Top 20 Centers

[dockingsched]

with people starting to discuss how centers are ranked in the other outdated thread, i figured i'd start a new one that goes a little deeper (top 20). i'll go with players that are expected to get the bulk of their minutes at center next season but use the level of performance they displayed last yr, so that means no pau/amare/oden. i'll leave jefferson in there unless they actually get a center next to him.

1. Tim Duncan - according to 82games.com, he spends most of his time playing center. if thats the case, he's easily my number one.
2. Yao Ming - have yao at two over dwight because of his much better offensive game and slight edge in head to head matchups
3. Dwight Howard
4. Chris Kaman - kaman's ability to defend centers gave him the edge here over jefferson
5. Al Jefferson
6. Andrew Bogut - though bynum clearly outplayed bogut in matchups, bogut turned in an entire season with a much improved 2nd half.
7. Andrew Bynum
8. Tyson Chandler
9. Rasheed Wallace
10. Al Horford
11. Emeka Okafor
12. Marcus Camby - traditionally a very overrated center on realgm. 12 seems right.
13. Brendan Haywood - traditionally a very underrated center on realgm.
14. Zydrunas Illgauskas
15. Mehmet Okur
16. Shaquille O'neal
17. Brad Miller
18. Andris Biedrins
19. Samuel Dalembert
20. Kendrick Perkins

[Warriors Analyst]

I'd have Biedrins over Haywood anyday and would have Okur over Biedrins.

[SOUL]

Solid list.. I think sammy is better than Brad/Shaq at this point tho

[dockingsched]

I'd have Biedrins over Haywood anyday and would have Okur over Biedrins.

i do have okur over biedrins. i don't agree with biedrins over haywood because i really like haywood's defense. its much better than biedrins. i can see an argument for biedrins though. the last 5 are really fluid imo.

Solid list.. I think sammy is better than Brad/Shaq at this point tho

brad i could see depending on what you value more. i don't see what sam does better than shaq though.

[paul]

Good list, I think I'd have Haywood slightly higher, Bierdrins and Dalambert slightly higher and Sheed Horford and Okur slightly lower, a solid list though. Also Bynum hasn't done quite enough for long enough to be that high for me yet, even though on potential he clearly is and could be top 5 by the end of next season. Okafur is the interesting one, another PF playing C for me. I'll transfer my list from the outdated thread and expand it a little.

1. Duncan
2. Dwight
3. Yao**** injured but proven
4. Kaman
5. Amare
6. Bogut
7. Jefferson
8. Chandler
9. Z
10. Haywood
11. Camby
12. Bierdrins
13. Sheed
14. Horford
15. Dalambert
16. Bynum ****Injured and as yet uproven
17. Okur
18. Miller
19. Shaq
20. Perkins

[dockingsched]

if you're going to include amare, why not pau?


i think you really underrate bynum. sure he was injured but 35 games isn't some fluke hot streak, thats nearly half the season. half a season is plenty of time to judge where a player is at. its not some short 5-6 game stretch. in those 35 games he showed he was superior to a lot of the players you have ahead of him.

[paul]

if you're going to include amare, why not pau?


i think you really underrate bynum. sure he was injured but 35 games isn't some fluke hot streak, thats nearly half the season. half a season is plenty of time to judge where a player is at. its not some short 5-6 game stretch. in those 35 games he showed he was superior to a lot of the players you have ahead of him.

Fair point on Amare, for some reason i just always have him in. Interestingly I don't normally include Timmy D or Pau or Okafur - it's hard with these PF/C's to know exactly what's what.

As for Bynum your right, the guy is a massive talent and put together a really strong 35 games I agree, but even in that 35 game period he 'only' put up 13/10, excellent numbers but not high enough with a relatively small sample size to put him top 10. He looked great doing it and will be an absolute force in the future, but going purely on this season I couldn't have him above guys who got it done for 70-80 games and have proven themselves in the past. Yao was in the same boat as Bynum and would probably be above Dwight had he have played all season - but he's proven himself in the past so stays high for me. Bynum previous to this season has looked like a very very raw kid so it's hard to put him up based on previous performances. He doesn't need to be high on this list, I get the feeling he'll be high on a lot of lists in the near future.

