Top 5 Point guard of all time

[rk2023]

1. Curry
2. Paul
3. Magic
4. Stockton
5. Oscar

Feel very good about that group. West, while close in an overall sense, is still clearly behind all those guys IMO. Harden, even if I classified him as a point guard (and I don't) would still be behind those 5 plus West and Nash at minimum.

How are CP3 and Stockton > Oscar and West? Seems like a take that’s rooted in the misapplication of advanced stats. I’ll give them longevity (though curving for era, Idek how much of an advantage there is), but in a prime sense - I fail to see it.

Stockton and Paul are both MUCH better passer/playmakers than Oscar and West and they're also MUCH better defenders than Oscar at least while being slightly better defenders than West too. Oscar had maybe the best passing season of the '60s in 1965 with an AST% of 37.8. Stockton beat that every year of his career. Paul beat it every year except for 2020 in OKC when he was focused on mentoring the young guys. Here's a quote from Backpicks describing Oscar's passing (which was better than West's):

"Unlike the modern ball-dominant quarterbacks, Oscar wasn’t spearheading attacks by relentlessly creating opportunities for teammates — such plays weren’t common for much of the 1960s. Oscar led the league in assists in most years, but even then assist rates were far below what they would become after the merger in 1977. Oscar’s assists per 75 possessions were regularly between 5.9 and 7.5. For comparison, John Stockton has the highest rate ever at 13.6, while Magic and Steve Nash peaked around 12. But the best mark before the merger was Kevin Porter’s 8.5.

Thus, Oscar wasn’t making life way easier for his teammates the way creators like Nash and LeBron did. Instead, he was a great facilitator. His more conservative passes put players in the right position to score. He could find easy offense in transition and his great feel for mismatches helped team efficiency too. But an enormous chunk of his global impact came from his own isolation scoring, which was orders better than anyone that decade not named Jerry West."

So basically, Oscar and West were closer to what we'd think of as almost a combo guard today, passing more like Curry than an elite facilitator, but without Curry's incredible gravity due to his constant off-ball movement. Also, while you're curving down longevity (where Stockton and Paul have large edges), don't forget to also curve up for the talent pool of the league growing much larger and it being much harder to dominate today than it was then due to tougher competition.

- I don’t doubt that the two of them *could* be considered better passers, but they are much more of “pass first” players and table setters. I’m high on Paul’s playmaking in an all-time sense (though he is a clear tier below Magic and Nash here) - certainly not Stockton’s. I’d take later career West and Oscar compared to the latter. I’ve read / watched through the Backpicks scouting report of Oscar coupled with other film. I’m aware that he might not be the modern-day “advantage creator” - but his table setting and on-ball QBing is holding much more value in an era-relative sense that I use in analysis (where it’s a harder era for even counting assists). His facilitation relative to the pack is obscene in and ahead of the time, which is fully reflected in team offenses and (what I suspect) Ben’s (and others’) WOWY studies. I’d regard him over Stock as a playmaker - unless you want to weight entry passing to Karl Malone highly. Oscar’s facilitation is lending itself into offensive success and an irreplaceable sense akin to levels of LBJ/Magic/Nash/Jordan/West/Curry.

- Defense, I don’t disagree. I regard Oscar as a slight + with defensive rebounding considered, and see West/Paul/Stockton as similar caliber defenders. It’s convenient to leave out the most important differentiator (while looking at macro skills) between the 2 X 2 in scoring. Not only did West / Oscar score more efficienctly, the gap in volume is astounding! Take a look into their rTS / TS+ / add as well. This is an era where being +9 is more valuable than it is now based on separation from the pack.

- West’s scoring and passing peaked at different times, whereas Oscar’s peaked together. That helps West’s longevity moreso than Oscar’s - but the latter came in as by far the GOAT Young offensive talent in NBA History (looking at production and impact) so he has solid longevity as well. I’m not sure if it’s more impressive than that of Paul and Stockton but *could* when realizing longevity then is objectively more impressive than longevity now. Regardless, when looking at peak and prime - Oscar and West are the vastly better players when it comes to impact, championship equity, and true value(s) over replacement. I’m taking an era relative approach here, where it appears that the much more valuable scoring volume/efficiency proved to be more additive than higher assist %ages in favor of Paul and Stockton (neither is a slouch here either!).

[MiamiBulls]

1.Magic

2.Oscar
3.Curry

4.Paul
5.Stockton

[One_and_Done]

Stockton isn't even top 10.

