RealGM

How would you rate the following 3 players -- DEFENSIVE VALUE ONLY -- in (a)peak, (b) 5-year prime, (c) career value?

Bobby Jones
Shawn Marion
Andrei Kirilenko

Peak: Jones/AK...Marion
Prime: Jones...AK...Marion
Career: Jones...Marion...AK, maybe Marion 1st.

I think AK has a case for #1 peak. Obviously the counting stats are in his favor but he did have a tendency to gamble. Marion certainly is a good defender but I think he's a notch below for peaks compared to Jones/AK.

AK's prime was very short though. He had like 3 good seasons then kinda fell off a cliff. And his overall career value was not fantastic.

Career wise obviously Marion makes up quite a bit on terms of what he lacks in peak. I'd still give the edge to Jones though. Most of the back half of his career Marion was not an elite defender.

Peak: #1 AK/Jones, #2 Marion
Prime: #1 Jones, #2 Marion, #3 AK
Career: #1 Jones, #2 Marion, #3 AK

He was the main guy guarding LeBron in the 2011 finals for Dallas so I think he has to get some of that credit defensively.

Bobby Jones's peak may have been his rookie year where he led a Denver team where the 2nd best player was either Mack Calvin or Ralph Simpson to the best record in the NBA. Not only was their defense good but their ability to create turnovers with Larry Brown's jump and switch scheme led to great years by almost the whole rest of the team offensively at least in the regular season.

kendogg wrote:AK's prime was very short though. He had like 3 good seasons then kinda fell off a cliff. And his overall career value was not fantastic.

There's a kernel of truth here ... but I'm not sure I fully agree.

His 03-06 box is pretty spectacular 21.9 PER (whilst on average usage), .181 WS/48 (whilst on a poor team) and 7.2 BPM ...

But that's already 3.5 years. '02 or 10 or perhaps '08 though are still productive and whilst Marion's near apex productivity prime is perhaps longer (circa 5 years) it will depend on your tool of preference and though between injuries and Sloan and maybe fit he seemed to lose something my impression is impact stuff overall likes Kirilenko better than Marion and he held up positive impact beyond those strongest years (though rate stuff will penalize Marion for a substantially larger career.

Not to say who should be where but there's value beyond that near-apex prime.


Jones like Kirilenko suffers versus Marion in terms of minutes but does have evidence supporting a high impact (in addition to his own very nice box/box-composite productivity).

I can't usefully talk about Bobby Jones.

On Marion vs AK, Marion was the better option for on-ball defense. If you need a 1st line of defense against a star forward Marion was a better choice than AK. Peak AK was spectacular in terms of help and weakside defense and generally creating havoc on defense.

In general I'd agree that AK's peak was better overall, but Marion was more consistent and was near his peak for much longer and thus had more total defensive value.