And there is a huge gap between “deferring” and “running the offense” so I don’t know how you got “you would like Melo to defer most of the game” out of my belief that running the offense you’re supposed to run is ultimately the best thing for the team.

This is what is nutty about the fervent defense of Melo right now: people are making up criticisms to deflect. Somebody says that Melo could have shared the ball more, and the response is “HOW CAN YOU BLAME HIM FOR THE LOSS HE SCORED SO MANY POINTS!!” Nobody blamed him for the loss, and because they’re taking things to such extremes it causes them to say some silly things.

The Melo defense team here needs to take a step back and calm down a bit.

I get the idea that as a/the leader of the team, the buck stops with Melo. Fine, sure good. But when the rest of the team shoots a combined 53/157 in the 3 losses, whose fault is it really? And at what point do you stop blaming Melo for passing it to guys who – let’s face it – wouldn’t be playing at all on most good teams in the league?

Whatever – it’s all moot at this point. Amare and Shumpert are probably back tonight, and BD will be back within a few weeks hopefully. We’ll have less of Bibby playing 15-20 min and bricking every open shot, less Bill Walker and his fear of shooting and stupid fouls/turnovers. Of course, we’ll have more Amare looking around as his man gets the offensive rebound and putback!

xduckshoex: Well if you have cold teammates, for the good of the team you should stop giving them the ball so that they can’t warm up and then the defense can safely ignore them. That’s just smart basketball, folks.

This is silly. Melo did all that he could to keep his team in the game. Sometimes it means taking tougher shots when guys are either hesitating to take open shots, or consistently missing them. You’d like Melo to defer most of the game, regardless of the score or size of deficit, so that he can eventually take the most efficient shots… that is, under the assumption the defense eventually respects floor spacing…..

Guess what? If Melo was wired that way he wouldn’t be the great player he is, certainly not the great scorer or clutch “difficult” shot-maker.

But much more importantly…
Melo could have easily had a triple double last night if guys were making open shots at a respectable rate. If his teammates shoot just a mediocre percentage on those looks, who knows what his scoring efficiency and final line looks like— certainly it would have been a win, given the defensive perofrmance.

Melo is in a no-win situation with most Knicks fans. It blows my mind that he is getting the brunt of the criticism in a game where he was clearly the best player on the floor, and clearly making the decisions a super star should make….do his best to make his teammates better and facilitate the offense and try to lead a comeback when everyone else is struggling.

You think any other great player who is a great scorer does something different?

xduckshoex: I don’t know why this comparison keeps coming up. Durant does not initiate the offense for his team, he comes off screens in catch and shoot or catch an attack scenarios more than anything. You might as well be saying “oranges are more citrusy than apples!”.

Melo never initiated the offense in Denver yet he averaged higher assist numbers and assist percentage every year Durant’s been in the league. They are both high-usage small-fowards with, granted, different skill-sets (with Melo being the better passer). However, this notion that Melo does not pass enough, given his traditional role in the offense, is far fetched when compared to 3s and iso 4s who do the same thing…

What I suspect, though, is that their short rotation will eventually hurt them. You can’t rely that much on your starters, not in a shortened season like this. And especially when your center platoon is a combined 200 years old.

As for Atlanta, the wild card for them was always going to be Teague. If he really made “the leap,” like he looked like he was ready to do in the Playoffs, then they were going to be a good team. However, even more importantly, it seems like in this shortened season, veteran teams have done better than teams still figuring things out (which makes logical sense, of course, as the lack of training camp would hurt teams that haven’t practiced together more than teams that have). I think that that was something that lots of folks (myself included) discounted. However, look at Atlanta and Orlando – both teams that people slept on, but both teams that were bringing back their entire starting lineups from last season.

@129 Yeah, for whatever reason, the Hawks look awesome – better than anyone in the league, so far. Not that I expect them to dominate in May, but you have to wonder – with the schedule so front-loaded, could they jump out front and end up with that #3 seed, or even #2?