Knixkik wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

tkf wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

tkf wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:I don't get the logic that Melo needs to win a championship or we need to rebuild when the guys we traded for him have limited playoff results and the draft picks you want during the rebuilding process have 0 playoff results.

The plan you guys want to follow is not a guranteed championship winner. Look at Denver when they traded Dice for Camby and a lotto pick landing Nene and Skeet. Then landing Melo the following yr making that 3 lotto picks in 2yrs. Then witht there huge cap space signing Kenyon Martin the highest rated free agent of that class. Now according to some of you guys logic Denver threw away 9yrs figuring out that Melo wasn't a franchise championship winning player. Following the same exact plan that you guys want to execute.

Melo needs to win a championship or bust coming from an organization that won its first playoff game in 13yrs last yr.

LET me ask you.. what would be the reason holding onto a soon to be 30 year old carmelo( by that time) who will be making 20+ million a year? Other than hoping and wishing he becomes the star player you envision after 10 years in the league, why hold onto him at that price with what he offers?

Because its better then any alternative that you have brought to the table. Whats the plan if we rebuild and the players we bring in don't get it done. Does that mean that we are going to tear it down and rebuild again and keep doing that until we find a championship team. When are we going to stop being in a transitional period, putting our players in positions to fail, villifying them then kicking them out of NY. When are we going to put our players in a position to succeed, put complimentary players around them and form some type of stability.

So unless you have some proven championship calibre players that are waiting in the wings for the Knicks to build there roster with y don't we follow through and put Melo in a position to succeed, form some stability and see what he is really made of.

No it isn't... understand the key is to win a title, right? so how do you do that with a guy making max money and you can't build a winner with him being the face of the franchise. Most keep saying carmelo played a role as "the other guy" on the olympic team.. well ok, if that is the case then he should be getting paid like an allstar role player.. but.. carmelo is not taking a pay cut to play in NY..

The alternative would be to start building a team with a true franchise talent, or better yet, build a team with the same attributes of this team.. Defense, sharing the ball, but do it with younger players, cheaper salaries and more flexibility to make moves to get that franchise talent...

that is better than the plan of keeping carmelo well into his 30's listening to him tell us how much he is willing to change every year....

Yea its all so easy and simple when your only dealing with hypotheticals. Where is this franchise player comming from? Young players don't stay young players with cheap salaries forever. So what happends if you don't find a franshise player and the young players are now looking for bigger contracts? You stay in purgatory until the franchise player falls in your lap?

If you really want to land a franchise player the #1 route is the draft with a top 5 pick. So if nothing else matters but championships then you need to tank every yr for a top 5 pick until you find one. But then there is the chance that you think you have one so you start to actually build a team with him then you find out he isn't one.

How is it a fact that you can't build a winner with Melo? We also will have a good amount of cap space when Melo is a free agent when he turns 30. So a better plan would be use that cap space to replace Amare with a big time piece that actually compliments Melo's game. Use our 2-3 draft picks that we will have over this span to fill in the rest of the roles with young players gradually finding replacements for Kidd, KT, Sheed, Prigs? And develop Iman Shumpert into a quality 3rd option. Odds are more likley that Melo finds more success in the playoffs then us landing your ideal franchise player thats going to lead us to the promise land.

This is my point exactly. It is all hypotheticals. The odds of getting a high draft pick and finding players better than Melo is slim to none. Blowing it up and hoping for the best is not a good alternate plan. I would rather be a playoff team.

Melo had crazy pedigree coming out of college as a winner as a top 3 pick. You go into the draft looking to draft a player like Melo only to find out that "he isn't a winner" or whatever. But of course the Knicks will be different when we draft we are going to land that superstar that will surpass Melo.

Knixkik wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

tkf wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

tkf wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:I don't get the logic that Melo needs to win a championship or we need to rebuild when the guys we traded for him have limited playoff results and the draft picks you want during the rebuilding process have 0 playoff results.

The plan you guys want to follow is not a guranteed championship winner. Look at Denver when they traded Dice for Camby and a lotto pick landing Nene and Skeet. Then landing Melo the following yr making that 3 lotto picks in 2yrs. Then witht there huge cap space signing Kenyon Martin the highest rated free agent of that class. Now according to some of you guys logic Denver threw away 9yrs figuring out that Melo wasn't a franchise championship winning player. Following the same exact plan that you guys want to execute.

Melo needs to win a championship or bust coming from an organization that won its first playoff game in 13yrs last yr.

LET me ask you.. what would be the reason holding onto a soon to be 30 year old carmelo( by that time) who will be making 20+ million a year? Other than hoping and wishing he becomes the star player you envision after 10 years in the league, why hold onto him at that price with what he offers?

