RealGM Top 100 List #42

[penbeast0]

VOTE: Dwight Howard though I'm open to arguments. Miller and Pierce just don't seem to have the same impact for me although their longevity is certainly a strong advantage.

Howard 10 years, 768 games, 35.9minute per game
18.7reb 2.2ast 4.5to 26.5pts per 100 possessions @ .599ts%
18.7 2.0 4.9 28.3 @.613 for his playoff career
3xDPOY, 4x All-Defense 1st, 1x All-Defense 2nd

Mourning 10 years (+5 injury riddled ones) 31.0 mpg
14.5reb 1.9ast 4.5to 29.1pts per 100 possessions @ .583ts%
14.1 1.7 4.9 27.3 @ .570 for playoffs
2x DPOY, 2x All-Defense 1st (never even made 2nd any other year)

McHale 12 years 31.0mpg
11.4reb 2.7ast 3.0to 27.8pts per 100 possessions @ .605ts%
10.9 2.4 2.8 27.6 @ .618 for playoffs
3x1st All-Defense, 2x 2nd All-Defense

Motombo 16 years (+2 partials) 30.8mpg
17.6reb 1.8ast 3.1to 16.7pts per 100 possessions @ .573ts%
17.2 1.4 2.7 16.4 @ .587 for playoffs
4x DPOY 4x1st All-Defense 3x2nd All-Defense

Just wanted to put the box score numbers up. Except for longevity, Dwight Howard seems to have the edge, Mutombo certainly has the edge there. Howard also played the most minutes during his prime. He did have a system tailored to maximize his impact in Orlando and really ugly A/T numbers (Zo is even worse!), but also plays in an era where the rules have been slanted more to favor perimeter players. Deke had some nice playoff series but Dwight carried less talent farther. I do have some maturity concerns with Dwight that do not exist for any of the others but overall I favor Dwight of these 4 despite the passing which really hurts him.

. . . .

Reed v Cowens v. Beaty

All three shared some things in common . . . undersized, mobile centers with good range and good defense. Reed is the strongest, Cowens the most physical, Beaty has a Bill Laimbeer/Vlade Divac rep for annoying opps with a lot of dirty/veteran tricks.

All had shortened careers, Reed played only 7 years over 20 games in a season, Cowens played 10 but with increasing missed games plus a half year attempted comeback in Milwaukee, Beaty played 12 seasons (2 as reserve) but 2 were cut short by his recurring knee injuries; it's not a coincidence that his best season (72 in Utah) came after being forced to sit out a year. Beaty is considered a step down from Reed and Cowens but seems a reasonable comp to show their strengths.

Prime numbers

Reed (67-71) 20.5ppg 13.5reb 2ast .540ts%
Cowens (72-76) 19.5ppg 15.5reb 4ast .495ts%
Beaty* (65-69) 20ppg 12reb 1.5ast .535ts%
*(using NBA numbers only)

As the numbers show, Cowens was the best passer and rebounder, but the worst shooter. Reed is slightly better than Beaty in all areas but only slightly (and the NBA had expansion in these years so Reed was playing against slightly inferior competition). Beaty has the longevity edge. Very comparable players if you consider their defensive abilities roughly equal. I didn't use Beaty's ABA years because I don't want to get into a debate about how much to discount them.

Right now I think the best wing left is Alex English, a bit above Dantley, Nique, or Richmond. I am open to arguments for Sam Jones or Paul Arizin but the comps we had 2 threads ago had them looking like a bit below Dolph Schayes who I don't have up with the best bigs left, though I am open to being convinced.

There are also a lot of short career prospects. The shortest and greatest peak would be Walton; others would include Connie Hawkins, Tracy McGrady, or Sidney Moncrief..

Willing to listen . . . .

[Doctor MJ]

I'm going to share a PM conversation I had with RebelWithoutACause because I think it should be on people's minds.

Rebel, I hope you don't mind, I'm doing this because I think you're thinking thoughts we all should ponder.

Pierce vs Wallace

I saw that you are considering Pierce for a spot, while not having Rasheed on your radar yet.
We scratched that convo about Rasheed before in another thread as well.

Therefore I have 2 questions that are really itching me.

1. Do you think Rasheed was the better/more impactful player than Pierce?

2. If so, and he is ahead of Pierce how can his personality hurt him so much that he is not even considered here when his impact despite his personality was always there?!

What does the data say?

From your RAPM spreadsheet:
*98 data corrected by roughly 77 %

Sheed : 5.8 average
11 years of data
(98-09 with 01 missing)


Pierce : 3.9 average
13 years of data
(99-12 with 01 missing)

(4.4 for 11 best years for a better comparison with Rasheed)


Sheed was a 34-35 mpg on average during a 13 year prime of impact play.
Pierce was a 36-37 mpg on average during a 14 year prime of impact play.


