RealGM

Criteria: Take into account both peak and career play, era dominance, impact on the game of basketball, and how well their style of play and skills would transcend onto different eras. To be more exact, how great they were at playing the game of basketball.

Voting Will End In 2 Days -- Please vote and nominate

Newest addition:

James Worthy

Hall of Fame 2003
2x NBA 3rd Team
Finals MVP 88
3x NBA Champion
7x All-Star
Tiny Archibald

Hall of Fame 1991
3x All-NBA 1st team
2x All-NBA 2nd team
NBA Champion in Boston 1981
6x All-Star


Bobby Jones

1x All-ABA 2nd team
NBA Champion 1983
10x All-Defense 1st team (2x in ABA)
1x All-Defense 2nd team
Sixth Man of the Year 1983
5x All-Star

Billy Cunningham

Hall of Fame 1986
ABA MVP 1973
3x All-NBA 1st team
1x All-NBA 2nd team
1x All-ABA 1st team
NBA Champion 1967
5x All-Star

Dolph Schayes

Hall of Fame 1973
6x All-NBA 1st Team
6x All-NBA 2nd Team
NBA Champion 1955
12x All-Star

Dikembe Mutombo Mpolondo Mukamba Jean-Jacques Wamutombo

1x All-NBA 2nd Team
2x All-NBA 3rd Team
4x Defensive Player of the Year
4x All-Defense 1st Team
3x All-Defense 2nd Team
8x All-Star

Vince Carter

1x All-NBA 2nd team
1x All-NBA 3rd team
8x All-Star
Rookie of Year

Grant Hill

1x 1st Team All-NBA
3x 2nd Team All-NBA
7x All-Star
Rookie of the Year

VOTE:

We have a7' shotblocking defensive anchor in Dikembe Mutombo -- efficient but with poor hands v. 50s star Dolph Schayes who was a weak shooter from the field but whose foul shooting puts Larry Bird to shame and a tough defender to boot.

Some combo forwards with versatile 2 ways games. From the 60/70s we have Billy Cunningham who came up as a scorer but who added defense and playmaking for a very valuable all around player. From the 70s/80s we have Bobby Jones who is the only player to ever get named 1st team All-Defense 10 times . . . in his 1st 10 seasons (his last year he was only selected as 2nd team) and played a variety of roles in his career -- he was the star of Denver's best record in either league team in 75, defended both forwards and center in Denver then went to Philly where he was a combo foward who also defended guards and shifted to 6th man (winning SMOY) when asked to give bench help to that star-studded starting lineup (Moses, DrJ, Toney, Cheeks) and was a winner everywhere he went. The 80s gave us James Worthy of the show time Lakers and a finals MVP. Finally, we have Grant Hill, an all-around star of 00s in Detroit before his injury.

For explosive scoring, we have Vince Carter, half-man/half-amazing and Nate "Tiny" Archibald. Both had great individual years with some later team success though Tiny's team success came after he quit being a "star"

VOTE: Schayes's FT shooting was more important than you would think, it was much more of a key to 50's offenses where the paint tended to resemble a rugby scrum -- probably the first candidate to go in here. That and a lot more accolades lead me to VOTE: DOLPH SCHAYES

Point Guards -- I like Billups's consistency and efficiency, not up for any of the others
Chauncey Billups
Nate Archibald
Tim Hardaway
Mark Price
Dennis Johnson ? Mookie Blaylock?

Shooting Guards -- Not really feeling any of the top guys yet but here's who I'm thinking about
David Thompson
Joe Dumars
Bill Sharman ?
Chris Mullin
Hal Greer

Shooting Forward -- a lot of great candidate left, in no particular order
Adrian Dantley
Shawn Marion
Connie Hawkins
Cliff Hagan
Jamaal Wilkes?

Power Forward --
Jerry Lucas
Larry Nance
Amare Stoudamire/Terry Cummings/Elton Brand
Not quite ready for Chris Webber or Shawn Kemp yet (two guys I didn't like their games but talented enough to start getting a look here over the Paul Silas/Buck Williams types that would be the main alternatives)

Centers: starting to run a little short here
Mel Daniels
----------?
Walt Bellamy
Neil Johnston
Yao Ming

Looking at the candidates -- Billups is the kind of guy I tend to rank higher than most -- very consistent two way player who wasn't a superstar but is the kind of guy who makes winning teams win. Same for Dumars and Sharman -- I'd love to get a comp of them from someone. I'd lean to Worthy over David Thompson or Adrian Dantley among the scorers, again, because I think he's more the kind of player you will find championship teams built around. Lucas and Nance are the best PF types (and probably over Shawn Marion too) for consistency and star quality over time. Jerry Lucas wasn't a great defender but he was the other main star on those great Cinncinnati offenses with his rebounding and outside game allowing Oscar to work his magic inside -- then Lucas turned around and helped the defense and passing oriented Knicks win another title with Willis Reed injured and ineffective. He was a great rebounder, a very efficient outside scoring big, and a terrific passer who gets less love than his numbers because of his Asberger's type personality but one of the best for a long time. Finally, Mel Daniels won TWO MVP's and 3 championships in the ABA -- yes it was an inferior league and his career wasn't that long but it was better ball than the NBA in the 50s and he was basically Alonzo Mourning as a player with better rebounding but less shotblocking -- similar offense and attitude. He'd be a star even today though probably not a 20ppg scorer.