Because its better then any alternative that you have brought to the table. Whats the plan if we rebuild and the players we bring in don't get it done. Does that mean that we are going to tear it down and rebuild again and keep doing that until we find a championship team. When are we going to stop being in a transitional period, putting our players in positions to fail, villifying them then kicking them out of NY. When are we going to put our players in a position to succeed, put complimentary players around them and form some type of stability.

So unless you have some proven championship calibre players that are waiting in the wings for the Knicks to build there roster with y don't we follow through and put Melo in a position to succeed, form some stability and see what he is really made of.

No it isn't... understand the key is to win a title, right? so how do you do that with a guy making max money and you can't build a winner with him being the face of the franchise. Most keep saying carmelo played a role as "the other guy" on the olympic team.. well ok, if that is the case then he should be getting paid like an allstar role player.. but.. carmelo is not taking a pay cut to play in NY..

The alternative would be to start building a team with a true franchise talent, or better yet, build a team with the same attributes of this team.. Defense, sharing the ball, but do it with younger players, cheaper salaries and more flexibility to make moves to get that franchise talent...

that is better than the plan of keeping carmelo well into his 30's listening to him tell us how much he is willing to change every year....

Yea its all so easy and simple when your only dealing with hypotheticals. Where is this franchise player comming from? Young players don't stay young players with cheap salaries forever. So what happends if you don't find a franshise player and the young players are now looking for bigger contracts? You stay in purgatory until the franchise player falls in your lap?

If you really want to land a franchise player the #1 route is the draft with a top 5 pick. So if nothing else matters but championships then you need to tank every yr for a top 5 pick until you find one. But then there is the chance that you think you have one so you start to actually build a team with him then you find out he isn't one.

How is it a fact that you can't build a winner with Melo? We also will have a good amount of cap space when Melo is a free agent when he turns 30. So a better plan would be use that cap space to replace Amare with a big time piece that actually compliments Melo's game. Use our 2-3 draft picks that we will have over this span to fill in the rest of the roles with young players gradually finding replacements for Kidd, KT, Sheed, Prigs? And develop Iman Shumpert into a quality 3rd option. Odds are more likley that Melo finds more success in the playoffs then us landing your ideal franchise player thats going to lead us to the promise land.

This is my point exactly. It is all hypotheticals. The odds of getting a high draft pick and finding players better than Melo is slim to none. Blowing it up and hoping for the best is not a good alternate plan. I would rather be a playoff team.

Exactly, why gamble on the lottery when you have a proven thing.

tkf wrote:melo is a sure thing to do what? the key is to win, and we all know the draft and young players can be a gamble, but if you are doing your homework more so than not you will come out with the right players... trying to recycle melo over and over again, is not going to get you a ring....at some point you have to make good decisions on how you are going to move forward.... You guys seem like you want to hold onto carmelo win a few games, and wait until his value dips and then try to move him.. it doesn't work that way... you have to be smart and proactive, not reactive... if melo doesn't win with this team now.. time to hit the reset button.. no excuses....

I think Grunwald was proactive. I think that is why the team is filled with vets and why the Knicks have three very competent point guards as opposed to last year. Teams generally don't have OKC/Spurs type success through the draft. Also, the guys that were in place before Grunwald traded every first round pick the league allowed them to until 2016. Drafting euros with second round picks, structuring league minimum guys and end of the bench second round picks contracts so that they can be used in trades is proactive. The Knicks are all in with this bunch and they are getting league wide praise for their play on both sides of the court.

tkf wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

tkf wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

tkf wrote:it is 3 games.. melo has won before in denver.. regular season that is.. the question remains, is is championship worth, heck is it get out of the first round worth? so far it hasn't been for 8 out of 9 seasons....

do you think 3 games is enough to draw such conclusions, or maybe we should just wait just a tad bit more?....

We should wait longer, but given that this is the best start in franchise history (based on record and scoring margin) i think we can draw the conclusion that this is a pretty good team. Championship worth? Probably not yet, but with the right upgrades along the way, absolutely.

what upgrades,are you referring to?

Ok i'll give you a couple examples. Brewer will likely get replaced at some point (this year or next year) by Shumpert in the starting lineup. Kidd, as long as he stays healthy, could continue to be the starting SG over the next year or 2 by playing 20 mpg because he fits great. Eventually he will need to be replaced. Look at some underappreciated 3/D type players like Chase Budinger (a FA next summer), Jared Dudley, Dorrell Wright (another FA), etc. These guys are big SFs who can shoot and seem to be above average defenders. Those are the type of guys you look at who can improve this team and add a nice punch on both ends of the floor without changing what we are doing. I really think we could eventually have a starting five of Chandler, Anthony, Shumpert, Kidd, and Felton and be in great shape, but will need to continue to improve. I love what Brewer is doing, but when healthy, Shumpert is an as good or better defender and better scorer.

