Allen Iverson is very rarely listed as a PG, so what is he?

[Pg81]

Allen Iverson is also a complimentary player...you can't win a championship with him as your best player.

Yeah that is what they said about Dirk for years.

[batmana]

Iverson is one of the players who has suffered the most by revisionist history, and it's pretty pronounced on this forum. For those who say Iverson fans are overestimating shot creation, I say "you are overestimating FG% and efficiency". The man didn't care about his efficiency, he simply shot and scored as many as he needed to in order for his team to stand a chance at winning. How overestimated can shot creation be if your teammates would struggle to score 70 points without you?

It is laughable to put Iverson below Klay Thompson. They are in different tiers. Iverson can lead a team as the go-to guy. Klay could probably score more points than on the Warriors if he had his own team but I don't think he has the toughness to lead a team of sub-par offensive players to anywhere. You may like Klay better as a secondary scorer than Iverson as a go-to guy, you may think it's easier to build a team around primary star + Klay instead of Iverson + someone else but that's not the point. The point is that Iverson is objectively better than Klay Thompson and it's not like he played 50 years ago, we saw him play. We all know how good he was. Just because newer advanced metrics were developed in recent years, it doesn't mean a certain player's career became somehow worse retroactively because of what those metrics say.

You could see the same thing happening with Melo BTW, 10-15 years from now posters will say Melo was worse than Chris Bosh for instance (unless they are already saying it).

[HeartBreakKid]

Allen Iverson is also a complimentary player...you can't win a championship with him as your best player.

Yeah that is what they said about Dirk for years.

No it isn't, and that is a strawman argument if I ever saw one.

You're saying what ever Reggie Miller did doesn't count because he's a complimentary player (when he was the best player on his team for almost his entire career) but Allen Iverson isn't is weird as hell. I mean are you actually trying to infer that Allen Iverson is as good as Dirk Nowitzki? (no one ever said Dirk was a complimentary player, that wasn't a mainstream opinion at all)

And the whole Iverson was only inefficient because he didnt' have shooters is BS, he wasn't just "inefficient" he was WAY below league average - and this was evident almost his entire career, not just 2001.

Saying Allen Iverson is a superstar is like saying Paul Pierce is a superstar (who beat him in the playoffs with a team just as bad). What is this hypothetical team you're picturing that is going to win a title with Iverson as their best player?

[Pg81]

Allen Iverson is also a complimentary player...you can't win a championship with him as your best player.

Yeah that is what they said about Dirk for years.

No it isn't, and that is a strawman argument if I ever saw one.

You're saying what ever Reggie Miller did doesn't count because he's a complimentary player (when he was the best player on his team for almost his entire career) but Allen Iverson isn't is weird as hell. I mean are you actually trying to infer that Allen Iverson is as good as Dirk Nowitzki?

And the whole Iverson was only inefficient because he didnt' have shooters is BS, he wasn't just "inefficient" he was WAY below league average - and this was evident almost his entire career, not just 2001.

Saying Allen Iverson is a superstar is like saying Paul Pierce is a superstar (who beat him in the playoffs with a team just as bad). What is this hypothetical team you're picturing that is going to win a title with Iverson as their best player?

Nothing but revisionist history, and yes, there were people who after 2007 said that a Dirk led team will never win a title. I mean Miller never led a team to a title either, so I guess that makes him worse than Iverson since he is worse in every other metric sans 3 point shooting and never won a MvP either, has fewer All Star selections and never made it as an All NBA. All I see here is a guy who is vastly overrating effiency and yes Iverson did score a lot more efficiently once the rule change happened and he went to Denver. Oh and strawmanning? Really? "I mean are you actually trying to infer that Allen Iverson is as good as Dirk Nowitzki?" yeah that must mean it when I point out that there people who said the exact same nonsense about Dirk prior to 2011. It is obvious that I meant that such a claim is all but worthless. How you could miss such an obvious point is beyond me.
Oh noes, Paul Pierce lead his team over a win of Iverson's team, that must mean that 2002 Dirk was better than KG when he trashed the Twolves going off for 33/16.
What point are YOU exactly trying to prove here? That Iverson was some scrub? Tell you what, swap Iverson with Kobe Bryant and tell me the Lakers would have won fewer titles at the start of the new millenia.

