Where do you rank Kevin Garnett all time?

[Franco]

Having any players’ list as an argument is a terrible idea, specially one where Dr J himself specifically said those were his favorite players.

Also, first take. Lol

[Colbinii]

Having any players’ list as an argument is a terrible idea, specially one where Dr J himself specifically said those were his favorite players.

Also, first take. Lol

I do my best to avoid conversations revolving around KG as they devolve from actual intellectual discussion to "This guy says he isnt as good so he isnt".

If there is one takeaway from this thread it is KG supporters have much stronger posts with regards to content and show less emotion when supporting Garnett than his proponents.
This alone should be great evidence that Garnett belongs in the top 15-20.

[Franco]

Having any players’ list as an argument is a terrible idea, specially one where Dr J himself specifically said those were his favorite players.

Also, first take. Lol

I do my best to avoid conversations revolving around KG as they devolve from actual intellectual discussion to "This guy says he isnt as good so he isnt".

If there is one takeaway from this thread it is KG supporters have much stronger posts with regards to content and show less emotion when supporting Garnett than his proponents.
This alone should be great evidence that Garnett belongs in the top 15-20.

Personally, I have him hovering at 9~12.

I do think there are arguments to keep him lower on ranking, specially winning-biased ones. I don’t particularly think it’s inherently wrong to have that bias, but whatever criteria someone has it at least needs to be consistent, which a lot of people lack.

[G35]

He may not be a Top 10 player of all-time (he's on the fringe), but he certainly should be characterized as one of the most influential players in league history. He restarted the HS-to-NBA movement, he revolutionized how the PF position is played, he was essentially the reason for the 1998 lockout and the creation of a rookie salary scale and max contracts.

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

When I think revolutionizing, I think of how that player changed the league or how the position was played for example:

Steph Curry revolutionized the 3pt shot, the league was already trending that way but he was the first to start shooting 25ft+ shots on a consistent basis and now you see everyone doing it.

Michael Jordan revolutionized the SG position, he was the precursor to Kobe, McGrady, Vince, Harden being the initiators of the offense from the SG position.

Mike D'Antoni revolutionized the NBA with his philosophy of maximizing the 3pt shot, which every team uses now to some degree.

KG did not revolutionize the PF position...Tim Duncan didn't change his play style, Rasheed didn't change, Dirk didn't change, there was no mass push for 7ft PF's to initiate the offense. KG may have been an outlier and coaches tried to maximize his skill set but there was no revolution.

That would be like saying Phil Jackson revolutionized the NBA with the triangle offense. No he didn't, he was very successful with that offense, but there weren't many, if any, other teams running the triangle. Many teams tried, to little success.

It's funny that KG had his most success when he was not initiating the offense and focused more on the defensive side of the ball......

[Klomp]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

[SinceGatlingWasARookie]

I rank everybody 5 to 15 slots higher before I remember all the other great players and then lower the guys ranking back to 5 to 15 spots lower.

[SinceGatlingWasARookie]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

KG was listed at 6-11.
David Robinson was a bit perimeter.

Moving on to other tall guys that are not 7 footers.
On KG's rookie team there is Laetner and Gugliatta.
Young KG reminded me some of Vin Baker, Derrick McKey and Clifford Robinson.
There is Shrempf, Tom Chambers and Kukoc.
There is Divac
There is young Chris Webber and Juwan Howard.

[Klomp]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

KG was listed at 6-11.
David Robinson was a bit perimeter.

Moving on to other tall guys that are not 7 footers.
On KG's rookie team there is Laetner and Gugliatta.
Young KG reminded me some of Vin Baker, Derrick McKey and Clifford Robinson.
There is Shrempf, Tom Chambers and Kukoc.
There is Divac
There is young Chris Webber and Juwan Howard.

Kukoc is the only guy from those listed you could maybe put in that category.

As for the height....

He’s not alone. NBA game programs across the country are littered with inaccuracies when it comes to player height. The widespread misrepresentations highlight a funny thing about the NBA: Its players, despite being taller than most of the other 2.7 billion men on earth, lie about their height like everyone else.

Durant’s case is particularly odd, though, since he stretched the truth to make himself shorter. Durant, whose team is tied 1-1 with the San Antonio Spurs in the Western Conference semifinals, said he often lies about his height depending on whom he’s speaking with.