[SpreeS]

Maybe its time to count Harden as PG

According to B-Ref, he has 62% of his career minutes at SG, 28% at PG, and 11% at SF. His first season really playing the point was 2007, but then they immediately brought in Chris Paul and his primary position switched back to SG. When they traded Paul, they traded him for another guy who has to play PG in Westbrook. Even in Brooklyn, he played next to a PG in Kyrie. The only seasons he actually played >60% of his minutes at PG are 2017 and 2023.

Dont look at BR.COM You can find here that D.Green played 19% of his career at SF more than at C. I think he started to be PG from HOU days in 2014. Beverly has nothing to do with ball handling and playmaking. Harden played with true PG's (Paul and Westbrook), but I look more this way - two PG in starting lineup. They play more my turn your turn than PG to SG. Harden was standing and watching how Paul or Westbrook makes plays and other way around.

17 Harden 8.8 ast Paul 7.9 ast, PS 6.8 and 5.8
18 Harden 7.5 ast Paul 8.2 ast, PS 6.6 and 5.5
19 Harden 7.5 ast Westy 7.0 ast, PS 7.7 and 4.6

[MyUniBroDavis]

Why does it matter when you run the offense

Y’all know most of the time coaches call the plays and then the guard signals it from the coach right lol

[rk2023]

Maybe its time to count Harden as PG

According to B-Ref, he has 62% of his career minutes at SG, 28% at PG, and 11% at SF. His first season really playing the point was 2007, but then they immediately brought in Chris Paul and his primary position switched back to SG. When they traded Paul, they traded him for another guy who has to play PG in Westbrook. Even in Brooklyn, he played next to a PG in Kyrie. The only seasons he actually played >60% of his minutes at PG are 2017 and 2023.

Dont look at BR.COM You can find here that D.Green played 19% of his career at SF more than at C. I think he started to be PG from HOU days in 2014. Beverly has nothing to do with ball handling and playmaking. Harden played with true PG's (Paul and Westbrook), but I look more this way - two PG in starting lineup. They play more my turn your turn than PG to SG. Harden was standing and watching how Paul or Westbrook makes plays and other way around.

17 Harden 8.8 ast Paul 7.9 ast, PS 6.8 and 5.8
18 Harden 7.5 ast Paul 8.2 ast, PS 6.6 and 5.5
19 Harden 7.5 ast Westy 7.0 ast, PS 7.7 and 4.6

I, myself, am curious why those numbers tend to tail-off in the PS 2/3 years for Harden and all of them for running-mates. Am aware Paul and Westbrook were somewhat hampered in 2019 and 2020 (no Harden sycophants, this doesn't equal a title ) but I've had questions towards how Harden-ball translates into a PS setting.

[SpreeS]

According to B-Ref, he has 62% of his career minutes at SG, 28% at PG, and 11% at SF. His first season really playing the point was 2007, but then they immediately brought in Chris Paul and his primary position switched back to SG. When they traded Paul, they traded him for another guy who has to play PG in Westbrook. Even in Brooklyn, he played next to a PG in Kyrie. The only seasons he actually played >60% of his minutes at PG are 2017 and 2023.

Dont look at BR.COM You can find here that D.Green played 19% of his career at SF more than at C. I think he started to be PG from HOU days in 2014. Beverly has nothing to do with ball handling and playmaking. Harden played with true PG's (Paul and Westbrook), but I look more this way - two PG in starting lineup. They play more my turn your turn than PG to SG. Harden was standing and watching how Paul or Westbrook makes plays and other way around.

17 Harden 8.8 ast Paul 7.9 ast, PS 6.8 and 5.8
18 Harden 7.5 ast Paul 8.2 ast, PS 6.6 and 5.5
19 Harden 7.5 ast Westy 7.0 ast, PS 7.7 and 4.6

I, myself, am curious why those numbers tend to tail-off in the PS 2/3 years for Harden and all of them for running-mates. Am aware Paul and Westbrook were somewhat hampered in 2019 and 2020 (no Harden sycophants, this doesn't equal a title ) but I've had questions towards how Harden-ball translates into a PS setting.