[HeartBreakKid]

No it isn't, and that is a strawman argument if I ever saw one.

You're saying what ever Reggie Miller did doesn't count because he's a complimentary player (when he was the best player on his team for almost his entire career) but Allen Iverson isn't is weird as hell. I mean are you actually trying to infer that Allen Iverson is as good as Dirk Nowitzki?

And the whole Iverson was only inefficient because he didnt' have shooters is BS, he wasn't just "inefficient" he was WAY below league average - and this was evident almost his entire career, not just 2001.

Saying Allen Iverson is a superstar is like saying Paul Pierce is a superstar (who beat him in the playoffs with a team just as bad). What is this hypothetical team you're picturing that is going to win a title with Iverson as their best player?

Nothing but revisionist history, and yes, there were people who after 2007 said that a Dirk led team will never win a title. I mean Miller led a team to a title either, so I guess that makes him worse than Iverson since he is worse in every other metric sans 3 point shooting and never won a MvP either, has fewer All Star selections and never made it as an All NBA. All I see here is a guy who is vastly overrating effiency and yes Iverson did score a lot more efficiently once the rule change happened and he went to Denver. Oh and strawmanning? Really? "I mean are you actually trying to infer that Allen Iverson is as good as Dirk Nowitzki?" yeah that must mean it when I point out that there people who said the exact same nonsense about Dirk prior to 2011. It is obvious that I meant that such a claim is all but worthless. How you could miss such an obvious point is beyond me.

Honestly dude, if English is your first language then sheesh.

And to the bold - it's almost like you're getting so angry you're trying to read in between the lines of something that isn't there. I said Allen Iverson is a complimentary player (which is what you said about Reggie Miller) - so how does your retort "well Reggie Miller never won anything either!" counter my point? Seriously, sit down and reflect on that for a few seconds. You do realize that an easy rebuttal to that is simply that both Reggie Miller and Allen Iverson are complimentary pieces - now that will probably make you angry because you seem to think Allen Iverson is a superstar, but that is the logical conclusion if you actually read the what you're quoting.

And how the hell can you overrate efficiency lmao - because it makes Iverson look worse? You also just said why Iverson efficiency went up - it went up because of a rule change in which case EVERYONE's efficiency went up. But yeah, keep thinking that Iverson would have been so magnificently efficient even though he never was his entire tenure as a Sixer - and yes, he was above league efficency when he went to Denver....so? Again, I did not say that Iverson was inefficient, I said that he is WAYYY inefficient - it is ridiculous to assume he would be this unstoppable scorer if he had shooters, there is literally zero basis to support that argument - and making some bizarre connection to Dirk (who was seen as a superstar and a championship center piece) doesn't help your point. Just drop the Dirk thing because it's dumb as hell and literally not relevant.

Oh noes, Paul Pierce lead his team over a win of Iverson's team, that must mean that 2002 Dirk was better than KG when he trashed the Twolves going off for 33/16.

Dirk and KG are both superstars and top 20 players all time - Dirk does have an argument over KG.

If Allen Iverson is roughly as good as Paul Pierce then that means he is a complimentary player...

You're really making this easy for me.

What point are YOU exactly trying to prove here? That Iverson was some scrub? Tell you what, swap Iverson with Kobe Bryant and tell me the Lakers would have won fewer titles at the start of the new millenia.

[/quote]

Um...he would still be a complimentary player, Shaq was better than Allen Iverson.


Where is your proof exactly that Allen Iverson is so dominating? Why does 2001 matter, but not 2002 when he got knocked off by the Celtics? Or any of the other seasons where his team was bumped in the first round or didn't even make the playoffs? You really want to make the game of comparing him to KG or Dirk or whoever- okay, sure, I can make a lot of arguments why KG was better than Iverson. Pick your poison.

