>i'm not arguing melo wouldn't make you better. i'm arguing
>that he would not make you better enough in the next 2-3 years
>to sniff a title. even if noah reverses his decline and rose
>turns back into a 20ppg, efficient player (neither of which is
>likely to happen), you're not going to be good enough to get
>out of the East absent multiple* Cleveland injuries, let alone
>deal with the West.

why not? with Melo as the #1 option Rose wouldn't need to return to being a 20+ppg scorer, he could be an 18-19 ppg scorer with improved efficiency + add maybe 7-8 apg running the offense without having to worrry about carrying the scoring load; add a healthy Noah into the mix and i'm not sure why that's not good enough.

As for Cleveland, Kyrie gets hurt every year, we still don't really know how Love fits in with this team & he remains an unknown quantity as a playoff performer, and as much of an indestructible cyborg Lebron seems to be, he's been carrying an insane load for a hell of a long time esp. the past 2 years, so he's bound to start slowing down at some point.

Of course as long as Lebron is still in his prime (even if he's entering the back-end of it) Cleveland will be the favorite, but it wouldn't be as impossible for Chicago to compete with them as you're making it out to be.