But Harden teams offences has only little drop from RS to PS

Harden RS rOrtg +5.44 (114.57)
Harden PS rOrtg +3.56 (112.81)

[Doctor MJ]

Y’all know most of the time coaches call the plays and then the guard signals it from the coach right lol

So I'll just own up to being ignorant here. I'm certainly aware that coaches call plays at all levels of basketball, and in my experience in youth basketball my coaches would insist on doing it whenever we had a half court possession - one more reason to attack in transition if at all possible, so the coach wouldn't gum up the flow we had going - but I was under the impression that trends had moved further and further away from that on the NBA level. Plays still get called of course, particularly after time outs, but I had thought that in the NBA it was recognized that micromanaging was problematic. How off am I?

Tangent: In deep history, this wasn't how the game was played. In pro leagues prior to the NBA, the "coach" was often just one of the players on the floor, and in college in those times there were rules preventing direct communication between the coach and the players on the floor. This part of an even deeper history with Naismith seeing basketball as a sport that didn't need coaches except as adults to be responsible for kids. He saw the players on the court as the ones making decisions.

[penbeast0]

Oh, and West was a far superior defender to Paul and Stockton mainly due to his greater length and bounciness. They all generate steals (Paul less so as he gambles less) but West adds blocks and switchability with better man defense.

[wafflzgod]

Post 3PT Line

1) Magic Johnson
2) Steph Curry
3) Chris Paul
4) Steve Nash
5) John Stockton

[MyUniBroDavis]

[list=][/list]

Y’all know most of the time coaches call the plays and then the guard signals it from the coach right lol

So I'll just own up to being ignorant here. I'm certainly aware that coaches call plays at all levels of basketball, and in my experience in youth basketball my coaches would insist on doing it whenever we had a half court possession - one more reason to attack in transition if at all possible, so the coach wouldn't gum up the flow we had going - but I was under the impression that trends had moved further and further away from that on the NBA level. Plays still get called of course, particularly after time outs, but I had thought that in the NBA it was recognized that micromanaging was problematic. How off am I?

Tangent: In deep history, this wasn't how the game was played. In pro leagues prior to the NBA, the "coach" was often just one of the players on the floor, and in college in those times there were rules preventing direct communication between the coach and the players on the floor. This part of an even deeper history with Naismith seeing basketball as a sport that didn't need coaches except as adults to be responsible for kids. He saw the players on the court as the ones making decisions.

So theres a lot of freelance but most teams are still running a ton of plays. I’d say a good team more than 50%

At the end of the day when you think of what a basketball play is, it depends on how you define it right? Like, for example on a pick and roll, you see a team is running drop so the coach or whoever is like, ok let’s run out drop coverage counter which for the Suns for example is usually stack/spain (which is a normal one alotnof teams run), so they get a guard in the paint, have the roller go in and screen or cut in for that guard to run out to the three and shoot, and there are concepts within that depending on what the defense does, the route the shooter takes, etc etc. or you have veer where it’s the screener vs drop usually setting a down screen because the drop defender isn’t in the position to effect that two man action


Now when we talk about a play or a set, a longer play is just building off of those concepts right? Like while doing X, we attack the weakside doing X making it more effective, or we make something have multiple steps and wrinkles in order to make it harder to defend.

And I’d go further to say that this essentially is the same as help beaters right?

So you have concepts to do some stuff, and then you have sets that kind of take it to the next level, but of course it’s not realistic to run 100% of plays either.


If you combine those things + how often teams run help beaters good teams probably do it 50-70% of the time, theres tracking for a few teams out there but they might’ve been taken down, Generally organized offense is >>>> freelance other than specific matchup hunting type games. Even then if you matchup hunt and don’t run help beaters a smart defensive team can manage that (2022 finals for an example lol celtics)


Essentially while it may vary from team to team, organized offense is gonna be 55-60% of the offense, it takes IQ of course to read the situation for some of these to do the things drilled in by the coaches and other times it’s just executing what the coaches gameplans are. The Nuggets I know have probably the best offensive coordinator in the nba in adelman (as some of their players have said) and the Suns were crazy well run but somewhat simplified stuff when KD came in I heard from someone watching them. But at the end of the day alotnof crazy high iq moments are basically concepts drilled in or set up by coaches, it takes a high iq to make the reads in those situations of course but it’s more organized than it looks. Of course sometimes that isn’t the case as well.

For the most part I don’t think players are super responsible for like the composition sets and plays, Although I’ve seen stories of bron drawing up a whole play in the playoffs and telling everyone they’re running x. But I’d probably go as far to say that in the playoffs if you don’t have those concepts on lockdown you probably don’t have a shot to be great offensively.