Where is your proof that Allen Iverson is as good as Kobe Bryant? Why do you think he is better than Jason Kidd or Paul Pierce? Why do you think he is so much better than Reggie Miller. Why do you think he can be the best player on a championship team? I don't care about your feelings or that you were in middle school when Iverson won MVP - give people some facts, otherwise, why even bother posting on this section - no one cares if you can't prove your point.

[frica]

Iverson is one of the players who has suffered the most by revisionist history, and it's pretty pronounced on this forum. For those who say Iverson fans are overestimating shot creation, I say "you are overestimating FG% and efficiency". The man didn't care about his efficiency, he simply shot and scored as many as he needed to in order for his team to stand a chance at winning. How overestimated can shot creation be if your teammates would struggle to score 70 points without you?

It is laughable to put Iverson below Klay Thompson. They are in different tiers. Iverson can lead a team as the go-to guy. Klay could probably score more points than on the Warriors if he had his own team but I don't think he has the toughness to lead a team of sub-par offensive players to anywhere. You may like Klay better as a secondary scorer than Iverson as a go-to guy, you may think it's easier to build a team around primary star + Klay instead of Iverson + someone else but that's not the point. The point is that Iverson is objectively better than Klay Thompson and it's not like he played 50 years ago, we saw him play. We all know how good he was. Just because newer advanced metrics were developed in recent years, it doesn't mean a certain player's career became somehow worse retroactively because of what those metrics say.

You could see the same thing happening with Melo BTW, 10-15 years from now posters will say Melo was worse than Chris Bosh for instance (unless they are already saying it).

People also like to quote efficiency but forget he played in an era where the whole league averaged a lower TS%.
Like calling Westbrook more efficient than Iverson despite Iverson being more efficient relative to era.

[frica]

I do wonder, I feel like Iverson is getting underrated but he falls outside my top 40.
I think he's similar to Irving, very good player but lacks the impact the true superstars have.

Iverson can carry a big load but ball-dominance would diminish the impact of stronger teammates somewhat. He's also fairly lacklustre off-ball so doesn't provide much value on that front.
Otherwise he's an underrated passer/playmaker but is not elite at it. Better scorer than Westbrook relative to era but worse at everything else.

[GYK]

SG. he came off of screens either shot or got in the triple threat to breakdown. he could navigate the pick and roll but it wasn't primary nor something scorers did back then or when he grew up. something that was from probing PG's(not driving hard) and post Lebron/zone defense. none of those guys were big pick and roll players. actually I don't want to make this about Lebron but you can literally attribute the rise of point forwards, scoring pick and roll point guards and triple doubles to him directly. anywho AI is a SG. he grew up and played half his career in illegal defense in which 1vs1 was king. post 04 scoring from the pick and roll became king(the rise of option scorers, guys who could score or pass of the pick and roll, passing becoming important that zone'ish defense means you're slightly off your man). that was met with ICE. which was countered with pick and pops. which was countered with switching. all along shooting ability has been increasing as spot up shooting has become more involved in ever offense. switching counter seems to be countered by high post/triple threat action. 1vs1 becoming king again. maybe on the last only time will tell.

[penbeast0]

People also like to quote efficiency but forget he played in an era where the whole league averaged a lower TS%.
Like calling Westbrook more efficient than Iverson despite Iverson being more efficient relative to era.

When I make statements like "Iverson is an inefficient scorer," or "Bob Pettit was an efficient scorer," I am talking about those players efficiency compared to their league (or even the rest of their team's) efficiency. Iverson was generally below league average efficiency, a reasonable comp in terms of efficiency is Westbrook except that Westbrook brings appreciably better playmaking and rebounding and even better defense, plays more games a season on the average, and provides better leadership (the attitude that led to the whole practice thing again).

[KobesScarf]

except that Westbrook ... plays more games a season on the average,

????? who cares about games when Westbrook has never even played 3000 minutes in a season. Westbrook's career high is 2914 a mark Iverson eclipsed 7x

[HeartBreakKid]

Iverson is one of the players who has suffered the most by revisionist history, and it's pretty pronounced on this forum. For those who say Iverson fans are overestimating shot creation, I say "you are overestimating FG% and efficiency". The man didn't care about his efficiency, he simply shot and scored as many as he needed to in order for his team to stand a chance at winning. How overestimated can shot creation be if your teammates would struggle to score 70 points without you?

