If Shaquille O’Neal was the blueprint, DeMarcus Cousins never read the manual. Because while most bigs wanted to bulldoze their way into the paint like Shaq with a grudge, Cousins? He was out there borrowing tricks from wings, studying crossovers like he was prepping for a pop quiz, and stealing jumpers from players who lived 25 feet from the rim. This wasn’t your average 6-foot-10 wrecking ball trying to fit into a one-size-fits-all NBA mold. This was a basketball alchemist… part center, part scoring guard, part whatever-he-felt-like-that-day. And if you’re wondering who helped cook up that formula?

Spoiler alert: It wasn’t Shaq. It was Carmelo Anthony. “I was always the player that wasn’t afraid to try things,” Cousins recently shared. And by “try things,” he meant throwing a jab step like Melo in the body of a defensive anchor. “I fell in love with a lot of bigger wings. Carmelo Anthony.” Yup, read that again. Carmelo. Not Shaq. Not Duncan. And not even Hakeem. DeMarcus Cousins took notes from a small forward who made a living with footwork smoother than jazz and a jumper that could torch any hand in his face.

It was basketball identity theft, in the best possible way. Cousins broke the big man prototype. He didn’t need to jump through the roof or out-muscle defenders like a WWE contestant. He just needed angles, timing, shot touch, analyzing, adapting, and applying — that’s how he built his game. “I was kind of a sponge,” he said.

“I did it from afar, watched their film, watched their videos… would kind of steal it from that.” And this is where Melo walks in as the unsung architect. Before he was a hoodie icon or Olympic scoring machine, Carmelo Anthony was simply inevitable. A 10-time All-Star with a silky midrange, bulldozing strength, and a scoring title to his name, Melo racked up 28,289 points in his career, good for top 10 all-time when he retired. He made isolation look like art, and in his prime, few dared to challenge him one-on-one. But beyond the numbers, Melo represented something deeper to a generation of players: freedom.

The freedom to score your way, to own your space, to not fit neatly into a system. For someone like DeMarcus Cousins… equally misunderstood, equally gifted, watching Melo wasn’t just entertainment. It was a blueprint. And Cousins, despite standing 6’10″ and being built like a semi-truck, didn’t want to just dunk. He wanted to cook. With a jab-step, hesitation, pull-up. And he did. Remember peak Sacramento Cousins?

Averaging 27 and 11 like it was a Tuesday chore? That wasn’t just brute force. It was finesse. That’s Carmelo’s ghost in the post-up game. That’s Melo’s DNA in the midrange fadeaway. And let’s give the man his due credit as a Warriors legend. Cousins did this in an era where bigs were still figuring out how to exist outside the paint. He was the curve. Ask coaches, opponents, even his former teammates. They’ll all tell you: DeMarcus wasn’t just different, but also dangerous.

From Carmelo’s moves to NBA mayhem

Boogie’s impact went far beyond the person he modeled his game after. His versatile style changed how teams scouted, how defenses were drawn up, and even how front offices drafted. He made it okay for a center to dribble between the legs and launch a three without getting side-eyed by the coach.

And while Cousins never had a perfect health record or drama-free career arc, his talent was always undeniable. From the Kings to the Pelicans to the Warriors and finally the Nuggets, Boogie’s stat lines were video-game-ish. He averaged almost 25 points for five straight seasons. And when paired with Anthony Davis in New Orleans?

That was a fever dream of a frontcourt, a glimpse into what could’ve been. If injuries didn’t hit like a wrecking ball, we might be talking about Cousins as a Hall of Famer right now. Teams still talk about that. They had to game-plan around him. How impossible it was to find someone who could guard both his power and his polish. And the best part?

That all started because DeMarcus Cousins, sitting somewhere as a teenager, watched Carmelo Anthony on film and said, “Yeah, I want to be that guy.” There’s something poetic about that. One of the most misunderstood stars of the modern NBA era quietly tipped his hat to another one.

No shoutouts or viral posts, just one hybrid big, changing the game with Melo’s fingerprints all over his moves. So the next time you hear someone say Cousins was just a temperamental bruiser? Show them the tape. The jab-step, rhythm jumper, the Carmelo in him. Shaquille O’Neal may have been the dream, but Carmelo Anthony? He was the blueprint.