“For me, when I’m talking to women, I’m 7 feet,” he said. “In basketball circles, I’m 6-9.”

There’s actually a basketball reason behind Durant’s white lie. “But really, I’ve always thought it was cool to say I’m a 6-9 small forward,” he said. “Really, that’s the prototypical size for a small forward. Anything taller than that, and they’ll start saying, ‘Ah, he’s a power forward.’ ”

A handful of other high-profile players seemingly cheated themselves by an inch or two to avoid the distinction of being labeled a 7-footer. Flip Saunders, the late Minnesota Timberwolves coach and executive, often said he referred to Kevin Garnett as “6-foot-13” because, like Durant now, the former MVP feared people would view him as a center as opposed to a power forward. Garnett, who was unavailable for comment, is still listed at 6-foot-11.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-nba-players-lie-about-their-height-1462316051

[HeartBreakKid]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

KG was listed at 6-11.
David Robinson was a bit perimeter.

Moving on to other tall guys that are not 7 footers.
On KG's rookie team there is Laetner and Gugliatta.
Young KG reminded me some of Vin Baker, Derrick McKey and Clifford Robinson.
There is Shrempf, Tom Chambers and Kukoc.
There is Divac
There is young Chris Webber and Juwan Howard.

Even if KG was actually 6'11 (he looks 7 foot to me), this seems pretty semantic.

[Amares]

Having any players’ list as an argument is a terrible idea, specially one where Dr J himself specifically said those were his favorite players.

Also, first take. Lol

Exactly, most people have no arguments to support their opinion, so they use arguments like "because some player said, and he's respected and well known"
DrJs top 5 is West, Wilt, Oscar, Baylor and Russell, so it only proves for the 1000th of time you should never even consider ex players opinion, especially when they clearly states why such choice: "...because I like how they played, I learned a lot from them".
Also other ridiculus things like denying KG's unanimous 2004 MVP or 2008 domination on the road to champs, and the best "We all know Kobe should have won MVP in 2009"

[Pg81]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

Larry Bird averaged substantially less assists than Magic, yet most people agree that Bird was close in terms of passing ability. Apg on its own is a poor argument. That being said, you are completely missing the point, as G35 pointed out, KG was an outlier, not a revolutionary. Why? Because hardly any PF models his game after KG. It would be far more correct to say that Dirk Nowitzki revolutionized the game by showing that big men can shoot, too.

[KTM_2813]

I don't personally have a dog in this fight, but as someone who feels as though Garnett probably ranks somewhere in the 15-20 range, I think that the strongest argument for him as a top-ten player ever is:

- I, and many people, think that Tim Duncan is a no-brain top-seven player ever
- Kevin Garnett has a career resume and statistical portfolio that stacks up very favorably to Duncan's. He also felt like very much Duncan's equal while they were playing
- So with that said, it feels very weird to rank Duncan in the top seven but have Garnett all the way down around 20

I know this is a half-baked argument at best but for some reason it genuinely gives me pause when I think about the comparison. I just get a weird feeling in my gut when I see Duncan and Garnett so far apart.

[freethedevil]

He may not be a Top 10 player of all-time (he's on the fringe), but he certainly should be characterized as one of the most influential players in league history. He restarted the HS-to-NBA movement, he revolutionized how the PF position is played, he was essentially the reason for the 1998 lockout and the creation of a rookie salary scale and max contracts.

man

It's funny that KG had his most success when he was not initiating the offense and focused more on the defensive side of the ball......

man was still his team's leading scorer. What are you talking about?

[freethedevil]

4) We're supposed to be impressed that KG led his team to the #1 seed in the western conference ONE TIME? But then despite being the higher seeded team, his team lost in the WCF, that's supposed to help your argument for KG?

When timberwolves second best player got injured? Yeah, I'm the biased one.

Not to mention you've posted a link to that backpicks article that ranks KG #8 all-time about 15 different times in this thread...we get it, you like KG. While the backpicks article makes some good points it does some very biased (bias in favor of KG, bias against MJ, etc) seems to put too much emphasis on longevity and impact stats/advanced stats but hey, we're all entitled to our own criteria..

I love how people claim "bias" instead of addressing the argumentation and then get worked over being called out for it. It's "biased" to impact stats over box stats because the former demonstrably have a higher correlation with winning and come from the score, winning/losing. Unless you don't value winning, there's no reason not to put greater emphasis on the former. If the points are "biased", why don't you go and address them?

