#10 Greatest Defensive C of All-Time - Top 10 Defense at each position project

[cecilthesheep]

I'll vote for Mark Eaton. The thread has convinced me. I think it's rather revealing that the most commonly advanced argument against him seems to be "he wouldn't do well in this era" ... I don't judge players on that very much, if at all. We don't know how he might have changed his training habits and his game if he played today. The only way a concrete, non-hypothetical judgement can possibly be made is by comparing how well each player did against the competition they faced in the era they played in, and when looking at it that way, Eaton stands out.

I will say though, this is not a longevity vote. Eaton played in the league for eleven years *total*. Mourning and Howard don't have awesome longevity, but I don't think it's a big disadvantage of theirs when compared to Eaton. Mourning almost certainly has the best longevity of the three, honestly.

[cecilthesheep]

I would like to change my vote. I was on the fence with Howard and Eaton but Eaton's impact is almost impossible to ignore here. My vote will go to Mark Eaton.

Trex has told me that a good practice here is to edit your first comment to make this clear as well; that makes vote-counting easier and reduces the risk of errors.

[trex_8063]

Well, been mulling it over and I'm tentatively casting a vote for Alonzo Mourning; though it's pretty much a mental coin-flip between him and Mark Eaton for me, so I'm perfectly at peace with Eaton taking this spot. I think Eaton had the slightly better in-era dominance, but I'm hedging with Zo due to better era portability. Anyone can read my more detailed thoughts on the previous page.

fwiw, I don't think Dwight Howard (or Artis Gilmore, for that matter) is an unreasonable pick here either; I've simply arrived at the conclusion, after looking everything over, that Eaton and Mourning may be slightly better picks.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #43:

Mark Eaton - 8 (penbeast0, 70sFan, iggymcfrack, SinceGatlingWasARookie, LA Bird, Samurai, SkyHookFTW, cecilthesheep)
Alonzo Mourning - 4 (kendogg, Dr Positivity, KnickFan33, trex_8063)
Dwight Howard - 4 (pandrade83, Jaivl, HurricaneKid, HeartBreakKid)
Bill Walton - 2 (Johnny Firpo, colts19)

Calling it for Eaton. And that is [finally] that. Done.

[cecilthesheep]

Thru post #43:

Mark Eaton - 8 (penbeast0, 70sFan, iggymcfrack, SinceGatlingWasARookie, LA Bird, Samurai, SkyHookFTW, cecilthesheep)
Alonzo Mourning - 4 (kendogg, Dr Positivity, KnickFan33, trex_8063)
Dwight Howard - 4 (pandrade83, Jaivl, HurricaneKid, HeartBreakKid)
Bill Walton - 2 (Johnny Firpo, colts19)

Calling it for Eaton. And that is [finally] that. Done.

it's been a pleasure; thanks for making sure it got through to the end.

[pandrade83]

I'm not sure if it's fair to penalize Eaton for being slow - maybe he wouldn't be good today, but the vast majority of NBA history he would be.

As for between Howard and Mourning - I've always thought Howard was better. While Howard doesn't block shots as well, seemingly to me he had better mobility and could switch better than Zo - Howard also carried really awesome defenses without any great defenders - not sure if Zo ever did that. Howard also beat Mourning comfortably on glass - actually, I don't have much doubt that Howard was a better defender.

I haven't read the last page, but I need to sleep so I might miss the deadline.

vote goes to Dwight Howard

I wish I had some more time to look into Mark Eaton because I do think he might be getting stereotyped a bit. Yes, he was slow, but there is evidence to suggest his slowness was not much of a hindrance - it's not like it was okay to be slow back when he played.

It's fair when it impacted him in his era. People look at today's "pace & space" and forget that we've had pace before - it's been about 25 years but we've had it - we just haven't always had this degree of space.

Some teams learned to adapt to his size and punished him for it in the playoffs in series where the Jazz underperformed what they probably should've achieved:

'89 Warriors racked up 115 ORTG on them in a sweep (Eaton was -1.7 team avg)
'91 Blazers racked up 115 ORTG on them in a 4-1 series; not to say Utah should've won - but it shouldn't have been 4-1 (Eaton was -0.9 team avg)
'92 Blazers got to 120 ORTG on them in the WCF; Eaton was only -2 to team avg.

And if Eaton's only having a positive but smaller effect on your defense, he's not worth keeping out there because he's near worthless offensively; essentially you can remove his impact on a series somewhat easily - and if you do that, you turn a decisively positive player into a decisively negative one.

I don't love Howard but I can't objectively take someone with that pronounced of a weakness over him.

[SkyHookFTW]

Thanks Trex, this was a fun little project all the way through.

[trex_8063]

.

Thanks Trex, this was a fun little project all the way through.

Passing your thanks on to lebron3-14-3; this project was his idea, and he'd been running the show thru roughly the first half or so.

