Stockton had 8 assists and 6 turnovers this game, all 8 were to Karl Malone. 5 of them was basic passing, low creation value. 3 of them were decent to good level of creation.
The Jazz had a terrible offensive game, and Stockton did not produce a single assist to someone not named Karl Malone, leading to them going 41.7 % from the field despite taking only 11 three pointers. Jazz lost the assist battle 19-24 and the Jazz would go on to lose the series in 4, despite Malone scoring 29.3 pts on 56.1 ts %, with 12.3 rebs, 1.8 ast, 1.5 stl and 0.8 blk.
Stockton averaged 11.5 pts on 58 ts %, 10.8 ast/2.3 to, 1.8 stl. So when half of your assists or more, come from throwing the ball to Karl Malone scoring a jumper or scoring in the post, your real value as a playmaker is pretty **** low. And as an offensive player, just taking 9.3 fg when your team is struggling to score, a pretty bad impact on the offense.
Now let's look at a game where Stoudemire scores 41 pts in the 2005 playoffs with Nash as the pg.
First play, Nash creates space for Stoudemire by driving in, kicking it out to a three pt shooter and confusing the defense, leading to a deep position and free throws for Stoudemire.
Second play, Nash creates a wide open jumper with a behind the back pass. He misses, Nash gets the rebound and feeds him inside again for an easy layup.
Third play, Nash creates a dunk for Stoudemire with a well timed pass in transition.
Fourth play with Nash, creates space for Stoudemire by running into the center guarding him, open jumper.
Fifth play with Nash, Nash creates a nice pass out to Marion open on the 3pt line after a pick and roll, Marion gets rushed on and has a free drive to the line, Stoudemire cleans up the miss at the rim.
Sixth play with Nash, he sees Stoudemire in good position and quickly gets it to him in a mismatch with Ginobili on the fastbreak, Ginobili fouls him, free throws.
Seventh play with Nash, pick and roll, Nash gives Stoudemire the ball with space, deep in the paint after a pick and roll, this one isnt a free basket, but still a very nice position and Stoudemire scores easily.
Eight play with Nash, Nash drives in to the paint, gets the center to commit, passes to Stoudemire who gets fouled going for the dunk, free throws.
Ninth play with Nash, gets the ball in transition and drives into the paint, gets the defenders on him and throws a nice pass for an open Stoudemire dunk.
Tenth play with Nash, dishes a beautiful pass in between defenders in semi-transition to Stoudemire who gets fouled because he has a dunk if not.
Eleventh play with Nash, here, for the first time in this video at 5.10 in the third quarter, he does what Stockton does mostly in the video with Malone and just drops it to Stoudemire who drives and scores. Nash gets an assist here, but not for the ten points he created earlier where Stoudemire got deep position off his creation and had to get fouled or scored.
Twelth play with Nash, he gets doubled in the pick and roll, passes it between the defenders and Stoudemire gets fouled on the rotating player in the 1v1 at the rim.
Thirteenth play with Nash, he gets into the paint, does a beautiful behind the back pass to Stoudemire who gets fouled going for a dunk again.
Mind you there has been 3-4 plays between this where the pressure Nash creates, causes Stoudemire to get deep position for a rebound or a putback off other misses, so his value is not just related to the actions where he directly feeds Stoudemire.
Stoudemire ends with 13-21 fg, 15-18 ft, 41 pts in 35 min yet is a -9.
Steve Nash in 40 min is 29 pts, 12-22 fg, 5-5 ft, 13 ast/6 to and with a +4.
Nash directly led to Stoudemire getting 14 free throws. Nash directly led to 12 easy points for Stoudemire, and others indirectly, but that's 26 of his possible 41 pts.
He creates better looks for Stoudemire, Stockton does not match this impact in anything I have seen so far in terms of good shot creation for Malone.
Stoudemire was at 20.6 pts per game, 47.5 % fg and 7.9 fta with a 53.6 ts % in just the regular season the year before Nash came.
Now in the whole 2005 playoffs, where they are playing the best teams like the eventual champion Spurs who had the best defense in the league, he is suddenly averaging 29.9 pts on 53,9 fg %, with 12.2 fta on a 61.7 ts % over 15 games against the best teams in the league.
That's the Steve Nash effect, and why he is greater than John Stockton.
We don't really see this effect at all on Malone from Stockton, Stoudemire had an 58.8 ts % in the playoffs with the Suns.
Malone had an 52.8 ts % over his whole playoff career with the Jazz.
If Stockton was such an fantastic passer and creator, why is Amare Stoudemire, who is considered much lower than Karl Malone all time, able to outperform him with a 6 ts % difference in the playoffs with the Suns, on almost the same amount of shots? He played with a true great playmaker, that's why.
Stoudemires ts % drops just as fast as it rose when Nash arrived, from 61.5 ts % to 56.5 % when he leaves the Suns and Nash to the Knicks. And he only averages 2.2 more pts and the same amount of free throws, despite taking a lot more shots and having a higher usage. And having 2 point guard types in Billups (who was only one season away from being 12th in MVP voting) and Felton.
Malone meanwhile has a ts % that fluctuates wildly from postseason to postseason, from 48.2 ts % one year to 57.4 ts % 2 years after. Why? Because he is reliant on creating the shots more for himself, he doesn't get these free high value shots that Nash creates for Stoudemire, from Stockton. Some, for sure, but not that many.
So what's the excuse going to be, Stoudemire was just better, he had a better vertical, but Malone was stronger and a decent to great athlete on his own, especially in the younger days. So it's not like Stockton could set him up deep in the post like Nash did with Stoudemire, he just didn't have the skill and creativity of Nash at doing so.
That's why Nash is a two time MVP, and Stockton has none, despite being a more complete player, especially in his younger years. At least he will always have the guys who will use his All Time regular season leaderboard, as their fantastic argument for why he was just oh so superior to players like Steve Nash and Chris Paul, these bums who competed with MVP's with Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant, Dirk Nowitzki, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, while no one mentions John Stockton in conversation with Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Hakeem Olajuwon or Charles Barkley. He finished 7th behind them at best. Barely above Kevin Johnson, who probably is underrated to Stocktons overrated.
In 89-90 he finishes ninth behind Tom Chambers.
Behind Terry Porter in 90-91. Behind Mark Price (underrated), Tim Hardaway and Brad Daugherty in 91-92. And the list goes on...
Steve Nash managed to finish above prime Dirk, Kobe, Duncan and young LeBron (31 pts 7 reb 6.6 ast 1.6 stl 0.8 blk). Because it became obvious what impact he was having by how the Suns offense powered through all of a sudden.
And some say he should have won in 2007 as well, I don't have the insight about that.
