Chris Webber in today's game

[durantbird]

Where do you think Webber ranks today among the league's big men?

Edit: and where among all players

[tsherkin]

Interesting question.

Webber would shoot 3s today. He loved to shoot. He was a soft big back in the era of post play and he was inefficient relative to his peers as a result. That said, when he was younger and healthier, he also had a nasty first step and liked to slash. Some good triple threat action with a good perimeter jumper (aka stepping back for the 3 today) coupled to his passing would make him pretty effective. He had good vision, excellent passing touch and knew how to play around the elbow very well. I think he would be better in today's game than he was in his own time. They wouldn't load him up with too many minutes, they wouldn't overforce the ball to him and he'd probably look pretty decent. He took a minute to develop at the line, kind of like Karl Malone, so that would hurt him from attaining a higher upper bound, just like his generally tepid ability to draw fouls because of how much he avoided contact, but he could compensate for that some if he found his way to decent 3pt shooting.

He wouldn't match up to guys like Embiid or Jokic or anything like that but he'd be a solid player and a pretty good #2 option alongside a real first star.

[kendogg]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

[Colbinii]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

[IdolW0rm]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

I don't see the Griffin comparison. Webber was a much more fluid, much better ball handler, far better passer and playmaker and worse defender. Webber's bball IQ was off the charts, Blake's isn't anything to write home about. Griffin was also a hard strong 4, CWebb would much rather avoid contact.

[durantbird]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

I suppose he referred to my OP regarding where he ranks among big men

[70sFan]

Probably top 15 player?

[tsherkin]

I suppose he referred to my OP regarding where he ranks among big men

Do you consider Giannis a big? What about Pascal Siakham, or Lauri Markkanen?

Circling back to the notion of being top 4 on O as a big, how would he compare to Julius Randle or Kristaps Porzingis? Bam Adebayo? Would be really be notably/definitively better than those guys?

[Colbinii]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

I suppose he referred to my OP regarding where he ranks among big men

I would have him behind Jokic, Embiid, KAT and Sabonis Offensively.

Among big men, Probably Top 10-15 [Not sure I prefer him over Bam, Gobert, JJJ or Draymond].

[magicman1978]

Never saw him as a difference maker offensively and defensively he seemed to have poor lateral quickness (my memory is fuzzy in this). Without doing an in-depth analysis - probably fringe top 10 most of his prime years for bigs. Doesn't crack top 5 in his best years.

[penbeast0]

He'd be roughly the same player he was in his era unless he made massive strides in some area. A valuable but overrated scorer with great athleticism and very good court vision for a big. I wouldn't say he was a terrible defender, he wasn't. He wasn't great either. His dislike of banging with the big bodies would be less of a problem today, his quickness and ability to recover even more valuable so I'd guess he'd be better defensively today (if he was willing to play 5 which he complained about during his career).

AS a modern offensive 4, his weak outside shooting (career 3 point percentage 29.9, career ft percentage 64.9, overall career efg 48.7) would be an even bigger problem than it was when teams tried to get him to take less 3's and play more to his strengths. Today, coaches might even encourage him to shoot 3's (of course with more shooting, he might improve too, but unlikely to become a good shooter). He wasn't and wouldn't be a top 10 offensive player but with the confidence to shoot high volume, the "potential" of a #1 draft choice, and his truly strong passing skills, he would still get the ball enough to become overrated.

[kendogg]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

top 4 of bigs. did you even read the original question? quit wasting my time having to respond to this

[SNPA]

Space helps him offensively. Putting him mid-high post with spread out shooters running cuts would put pressure on defenses in the half court.

[dooki667]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

he's not. For bigs I'm adding AD and KAT as well andwhen healthy Zion

[tsherkin]

his weak outside shooting (career 3 point percentage 29.9, career ft percentage 64.9, overall career efg 48.7)

Mmmm. He took 883 3PA in his career. He shot 32.2% in seasons where he took 1+ 3PA/g, and 33.6% in seasons where he took 2+ (though the line was sucked in for 3 of those 4 years). They weren't a shot of emphasis for him, Brook Lopez showed no signs of 3pt shooting really for the first 8 years or so of his career, and he's shot 34.9% over the past 7 seasons on 4.9 3PA/g. Hard to judge until the player starts really letting fly. In essence, we never saw Webber taking threes. We saw some of his long twos converted into threes for a few years.

97 forward, we saw him shoot 41.8% from 16-23 feet. His outside shooting wasn't actually a problem, except in so much as it was his fallback for not driving and not posting, not crashing the offensive glass as much as he could have, etc. His 10- to 16-foot J was actually weaker than his perimeter J.

[Owly]

his weak outside shooting (career 3 point percentage 29.9, career ft percentage 64.9, overall career efg 48.7)

Mmmm. He took 883 3PA in his career. He shot 32.2% in seasons where he took 1+ 3PA/g, and 33.6% in seasons where he took 2+ (though the line was sucked in for 3 of those 4 years). They weren't a shot of emphasis for him, Brook Lopez showed no signs of 3pt shooting really for the first 8 years or so of his career, and he's shot 34.9% over the past 7 seasons on 4.9 3PA/g. Hard to judge until the player starts really letting fly. In essence, we never saw Webber taking threes. We saw some of his long twos converted into threes for a few years.

97 forward, we saw him shoot 41.8% from 16-23 feet. His outside shooting wasn't actually a problem, except in so much as it was his fallback for not driving and not posting, not crashing the offensive glass as much as he could have, etc. His 10- to 16-foot J was actually weaker than his perimeter J.

I could be wrong but ...

