Best of the Best: C/ Wrap Up

Post #1 » by **The Guilty Party** » Thu Sep 4, 2008 8:34 pm

You may or may not have noticed, but the Sixers are celebrating the franchise's 60 year anniversary this season (going back to the Syracuse days) hence they will be wearing the throwbacks uniforms more often and using the old red, white, and blue basketball logo as well. In honor of that.... I thought we could have some threads discussing some of the players of the past. Similar to the "Best of the Best" threads that I created a couple of weeks ago, I wanted to create threads to find out who we, the Sixers' Board, feel is the best player at each position in the Sixers' recent history. I say recent history (PAST 20 YEARS) because I believe a majority of posters have only had limited time to watch players pre-1988 play. So rather than discuss and vote on guys like Wilt, Hal Greer, Billy Cunningham, Dolph Shayes, and even someone like Andrew Toney.... these threads will only feature guys from the 1988-89 roster up to the upcoming roster.

The name of the game is simple.... there are five names of players at a certain position listed above so please vote for one and let's discuss why you think he's the best player at that position over the past 20 years.

*****************
This roster is just about filled out....

Cheeks
Iverson
Iguodala
Barkley

.... and so now it's onto the final position and perhaps what will be the closest vote. I sort of saw the other positions playing out the way they did but I honestly think this one could go one of 4 ways so let the voting begin. Who Ya Got???

** Also I couldn't determine who was better/worse so I put both Matt Geiger and Shawn Bradley on this list.

Skates · Post #2 » by **Skates** » Thu Sep 4, 2008 9:12 pm

This might be the toughest pick of the five we have done. PG was also tough, but there were higher caliber players there with very different styles (I still think too many people ignored the 20 year rule in voting for Cheeks, but I digress). Throwing out Bradley and Geiger immediately I am left with one offensive minded player who could score, pass and rebound in Gminski and three shotblockers/rebounders in Dikembe, Ratliff and Sammy. Deke was the best player who played here at C, although much like Cheeks he played here a short time during those 20 years and his best years did not occur for the Sixers during the years to be considered. A lot of the stats for Sammy, Mutombo and Ratliff are remarkably similar if you look at Sammy's last two years primarily. They all scored in the low double digits, rebounded well (Mutombo was best), blocked shots (Ratliff was best) and shot fairly similar percentages (Sammy with a slight edge in FG%). Out of these three I chose Ratliff because he played more games here in his prime and was more of a game changer with his blocks and intimidation.

Ratliff versus G-Man represents two completely different players. I went with Ratliff despite G-Man being the much better offensive player, scoring and passing, and being a better rebounder because G-Man was a complimentary player in all phases of the game, while Ratliff was a dominant shot-blocker. My rankings would be: Ratliff, G-Man, Mutombo and then Sammy. Sam might have the most physical ability, but the least basketball sense.

Carmelo Anthony · Post #3 » by **Carmelo Anthony** » Thu Sep 4, 2008 10:24 pm

I voted for Dikembe for the simple fact that we expierienced what I consider our best season with him Anchoring our front court.

CoachK · Post #4 » by **CoachK** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 12:54 am

Had to go with the player who played for me.

barkley34 · Post #5 » by **barkley34** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 4:55 am

Mutumbo with Theo being a close 2nd IMO.

Post #6 » by **The Guilty Party** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 1:13 pm

I went with Theo because I feel that when he was healthy, he played better ball than what Mutumbo did in his 18 months here.

geiger · Post #7 » by **geiger** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 2:26 pm

Deke led us to the Finals. He was here a short time and on the tail end, but he played hard, played the right way, was stellar defensively, and maximized what his body allowed him to do. For that, he deserves to be number 1 on an admittely lousy list.

Post #8 » by **The Guilty Party** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 2:32 pm

I don't disagree geiger but when I think about Mutumbo... I recall the weird two month transition period he had right after the trade happened. Then he played solid, solid ball in the playoffs. The next year, he was average and actually hurt us BADLY in the playoff series against the Celtics for which I am still having nightmares of Tony Battie and that goofy multi-colored mouth guard running circles around Deke and his slow legs.

So for me, Deke gave us 2 good months of ball (the 2001 playoffs) versus Ratliff who was playing out of his mind in the beginning of 2000-2001 season. It's close, but I'm taking Ratliff. If we're talking about entire careers than Deke was obviously the superior player.

83SixersRocked · Post #9 » by **83SixersRocked** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 5:31 pm

I went with Theo. If you use the same criteria as we did for Mo as PG, its Theo who took the 6ers most of the way through the season when they went to the finals. Mutombo was good the rest of that year for them, but that was it. You could look at it either way but Theo gets my vote.

geiger · Post #10 » by **geiger** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 7:13 pm

Tough to argue, but Theo played about 40 games for us that season and none in the playoffs. Deke led us to the division title and all the way to the Finals. Not a steallar group, but it's tough when you limit it to 20 years. First off, we were bad for a large portion of them and guys switched roles often. Secondly, it cuts off people's careers. So for a PG, Cheeks gets judged only by his last year in Philly where he was a shade of his former self and not on his incredible career here and his NBA title.

Post #11 » by **The Guilty Party** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 7:18 pm

The 20 year mark does make it a little tougher but I wanted to limit it to what most of the posters here have seen. I grew up with Cheeks and Toney and Doc but I think a large portion of the crowd on here is below the age of 29.

Then again, this board has attracted a decent number of guys in their 30s over the past 18 months. It might be time to bring back the "Who Are You" Thread so that we can all understand who we are all dealing with. I think some people come down pretty hard on "Dedicated" but he/she has been posting here since he/she was 13. I think some people would be a little easier on him/her if they knew they were talking to a 16 year old. Anywho... we'll do that just before the season starts and this board begins to get flooded.

Skates · Post #12 » by **Skates** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 7:21 pm

The results of these polls kind of sum up why we lost so much in the last 20 years - Our best PG was on his last legs entering this 20 year period, our HOF shooting guard might be 6'0" (in sneakers), our best SF only played the position for a couple of years full time, our HOF PF was about 6'4" and our best center played his prime years elsewhere. Other than a few years here or there the one constant theme was bad management.

TGP, are you going to do a head coach and/or GM poll under the same parameters?

Post #13 » by **The Guilty Party** » Fri Sep 5, 2008 7:39 pm

Skates wrote:TGP, are you going to do a head coach and/or GM poll under the same parameters?

I didn't even think of that but with the board being a ghost town with very little to talk about... why not?? Then again... it'll be somewhat predictable with Johnny Davis winning the head coach vote and Brad Greenberg running away with the GM role.