RealGM Top 100 List #5

[DQuinn1575]

What was so good about KG's 2002 supporting cast? Terrell Brandon starting 28 games, pre-breakout Billups, one-dimensional Sczerbiak, Rasho, Joe Smith, Anthony Peeler and old Sam Mitchell isn't anything to get excited about.

It wasn't "so good", but it compares very favourably to the support cast of [insert-top-10-player-here] when they carried a team of rubbish to contention, whether that's Lebron in 09 and 10, Duncan in 01-03, Walton in 77, Dr J in 74 and 76, Bird in 1980, Kareem in 1970, etc, etc. KG couldn't do it, and that counts against him.

74 Nets started Kenon,Paultz,Brian Taylor, John Williamson - all of whom were good enough to start in the NBA 3-4 years later. That is NOT a rubbish team, especially by ABA standards.

01 San Antonio - just looking up B-Ref, Robinson PER and Win Shares are pretty darn close to Duncan - hard to call it rubbish

[Baller2014]

The 76 Nets are a better example. Dr J was basically leading them in every category and carrying them.

I talked about the 01-03 Spurs in my OP on this thread, it's on page 2, please read it. While 28mpg D.Rob in 01 still played at a pretty high level, he was it as far as help went. The Spurs sucked everywhere else. In 02 D.Rob got substantially worse (and was hurt in the playoffs), while the rest of the team wasn't really better. In 03 D.Rob was worse still (and hurt), and the rest of the support cast (while stronger than 01 and 02) was still grossly below what it should have been to win a title.

[DQuinn1575]

[So if we include fpliii's pre-74 data with basketball-reference's post-74 data, we get 1972 as Kareem's highest scoring season in terms of PP100. fpliii's projected average for Kareem in that season is 34.0 PP100... Shaq's career average was 35.2 per 100. So Kareem's career high volume scoring season in terms of per100 trails Shaq's career average.

So while I agree that maybe I should've mentioned that Kareem's pre-74 scoring volume wasn't officially tracked, I think it was obvious that Shaq was going to edge Kareem in this stat. I certainly wasn't trying to keep information hidden to boost my guy. Shaq is far from "my guy". I've just come to believe that he has the best argument for this spot.

I looked at this and at first glance thought it couln't be right, even with pace adjustment.

Then I realized that Jabbar played a lot more minutes and "Drag(ged) Walton And Lanier Up And Down The Court For 48 Minutes" while Shaq was sitting on the bench.

So per 100 possessions is okay, but realize that Shaq wasnt out on the court some of that time.

Of the guys who scored 25,000 NBA points, Shaq is 15th of 18 in minutes played - beating out Reggie Miller, Alex English, and Moses

[Purch]

After hearing these KG arguments I've been going back to my game tapes of 04 and 03, and I've been comparing them to tapes of Duncan and Shaq.

The conclusion I've come to, is that advanced stats paint a picture much more favorable of KG than game footage does. Especilly on the offensive end. Though it should be noted that I was half asleep when I did this, so it wasn't an in depth analysis.

There's 3 areas on the offensive end I feel he's elite at. Passing, Mid range, and screen setting. Is their another part of his offensive game that he's elite at, that I'm overlooking?

[ronnymac2]

After hearing these KG arguments I've been going back to my game tapes of 04 and 03, and I've been comparing them to tapes of Duncan and Shaq.

The conclusion I've come to, is that advanced stats paint a picture much more favorable of KG than game footage does. Especilly on the offensive end. Though it should be noted that I was half asleep when I did this, so it wasn't an in depth analysis.

There's 3 areas on the offensive end I feel he's elite at. Passing, Mid range, and screen setting. Is their another part of his offensive game that he's elite at, that I'm overlooking?

Knocking down free throws. He's definitely elite for a big.

[penbeast0]

And with all the emphasis on "team support," in the interest of fairness, I submit two names we should be talking about:

Rick Barry and Moses Malone

Look at Rick Barry's team support in 1975. He led a team to a title over a team with two Hall of Famers on it in the Finals, something neither Hakeem nor Duncan did in '94 and '03. If he could do that lacking team support, imagine how his career would have gone if he'd had it!

