Trail Blazers: Please don’t bring back Carmelo Anthony next year

I might be in the minority here. I’m not sure. When it comes to Carmelo Anthony, I have one thing to say to the Portland Trail Blazers. Please don’t bring him back next year.

Carmelo Anthony was out of basketball for a bit before signing, and playing quite a bit, with the Portland Trail Blazers. That doesn’t mean that I want to see him come back next year.

On the surface, I can see how you would think that Melo has been playing well for the Trail Blazers. They are playing him a bunch of minutes (32.6 mpg), and he is scoring points (15.6 ppg). That has to be a good thing, right?

I don’t think it is. Just look at the way that he is doing it.

More from Rip City Project

• Blazers News: Portland signs FIBA WC standout center
• Blazers News: Portland re-signing failed lottery pick
• 8 Do-overs the Portland Trail Blazers Wish They Had During Last Decade
• Portland Trail Blazers NBA 2K24 team, player ratings
• Woj: Blazers, Lillard ‘fully prepared’ for star to be with team in training camp

Carmelo has a pretty high usage rate, all the way up at 21.5% which is in the 86th percentile for his position. Pretty impressive for a 35-year-old. What he is doing with it though, is the part that is saddening. Thanks to Cleaningtheglass.com you can get a better look at how efficient he is. Carmelo is only good for 100.8 points per 100 shot attempts, which falls into an abysmally low 7th percentile for his position.

You’d be hard-pressed to find someone with a worse ratio of usage rate to points per 100.

Let’s go back to his usage rate. For goodness sake Trail Blazers fans, Melo has a higher usage rate than CJ McCollum. He puts up a tidy 107.7, which is at least average coming in at the 50th percentile.

Not only is he not scoring efficiently, but he also isn’t helping others score either.

He only is responsible for an assist on 6.5% of baskets made, which is a pretty poor number. It’s a nice ice-cold blue of being in the 24th percentile. Combine that together with his poor usage rate and you have one of the worst marks in the entire league. So bad in fact, he is in the 5th percentile.

For a long time, pundits have worried about his defense. According to basketball reference, it’s actually the worst it’s ever been, at least when you are looking at points given up per 100 possessions. He is giving up 114 this season according to them, the worst of his career, although this is one that I would be fine hearing an argument against. More and more points are scored every year, so 2010-11 when he gave up 111 was probably worse compared to the rest of the league.

Even his win shares are bad. He is responsible for 0.028. The league average is 0.100. That’s tied for 221st out of 354 players. When you are 103rd in usage rate, that isn’t a good combo. In fact, it marks him as a below-average player, and by quite a bit.

PER (Player Efficiency Rating) is a stat many have heard of, made popular by John Hollinger. Carmelo Anthony ranks 218th here with a ranking of 12.34. League average is 15. Melo plays 32.6 minutes per game, 46th in the league.

Let’s go ahead and look at everything all together. 2nd in usage rate, last in the team in points per attempt, only a 6.5% assist rate, and a PER of 12.3. Worst defense of his career, worst win shares, and nearly a league-worst assists per usage rate.

One last stat that you should feel deep inside. You know that guy who chucks up 11 three’s in your pickup game, makes two, and then wants everything to think he was the main part of your offense for scoring four of your teams eight points in their 8-11 loss playing by ones and twos. That’s Carmelo Anthony. His true shooting % is 51.1, which is T-288th in the league.

That means there are only 61 people who shoot worse than Melo in the entire NBA! Even hot potato man himself Markelle Fultz shoots better.

Carmelo Anthony is hurting the Trail Blazers, and all I have to say is please don’t bring him back next year.