[dockingsched]

bynum's 35 game stretch of "13/10" had him playing with a PER of 22.6. that puts him in the top 15 of the entire league. saying he only put up 13/10 and ignoring everything else is REALLY downplaying how impressive his 35 games were. also, he's not some established player who just suddenly had an unexpected rise in play, he's a 20 yr old kid who SHOULD be improving. of course his previous seasons had him looking like a very very raw kid, he was. you treat his performance with way too much speculation considering he should be improving and has all the physical skills to do so.

[paul]

bynum's 35 game stretch of "13/10" had him playing with a PER of 22.6. that puts him in the top 15 of the entire league. saying he only put up 13/10 and ignoring everything else is REALLY downplaying how impressive his 35 games were. also, he's not some established player who just suddenly had an unexpected rise in play, he's a 20 yr old kid who SHOULD be improving. of course his previous seasons had him looking like a very very raw kid, he was. you treat his performance with way too much speculation considering he should be improving and has all the physical skills to do so.

I really don't, I know the guy is going to be an outstanding player with very little doubt, but I do have a few questions that I'm sure will be answered in the coming season, namely -

1. Can the guy continue to shoot 64% from the field for an entire season, or indeed career? (Bearing in mind this would put him at some ridiculously high statistical level for 'all time' ETA - Shaq, the most dominant 'close to the bucket' center of our time, has a career FG% of 58%).
2. Will his recovery from a very long injury layoff harm any of his physical attributes or development?
3. Will having Pau beside him mean that he's no longer such a focus on offense?


It's also worth noting that while a lot of the guys on this list play on relatively poor teams and have to scrap for most buckets, Bynum had Kobe, Odom etc at times spoon feeding him. He was used very well in the offense meaning a lot of dunks and open layups. I'm not doubting he's a very good player at all and a possible superstar - I'm saying I've got a few questions that 35 games haven't quite answered.
Then again it could just be that I'm so sick of the hype I'm rebelling.

[dockingsched]

I really don't, I know the guy is going to be an outstanding player with very little doubt, but I do have a few questions that I'm sure will be answered in the coming season, namely -

1. Can the guy continue to shoot 64% from the field for an entire season, or indeed career? (Bearing in mind this would put him at some ridiculously high statistical level for 'all time'.

eh, you're kinda judging him by higher standards if he has to maintain that production just to get ahead of guys like dalembert, horford, chandler, z and a bunch of other players you put ahead of him who haven't ever demonstrated that type of potential.

2. Will his recovery from a very long injury layoff harm any of his physical attributes?

will he be permanently affected? i don't see why it would. his surgery was a minor scope to help clean up the healing process. no major surgeries whatsoever.

3. Will having Pau beside him mean that he's no longer such a focus on offense?

bynum's elite rebounding and shot blocking will always be there. a lot of bynum's points came off of his own offensive rebounds too so he doesn't need to be a focus for that. either way though, how many touches he gets doesn't change his skill level, which is kinda whats being judged.

It's also worth noting that while a lot of the guys on this list play on relatively poor teams and have to scrap for most buckets, Bynum had Kobe, Odom etc at times spoon feeding him. He was used very well in the offense meaning a lot of dunks and open layups. I'm not doubting he's a very good player at all and a possible superstar - I'm saying I've got a few questions that 35 games haven't quite answered.
Then again it could just be that I'm so sick of the hype I'm rebelling.

it shouldn't be held against bynum that he makes his team that good. in his last 19 games, the lakers went 16-3. the next 8 games before the gasol trade had the lakers with a 3-5 record.

