Carmelo Signed by the Blazers

lovegtm

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The Celtics should see what Portland would give for Semi. He breathes air and is a wing!
 

Sam Ray Not

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Still think Olshey should try (or should have tried) for a McCollum-for-Wiggins swap. And still kinda think it’s Minnesota, not Portland, who says no.
 

DJnVa

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Not a huge deal, but title says "traded". He was a FA.
 

benhogan

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This is coming from a Cuse fan that is forever grateful for 2003

BUT can the Portland Trailblazers sabotage themselves anymore? What a perplexing 6 months for Portland fans.

Has anyone put a mirror up to Melo's mouth recently? I'd probably take Semi over him.
 

HomeRunBaker

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This is coming from a Cuse fan that is forever grateful for 2003

BUT can the Portland Trailblazers sabotage themselves anymore? What a perplexing 6 months for Portland fans.

Has anyone put a mirror up to Melo's mouth recently? I'd probably take Semi over him.
I was a huge Melo fan in his prime and felt his career was ruined by his desire to play in New York. When you have awful teammates you have to be selfish to give your team a chance to win and this began the ruination of his HOF career.

I was also a huge Melo detractor as he did not age gracefully and his brief stint in Houston was a trainwreck.

Having said all that...….after playing all of 10 games over the past year and a half he has stepped into the NBA without a training camp after missing essentially all of last season and is putting up counting numbers mimicking those of his career averages with better shooting numbers...….yes, well aware of the small sample but I was expecting him to put up Isaiah-like numbers from the past couple of years. While I've only seen him briefing in his first game, in which he was awful, I am intrigued enough to watch a Blazers game this week.
 

Nick Kaufman

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Nate Silver tweeted that his offense wasn't enough to make up for his poor defense and that he was thus a net negative.
 

Van Everyman

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I was a huge Melo fan in his prime and felt his career was ruined by his desire to play in New York. When you have awful teammates you have to be selfish to give your team a chance to win and this began the ruination of his HOF career.

I was also a huge Melo detractor as he did not age gracefully and his brief stint in Houston was a trainwreck.

Having said all that...….after playing all of 10 games over the past year and a half he has stepped into the NBA without a training camp after missing essentially all of last season and is putting up counting numbers mimicking those of his career averages with better shooting numbers...….yes, well aware of the small sample but I was expecting him to put up Isaiah-like numbers from the past couple of years. While I've only seen him briefing in his first game, in which he was awful, I am intrigued enough to watch a Blazers game this week.
I haven’t watched a game of his yet but it seems like there is a lot of goodwill toward Melo in this league and a lot of people rooting for him here. Given his reputation as a legitimately good guy, it’s a nice story.
 

TripleOT

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Six games in, coming back to the NBA off the street, at age 35, Melo has the highest eFG of his career. Even if he's horrible at defense, that's not easy to do. After jumping into a new defensive system at NBA senior citizen age, was anyone expecting Marcus Smart level defense?
 

Sam Ray Not

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There's hyperbole ... and then there's "if Carmelo Anthony keeps up some semblance of this play for the rest of the season, this will go down as the greatest free agent signing in history."

I mean, I'm happy for Melo, who does seem like a genuinely nice guy. But it's a 184-minute sample size, which makes both Sopan Deb's tweet and Nate Silver's statistical retort rather worthless. Even setting aside sample-size issues, tho: 20.7 points per 36 on .543 true shooting is not all that. Ray Allen and Steve Nash both put up .615 ts at age 35. Vince Carter Warlord of Mars was .565 last season at age 42.

Also, Sopan's mileage may vary, but I'd reserve "greatest signing in history" talk for teams that are at least fringe title contenders. If we're talking about smart signings by scrub teams: Ky Bowman on his ~$80K two-way contract is putting up a +10.8 net plus-minus, best mark by far on the worst team in the league / five-time defending Western champs.
 
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HomeRunBaker

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Nate Silver tweeted that his offense wasn't enough to make up for his poor defense and that he was thus a net negative.
Oh, I didn't doubt this at all. I just expected MUCH worse like last two years Isaiah-worse not just below average. His game hasn't evolved, he hasn't played in nearly two years and had no training camp with a new team. To me, "below average" for Carmelo facing these circumstances is a positive result for him. It was his absolute ceiling.
 

InstaFace

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There's hyperbole ... and then there's "if Carmelo Anthony keeps up some semblance of this play for the rest of the season, this will go down as the greatest free agent signing in history."

I mean, I'm happy for Melo, who does seem like a genuinely nice guy. But it's a 184-minute sample size, which makes both Sopan Deb's tweet and Nate Silver's statistical retort rather worthless. Even setting aside sample-size issues, tho: 20.7 points per 36 on .543 true shooting is not all that. Ray Allen and Steve Nash both put up .615 ts at age 35. Vince Carter Warlord of Mars was .565 last season at age 42.

Also, Sopan's mileage may vary, but I'd reserve "greatest signing in history" talk for teams that are at least fringe title contenders. If we're talking about smart signings by scrub teams: Ky Bowman on his ~$80K two-way contract is putting up a +10.8 net plus-minus, best mark by far on the worst team in the league / five-time defending Western champs.
Right I mean, say what you will about the long-term for those teams, but the Heat and Warriors signed LeBron/Bosh and Durant respectively out of free agency and each won two titles in the following 3 years.

