Whenever I see Ty Lawson play, I think of Chris Paul. The two players have different games, but physically, they’re similar. Paul stands 6’0″ and weighs 175 pounds. Lawson is 5’11″ and weighs in at 195 pounds, so he’s a little stockier than CP3, but they’re both fairly undersized for the point guard position.

Here are the per 48-minute stats from each player’s rookie and second season. Since Paul played about 16 minutes more per game in his rookie season (and 10+ minutes more in his sophomore season), we need to adjust per minute for an apples-to-apples comparison.

ROOKIE SEASON

SECOND SEASON

(Note: Blocks are negligible so I excluded them to save space.)

It’s clear from Paul’s assist numbers that he’s the superior playmaker. He averaged 3.0 more assists per 48 minutes than Lawson. But Lawson is a far more efficient scorer, making over 50% of his shots in his first two seasons. This is helped by his excellent three-point shooting, which is over 40% for his career. Paul is quite a bit better at getting to the line and makes a higher percentage when he gets there.

From an overall efficiency standpoint, Paul actually regressed a tad in his sophomore season, while Lawson improved about 11%.

Ty Lawson is no Chris Paul, mostly because he doesn’t have the pure point guard mentality that Paul does. But he’s a fine player, and is superior to Paul with his efficient shooting and scoring. Paul does a better job of changing gears, while Lawson seems to be going 100 mph all the time. It will be interesting to see how his game develops over the next two seasons as he matures as a starting point guard.

The worst part, of course, is that this deal proves that no matter how many advantages New York gains from its magnetic appeal to potential free agents, owner James Dolan will screw them up. Leaning on the genius of Isiah Thomas — because it worked out so well for the first time — he fell hook, line and sinker for every bluff thrown his way by the Nuggets and Melo’s people. (Yes, Melo’s people participated — Anthony needed to make sure he got a lucrative contract extension under the current salary rules before being traded.)

New York still gets its Melo-Stoudemire nucleus, but now lacks the supporting pieces to do anything important with that core. And by extending Melo now, they agree to lock him up at such an expensive price that, in concert with Stoudemire’s deal, it likely precludes making a run at Chris Paul, Deron Williams or Dwight Howard in 2012.

The Knicks were bid up by the Nets, who never really had a chance at acquiring Carmelo in the first place. It would have been worth all of this to acquire a Top 5 player like LeBron James or Dwight Howard, but Carmelo is in the second or third tier of NBA stars and by acquiring and extending him now, they’re going to be paying a premium for his services for the next three or four years. His contract could make things especially tough if there’s a hard(er) cap.

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In case you haven’t heard, Carmelo Anthony was traded to the Knicks last night. If you haven’t heard, count yourself lucky (and completely oblivious), because all of this “Melodrama” got old a full month ago. A quick search at Twitter shows just how sick everyone was of the speculation.

You see, Carmelo didn’t ask to be traded. Or maybe he did, we don’t really know. He wouldn’t admit to the press that he asked for a trade, instead putting the onus on the Nuggets for wanting to trade him away. After what happened to LeBron’s image last summer, he didn’t want to be painted as the bad guy, but his act has worn thin. Everyone knows he wants to play for the Knicks. He wants to play in New York so badly that he doesn’t care that his new team had to give up the farm to get him. He just wants to be a Knick. Oh, and he wants a three-year, $65 million extension too. Let’s not forget about that.

There was another team pursuing him — the New Jersey Nets. But New Jersey (who will soon move to Carmelo’s hometown of Brooklyn) wasn’t good enough for this guy. The Nuggets and Nets worked out a trade, but the only thing holding up the deal was Carmelo’s unwillingness to sign the aforementioned extension. Who can blame the Nets? Why would they trade for him if he’s just going to leave after the season?

All of this drama would be enough to keep High Life from sponsoring Carmelo. But he recently took his hat off to himself — seriously — for playing through all this speculation. Here’s the mind-bending quote from FanHouse:

“I think it takes a strong-willed person, a strong-minded person, to deal with the stuff that I deal with and still go out there and go to work every day and perform on a nightly basis,” the Denver forward said about trade rumors that have swirled all season as the Feb. 24 trade deadline approaches. “I take my hat off to myself for dealing with all this stuff that’s going on and still be able to go out there and play at the high level that I can play at. I really don’t think an average person can walk in my shoes. I don’t think that.”

Somehow, in Carmelo’s World, he was the victim of circumstance. Not his team of eight years, the Denver Nuggets, who had no leverage and were forced into making a suspect deal because he was only willing to play for the Knicks.

Fortunately for the Common Man living the High Life, this NBA nightmare is now over. We can all go back to our lives and not be inundated with Carmelo rumors on SportsCenter.

Because it’s painful to watch a guy who refuses to live the High Life.

Michael Wilbon, ESPN: Even with all the analysis of the Knicks we’ll be indulging in for the next few weeks, the club is so much better off post-Carmelo than pre-Carmelo. Goodness, if anything the Knicks should probably be criticized for not simply getting down to business and making this deal six or eight weeks ago. The team could have played 20 games with Billups-Fields-Anthony-Stoudemire already. If the Knicks hadn’t goofed around until nearly the trade deadline, they probably could have made a deal that excluded Mozgov. But they let the New Jersey Nets set the terms, which likely pushed Denver’s price higher. Still, after a lot of false starts the Knicks appear to be actually on the road to contention — how serious we’ll find out soon enough. Miami’s all-new cast needed close to 30 games to figure out how to play with one another. Stoudemire, Anthony and Billups do have different skill sets and don’t have to examine everything they’ve done for years the way LeBron James and Dwyane Wade had to do. Then again, James and Wade are adept passers; Stoudemire and Anthony are not, which is why Billups, intimidated by nothing and calm in the face of all kinds of NBA drama, is better off running the point with this group than Felton, whose shoulders have no stripes.

