With an alarming number of votes for Stockton coming in, I guess it's time to unveil the case for Isiah Lord Thomas
10 Reasons number #11 comes before #12 and #13 (and #3)...
#1 He’s a true superstar and franchise player in a way that John Stockton, Steve Nash and Chris Paul are not. "God placed his hand on Isiah and said, 'You shall play basketball, and you shall play it great " -Rory Sparrow
He transformed the Pistons franchise from doormat, having won just one playoff series since 1962, to one of the NBA’s elite franchises of the 1980’s and still a largely respected franchise today. In his first game he scored 31 points and dished out 11 assists as the Pistons beat the Bucks who’d go on to win 55 games. Detroit jumped from 22 to 39 wins in Isiah's rookie year. The next year, he made the All-NBA team at just 21 years old. By his third season the Pistons won 49 games, second most in franchise history and went to the playoffs for the first of what would be a franchise record nine year postseason streak led by Zeke. Additionally the Pistons attendance went from last in the league the year before he arrived, to 14th to 9th to 1st by the time he was old enough to drink. In 1989, they opened a new arena, the Palace of Auburn Hills, that season they led the NBA in attendance for the fifth consecutive year and became the first team to draw over 1 million fans (postseason included) three years in a row. They went from playing in a football stadium and 228,000 fans a year to setting records for attendance in a state of the art arena that was still considered among the best as it closed it doors this season.. Isiah did what superstars do, he transformed the culture and made Detroit a basketball city.
“Internally, we call the Palace the house that Isiah built. Simply put, Isiah Thomas was the difference maker and the key to the franchise’s success.” - Tom Wilson, long-time Pistons president and CEO.
#2: He has a winners resume only matched by (some) others almost universally in the top 20“After a bad stretch, Isiah called a team meeting, something unheard for a rookie to do and said, ‘I didn’t come here to lose, I came out here to win, and if you don’t want to win, then don’t play,’ ” Greg Kelser said.
“He’s 20 and he’s calling out everybody. From that day forward, it was Isiah’s team.” A winner of the highest order at every level. He took his team to the State Finals in High School, Won a Championship at Indiana as the best player and won two NBA titles as the team's best player. The Pistons and Thomas have as good of a case as any for being robbed of a title in 1988. Literally one obviously bad call not made and the Pistons odds of winning the game go over 95%. That doesn’t account for the injury Thomas suffered which affected him severely in the fourth quarter of game six and made him all but useless in game seven. But he doesn’t need that third ring to separate himself from the pack quite distinctly.
Here’s the list of players with multiple Championships as their team's best player taking into account the general variance of popular opinion.
Two or More for Sure:
Russell, Jordan, Mikan, Magic, Bird, Shaq, Kareem, Duncan, Kobe, Hakeem, LeBron, Isiah
Two or more in my opinion:
Wilt, Frazier, Doctor J (ABA), Mel Daniels (ABA)
Could be debated two or more:
Havlicek, Cowens, Curry, Reed? (I can’t see it anymore, but who knows)
Now you can talk about how basketball is a team game, and it is. And you can mention that the Pistons were a deep team, and they were. You can talk about all the good fortune that usually follows players and teams and win titles and that’s true also. But look at that list. Aside from Isiah (and Mikan), everyone on that top line was ranked inside the top eleven. That is too striking a correlation to ignore. We ranked the top 11 players based on our own criteria and what we came up with is a list of 10 of the 12 guys to unquestionably win two titles as their teams best player and another that has the strongest case for being the best on two Champions in Wilt. We excluded Mikan (due to era almost exclusively) and Isiah, because…
And mind you, I am not arguing for Isiah to be #12 or #13 all-time. Not even #21. I have him at #28, moves between #23 and #31 these days for me. But he was and still is a different level of player than Stockton or Nash or Paul were. That’s my argument here, if you’re going to vote for Stockton, you have to vote for the guy who was better than him first. The guy who achieved greater things and was held in higher regard by his peers and the honest media that was carry a personal bias. (more on that...right now)
#3 - He made five all-NBA teams, but it should have been eight and he belonged on the Dream Team“Had Isiah not been so unpopular among other players and committee members he’d have been on the Dream and Stockton would’ve been left out. That’s just a fact.” - Jack McCallum