And what about Moses Malone? Led a sub-.500 team to the Finals, knocking off the Showtime Lakers in the process. And when he got some support, he led one of the greatest single-season teams in NBA history, which steamrolled through the postseason with only one loss. Imagine if he'd had that kind of support sooner!

I think those two have risen for me. I need to rethink.

Rick Barry and Moses will certainly be two guys I will be talking about in the top 20. However, that said, what Rick Barry did hardly compares to Duncan. Duncan beat a team with a prime Shaq and Kobe in 03 (and a team with a prime Shaq and all-nba Kobe in 99, plus another all-star). The guys Barry beat in 1975 (Hayes and Unseld) hardly compare. I don't know that I'd have either of those guys in my top 50 players of all time, where we're discussing Shaq in the top 5-7 and Kobe will be in the top 15.
.

Duncan did it while playing with a Top 20/Top 50/Top 100 player/Top 20 Defensive player/Top 20 3 pt shooter

Barry had - rookie 190 lb power forward Jamaal/Keith Wilkes, Clifford Ray, Butch Beard, and Charles Johnson.

Has to be a strong contender for worst supporting cast to win a title.

Way too early for Barry but that 75 team had a lot of talent on it whose stats were a bit low that season due to Barry's high usage rates. Cliff Ray comes up strong on any measure other than scoring, an excellent defender, rebounder, and good passing center -- very similar player to Wes Unseld. Wilkes and Phil Smith were young future stars who hadn't broken out yet but showed flashed of potential stardom. George Johnson is probably the greatest backup center in NBA history, shotblocking and defense for a lot of years and whenever he got minutes, the defense improved for that team. Former all-stars as veterans off the bench in Jeff Mullins and Bill Bridges as well as solid pros like Charles Dudley and Derrick Dickey. Even Charles Johnson, who looks weak in advanced stats, was a good defender and was Mr. Clutch (and had the same role for the Bullets championship team in 78). It isn't a powerhouse team, but it isn't complete stiffs either.

And Barry never did much with Nate Thurmond who people talked up so much in the Kareem thread. Further, his only other title was in the ABA, and they won that title with Barry injured for the second half of the season in the weak early ABA . . . and yet, losing Barry didn't hurt them. Add to that Barry's well documented history of being one of the prime jerks and disliked teammates in NBA history (he's the main one talking about how weak that 75 team was -- what other NBA champion gives no credit to his teammates) and no, I'm not a fan of him as a top 20 or even top 30 player although he's one of the guys who I would guess would be helped most by the modern game and emphasis on spacing/3's (even though he didn't shoot them well then; but they weren't a key part of the game plan then).

I voted Shaq here the last time we did this; for me it's Shaq/Duncan/Hakeem with an outside look at Magic or LeBron . . . but a big key for me is going to be Shaq's defensive impact. He wasn't particularly good out on the floor but was super intimidating to guys driving the lane. When Shaq fouled you, you didn't get the And1, you got just the FT's . . . 82games.com had a chart of players giving up And1s (going back only a few years admittedly) and Shaq was a massive outlier with only about half the And1s allowed of anyone else.

[Purch]

After hearing these KG arguments I've been going back to my game tapes of 04 and 03, and I've been comparing them to tapes of Duncan and Shaq.

The conclusion I've come to, is that advanced stats paint a picture much more favorable of KG than game footage does. Especilly on the offensive end. Though it should be noted that I was half asleep when I did this, so it wasn't an in depth analysis.

There's 3 areas on the offensive end I feel he's elite at. Passing, Mid range, and screen setting. Is their another part of his offensive game that he's elite at, that I'm overlooking?

Knocking down free throws. He's definitely elite for a big.

O yea, that definitely can't be overlooked.

In general when we discuss bigs who are around a similar level, I'll always belive players who constantly attack the defense inside or do most of their work in the paint, have a higher impact then players who are willing to settle for long jumpers. I think it causes more adjustments to be made by the defense, and also creates more oppurtunities for outside shooters, and puts the oppositions rim protector in foul trouble. Not to mention I think post players tend to draw double teams at a higher rate than guys who are perfectly willing to settle for long jumpers

It's a big part of the reason why I have this years Blake Griffin over Kevin Love (Has over 300 more attempts inside and finishes at a ridiculously high efficiency) And why I have Barkley over Dirk

[Notanoob]

I said the 95 Rockets who Shaq/Penny faced.
Peak Hakeem + All-Star Drexler & Elie/Horry/Smith/Cassell.

