Current SGA vs all-time SGs

[rand]

How many shooting guards at their peak would you take over current SGA for today's game?

Assume anyone from a prior era has an offseason to adjust to today's game.

[70sFan]

It's tricky, because one off-season might not be enough time to adjust for most older players.

Here is the competition:

George Gervin
Michael Jordan
Reggie Miller
Tracy McGrady
Manu Ginobili
Kobe Bryant
Dwyane Wade
James Harden

I think we can all agree that Shai already surpassed Iceman, Reggie and Manu. I'd clearly take him over Tmac as well (I'm not that high on one outlier season type guys).

That leaves us with Jordan, Kobe, Wade and Harden. I think he already surpassed Kobe's RS peak, not sure about Harden and Wade. Playoffs is another matter, Shai isn't well tested in postseason situation yet.

I can say that out of these 5 best SGs, Shai is clearly my favourite and I hope he'll become top 2 SG ever at the end of his career.

[durantbird]

Isn't Shai a PG? I also consider Harden a PG

[MiamiBulls]

SGA in the last 4 years has played nearly 90% of his minutes at the Point Guard position.

1) SGA isn't a Shooting Guard.

2) Regular Season Basketball from an historical perspective doesn't matter that much.

Peak David Robinson in the Regular Season was a better basketball player than both Hakeem Olajuwon & Tim Duncan, yet no one's generally invoking Robinson in conversations with Olajuwon & Duncan historically.

[Tim Lehrbach]

2) Regular Season Basketball from an historical perspective doesn't matter that much.

To whom? Why not?

[lessthanjake]

I guess he is technically a PG, but honestly in this era of more heliocentric basketball, I’m not sure that there’s much of any real difference between a score-first PG and a star SG. They’re both going to have the ball a lot and look to score a lot, with playmaking as an important secondary function opened up by their scoring threat. The only real difference I’d see is that if someone is really small, then we could classify them as a PG simply because you’re not going to want them to guard most SGs. But that’s not the case with SGA. So it’s really just a grey area. Personally, I see him as more like a SG, even though his position technically is PG.

[Matt15]

Regular season probably over everyone not named Jordan…post season I don’t think he’ll surpass 2001 Kobe.

[One_and_Done]

He's a point guard

[Matt15]

He's a point guard

More of a combo guard like Jerry West

[One_and_Done]

He's a point guard

More of a combo guard like Jerry West

Disagree, and not just because SGA is a vastly, vastly better player.

[OhayoKD]

Regular season probably over everyone not named Jordan…post season I don’t think he’ll surpass 2001 Kobe.

there's no real argument for jordan over someone spear-heading a 70-win team without his best teammate. Of course there was no real argument for him vs the small-forward spear heading a 66-win team with 20-winish help but that didn't stop you from pretending there was.

If this translates in the playoffs, it's the best shooting guard peak barring evidence this team was capable of 50 wins without him, contrary to what we saw last season

[Ol Roy]

Definitely Jordan, probably West, maybe Kobe, possibly Wade.

[homecourtloss]

I don’t think I would take anybody clearly over what he’s doing right now in this league. Which SG would have the team playing at a +11 SRS and 70 win pace WITHOUT his best teammate?

Definitely Jordan, probably West, maybe Kobe, possibly Wade.

I think there are cases for maybe for all of them under specific criteria, but I can’t see an argument for “definitely Jordan.“

[Ol Roy]

I don’t think I would take anybody clearly over what he’s doing right now in this league. Which SG would have the team playing at a +11 SRS and 70 win pace WITHOUT his best teammate?

Definitely Jordan, probably West, maybe Kobe, possibly Wade.

I think there are cases for maybe for all of them under specific criteria, but I can’t see an argument for “definitely Jordan.“

It's Michael Jordan. His biggest challenge would be trying to comprehend how much spacing he'd have, the freedom of movement, and how little rim deterrence he would face today.

I think two things can be true, that the league is more talented than ever, and that it also favors offense like never before. Look, I'm not taking anything away from SGA, but I think we can slow our roll on putting him above Jordan. The Thunder are clearly a well-coached, disciplined team who are adhering to their system on both ends of the floor, particularly defensively where they are ranked number one. Lots of athletic players on the roster who play their roles to a tee. But as with anything, we have to be careful with sample size and recency bias.

https://www.nba.com/news/4-reasons-why-thunder-are-clear-favorites-in-west

My small point on West is that I think he'd be shooting the lights out from behind the arc today.

[OhayoKD]

I don’t think I would take anybody clearly over what he’s doing right now in this league. Which SG would have the team playing at a +11 SRS and 70 win pace WITHOUT his best teammate?

Definitely Jordan, probably West, maybe Kobe, possibly Wade.

I think there are cases for maybe for all of them under specific criteria, but I can’t see an argument for “definitely Jordan.“

It's Michael Jordan. His biggest challenge would be trying to comprehend how much spacing he'd have, the freedom of movement, and how little rim deterrence he would face today.

I think two things can be true, that the league is more talented than ever, and that it also favors offense like never before.