The Vince Carter comp is going to be an amusing one to trot out, though, because it's one that Melo can't win. If he's better it's cause he's younger, and if he's worse, well, how embarrassing, right?
 

benhogan

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If we're talking about smart signings by scrub teams: Ky Bowman on his ~$80K two-way contract is putting up a +10.8 net plus-minus, best mark by far on the worst team in the league / five-time defending Western champs.
This is good stuff, keep it coming. I'm keeping an eye on the Warriors. I see them re-loading for a 2-3yr run starting next season, which lines up with the Celtics title ambitions.
I see Bob packaging all these kids (Bowman, Paschall, Poole etc) that are getting valuable NBA minutes & a high 2020 pick & future picks & D.Lo for a couple of studs that line up with Dray, Steph, Klay, Looney. Plus throw in a few ring chasers (AI's return) and an MLE.

As far as Carmelo, he is the real deal/good guy IMO. He spent one season at Syracuse, delivered their only Championship and then sent millions to the University to build a state of the art practice facility. Most small, private northeast schools are massively disadvantaged against the large, tax-payer funded state schools with their unlimited sports budgets for facilities. Melo tried to go home/make something happen with the Knicks, but no one is overcoming Dolan and their front office ineptness.
 
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Kliq

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This is good stuff, keep it coming. I'm keeping an eye on the Warriors. I see them re-loading for a 2-3yr run starting next season, which lines up with the Celtics title ambitions.
I see Bob packaging all these kids (Bowman, Paschall, Poole etc) that are getting valuable NBA minutes & a high 2020 pick & future picks & D.Lo for a couple of studs that line up with Dray, Steph, Klay, Looney. Plus throw in a few ring chasers (AI's return) and an MLE.

As far as Carmelo, he is the real deal/good guy IMO. He spent one season at Syracuse, delivered their only Championship and then sent millions to the University to build a state of the art practice facility. Most small, private northeast schools are massively disadvantaged against the large, tax-payer funded state schools with their unlimited sports budgets for facilities. Melo tried to go home/make something happen with the Knicks, but no one is overcoming Dolan and their front office ineptness.
Oh, poor Syracuse! Their 1.5 billion endowment, 23,000 students and their 35,000 seat basketball arena. They don't have a chance to compete if it wasn't for generous players like Melo!
 

luckiestman

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Oh, poor Syracuse! Their 1.5 billion endowment, 23,000 students and their 35,000 seat basketball arena. They don't have a chance to compete if it wasn't for generous players like Melo!

I've said it before, but I guess worth repeating. I was told that "Carmelo Anthony has a heart of gold" by someone when I was at a work event in Baltimore.
 

Kliq

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I've said it before, but I guess worth repeating. I was told that "Carmelo Anthony has a heart of gold" by someone when I was at a work event in Baltimore.
Oh this was not meant at a shot at Carmelo at all. I actually haven't heard much about his charity work but a lot of these guys do great, great things without much publicity. I was replying to benhogan labeling Syracuse as a "small, private Northeast school at a massive disadvantage to the large public schools."
 

HomeRunBaker

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Nice highlight package, with a couple of flashy passes, and some decent lift on a few dunks. He does look a little Kevin Duckworth-y in the 00 Blazers uni.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8NKnNxKZ7c
I don't think it's only the 00 that is making Melo look Duck-worthy. RIP Duck.



This is good stuff, keep it coming. I'm keeping an eye on the Warriors. I see them re-loading for a 2-3yr run starting next season, which lines up with the Celtics title ambitions.
I see Bob packaging all these kids (Bowman, Paschall, Poole etc) that are getting valuable NBA minutes & a high 2020 pick & future picks & D.Lo for a couple of studs that line up with Dray, Steph, Klay, Looney. Plus throw in a few ring chasers (AI's return) and an MLE.
Unheralded young players getting rotation minutes on historically bad teams are going to be lucky to be in the league in a few years much less carrying actual trade value. Guys like Jordan Poole with his 33% eFG numbers are more likely to be betting against their former teams in Vegas than they are returning value to the Warriors via trade.
 

Kliq

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I don't think it's only the 00 that is making Melo look Duck-worthy. RIP Duck.





Unheralded young players getting rotation minutes on historically bad teams are going to be lucky to be in the league in a few years much less carrying actual trade value. Guys like Jordan Poole with his 33% eFG numbers are more likely to be betting against their former teams in Vegas than they are returning value to the Warriors via trade.
Yeah, it reminds me a bit of the Hinkie Sixers. You might be able to find one guy that has real value (Covington, in the case of Philly) by scraping the bottom of the barrel but most of guys are just roster filler soaking up minutes.
 

benhogan

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Oh, poor Syracuse! Their 1.5 billion endowment, 23,000 students and their 35,000 seat basketball arena. They don't have a chance to compete if it wasn't for generous players like Melo!
Yea I never thought Cuse was at a disadvantage until I noticed they couldn't afford (or the University wouldn't payout) to change the turf in the Dome. Donvan McNabb came up with a few $$$ about 5yrs ago and made the update. It was really run down, painted over and embarrassing. The University just draws the line on sports, only basketball makes them some money, they lose big money on football (never mind the future concussion liabilities). The Carrier Dome, a football stadium that is refitted for hoops, is finally getting an update 40yrs after it was built.

According to a few UConn alums, they felt Boston College (and Cuse to some extent) blackballed them from the ACC since their facilities were far superior to both those programs. Training rooms/practice facilities/special housing is a huge draw for top-notch recruits/athletes.
 
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