Tag Archives: Wilson Chandler

It’s been a few weeks since I blogged about the possibility of the Knicks getting ‘Melo (here, if you missed it or want to read it again).  Well, the guys on local sports radio are still talking about it (and so are the guys on the podcasts I listen to), so I might as well keep going.

Add him, Knicks.  Like, yesterday.

From the people who don’t think it makes sense for the Knicks to acquire him, I hear two general themes: (1) that he isn’t “efficient” on offense, and (2) that he isn’t very good on defense.  I’ll address them in turn.

He Isn’t “Efficient” On Offense: As the argument goes, Carmelo takes a bunch of bad shots, and is a “ball-stopper.”  The guys who make this argument back it up with some new-age statistics.  I’d respond with some statistics of my own, but, in my experience, people typically aren’t interested in reading nerds argue about basketball statistics and, well, I’m having enough trouble recruiting readers as it is.  So I’ll stay away from a heavy statistical argument.

Here’s the deal: the Nuggets were 17-65 the season before Carmelo arrived.  Now, they’re consistently one of the top-10 offensive teams in the league, as measured by total points scored.  (Last year – #3; 2008-09 – #6)  During each of those seasons, Carmelo was their leading scorer.

So… either Carmelo is “efficient” on offense, or Nene and the Birdman have been operating at a level of “efficiency” never seen before, in order to make up for his deficiencies.  I don’t need complicated statistics to tell me which of those two things has been going on in Denver.

He Isn’t Very Good On Defense: Some Knicks fans believe that Carmelo, on the defensive end, represents a significant dropoff from Wilson Chandler. To hear them talk about it, you’d think that Wilson Chandler plays D like Scottie Pippen, and Carmelo gets all of his points by cherry-picking.

Talking about defense is tricky, for at least two reasons: (1) it’s harder to measure statistically than offense, and (2) even when watching a game, it’s easier to identify good offense than good defense – the difference between “good defense” and “bad defense” on a given possession can be imperceptible to a casual observer, like, for example, a good defender getting his hand within 2 inches of a shot and a bad defender getting within 4 inches of a shot.

Frankly, I haven’t sat down with hours of video comparing Carmelo and Wilson Chandler reacting on defense in similar situations.  So, maybe I’m just missing something.  But I’ve seen enough of Wilson Chandler to know that he’s no Scottie Pippen, and I’ve seen enough of Carmelo to know that, whatever his defensive shortcomings may be, he’s spent his entire NBA career as the best player on a playoff team.  (And he won the national championship during his only year at Syracuse.)  If he’s not playing any defense, opposing coaches are doing a pretty lousy job taking advantage of that.

And the statistics, for what they’re worth, undermine the argument that Chandler is a significantly better defender than Carmelo.  Chandler, for his career, averages .7 steals per game, .9 blocks per game, and 5.3 rebounds per game.  (As my coach always said, rebounding is a part of defense, because getting a rebound takes an opportunity away from the other team to score.)  Carmelo, for his career, averages 1.1 steals per game, .5 blocks per game, and 6.3 rebounds per game. Consider that Carmelo plays more minutes per game, and it’s about a statistical wash.

Yes, I understand that the Knicks would be giving up more than just Wilson Chandler, but Chandler, from what I’m hearing, would be the main piece.  Landry Fields is good, and draft picks are nice to have, but those things shouldn’t hold up a trade for Carmelo Anthony.

At bottom, there are two fundamental reasons to get Carmelo: the first is that he’s one of only a handful of players in the league – there are, what, 10 of them? – with a track record of consistently being the primary scorer on a high-scoring offense.  Wilson Chandler… not so much.  The second is that, when your team has Mike D’Antoni as its coach and Amar’e Stoudamire as its big man, nobody’s going to confuse you for the Bad Boy Pistons on the defensive end.  Your formula is to score a whole bunch o’ points, and play just enough defense to hold your opponents to about 105 points per game.  Carmelo fits — he improves the team on offense, and, even if he does nothing else on D, his offensive prowess provides the Knicks with the luxury of plugging defensive-minded players like Turiaf into the lineup for more minutes.

Make the trade, Knicks.

