sorry, you're right, the .300 winning percentage teams he took over were better teams, he didn't make them any better.
2012--NYK 29-26 with him, 7-4 without him 2011--NYK 14-13 with him, 28-26 before trading for him 2011--DEN 29-21 with him, 21-11 after trading him 2010--DEN 45-24 with him, 8-5 without him 2009--DEN 45-21 with him, 9-7 without him Last 4 years combined, in seasons in which he played some or all of the season with a team, those teams are 162-105 (.607) with him, and 73-53 (.579) without him. Over an 82 game season, the difference between .607 and .579 is 2 games.
.207 .329 .488 .427 .280 .134 .256 .427 .500 .512 Those are the winning percentages of the Nuggets franchise the 10 years leading up to drafting Carmelo. .512, 10 years prior to drafting him was the best winning percentage they had. The lowest winning percentage a Denver Nugget team had since drafting Carmelo was .524 his rookie year. They were a better team after having drafted Carmelo than for an entire decade before they drafted him. But I guess he didn't make them better. A string of good luck randomly coincided with drafting him after a decade of bad luck.
This really is about Syracuse players as a whole. None of them are worth drafting where they are slotted
03-04--Melo's first year in Denver, also happened to be Andre Miller's first year there, and Marcus Camby's first full year there (he started all of 9 games the year prior). So yes, it's easily arguable that they would have been a .500 team that year without 'Melo, who put up a 17.6 PER (third on the team behind Miller and Camby) as a rookie shooting 42.6% from the field with a 28.5% usage rate. 04-05--'Melo's Nuggets were 17-25, before they hired George Karl, the first legitimately good coach they'd had since Doug Moe. They went 32-8 the rest of the way. I give more credit for the Nuggets becoming a respectable franchise to Miller/Camby, and then Karl than I do to 'Melo.
Because, one player barred, they underperform in such a universal sense that you can generalize a rule around them.
For the sake of argument I won't include Melo, but who was the last Syracuse player who lived up to his billing? Here is some info on Cuse players. Since 92, those wee the players drafted from Syracuse 92' - None 93' Conrad McRay 94' None 95' Lawrence Moutan 96' John Wallace 97' None 98' None 99' None 00 ' Eton Thomas, Jason Hart 01' Damone Brown 02' None 03' Carmelo Anthony 04' None 05' Hakim Warrick 06' None 07' Demitris Nichols 08' Donte Green 09' Jonny Flynn 10' Wesley Johnson, Andy Rautins 11' None
What do you thinks the cause of this? I don't buy into anything other than coincidence. What players outside of Derrick Coleman (who made AS games albeit) and Billy Owens were really high picks. That said, I don't like Waiters that much. I'd rather go after Wroten with a pick that late.
Just for reference -- here are the best draft sites: #1 - Draftexpress.com #2 - Swishscout.com #3 - NBAdraft.net #4 - nbadraftinsider.com
I've been on the PJ3 bandwagon for a long time, but as already mentioned, I do worry about his "motor", for lack of a better word. He has incredible physical tools, but at times he would just disappear during Baylor games. Still, with that talent, either the 6th or 11th pick is worth him, although he's the type that can keep climbing, and end up Top 3 or 4.
I see and maybe agree with that point, I was more wondering if you have any reasoning from the other side of it. Do you have any reasons as to why Syracuse players don't live up to the hype? Without causes from that point of view I don't know if I can come to the conclusion that Waiters won't be good simply because other Syracuse players weren't. Maybe that's just me.