They would sweep the 09 Magic without difficulty.

Yeh I meant the 95 Rockets. My mistake

And no, they would not sweep the 2009 Magic. The same Magic who beat a tough 09 Cavs team led by Lebron.

That 95 Rockets team only had a 2.32 SRS

#1. I disagree that Shaq had better help.
Shaq had Penny for 2 years and Wade for 1 (he got injured in 05).
Kobe had Gasol for 4-5 years with All-Star Bynum for 1 year.

Yeah sorry but I don't consider Jones or Van Exel All-Stars like a Penny or Gasol.
Jones was a playoff choker and so was Van Exel outside of 1 year.

But Van Exel/Jones were on the same team. That was an excellent backcourt, along with guys like Ceballos (another all-star), and Cambell. Those Lakers won 53 games, with a 4.21 SRS BEFORE Shaq came there.

From 94-06, Shaq had a GREAT supporting cast ALL years. Who else can say that? that's 13 straight years with great support. yet all his team success came next to Prime Kobe.

From 00-04, Kobe had the Diesel, and they won 3 rings in 5 years. He got Pau in 08, and won 2 rings from 08-11. Kobe is the only guy other than Russell with 2 separate mutil-title teams.

#2. (Why did he have less success).
Competition.
Shaq faced an immensely talented Houston team which was firing on all cylinders in 95.
Shaq faced an ATG Bulls team in 96.

He played great in both series but his supporting cast got badly outplayed.
Put the 95/96 Magic in 09-10 and they likely 2peat.

Put the 09 Lakers in the 95 Finals and they lose badly.
Kobe is not going to play better then Shaq did in that series and Gasol is going to get nerfed badly by Hakeem.
Put the 10 Lakers in the 95 ECF against the Bulls and do you think they are gonna win? No.

95 Rockets = 2.32 SRS
09 Magic = 6.49 SRS

You keep saying competition like the Lakers weren't going through extremely tough Western Conferences.

The 95 Rockets probably would have had a better SRS if they had Drexler for the full season. SRS understates how good that team actually was. They did win a championship without HCA for a reason; they were a very good team.

[MacGill]

It is pretty obvious Shaq's individual performance being less impactful than Duncan's individual performance was a big factor in some of those let down series- like 99 where Duncan was the most valuable player on the court, or 03 where Duncan was the most valuable player on the court. In both instances Shaq had the superior support cast, and lost. Heck, Shaq was matched up primarily with Duncan in the 02 series where D.Rob was hurt, and Duncan outplayed him individually. It was only Shaq's superior support cast that enabled the Lakers to win the series. Ditto 04 really. This all seems highly relevant given Shaq is being compared to Duncan.

I'm just going to link you back to my OP analysing this: viewtopic.php?p=40468675#p40468675

Again, you're trying to use a team versus team match-up here to determine why Duncan's impact was greater than Shaq's, yet nothing was equal here? Look, I respect Duncan and Hakeem and I have these guys all very close so I am not going to try and be selective on certain series to try and prove my point here or try to degrate Duncan because he was a fantastic player.

As much as you try to paint the picture here of individual dominance, it's a team game and while basketball has the ability to influence both offense and defense, context and position is required. If you're trying to say that you want to play Duncan on Shaq each and every time, then I'd say you're crazy. Duncan could certainly guard him in spurts but like all, needed help and to be switched off.

The other point here is that Duncan is an all-time great as well, so how are we trying to paint the picture that having success against Shaq and LA is a bad thing? It's only relevant because it fits the agenda that you've been trying to push for awhile now. Basketball is a game of match-ups and everyone has a player(s) who prove to be difficult for the other but history shows that Shaq's ability to fight through this wall. What one teammate does in LA he may do something different in SA. Team make-up, coaching, right personel have so much to do with it. What has SA always had since the start with D-Rob? Character. Smart front office and the ability to stay competitve, even when their stars are well past prime. I watched SA take Miami to the wire without their BIG 3, so to act like it's just on the big star player is silly to me.

Is it what most do..? sure, but people need to remember that not everyone is Michael Jordan here and basketball isn't all about having that hero that can will you to victory. TD didn't shoot 75% in a quarter this year, nor did he blow out the Heat by himself. Neither did he in his prime. I respect you position on Duncan but I just think that you trying to discredit Shaq/Hakeem to prop him up surprising. There is very little separation here IMO.

