It’s the NBA silly season, which means now that we’re past free agency, and Summer League, and “Instagram like watch,” and Kyrie Irving trade alerts, and NBA 2K ratings, we’ve moved into the stage where everyone gets upset over arbitrary rankings of players on various websites.
Dude are getting upset at Sports Illustrated, others are confusing ESPN and SI entirely, and it seems as though the entire basketball world has come to bat for Carmelo Anthony over the fact he was ranked below rookie Lonzo Ball.
While there’s merit to it, the whole thing is just so ridiculous it’s hard not to laugh. If you haven’t chuckled yet, you will after the latest piece of this great tapestry. That would be ESPN’s own representative Stephen A. Smith, all fired up and mad as heck going full Network on his own, well, network.
Smith can’t believe the audacity or the insinuation that Car-Me-Lo-An-Tho-Ny would be ranked that low. It’s downright preposterous. Well, see for yourself.
Here’s a transcription of the most important parts, but we weren’t going to type out the full five minutes:
Just because we all work at ESPN together, don’t believe we all believe the same things. You know, we do have independent personalities, and you’re looking at one. This poll is a disgrace. It’s an embarrassment. And as far as I’m concerned, the damn network should be ashamed for having the poll on it.
Who the hell came up with this list? Because they clearly know nothing about the game of basketball. I don’t want to hear some stuff about some garbage criteria that you can come up with. There are 30 teams in the NBA. By putting 63 players ahead of Carmelo Anthony, you are saying that at least two players on every team is better than Carmelo Anthony, a career near-25-point-per-game scorer, who’s repeatedly a number one option, who’s a scoring machine and one of the prolific scorers of the modern era. Has he slipped in recent memory? Of course he has, but … he can do it all.
Don’t give me some metrics, don’t give me some analytics. Don’t give me some garbage nonsense about how, oh my goodness, who contributes to winning or whatever. I’ll tell you what contributes to losing, Max: people who can’t score. … And Carmelo Anthony clearly does not have that problem.
But wait, there’s more:
When you tell me No. 64, you’re telling me 63 players, from a talent perspective, is better than this man. It is disgraceful, it is garbage, and I am sick and tired of people hiding behind the brand that is ESPN, pretending to know a damn thing about basketball, when they clearly do not.
There is no one, and I repeat, no one, with knowledge about the game of basketball, that would look at the NBA today and say that 63 players in the NBA are better than Carmelo Anthony. And I don’t have the list in front of me. You know what I don’t have the list in front of me? Because I didn’t bother to look. That’s how garbage I think the poll is. There’s not 63 players that are better than Carmelo Anthony. Garbage!
Garbage! In recent months, Smith seems to have recognized his own entertainment value. When he gets wound up like this, it’s amazing to see his own coworkers stay off to the side and let him go.
Stephen A. doesn’t want analytics or metrics (sorry to friend of the program Chris Herring), he’s got art to make. And he’s got Melo’s back.