1 year peak, 3 year peak, 5 year prime, 10 year prime Rasheed comes out on top by a clear margin.

You have desrcribed smaller RAPM differences that were consistent as different tiers.
Those are several tiers!

When you mentioned Garnett in a thread on the stats board you were talking about how you can't ignore his overwhelming impact and you don't fully do an analysis by RAPM but it has a ton of weight for you towards your decision?

So what is it that Pierce , a clearly less impactful player , puts him so much in front of Sheed?

Well first off let me say: Bravo for following a way of thinking to its logical conclusion. I think it's absolutely worth question if I, and others, need to totally rethink Sheed.

The biggest thing for me is that Sheed's a nutcase who I don't think I could trust to build a franchise around. If I'm drafting my future franchise between Pierce and Sheed, it's so hard to fathom choosing Sheed.

Now breaking it down a bit further:

It's the Portland years where Sheed's impact surpasses Pierce's, and of course the franchise fell into utter disarray with that approach, so I don't see it as sustainable really.

After that, Sheed found his footing Detroit where he had an impact that was comparable to Pierce. There's a part of me that wants to say "So that's what Sheed can be relied upon to give you, and it's in Pierce's ballpark, so I should rate them similarly." The issue with that is that Sheed wasn't simply a supporting player, he was a supporting player dropped into an incredibly strong team context both in terms of talent and ethos. Put him in any lesser context, and I think he self-destructs.

I just don't have these problems with Pierce. So for me, I don't see the two as on the same tier despite the RAPM numbers, based on the definition that a "tier" is a group of player you can see something of a debate over.

If personally view the game more in terms of purely what Sheed gave using RAPM, I don't fault you, but to me all RAPM can ever hope to do is say how things worked out in a particular context, and my player evaluation has to go beyond that.

All that said, I do expect to talk about Sheed in this project even if no one else does, and to me the level where that I immediately start thinking about is Sheed vs Big Ben. Sheed's certainly the all around more capable player, but it was the steady-as-a-rock Ben that supplied the backbone of that Piston ethos which gave Sheed structure. Which should rate higher, I'm not sure. I will say that when I think about entry into the Hall, Ben's a lock in my book, and I really don't know about Sheed.

Your thoughts?

[Doctor MJ]

Continuing on:

I can see some people thinking, "Pierce doesn't really stand out that much. Why him and not Player X?"

To be honest, I feel similarly, and in 2011 when Pierce made the jump he did in this list, it rather blew my mind. To me a lot of what it says is that the gaps between these guys at this point get narrower and narrower.

Still, it's not easy to find someone who has the kind of complete career that Pierce does at this point. I'll go back to Win Shares - and as always I know that's not some Holy Grail, it's just a reference point - Pierce ranks 28th in career WS, here are the guys ahead of him not already in:

22. Dan Issel
24. Robert Parish
27. Ray Allen

What that's saying for the most part is that if you're clearly beating Pierce at this stage in the game, a guy who scored successfully at volume & efficiency and transitioned seamlessly to a contender where his primacy had to be sacrificed, you probably have to have a good edge on peak and quite solid longevity.

I just can't think of anyone who can claim this without dispute.

So, yeah, I'm sure others will come up who have a case against Pierce, but I don't really see any perimeter player left who can claim to be on a separate tier than him.

Now, the bigs, that's interesting. I said last time it was between Pierce, Zo, and McHale. With Pierce in, I can see an argument for Mutombo, so those are the main 3 on my mind.

I'm rather expecting Howard to be the favorite at the moment, and that's fine. As mentioned, I have trouble seeing him over Zo. I'd be interested to hear more on that comparison.

[Notanoob]

It's the Portland years where Sheed's impact surpasses Pierce's, and of course the franchise fell into utter disarray with that approach, so I don't see it as sustainable really.

After that, Sheed found his footing Detroit where he had an impact that was comparable to Pierce. There's a part of me that wants to say "So that's what Sheed can be relied upon to give you, and it's in Pierce's ballpark, so I should rate them similarly." The issue with that is that Sheed wasn't simply a supporting player, he was a supporting player dropped into an incredibly strong team context both in terms of talent and ethos. Put him in any lesser context, and I think he self-destructs.

I just don't have these problems with Pierce. So for me, I don't see the two as on the same tier despite the RAPM numbers, based on the definition that a "tier" is a group of player you can see something of a debate over.

If personally view the game more in terms of purely what Sheed gave using RAPM, I don't fault you, but to me all RAPM can ever hope to do is say how things worked out in a particular context, and my player evaluation has to go beyond that.

All that said, I do expect to talk about Sheed in this project even if no one else does, and to me the level where that I immediately start thinking about is Sheed vs Big Ben. Sheed's certainly the all around more capable player, but it was the steady-as-a-rock Ben that supplied the backbone of that Piston ethos which gave Sheed structure. Which should rate higher, I'm not sure. I will say that when I think about entry into the Hall, Ben's a lock in my book, and I really don't know about Sheed.

