If TMac's prime was ten years

[migya]

If TMac hasn't gotten the back injury when he did and his prime later ten years, where would he rank alltime and what possible awards would he have?

[Stan]

Is he getting out of the first round? Then not very high. The fact is his teams were never good enough to be championship contenders, esp Orlando. He had a legit WOAT level cast there.

[penbeast0]

If he consistently had his one peak year for 10 years, he definitely moves up but if he's the same player he was in Houston . . . superstar for 20 games, then meh for 20, then when Yao goes down he turns into Michael Jordan . . . . not a whole lot of difference. His problem wasn't his back, it was consistency of focus (like so many others of us in the world).

[Cavsfansince84]

If he consistently had his one peak year for 10 years, he definitely moves up but if he's the same player he was in Houston . . . superstar for 20 games, then meh for 20, then when Yao goes down he turns into Michael Jordan . . . . not a whole lot of difference. His problem wasn't his back, it was consistency of focus (like so many others of us in the world).

I think it'd be more fair to say both things were a problem. It's also possible that 03 is a bit of an outlier even without the injuries.

[Chronz]

People dont appreciate the alterations Tmac made to his game to stay at an All-NBA level, when the back issues really started creaking up in Orlando, he lost the low dribble attack stance he used to fake and blow by defenders, he became more of a PnR player than an off the ball/isolation scorer and grew into more of a playmaking role. In todays league, with todays spacing and pnr spamming, I have no doubt he would have averaged 10 assists. If he can sustain his peak long enough for Dwight Howard to develop on that team, then hes going to several Finals.

[Chronz]

If he consistently had his one peak year for 10 years, he definitely moves up but if he's the same player he was in Houston . . . superstar for 20 games, then meh for 20, then when Yao goes down he turns into Michael Jordan . . . . not a whole lot of difference. His problem wasn't his back, it was consistency of focus (like so many others of us in the world).

There should be a healthy middle, Tmac in Houston had already lost the elite first step, fair bit of hops and as I've stated, the low dribble attack stance was all but abandoned save for timely moments. He had become the kind of guy to pace himself for the playoffs and sure enough, that series vs Dallas was truly the best hoopin I've ever seen from him. If he could be around that level for several runs, thats Top-20 with or without a chip in my book.

[Morb]

Maybe Won couple rings with Howard/Yao 2009 Artest.

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[IG2]

T-Mac pretty much always had back issues in his career. They just didn't become severe until 2006, where he missed almost half the season. But prior to that he was playing 75+ games every year. 2006 is the key here. Everybody for some reason assumes 2003 T-Mac was who he was up until injuries struck, but that's just not true. 2003 was just a massive outlier. His play, while still very good, returned to Earth starting with 2004 itself. 2005 was along the same lines. Then he got hurt in 2006. But he was relatively healthy the 5 seasons prior to that - 2001/2002/2003/2004/2005 - and he was very good, but not really close to 2003-level good that people falsely remember him being every year.

Would his ranking be higher on the ATG list had he been healthy? Sure, strictly due to longevity. But I don't think we were gonna see anything in his late 20's that would've rivaled his 2003 season.