RealGM

I was wondering what your guys list of offensive players in NBA History looks like. Preferably try and rank this relative to era. If I had to make one, I’d do…
(Note: just prime/peak, no longevity. Meaning, having 10 offensive years vs 5 doesn’t make the former win due to volume of seasons)
1. Steve Nash
2. LeBron James
3. Stephen Curry
4. Magic Johnson
5. James Harden
6. Nikola Jokic (assuming this year finishes)
7. Michael Jordan
8. Chris Paul
9. Oscar
10. West?

I’d like to see your guys list.

If you are doing this relative to era, not sure how Oscar is out of the top three, let alone not even in the top five and behind several players who demonstrably did not separate themselves as much. How can you say it is an “era relative” list when five of your top six and six of your top eight all had their primes within the same ~twenty-year stretch?

AEnigma wrote:If you are doing this relative to era, not sure how Oscar is out of the top three, let alone not even in the top five and behind several players who demonstrably did not separate themselves as much. How can you say it as an “era relative” list when five of your top six and six of your top eight all had their primes within the same ~twenty-year stretch?

Because relative to the league average I still think they’re that impactful.

Lebronnygoat wrote:

AEnigma wrote:If you are doing this relative to era, not sure how Oscar is out of the top three, let alone not even in the top five and behind several players who demonstrably did not separate themselves as much. How can you say it as an “era relative” list when five of your top six and six of your top eight all had their primes within the same ~twenty-year stretch?

Because relative to the league average I still think they’re that impactful.

You think that because you haven't thought through what impactful actually means lol

1. Michael Jordan
2. Magic Johnson
3. Wilt Chamberlain
4. Shaquille O’Neal
5. Nikola Jokic
6. Stephen Curry
7. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
8. Larry Bird
9. LeBron James
10. Kevin Durant

1. MJ - GOAT Scorer, killer. alpha
2. Magic - passing, setting up teammates, O-Rating killer teams
3. Wilt - unstoppable force
4. Chris Paul - Point God, Deron was a rival for a while... but Point God is unstoppable on O
5. LeBron - more on the athletic side, made offense look good on any team
6. Kobe - Top 10 all time scorer, killer instinct
7. Larry Legend - skilled, IQ, GOAT white boy
8. Kevin Durant - clutch, great scoring, top pressure performer
9. Oscar - part of the 60's tribe, could've been Magic on another team
10. Joker - consistent godly numbers in the modern era.

HM: Nash

CarlikJones22 wrote:1. MJ - GOAT Scorer, killer. alpha
2. Magic - passing, setting up teammates, O-Rating killer teams
3. Wilt - unstoppable force
4. Chris Paul - Point God, Deron was a rival for a while... but Point God is unstoppable on O
5. LeBron - more on the athletic side, made offense look good on any team
6. Kobe - Top 10 all time scorer, killer instinct
7. Larry Legend - skilled, IQ, GOAT white boy
8. Kevin Durant - clutch, great scoring, top pressure performer
9. Oscar - part of the 60's tribe, could've been Magic on another team
10. Joker - consistent godly numbers in the modern era.

HM: Nash

Outrageous order.

1- lebron
2- magic
3- nash
4- jokic
5- jordan
6- shaq
7- curry
8 - shai
9 -luka
10 -oscar

Hm: bird, paul, kobe

Or somethinfg like that unless i am missing someone

I think there’s a handful of obvious guys that people will list.