Two things here.

1. I don't think that you can blame the "Jailblazers" on Sheed. Is it really his fault that he was teamed up with a bunch of guys who got arrested? Including:
Reuben Patterson-arrested for domestic abuse and trying to rape his child's nanny.
Zach Randolph-DUI and sucker-punched Ruben Patterson, breaking his eyesocket , along with being a lazy bastard.
Damon Stoudamire- caught with weed multiple times, including a DUI and sneaking it through an air port.
Qyntel Woods-caught with weed and was a dog fighter.
Shawn Kemp- going through rehab during his time with the blazers, chronic adultress and also lazy and overweight
Jermaine O'neal- part of the Malice in the Palace
Darius Miles- suspended for weed (you know how hard that is?) and generally lazy bastard
Sheed was never arrested, and was universally loved by his teammates-sure, his techs are excessive, but I don't see how his disputes with the refs were responsible for that team falling apart- I would suggest that the team would have fallen apart no matter who you replaced Sheed with.

2. There is a great myth about the 'going to work' Pistons when it comes to their culture. Even during the best of times, they were in disputes with their coach. I remember a story about how after their overtime loss to the Lakers in the 04 Finals, how Larry Brown was about to give a rousing speech of some sort, and one of the players (not Sheed IIRC) told him to sit down and "shut the **** up, cuz coach we got this". They basically never gave a damn about what their coach said, whoever he was, because they were all very sure of themselves. This sort of arrogance only got worse after they won- they all bought into their own narratives about themselves and really didn't push themselves like they should have. Continuity was the only thing holding the team together- the team also fought with Flip, and when Chauncey was traded openly mutinied against the new coach (led by Rip). Ben Wallace was also widely known as a huge **** among the reporters, they just kept quiet about it while he was around. The only real saint among that group was Tayshaun Prince.

What I'm trying to say here is that Sheed didn't really change, and the Pistons' locker room culture is overrated because of their consistent success (and Chauncey's reputation). The only thing that really changed was that Larry Brown would try and get technicals before Sheed when Sheed was getting fired up- that was basically it.

[D Nice]

I'm rather expecting Howard to be the favorite at the moment, and that's fine. As mentioned, I have trouble seeing him over Zo. I'd be interested to hear more on that comparison.

Let me preface this by saying Zo is one of my favorite centers of all time, perhaps my favorite outside of Hakeem/Kareem (and JO if you count him as a center), and I loath Dwight, he’s one of my 5 least favorite players to ever step onto an NBA court.

Offensively, I think D12 has a clear advantage. Dwight led better offenses. We only have 1 semi-elite year of Mourning’s +/- (2002) and he and a +5 while Dwight’s 3-year peak was +7/+6/+6. But Dwight was doing so on a top 4 offensive team while Miami was the 3rd worst offensive team in the league. The Magic had more options outside of Dwight for offense over the ’09-’11 stretch, by a huge margin. The 2002 heat had Eddie Jones, an injured Jim Jackson, and a bunch of junk. There was more co-dependednce on Mourning and yet his +/- was not as impressive. Obviously he wasn’t his 94-00 self but this is still a relatively productive version of Alonzo. And if we did have the +/- data for a prime Zo, I don’t think he would look great compared to Dwight even with his more pedestrian overall offensive teams in terms of ORTG (which sported supporting talent like Tim Hardaway, Jamal Mashburn, and Terry Porter). On your scaled sheet his ORAPM for 98-00 was 1.6/1.3/0.8 while. Dwight seemed to float around 0.6-1.2 on the same sheet, but he did so on top 3-4 league offenses, not 7-12 league offenses.

Mourning may have been more portable because he had the (much much much) superior jumper but this generally applies when you are going to slot a guy as a #2. I’m not actually convinced Zo is better as a #2 to Dwight because his post presence, even as the secondary rather than primary option, has benefits (court distortion), he’s a MUCH bigger threat to catch-and-finish around the basket, and he’ll get more offensive rebounds. I’m not sure if Houston, for example, would have been better off offensively swapping out Howard for a prime Mourning, and ’14 isn’t really peak Dwight. And as a #1, Dwight’s skill-set crushes Zo’s. He does the more important things better (volume-score efficiently, force help, make game easier for role players).

