Melo's new groove

[MaNuMaNiAc]

Melo's new groove

by Mark Stein, ESPN.com

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs2005/dailydime



Have you heard the one about Vince Carter winning Comeback Player of the Year in the same season?

Hold on.

Carmelo Anthony's second-half resurrection is right there with Vince's, even though the NBA doesn't award a comeback trophy during or after its season, and even though Melo's playoff run lasted a game or two less than expected.

Anthony's second visit to the playoffs was a bumpy one, if not quite as rough as last spring's Minnesota series, but he rallied against the Spurs just as he rallied during Denver's 25-4 rush to finish the regular season. Which moves you to say that a good bit of Melo's rep has been restored.

Or did you not notice how the consensus best team in the West made stopping Melo its entire defensive focus?

The Spurs really did. For three games, Anthony couldn't escape the attentions of Spurs stopper Bruce Bowen and Bowen's double-team helpers, frustrating Melo to the point that he committed an over-the-line foul on Manu Ginobili late in Game 3 that earned the 20-year-old an ejection.

Melo, though, rebounded with 53 points in the final two games against the Spurs' swarm, just as he gradually distanced himself from a string of controversies (dating all the way back to last summer's Olympics) to click in reasonably quick fashion with new Nuggets coach George Karl.

The partnership with Karl didn't start out blissfully, of course, but they're certainly united now. Melo concedes that Furious George is dead-on right when Karl tells him that he needs to be more selective with shots and drastically increase his defensive intensity. And Karl has been handling the kid better ever since he stepped back and realized that Anthony, despite leading Syracuse to an NCAA le as a freshman and immediately becoming a 20-point man in the NBA, is about the same as George's son Coby, who plays at Boise State.

"It feels like an end," Karl said after Denver's Game 5 elimination defeat Wednesday night, "but it's really a beginning."

Indeed. Denver failed to impose its up-tempo pace even once after its Game 1 upset on the road -- and Kenyon Martin's debut playoff series out West was another disappointment -- but these look more like the Nuggets we envisioned going into the season. They still need a proven shooter-scorer at the two to help open up the floor and take some pressure off Melo, and perhaps a bit more frontline bulk ... but they've got a young franchise player who's growing up fast.

He doesn't want to be a mere All-Star Weekend ambassador ever again, which is why Anthony has promised Karl to take less than a month off before getting back in the gym. "They won't be a seventh seed next year," said Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, serious as ever.

[GSH]

The T-Wolves had largely the same group of players that had the best regular season record last year, and made it to the West finals. They didn't make the playoffs this year. It was all about team chemistry, and character - or a lack of them.

Kobe Bryant is an incredible player, and can be counted on for 30+ on any given night. His team didn't make the playoffs.

LeBron James was in the highlight reels all season long. He has great skills, and no doubt will be a star in the league for many years to come. He didn't make the playoffs.

What Carmello and the Nuggets need is not more gym time. They need to grow up, develop a little character, and a lot more team chemistry. After Game 4, Carmello's analysis was, "We didn't get the ball to me". (Meaning to Carmello.) That was in a game where his 5'5" teammate scored 30 points. He should have been talking about how the team should have done more to support Boykins.

The real question is where the players are going to learn about character. George Karl has proven he is great with X's and O's. But his excuses and comments after each game didn't impress me. The Nuggets probably won't be a 7-seed next season. But they will almost certainly be like some of Karl's other talented teams - runners up.

[Useruser666]

So true! The Nuggets are just so immature. They don't act like champions.