One player I want to give a shout to here, though, is Charles Barkley. He’s not #1, or even top 5. But I think he may well be top 10. Obviously, his offensive numbers—including scoring volume & efficiency, as well as his offensive rebounding and assists—suggest an incredible offensive player, as does the eye test watching him. In terms of impact numbers, when he was on the 76ers, he drove a pretty weak team to have the 2nd and 3rd ranked offenses in 1989 and 1990. Very impressive stuff. More generally, we know his offensive on-off was really high over his last several years with the 76ers (somewhere around +11 or +12). He then went to the Suns and led them to have the best offense in the league twice in a row, as well as a really good offense the next two years (though they had a good offense in that era in the years surrounding Barkley too). And then we have actual RAPM data from his Rockets years, which were definitely largely post-prime but were good enough to land him near the top of the league in multi-year ORAPM and was good enough to have him 11th in Engelmann’s lifetime ORAPM. Barkley was an incredible offensive player. What brought him down in terms of impact was that he was a negative defensive player, but if we are talking purely about offense then Barkley was incredible and is an all-time great basically purely on the back of offensive greatness. I also note that another knock on Barkley is lack of playoff success, but he was actually a great playoff performer offensively.

I think there’s probably six guys that are definitely above Barkley (in no particular order: Jordan, Magic, Nash, Jokic, Curry, and LeBron). And it might be seven guys, depending on how we feel about Oscar. But Barkley’s definitely in the conversation for the last few spots. And, for instance, to take an example of another guy in that conversation, I’m inclined to think that Barkley was probably a better offensive player than Harden. Harden might’ve been a little bit better as an offensive player in the RS, but Barkley wasn’t actually a playoff dropper offensively like Harden was.

Surprised Shaq hasn’t gotten much love here

My clear top 7 (GOAT tier) in chronological order are:

Oscar
Magic
Jordan
Nash
James
Curry
Jokic

Next tier looks probably like this (all-time tier):

West
Kareem
Bird
Barkley
Shaq
Kobe
Dirk
Durant
Paul
Harden

Maybe I missed someone, but that's the rough list. HM to Moses, Wilt, Wade and Barry. Luka will be probably there soon as well.

70sFan wrote:My clear top 7 (GOAT tier) in chronological order are:

Oscar
Magic
Jordan
Nash
James
Curry
Jokic

Next tier looks probably like this (all-time tier):

West
Kareem
Bird
Barkley
Shaq
Kobe
Dirk
Durant
Paul
Harden

Maybe I missed someone, but that's the rough list. HM to Moses, Wilt, Wade and Barry. Luka will be probably there soon as well.

I agree with that top 7. Ordering them is tricky,

Magic
Oscar
Nash
Jokic
James
Curry
Jordan

The pre-Oscar/West era deserves a shout in some form - Davies is probably my pick, though as more of an HM that's impossible to place well with the lacking data.

60s - Oscar is an easy top 10, decent case for top 5 - relative weaknesses - mainly played on offensively slanted rosters and not super playoff proven. West has a back half of top 10 case, but clearly behind Oscar.

70s - The weakest non-50s era, KAJ has a back half case, not very impressed by his solo work without guys I see as clearly top 10. His best work came in the expansion riddled ABA years.

80s - Magic a strong case for #1, no real holes in his offensive game. Did it with Kareem, did it without him. Bird might be the era #2, but outside of my own top 10. A strong offensive era, but relatively balanced team efforts outside of Magic.

90s - MJ headlines, lacks in playmaking relative to most of the other clear top 10s. Outlier turnover impact. Barkley/Malone/Miller all with fringe top 10 cases.

00s - MDA and Nash usher in the strongest offensive era in NBA history. Prior to that Shaq presents a back of the top 10 case. Nash the top guy of the decade. Dirk/Kobe with pretty decent back of top 10 cases.

10s - Bron was already here, but he/Curry are clear top 10 guys from this era. CP3/Harden/KD also with cases.

20s - Jokic top dog so far, Luka/Tatum/Shai making cases (Shai pulling away, but only halfway through the season/decade).

Probably missed somebody.

Oscar/Magic/MJ/Nash/Bron/Curry my 6 that would be clear top 10 as of today. Probably my top 6 in some order.

eminence wrote:20s - Jokic top dog so far, Luka/Tatum/Shai making cases

Hey hey hey, wait a minute.

Jaivl wrote:

eminence wrote:20s - Jokic top dog so far, Luka/Tatum/Shai making cases

Hey hey hey, wait a minute.