I guess it’s a debate whether counters to help are really plays or not, but with names like Spain, Stack, Horns Bruin, Miami action, etc etc, I think they’re under that umbrella even though usually I think of plays as more multiple layered than that.


Teams don’t necessarily do stuff optimally 100% of the time because the nba isn’t a collaborative league in that regard, so some teams are slow to adjust. Memphis we’re kind of absurd with how they just died vs drop coverage and just kept running into it.

[70sFan]

1. Curry
2. Paul
3. Magic
4. Stockton
5. Oscar

Feel very good about that group. West, while close in an overall sense, is still clearly behind all those guys IMO. Harden, even if I classified him as a point guard (and I don't) would still be behind those 5 plus West and Nash at minimum.

How are CP3 and Stockton > Oscar and West? Seems like a take that’s rooted in the misapplication of advanced stats. I’ll give them longevity (though curving for era, Idek how much of an advantage there is), but in a prime sense - I fail to see it.

Stockton and Paul are both MUCH better passer/playmakers than Oscar and West and they're also MUCH better defenders than Oscar at least while being slightly better defenders than West too. Oscar had maybe the best passing season of the '60s in 1965 with an AST% of 37.8. Stockton beat that every year of his career. Paul beat it every year except for 2020 in OKC when he was focused on mentoring the young guys. Here's a quote from Backpicks describing Oscar's passing (which was better than West's):

"Unlike the modern ball-dominant quarterbacks, Oscar wasn’t spearheading attacks by relentlessly creating opportunities for teammates — such plays weren’t common for much of the 1960s. Oscar led the league in assists in most years, but even then assist rates were far below what they would become after the merger in 1977. Oscar’s assists per 75 possessions were regularly between 5.9 and 7.5. For comparison, John Stockton has the highest rate ever at 13.6, while Magic and Steve Nash peaked around 12. But the best mark before the merger was Kevin Porter’s 8.5.

Thus, Oscar wasn’t making life way easier for his teammates the way creators like Nash and LeBron did. Instead, he was a great facilitator. His more conservative passes put players in the right position to score. He could find easy offense in transition and his great feel for mismatches helped team efficiency too. But an enormous chunk of his global impact came from his own isolation scoring, which was orders better than anyone that decade not named Jerry West."

So basically, Oscar and West were closer to what we'd think of as almost a combo guard today, passing more like Curry than an elite facilitator, but without Curry's incredible gravity due to his constant off-ball movement. Also, while you're curving down longevity (where Stockton and Paul have large edges), don't forget to also curve up for the talent pool of the league growing much larger and it being much harder to dominate today than it was then due to tougher competition.

You cite Ben's work but I don't think you reach the same conclusion as Ben from this paragraph. Ben stated this, because back then the game was played in a way that it was way harder to create open looks and have similar volume of creation as it is today. It doesn't mean that players in the 1960s were worse passers or playmakers, only that circumstances didn't allow them to leverage their talent to the same degree.

[Doctor MJ]

[list=][/list]

Y’all know most of the time coaches call the plays and then the guard signals it from the coach right lol

So I'll just own up to being ignorant here. I'm certainly aware that coaches call plays at all levels of basketball, and in my experience in youth basketball my coaches would insist on doing it whenever we had a half court possession - one more reason to attack in transition if at all possible, so the coach wouldn't gum up the flow we had going - but I was under the impression that trends had moved further and further away from that on the NBA level. Plays still get called of course, particularly after time outs, but I had thought that in the NBA it was recognized that micromanaging was problematic. How off am I?

Tangent: In deep history, this wasn't how the game was played. In pro leagues prior to the NBA, the "coach" was often just one of the players on the floor, and in college in those times there were rules preventing direct communication between the coach and the players on the floor. This part of an even deeper history with Naismith seeing basketball as a sport that didn't need coaches except as adults to be responsible for kids. He saw the players on the court as the ones making decisions.