It is laughable to put Iverson below Klay Thompson. They are in different tiers. Iverson can lead a team as the go-to guy. Klay could probably score more points than on the Warriors if he had his own team but I don't think he has the toughness to lead a team of sub-par offensive players to anywhere. You may like Klay better as a secondary scorer than Iverson as a go-to guy, you may think it's easier to build a team around primary star + Klay instead of Iverson + someone else but that's not the point. The point is that Iverson is objectively better than Klay Thompson and it's not like he played 50 years ago, we saw him play. We all know how good he was. Just because newer advanced metrics were developed in recent years, it doesn't mean a certain player's career became somehow worse retroactively because of what those metrics say.

You could see the same thing happening with Melo BTW, 10-15 years from now posters will say Melo was worse than Chris Bosh for instance (unless they are already saying it).

People also like to quote efficiency but forget he played in an era where the whole league averaged a lower TS%.
Like calling Westbrook more efficient than Iverson despite Iverson being more efficient relative to era.

Iverson was inefficient relative to his era.


On a separate note, I also have no idea why people keep saying iverson had bad teammates and thats why he was inefficient, he's not the only player in NBA history to not have teammate who couldn't shoot. Allen Iverson was a Scottie Pippen not a Michael Jordan, people get caught up because the guy's only way to impact a game was scoring (in which he wasn't a dominant scorer) - it doesn't mean he's a superstar or a top 20 all time talent or what ever jibberish that Mavs fan was trying to push earlier.

[Pg81]

Iverson is one of the players who has suffered the most by revisionist history, and it's pretty pronounced on this forum. For those who say Iverson fans are overestimating shot creation, I say "you are overestimating FG% and efficiency". The man didn't care about his efficiency, he simply shot and scored as many as he needed to in order for his team to stand a chance at winning. How overestimated can shot creation be if your teammates would struggle to score 70 points without you?

It is laughable to put Iverson below Klay Thompson. They are in different tiers. Iverson can lead a team as the go-to guy. Klay could probably score more points than on the Warriors if he had his own team but I don't think he has the toughness to lead a team of sub-par offensive players to anywhere. You may like Klay better as a secondary scorer than Iverson as a go-to guy, you may think it's easier to build a team around primary star + Klay instead of Iverson + someone else but that's not the point. The point is that Iverson is objectively better than Klay Thompson and it's not like he played 50 years ago, we saw him play. We all know how good he was. Just because newer advanced metrics were developed in recent years, it doesn't mean a certain player's career became somehow worse retroactively because of what those metrics say.

You could see the same thing happening with Melo BTW, 10-15 years from now posters will say Melo was worse than Chris Bosh for instance (unless they are already saying it).

People also like to quote efficiency but forget he played in an era where the whole league averaged a lower TS%.
Like calling Westbrook more efficient than Iverson despite Iverson being more efficient relative to era.

Iverson was inefficient relative to his era.


On a separate note, I also have no idea why people keep saying iverson had bad teammates and thats why he was inefficient, he's not the only player in NBA history to not have teammate who couldn't shoot. Allen Iverson was a Scottie Pippen not a Michael Jordan, people get caught up because the guy's only way to impact a game was scoring (in which he wasn't a dominant scorer) - it doesn't mean he's a superstar or a top 20 all time talent or what ever jibberish that Mavs fan was trying to push earlier.

Scottie Pippen was a bonafide superstar as he has proven in 1994, so your post is complete rubbish. It was just his bad luck that he got paired with MJ and was a very unselfish player, unlike MJ. This just shows again how ignorant you are. Furthermore it is telling that time and again you are either purposefully or ignorantly misrepresent what I say, which makes you look highly disingenuous since I never claimed he is a top 20 all time great talent, all I ever said that he has an argument for top 5 shooting guard but I also said he has no case over MJ, Kobe and Wade, something you just not seem to get or as pointed out earlier either purposefully or ignorantly leave out and personally I also have West above him.
Oh yeah which other player had an offensively inept team like Iverson which also did not provide any outside shooting? Even Hakeem had better offensive help in 94 and yet people claim he had "no help". It is also, again, telling how a simple nuance as "offensively inept" seem to elude you and you just say "bad team mates" even though at least I have not said that. Is it fun to you to misrepresent and malign other posters or are you just obnoxious and obtuse on purpose, because even Forest Gump would have understood what me and others have been trying to point out about Iverson's team mates at this point.