[paul]

I really don't, I know the guy is going to be an outstanding player with very little doubt, but I do have a few questions that I'm sure will be answered in the coming season, namely -

1. Can the guy continue to shoot 64% from the field for an entire season, or indeed career? (Bearing in mind this would put him at some ridiculously high statistical level for 'all time'.

eh, you're kinda judging him by higher standards if he has to maintain that production just to get ahead of guys like dalembert, horford, chandler, z and a bunch of other players you put ahead of him who haven't ever demonstrated that type of potential.

2. Will his recovery from a very long injury layoff harm any of his physical attributes?

will he be permanently affected? i don't see why it would. his surgery was a minor scope to help clean up the healing process. no major surgeries whatsoever.

3. Will having Pau beside him mean that he's no longer such a focus on offense?

bynum's elite rebounding and shot blocking will always be there. a lot of bynum's points came off of his own offensive rebounds too so he doesn't need to be a focus for that. either way though, how many touches he gets doesn't change his skill level, which is kinda whats being judged.

It's also worth noting that while a lot of the guys on this list play on relatively poor teams and have to scrap for most buckets, Bynum had Kobe, Odom etc at times spoon feeding him. He was used very well in the offense meaning a lot of dunks and open layups. I'm not doubting he's a very good player at all and a possible superstar - I'm saying I've got a few questions that 35 games haven't quite answered.
Then again it could just be that I'm so sick of the hype I'm rebelling.

it shouldn't be held against bynum that he makes his team that good. in his last 19 games, the lakers went 16-3. the next 8 games before the gasol trade had the lakers with a 3-5 record.

Yep like I said those are all fair points and hard to argue with, it's just my opinion that I want to see a little more from him before ranking him above established guys. The FG% is a big question for me, along with having Pau beside him. Take 5% to 10% off his incredibly high clip (which would still have him well above average) and give him a shot or two less a game with Pau there and suddenly he's around 10/10 and looking more like a young Chandler than a young Shaq. That's a bit of a cheeky comment as he will be better than Chandler, like I said I'd just like to see another 30 games at that level. The hype machine really got out of control with Bynum and it started to really annoy me.

[That Nicka]

1. Dwight Howard
2. Yao Ming
3. Chris Kaman
4. Tyson Chandler
5. Emeka Okafor
6. Andrew Bynum
7. Andrew Bogut
8. Marcus Camby
9. Zydrunas Illgauskus
10. Brendan Haywood
11. Andris Biendrins
12. Memo Okur
13. Samuel Dalembert
14. Shaquille O’Neal
15. Brad Miller
16. Kendrick Perkins
17. Eddy Curry
18. Rasho Nesterovic
19. Erick Dampier
20. Nazr Mohammed

I consider: Sheed, Jefferson, Gasol, Duncan, Amare and Horford PFs

[dockingsched]

ok fair enough. though i'd like to see a sixers fan agree with you that dalembert is better than bynum. in the other thread i mentioned bynum outplaying bogut, well he completely destroyed dalembert twice. it wasn't even a contest.

[_BBIB_]

I consider: Sheed, Jefferson, Gasol, Duncan, Amare and Horford PFs

Well when you play full-time C like Horford does, then how can you be considered a PF?

[Malinhion]

2. Yao Ming - have yao at two over dwight because of his much better offensive game and slight edge in head to head matchups
3. Dwight Howard

STOP SPREADING THESE LIES!!

From the Yao/Dwight thread...

Put Backs
Dwight Howard gets 9.9% of his team's offensive rebound chances, for 3.4 per game.
Yao Ming gets 8.7% of his team's offensive rebound chances, for 3.1 per game.
Both players shoot 2% of their baskets as tip-ins.

So the notion that Howard is getting more shots from offensive rebounds and putbacks is ludicrous. If anything Yao has more tip-ins, and Howard is only getting one more offensive rebound every three games. Assuming he made his standard .599 on field goals, and took every offensive rebound up over the course of a season, that's a total difference of .179 points per game. Or less than 15 points in an 82-game season.

