RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #34

[Hornet Mania]

At this point it's hard for me to pass up Kidd's longevity. He was a really high-level player for many years, and useful starter for even longer. My alternate vote was a tough choice, everyone in this area is so close. Gary Payton was a tempting choice, as was Artis Gilmore, but in the end I have to side with Walt Frazier.

34. Jason Kidd
Alt vote: Walt Frazier

Can you explain Kidd vs Miller of Longevity is the driver here? 19 vs 18 years, but stats like winshare are heavily favor Miller (I think he's our top guy in WS not in). I myself have Kidd over Miller as well, but longevity isn't the driver for where I rank kidd or miller or at least it isn't the primary one. I ask in part because I'm starting to look at miller and wondering if I'm overrating kidd and/or under rating miller.

I give Kidd the nod over Reggie because I believe at his best (Nets period) he was the better player, his defensive edge also seems substantial. I usually go with a combo of longevity/peak in my thought process, Kidd came out a bit ahead in this case. I like Reggie a lot too though, and I think his impact when beyond the box score, so I can't argue too much if you think his peak was closer to Kidd than I do. Once the PG group and Gilmore go off the board Reggie will be one of my next men up.

[mischievous]

For those voting or considering Billups, what puts him over Westbrook for example? I mean he has some nice longevity but quite a few of those seasons come as a role player, and he was never at any point considered a legit superstar. Westbrook already has 3 seasons that destroy anything Billups has done, and if we look at say a 6 year stretch 2012-2017 from Westbrook he beats out Billups best 6 year stretch by a pretty significant margin. This isn't to say i would even vote Westbrook yet, but it's just an example of a guy who is just a totally different caliber of player.

[Lou Fan]

These next 2 spots for me are a toss up between Gary Payton and Jason Kidd
Kidd: He's an elite defender and rebounder at his position and obviously an ATG player/passer on the fastbreak. He took the Nets to back to back Finals while leading the team in points, assists, and steals. The big drawback for Kidd is his lack of a pull up jumper. He just never learned how to score off the dribble, except layups/dunks, and that really hurt his teams in the halfcourt. 87% of his 3s were assisted on which clearly shows he wasn't creating his own jumpers. I do value his championship as a starter on the Mavs. His very solid post prime seasons bump his case. His relatively high turnover numbers don't really bug me as they were a necessary byproduct of his risky mindset that made him so brilliant as a passer. drza had a great post talking about Kidd's impact a few posts back read that for more.
Payton: I want to vote for him here but his playoff fails, specifically those in 94 and 95, really give me pause. The Denver series was flat out embarrassing and he got schooled by Van Exel (who was only in his second year) the next year. The Sonics might have been the best team in the league those years and they blew their best shot at a title. GP got his ring as the 4th/5th best player on the Heat which helps a little bit but he also lost on the Lakers in 04. Overall I think GP was a pretty good playoff performer but his defeats were ugly and memorable. "The Glove" is easily the GOAT point guard defender and he even one DPOY in 96. He has really good longevity into his 30s and took a team to the finals as the man. 9 All-NBAs and All-Defensive teams show you just how great he was. Peak Payton was an offensive and defensive ace as in 98-00 he led the league twice in OBPM while being selected for the All-Defensive first team all 3 years. He had solid efficiency for his time peaking at 55 ts%.
They both were elite defenders at their positions. I give the edge in defense to the Glove he won DPOY and his combination of trash talking and elite defensive skills make him clearly the best defensive pg ever. They both took their team to the finals as the man and won a championship as an important role player. However, outside of 03 Kidd never really had a chance to win as the man and GP had great chance from 94-96. In 94-95 I think they were the best team in the league honestly. Kenny Smith even said the Sonics had their number and they were lucky they didn't have to play them. Kidd was the better rebounder but I'm not sure how much I care about that. Kidd also has a slight longevity edge but Payton has peak edge. Payton's intangibles are better than Kidd's the whole Dallas situation was a mess and from every account Payton never had problems like that and he was a great leader. Payton led his teams to being some of the top offenses in the league finishing top 3 a few times in the 90s while Kidd's offenses were pretty mediocre. That's what gives GP the slight edge.
1st Vote: Payton
2nd Vote: Kidd

[Clyde Frazier]

Vote 1 - Walt Frazier

Vote 2 - Rick Barry

Reasoning: viewtopic.php?p=58257557#p58257557

[Winsome Gerbil]