Oh and lastly, first and foremost I am a Dirk fan, and since you asked, no English is not my native language. Thanks for bringing up such a pointless "argument", which seems to be your modus operandi.

[LA Bird]

He is going to go down as a SG but based on defensive assignments, Iverson is fairly clearly a PG. No team is going to play him with usual PGs unless they want to kill their own defense and if Iverson's teams must have a big PG capable of guarding opponent SGs for him, how is that PG then not the SG on the team?

About his all time ranking, I would say this board is pretty fair on Iverson. Top 50s all time which is below Reggie but easily above Klay. There is some value to volume scoring but for his minutes and shooting efficiency, his scoring waasn't that mindblowing. Fan rankings of Iverson are usually too biased by emotions since he was a huge cultural icon and an idol for shorter guys.

[Chicago76]

He also didn't really improve his efficiency when he was asked to share the offensive load later.

This is factually not true. Iverson's TS% in his first full season in Denver was 57% that +3 over league average at the time. His TS% was in the same ball park as LeBron and Kobe that year. That year in Denver proved that he could play efficiently next to another ball dominant superstar.

People massively exaggerated how hard it was to build around Iverson. Philly's issue was they never could put any shooting around him. It was painful to watch some of these old Sixers games in which Iverson would have the ball and second defender would just completely leave Snow open because of lack of a jump shot.

Thanks. Should have amended that to he didn't really enhance his team's O differently when he was asked to share the load. Quick caveat though: he improved his TS% from his last full season to his first full season in DEN, relative to average, but 2 pts. One of the biggest complaints from supporters of Iverson is that he carried his team. There is a very easy way to test that using RAPM. There is some variability year over year, so we'll take Iversons stint in Philly (minus his first two years when he was getting up to speed). drop his 2 best and 2 worst RAPM seasons. Averaging the middle 5 for offense and defense (not necessarily in the same season for both) are probably a good baseline for his contributions:

O: +1.1 pts/100 poss. D: +0.1 pts per 100 poss.

Keep in mind RAPM isn't perfect, but over multiple seasons you get a pretty accurate read. One of the issues, however, is that it can only account for things based upon the actual teammate combinations used. So if a team doesn't give players the opportunity to play with decent offensive players, it could actually overstate a player's offensive impact...because the O could completely wilt and cease to function without player x on the court. Yet Iverson's offensive contributions aren't extraordinary even though his teams were expressly built around him and his ability to carry the load. They loaded up on D and let him do his thing on O. His ORAPM for his full tenure in DEN was the exact same: +1.1. So it wasn't as if giving him help allowed him to improve his impact.

You can do the same thing for Miller, except we don't have most of his best years. 89/90-97/98 was his peak. Playing in a small market pre-internet, he flew under the radar in the league for his first 5 regular seasons (really only gaining a rep from the Knicks series in 94). Understanding we're missing a lot of his best years (and his very best), we can still take his final 2 peak years, the 98/99 season that was a grind for him as and older player with the compressed schedule and 99/00 + 00/01. Smaller sample, so only drop the best and worst seasons.

O: +2.8 pts D: zero

So you have a player at the end of his 9 year peak/post peak who has appreciably more impact than Iverson. Because he is crazy efficient, doesn't require a lot of touches/play that interferes with others' offensive games, and he stretches defenses. And he increases his load a lot in the postseason.

So Iverson is a more exciting player. He's greater in terms of diversity of skills and being an alpha that can push a bad team to mediocrity. He has better raw production. But raw production doesn't win games. He's not greater if you measure that as impact on moving the needle on team play from mediocre to legit contender. Which is kind of the point of it all, isn't it?