[Clyde Frazier]

Vote for #5 - Magic

Reasoning detailed below:

viewtopic.php?p=40419929#p40419929

[Baller2014]

I voted Shaq here the last time we did this; for me it's Shaq/Duncan/Hakeem with an outside look at Magic or LeBron . . . but a big key for me is going to be Shaq's defensive impact. He wasn't particularly good out on the floor but was super intimidating to guys driving the lane. When Shaq fouled you, you didn't get the And1, you got just the FT's . . . 82games.com had a chart of players giving up And1s (going back only a few years admittedly) and Shaq was a massive outlier with only about half the And1s allowed of anyone else.

That was Shaq's strength on D. He would never let anyone "dunk on him", because he'd just slam into you rather than let it happen. He was pretty paranoid about not ending up on some poster. Unfortunately, for most of Shaq's career, his overall D lacked that same commitment. As I already posted, Shaq started to get really lazy on D as his career went on (and as he added weight). He was inconsistent boxing out, easily lost on pick and rolls, reluctant to hustle, jogged up and down the court, slow to switch, and just generally lazy. Don't get me wrong, Shaq absolutely deserves to be discussed at #5, he's right here with Duncan, but let's call his career for what it was. There are reasons why, in spite of more favourable circumstances (better teams, higher peak, slightly longer prime) Shaq's team results are worse than Duncan's. The guy was an underachiever. That doesn't hurt him in a comparison against most of the remaining candidates, just because he was so awesome anyway. Against Duncan though? It hurts him.

[Baller2014]

As much as you try to paint the picture here of individual dominance, it's a team game and while basketball has the ability to influence both offense and defense, context and position is required. If you're trying to say that you want to play Duncan on Shaq each and every time, then I'd say you're crazy. Duncan could certainly guard him in spurts but like all, needed help and to be switched off.

Like I just said, and have consistently said, Shaq is awesome and an absolutely worthy candidate here. I switched to vote for him last time, and I have praised him repeatedly. This is quite close, it's not a chasm. I have a clear top 2 (Jordan and Kareem), and then it gets hazier. My comments criticising Shaq should be taken in that light, I'm not for a second suggesting he was anything less than a top 5 player all-time (remember, I didn't vote for Russell or Wilt, so I still have him right there in the top 5).

But there are things Duncan did that make him the more impactful player in the careers they actually had, and I've explained some of them.

You say Duncan and Shaq couldn't match up against each other, but they did in 02. They were each others primary cover in the playoffs. The games are online. Sure, they sometimes didn't guard each other, no 2 players will ever do that. But predominantly they did, and Duncan outperformed him. I don't know what else to say. I conceded this wasn't peak Shaq, who was better than prime Duncan for the 1-2 years he existed.

[Texas Chuck]

Im still not ready to cast a vote. Of guys getting mention I've ruled out Bird, KG, Dream and Lebron--tho I'm starting to think Im too quick to rule out Lebron because in all reality he likely is one of the 5 best guys to ever play, but alas he could retire/suffer huge injury and I can't project him in.

Please note that I'm not including really any statistical information in this post because frankly there are better qualified guys than me to do so. So if a more subjective post adds no value to some of you I totally understand and you can skip past this.


Players I am considering and a brief reason why:

1. Duncan--

Spoiler:

Simply put a great player from the first day he stepped foot in the league and still able to be the best player on a b2b finals team his last 2 years(and yes he's better than Parker still--and his play in the 2013 PS should have made that crystal clear to anyone who thought otherwise) and great all in-between save a couple down years(for him--still a top 10 player those years). Doesnt have the outlier peak some other guys have, but I never get the argument for knocking guys whose prime/peak are nearly interchangable.

Duncan seems to be not thought of as high defensively as guys like Dream and KG and I don't really understand it. Im not sure if its the lack of DPOY, the credit being given to Pop, or the idea that Bruce Bowen is really driving those defenses. I've posted the Spurs team defensive ranking before and won't do it again, but essentially every year of Duncan's prime and many of his post-prime years they were a top 3 or better defense. Much more than offense, defense is a team pursuit so obviously Duncan had help, but just as obviously he was the backbone of those defenses. Much more important to me than how many blocks/steals etc.