I don’t actually know if Zo was ever a strong enough offensive player to be a #1 on an elite offense. I don’t think he was, for very similar reasons to David Robinson actually. Zo definitely had a post game, let’s be clear, he’s more impressive than D-Rob there, but he really doesn’t touch Dwight in that department and he wasn’t a hugely double-teamed guy in relation to other elite centers (like Howard). His jumper allowed him to open up the floor and be a pick-and-pop threat (loved his little baseline 10-13 footer) but he didn’t actually distort opposing defenses the way Howard did. Dwight’s passing somewhat mitigated the impact of said warping but it was still a big factor (also Alonzo was just as bad if not a worse passer than Dwight). I actually think Dwight’s 21-22 PPG while being doubled constantly on 60-61TS% IS enough to be a #1 on an elite offensive team and history bears this out: the magic WERE elite with Dwight as the clear lead. If you were to reverse the roles the Magic would not have thrived comparably because (as I touched on before)...

a) Zo is a fairly less efficient scorer
b) Zo would not open up the floor for shooters like Dwight because of his double-teams
c) Zo is not going to get you as many 2nd shot opportunities

I do feel like Zo was a clearly superior defender, I’m glad RAPM bears this out. I think he’s got ATG shot-block timing and unlike say a young Hakeem wasn’t the type to consistently sacrifice good positioning for block attempts…he was that rare guy (like Deke although not quite as good) who would contest at a elite rate AND swat at an elite rate. I never liked when Magic fans tried to paint Dwight as an equal defender to Zo because he was “single-handedly anchoring” an elite D for Orlando, because even with their good defensive statistics they were hugely vulnerable in certain areas where great defensive teams typically weren’t, and if you evaluate them on the basis of defensive skill-set the only thing Dwight did better was rebound. In some (many?) areas they were equal, and the rest goes to Zo. Dwight was a very good shot-contester, Zo was GOAT-level. To break it down, unless you’re Noah or KG, the cornerstones of big-man defense are, in order of importance…

1. Rim Protection (Swatting & Contesting)
2. Rotations (Switching & Perimeter Disruption)
3. Post Defense
4. P&R Play (Hedge, Recover, Guard Smalls at the end of the clock)

#1 clearly goes to Zo, #2 is a wash, #3 goes to Zo, and #4 goes to Dwight slightly. In this era #3 and #4 have probably swapped importance, but that doesn’t really change the end result.

Now between the ears Zo is one of the best teammates/franchise players you can hope for while Dwight is about as bad as it gets in terms of leadership, competitiveness, etc. That’s up to you how much to weigh. But IMO the offensive advantage for Dwight is bigger than the defensive one, and when you couple that with durability it makes Dwight the choice. It’s by no means easy though. I personally have Mourning at #41 on my list and Dwight at #42, so it shows how close I think they are.

[tsherkin]

1. I don't think that you can blame the "Jailblazers" on Sheed. Is it really his fault that he was teamed up with a bunch of guys who got arrested? Including:

Wasn't just about the criminal records, it was about their generally poor and immature attitude, to which Sheed most definitely contributed during his time in Portland. Obviously, him being a mouthy idiot to the refs is far different from beating his wife or DUI or whatever, but he certainly wasn't a "character guy" amidst all of the idiocy around him. I don't propose that he be blamed for the general tone of the team, but he sure did absolutely nothing to change the team culture, which is what a strong leader figure can do. In the end, it's more that he was net neutral or slightly negative than that he was singularly at fault or even a major contributor to that issue.

What I'm trying to say here is that Sheed didn't really change, and the Pistons' locker room culture is overrated because of their consistent success (and Chauncey's reputation). The only thing that really changed was that Larry Brown would try and get technicals before Sheed when Sheed was getting fired up- that was basically it.

Surely. The Pistons had a good arrangement of talent, exploited the defensive rules of the time intelligently and hit some particularly favorable circumstances (terrible conference, drama/injury-wracked Lakers) while performing well above the level of most of their peers. Credit to them, I mean what else is there to say? They did the things necessary to take advantage of their situation, and Sheed was a part of that, for sure. That said, he fit in more effectively in a supporting role than he did in one with significant primacy. In Detroit, he was a 13/7/2 guy in 33 mpg on mediocre/poor offense (51.5% TS wasn't impressive by any means, nor was his 106 ORTG). His 3pt shooting was overrated, but not bad: 34.8% isn't that impressive, but it still produces a spacing effect, though at 4.2 3PA/g, it wasn't the greatest arrangement of shots. Still, he contributed within the scope of the team plan, didn't have to do a lot of what he didn't like, was a very good individual post defender and box-out guy, and was communicative on D. He fit well into the system in a role that suited his mentality. You add Prince and Billups and Wallace, and just enough O to get by (more, once Flip took over), and you get a pretty solid team that can attack any squad that isn't really dominant.

Now, dragging that back to contextual relevance, how does that help him in conversation with Pierce?

Different styles of player, but Sheed wasn't any more effective in his supporting role for the Pistons than has been Pierce since the 08 title season and the period of Celtics prominence thereafter. Pierce was actually a lot better individually from 08-10 than Sheed ever was, IMO, particularly since what he did had a more global effect on the game than Sheed's fairly narrow scope of on-court influence. The Pistons were already a Conference Finals squad before Sheed ever got there, and that was under Carlisle. They had a lovely 17-5 run with Sheed after the trade in 04, and of course instead of getting swept in the ECFs, they beat the Lakers rather handily with Kobe playing the worst basketball I've ever seen from him, Malone going at quarter speed in his final season due to age and injury, and Payton being generally awful while the team fielded no depth, then came back and nearly did it to the Spurs the year after, proving their legitimacy as contenders. Lovely stuff, and an extended run as ECF participants as well. 6 consecutive years, was it?