If only KG liked his teammates as much as you like him! What do I mean? Take a look at this thread where the discussion was KG vs Robinson. There was some good debates on both sides but the consensus seemed to be that Robinson was slightly better. One of the most interesting comments from the thread was the one made by G35 here about some of the altercations KG got in with teammates over the years:

Fallacy Game on point:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum

Only way to argue for robinson wsa to throw out garnett's extra seasons, so iow, not much of an argument for robinson. As for teammate issues, this is something we've seen with jordan, shaq, kobe, lebron, ect. Regardless, if robinson is close to or higher than garnett for you, that's great for rob. It's still a meaningless claim unless you can make a compelling case for where garnett should be held.

Leadership and how good of a teammate you are. Intangibles like this don't seem to factor in to your beloved backpicks article. The other players that most on here have in the top 10 ahead of KG don't have those types of issues.

[/quote]
The article also didn't take those into account for shaq, kobe, or wilt. Not seeing the "bias" here.

[HeartBreakKid]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

Larry Bird averaged substantially less assists than Magic, yet most people agree that Bird was close in terms of passing ability. Apg on its own is a poor argument. That being said, you are completely missing the point, as G35 pointed out, KG was an outlier, not a revolutionary. Why? Because hardly any PF models his game after KG. It would be far more correct to say that Dirk Nowitzki revolutionized the game by showing that big men can shoot, too.

huh? bigs could shoot before Dirk, and shooting doesn't make you Dirk-esque.

Pick and roll defense, stretch 4, high post passing are all in pretty high demand now. Almost every defense today is modeled after the 2008 Celtics defense in some degree, so I'd say KG was plenty influential. I can't think of any player today that plays like Dirk, unless we are saying any big white guy that takes a jumper is a Dirk player.

[DatAsh]

2004 KG had a near unanimous mvp (kobe has never come close to that) as his "low talent" team got the first seed in the west and took the lakers to 6 in the cf with their second best player injured. Then Garnett, at 35, went ahead and won a ring as his team's clear cut #1.

You may think garnett was a tier 2 guy, but until you support that claim, I'm not going to take it seriously.

You'e really showing your bias towards Garnett at this point. You simply won't let it go if anybody tries disagreeing with your opinion that KG is a top 10 player of all-time.

1) KG was not 35 when he won a ring with the Celtics. He was 32 and for the vast majority of that season he was 31. He turned 32 during the playoffs.

2) KG was not the clear cut #1 guy on the 2008 Celtics championship team. He was arguably the #1 guy but Paul Pierce carried that team to the title just as much as KG did. Pierce was the NBA finals MVP...not KG. Pierce led the team in points per game, minutes per game, he was better than KG in FG%, 3 point % and FT %.

3) Let's not put too much stock in KG being the near unanimous MVP winner in 2004. This was an era where the NBA had some very questionable MVP winners. We all know Kobe should have won it in 2009 - not LeBron. It's very debatable whether Steve Nash deserved to win either of his MVPs in 2005 and 2006. Many people think Iverson didn't deserve the MVP in 2001..I could go on....

4) We're supposed to be impressed that KG led his team to the #1 seed in the western conference ONE TIME? But then despite being the higher seeded team, his team lost in the WCF, that's supposed to help your argument for KG?

Not to mention you've posted a link to that backpicks article that ranks KG #8 all-time about 15 different times in this thread...we get it, you like KG. While the backpicks article makes some good points it does some very biased (bias in favor of KG, bias against MJ, etc) seems to put too much emphasis on longevity and impact stats/advanced stats but hey, we're all entitled to our own criteria..

If only KG liked his teammates as much as you like him! What do I mean? Take a look at this thread where the discussion was KG vs Robinson. There was some good debates on both sides but the consensus seemed to be that Robinson was slightly better. One of the most interesting comments from the thread was the one made by G35 here about some of the altercations KG got in with teammates over the years:

viewtopic.php?t=1832046

Leadership and how good of a teammate you are. Intangibles like this don't seem to factor in to your beloved backpicks article. The other players that most on here have in the top 10 ahead of KG don't have those types of issues.

KG not the clear #1 guy in 2008? Everything is subjective I guess, but that seems like a really out there take. The value difference between KG and Pierce defensively is bigger than than Pierce's total offensive and defensive value combined, ie even if KG was net neutral on offense, he would still be the best player on the team, and he was far better than neutral on offense(you could even argue he was better than Pierce on offense).