My small point on West is that I think he'd be shooting the lights out from behind the arc today.

His biggest challenge would be massively upping the amount of time he needs to make a decision, becoming vastly better at deep-shooting, becoming a far more dynamic ball-handler, and becoming a vastly more disciplined defender.

A more talented league means players will generally get worse. That's how competition works. Jordan is not the only beneficiary of spacing so your argument doesn't logically lead to Jordan being an exception.

[Ol Roy]

I don’t think I would take anybody clearly over what he’s doing right now in this league. Which SG would have the team playing at a +11 SRS and 70 win pace WITHOUT his best teammate?


I think there are cases for maybe for all of them under specific criteria, but I can’t see an argument for “definitely Jordan.“

It's Michael Jordan. His biggest challenge would be trying to comprehend how much spacing he'd have, the freedom of movement, and how little rim deterrence he would face today.

I think two things can be true, that the league is more talented than ever, and that it also favors offense like never before.

My small point on West is that I think he'd be shooting the lights out from behind the arc today.

His biggest challenge would be massively upping the amount of time he needs to make a decision, becoming vastly better at deep-shooting, becoming a far more dynamic ball-handler, and becoming a vastly more disciplined defender.

A more talented league means players will generally get worse. That's how competition works. Jordan is not the only beneficiary of spacing so your argument doesn't logically lead to Jordan being an exception.

Jordan's 3P% would increase with volume, as it did when he played. Except now he'd actually be practicing the shot, which he didn't do in the past. It seems pretty obvious to me...but practicing is actually kind of a big deal. I suspect he'd match or surpass SGA from behind the arc in short order. I don't think the decision-making or handles points are serious criticisms, with all due respect. Adjusting his defensive approach, also not a big deal. That's a coaching/analytics thing, and Jordan's a smart guy who prioritizes winning.

No, more talent doesn't mean Jordan would be worse. There is every reason to think he'd improve. Would he be as far above other players than in his era? No, but in absolute terms, he'd still be the best.

Yes, I recognize I'm making a bunch of conjectures, but this thread is speculative by nature.

[Jaqua92]

So we have people picking current SGA over peak Jordan. One of which is the same character who goes out of his way to downplay Jordan in every single thread he has the chance to.

SGA over Michael Jordan.

Realgm is a joke

[Jaqua92]

It's Michael Jordan. His biggest challenge would be trying to comprehend how much spacing he'd have, the freedom of movement, and how little rim deterrence he would face today.

I think two things can be true, that the league is more talented than ever, and that it also favors offense like never before.

My small point on West is that I think he'd be shooting the lights out from behind the arc today.

His biggest challenge would be massively upping the amount of time he needs to make a decision, becoming vastly better at deep-shooting, becoming a far more dynamic ball-handler, and becoming a vastly more disciplined defender.

A more talented league means players will generally get worse. That's how competition works. Jordan is not the only beneficiary of spacing so your argument doesn't logically lead to Jordan being an exception.

Jordan's 3P% would increase with volume, as it did when he played. Except now he'd actually be practicing the shot, which he didn't do in the past. It seems pretty obvious to me...but practicing is actually kind of a big deal. I suspect he'd match or surpass SGA from behind the arc in short order. I don't think the decision-making or handles points are serious criticisms, with all due respect. Adjusting his defensive approach, also not a big deal. That's a coaching/analytics thing, and Jordan's a smart guy who prioritizes winning.

No, more talent doesn't mean Jordan would be worse. There is every reason to think he'd improve. Would he be as far above other players than in his era? No, but in absolute terms, he'd still be the best.

Yes, I recognize I'm making a bunch of conjectures, but this thread is speculative by nature.

That guy exists to downgrade MJ. Every thread that directly or indirectly involves MJ, he shows up spewing the same hateful nonsense.

Ignore him. He's not capable participating in this thread in good faith lol

[lessthanjake]

Since the question is for “today’s game,” my answer is maybe no one.

But there’s some real caveats to that answer. The first caveat is that I’d take Jordan if we assumed Jordan would actually have honed his skill set to optimize for today’s era rather than optimizing for his own era and therefore leaving a good deal of potential on the table as it relates to playing today (and even without that, Jordan is the primary reason my answer is only “maybe” no one). The second caveat is that I’m defining “current SGA” as what we are seeing in this season specifically. We are less than halfway through this season, though. It’s not clear that SGA will continue through the rest of the season and the playoffs playing at the level he has been so far this season. I hope he does. But it’s definitely by no means certain that he will, in which case my present-day assessment of “current SGA” would end up being an overrating of him. And if we expanded out the sample we are defining as “current SGA,” to at least also include last year, then I think there’s several people that would have an argument over him.

[TheGOATRises007]

I don't consider SGA a SG at all. He's a PG.

That said, this question is tricky, because we have no idea how stars from the past would adjust to today's game. The game is obviously much different now from the past, but it's still basketball. I think great players thrive in any era.

If we put 2008-2009 Wade in place of SGA now, do I see the Thunder getting clearly worse? I'm not so sure. I think it's pretty close.