Post Play
Now onto shot creation. Again, Yao has more turnovers than Dwight by a slight margin, while Dwight makes a slightly greater number of offensive fouls.

Let's look at their scoring and how many shots each creates on the interior.

Yao takes 15.5 shots a game, and 52% were on the interior. That's 8.06 shots in the paint. Yao is assisted on 61% of these shots. So that means that he is creating 3.14 of his post shots on his own, per game. Now, it will take a bit of flawed math (since assisted eFG% is probably higher than nonassisted eFG%) but we can extrapolate this by multiplying it times his inside scoring percentage to see that Yao generates 4.174 points on nonassisted interior field goals throughout the course of the game.

Dwight takes 11.9 shots per game, and 84% were on the interior. That's 9.996 shots in the paint. Dwight is assisted on 68% of these shots. That means he is creating 3.20 of his post shots on his own, per game. Using our same extrapolation technique, we can assume he made .664 of these to generate 4.248 points on nonassisted interior field goals.

Aside from the fact that the difference is negligible, Dwight clearly generates more of his own points on the interior. If you subtract back out the offensive rebounding difference, then it tips the scale back in Yao's favor to the tune of less than .01 PPG. And remember, this is assuming that Dwight shoots every additional offensive rebound that he grabs over Yao (the 0.3 per game). Even considering this minor adjustment is insane, though, when you look at the foul drawing rates.

Dwight is banging on the interior as much as Yao is taking jumpshots. He draws fouls on 28.3% of his FGA. That's INSANE! Yao's is a paltry 16.0%, unimpressive for a post player. Even including the massive difference in free throw shooting, Dwight is better at the stripe from a production standpoint. Last season he hit 6.5 to Yao's 6.3.

Dwight is producing more points on his own in the paint and on the free throw line than Yao is while taking 3.5 more shots per game. There is no way you can argue this any further. I have laid out the facts. Dwight is at worst comparable in terms of making his own shot in the paint.

[PimpORL]

I love you, Malinhion.

[dockingsched]

2. Yao Ming - have yao at two over dwight because of his much better offensive game and slight edge in head to head matchups
3. Dwight Howard

STOP SPREADING THESE LIES!!

From the Yao/Dwight thread...

Put Backs
Dwight Howard gets 9.9% of his team's offensive rebound chances, for 3.4 per game.
Yao Ming gets 8.7% of his team's offensive rebound chances, for 3.1 per game.
Both players shoot 2% of their baskets as tip-ins.

So the notion that Howard is getting more shots from offensive rebounds and putbacks is ludicrous. If anything Yao has more tip-ins, and Howard is only getting one more offensive rebound every three games. Assuming he made his standard .599 on field goals, and took every offensive rebound up over the course of a season, that's a total difference of .179 points per game. Or less than 15 points in an 82-game season.

Post Play
Now onto shot creation. Again, Yao has more turnovers than Dwight by a slight margin, while Dwight makes a slightly greater number of offensive fouls.

Let's look at their scoring and how many shots each creates on the interior.

Yao takes 15.5 shots a game, and 52% were on the interior. That's 8.06 shots in the paint. Yao is assisted on 61% of these shots. So that means that he is creating 3.14 of his post shots on his own, per game. Now, it will take a bit of flawed math (since assisted eFG% is probably higher than nonassisted eFG%) but we can extrapolate this by multiplying it times his inside scoring percentage to see that Yao generates 4.174 points on nonassisted interior field goals throughout the course of the game.

Dwight takes 11.9 shots per game, and 84% were on the interior. That's 9.996 shots in the paint. Dwight is assisted on 68% of these shots. That means he is creating 3.20 of his post shots on his own, per game. Using our same extrapolation technique, we can assume he made .664 of these to generate 4.248 points on nonassisted interior field goals.

