RebelWithACause wrote:...
I personally would prefer about 10 wings at this point, before even thinking about Moncrief to be honest.
His longevity is mediocre.
Pennbeast spoke about his terrific man defense often. Yet as great as his man defense was his help defense was not nearly as good and help defense is something much more valuable regarding value and impact especially among wing players.
His offense was simplistic, yet effective. His skill set does not strike me as great.
Most of his games I watched were from the 84-85 season, which is his prime/peak and from the eye test I was not that impressed actually (as I am with other wings that are not in yet)
I am surprised how Moncrief ranked so early in the last project (at 53).
Does anybody have some compelling evidence for Moncrief to sway me on this one here?
Longevity is poor, that's the reason he's not ranked higher. His man defense is probably the all-time best in terms of shutting down an opposing shooter , particularly a jump shooter. If he was playing today, you could be playing Houston and if you put Sid on James Harden, there would be a decent chance that Harden is not a factor in the game. Thus either Dwight has to have a big game or someone like Ariza or Lin has to step up. That's huge if you can do it.
I strongly disagree about the value of man defense v. help defense for wings. For bigs, great help defense is clearly more important, for wings, I would guess that man defense is more key -- especially in the era of ball dominant wings. I don't have RAPM to back me up, but Moncrief led a bunch of top defenses in those 5 years (then Pressey led another top defense after Moncrief went down but Milwaukee couldn't maintain it after that). And, he did it without great big man help. Milwaukee used a center by committee with the likes of good defense but foul prone Alton Lister, and defensive specialist Harvey Catchings platooning with solid but not outstanding offensive scorers like aging Bob Lanier or Randy Breuer. None was that good, but they were adequate. BUT, Nelson made the defense work by taking opponents out of their game plan and Moncrief's ability to shut down an Otis Birdsong or Dennis Johnson was a big part of that.
Finally, offensively, he was a lower volume, more efficient version of Dwyane Wade -- super athletic and virtually impossible to stop from getting an open shot in midrange or driving to the hoop where he was an excellent finisher with good foul draw. He was around .600 ts% on 20ppg several of those 5 years while playing on an offense designed to spread shots round rather than open space for the star. That's impressive offense as well.
If Moncrief had 10 healthy years instead of 5 at the same level of dominance, I'd have around Dwyane Wade's level here though his playoff record was up and down -- one year he led the league in playoff efficiency, the next he had a bad stretch. He shut Birdsong and Dennis Johnson down, but Andrew Toney had a big series. Still, he was more capable of dominating opposing teams defensively than any other 2 I have ever seen - including Jordan (though I might take Jordan for one key game or one key 4th quarter defensively).