I see where you are going.. you have a point, but honestly, if the knicks can't win it this year, I think you start to look at hitting the reset button and selling off these big contracts while they have some value still..

Sell the contracts for what or for who. Just because you hate Melo that is your problem. If you hate him that bad go root for another team. You must remember Melo is the alfa male and leader on this team for years to come. Se you better get use to it.

3G4G wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

tkf wrote:

3G4G wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

tkf wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

dude, who really game plans for carmelo? come on with that.. jeez...

Uhm everyone. No Amare, so why not try to take away their number 1 option. Sixers doubled Melo like crazy, guess that wasn't by design right?

just remember the eddy curry rule.. he was double teamed a lot not because he was unstoppable, but because teams knew he wouldn't make the pass..

Eddy Curry is out of the league for a reason. Next.

why do you think lebron doesn't get double teamed a lot?

Because he's lethal with the pass, and has shooters like Battier, Miller, Allen, Jones, Lewis, Chalmers, Cole spacing the floor.

Too easy.

not easy, you are basically killing your own argument....don't we have lethal shooters on our team? right? so why are guys still doubling carmelo according to you guys? I think, again, as usual the carmel hype train is in full effect.. the truth is, carmelo doesn't get doubled a lot, teams don't game plan for him as much as you think... and if all of that were true, then I must ask, why such little success in the playoffs?

And eddy curry being out of the league doesn't take away the fact that he was double teamed all of the time, if anything it proves my point.. you guys are overrating the aspect and effect of being double teamed!

Yup, it's all hype...

Guess they just had 2 bodies pretend to guard him:

This is fun....

Melo's inauguration speech is going to be a Doosy because "The Melo Coalition" is on some fierceness like never seen before

ROFL, you beat me to the pics.. I knew once they posted those pics, they opened the door.

Geez when are those pictures taken? The ones I posted are from this week and clearly shows the double and triple teaming on Carmelo. I see Jason Richardson on the Suns, Stephen Jackson on the Bobcats, Ariza on the Hornets...at least get recent pictures, not Luol Deng's career glamour shots!

Haha with the exception of wade and lebron, i see no one in those pics that are even on the same team anymore.

Pics from past week within the past year

These are only pics of Luol Deng I haven't even got to the rest of my list

Carmelo is also cappable of shooting guys back into cames and being a go to guy in crunch time situations and carrying a team on his back ofensively for periods of time.

So Carmelo can bring things to the table the none of the other Knicks bring and they bring things that Carmelo doesn't. Thats how good teams are formed they cover each others weaknesses. And you need both aspects to win in this league especially in the playoffs.

dk7th wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

dk7th wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

dk7th wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

dk7th wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

tkf wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

fishmike wrote:fail. Swap Melo with Iggy, Gallo, Paul Pierce... any good 3 and we are still 3-0

Im glad we are winning games rather than losing but we spanked Phili who doesnt have their franchise player and the Heat who didnt want to be there.

Let just be realistic

Hey fishmike, I thought Amare was the best player on the Knicks???

Don't you mean the Knicks won without their franchise player?

he sure isn't being used that way....if this team was being built around amare and the pick and roll, i could see your point tho.. but it isn't..

I'm just teasing fm, since he has topless pics of Amare on his car dashboard, and has a tattoo "STAT4LIFE" on his buttocks...JOKING!

In all seriousness, Knixkik is 100% on the money. Melo is not Lebron, but if you surround him with the right pieces, his team can make a deep a run as anyone (see 2009 WCF). Though, we still need a healthy Amare to be an offensive juggernaut in the 2nd unit, to make a legit run at the crown.

sorry but unless melo cuts back on the ill-advised shots-- i counted at least 4 or 5 last night-- it's going to be tough for the knicks to excel beyond the first round. the flipside of the ill-advised shots: passing out of converging doubles. he did it a few times but you just knew he could not sustain that focus and poise-- his habit is to get shot happy and that isn't going to fly.

