Carmelo Anthony is driving the stat junkies mad this postseason.
He’s shooting the ball with reckless abandon, apparently far more comfortable handling thechucker role than George Costanza ever was.
Through two playoff games, Anthony has totaled 70 points on 53 field-goal attempts. He has two assists in 80-plus minutes of work.
Ask anyone in the Big Apple if they care. If anything, they’ll be asking for even more shots from Anthony after his 34-point outing gave the New York Knicks an 87-71 win over the Boston Celtics in Game 2.
Here’s the challenge for anyone bemoaning Melo’s activity: name the player(s) worthy of receiving his looks.
J.R. Smith, you say? He has 34 points on 34-field goal attempts through two games. Or Raymond Felton, perhaps? He’s chipped in with 29 points on 28 field-goal attempts in the series.
After that it’s a largely offensively challenged group. The rest of the roster needs to have shots created for them, but even then, who’s to say they’ll find anything as good as what Anthony’s been getting? And does anyone think they’d convert those looks as efficiently as the scoring champion?
If the Knicks were losing, I could understand the outcry. But the fact of the matter is Anthony’s ball-dominant approach has New York in prime position, up two games to none, to get past the opening round for the first time since 1999.
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