You do realize the other star players also have to take pay-cuts for it to work, right?
Yeah.
They also were completed via Sign and Trades. People forget that. A lot of first round picks were packaged to get LeBron and Bosh. And while they took pay-cuts. The amount only came out to about 15M over the span of the 6 year deal, and they aren't staying for all six years, so a significant portion of the money they "gave up" isn't real, as those years in the deal were never going to exist.
If Melo wants to follow what Wade did, taking a much smaller deal than the allowable max, then great. But unless stars like LeBron opt out this summer and coordinate with Melo - like they did in 2010... Melo doesn't have the advantage of KNOWING other players will sign smaller deals.
We'll see what happens. Dude is a great player, if he stays... he stays. If he leaves, we'll move on. But if he leaves this summer, people need to recognize that life without Melo is an ugly offensive proposition.