But Sheed was always best as a component of an ensemble, where as Pierce was able to do more with less, even when his best running mate was the lamentably moronic Antoine Walker. He certainly wasn't a tier-1 superstar, but IMO he was much better than Sheed, who was basically a more defensively capable Sam Perkins during the best moments of his career. That's an exaggeration, of course, but basically describes his Detroit career, and he wasn't even close to Pierce when he held more primacy during his Portland career.

[RebelWithACause]

Spoiler:

I'm going to share a PM conversation I had with RebelWithoutACause because I think it should be on people's minds.

Rebel, I hope you don't mind, I'm doing this because I think you're thinking thoughts we all should ponder.

Pierce vs Wallace

I saw that you are considering Pierce for a spot, while not having Rasheed on your radar yet.
We scratched that convo about Rasheed before in another thread as well.

Therefore I have 2 questions that are really itching me.

1. Do you think Rasheed was the better/more impactful player than Pierce?

2. If so, and he is ahead of Pierce how can his personality hurt him so much that he is not even considered here when his impact despite his personality was always there?!

What does the data say?

From your RAPM spreadsheet:
*98 data corrected by roughly 77 %

Sheed : 5.8 average
11 years of data
(98-09 with 01 missing)


Pierce : 3.9 average
13 years of data
(99-12 with 01 missing)

(4.4 for 11 best years for a better comparison with Rasheed)


Sheed was a 34-35 mpg on average during a 13 year prime of impact play.
Pierce was a 36-37 mpg on average during a 14 year prime of impact play.


1 year peak, 3 year peak, 5 year prime, 10 year prime Rasheed comes out on top by a clear margin.

You have desrcribed smaller RAPM differences that were consistent as different tiers.
Those are several tiers!

When you mentioned Garnett in a thread on the stats board you were talking about how you can't ignore his overwhelming impact and you don't fully do an analysis by RAPM but it has a ton of weight for you towards your decision?

So what is it that Pierce , a clearly less impactful player , puts him so much in front of Sheed?

Well first off let me say: Bravo for following a way of thinking to its logical conclusion. I think it's absolutely worth question if I, and others, need to totally rethink Sheed.

The biggest thing for me is that Sheed's a nutcase who I don't think I could trust to build a franchise around. If I'm drafting my future franchise between Pierce and Sheed, it's so hard to fathom choosing Sheed.

Now breaking it down a bit further:

It's the Portland years where Sheed's impact surpasses Pierce's, and of course the franchise fell into utter disarray with that approach, so I don't see it as sustainable really.

After that, Sheed found his footing Detroit where he had an impact that was comparable to Pierce. There's a part of me that wants to say "So that's what Sheed can be relied upon to give you, and it's in Pierce's ballpark, so I should rate them similarly." The issue with that is that Sheed wasn't simply a supporting player, he was a supporting player dropped into an incredibly strong team context both in terms of talent and ethos. Put him in any lesser context, and I think he self-destructs.

I just don't have these problems with Pierce. So for me, I don't see the two as on the same tier despite the RAPM numbers, based on the definition that a "tier" is a group of player you can see something of a debate over.

If personally view the game more in terms of purely what Sheed gave using RAPM, I don't fault you, but to me all RAPM can ever hope to do is say how things worked out in a particular context, and my player evaluation has to go beyond that.

All that said, I do expect to talk about Sheed in this project even if no one else does, and to me the level where that I immediately start thinking about is Sheed vs Big Ben. Sheed's certainly the all around more capable player, but it was the steady-as-a-rock Ben that supplied the backbone of that Piston ethos which gave Sheed structure. Which should rate higher, I'm not sure. I will say that when I think about entry into the Hall, Ben's a lock in my book, and I really don't know about Sheed.

Your thoughts?

Sure no problem.

I will reply here now instead of a PM. I am really short on time, so just a few things

Re: Drafting for a future franchise
I agree that this is a scenario where I would prefer Pierce. However in an All-Time list this is not what I am looking at. I would also prefer to draft Pierce over someone like Shaq, because well, you know Shaq is a troubled player to build around as welll (and will take the high road)

So when I look at a player, the first thing I try to do is to figure out the quality of a player.
Drza had a great post comparing Pierce and Rasheed in thread number 40 or 41 and I tried to lay out the quality of Sheed as well.
Then I try to apply certain things like personality, character and portability.

Re: Dismissing Portland Rasheed because it is not sustainable
The fact that Sheed messed up in Portland after some time does not change the fact that he had 6 incredible prime seasons there. At least for me.
Seasons that eclipse Pierce by far.
(Shaq again, always burned bridges and imloded on teams after some time. Do we fault him for that too?)