7-16 but 1-6 from 3 = shot happy. good news is he is finally defending with some heart and he seems to be finishing at the rim better than i remember him ever as a knickerbocker.

here is a key stat: 54.4% true shooting through 3 games. this is below average for a great scorer. it needs to be a whole lot closer to 60% if he is going truly help the team win in the playoffs. PLAYOFFS

As long as Melo's doing it on both ends of the court, it has a trickle down effect on the whole team. Defense wins Championships, I could care less about True Shooting Percentages. Believe the Knicks were +20 in the plus/minus category while Carmelo Anthony was on the floor.

on defense you're preaching to the choir. don't have much patience for the +/- stat to be honest. what's it good for? no doubt the way melo handles himself on defense has a trickle-down effect-- that is one mark of a leader... how he plays defense and makes hustle plays.

but you can't at the same time tell me that bad shot selection doesn't also have a trickle-down effect. eventually poor shots undermine cohesion and focus. we are looking at three games at the beginning of the season, not 3 games against a second round playoff team.

all of our focus on this team should be informed by how well they look as a strong second-round playoff team.

The attention Melo draws had elevated our 3pt shooting for all the players around him. So you take that true shooting % of Melo and then look at the TS of all the players that he has helped get easier shots by causing the ripple effect in the defense.

yeah i have heard this theory about how melo's "presence" on the court has a direct bearing on his teammates' raising their fg% and i am not buying it. the reason is that there is a direct relationship between passing out of doubles to finding the open man to shoot in rhythm and guess what melo has never been very good at that. far from it. we see him forcing a few shots a game whether a rushed 3-pointer or forcing a shot over a double team or jab-stepping to nowhere.

i'd say that the true shooting percentage is a more a "personal" statistic that simply indicates individual efficiency with an indirect or secondary effect on overall team play. when high it tends to help a team and when average or low it tends to hurt the team.

I may have overstated him raising guys TS%. Wasn't really what I meant. What he really does is get guys a lot more open looks from 3 then they would if he was not in the game. If you knock down those 3s like we have been doing we get the results we have been getting for the last 20+games. If you don't then you get the results we had when we had Fields, Douglas and Bibby in our backcourt missing open shot after open shot after open shot.

how does he get guys open looks other than being part of a squad that prizes ball movement over holding on to the ball? breen observed the other night that you want melo to find a balance between when to pass and when to take a guy off the dribble. he has yet to find that balance but when he does then he will have maximized his ability to make others better. he isn't a playmaker like pierce so what we are left with is his recognition that a hockey assist is more often more helpful than bulling his way into the lane against a good defender or occasionally two defenders. and on occasion when he is in fact doubled then its' a no-brainer: you pass the rock.

what i am saying is that your pinning the success of his teammates' three point shooting on melo is misguided. lionize him for improved defense and finishing better at the rim and making a hustle play or two, but improved 3-point shooting has more to do with overall ball movement-- in which he plays a part-- than his mere presence. just take a look at san antonio or boston and compare them to when the knicks have been "on" and cohesive. that's what d'antoni meant when he said "the ball has energy" because by moving the ball you eventually find the man with the best look and usually find him in rhythm to shoot. it's an echo of holzman saying "find the open man." zen-like in its simplicity but a timeless truth nonetheless.

The hot 3 pt shooting has dated back to when Woodson took over and handed Melo the keys last season, something has to give. There was no Felton, Kidd or Pablo on that squad. There was a faded Davis, Bibby, Shump, JR, Fields and Novak.

Even when we had Bibby and Douglas and Fields as our guard rotation early. We didn't have quality Pg play at all yet they got tons of open looks that they missed. So where was the ball movement and the open looks comming from?

Uptown wrote:

dk7th wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

tkf wrote:

ChuckBuck wrote:

fishmike wrote:fail. Swap Melo with Iggy, Gallo, Paul Pierce... any good 3 and we are still 3-0

Im glad we are winning games rather than losing but we spanked Phili who doesnt have their franchise player and the Heat who didnt want to be there.

Let just be realistic

Hey fishmike, I thought Amare was the best player on the Knicks???

Don't you mean the Knicks won without their franchise player?

he sure isn't being used that way....if this team was being built around amare and the pick and roll, i could see your point tho.. but it isn't..

I'm just teasing fm, since he has topless pics of Amare on his car dashboard, and has a tattoo "STAT4LIFE" on his buttocks...JOKING!

In all seriousness, Knixkik is 100% on the money. Melo is not Lebron, but if you surround him with the right pieces, his team can make a deep a run as anyone (see 2009 WCF). Though, we still need a healthy Amare to be an offensive juggernaut in the 2nd unit, to make a legit run at the crown.

sorry but unless melo cuts back on the ill-advised shots-- i counted at least 4 or 5 last night-- it's going to be tough for the knicks to excel beyond the first round. the flipside of the ill-advised shots: passing out of converging doubles. he did it a few times but you just knew he could not sustain that focus and poise-- his habit is to get shot happy and that isn't going to fly.

