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We've often seen guys like Bowen or Marion defend opposing teams' PGs when their guys were over-matched. Even Scottie Pippen was occasionally assigned to opposing PGs.

What other SGs/SFs have done this with some degree of success in today's league? What other players do you think COULD do this with some success?

Bowen guarded Nash

Allen Iverson dropped 50 points through 3 quarters on Farmar and Fisher. Phil stuck Ariza on him in the 4th and AI score like 2 points that quarter.

Kobe guards Baron Davis everytime.

Bowen has done a good job on Nash and I've seen Wade guard a lot of PGs.

^^I remember that as well(I follow the Lakers). Bryant was also assigned to Iverson in the latter stages of that 4th quarter against Denver a few months ago.

Would players such as Gerald Wallace, Andre Iguodala, and Travis Outlaw (ie long, explosive athletes with good defensive qualities) be able to assume similar roles for their teams? Have they?

John Salmons with the Kings... Jameer Nelson last year at Orlando, 2nd half on Tony Parker at SA (1st game) last year, 2nd half on Delonte West last season at Arco, on Deron at least a couple times (once at 2nd Arco game last season, and at Arco in one of the Kings wins this season, maybe both of them), Steve Nash 2nd half at 2nd Arco game last season.

Ron Artest on Baron Davis 2/3 times within the last couple seasons.

Maurice Evans w/ Kings, on Marbury really helping hold him to 1 pt in the 4th qtr at the Knicks in 2005. Marbury was having a big game before that.

Josh Howard on Nash in the 2nd half of G6 2006 WCF

Robert Horry on Nash in the 2nd half of G5 of 2005 WCF... this was very impressive

Sprewell on Bibby in 2004 playoff series. This adjustment was made after Bibby went off in G1 of the series.

FlawlessVictory wrote:Would players such as Gerald Wallace, Andre Iguodala, and Travis Outlaw (ie long, explosive athletes with good defensive qualities) be able to assume similar roles for their teams? Have they?

A more disciplined Gerald Wallace I think definitely could, may of already in that kind of assignment. Iguodala definitely can, and probably has, I can't think of any myself, though. Outlaw I think could, not sure if he has.

should guarding baron even count? don't most teams put their sg on baron and their pg on monta?

Thanks Ballings. Great response. I had forgotten about Horry v Nash; that's a great example.

If anyone else has similar memories or opinions on current players, I'd love to hear what you have to say as well.

LeBron obviously has all tools to be able to guard PG's and he already does from time to time and not unsuccesfully...

^^One game comes to mind where Tinsley practically had a triple double, he might have had one actually, and Bron was assigned to him in the last five minutes or so, effectively shut him down, and forced him into several TOs and numerous poor shots.

A combination of Quinton Ross, Livingston, Mobley were thrown at Nash and gave him noticable issues over the playoff series in 2006. I think Ross was on Nash the most. Tough series loss for the Clips, though.

Marion has had much less success than so against Tony Parker... and on Chris Paul, none from what I've gathered.

Marion I think was put on Sam Cassell from G3 on in the Clippers series. Don't recall it like the others, but boxscores indicate Marion had obvious success in G3, with Cassell going 2-10 there for 6 pts, in G6 Cassell shot 45 percent, but went 5-11 for 15 pts with 6 TOs (Clippers won there), and G7 went 3-12 for 11 pts. In G6 I'm not quite sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if Cassell made some shots later in that game to be key to the Clips win. Don't think so on G4/5, because Cassell statisically did well-great in them.

Marko Jaric played SF almost exclusively last year, and often guarded opposing PG's. At 6' 7", he was pretty good at using his size on defense, and his long arms sometimes limited their passing.

However (and this would probably be true for many of these other players), there were a handful of PG's he had no chance against. While Jaric has quick hands, at 6' 7" he simply didn't have the footspeed or cornering to stay with guys like Tony Parker. Scoring PG's that have unnatural speed could run away from his length, and he couldn't keep up with them.

CzBron wrote:LeBron obviously has all tools to be able to guard PG's and he already does from time to time and not unsuccesfully...

Yup, Lebron guarded Paul the other night.

When Kerry Kittles was on the Nets the Nets would sometimes go with a cross-guard matchup and have Kidd on Hamilton and Kittles on Billups (during the playoffs).

Kittles was effective at guarding point guards because of his large reach and insane quickness...

Rookie SF Dominic McGuire slowed down Chris Paul both times we played him. That was the key to the Wizards sweeping the Hornets.

Tony Allen guards bigger point guards for the celtics.

Anthony Parker sometimes guards PG's because Calderon is the worst defender on the team.

TheKingOfVa360 wrote:Rookie SF Dominic McGuire slowed down Chris Paul both times we played him. That was the key to the Wizards sweeping the Hornets.

Interesting. How long was he left on Paul? You said he slowed him down. On a scale of 1-10, how effective would you say his defense on Paul was?

It's common for wing players to guard opposing pg's. The problem is that pg's who have to guard opposing wing players usually have a big matchup problem. This is usually the bigger limitation.

If a team has a big PG who can guard opposing wings without a big size advantage than they can often switch defensive responsibilities. Otherwise the switch only happens when a pg is such key to a team's offense (such as Nash or Paul) that sacrificing a bad wing matchup is a relatively small problem; or else when a team plays a non-offensive player as one of their wings - such as when Phoenix plays SA, usually Bell or Marion used to guard Parker while Nash guarded Bowen.

Pretty much all the names that came to mind when I opened this thread have already been mentioned.

The question arises...

Who does this best in the league today?