1:02pm: Haynes clarifies to Hoops Rumors that Lillard’s bonus comes from his shoe endorsement deal, not his NBA contract, so his cap hit remains the same for next season.
12:07pm: Lillard receives a $250K bonus for his third-team selection, reports Chris Haynes of CSNNW.com. Haynes doesn’t specify whether it was counted as a likely or unlikely bonus, but since Lillard signed the rookie scale contract just after going No. 6 overall in the 2012 draft, it’s almost certainly an unlikely bonus, meaning his cap figure for next season will receive a bump, just as with Noah.
11:27am: Kevin Durant, LeBron James, Joakim Noah, Chris Paul and James Harden make up the All-NBA First Team, the league announced. Stephen Curry, Blake Griffin, Kevin Love, Dwight Howard and Tony Parker are on the second team, while the third team is Al Jefferson, Paul George, LaMarcus Aldridge, Goran Dragic and Damian Lillard. The selection means George will earn roughly 27% of the salary cap next season, rather than 25%, as a result of the Derrick Rose Rule provision in his extension that kicks in for 2014/15.
Durant, the league’s MVP, was a unanimous first-team selection, while James received first-team nods from 124 of the 125 media voters. Curry was the highest vote-getter who failed to make the first team, collecting 65 first-team votes. The rest of the second team combined to receive just 30 first-team votes.
Carmelo Anthony came closest to making the teams among those who didn’t, followed by John Wall, Tim Duncan, DeMar DeRozan and Anthony Davis. A total of 22 players received first-team votes, while 39 got votes for at least one of the teams.
Noah’s first-team nod gives him a $500K bonus that was originally deemed unlikely. It’ll be added to his cap figure, but it probably won’t be enough to tip the Bulls over the luxury tax line this season, as they scrambled to make late season moves to avoid any scenario in which they would have to do so. The bonus will nonetheless impinge on Chicago’s cap flexibility for the summer ahead, since it will be counted as likely for 2014/15 and be a part of Noah’s cap hit, taking it from $12.2MM to $12.7MM.
This is disrespectful to Melo and Westbrook. These voters don’t know basketball. Anyone who knows ball would take Melo over Love, the overrated George, and Aldridge.
Because PPG is the only stat that matters right /sarcasm
There’s This Thing Called Rebounding And Melo Isn’t A Bad Defender Contrary To Popular Belief.
You know ball bro. Respect.
I like Melo a lot, and think he is a great player who was screwed over by an awful coach. But his team only had 37 wins in the East. He deserves no honors for that.
I’ll explain it to you because it seems like you know the game. Carmelo was 2nd team last season and earned the 2nd season in the East. This year, he had a better season but him team was awful and now these guys are better? Come on. Who can name the 2nd or 3rd best player on his team? He played with the worst starting PG in the league, the erratic JR Smith, the ghost of STAT and Chandler, and a stagnant Shumpert. Basketball is a team game and he didn’t have much help. To paraphrase the great Oscar Robertson, if you’re going to elevate a guy because his team is good, you can’t slight a guy because his team is bad. He’s not the GM, nor is he the coach. The fact that he shot 45% and had a career year in rebounding playing with those bums is amazing.
Westbrook, on the other hand, is a 2-guard masquerading at the point. If he played at his natural position and OKC had a true point guard, he would be the best SG in the league and it wouldn’t be close. His combination is athleticism and shooting is otherworldly. That’s why OKC will never trade him, no matter how many boneheaded plays he makes. You don’t get equal value for tantalizing talents like that. Goran Dragic and Lillard over him? Every GM would laugh in your face about that.
Seed*
I really like Melo, and think he should have made the playoffs. It isn’t so much that his team sucked, as much as Mike Woodson was the worst coach ever. I hate Felton (especially because I am a Blazer fan and he screwed us over), and JR should be better, but Woodson screwed him up. Stoudemire and Chandler were much worse this year, mostly because of injury. You could see how the Knicks struggled at the end of the game because their plan was, give it to Melo and watch him take a bad shot. There was a great comparison between Lillard and Melo for the last second shot in December, and it showed that the Knicks had a bad rotation because no one spaced the floor properly. This just shows how much Woodson screwed up. However, I like to see team success in these picks as well, because anyone can have really good stats but screw their team over. It takes more skill and leadership to lead your team somewhere. I agree that Melo should have potentially made it on there if you drop guys like Kevin Love out of there, who had no team success, and despite what some say, his team was actually better than what the record suggests.