Some caveats to Duncan--was drafted into a near perfect situation with perhaps the only superstar in the league even more unselfish and willing to move over and let Duncan be the man in David Robinson. Getting to learn from and play next to a guy like Admiral can only been seen as a great positive for Duncan. Pop is obviously an all-time great coach and he's played with some pretty great teammates in Admiral, TP, and Manu tho rarely more than one of them at top level at a time. He's benefited from a stable organization that mostly made smart decisions around him.

2. Shaq

Spoiler:

First and foremost for me in regards to Shaq is my believe that he was the single biggest nightmare for other teams the league has ever seen. More than Wilt and his 50ppg, more than Mike, more than Jabbar, more than Lebron. His sheer physical dominance, his scoring dominance, his when motivated sheer will to just destroy the other team I think is unmatched. As someone else(and I apologize I can't recall who) pointed out earlier--no other player forced the other team's coach into doing more out of character things.

A great offensive player. Primarily as a scorer, but Shaq was a willing passer and a smart one. Only big in his league as an offensive player imo is Kareem. The idea that Dream compares offensively and is better defensively is built on a giant flaw. Dream as great as he was at his peak just doesnt compare peak, prime, or career to Shaq as a scorer. Dirk doesnt measure up. Certainly not Duncan or KG.

An underrated defensive player. No he doesnt belong in the conversation with Duncan, Dream, and KG. But he was having positive defensive impact to be sure. A good rebounder, a very intimidating presence, and when he was interested, a quite effective defensive anchor.

Some caveats--- the missed games bother me. It doesnt kill him for me since he was ready to go come the PS, but when you look at some of the ironmen he's being compared to its a knock. The personal drama bothers me. As a fan of the game I enjoyed Shaq's antics with the self-given nicknames, and the silly mocking names he gave opposing big men. Shaq is legit funny. But the drama with Kobe was unnecessary and even if obviously didn't hurt the Lakers much on the court, it did lead to them breaking up when they still had a very clear championship window.

The sometimes I feel like playing hard and being in shape, but other times I don't hurts him for me. Again he was still very productive and that's ultimately what I judge him by, but without question those things limited his performance.

Free throw shooting. It became a problem when he was no longer at his peak and just dominating at a level to where it just didn't matter. But at other times in his career this was very costly especially when his team had to pull him out of late close games.

Magic

Spoiler:

First, I have Magic as one of the game's few true geniuses. Russell and Bird being the primary other two guys. Magic just played the game like no one else ever has or ever will. Maybe even more tiresome to me than "the next Mike" talk to me is the next Magic talk. Kobe has shown us that you can find a poor man's Michael Jordan, but nobody and I mean nobody has ever come close to being the next Magic. Not Penny, not Lebron, no one.

Magic had the size, the vision(oh the vision), the skill, the guts to just do the unthinkable. And while I love the flash and the style, he had plenty of substance to back it up. Great at running a team, fast break is what he's known for, but was unbelievable in the half-court as well. Very efficient scorer in his own right, great rebounder which was only magnified because every defensive rebound he got meant you already had the ball in the hand of the greatest transition PG of all time.

I don't want to give him credit as a player for helping to "save" the league, but it deserves mention. His talent, his personality, his relationship with Bird, it was all special and it pulled this league we love out of the idea that it was too black, too violent, too drug-filled. He made it fun again.

Some caveats: Not the greatest defender. His career was cut way too short. Had a tremendous ego--don't think it did much harm to the Lakers, but if we discuss it about Shaq it must be mentioned here. He too was blessed with a great coach and great teammates--came into the league with Kareem still playing at a super high level. Had really good role players around him as well--Big Game, Scott, Cooper, Rambis and Green, Thompson etc....

[DQuinn1575]

Way too early for Barry but that 75 team had a lot of talent on it whose stats were a bit low that season due to Barry's high usage rates. Cliff Ray comes up strong on any measure other than scoring, an excellent defender, rebounder, and good passing center -- very similar player to Wes Unseld. Wilkes and Phil Smith were young future stars who hadn't broken out yet but showed flashed of potential stardom. George Johnson is probably the greatest backup center in NBA history, shotblocking and defense for a lot of years and whenever he got minutes, the defense improved for that team. Former all-stars as veterans off the bench in Jeff Mullins and Bill Bridges as well as solid pros like Charles Dudley and Derrick Dickey. Even Charles Johnson, who looks weak in advanced stats, was a good defender and was Mr. Clutch (and had the same role for the Bullets championship team in 78). It isn't a powerhouse team, but it isn't complete stiffs either.