7-16 but 1-6 from 3 = shot happy. good news is he is finally defending with some heart and he seems to be finishing at the rim better than i remember him ever as a knickerbocker.

here is a key stat: 54.4% true shooting through 3 games. this is below average for a great scorer. it needs to be a whole lot closer to 60% if he is going truly help the team win in the playoffs. PLAYOFFS

Show me a scorer, I'll show you 5-8 ill-advised shots per game, regardless of the name on the back of the jersey. From Durant, to Kobe, to Pierce, to Wade, all the way down to Lin and JR Smith. Scorer's take tough shots. It happens. You just dont want a team full of tough-shot-takers. One-to-two is more than enough for one team, as long as you surround them with ball-movers, defenders, a spot-up shooter or two, and guys who know their limitations and wont step outside of the system, then you are on your way.

Honestly, you need tough shot takers/makers when things bog down on the playoffs. When the other team puts a cage around your system guys and they cant shake free. When your tendencies are scouted so well, the other team not only knows your play before you call it, but they know your children's names, ya spouses pet name, and where ya momma shops. That tough-shot-taker/maker can beat good defenses.

well you list some formidable players here but only one of them takes too many tough shots: bryant. pierce is quite selective. wade somewhat less so because he has never been a consistent outside shooter. durant is learning to be more selective even as he is the most gifted shooter. all these things are reflected in their eFG%. bryant 48.8; wade 49.9; pierce 50.2; durant 50.6.

melo 47.9 way off the pace. yes a single percentage point is a big deal because the measure, although it appears mathematical, is in fact geometrical in terms of floor impact.

so if bryant takes too many and is trailing by over a percentage point then what does it say about melo who trails by over two?

it's a team game and scoring is but one part of success-- axiomatically important but not exclusively. so when a guy is not really all that efficient he must make up for that in every other aspect of the game. thus far throughout his entire career he has not and the result has been underachievement, regardless of the playoff opponent. now for three games he has tried to get better in those other aspects of the game such as rebounding, hustle plays, and defense-- and he gets credit from me for that. i still think he needs to get to the line 7-8 times a game, which is directly related to his taking too many "adrenaline 3 point shots."

playoff success in my opinion has more to do with playing a cohesive team game on both ends of the floor than "making tough shots." i want to see melo contribute in the former manner than having to rely on the latter. wouldn't you?

Amar'e has no choice but to move without the ball once he comes back. Him being a threat in the low post is nice but I don't see that working so great if he continues driving into double and triple teams. If he continues that our chemistry on the court will get shot. Hopefully he's watching reeeeeal good and working on that mid range shot of his. That would work out beautifully as well.

newyorknewyork wrote:
Watch from 55secs on and tell me what you see.

This video shows it all.

SMH at your clearly disingenuous posting.

knickscity wrote:

tkf wrote:

newyorknewyork wrote:

tkf wrote:melo is a sure thing to do what? the key is to win, and we all know the draft and young players can be a gamble, but if you are doing your homework more so than not you will come out with the right players... trying to recycle melo over and over again, is not going to get you a ring....at some point you have to make good decisions on how you are going to move forward.... You guys seem like you want to hold onto carmelo win a few games, and wait until his value dips and then try to move him.. it doesn't work that way... you have to be smart and proactive, not reactive... if melo doesn't win with this team now.. time to hit the reset button.. no excuses....

So in the Lebron James draft you wouldn't have taken Carmelo Anthony as doing homework on him would tell you that he wouldn't be a franchise player?

I agree there is no excuses for Melo not to have more playoff success with this squad then he has had in the past. I am not looking to move Carmelo Anthony im trying to see him put in a position to succeed.

what does that have to do with the situation we are in now... there are a lot of players I would have taken in a lot of drafts that I would not keep trying to rebuild around after so many years of not getting it done...

History doesn't agree with you, Melo can be a winner, but it takes talent around him no different than any other player.

I guess according to you Pierce should have been traded, the Lakers should have sent Kobe to the Bulls, and the Mavs should have given up on Dirk.

The point is beef up the talent and then judge.

He has the needed talent now, and 2-3 years to get that done.

HISTORY is on my side.. look at his playoff record....

I guess according to you Pierce should have been traded, the Lakers should have sent Kobe to the Bulls, and the Mavs should have given up on Dirk.

If the celtics were going to continue to build a team centered around pierce then yes.. but instead they built a team centered around 3 players.. knicks continue to try to build the Denver nuggets.. that team was not a championship team...

As far as kobe.. why bring him into the discussion? he won 5 rings... I don't see your point here..

Dirk? he isn't a playoff loser like carmelo,again I don't see your point here...