Westbrook is a very athletic and talented player. He hits some incredible shots. However, what I don’t like about him is the fact that he runs horrible plays, and takes bad shots. I think it is probably Scott Brooks’ fault more than anything because he is supposed to create the plays, but if you watch him play, he takes bad shots when his team needs them the most, and has untimely turnovers. You seem to agree with the fact that he makes so many bonehead plays, which is why I don’t like him.
I am a Blazer fan, but I do agree that Westbrook is more talented than Lillard. However, I do think that Lillard leads the team better, and does do his role to feed his teammates much better than Aldridge. This is especially clear in their series with the Rockets.
To shorten my comment about Melo, I think he just got unlucky because of how his team was set up and what they did. However, he could just lead his team to one more win, they could have made it to the post season. 37 wins in the east, despite how bad your team is, does not warrant you honors over players who lead their teams to be successful.
Agree to disagree but I respect your respectful comments about the game of basketball.
Fair enough.
Do you disagree with my opinion on both Melo or Westbrook, or do you just strongly disagree with one of the comments?
The fact that you would take Lillard over Westbrook. Lillard takes his share of bad shots also. And with Carmelo, if you slight guys because their team, which they didn’t build, is bad, then you can’t elevate guys like George because they had a better team built by the organization. Carmelo was 2nd Team All-NBA last year and got snubbed this year while having a better year makes no sense. Guys like George that shoot 41% getting nods before a superior player just irks me.
Carmelo averaged the most rebounds out of James and Durant too. Melo was also second leading scorer also Melo had the best year of his career! Then they just disrespect him like this.
27 points 8 rebounds 3 assist
Paul George is a superstar my dude he is way way way better than melo. Melo does not know how to do anything but shoot the basketball. Paul is an all around player…now Westbrook should of made it but Melo no way.
Paul George — 21.7 PPG, 6.8 RPG, 3.5 APG
Carmelo Anthony — 27.4 PPG, 8.1 RPG, 3.1 APG
That doesn’t sound like George is way way way better my dude.
George does it on both sides of the ball. Melo is a 30 year old gunner
Where did they lead their teams? 56 wins vs 37 wins. George isn’t better as a player, but deserves the honors over Melo due to this disparity.
Put Melo on the Pacers, put Paul George on the Knicks and see what happens.
As I said, melo is a better player than Paul George, but with the circumstance of the year, and George’s great first half of the year, that is why he got the nod over Melo.
George played horribly in the second half of the season, which is what dropped him this far. However, I agree with the fact that he should be on the third team because he did lead his team to the first spot in the Eastern Conference (which I know doesn’t mean anything, but still qualified him to the third team).
melo plays no defense and westbrook shots way too many shoots i think blake should switch with james harden
If you believe Melo plays no defense you don’t watch Melo.
Right. Melo couldn’t lead a team to the offs in the East. THE EAST. Come on bruh, he doesn’t play D, he doesn’t make teammates better and he don’t deserve to be on the list
And James Harden does?
Harden is overrated as hell, I’m shocked he made the first team.
As I said in my other post, Harden doesn’t deserve squat. He screws his team over big time, and is overrated. We saw this in their first round matchup. Also, he played horribly on the offensive end in that series as well.
I wanna see what the usage rate for Melo and Harden is.
What about Aldridge’s 89 points in the first two games against the Rockets. I know that it doesn’t count officially towards the voting, but it shows that he isn’t overrated.
Also, Westbrook is an overrated ballhog who makes bad plays, and shoots bad shots.
lol.. Aldrige is not even close to over-rated. You should check into rehab bro, cause you been smokin too much.
Aldridge is a great player, or did his 89 points in the first two games of the Rockets series not convince you of that. George is overrated, but Melo does not deserve the honors because he didn’t make it to the playoffs in the east.
