Aldridge, Bynum,KG,Josh Smith,Griffin,Horford and Kyrie Irving is laughable
Most of those guys I said was a toss up. But if I was the knicks GM id take kyrie over carmelo. Knicks dont need aldridge bynum kg smith griffin horford bc they already have amare and chandler...but you better believe boston would not deal kg for carmelo and LA would not deal bynum for carmelo
It's silly to compare centers and small forwards. LA wouldn't trade Bynum for Melo because if they did they would no longer have a center. Garnett is a HOFer, but he's old. Comparing him to Melo is even more difficult. Paul Pierce, Kobe Bryant, KD & James make sense. Among those, he's probably toasted the bottom.
Melo is a great scorer, but that alone doesn't make him a great player.
LeBron James is better then every single player in the league. That goes without saying. Melo isn't just a great scorer, he is a very underrated passer, he can handle the ball, he is among the best rebounders in the league at his position, and he can and very much did play some very good man to man defense down the stretch when the team began using a more defensive oriented gameplan . He also is not only a great scorer, he is the best and most well rounded scorer in the NBA. He can spot up shoot, he can get to the line, he can finish above the rim, he can post up, he can drive by you with quickness or bully his way into the paint with his strength, and his mid-range game is best in the NBA. He is a dynamic scorer who still hasn't even had a training camp with Amare Stoudemire, Jeremy Lin and Tyson Chandler. He hasn't had an offseason or preseason to prepare with his team since he got here, and there was more or less no practicing in the NBA last year. That said, things really came together for the Knicks at the end of the season, yeah they ran into a Miami buzzsaw and lost in 5. So did OKC. The Knicks showed some seriously encouraging signs towards the end of the season.
Is there that much of a difference between Melo and all of the other guys you named, though, outside of Lebron? Paul Pierce was considered a loser for most of his career, until he had Ray Allen and KG join up with him. Now he's a clutch big game performer and a hall of famer. Kobe Bryant came into the league and had immediate success...with the most dominant player this side of Wilt Chamberlain, in his prime. When Shaq left, Kobe struggled immensely(in a team success aspect), he missed playoffs completely in some years, and his character was questioned, that is until he got Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum emerged, and now he (Kobe) is the most driven, competitive cold blooded winner we have seen since Jordan. KD currently plays with 2 guys on his team who are better then any player Carmelo Anthony has ever played with (outside of possibly a year or two Melo played with Chauncey, where he and the Nuggets thrived), and they have a dominant shot blocking presence there as well.
Carmelo consistently took pretty crummy Denver teams to the playoffs pretty much by himself. Yeah, he got knocked out early every year, but so did Kobe with the Shaqless Lakers. Dwayne Wade didn't do shit without Shaq, early playoff exits and missed playoffs altogether. Steve Nash has missed the playoffs a couple years running now that he is alone, and we don't criticize him, we just call him the best PG ever.
The thing about the NBA, is that, if you're a really good player who plays on a team that isn't really good, you are considered a loser by a large population of NBA fans, mostly because the media is stupid and lazy, and Americans are generally a stupid and lazy people who don't really like to think that much and just regurgitate what they see on ESPN.
Melo will be seen as a loser and a cancer until he wins a ring. Which he probably will, because he is a winner, and he is really, really good. Watch what happens this year, with a full training camp with Melo, Lin, Stat, Chandler. They may not win a chip, but they will win their division and I think very possibly get a 2 or 3 seed and make a lot of noise in the post-season, and the perception of Melo will change completely.