Mullins and Bridges were over the hill - Bridges playing 108 minutes, Phil Smith a future star was only 9th man and doesnt countmuch either. Dickey and Dudley are 10th and 11th man.
If you want to rate a team's mop-up guys of Smith,Dickey,Dudley,Bridges, and Mullins - then they are good.

Wilkes was a good player but in his first year. I like George Johnson a lot, but "greatest backup center in NBA history" is a bit much. I like CJ too - not good stats, but a good clutch player and defender - maybe a poor man's Dennis Johnson.

Cliff Ray was a career 52% shooter, which looks good unless you realize it was all dunks. He passed a lot more in the Chicago Dick Motta offense than he did at Golden State. Comparing him to Unseld is laughable - the year before he was splitting minutes with Dennis Awtrey.

To be fair, Ray was a 6 year starter in the league (more than 24 mpg) with a career PER of 14.4. Butch Beard was 4 year starter with career PER of 15.0. CJ only year as starter, career PER of 12.5.

So that is 3 starting spots with 9 years of 24 mpg and average PER of 14.0 = (14.4 + 15.0 + 12.5)/3
I only use PER to get a real rough estimate of average players - it's a ballpark for me only. But if you have 3 slightly below average starters.

Good player in WIlkes, but was "power forward" here as well as having lowest TS% of his career 47.3%. He would rank real low on a list of #2 players on a championship team.

Barry may be a lousy person, but he carried a team to an NBA title probably more than anyone that season.

[Baller2014]

Barry beat a Bullets team who would not even have qualified for the Western Conference playoffs this year. It hardly compares to some of the earlier examples given, like Duncan taking out Shaq and Kobe in their primes.

[Clyde Frazier]

I don't see how they really met expectations in 02, 04 or 06. 2nd round exits aren't accepted during a span where a team wins multiple championships.

Go back and read my opening post on page 2. Duncan can't help that his team was outgunned, which it plainly was in 02 and 04.

As for 06, which I also mention in my OP:
1) Duncan went berserk that series, putting up crazy numbers
2) The series went to 7 games with 2 OT's, and if not for a dumb Manu foul they win the series. It was Parker who had a poor series that let the team down.
3) Duncan was not only on an outgunned team, he was on a team that was horribly unbalanced. There was zero big man support, literally zero. Duncan was starting next to 3 swing men and Tony Parker, and off the bench the big man support basically didn't exist either (here are the mpg totals for the next 2 bigs after Duncan; Horry got 16mpg, in which shot 250 from the field and 143 from 3pt land, and Oberto who got 6mpg, and played in only 3 games out of 7, Oberto shot 333. from the field).
Duncan did everything that could reasonably be expected to get the Spurs over the line over a deeper and more balanced Mavs team.

I love how people are claiming Shaq outperformed Duncan, when in point of fact in their 5 playoff match ups during their primes Duncan was clearly the better player on the floor 3/5 times, and the 5th time is arguable given the circumstances. This includes 02, when they were predominately matched up against each other due to D.Rob's injury... again, this is all in my OP.

Meanwhile, look at all the underachievement from Shaq- 97-99, 03, 04, never mind other years that are very arguable too. Magic has 3 clear playoff let downs, against the Rockets in 81 and 86 and the Suns in 1990. And they weren't 7 game series with 2 OT's where Magic's outgunned and poorly balanced team lost due to his team mates incompetence either. For guys who were supposedly better than Duncan, they sure seemed to lose more series than they should have during their primes.

There's no doubt they lost to good teams, but those teams weren't significantly better than them. All i'm saying is in a 7 year run where you win 3 championships, 2nd round exits aren't considered meeting expectations. The goal in that context is to win a championship, and they fell short in those years. Obviously it wasn't 7 straight championships or bust, but I just find your statement a little too finite.