It’s laughable. Thanks for creating a discussion on here highlighting it – I’ve never seen so many comments on one post here.
You’re welcome. I appreciate the sentiment and sparking legitimate basketball debates.
Wow smh someone make an all snubbed list featuring melo
Like the Knicks were snubbed from the offs IN THE EAST for not being able to win 40 games? 😂😂😂
has nothing to do with melo individual performance
Love should not be on the second team for sure, and probably not even on the third team as his team always sucks. He has good stats, but that doesn’t matter when you have a bad team.
Harden is also overrated as we saw in the blazers-rockets series, he avoids playing defense at all costs. He shouldn’t be on this team.
Melo is a good player, but doesn’t deserve these honors because his team sucked.
Aldridge should be on the second team at least, because he actually did lead his team far, or was 89 points in the first two games against the rockets not something to show for how good he is?
Thank you. Saved me the trouble of writing all that hahaha
Glad I found someone that agrees. Most people say Love and Harden are good players, and don’t understand how much they hurt their teams.
For everyone who says Melo deserved it, He didn’t. I like Melo a lot, and think he is a good player, but he didn’t make it to the playoffs in the East. He team only won 37 games, in the East again! Someone like that does not deserve to be on this list. (I do say the same thing about Kevin Love. There should be more complaints about him being so high on this list.)
His guards OFTEN COMBINED for 0 points. His center spent more time complaining about the ‘system’ than playing any way similar to what made him DPoY. His coach was fired because of the numerous times he lacked preparation for the other teams schemes. HOW is it Melo’s fault that they didn’t make the playoffs? Al Jefferson, Dragic, and Love all failed to make the playoffs and none of them can take over a game like Melo can.
Al Jefferson made it first of all. Second, Dragic barely fell out in the west, where the Knicks are in the pathetic East.
I agree that Love doesn’t deserve it, and if you read through my comments, I have said that I like Melo a lot, but he didn’t deserve it over Aldridge or George. He arguably did over Love. I agree that Melo was screwed over by Woodson, as anyone could have done a better job than Woodson did.
He didn’t deserve it over Aldridge or George?
Melo: 27/8, 2nd in the league in scoring, career high in rebounds/minutes, led all SFs in rebounds, arguably his best defensive year, and was the only reason the team wasn’t eliminated in January.
Aldridge: 23/11, extremely poor defensive numbers for a big man, nearly identical FG% as Melo – who shoots 5 treys a game
I’m guessing you believe he deserved it because of the team records? Aldridge has Lillard, Mathews, Batum, and Lopez (who was infinitely better than Chandler this year). Total missed games between ALL 4 of his starting lineup teammates? 0. Aldridge didn’t get voted in because of what he did, he got voted in because of the team and chemistry that made him look much better than he was.
As for George, I don’t get it. His shooting woes continued, he dropped in rebounds (and averaged less than even the SG on his team), and shot less than 40% after the all star break. He started off strong and was abysmal for the entire last half of the season.
And for whatever it’s worth, Melo’s PER: 24.5, Aldridge 21.8, George 20.2.
This is very tru
this is some bs smh Melo is better than Love and 100x better than paul george
If you don’t think melo belong on this list you don’t know shit about basketball, melo had a career best season shot 45% from the field averaging 27.5 points averaging 8 rebounds and shooting 40%!! From the 3 point….now he did not have much team success because of bad coaching and bad luck, the knicks were the only team in the leauge where everybody from the starters to the bench were injured including melo himself, chandler is our defensive anchour …and he was injured for damn near half the season, melo was determined and hurting all season her literally carried this team on his back, I THINK ITS SAFE FOR ME TO SAYY that if melo was not playing with the knicks they would prolly have 0 WINS!!, SERIOUSLY! …people who talks shit about him must not watch him play…he plays defense!, he only average 3 assits but really could avetage more but nobody connects there were several games where camelo score much more than half his team combined points,, I can go on forever, but im gonna rap it up,ive carmelo fan since he came in leauge and im kind of use to this shit ….hes a very underrated player, and he rarely gets his credit when its due .its been like this since he came in the leauge and if you think this is suprising you should see how they ranked him amongst the 100 best players this season ….smh