The years where he took more and made more ... that's baked into the career data. It's weighted more as he's taking more and the making more counts and still he's at a career .299. Even if there is in general a reason to prioritize (or even focus exclusively on) that data (and I'm not presently persuaded ... though I understand some arguments and in case of time machining it's a very loose process so ... I'm open to a large window on that sort of stuff and hear the "if he focuses on it it's possible that..." reasoning more there than certainty that a player totally could and just didn't) as you are honest enough to note ... the better years tilt towards the shorter line. At full distance he's .276315789 RS, .219512195 playoffs and .272727273 combined. Those are rough numbers.

On Lopez ... his career average FT% has always hovered around (a little under) 80%. It's not 1-to-1 either way but that's a pretty good indication (and like-for-like comparable across players) of a reasonably pure shot that, with work, if the form isn't unworkable for in-game or really doesn't stretch well ... I'd tend to project potential with practice at three point range. Webber improves in his career but that .649 career number ... I'd figure is in a much, much worse percentile.

Now I will say his beyond 15ft 2pt shooting was better than I expected. It's the stuff between that and at the rim that (to non-expert in this domain) eyes looks a little ugly so ... if you could get him to rationalize his game and if you could get the 3 ball developed (and he's healthy and happy and doesn't feud with anyone, get in trouble with the law, flirt with leaving ...) there's real upside. I'm just not that convinced on those ifs being that likely.

[tsherkin]

The years where he took more and made more ... that's baked into the career data. It's weighted more as he's taking more and the making more counts and still he's at a career .299. Even if there is in general a reason to prioritize (or even focus exclusively on) that data (and I'm not presently persuaded ... though I understand some arguments and in case of time machining it's a very loose process so ... I'm open to a large window on that sort of stuff and hear the "if he focuses on it it's possible that..." reasoning more there than certainty that a player totally could and just didn't) as you are honest enough to note ... the better years tilt towards the shorter line. At full distance he's .276315789 RS, .219512195 playoffs and .272727273 combined. Those are rough numbers.

I don't think the years he took more mean too much because, as I said, they are mostly from the years with the pulled-in line. I was mostly just highlighting that "perimeter shooting" wasn't actually a weakness for Webber as presented in the quote to which I was responding. Other than he did it too much at the expense of higher-efficiency stuff he didn't like to do because he didn't like to get physical, that is.

On Lopez ... his career average FT% has always hovered around (a little under) 80%. It's not 1-to-1 either way but that's a pretty good indication (and like-for-like comparable across players) of a reasonably pure shot that, with work, if the form isn't unworkable for in-game or really doesn't stretch well ... I'd tend to project potential with practice at three point range. Webber improves in his career but that .649 career number ... I'd figure is in a much, much worse percentile.

Yes, that's true, and is something I addressed a bit earlier ITT, because it's a fair point.

Now I will say his beyond 15ft 2pt shooting was better than I expected. It's the stuff between that and at the rim that (to non-expert in this domain) eyes looks a little ugly so

Absolutely.

I'm just not that convinced on those ifs being that likely.

I'm reasonably convinced that if you told him to focus on shooting 3s, he'd be fine with it. That's the least-physical shot you can get, and he liked to shoot. I don't think you could rely on him as a persona, of course; that's still just who he was as a young man and how he approached the game, etc. That's a whole other set of issues. I'm not invested in the idea that Webber would be amazing today, I just think he could crack 35, 36% from 3, that's all.

[kendogg]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

Easily Top 4 offensively is a huge stretch. How is he easily better than Curry, Luka, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Lillard, Butler?

he's not. For bigs I'm adding AD and KAT as well andwhen healthy Zion

Zion is never healthy so he doesn't count. And his offensive game isn't as developed anyway. Everyone simply rates him on his potential which may never be realized. Kat is a better jump shooter and thats it. Webber has a better overall offensive game. non-bubble AD is a constant disappointment whether its because of his health, conditioning, inconsistent shot or just a lack of any go-to moves. AD is certainly the better defender and 2-way player but I think Webber again has the better overall offensive game.

The only person brought up kn this thread that I do think is debatable is Sabonis but I'd still give the slight edge to Webber. He stays top 4 offensive big for me. It's easier to score now than in any other era and its not close. league average TS% is up over 6% from webber's era. Webbers numbers, which are already very good, would be up across the board. If Webber could take 5 steps, carry the ball and have unlimited spacing, he'd feast like everyone else in the league today.

[penbeast0]

...He stays top 4 offensive big for me. It's easier to score now than in any other era and its not close. league average TS% is up over 6% from webber's era. Webbers numbers, which are already very good, would be up across the board.....

I think you grossly overestimate Webber's ability to score efficiently. Even in his best year, 2001, scoring at an efficiency better than his career average, he was still a hair under the average scoring efficiency for the league in an era where bigs were more efficient scorers than smaller players. Playoffs don't help him as he dropped 91 points of ts% in the playoffs that year to .427 ts% which is bad in any era after the 1950s. Efficiency isn't everything and Webber was a very good passer, but below average efficiency volume scoring is only of limited value compared to guys who score more efficiently and at similar or greater volume.

Now you may think Webber suddenly gains a willingness to listen to his coaches and consistently take good shots but I'm not sure what evidence you are going on to give you that impression.

[homecourtloss]

young webb was a high flier and would be one of the best rim runners today. also would feast on all the single coverage and spacing of today, and the ability to blatantly carry and take 5 steps. he'd still be a negative defensively if he gave the same effort. he's basically the same player as blake griffin, with the injury history and all. easily top 4 offensively but overall it's hard to say. i guess jokic is bad on defense too and he's still an MVP candidate.

At the wild mischaracterization in the first bolded statement.

As for the 2nd bolded, there is absolutely 0% chance he’s “top 4 offensively”; his defense would be worse in todays game, so overall, he’d have worse impact.