So, Billups, Dumars, Nance, or Lucas for consistency; or Daniels for peak?




Looking at the numbers, the one that stands out is Chauncy Billups. One of the longest careers, most efficient scorer, all-around game, only Daniels has better regular season numbers and that's in about half the time and better postseason PER than James Worthy whose postseason heroics are pretty much his main case.

NOMINATE Chauncey Billups -- pretty clearly.

Vote: Grant Hill

Someone asked before if people just forgot about Hill. I didn't, but his dropoff has been pretty staggering considering that I don't feel like he's been "exposed" in any major way by out vetting process. He was nominated 20 threads ago. Wow. Kinda cool that we can see something like that, and I don't regret my votes, but he's been making my choices difficult for a while now.

I've never been one to really champion Hill, but I don't think he's dramatically overrated, and I respect the hell out of his attitude and work ethic.

Nominate: Billups

There's a clear contingent here who don't respect Billups. I'm only nominating him now, so it's not like I think he's been robbed, but I do think he's a pretty dang solid player. He was the best player on this last cycle of Piston title contending teams (though that didn't actually become the case until after they won the title), and while they were an ensemble, I think we're well into territory were prominent ensemble pieces should get some love.

Vote: Vince Carter
Nominate: David Thompson

Don't know what else to say at this point, Carter for me is pretty clearly the best player left.

Vote: Grant Hill
Nominate: Shawn Kemp

Damn, missed a lot of threads..

I'm personally up and down on Carter. Sometimes I don't get that "it" factor when I watch him play, but then I think that becomes so magnified when watching Carter, that in general, we tend to underrate how good he was in his prime. He definitely has impact (which I'm sure has already been alluded to); Nets were 9-16 before the trade, went 33-24 w/him (jumped from scoring 86.2 PPG to 93.6 PPG as a team [+7.4] while not really worsening their defense at all). Even w/ the Raptors, from 01-04, the Raps went 126-125 (.501) w/him opposed to 20-54 (.270) w/out him.

He can obviously volume score, had underrated play-making and was a good rebounder. I think the problem is, how many seasons do we value? '00, '01, and '05 are his peak/best seasons. In '06, and '07, we're looking at two more All-NBA caliber sort seasons (24/5/5, with a very good post-season thrown in). His '03, and '04 seasons are meh, injury, low efficiency (with nearly negative impact in '03). You could say, Carter has two more all-starish caliber seasons in '08 and '09. That's not bad.

I originally came into the thread after a long hiatus and thought, "damn, Hill is still on the board." But really, I have a tough time deciding between he and Carter. I don't really blame Hill for not having HUGE post-season #'s (scoring wise), b/c his overall activity wasn't bad. Better rebounder, defender, and play-maker too.

RE: Billups. Is he a better offensive player than Price? Mark's impact on those Cavs teams are pretty eye opening: from 88-94, the Cavaliers were 38-67 (.361) w/out him, and 252-135 (.651) w/him. Billups is better defensively, but isn't a.) the theme that PG's defense is the least important position defensively, and b.) Billups is severely overrated defensively. I don't even know if I'd take Price over Billups, but both should be rather close together, IMO.

To throw out some more names, Dandridge's name should start to come up soon. He was great on both ends, and had a knack for the big plays. His "star" ability is underrated (we hear of him fitting in w/ other sort stars, when he was a star sort himself). Where do ABA guys like McGinnis, or Wise go? McGinnis peak is pretty damn good, though there's a lot of other players at that position worth considering (Amare, Brand, Webber, Kemp to name a few). Kind of just thinking out loud, the RUN TMC guys, Dumars, heck even Ben Wallace (w/Rodman sort going), Sikma, Daniels etc.

^I'd include his 06 with his very best seasons, simply because that was by far his best individual playoffs. 30/7/5 on good efficiency. His 07 was a really good regular season, arguably his best, coupled with a disappointing playoffs...I'd still include it, since it's a similar case with his 00 season.