I'd like to hear the reasoning here. For me, Tatum on offense is fighting for top 10 in the league RIGHT NOW... and he's probably not quite there.

Jordan
Lebron
Curry
Joker
Harden
Nash
CP3
Magic
West
Oscar

in no order

Might come back and order it later.

Magic
West
Oscar
Jokic
Nash
Curry
Jordan
James

After this 8, it's not clear to me. I'd probably go:

Bird
KAJ

70sFan wrote:

Jaivl wrote:

eminence wrote:20s - Jokic top dog so far, Luka/Tatum/Shai making cases

Hey hey hey, wait a minute.

I'd like to hear the reasoning here. For me, Tatum on offense is fighting for top 10 in the league RIGHT NOW... and he's probably not quite there.

Guy's great. Scores, makes plays, on and off ball, does a bit of everything and does it well. Still clearly below Jokic/current Shai, but I'd put him on par with anyone else offensively for the last ~5 seasons (well, and 'PO Luka', but he dogs it so much in the regular season that his teams - even decent ones - are in danger of missing the POs and rack up low seeds). Absolute iron man.

Very similar impact/stat/eye test profile to '05-'08 Bron, but with a great team around him instead of a poor one. Of course, LeBron made the leap in '09 and went from 'just' an MVP to an all-timer, but I'm fully comfortable with Tatum as an MVP/clear top 5 guy who's in the +4 to +5 range of great but sub all-time on offense and a clear plus (+2 or so) on D.

Jordan is #1 for me because he has the best box score profile (elite in all four factors) and led elite offenses without a super strong supporting cast on that end. Impact data that's been coming out from Squared2020 also supports his case as the best offensive player ever. Basically his case has the least weaknesses to me. Not much to nitpick.

Next is Curry. He and his teams have slightly less PS resiliency compared to MJ but that narrative is a bit overblown. The Warriors' offenses were still really good in the PS even in pre and post-KD years. Looks like the offensive GOAT in the databall era based on impact stats.

Next tier is the four offensive engines in Magic, Lebron, Oscar and Nash. I used to have Magic in tier 1 with Jordan and Curry but not anymore. His supporting casts were incredibly talented and were playing at +2 rORtg or better without him in the mid and late 80's. He played with Kareem who is a top 10 offensive GOAT in my book. That said, his PS offenses were very resilient even against good teams, something that Lebron cannot say. I've made extensive posts about Lebron's teams not being THAT impressive in the RS over a large sample, seemingly dominating in the PS but then underwhelming greatly against 5+ SRS teams. Oscar and Nash are behind Bron because their teams were very offensively slanted. Magic and Lebron also had some slanting in certain years but not to the same extent. Jokic brings up the rear in this tier because I still want to see more from him. The team offenses haven't been transcendent consistently but his supporting casts are also the worst of any player here so that must be taken into consideration. Jokic' combination of scoring and playmaking is one of the best in history. He will likely move up in the future.

The last tier which extends beyond the top 10 is the hardest to rank. Kareem > Shaq I made many long posts about. It's very close but I prefer Kareem just because he's more flexible. He can play a bit further from the basket, he can make free throws, he runs the floor better. Shaq fouls out opposing players better and gets more offensive boards. Kobe gets kind of overlooked these days but he led very good offenses post-Shaq. +2 rORtg from 2005-2007 is quite impressive given the garbage he had around him and then elite offenses once Gasol came aboard. West's results were just a bit worse in my eyes.

1. Jordan
2. Curry

3. Magic
4. Lebron
5. Oscar
6. Nash
7. Jokic

8. Kareem
9. Shaq
10. Kobe
11. West
12. Dirk

Haven't thought much, this is former list, will need to rethink list:

1. Mj
2. Curry
3. Bron
4. Magic
5. Nash
6. Bird
7. Wilt
8. Jokic
9. Shaq
10. Oscar

Like I said this is old one, will have to remake it soon.