Another question popping up,
Was Sheed really that problematic outside of the technicals?

His tenure in Detroit ,NY and Boston prove otherwise. His recent coaching gig in Detroit as well.
Sheed comes off as a good teammate and in the right circumstances totally under control.
So maybe it was Portland, the coach and the staff, that simply handled Rasheed the wrong way?

Re: Sheed dropped into a team with good organization and talent in Detroit
That is right where you wanna put any good player. A contender. I actually think the opposite. He made himself fit into that already strong team and lifted them over the top. "Portability",
Why would you wanna have an inept organization or franchise any way?
Maybe Pierce lifts worse or disorganized teams a bit more, but is that the goal and more important?
Those jailblazers are an examplfe for poor organization and toxic environment, yet how was Sheed still that great there?!

Re: comparison with Ben Wallace
Sheed as a player, in my opinion, needs to be ranked over Ben Wallace and rather clearly. There is also no boxscore advantage for Ben, one that Pierce for example, had.
Ben does not even have half of the longevity and misses 2 way impact, even if he was a better defender.


Essentially it comes down to the quality of a player. Personality can drag someone down or make him look better, but by how much?

[Quotatious]

Vote - Dwight Howard

I'm really not a fan of this guy, but let's give the credit where it's due. I often feel like he gets disrespected and overly criticized for things that are (IMO) relatively unimportant (like his attitude - I mean, it's not totally irrelevant, but to me, by far the most important thing for a basketball player is what he can do on the court in terms of his skills, attitude is just a secondary concern). At the same time, many people are eager to disparage his skills, for example because he plays against weak competition (at least compared to the great centers of the 90s - but to me, it's a little overstated, to be honest - there were like 5 great all-around, two-way centers in the 90s - Hakeem, Shaq, Robinson, Ewing, Mourning), and each of them faced the others just for about 10-15% of the entire season, which isn't really that big of a deal.

I guess I'll always love to play the devil's advocate, so let's go.

Prime Howard was actually an all-time great at some things - defense, rebounding (likely top 10 ever in both categories), great finisher, especially considering that he can be your first scoring option, average 20+ PPG - he's 5th all-time in career FG%, and top 20 in TS% (23.4% career USG, even as much as 26-27% in his best seasons) - that's very impressive.

Also, Howard is an excellent playoff performer (his PER, WS/48, TS%, PPG, TRB%, BLK%, ORtg, as well as usage, all go up in the postseason).

Now, why Howard over Mourning? More efficient scorer (Alonzo was a bit more versatile, because of his jumper, but Dwight's brute strength and power, combined with superior explosiveness and ability to draw fouls, makes him the more consistent scorer. Neither is a good passer (basically a wash in terms of AST/TOV%), very comparable defenders, Howard is a much better rebounder, and a better playoff performer. FWIW (but it's not much, in the grand scheme of things...) Zo's intangibles (heart, leadership, whatever you want to call it) were superior.

It's a very natural comparison, because they are really similar as players, but I give Dwight a slight edge both in terms of peak and career. Howard's longevity is better at this point (30192 total RS + PS minutes, to 28572 for Mourning, and Dwight's been in the league for just 10 seasons so far, to 15 for Zo).

I always tend to link these two guys together, in my mind, but I always give Dwight a slight edge.

[Dubeta]

I can't believe Carmelo Anthony hasn't been voted in. I know the melo hate is strong in this forum, but come on, cp3 and durant high than melo on the all time list!? This is to the point of stupidity.

Vote: Carmelo Anthony

[Quotatious]

I can't believe Carmelo Anthony hasn't been voted in. I know the melo hate is strong in this forum, but come on, cp3 and durant high than melo on the all time list!? This is to the point of stupidity.

Vote: Carmelo Anthony

First of all, you are not on the list of the eligible voters (and seeing your attitude here, you likely won't be given the right to vote, anytime soon...), but what makes you think that Carmelo is better than CP3 or Durant?

[RightToCensor]

Dwight Howard finally getting love.

[Texas Chuck]

Seems to me that if you were a big KG supporter, you should also be a big Sheed supporter. Obviously KG is the superior player in just about every way(3-pt shooting the clearest exception), but both are great big man defenders, but not traditional anchors. Both were clearly at their best as part of ensemble casts as opposed to being the clear "man". Both were the ultimate in team players despite always being the most talented guy on their team.

I agree that way too much gets made of the techs with Sheed. This wasn't really a bad guy as much as it was a bit of a hot head. Who cares really? In no way should he be be blamed for what happened in Portland. That's what happens when you just try and pile up talent without looking at character and leadership. He wasn't a leader. I think its appropriate to knock him a bit for that, but not everyone has to be the alpha.