Dave Krieger, Denver Post: As excited as NBA officials may be about the resurrection of the Knicks in the league’s biggest market, they cannot ignore the dire straits in which smaller-market teams find themselves as the old labor agreement expires. Denver joins an unfortunate club that already included Cleveland and Toronto. Three of the game’s biggest stars — Anthony, LeBron James and Chris Bosh — abandoned these markets for brighter lights in the last eight months.

Mike Lupica, New York Daily News: The Knicks get Carmelo Anthony even after giving away all the leverage they had in this thing, and what feels like half their roster. The player only wanted to come to New York, only wanted to get his huge contract extension here, didn’t want to go to Jersey or anywhere else. The Knicks – meaning Walsh – always had the Nuggets where they wanted them, and should have been able to make this deal with Wilson Chandler and Eddy Curry’s big, fat expiring contract and some other junk thrown in. Instead they give up Raymond Felton and Danilo Gallinari and Chandler and Timofey Mozgov, too. If the trade deadline were next Thursday instead of this Thursday, Denver could have gotten James Dolan to throw in Mike Breen and Clyde Frazier, too. Clearly Dolan still has Isiah Thomas as his muse, apparently because all the good ones were taken.

William C. Rhoden, New York Times: Nearly all of the burden of proof rests on Anthony’s shoulders. He asked for this situation and now he has it. If he knows the Knicks’ history, Anthony knows that with the possible exception of Bernard King, no New York City player has ever come back as a Knick and turned the place upside down — in a positive way. He will have something to prove to the legions of fans who consider him a one-dimensional player who lacks the skills and the drive to play defense or make his teammates better. Anthony is not the answer, but he is unquestionably a building block. He led Syracuse to a national championship and was a vital component for the United States when it won an Olympic gold medal in Beijing. He could be a winner on a properly outfitted team, something the Knicks, with Stoudemire, are becoming. And now that the Knicks have two star players in place, a player like Chris Paul is much more likely to leave cash-strapped New Orleans for well-heeled New York.

J.A. Adande, ESPN: The Nuggets did well for themselves … which is more than the Cleveland Cavaliers or Toronto Raptors could say when LeBron James and Chris Bosh bolted for South Beach. The Cavs and Raptors made last-minute sign-and-trade deals for picks and trade exceptions, but those are just possibilities and cap space. The Nuggets have more tangible assets. They have three players averaging at least 16 points per game in Raymond Felton, Wilson Chandler and Danilo Gallinari and a 7-footer in Timofey Mozgov. They got a first-round pick and two second-round picks. I know the Nuggets were attracted to all of the first-round picks the New Jersey Nets offered, but I’d rather have the known in proven players than the unknown in picks of undetermined order. Plus that $3 million, in addition to the $13.2 million in luxury tax payments they’re no longer on the hook for, plus whatever cut they’ll receive from the taxpaying teams. This is the reward the Nuggets get for holding out until the end, for refusing to yield to pressure from around the league and a weary NBA media and fandom to just put this to a halt. This whole process dragged on longer and had more false endings than “The Return of the King.” But the Nuggets benefited from the early start, getting the initial lowball offers out of the way before Thanksgiving, learning what the minimum was and working from there.

ESPN has the details of the trade.

As a part of the deal, the Knicks will send Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov, and a 2014 first-round draft pick to the Nuggets, who would get additional picks and cash, league sources told Broussard. Along with Anthony, New York would acquire Chauncey Billups, Shelden Williams, Anthony Carter and Renaldo Balkman, the sources said.

New York will send Anthony Randolph and Eddy Curry to Minnesota as part of the deal in exchange for Corey Brewer, a league source told Broussard.

As Chris Broussard noted earlier in the day, Wilson Chandler was set to become a restricted free agent this summer, and the Knicks would have had to give up their rights to the swingman if they were going to try to sign Anthony as a free agent. So if Chandler were expendable, and we count the swap of Billups and Felton as a wash (at least in the short term), then this becomes Carmelo Anthony and Denver’s spare parts for Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov, a (likely late) first round pick and a pair of second rounders. The Knicks were going to get the better end of the deal all along since Carmelo made it clear that he only wanted to sign the extension if it meant he could play in New York. Still, the Nuggets improved their position and turned a bad situation into at least three starter-caliber players.

Look for Denver to move Felton before Thursday’s deadline for another piece to the rebuilding puzzle, signifying a changing of the guard at the point. The electric Ty Lawson will take over. It would have been nice if Denver had been able to acquire Landry Fields, but Arron Afflalo is a very similar player, and Mozgov has some upside as a young big. There are already rumors swirling that one or more of these former Knicks may be headed to the Nets for picks.

New York will start Billups, Fields, Anthony, Stoudemire and probably Ronny Turiaf going forward. I don’t expect a deep playoff run in the stacked Eastern Conference as the players get acclimated to one another, but they could spring an upset in the first round.

Is this finally over?