I think it's pretty clear that the 97-99 lakers fell short due to a young kobe who hadn't nearly developed into the player he would become during the 3 peat, and phil jackson was only there for 1 season. As we all know, the main thing he brings to the table as a coach is managing personalities, and shaq / kobe were strong personalities to say the least. 04 lakers were a mess chemistry-wise, and honestly the fact that they even got to the finals was semi-surprising.

All that said, I haven't voted for either player yet, so I'm not really responding here to support 1 over the other. Duncan epitomized team chemistry over the years. Shaq… had his issues.

[penbeast0]

He did carry that team; mad chucker (and very very good one) with a hot hand through a relatively short stretch of games. I like that team better than you do; lot of good defenders, guys who could score if needed, excellent depth, sort of like the Larry Brown/Allen Iverson finals team except that Barry was hitting his shots consistently in the finals. But, the other point is that Barry didn't have the kind of team success outside of that year that you would expect from a top 20-30 player unless you think Thurmond wasn't that good and he didn't dominate the early ABA the way people would expect if it was that lesser a league nor did losing him from his ABA championship team seem to be a big problem for that team (Kevin Durant goes to the NBDL . . . any team . . . isn't his team the favorite pretty much automatically?

[colts18]

Duncan's teams exceeded or met expectations every year of his prime. Shaq's often didn't. That's it in a nutshell. Look at those talent heavy Lakers teams in 97-99. How were they losing every year? And there are plenty of other disappointments- 03, 04, etc.

You mean the year that Shaq beat the Spurs without HCA? The year where Duncan shot like 38 FG% during their 4 straight losses?

[Baller2014]

Duncan's teams exceeded or met expectations every year of his prime. Shaq's often didn't. That's it in a nutshell. Look at those talent heavy Lakers teams in 97-99. How were they losing every year? And there are plenty of other disappointments- 03, 04, etc.

You mean the year that Shaq beat the Spurs without HCA? The year where Duncan shot like 38 FG% during their 4 straight losses?

I posted about this in my OP. Please go read it. Duncan did well in the circumstances in the circumstances, posting 21-12-3 on 534.TS% over the series. The problem, which I covered in my OP in more detail, was that:
a) his shooters couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, to the point that it was ridiculously embarrassing
b) Rasho was useless offensively, and therefore
c) Shaq and Malone were constantly able to double Duncan with no fear of being punished for it.

With those obstacles in his way, Duncan's raw stats that series were less than they could have been, but he was still doing awesomely. On D he was dominant as usual, and he almost put the Spurs up 3-2 off a crazy (should have been) game winner while Shaq and Malone doubled him. He just didn't get any help that series. Is that Shaq's excuse in the years Duncan plainly outplayed him head to head? Clearly not, because Shaq had the better support cast all 5 times they played (yet was outplayed 3/5 times). Trying to act like Duncan had the better team because they had HCA is silly. The Spurs had HC because the Lakers had been held back by injuries during the regular season. Come the playoffs they were healthy, and obviously a different team.

[MacGill]

Duncan's teams exceeded or met expectations every year of his prime. Shaq's often didn't. That's it in a nutshell. Look at those talent heavy Lakers teams in 97-99. How were they losing every year? And there are plenty of other disappointments- 03, 04, etc.

You mean the year that Shaq beat the Spurs without HCA? The year where Duncan shot like 38 FG% during their 4 straight losses?

I posted about this in my OP. Please go read it. Duncan did well in the circumstances in the circumstances, posting 21-12-3 on 534.TS% over the series. The problem, which I covered in my OP in more detail, was that:
a) his shooters couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, to the point that it was ridiculously embarrassingb) Rasho was useless offensively, and therefore
c) Shaq and Malone were constantly able to double Duncan with no fear of being punished for it.

With those obstacles in his way, Duncan's raw stats that series were less than they could have been, but he was still doing awesomely. On D he was dominant as usual, and he almost put the Spurs up 3-2 off a crazy (should have been) game winner while Shaq and Malone doubled him. He just didn't get any help that series. Is that Shaq's excuse in the years Duncan plainly outplayed him head to head? Clearly not, because Shaq had the better support cast all 5 times they played (yet was outplayed 3/5 times).

You mean like NVE and the other 'All-Star's' you mentioned about late 90's Shaq's LA teams? Hmmm, funny how Duncan couldn't elevate his teams like you expected Shaq to do

Stay consistent here.