'Melo's ability to draw double-teams and command the complete focus of the defense because of his elite shooting only serves to put his teammates in better positions to score. That's the reason his teammates had all those open looks and was the best 3pt shooting team in NBA history last season. Talk about making your teammates better.
'Melo only trails Lj by 8.7 less passes per game and this, while not playing PG. Why would 'Melo play PG with Billups, Baron, Felton etc on his team? Bremer, McInnis, Chalmers, Cole etc aren't on his team. Lj plays PG because he can't play off the ball. He's only played 51 more games than 'Melo out of the whole 11 years that they've been in the league. You talk like Lj has played hundreds more games than him.
Lj is a 2-way player in what sense? Like, KD, Lj is a horrid defender. Guarding an injured Tony Parker is just a bad match-up for Tony. Lj is bigger and just as fast as Parker, and speed is Parker's only advantage. Additionally, he pulled his hamstring. Lj is also bigger and just as fast as Derrick Rose. Only, he's an even easier assignment than Parker because Rose, like Lj, is not a threat from the perimeter. Like Lj, he needs his speed and athleticism to get him dunks and layups. Lebron did a
horrible job against Jason Terry in the '11 finals and the next season, didn't do any better against Durant.
Only reason he stayed focused on Parker and Rose is because his Coach had to babysit him to do it. He's the reason Felton hit all those 3's in December of 2012. Felton couldn't shoot over Lj but Lj kept getting caught on switches and just stopped defending him altogether. This past Sunday, little bitty Swish kept hitting 3's in Lj's face. Melo is the better defender. Last season, his overall defense ranked in the 69th%tile (a full 19% above average). He was excellent in defending the post up (his position [PF] that season), as he ranked in the 92nd%tile. It's extremely tough to guard those big, strong PF's.
That shows that 'Melo is just as strong as pf's. Lj is so weak and soft that he won't even take on the challenge of defending people with size, like 'Melo and West. He lets Battier do it, even though he's much younger and bigger (he got like 20-lbs on battier). That stat also shows that 'Melo sticks to his man. When Lj gets settled in a half court defense, he is always looking for the ball and not always watching his guy. He gets beat off the dribble a
lot and his lateral movements are poor.
He can't defend anyone w/ talent. 'Melo and Durant be lighting him up for 30pts (Durant), 38-40+ pts and game-winners ('Melo). In his off-ball defense, he often loses his man, and blames it on Chalmers. He's not a good on-ball defender, in fact he is quite terrible. He only defends in spurts and takes 2/3rds of games off, for the most part. He doesn't shut anyone down. He stops moving/guarding someone, watches his opponents shoot the ball in and then looks down at one of his teammates to wonder what they were doing. I can give Youtube links of this, if you like, because the film don't lie. Beckly Mason noted in the 2012 finals:
"The tape shows Durant is hardly struggling in one-on-one confrontations with James. In fact, James has not been able to stay in front of Durant off the dribble and Durant has also been able to shoot with relative ease because James tends to play one-on-one defense with his hands low. Durant has missed some open shots, but for the most part he's getting the same looks he did against Battier". This was when Serge Ibaka said:
"LeBron is not a good defender. He can play defense for two to three minutes but not 48 minutes. LeBron can't play (Durant) one-on-one. They're playing good defense like a team".
Lj even said he can't guard KD:
In this video, he claims that no one can guard KD but 'Melo sure did last season and so did Metta. KD shot poorly against 'Melo last season and the only reason he got 27 pts was from the free throw line. KD always tried to get the switch when Metta was guarding him. Lj won't even shoot the ball when 'Melo is guarding him.
Lj defends in transition at times. He'll roam around and make plays when he's out of position (or gambling) and he makes the flashy plays that everyone loves (steals, blocks), but when he has to face his opponent up, he's terrible. Anyone who says otherwise, is just a Stan, plain and simple. His steals be off bad passes. You never see him press someone and take their dribble. What you do see, is him play the passing lanes.
How could someone whose defense is so poor, get the 'All Defense 1st Team' position over Jimmy Butler? Propaganda, because the NBA's profits tremendously and keeps interest in the league from finding a fake Jordans (Lj) and a fake dynasties (Miami). All this over-commercializing of Lj has worked like a charm because people blindly believe absurd claims about Lj, such as "he's a good defender" and blindly believe false claims about other players, such as "Melo is doesn't/can't defend" (see yourself for an example). No facts support either claim and the facts are, in fact, to the contrary.