Carmelo Anthony and the Biggest Black Holes in the NBA

For the people out there that have seen the movie Eddie starring Whoopi Goldberg, you'll know one of the first references that I know of to the term "black hole" relating to basketball.

Goldberg calls Stacey Patton (played by the legendary Malik Sealy) the "Black Hole of basketball," at which point Olden Polynice explains to him what a black hole is.

It's one of the most humorous scenes in one of the most underrated basketball movies of all time. It's funny and informative, plus it involves Olden Polynice, so you can't get much better there.

Whoopi is calling Patton a black hole at that point because of the fact that he refuses to pass the ball as he repeatedly has gems throughout the movie along the lines of, "If Stacy Patton don't shoot, Stacy Patton don't play."

Stacy Patton didn't stop shooting, so Stacy Patton got benched.

Most of the time, you won't see that kind of extreme coaching in the NBA these days (although Paul Westphal gave it a wild and crazy shot), as the NBA's black holes are allowed to suck in the ball, at which point it will never escape on that offensive possession, lest it end with that player shooting the ball.

There are certain distinctions to basketball black holes that only the trained eye can find. Obviously, a black hole will shoot the ball more often than they will pass it, but they do it in a bad way.

For example, Ray Allen's job in recent years has been mainly to shoot the ball, but because that's his main expectation from his team, I wouldn't consider him a black hole. He's merely filling a role.

So, which players are basketball's biggest black holes? These next few guys sure do put up a good argument.

10. Kobe Bryant

No matter what the Kobe Bryant fanboys will try to argue, Kobe is still a black hole. He may be the black hole most integral to his team, but he's still a black hole.

He gets some assist numbers, but having the ball in his hand as much as he does, you wouldn't expect him to come away from a game with no assists.

Kobe led the league with a 35.1 usage percentage last season, but he came in at just a 26.7 assist percentage.

The Lakers need him to shoot a lot this season is seems, but that doesn't make him any less of a black hole.

9. Vince Carter

Vince Carter is getting old and his knees don't allow him to stay on the court as long as they used to every game, so what is he going to do? Take fewer shots?

Carter never put up huge assist numbers, but he was at least a pillar for ball movement at least at a time when he was with the Nets (and a bit with the Raptors), but these days his job is to shoot the ball.

He finished up last season with a 23.4 usage percentage but just a 12.4 percent assist percentage.  

8. Tyreke Evans

It seems to me that throughout his career, Tyreke Evans has oscillated between being a guy who skids an offense to a halt and a guy who tries to chase down numbers, both of which have been detrimental to his team.

He's a great player and he does get a bunch of assists, but when he does it seems like he's overly obvious when trying to get the ball to his teammates, kind of in the way that LeBron James does it at times.

7. Stephen Jackson

It's interesting that in the trade that went down back before the 2011 Draft that the three teams involved just ended up swapping different degrees of basketball black holes in order to get either a slightly better draft pick or a slightly better black hole.

A Stephen Jackson-Corey Maggette-John Salmons switcheroo doesn't exactly scream "blockbuster trade."

Anyway, Jackson, who is now chucking shots up in Milwaukee, has the interesting ability to take enough shots that would make you think that he thinks he's the team's best player. The funniest part about that is that it was only true for about half a season last year after Gerald Wallace was traded.

The ball-freezing Jackson has a usage percentage of 24.4 percent so far this season while throwing out assists at a rate of just 17.2 percent.

6. Carmelo Anthony

The central figure in the New York Knicks' lethargic, uninspired offense happens to be a half-court kind of guy stuck in a fast-paced, full-court Mike D'Antoni offense, and it's not working out great so far this season.

Carmelo Anthony's biggest asset is his ability to read a defender and break him down in a way that he'll get the space to take his shot or get into the lane to draw a foul. Unfortunately, D'Antoni's biggest coaching asset is designing an offense around players that can sprint up and down the court all day and make a multitude of passes before the ball eventually gets put up.

They are probably one of the worst player-coach pairings in the NBA, right after Kobe Bryant and Mike Brown (I saw LeBron James not listen to Mike Brown for five years; Kobe has made an art form of it).

5. Antawn Jamison

It's usually difficult to pinpoint the exact time that a player collapses into a basketball-sucking, shot-engulfing black hole, but for Antawn Jamison it was definitely the day that LeBron signed with the Miami Heat.

He was now a part of one of the worst teams in basketball and stuck there for two years on a huge contract that no team would trade for in the near future.

Jamison wasn't a particularly pass-happy player before this event, but at least he wasn't the center of an offense.

At this point, Jamison's main goal is to wait around until whoever has the ball gets him the ball, at which point he'll settle for a three or make a half-hearted attempt to get into the lane, at which point he'll settle for a fadeaway. 

4. Kevin Martin

Kevin Martin is like Carmelo Anthony lite, except he's not as chubby and he doesn't play as much defense as Carmelo.

Martin's main job ever since he became a good player (which was during his third season with Sacramento) has been to combine his penetrating ability with his shooting ability, thus the star collapsed into himself and became a black hole.

He's one of the more efficient black holes out there, but he's a black hole nonetheless. His usage rate being 10 percent higher than his assist rate kind of speaks to that.

3. DeMarcus Cousins

It's kind of hard for a big man to end up being called a black hole. Usually they just chill down low somewhere, set a few screens and when they end up with the ball in their hands, at which point they're taught to put up the shot.

However, DeMarcus Cousins will take a shot on any occasion without hesitation.

His 25 percent usage percentage compared to his abysmal 7.4 assist percentage is one of the largest disparities in the league, even for a big dude.

Then again, he does play for the Kings, a team that may or may not know what an assist is.

2. Nick Young

I've made excuses for Nick Young's inability (or unwillingness) to dish the rock off to the next open man in the past few years, usually saying he's young and not yet accustomed to an NBA offense.

Well, it's snuck up on me, but Nick Young has been in today's NBA for four full years now and this is going to be his fifth, so it's hard to make that excuse anymore.

Young's main goal when he gets the ball is to put it into the hoop himself, which has led to his mediocre shooting percentage (43 percent for his career) and his abysmally low assist numbers for a shooting guard, which total up to 300 assists in 309 games.

Yea, I'd say he's a shoot-first kind of guy.

1. Corey Maggette

An offense will start to get into a flow, the ball will be bee-bopping around the perimeter and before you know it, like the sound of a record screeching to a halt, Corey Maggette has the ball in his hand.

The offense stops, he dribbles the clock down to about eight seconds and he makes his move. He'll usually drive to the lane to his right. If he gets a lane he'll go up for a layup, if not he'll put up a jumper.

The minute he went to Golden State back in 2008, he stopped looking for the next pass first. It seems he loved the idea of their offense where he was used as the guy who got the ball if they couldn't put up a shot within the first few seconds of the shot clock.

If you are one of those twitterers, you can follow me @JDorsey33.