You can not have a player getting that many touches in an offense who improves the offense as little as he does and build a team that is a legit contender. The ceiling on the offense is too low unless you've got Russell-level impact coming from someone else. Even in the year that the Sixers made the finals, they squeaked by two teams in 7 that weren't even top 7 clubs. It looks like Iverson is heroic because he's obviously carrying the offensive load in that run, but the point is that he had to carry the load because of how teams need to be constructed around him. The Sixers weren't that good. They were about as good as they could be because of how Iverson's skill set determined the team was built though. Even if they found the perfect second perimeter option, best case, they were maybe the 5th best team in the league for a very brief window.

I realize you said that people exaggerate team construction with Iverson, but people need to ask themselves honestly, "Why couldn't they get that perimeter #2? Philly isn't an awful market. You get to play with a guy who won an MVP award and some solid interior D to clean up your defensive messes. Their front office wasn't stellar, but it wasn't a complete mess. Seriously, how could they not find that guy? They were even playing in the weaker conference during Iverson's best seasons. This should have been a very attractive spot for a quality FA. The obvious answer is that players and front office guys understood the team effects better than Iverson supporters do. And we saw his impact in DEN. He played next to an offensively gifted future HOF at the front end of his prime, an interior defender who was 2007 DPOY and in the middle of a 4 year all-Defense streak, and a bit of third option punch with Kenyon Martin. And they weren't quite a top 10 team in the league (and finished #10 and #11 in O and D that year).

And that's the difference. Neither Miller nor Iverson was capable of being a true #1 on a typical championship team. Very few players are. But Miller gave you the flexibility to assemble rosters on the fly who could keep a franchise at the floor level of contender for years. G7 losses to the #1, #2 and #3 SRS clubs in 94, 95, and 98. An OT loss away from doing the same in 00 vs. the #1 SRS team. And they were a bit unlucky in 99 not to have anything in the tank with an old roster in the compressed lockout season. That kind of opportunity would not be available on a club that featured Iverson.

With him, they could chuck a not terribly efficient second perimeter option on the court (Jalen Rose), or plug and play old vets in limited minutes (Mullin, Perkins, Byron Scott), or open up space to free up a non-athletic, but offensively skilled big (Smits), or play with different types of PGs (Jackson, Best, Workman, Fleming) or dump excess offense (Schrempf and Person) or use an offensively limited defensive line (two of the Davises/Foster).None of those guys were perfect compliments. They didn't need to be.

It's not as simple as rings/team success counting, but I do ask, "How could this player contribute to a conteder?" and "Could they put a team into serious contention?" That doesn't mean I don't think Iverson is a great player. He was. And there is value to getting a team from below average to pretty good by carrying that load. But when I make a mental list of top X players in a certain role, there are certain obvious guys: Jordan, Byrant, Wade, West (a combo guard, but one whose skill set really was as a SG). Beyond those guys, I look at the players who still carried a lot of the load, but more importantly were the type of players who could definitely elevate teams to contender status as a true #1 a #1B or a #2 sidekick. The very best of those guys are people I put above an Iverson. Guys like Miller, Allen, Gervin, Drexler.

[Chicago76]

