shawngoat23 wrote:I'm going to give Patrick Ewing and Karl Malone some nods as probably the next two best players this year, but I'm going to put Isiah Thomas at #4, which I'm sure will be a point of contention to a lot of judges this season.
I don't exactly understand the nature of this choice.
Malone and Ewing are better, but since Isiah was THE face on a championship team he ranks ahead of them.
Doesn't that run counter to the idea of this project? It seems too team-oriented a definition, particularly when you have a team as deep, multi-talented and defensively-defined as Detroit (would anybody say that Isiah was a lockdown, great or even very good defender?).
Thomas wasn't even a top 3 PG this year, let alone a top 5 player, period.
Stockton was putting up 17, nearly 15 and about 3 a game, which is an outlier so great that no one else has done it. Only Stockton himself has come close to replicating it. Shot over 50% again, and over 40% on 3s. A/TO ratio is nuts by comparison: Isiah averaged 5 fewer assists, and more TOs. Stockton's A/TO ratio was 4.1.
Ironically, Stockton was on an All-Defense squad, too. While Thomas, from the defensively-defined Pistons -- a team that would win another championship due to this factor, largely -- never made an All-Defense team; Stockton did it five times.
A player can be undervalued in certain areas by media votes, but I've never seen what I would call consistently good defense -- either man or team -- from Zeke. And it's hard to believe Isiah would be undervalued in this area, considering the nature of his own team and the spotlight that consistently was aimed at him as its representative. Bit of cognitive dissonance here.
Then there's Kevin Johnson. 22.5 and 11.4 per on 49% shooting. A/TO was 3.4. Isiah again averaged fewer assists and more TOs.
Isiah put up 18.4 and 9.4, shooting 43.8% for the season. Thomas' A/TO was 2.35.
I don't tend to believe efficiency is everything, but where is Isiah showing his superiority over those guys, when looking at his season on an individuated basis?
Really not getting the Isiah love.
Certainly, I don't believe he was the fourth best player for the entire season, but I do believe that for a veteran team like the Pistons coming off a championship the previous ring, their one goal is to defend a ring. Therefore, that is the primray goal by which I judge Isiah, and he was able to help the Pistons do exactly that.
The key word is 'help'. Are you even asking yourself how big his contribution was?
The most contentious series the Pistons had was with Chicago. They gave Jordan problems, if not fits.
Yet we know that Dumars led this charge, not Thomas.
Moreover, despite the fact that they beat the Blazers in five, some of those games were bitterly contested until the very end, and my understanding is that Isiah Thomas came up huge in the final moments for several of those games
Is anybody watching tape? Portland's talent was only matched by their lack of brains. Watching that game 5, the Blazers create fairytale moments...for their opponent.
The way to beat Portland wasn't so much outsmarting them -- that was nearly an automatic -- but having enough talent to not be overwhelmed by their roster. Detroit had that.
In the last two minutes, they allow a 7 point lead to turn into a 2 point loss.
Yet the leader of this charge is not Isiah, it's the Microwave, Vinny Johnson taking the Blazers apart on isos. They didn't even have Isiah bring the ball up the floor, a further testament to team depth and diversity as far as Daly's Bad Boys. No, instead Vinny handles it, end to end.
Isiah does score the game tying FG, credit there. But the game-winning run is keyed by Johnson, as he scores 7 points in two minutes.
Considering how far behind other players Isiah's overall season was, I'd think that there would have to be a greater sense of his winning each Finals game for Detroit, in very direct, domineering and clutch fashion conflated, to make the case for him in the top 4.
It's rather like arguing Tony Parker as the league's fourth best player in 07.
Bit of an exaggeration -- talent versus talent, mind you -- but it matches the exaggerated worth of Isiah's 90 season due to that championship.
Isiah was also very good down the stretch of game 1. But my point remains that this team had many heroes -- and I don't mean that in the sense of a shot here or there, but within the context of extended sequencing and even full series -- and it's arguable that Thomas was just one of them.
The irony remains that Detroit's championships were won largely on defense. The NBA's marketing department was never fully comfortable with this, IMO, and this has only increased with time. Hence, Joe Dumars' contributions are pushed into the background evermore as Isiah's legend grows, particularly as regards that game 6 against LA in 88.
But Detroit's true legacy was formed on D, they changed the league through it. Was Isiah at the vanguard of that? Was it Isiah that bothered Jordan in multiple playoff series?
Come on.
Don't sue me, Mr. Hollinger.
