Amar'e Stoudemire Still Doesn't Have What It Takes

Back before the season began I wrote an article titled "Could Amare Stoudemire Become A Top-5 Power Forward?" Stating the reasons why Stoudemire could not be considered in the top-five yet.

Earlier in the season it looked like Stoudemire was changing into that dominant player he was supposed to be, but lately he's gone back to his old self. He even stated he wanted to be the center piece of the offense for the Suns, yet sadly Amare wasn't able to claim that because even at Shaq's age he's still more dominant than Stoudemire is down low. 

The first reason why I stated that Stoudemire wasn't in the top was due his defense. Part of the problem was that Stoudemire tried too hard on defense and was usually committing ticky-tack fouls. Well the good news there though is that his fouls are down from the 3.7 last year, but he's still averaging 3.3 fouls per game. 

On top of that, Stoudemire averaged 2.1 blocks per game and he's back down to 1.1 blocks per game, which isn't very good for someone who's athletic as Stoudemire is. 

Take for example in tonight's game against the Boston Celtics. He shot 0-7 from the floor, went 3-4 from the line, had one rebound, one block, four turnovers, and four fouls in a little over 30 minutes.

The second part of Stoudemire's game was that he should be averaging at least 10 rebounds per game. At the moment he's averaging 8.1 rebounds per game which is one rebound less than he did last year.

This year has been up and down for Stoudemire in the rebounding department. He's had games of 20 rebounds, but then pulls down four boards or less. His rebounding is way too inconsistent to be up higher on the list in terms of the best power forwards in the NBA right now. 

This year, most of the major categories have gone down for Stoudemire. Part of that of course is because of having Shaq in the lineup which has made his scoring go down from 25.2 to 21.3 points per game, as mentioned the rebounding, his shooting percentage has gone down a lot, his passing has gotten better, but his turnovers are increasing. 

Unfortunately for Stoudemire, he's not top-five material. When you're getting out rebounded by Brook Lopez, or Dwyane Wade at 6’4” is averaging more blocks than a 6’10” athletic big man then there's no way that the player is in the top-five. So Amare still has a lot of work to do in order to even come close to being one of the top-five power forwards in the NBA. 

Lastly, a majority of NBA players, when taking on the defending championship, put out a little bit of extra effort. In the game tonight, Stoudemire did nothing of the kind. He ended up 0-7 from the floor, scored his only points by going 3-4 from the free throw line, had one lonely rebound, one blocked shot, and he had four turnovers. Definitely shows that Stoudemire hasn't gotten to the point of being top-five material.