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I wrote in the beginning of the season that one of the main storylines to keep an eye on is the evolution of the center position. (Here, in case you missed it the first time.)

Well, we’re almost halfway through the season, and, crunching the data regarding the center position specifically, the first conclusion to draw is that, well… um… there really isn’t much to base a conclusion on. That’s because so many of the centers have been hurt for significant chunks of time. If you play center in the NBA, chances are high that you’re having trouble walking these days. Apparently, having a “C” next to your name on an NBA roster means that you’re likely to be Crippled, or even that you might be Cursed.

Check it out: Yao is out for the season, and might be done forever. Oden, too. Bynum can never seem to give the Lakers a long stretch of healthy productivity. Kaman can’t get back on the court for the Clippers. Okur has hardly been available for the Jazz. The Suns might be a playoff team if Robin Lopez could return to the form he was in for parts of last year’s playoffs. And the Bulls could potentially be lethal — if they could keep their center, Joakim Noah, healthy.

Looking at all these injuries, I postulate that human bodies approaching or exceeding 7 feet in length are just not meant to run up and down a basketball court at the speed of today’s game. Actually, strike that. I don’t “postulate” anything — I’m trying to build up my street cred, and people with street cred don’t “postulate” things. Please let me try again… Looking at all these injuries, I hoopserve that human bodies approaching or exceeding 7 feet in length are just not meant to run up and down a basketball court at the speed of today’s game.

Nice. Now I got my street cred intact.

With my street cred intact, I’m ready for a few other hoopservations about the current state of the center position:
1a. If a team has a 7 foot body it can roll out onto the court, who can both walk straight and catch a basketball, that team is in good shape. Bonus points if the guy was born in the 1970’s, and was a force 5 or more years ago. He doesn’t have to be able to move fast or jump high. So long as he’s 7 feet tall and in one piece, you can fake your way through having a real center. Just roll him out there and hope nobody notices. It’s basically like Weekend at Bernie’s, if Bernie was 7 feet tall and used to be a good basketball player. Evidence in support of my point: Big Z in Miami. Duncan in San Antonio. And, of course, Shaq.
1b. If a team has a center who can stay relatively healthy, and produces about 12 points, 9 rebounds, and 2 blocks, it has a distinct advantage over other teams. In fact, if a team has such a guy, that team is almost certainly a playoff team. Evidence in support of my point: Roy Hibbert (13.5 ppg, 8 rpg, 1.8 bpg), Andrew Bogut (13.5 ppg, 11.4 rpg, 2.8 bpg), and Emeka Okafor (10.9 ppg, 9.8 rpg, 1.8 bpg).

2. It’s possible to win the battle of the paint armed only with a capable power forward. The numbers that some power forwards are putting up are just silly. They’re like video game numbers. I’m talking about Amar’e (26.4 ppg, 9 rpg, 2.3 bpg), Blake Griffin (21.7 ppg and 12.5 rpg), and Kevin Love (20.6 ppg and 15.6 rpg).

Where does this leave us? I think it’s wrong to say that a good power forward without a capable center alongside him is good enough to win with — in fact, it’s interesting that Blake and Love, with numbers like those, aren’t leading their teams to more victories. One possible explanation is that those guys don’t block shots (not the most meaningful stat in the world, but a good indicator of defensive presence in the paint) nearly as often as real centers do.  In contrast, Amar’e is blocking more than 2 shots per game.

Looking ahead, I’m psyched to see what the Bulls do when Noah and Boozer get to play together for a while, what the Lakers do when Bynum and Gasol develop a rhythm, whether the Mavs are able to get over the hump now that they have Chandler playing next to Nowitzki, and what the Hornets are able to do with West and Okafor. (And, as I’ve stated repeatedly, what the Clippers will do once Kaman and Griffin are playing together.)

In closing, let’s revisit the discussion about the Knicks trading for Carmelo, in light of this information. If they keep Felton and Stoudemire, then, with Carmelo and any mediocre perimeter shooter (Gallinari, Chandler, Fields, and Toney Douglas all fit the bill), they would be good enough on offense to play 4-on-5. That would enable them to play Turiaf (an offensive liability who is a presence on D) at center alongside Amar’e, giving them a distinct advantage over most teams in the league.

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