I'm not personally ready to vote for him yet, but I do think he was a really good player for a long time. And in Portland he seemingly could do anything he wanted---he scored inside and outside, he defended, he rebounded. If anything he should have been more selfish on that team. But his team-first attitude proved to be the perfect fit on those criminally underrated Pistons squads that went to 7 straight ECF(and yeah I know the East sucked, tsherkin, but winning at least 2 playoff series for 7 straight years is really hard to do).

[penbeast0]

Do you rate Sheed over Billups and Ben Wallace? If so, why? I tend to think the other two are the main reason for the Pistons' success and Sheed was another very good complementary piece, a step up from Rip or Tay but more like them than leading the squad like Chauncey or the Fro.

Rebel without a Cause did a nice job with this question; do you have anything to add?

[penbeast0]

Two things here.

1. I don't think that you can blame the "Jailblazers" on Sheed. Is it really his fault that he was teamed up with a bunch of guys who got arrested? Including:
Reuben Patterson-arrested for domestic abuse and trying to rape his child's nanny.
Zach Randolph-DUI and sucker-punched Ruben Patterson, breaking his eyesocket , along with being a lazy bastard.
Damon Stoudamire- caught with weed multiple times, including a DUI and sneaking it through an air port.
Qyntel Woods-caught with weed and was a dog fighter.
Shawn Kemp- going through rehab during his time with the blazers, chronic adultress and also lazy and overweight
Jermaine O'neal- part of the Malice in the Palace
Darius Miles- suspended for weed (you know how hard that is?) and generally lazy bastard
Sheed was never arrested, and was universally loved by his teammates-sure, his techs are excessive, but I don't see how his disputes with the refs were responsible for that team falling apart- I would suggest that the team would have fallen apart no matter who you replaced Sheed with.

2. There is a great myth about the 'going to work' Pistons when it comes to their culture. Even during the best of times, they were in disputes with their coach. I remember a story about how after their overtime loss to the Lakers in the 04 Finals, how Larry Brown was about to give a rousing speech of some sort, and one of the players (not Sheed IIRC) told him to sit down and "shut the **** up, cuz coach we got this". They basically never gave a damn about what their coach said, whoever he was, because they were all very sure of themselves. This sort of arrogance only got worse after they won- they all bought into their own narratives about themselves and really didn't push themselves like they should have. Continuity was the only thing holding the team together- the team also fought with Flip, and when Chauncey was traded openly mutinied against the new coach (led by Rip). Ben Wallace was also widely known as a huge **** among the reporters, they just kept quiet about it while he was around. The only real saint among that group was Tayshaun Prince.

What I'm trying to say here is that Sheed didn't really change, and the Pistons' locker room culture is overrated because of their consistent success (and Chauncey's reputation). The only thing that really changed was that Larry Brown would try and get technicals before Sheed when Sheed was getting fired up- that was basically it.

Not "universally loved among his teammates," in Washington, he didn't get along with Webber though I tended to blame that more on Webber who could be a real whiny little girl if he thought he wasn't getting his way. I do think he matured over his career though.

And I think Sheed was caught with weed once in Portland, but they didn't make a big deal out of it. I could be wrong about that though.

[ronnymac2]

Vote: Alonzo Mourning

A peak comparable to the best left (the new info. on his impact is reassuring). I like his skillset. Compared to Dwight Howard, who really wastes his portability potential with his on-court attitude, Zo has strong portability and can play with anybody. Great foul draw, can hit a jumper, dominant defender. He led some great Miami defenses and along with Hakeem probably has the best reflexes for shot-blocking of anybody in the modern era. He transitioned into the best role playing C since Bill Walton in his twilight years.

2DPOY, All-NBA 1st team in 1999 with prime Shaq playing 98% of the REG SEA, might have been a top-4 player in the 2000 season. Fantastic career.

[E-Balla]

Do you rate Sheed over Billups and Ben Wallace? If so, why? I tend to think the other two are the main reason for the Pistons' success and Sheed was another very good complementary piece, a step up from Rip or Tay but more like them than leading the squad like Chauncey or the Fro.

Rebel without a Cause did a nice job with this question; do you have anything to add?

Billups is close but he's easily better than Ben. Big Ben lost most of his defensive impact with his horrible offense IMO. Now Detroit Shees is worse than Ben but Sheed in 1999-02 is better than Ben at his best.

I do think people that were very impact minded should be voting Sheer but his techs were an issue. His hot headed antics got him kicked out of playoff games (game 1 against LA in 2000) and I'm sure refs were less likely to give his teammates a favorable call because they didn't like him.

My early vote would go to Paul Pierce. His longevity as a serviceable player (2001-13) compared to everyone else I'm considering is very impressive. Dwight and Zo have too many major problems (injuries and immaturity).

EDIT: Switched vote to Alonzo Mourning.

