Artest the real choice for DPOY

[ilikecb4]

Lamar is a solid @ defence

he's no ron artest
Ron artest is one of the best defenders of teh decade

Duncan, Ben Wallace, Ron Artest are 3 people i think of when you say defence.....

since 96/97 when i started watching NBA

[LakersSquad]

Lamar Odom the best defender? LMAO

Yeah... So funny that Lamar has led the team in defensive win shares every season he's been healthy. But you're right. The idea that Lamar is the best defender is laughable

Im a friend of Odoms and I watch every Laker game. If anybody would be admitting to it it would be me. But it aint true its so far from the truth. If it had any truth to it Lakers would have been a good defensive team years ago.

[LakersSquad]

Come on, Laker fans, Artest has been great defensively this year, he really has. Playing with Kobe has made him take it back to his prime level, but he doesn't have the impact that Dwight does.

Not only do stats back this up, but a simple observation of a good sample size of games will clearly show it.

Artest is a great man defender, but he cannot, and doesn't anchor the defense. It's nearly impossible for a wing to do so. Not a knock on him at all.

Ron Artest doesn't deter opposing PG's from driving the paint. He doesn't make centers take fadeaway jumpers and shooting guards pull up for floaters. He locks down his assignment and does so consistently. Credit to him, he deserves a 1st team bid.

Dwight does all those things listed above, all while fighting foul trouble in a league designed to protect guards and wings.

Judging by Howards 4 fouls per game he doesn't either lol but Espn has him first in this race.

Defensive Player of the Year Watch

Howard

1. Dwight Howard, Magic: His streak of 20 straight games with a double-double has been followed by two straight duds. Regardless, he is still the league's top rebounder and shot-blocker by a large margin. (Last week: 1)

2. Ron Artest, Lakers: If you need proof of his work, hit play on the DVR and watch how he frustrated Carmelo Anthony on Sunday when the Lakers topped the Nuggets. (Last week: 3)

3. Gerald Wallace, Bobcats: He is one of only 11 players in the league averaging more than 10 rebounds (8.6 defensive boards) per game. (Last week: 2)

4. Andrew Bogut, Bucks: The Most Improved Player of the Year candidate is averaging a career high in points (16.0), rebounds (10.5), blocks (2.3) and free throw shooting (63.5). He is in the top five in the league in drawing charges and second in blocked shots. (Last week: NR)

5. Josh Smith, Hawks: Numbers don't lie: He is fifth in blocks (2.05) and 12th in steals (1.66). (Last week: 5)

[GatorKid117]

Judging by Howards 4 fouls per game he doesn't either lol but Espn has him first in this race.

Defensive Player of the Year Watch

Howard

1. Dwight Howard, Magic: His streak of 20 straight games with a double-double has been followed by two straight duds. Regardless, he is still the league's top rebounder and shot-blocker by a large margin. (Last week: 1)

2. Ron Artest, Lakers: If you need proof of his work, hit play on the DVR and watch how he frustrated Carmelo Anthony on Sunday when the Lakers topped the Nuggets. (Last week: 3)

3. Gerald Wallace, Bobcats: He is one of only 11 players in the league averaging more than 10 rebounds (8.6 defensive boards) per game. (Last week: 2)

4. Andrew Bogut, Bucks: The Most Improved Player of the Year candidate is averaging a career high in points (16.0), rebounds (10.5), blocks (2.3) and free throw shooting (63.5). He is in the top five in the league in drawing charges and second in blocked shots. (Last week: NR)

5. Josh Smith, Hawks: Numbers don't lie: He is fifth in blocks (2.05) and 12th in steals (1.66). (Last week: 5)

The Magic lead the league in defense at the rim allowing a fg% of only 59%
They are 3rd in the league in makes at the rim, only allowing 13.7 makes per game.

Foul trouble comes with the territory. Howard is involved in a great deal of defensive plays and protects the paint so obviously he is going to foul a lot. I don't see what foul trouble has to do w/ Howard preventing people from getting to the rim.

[farzi]

I personally LOVE it when Ron Ron guards Roy, so more power to him

[magicman123]

I view DPOY as a shutdown defender. The nba lacks bigs and when dhoward goes up against quality bigs like shaq, gasol, bogut, bargani, etc, he gets abused. Artest is constantly seeing qaulity sf on a night to night basis...

um do you watch them?

[ponder276]

Dwight Howard

DRtg= 95
DWS= 5.6


Ron Artest

DRtg= 104
DWS= 2.7

Ron isn't even in the discussion. Sorry.

It is one way to look at those numbers which are derived from the boxscore numbers. The other way would be looking at the On/Off court and Net numbers for both.

Artest On: 100.5
Artest Off: 105.0
Artest Net: -4.5

Howard On: 103.0
Howard Off: 105.3
Howard Net: -2.3

Seems like Artest improves the Lakers defense more than Howard improves the Magic defense. Both teams are close to each other in DRtg while neither of both players is on the court. Therefore Artest is in fact a really good candidate for DPOY.