So theres a lot of freelance but most teams are still running a ton of plays. I’d say a good team more than 50%

At the end of the day when you think of what a basketball play is, it depends on how you define it right? Like, for example on a pick and roll, you see a team is running drop so the coach or whoever is like, ok let’s run out drop coverage counter which for the Suns for example is usually stack/spain (which is a normal one alotnof teams run), so they get a guard in the paint, have the roller go in and screen or cut in for that guard to run out to the three and shoot, and there are concepts within that depending on what the defense does, the route the shooter takes, etc etc. or you have veer where it’s the screener vs drop usually setting a down screen because the drop defender isn’t in the position to effect that two man action


Now when we talk about a play or a set, a longer play is just building off of those concepts right? Like while doing X, we attack the weakside doing X making it more effective, or we make something have multiple steps and wrinkles in order to make it harder to defend.

And I’d go further to say that this essentially is the same as help beaters right?

So you have concepts to do some stuff, and then you have sets that kind of take it to the next level, but of course it’s not realistic to run 100% of plays either.


If you combine those things + how often teams run help beaters good teams probably do it 50-70% of the time, theres tracking for a few teams out there but they might’ve been taken down, Generally organized offense is >>>> freelance other than specific matchup hunting type games. Even then if you matchup hunt and don’t run help beaters a smart defensive team can manage that (2022 finals for an example lol celtics)


Essentially while it may vary from team to team, organized offense is gonna be 55-60% of the offense, it takes IQ of course to read the situation for some of these to do the things drilled in by the coaches and other times it’s just executing what the coaches gameplans are. The Nuggets I know have probably the best offensive coordinator in the nba in adelman (as some of their players have said) and the Suns were crazy well run but somewhat simplified stuff when KD came in I heard from someone watching them. But at the end of the day alotnof crazy high iq moments are basically concepts drilled in or set up by coaches, it takes a high iq to make the reads in those situations of course but it’s more organized than it looks. Of course sometimes that isn’t the case as well.

For the most part I don’t think players are super responsible for like the composition sets and plays, Although I’ve seen stories of bron drawing up a whole play in the playoffs and telling everyone they’re running x. But I’d probably go as far to say that in the playoffs if you don’t have those concepts on lockdown you probably don’t have a shot to be great offensively.


I guess it’s a debate whether counters to help are really plays or not, but with names like Spain, Stack, Horns Bruin, Miami action, etc etc, I think they’re under that umbrella even though usually I think of plays as more multiple layered than that.


Teams don’t necessarily do stuff optimally 100% of the time because the nba isn’t a collaborative league in that regard, so some teams are slow to adjust. Memphis we’re kind of absurd with how they just died vs drop coverage and just kept running into it.

Thank you for going into more detail, and yes I see the challenge of distinguishing where "the play ends".

I suppose I tend to see a lot of this stuff as something like an opening in chess' beginning-game. It may be a compound set of action at the start the possessions, but at a certain point players are having to make decisions that go beyond just "try to score" or "give up and reset". Those decision making points then constitute the middlegame, with the physical act of the scoring attempt - traditionally a shot, but sometimes it's a flop - being the endgame.

Back when I was a kid and had coaches calling plays for us, it basically took away our ability to make middlegame-type decisions, so that's how I think of play-calling.

As you say though, there's a vocabulary of action types that can be seen as mere branches of the broader tree that is "the play". From that perspective, then one might argue that more of the modern basketball game exists within a "play" than in the past, rather than less.

What feels more real to me though is the amount of decision making that's made by the players on the court. If what you're teaching your players to do requires them to make more decisions on the fly, then it doesn't seem right to describe what they're doing out there as "running plays", even if I think you as a coach absolutely deserve credit for teaching them to recognize action options and make correct assessments of their likelihood of success.

[MyUniBroDavis]

[list=][/list]

So I'll just own up to being ignorant here. I'm certainly aware that coaches call plays at all levels of basketball, and in my experience in youth basketball my coaches would insist on doing it whenever we had a half court possession - one more reason to attack in transition if at all possible, so the coach wouldn't gum up the flow we had going - but I was under the impression that trends had moved further and further away from that on the NBA level. Plays still get called of course, particularly after time outs, but I had thought that in the NBA it was recognized that micromanaging was problematic. How off am I?

Tangent: In deep history, this wasn't how the game was played. In pro leagues prior to the NBA, the "coach" was often just one of the players on the floor, and in college in those times there were rules preventing direct communication between the coach and the players on the floor. This part of an even deeper history with Naismith seeing basketball as a sport that didn't need coaches except as adults to be responsible for kids. He saw the players on the court as the ones making decisions.