[kendogg]

Was a fun project. Thanks to lebron and trex for coordinating. I still think centers 11-20 could be fun to do...maybe I'll start a thread at some point after we've had a short break.

[Vladimir777]

Was a fun project. Thanks to lebron and trex for coordinating. I still think centers 11-20 could be fun to do...maybe I'll start a thread at some point after we've had a short break.

Agreed. Even though I don’t understand the stats, I loved reading all the pages.

You guys should do top overall defenders sometime, although it might be hard when comparing a PG to a center.

Or top rebounders. Or other categories. I love stuff like this.

[Dr Positivity]

Is it possible Cowens defense historically for a center is slept on?

The best of the other pivotmen create an impression of grace, in part because of their practiced smoothness but also because they pace themselves. By contrast, Cowens is an unguided missile, a runaway freight. During any given game he is apt to run more baseline-to-baseline sprints, take part in more fast breaks, guard more outside shooters, dive for more loose balls and trample over more opponents, teammates, referees, ball boys, front-row spectators, scorekeepers, sportswriters and sundry pieces of courtside furniture than some centers do in their entire careers.

Celtic Coach Tom Heinsohn believes Cowens may revolutionize the pro game as much as Boston's other dominant center, Bill Russell, did in his time. While Russell took the territory within 10 feet of the basket away from opposing shooters, Cowens, not a shot blocker of Russell's caliber, has extended the center's area of play to the four corners of the court. He has brought speed to the one spot in the lineup where it always has been considered least necessary. Cowens can slip outside for his vastly improved jump shot or curl inside for a quick, left-handed hook. He can fill a lane in the fast break and yet is strong enough to rebound against anyone. He is able to participate in the full-court press and still effectively guard far taller men close to the basket. He helps Boston play the NBA's switchingest defense because he is capable of going man-on-man against the quickest outside shooters. During Cowens' first pro season his opponents felt that he would ultimately serve Boston best as a forward. Now most pros think he is the perfect center for the Celtics' fast-tempo style.

"He adds a different dimension to Boston's game," says Chicago's Norm Van Lier. "He has great defensive range on a horizontal rather than on a vertical plane. He'll meet me at the top of the key, spread those long arms and make it almost impossible to pass off without him getting a finger on the ball."

https://www.si.com/vault/1973/04/02/618012/bostons-perpetual-motion-machine

It seems like Cowens is valuable on defense for the same reason as Draymond or KG. Despite not getting many blocks because of his size, he is phenomenal perimeter defender for a big man + is a lunatic motor wise

[trex_8063]

Is it possible Cowens defense historically for a center is slept on?

The best of the other pivotmen create an impression of grace, in part because of their practiced smoothness but also because they pace themselves. By contrast, Cowens is an unguided missile, a runaway freight. During any given game he is apt to run more baseline-to-baseline sprints, take part in more fast breaks, guard more outside shooters, dive for more loose balls and trample over more opponents, teammates, referees, ball boys, front-row spectators, scorekeepers, sportswriters and sundry pieces of courtside furniture than some centers do in their entire careers.

Celtic Coach Tom Heinsohn believes Cowens may revolutionize the pro game as much as Boston's other dominant center, Bill Russell, did in his time. While Russell took the territory within 10 feet of the basket away from opposing shooters, Cowens, not a shot blocker of Russell's caliber, has extended the center's area of play to the four corners of the court. He has brought speed to the one spot in the lineup where it always has been considered least necessary. Cowens can slip outside for his vastly improved jump shot or curl inside for a quick, left-handed hook. He can fill a lane in the fast break and yet is strong enough to rebound against anyone. He is able to participate in the full-court press and still effectively guard far taller men close to the basket. He helps Boston play the NBA's switchingest defense because he is capable of going man-on-man against the quickest outside shooters. During Cowens' first pro season his opponents felt that he would ultimately serve Boston best as a forward. Now most pros think he is the perfect center for the Celtics' fast-tempo style.

"He adds a different dimension to Boston's game," says Chicago's Norm Van Lier. "He has great defensive range on a horizontal rather than on a vertical plane. He'll meet me at the top of the key, spread those long arms and make it almost impossible to pass off without him getting a finger on the ball."

https://www.si.com/vault/1973/04/02/618012/bostons-perpetual-motion-machine

It seems like Cowens is valuable on defense for the same reason as Draymond or KG. Despite not getting many blocks because of his size, he is phenomenal perimeter defender for a big man + is a lunatic motor wise

I certainly gave him some thought. Honestly, it was the infrequency of truly elite defenses during his tenure [despite Havlicek and Paul Silas joining him in the frontcourt, and a tough defensive backcourt of Don Chaney and Jo Jo White], and to a lesser degree his middling longevity, that made me pass him over.

Seriously, the center field is so ridiculously tough; we could go 15 deep and still never depart from dominant defensive centers. I mean, even Alonzo Mourning and Dwight Howard were passed over.