So Miller was a great complementary player, glad we cleared that up. Now try to use him as the main guy and watch him fail. It is fun to see how you try to prop him up while avoiding Millers worst weakness, rebounding, his best seasons at close to 4, career average being 3. Iverson has almost one rebound up on him for career with a peak of almost five despite being 7 inches smaller than Reggie. So I guess I have to slightly alter my statement about Miller's defense. He could not play a lick of man to man defense. Glad we cleared that up. It is telling that you completely avoided the issue of Miller never shouldering an offensive load like Iverson, it was never even close. Miller had his niche and he was great at it. Despite what you are trying to tell me, Miller was not a guy who could take a team with offensively inept players and lead them anywhere.
Just to reinforce that point Millers assists average are pretty bad for a sg compared to Iverson who, despite being labeled a "chucker" and "ballhog" here, has a higher career assist average than MJ, Kobe and Wade. It is telling that Iverson despite playing sg on that 76ers team still sported higher apg than Miller ever did on a team which could not have been much worse offensively apart from him.
Iverson's inefficiency is directly linked to the ineptitude of his team mates on the offensive end. They had barely any range and needed to be close to the basket to be effective with the exception of McKie who still was not a great 3 point shooter, just good enough to hit open 3s. They all struggled to create their own shot as well. Despite teams in the league knowing that their offense rested entirely on Iverson he still managed to average career high ppg.
Iverson also did not really need something special as a team, not anymore than Reggie, stop making stuff up. All he needed was a decent pg who can play some d and shoot 3 and a non-awful center. In fact I dare make the bold statement that in todays league he would have flourished and put up record efficiency numbers with all the spacing he'd get on many teams.
But even if I were to grant you that Iverson needed more specific teams, so what? When did MJ win? When he had the triangle defense, the best wing defender and a fringe all star/HoF level PF at his side. When did Magic win? When he had the best center and the best defensive PF on his team. When did Kobe win? When he had the best center and later a dominant PF in addition to one of the best sixth man. I could go on showing that many top players only ever won when they had specific teams around them. Yet I never see them maligned, only Iverson.

Yes Iverson can be argued into the top 5, there are only 3 clear cut better sgs, MJ, Wade and Kobe. To claim he has no case is ludicrous. Mind you I do not have a problem if someone rates him outside of it, just the proclamation that he has no case whatsoever and that complimentary players like Miller or bloody Klay are better than him are such ludicrous statements I feel the need to defend a player I am not that high on in the first place.

Rebuttal in my post above, but FWIW, if you're relying upon rebounding to compare SGs, you're grasping. Especially when their rebound rates (a better measure of rebounding effectiveness) has them dead even over same ages (Iverson stopped playing earlier).


Short version of the rebuttal:

Iverson couldn't carry the load effectively as a true 1A player on a title team either. But very few players can. If we're limiting greatness to those players, then we can probably exclude>50% of all 80s-mid 00s HOFers from any future discussion. Prime Iverson was only equal to past prime Miller defensively. Prime Iverson was not as effective/additive to his team's offenses without help (Philly) or with help (Nuggets) compared to end of prime/past prime Miller. Prime Iverson had a positive but not earth shattering impact in both of these scenarios.

Allen Iverson, as a primary scorer or in any role that he could play, could not exist on a team with a good enough team O to win a title. So he wasn't helpful as a first banana, a 1B or a #2 role when it comes to title creation. Miller's greater impact and the flexibility with which others players could do their thing around him meant he could at least be a 1B or a #2 on a title team.

And that's the difference really. Raw production is one thing. But production in a way that improves team effects in pursuit of titles is what matters. Unless we're talking about a fantasy team. If that's what is important to you, then Iverson over Miller all day long. Great player. Fun to watch. Gritty. Not necessarily a selfish player, but it was more the case that his style of play/skill set was selfish. Definitely Hall worthy. But he's not in the caliber of the guys with the talent capable of delivering titles as a true first option: Jordan, Bryant, Wade, West, maybe Drexler nor is he in the caliber of the best of the rest whose style of play and impact were capable of delivering in a team pursuit of titles context.

[Franco]

except that Westbrook ... plays more games a season on the average,

????? who cares about games when Westbrook has never even played 3000 minutes in a season. Westbrook's career high is 2914 a mark Iverson eclipsed 7x

League MPG average for superstars has being going down for years now, it would be better to compare him with his contemporaries.

That’s the “minutes” equivalent of trying to compare Iverson’s TS% to today’s league average instead of his own era.

[KobesScarf]

except that Westbrook ... plays more games a season on the average,

????? who cares about games when Westbrook has never even played 3000 minutes in a season. Westbrook's career high is 2914 a mark Iverson eclipsed 7x

League MPG average for superstars has being going down for years now, it would be better to compare him with his contemporaries.

That’s the “minutes” equivalent of trying to compare Iverson’s TS% to today’s league average instead of his own era.

AI was top 10 in mpg 10x and lead the NBA 7 of those years vs Westbrook was top 10 only twice and that's including this year which isnt even over.