34) Barry

35) see below

Iverson 26.7pts 3.7reb 6.2ast, 24368pts 3394reb 5624ast, 7x (3/3/1) All NBA, 4x Scoring Champ, 1x MVP
Thomas 19.2pts 3.6reb 9.3ast,18882pts 3478reb 9061ast, 5x (3/2) All NBA, 2x champion
Payton 16.3pts 3.9reb 6.7ast, 21813pts 5269reb 8966ast, 9x (2/5/2) All NBA, 9x All Defense (9/0), 1x DPOY
Westbrook 22.7pts 6.2reb 7.9ast, 15156pts 4149reb 5293ast, 6x (4/2) All NBA, 2x Scoring Champ, 1x MVP
Cousy 18.4pts 5.2reb 7.5ast, 16960pts 4786reb 6955ast, 12x (10/2) All NBA, 6x champion, 8x Assists Champ, 1x MVP
Frazier 18.9pts 5.9reb 6.1ast, 15581pts 4830reb 5040ast, 6x (4/2) All NBA, 2x champion, 7x All Defense (7/0)
JKidd 12.6pts 6.3reb 8.7ast, 17529pts 9725reb 12091ast, 6x (5/1) All NBA, 1x champion, 5x Assist Champ, 9x All Defense (4/5)
Gervin 25.1pts 5.3reb 2.6ast, 26595pts 5602reb 2798ast, 7x (5/2) All NBA + 2x All ABA (0/2), 4x Scoring Champ

Guys who I really don't think should be talked about yet:

Billups 15.2pts 2.9reb 5.4ast, 15802pts 2992reb 5636ast, 3x (1/2) All NBA, 1x champion, 2x All Defense (0/2)
Miller 18.2pts 3.0reb 3.0ast, 25279pts 4182reb 4141ast, 3x (0/0/3) All NBA


So my analysis here is that:

a) I don't think guys like Billups and Miller have any real business being considered this high. They have much more decorated counterparts from earlier eras. Reggie wasn't even consistently an All Star in his own era, Billups only had half a career of excellence. There's no real argument for Reggie > Gervin for instance, or Billups > Frazier.

b) I like my MVPs -- we've got 3 of them in this group, which means to me we've got 3 guys who almost unquestionably peaked out Top 5 in the NBA. I think its possible Isiah may have been considered Top 5 at his peak, but he would have been well back of the Magic/Bird/Kareem/Michael monsters of his era.

c) floor generals of the group: Thomas, Cousy, Kidd

d) scorers of the group: Iverson, Gervin, Westbrook, maybe Thomas at peak

e) defenders of the group: Payton, Frazier, Kidd

-- I've always loved Payton's defensive game. Not just a PG credited with being a "good defender" because he was one of the few who would consistently stay in front of his man, Payton actually weaponized PG defense. He was an attack dog climbing all over guys, smothering, poking, banging, talking smack, and intimidating the hell out of opposing PGs. That said, in the numbers you can see the little bit of weakness in his offensive game. He wasn't a great intuitive passer at the level of some of these other guys. In his early career he operated in a combo guard backcourt sharing passing duties with guys like McMillan, Hawkins, even Shrempf. he became a better assist man later in his career at the same time he became a volume scorer, but his efficiency as a scorer really dropped as the focus shifted to him fulltime and he was asked to go from an 18-20ppg scorer to a 22-24ppg scorer. While the D is a great calling card, I just can't call him the best of this bunch overall, and will save him for later. P.S. as a point of curiosity that per usual for me I think points out more problems with advanced metrics than anything else, advanced stats like DWS and DPM seem to have a hard time picking up his defensive excellence.

-- going through Isiah's numbers I think I'm more comfortable still not advocating for him. I knew him late career as a tough minded clutch and rather despicable jerk who led, and yes LED those Bad Boy Pistons teams. And I do think his numbers deserve a leadership/clutch winner type of boost. That was definitely his rep, and he would compete like hell. But as far as his "greatness" peak/prime stuff, what seems to me to have happened is that a little guy had a big burst of mid-80s numbers in a short statistical peak/prime, and the perceived greatness of that burst was then carried over and continued to be attributed to Isiah through his later career when he was no longer that major star, and was now part of a platooning share the duties championship backcourt. He made his rep in about 4 years as a 21-11 guy, then settled in and won through his later career as something closer to an 18-9 guy with numbers right in line with guys like Timmy Hardaway or Kevin Johnson. I'm comfortable holding off on him as well.

-- Frazier might have the most well rounded resume of any of these guys, but you can see on career value that he had a very short career compared to most of these guys, really only 11 years, and the first one was a warmup. His career numbers are already being surpassed by Westbrook who is still adding in his prime and playing at an MVP level. Walt's all around abilities are attractive, but his overall career too truncated for me to make him my next post-Barry choice.

