extension would be for 3 more years. Dunleavy averaged about 11 pts a game and 4.7 rebounds a game, when he resigned with the Warriors. There's a huge difference between Carmelo a 25 pt 6 reb player and an 11 pt 4.7 reb player. Carmelo is a much better player.