Aside from the fact that the difference is negligible, Dwight clearly generates more of his own points on the interior. If you subtract back out the offensive rebounding difference, then it tips the scale back in Yao's favor to the tune of less than .01 PPG. And remember, this is assuming that Dwight shoots every additional offensive rebound that he grabs over Yao (the 0.3 per game). Even considering this minor adjustment is insane, though, when you look at the foul drawing rates.

Dwight is banging on the interior as much as Yao is taking jumpshots. He draws fouls on 28.3% of his FGA. That's INSANE! Yao's is a paltry 16.0%, unimpressive for a post player. Even including the massive difference in free throw shooting, Dwight is better at the stripe from a production standpoint. Last season he hit 6.5 to Yao's 6.3.

Dwight is producing more points on his own in the paint and on the free throw line than Yao is while taking 3.5 more shots per game. There is no way you can argue this any further. I have laid out the facts. Dwight is at worst comparable in terms of making his own shot in the paint.

you made it exclusively about their production in the paint/post play when i never singled out that skill. i simply referenced yao's entire game, looking back now in a rather vague fashion. yao has a wider range of offensive moves/skills, thats the only thing i was really talking about. you argue that dwight is the superior interior scorer but i never made that argument all.

[Malinhion]

Yes, that was initially a response to someone who said Yao has better post moves and that Dwight gets all his buckets from putbacks and dunks he catches 2 feet from the basket. This is a lie. Fact is, Yao might have more post moves but it doesn't mean jack, because Dwight is a better scorer using what he has. Next year Dwight will be taking more than 12 shots per game.

If I wanted to defeat the simple argument that Yao is better on offense I would point to the fact that they have the same number of turnovers, but Dwight shoots 60% to Yao's 50%. Dwight only scored one fewer point taking 3.5 fewer shots. He is also fouled almost twice as often, and makes more FTA per game despite shooting 20% less than Yao from the stripe. Yao may be a good FT shooter but his lack of aggressiveness is really limiting his ability to capitalize on that skill. Next year all of this will change, when Dwight will surpass Yao in terms of scoring volume, and efficiency.

Point is, Dwight creates the same number of points on his own in the paint as Yao, while taking a lot less shots (comparably). And he creates more points in the paint from putbacks, tip-ins, and getting good position so he can go up for a dunk or hookshot.

In fact, I'm not sure how anyone that has watched both players can really argue that Yao has a great post game. He doesn't. He is too slow and mechanical on offense, which leads to him getting stripped all the time. Dwight's turnovers, on the other hand, often come because he it trying to catch and make a move before he gathers himself. It's completely different, because when Dwight learns to pace himself his turnovers will drop. Yao is not going to get any quicker. Sure, Yao has little twists and leans in the post, but if you asked around, does Yao have a go-to move? No. He tends to just pick an angle and work it in with a scoop or a layup or sometimes a dunk. But too often he will just dribble and then turn around to take that short psuedo-fade or jumpshot. It's ridiculous. Dwight we can see a developing post game from. That spin move he has had for a couple years and its getting nasty. He added a few other moves last season but nothing that really panned out predominantly. I think he has a greater arsenal that he will continue to hone. If he adds just one more move this summer he will definitely have a more developed post skillset than Yao.

[That Nicka]

I consider: Sheed, Jefferson, Gasol, Duncan, Amare and Horford PFs

Well when you play full-time C like Horford does, then how can you be considered a PF?

imo, Horford would be a lot better playing the PF and things would be a lot easier if he were paired with a legit C.. therefore I consider him a PF that plays C... just like the last 3 years even though Marion/Amare were pretty much full time PF/C, I always considered them SF/PF

[dockingsched]

horford basically exclusively played center this past season. he can most certainly be considered a center until he actually stops playing center. same with amare, he was an all-nba center and played the position all the time so he most certainly should have been considered a center. now he slid over to pf though.


the one player that has some conflicts is tim duncan. according to 82games.com he plays most of his minutes at center but then he's considered a forward for all-star balloting and he's considered a forward for all-nba teams.