-- Gervin absolutely belongs in this group in terms of accolades, but I think the reason I initially left him off is because of his one dimensionality. He's a great scorer, along with Iverson the greatest pure scorer of this bunch, but in most ways I think he compares much more naturally to the relatively one dimensional SF scoring pack of Dantley and Nique and English etc. etc. He was not a passing creater, notoriously not a defender at all. And so while he absolutely deserves a mention here, and to me is clearly on another plane from a guy like Reggie, I don't think I like him over all these better rounded guards who were doing other things as passers and defenders as well as scorers.

-- Kidd's problem of course in his career was that he simply was not a scorer. He hung around forever and leads this group in career assists by a wide total. And through his prime he was a very good defender, who retained abilities as a ball thief long after he'd lost the lateral quickness to be a smothering force. He and Frazier are the other two top defenders of this group. But the scoring is just far below the level of the other candidates here, and if you really look at his accolades, there was only a relatively short prime period compared to his overall career, where he was considered a true top guy, and where he was scoring enough to keep it respectable. He's got an argument in this group, but he's not going to be my next choice either.


So as I mentioned, I love my MVPs, and I think my next choice is going to be drawn from:

Iverson 26.7pts 3.7reb 6.2ast, 24368pts 3394reb 5624ast, 7x (3/3/1) All NBA, 4x Scoring Champ, 1x MVP
Westbrook 22.7pts 6.2reb 7.9ast, 15156pts 4149reb 5293ast, 6x (4/2) All NBA, 2x Scoring Champ, 1x MVP
Cousy 18.4pts 5.2reb 7.5ast, 16960pts 4786reb 6955ast, 12x (10/2) All NBA, 6x champion, 8x Assists Champ, 1x MVP

-- I think Westbrook will eventually be the top guy out of this group, and may in fact rise higher than some of the guys we've already taken. Back before Curry was taken I pointed out that on career numbers, he looks as strong or stronger than Curry does right now. But I think I'm going to hold off on him for no greater reason than longevity. He's already got Walt Frazier level career numbers, but I think needs a few more years ot fo Durant's shadow as his team's clear "the man" for me to give him this spot over competition of this level.

-- what to do with Cousy is a lot like what to do with Mikan. The numbers are hard to translate. Even the accolades are hard to translate, because being All NBA in an 8 team league is not the same thing as being All NBA in a 30 team league. But what the variety of accolades, including even an MVP, do establish is that the stature of the man amongst his peers of the era matched the level of statistical groundbreaking for the top team of that era. Leading the league in assists for 8 straight years would be like a PG going on a decade long run of 12+ assists a game today.

[mikejames23]

All the Kidd love is surprising. I think Kidd sort of settled into the mid 30's and no one really questioned it much.

From age 26-30 he appears to have multiple playoff runs where his individual O-Rating is in the 90's. His entire playoff career he seems to have difficulty cutting through the 110 mark. In the RS he's pretty regularly flirting with below 50 TS% shooting. Over his career, he was most famous for his triple doubles, but it's not the type of stat-line that foretells a player's impact. His closest W/S comparison is Ray Allen who isn't being discussed.

He did longevity himself into being in the early 30's for W/S all time, but his W/S per 48, on the flip side, isn't all that impressive.

Frankly with his offense it's not just the jumper, he doesn't appear to draw defensive attention like the others being discussed here. Certainly not on Reggie Miller's level. Honestly if you're not drawing elite defensive attention, your jumper is flat, your efficiency mediocre, your FT shooting questionable, etc. there are major questions on Kidd's game.

There are pros and I am not ignoring that. Elite rebounding, defense and size for a PG. He also has certain elite intagibles such as IQ, leadership, etc.

IMO Kidd received as much attention as he did because of the dreadful competition in the East during that time. He appeared to be the best PG in the East for a number of a years and did all the little things the right way along with posting a sexy triple double line, so he quickly became a media favorite. However, #34 might be a tad early for him.

In comparison with PG's both Frazier and Payton should rank higher than Kidd. What they bring to the floor esp. at the PG position is more valuable. You could even argue that for Isiah Thomas. Probably not Billups but I found the vote to be interesting regardless.

[penbeast0]

Running a few hours late again, 1st week of full classes at school so it's been a bit hectic.

Our votes this thread:
Barry 8
Payton 3
Kidd 2
Billups 1
Cousy 1
Thomas 1
Frazier 1

Turning to alternates on the 4 solos, we have 1 Frazier, 1Thomas, 1Hayes, and 1 Barry

Rick Barry wins in a walk

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