In terms of how many valuable seasons does Carter give you...there's 00, 01, 05, 06, and 07 as 5 great seasons. In addition to that, he has 2 underrated and All-Star caliber seasons in 08 and 09. Remember, he was still the best player for the Nets...he was carrying the offense and he was still a 21/6/5-ish player. I said it before, the loss of Carter isn't the whole reason why the Nets went from a 34-win team to a 12-win team...but he's clearly the main reason why imo.

His 04 season is clearly the worst full season of his prime, but there's still value there. He averaged close to 5 boards and 5 assists per game, and he still managed to average over 22 ppg. I would say it's an All-Star caliber season still. I don't care much for his 02 or 03 seasons, because he misses so much time.

But overall, that's a valuable 8-year period from Carter, and he performs well in the playoffs, capable of carrying huge scoring loads when needed. He's actually pretty durable, despite his reputation (aside from 02 and 03, he never misses more than 9 games in a season). Also, like you said, an underrated playmaker and a good rebounder for his position.

VOTE: Dolph Schayes
NOMINATE: Chauncey Billups

Vote-Schayes
Nominate-Greer

Vote: Dolph Schayes
Nominate: Chris Webber

(Count me with TMac4MVP as another that would like to see a more in depth Billups vs Price discussion before Billups gets in by acclaim)

-vote: undecided
Nomination: Adrian Dantley.
He was pretty comparable to guys like King or English selected already. A scoring machine, great %, several allstar, his only fault was bad reputation, but man, he had six years where scored between 28 ppg and 31 ppg. This is remarkable. He shot 54%.
6 time allstar, ROY, 2 scoring titles.

vote: Schayes
nominate: Dantley

VOTE: Schayes
Nominate: Greer

Vote Vince

Nominate David Thompson

Billups v. Prince

Both's main strength is three point shooting, neither was particularly a great playmaker or rebounder, Price shot better from 2 (better on the fast break), Billups gets to the line a lot more so their overall efficiency is similar.

So, where is the big difference? (1) Health -- Price was small and injury prone, Billups has already played 2 years and 1/3 more games than Price played in his career. Billups is a good defender with good size, Price was a weak defender. Billups has a deserved rep for stepping up in the playoffs -- PER is a far from perfect measure but it's a good quick look tool -- Billups's PER actually goes up in the playoffs which is unusual, Price has the typical 2 point slide that seems more typical -- about the same as Shawn Marion.

With players ranking as close as they are at this point in the project, that's a pretty clear edge for Billups.

@therealbig3, definitely agree with your post on Carter.

@pen, I definitely think Price was a better play-maker. I know their APG are similar (though Price generally hovers around 7-8, while Billups is more 6-7), but it's worth mentioning Price was never a BIG minutes guy (this can be considered a negative as well), averaging under 32 minutes per game from 91-94. When he was up near 35-36 minutes, he did nine assists per game from 89-91 (this could be reflected in AST%). And point taken about games played, but we have to consider Billups first 5-6 years of his career was pretty much irrelevant, and outside of one season for Price during his peak, he was generally good for 72+ games each season. I think Price has 6 relevant seasons, while Billups has 7, so the difference isn't too much to sway the overall decision, IMO.

As for defensively, yeah, he was better than Price, and that might probably be enough if we consider them equal offensively. However, I think Billups defense is grossly overblown, and Price was little better offensively. But the playoffs argument is a good call, Price was good, but Billups was better in that regard.

Again, as I said in the original post, I probably have Billups over Price, but they're nearly neck and neck, IMO.

vote: Grant Hill
nominate: David Thompson

A few things quickly while I have a chance:

-I have Price way ahead of Billups (and Billups in the top 100). I see Price as a Nash Lite. I'll be nice and say that I do not see Billups anywhere near that light. Totally agree that I have Price at 6 relevant seasons and Billups at 7, and I continue to be confused by the logic behind people valuing peripheral years in this project. Why should we care what someone does when it has little effect on a team?

-What exactly is the argument for Adrian Dantley? Again, this is a guy who shows negative impact who keeps getting discarded who was even benched at one point in his career -- presumably, for just not getting it -- and doesn't pass the eye test.

-I have listed out 95 players. (I have not evaluated notables such as Haywood, Hawkins, Westphal, Wilkens, Hagan, Schayes, Dumars, Bing and Yao.) My current Penbeast board of players by position:

PG
Price
D. Williams
Billups
Archibald
T. Hardaway

SG
Thompson
Greer
Sharman
Carter
Mullin

SF
Anthony
Worthy
Dandridge
McGinnis
Rice

PF
Webber
Brand
Kemp (?)
Cunningham
Amare

C
Mutombo
B. Wallace
? Who else to consider besides Yao?

Open to shifting on some of these guys as this whole final group is fairly close.

What with Kirilenko, Daugherty, Schrempf, Dennis Johnson, Issell, Pistol Pete, Fat Lever, Sikma, Lucas, Wilkens, Nance, Cummings?