Pierce was a better scorer, so I guess if that's all your looking at I can understand?

[homecourtloss]

3) Let's not put too much stock in KG being the near unanimous MVP winner in 2004. This was an era where the NBA had some very questionable MVP winners. We all know Kobe should have won it in 2009 - not LeBron. It's very debatable whether Steve Nash deserved to win either of his MVPs in 2005 and 2006. Many people think Iverson didn't deserve the MVP in 2001..I could go on....

Absurd. “We all know”?

[iggymcfrack]

3) Let's not put too much stock in KG being the near unanimous MVP winner in 2004. This was an era where the NBA had some very questionable MVP winners. We all know Kobe should have won it in 2009 - not LeBron. It's very debatable whether Steve Nash deserved to win either of his MVPs in 2005 and 2006. Many people think Iverson didn't deserve the MVP in 2001..I could go on....

Absurd. “We all know”?

LOL. LeBron got 109 out of 121 first place votes that year and it really should have been unanimous. That was probably the most impressive season in NBA history. He had the highest WS/48 since Kareem, the highest PER since Wilt, finished 2nd in DPOY voting and led Mo Williams, Delonte West, 33 year old Big Z, and 34 year old Ben Wallace to 66 wins despite having the point differential of a 20-win team whenever Bron went to the bench.

Kobe had 2 first place votes and was nowhere near LeBron’s league. He had a worse record with much better teammates. He wasn’t top 5 in PER, WS, WS/48, BPM, or VORP. He finished 6th in RAPM and was closer to Nene in 32nd than he was to LeBron in first. I don’t think he even deserved first team all-NBA that year over Paul and Wade. It would have been the most absurd awards decision in the history of the league if he’d won MVP that season.

[bledredwine]

I don't understand how he revolutionized the PF position. I hear that sometimes about KG, that he changed how the PF position was played. There have been a lot of PF's that could pass the ball. The Sixers ran their offense through Charles Barkley and he was great passer.

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

There have been countless stretch bigs even when it wasn't cool to play away from the rim.

Sabonis, Sikma, Detlef Schrempf, Robinson (probably very slightly shorter than KG). Hell, Lambeer had a jumper. Anyone who watched 90s ball knows that no, this isn't some new revolutionary thing. The defenses and rules changed the game, not the skill set of bigs. Everyone adjusted accordingly to take advantage of the spacing and open shots.

[Pg81]

How many perimeter-oriented 7-footers were there when he entered the league in 1995?

As for passing the ball, Barkley had one season over 5 apg. Garnett had 6 in a row over 5 apg.

Larry Bird averaged substantially less assists than Magic, yet most people agree that Bird was close in terms of passing ability. Apg on its own is a poor argument. That being said, you are completely missing the point, as G35 pointed out, KG was an outlier, not a revolutionary. Why? Because hardly any PF models his game after KG. It would be far more correct to say that Dirk Nowitzki revolutionized the game by showing that big men can shoot, too.

huh? bigs could shoot before Dirk, and shooting doesn't make you Dirk-esque.

Pick and roll defense, stretch 4, high post passing are all in pretty high demand now. Almost every defense today is modeled after the 2008 Celtics defense in some degree, so I'd say KG was plenty influential. I can't think of any player today that plays like Dirk, unless we are saying any big white guy that takes a jumper is a Dirk player.

No 7 footer was playing like Dirk and shooting 3s at the volume he did over such a long career, outside of maybe Sabonis but he only shot them as a spot up shooter and very rarely, far removed from Dirk's volume. I can think of several players who are around 7 foot and are not banging down low a lot today though, current most prominent example being Porzingis, but even guys like Durant and Aldrige have tried to copy Dirk's go to move, the one legged fadeaway. Tell, which moves from KG have players tried to copy?
Oh and claiming that KG has "influenced" defense because teams are modelling "to some degree" their defense is not really saying much about how much KG influenced players but how that Boston team influenced other teams. There is a difference between how a team influenced certain following trends, similar to how teams modeled their offense after the 2011 Mavs to some degree, it would be disingenuous to claim that they modeled their game after Dirk for that, simply because it is not true and you do not need Dirk to make it work, just like you do not need KG to get it to work.