[Texas Chuck]

Do you rate Sheed over Billups and Ben Wallace? If so, why? I tend to think the other two are the main reason for the Pistons' success and Sheed was another very good complementary piece, a step up from Rip or Tay but more like them than leading the squad like Chauncey or the Fro.

Rebel without a Cause did a nice job with this question; do you have anything to add?

TBH I don't know off the top of my head how I would rank those 3 guys. Sheed is clearly the most talented, Wallace the most dominant in a couple different areas(defense/rebounding) and Chauncey was of course a really good all-around player too.

In real-time I never bothered really trying to break down who on that team deserved the most credit because they were such a quintessential team. The parts were all really solid, but the sum was better than the parts and in my basketball lifetime the only champs without one of the 2 or 3 best players in the world on it.

And I think Sheed and Billips in particular were a big part of that because they were above average at so many things. Never quite elite, but really really good. OTOH, those Larry Brown teams made their bones with defense and all due to respect to those 2 guys(and Prince and Hunter among others)--Wallace was clearly the most important guy in that regard.

I don't have any of them as top 50 guys for sure and without having researched past 60 yet(none of them there either) I'm not sure how to separate them. I was simply commenting on how I perceived Sheed in general rather than in terms of a ranking at this point.

[drza]

Do you rate Sheed over Billups and Ben Wallace? If so, why? I tend to think the other two are the main reason for the Pistons' success and Sheed was another very good complementary piece, a step up from Rip or Tay but more like them than leading the squad like Chauncey or the Fro.

Rebel without a Cause did a nice job with this question; do you have anything to add?

Billups is close but he's easily better than Ben. Big Ben lost most of his defensive impact with his horrible offense IMO. Now Detroit Shees is worse than Ben but Sheed in 1999-02 is better than Ben at his best.

I do think people that were very impact minded should be voting Sheer but his techs were an issue. His hot headed antics got him kicked out of playoff games (game 1 against LA in 2000) and I'm sure refs were less likely to give his teammates a favorable call because they didn't like him.

My early vote would go to Paul Pierce. His longevity as a serviceable player (2001-13) compared to everyone else I'm considering is very impressive. Dwight and Zo have too many major problems (injuries and immaturity).

Pierce actually got voted in last thread. He's only been mentioned here as a continuation of conversations that began last thread, and as a foil for Rasheed Wallace.

FWIW, I was pretty vocal about having Sheed over Pierce in the last two threads, but I was pretty clearly in the minority on that front.

[Quotatious]

Seeing Sheed being mentioned so early, I'd like to ask - how would you compare him to Horace Grant (or even Buck Williams), guys? For Buck, we don't really have impact stats, but we know that Horace looked extremely well in NPI DRAPM in 1997 (+2.52).

[drza]

It's interesting. A lot of it does come back to how much you trust the RAPM stats, and how it fits with your personal recollections. As I mentioned in one of the last couple of threads, live-action I thought Sheed in the Portland days was one of the elite players in the league as part of the wave of power forwards that seemed to be the key to all of the Western contenders sans LA. Sheed was the focal point/face of those Blazers in a way that Horace Grant and Buck Williams never were, and I'd argue that he was more of an offensive presence for those teams (leading scorer 4 straight years) than either Grant or Williams were.

Also, by my eye test I thought Sheed was a very good defender and I'd have argued him as possibly the best defensive 4 of his generation not named KG or Duncan before the RAPM results come out.

So when the RAPM results from his prime DID come out and a) support that he was having a consistently positive offensive impact despite the common criticisms that he shot too many jumpers and b) supported that he was repeatedly measuring out as a monster defensive presence consistently in both Portland and Detroit...for me, as I mentioned before, it kind of puts his career in a different perspective than I would have had without the data.

Now, like Doc MJ, I'm not ready to just shoot him up the rankings to where he'd be if I took RAPM results as gospel (his RAPM scores were in the same vicinity as guys that got voted in long ago, for instance, so by RAPM alone he should have been supported back in the 20s (using DocMJ's 5-year averages method, Sheed slotted in just behind Nash and ahead of both Kidd and Paul). The other career considerations (e.g. attitude, line between focal point and excellent role player, etc.) do exist.

However, when compared to a player like Pierce that didn't really have a truly elite peak and had a candidacy built primarily upon being very good across the board with good longevity and no real weaknesses...but that I didn't think was as good as prime Sheed even live action, and the RAPM scores support that Sheed was having a very clearly larger impact, AND Sheed also had very good longevity, and exhibited good portability by thriving in different roles on different teams...for me, at this point Sheed seems pretty clearly like he should be ahead of Pierce.

Bringing it back to the question, I don't think that Grant or Williams showed the ability to be a featured offensive player like Sheed and I don't have as much evidence that they were as good on defense. But I'm also open to that line of thought, and if it can be supported that Grant and Williams WERE dominant defenders that were huge different makers I wouldn't have any problem with seeing them in a better vein than they are currently mentioned.