I like On/Off Court numbers more, because the boxscore numbers aren't really good to determine defense. In fact defensive rebounds have the highest correlation to DRtg with a linear correlation coefficent of around 0.4, steals has a higher correlation to DRtg than blocked shots, but neither is higher than 0.2. Those values are rather bad. So, I wouldn't rely too much on DRtg and DWS, especially for perimeter players.

Howard's backup is Gortat, who is actually an excellent defense and rebounding C, one of the best backup defensive Cs in the league. Artest's backup is Luke Walton, who is a sieve.

[wreck]

Lamar Odom the best defender? LMAO

Yeah... So funny that Lamar has led the team in defensive win shares every season he's been healthy. But you're right. The idea that Lamar is the best defender is laughable

Im a friend of Odoms and I watch every Laker game. If anybody would be admitting to it it would be me. But it aint true its so far from the truth. If it had any truth to it Lakers would have been a good defensive team years ago.

I'm not sure what comprises 'good' in your opinion, but the team has been top 5 in defense the last few seasons.

Artest is not DPOY but he has definitely helped the team out as their weakness on D has and will continue to be with the starting backcourt.

[mo4allstar]

varejao laughs at this thread.

[magicman123]

varejao flops at this thread.

fixed no charge

[semi-sentient]

varejao flops at this thread.

fixed no charge

Well done sir.

[Mamba Venom]

1. Wallace
2. Artest
3. Howard

[Idunkonyou2]

Howard is the DPOTY and it won't even be close. Howard might have DPOTY wrapped up for the next decade. He is only 24 years old after all.

[B-Scott]

To say it's not even close makes absolutely no sense at all. Howard's competetion at the center position in the East is horrible. There are no other rival centers in the East that can make him have to work and have to play low post defense so he can be a rover, cheat off his man and focus on shot blocking only and a help defender.

Artest has a much tougher assignment because he defends the opposing teams best perimiter player which is much more tiring and he's been locking them up 1 on 1. No cheating off the man for weakside cheap steals or blocks. Just mano vs mano 1 on 1 defense on the opposing teams best wing player and puting them in Alcatraz in San Francisco in isolation. To me locking up a teams best player on a consistent basis is more impressive than blocking shots. Howard can focus on that because the centers are horrible. Sad that his best competetion is old Shaq at 38 years old.

[tranjSAIC]

To say it's not even close makes absolutely no sense at all. Howard's competetion at the center position in the East is horrible. There are no other rival centers in the East that can make him have to work and have to play low post defense so he can be a rover, cheat off his man and focus on shot blocking only and a help defender.

Artest has a much tougher assignment because he defends the opposing teams best perimiter player which is much more tiring and he's been locking them up 1 on 1. No cheating off the man for weakside cheap steals or blocks. Just mano vs mano 1 on 1 defense on the opposing teams best wing player and puting them in Alcatraz in San Francisco in isolation. To me locking up a teams best player on a consistent basis is more impressive than blocking shots. Howard can focus on that because the centers are horrible. Sad that his best competetion is old Shaq at 38 years old.

I guess people value different things, I prefer a guy who can control the WHOLE game not just a guy who can lock down ONE guy.

[Shwegeh]

Lamar Odom the best defender? LMAO

Yeah... So funny that Lamar has led the team in defensive win shares every season he's been healthy. But you're right. The idea that Lamar is the best defender is laughable

Im a friend of Odoms and I watch every Laker game. If anybody would be admitting to it it would be me. But it aint true its so far from the truth. If it had any truth to it Lakers would have been a good defensive team years ago.

...and goodbye credibility.

[DrunkOnMystery]

I view DPOY as a shutdown defender. The nba lacks bigs and when dhoward goes up against quality bigs like shaq, gasol, bogut, bargani, etc, he gets abused. Artest is constantly seeing qaulity sf on a night to night basis...

Howard doesn't guard Bargnani, guards Gasol for half a game at most, and Bogut has averaged 12.5ppg on 42% shooting this year against Orlando.

[microfib4thewin]

To say it's not even close makes absolutely no sense at all. Howard's competetion at the center position in the East is horrible. There are no other rival centers in the East that can make him have to work and have to play low post defense so he can be a rover, cheat off his man and focus on shot blocking only and a help defender.

In today's league where perimeter players dominate, it's much more imperative that a big knows how to play help defense than to know how to play shut down man defense. If help defense is such a small factor, then we'd be rating Kwame Brown as an equivalent defender because he bodies up well but his feet are nailed to the floor when he needs to make a rotation.

Additionally, he may be over-aggressive, but he has done a good enough job against his opposition that it would be impossible to merely label him average as a man defender. Man defense has become overrated, and even if we were to weight both types of defense equally, I don't see how anyone can say Artest is close to what Dwight has achieved this year.

[Dupp]

agree to disagree