So theres a lot of freelance but most teams are still running a ton of plays. I’d say a good team more than 50%

At the end of the day when you think of what a basketball play is, it depends on how you define it right? Like, for example on a pick and roll, you see a team is running drop so the coach or whoever is like, ok let’s run out drop coverage counter which for the Suns for example is usually stack/spain (which is a normal one alotnof teams run), so they get a guard in the paint, have the roller go in and screen or cut in for that guard to run out to the three and shoot, and there are concepts within that depending on what the defense does, the route the shooter takes, etc etc. or you have veer where it’s the screener vs drop usually setting a down screen because the drop defender isn’t in the position to effect that two man action


Now when we talk about a play or a set, a longer play is just building off of those concepts right? Like while doing X, we attack the weakside doing X making it more effective, or we make something have multiple steps and wrinkles in order to make it harder to defend.

And I’d go further to say that this essentially is the same as help beaters right?

So you have concepts to do some stuff, and then you have sets that kind of take it to the next level, but of course it’s not realistic to run 100% of plays either.


If you combine those things + how often teams run help beaters good teams probably do it 50-70% of the time, theres tracking for a few teams out there but they might’ve been taken down, Generally organized offense is >>>> freelance other than specific matchup hunting type games. Even then if you matchup hunt and don’t run help beaters a smart defensive team can manage that (2022 finals for an example lol celtics)


Essentially while it may vary from team to team, organized offense is gonna be 55-60% of the offense, it takes IQ of course to read the situation for some of these to do the things drilled in by the coaches and other times it’s just executing what the coaches gameplans are. The Nuggets I know have probably the best offensive coordinator in the nba in adelman (as some of their players have said) and the Suns were crazy well run but somewhat simplified stuff when KD came in I heard from someone watching them. But at the end of the day alotnof crazy high iq moments are basically concepts drilled in or set up by coaches, it takes a high iq to make the reads in those situations of course but it’s more organized than it looks. Of course sometimes that isn’t the case as well.

For the most part I don’t think players are super responsible for like the composition sets and plays, Although I’ve seen stories of bron drawing up a whole play in the playoffs and telling everyone they’re running x. But I’d probably go as far to say that in the playoffs if you don’t have those concepts on lockdown you probably don’t have a shot to be great offensively.


I guess it’s a debate whether counters to help are really plays or not, but with names like Spain, Stack, Horns Bruin, Miami action, etc etc, I think they’re under that umbrella even though usually I think of plays as more multiple layered than that.


Teams don’t necessarily do stuff optimally 100% of the time because the nba isn’t a collaborative league in that regard, so some teams are slow to adjust. Memphis we’re kind of absurd with how they just died vs drop coverage and just kept running into it.

Thank you for going into more detail, and yes I see the challenge of distinguishing where "the play ends".

I suppose I tend to see a lot of this stuff as something like an opening in chess' beginning-game. It may be a compound set of action at the start the possessions, but at a certain point players are having to make decisions that go beyond just "try to score" or "give up and reset". Those decision making points then constitute the middlegame, with the physical act of the scoring attempt - traditionally a shot, but sometimes it's a flop - being the endgame.

Back when I was a kid and had coaches calling plays for us, it basically took away our ability to make middlegame-type decisions, so that's how I think of play-calling.

As you say though, there's a vocabulary of action types that can be seen as mere branches of the broader tree that is "the play". From that perspective, then one might argue that more of the modern basketball game exists within a "play" than in the past, rather than less.

What feels more real to me though is the amount of decision making that's made by the players on the court. If what you're teaching your players to do requires them to make more decisions on the fly, then it doesn't seem right to describe what they're doing out there as "running plays", even if I think you as a coach absolutely deserve credit for teaching them to recognize action options and make correct assessments of their likelihood of success.

Yeah there def is a level of decision making players have to make, and making reads within coverages and plays is important, at the same time the difficulty of those reads and in particular the available options within that aren’tgonna be the same for different teams based on how good the coaching is, there are genuinely teams where there’s a certain coverage and there aren’t reads to make and it’s basically just “yeah try go at and try to score AD in drop hope it goes well” or something like that. Also if we’re talking about specific actions like countering pick and roll coverages I just mean it’s not only the ball handler who should get credit for well executed actions, everyone has to be aware even off ball guys, and a lot of times the passing reads aren’t as amazing as they look because it’s more understanding what’s going to happen because they know this is what is drawn up as a result. In any case I meant more the idea that because harden was at SG instead of PG which isn’t that meaningful considering his role in the offense.