[Chicago76]

????? who cares about games when Westbrook has never even played 3000 minutes in a season. Westbrook's career high is 2914 a mark Iverson eclipsed 7x

League MPG average for superstars has being going down for years now, it would be better to compare him with his contemporaries.

That’s the “minutes” equivalent of trying to compare Iverson’s TS% to today’s league average instead of his own era.

AI was top 10 in mpg 10x and lead the NBA 7 of those years vs Westbrook was top 10 only twice and that's including this year which isnt even over.

I guess I'm lost here wondering why that is important. Playing in this era, he'd be on the court about 4 minutes less per night. So he'd be on the floor 37-39 minutes per night. Is that still more than Westbrook's 34-36? Sure. But we're really only talking about 3 minutes when you account for how player minutes are allocated today vs. 15 years ago.

Looking at their first 11 years (10.5 for Westbrook), both had a single season where they missed almost half the year. For the other 10 seasons, Westbrook missed 28 games to Iverson's 89. That seems a lot more significant

[KobesScarf]

League MPG average for superstars has being going down for years now, it would be better to compare him with his contemporaries.

That’s the “minutes” equivalent of trying to compare Iverson’s TS% to today’s league average instead of his own era.

AI was top 10 in mpg 10x and lead the NBA 7 of those years vs Westbrook was top 10 only twice and that's including this year which isnt even over.

I guess I'm lost here wondering why that is important. Playing in this era, he'd be on the court about 4 minutes less per night. So he'd be on the floor 37-39 minutes per night. Is that still more than Westbrook's 34-36? Sure. But we're really only talking about 3 minutes when you account for how player minutes are allocated today vs. 15 years ago.

Looking at their first 11 years (10.5 for Westbrook), both had a single season where they missed almost half the year. For the other 10 seasons, Westbrook missed 28 games to Iverson's 89. That seems a lot more significant

How could that be more significant when Iverson was actually on the court A LOT more

[Chicago76]

AI was top 10 in mpg 10x and lead the NBA 7 of those years vs Westbrook was top 10 only twice and that's including this year which isnt even over.

I guess I'm lost here wondering why that is important. Playing in this era, he'd be on the court about 4 minutes less per night. So he'd be on the floor 37-39 minutes per night. Is that still more than Westbrook's 34-36? Sure. But we're really only talking about 3 minutes when you account for how player minutes are allocated today vs. 15 years ago.

Looking at their first 11 years (10.5 for Westbrook), both had a single season where they missed almost half the year. For the other 10 seasons, Westbrook missed 28 games to Iverson's 89. That seems a lot more significant

How could that be more significant when Iverson was actually on the court A LOT more

Because he really wasn't on the court a lot more. Let's take their first 11 seasons, scratching their respective seasons where both were injured half the year.

Iverson was on the court 77.1% of the time
Wesbrook was on the court 69.6% of the time

The reason Iverson was on the court that much was due to usage patterns in his day vs. Westbrook's...and a lot of that is down to bench quality today vs. before. If you take a look #100 mpg in a season guy over a 5 year period in Iverson't prime, that guy is playing 4 more mpg than the #100 mpg single season guy in a 5 year span in Westbrook's prime.

Ignoring that is kind of like saying a 60s star is better/more valuable because so many of them played 44 mpg or in Wilt's case more than 48mpg one year (cuz overtime). It's not a useful comparison because players should be benchmarked vs. their era...just like Iverson's TS% should be benchmarked against his...not the insane rates we see from perimeter players today due to the 3.

If you account for the mpg loading (to make an apples to apples comparison across eras):

Iverson was on the court 69.7% of the time vs. Westbrook's 69.6%. There is no difference beyond a rounding error. Iverson today would still have more mpg, but Westbrook was more durable. You could argue that Iverson's durability would be better because he wouldn't be forced into all of those extra minutes. But someone else could say, "That might be true, but it wouldn't suddenly make him more healthy than Westbrook. He's small and he's going to break. I'd still rather give up an extra 4 minutes a night of my star if it meant I was more likely to have him healthy enough to play X more games."