From 1983 to 1987, Isiah was an all-NBA player every season. He was first team in 1985 and 1986, then rightfully surpassed in 1987 by Michael Jordan, joining Magic on the first team. From 1983 to 1987 the Pistons were not a title contending team. The media acknowledged that Isiah was a superstar talent, the NBA made a now legendary promotional video called Superstars and there he was alongside Magic, Bird, Doctor J, Barkley, Hakeem and Dominique. But at the end of the day Isiah couldn’t join the elite until his team won a title. Isiah took that to heart, there are several interviews with him, in-game pieces where he addresses wanting the title, the process of getting there and the lessons he had to learn along the way. So Isiah changes his game for the 1987-88 season. His scoring and assist numbers drop below 20 and 10 for the first time since the 1983 season. He adopts a philosophy for his role which he describes as follows:
1st Quarter: Get everyone involved
2nd Quarter: Feed the hot hand
3rd Quarter: Look for my shot, take advantage of opportunities
4th Quarter: Winning time, if someone else is hot, feed them, if not, I have to get hot
The outcome was that for the next three seasons Isiah was the best player on the NBA’s best team. He had far and away more significant postseason moments than anyone else and yet, he made zero all-NBA teams. Why? Well, I can’t say for sure, but enough has been written to convince me it was almost solely a vendetta.
In the spring of 1987, following a heartbreaking game seven defeat, Thomas lent credence to teammate Dennis Rodman’s allegations that Bird was overrated because of his race Thomas prefaced his comments by calling Bird “an exceptional talent” but followed it up with “...but I’d have to agree with Rodman. If he was black, he’d be just another good guy.”. Isiah was a notoriously sore loser, he was so competitive, his best quality as a basketball player, his worst, it seems, as a human being off the court. He never handled the fallout well, he wasn’t honest about it, he blamed Dennis indirectly, the media as well. Instead of just admitting it was frustration at Bird beating him and serving up the most humiliating moment of his career in the series turning closing seconds of game five, he deflected. Instead of being the bigger man, Isiah remained as he was on the court, the ultra competitive little man.
The media already disliked Isiah and probably to a large extent, rightfully so. But this got him all but blacklisted from the things they had control of. It was petty, but we know it happens and I think this is one of the clearest examples. The voters traditionally favored the player from the better team if things were relatively equal, especially if the more winning player had a superstar reputation. But not in the case of Isiah from 1988-1990. His coach, teammates and the town that rooted for him, all knew that Isiah was a better player during the title years, again he sacrificed stats a little to win a lot, that’s what the media criticized him for not doing sooner, while they were voting him All-NBA. How else do you explain it?
This wasn’t the end of the anti-Isiah bias either, we all know what happened with the Dream Team now. We know everyone knew he belonged on that team, and also knew, they couldn’t put him on that team. So Isiah, wasn’t the most likable guy, but he was loved by his teammates and the Pistons fans. And more importantly, the love Piston fans had for him was generated by his play on the court. Isiah had a great smile, right? But Adrian Dantley isn’t nearly as incorrect as he is bitter when he calls Isiah a con-man. Isiah was salty and unapproachable while he played, burned bridges with ownership as soon as he retired and his left a Sherman-esque trail of destruction in his wake everywhere he’s gone post-playing career. But yet from 1981-1994, Piston fans loved him, adored him, worshipped him. He made Detroit a basketball city.
"If you went strictly on terms of ability, then Isiah should have been chosen for the Dream Team," - Magic Johnson
#4 & #5 & #6 - Thomas was sensational during the playoffs, especially in big games, especially in the last two rounds, especially in the second half, especially in the fourth quarter, especially in crunch time. Oh and especially when facing elimination too. "Like many other superstars—at least the smart ones—Thomas learned long ago that piling up statistics is less intriguing than chasing or craving what he cannot guarantee. Like winning. By that measure, regardless of what anyone else says, he is an unqualified success." - Johnette Howard, Sport Magazine 1989
Isiah is one of the all-time great postseason crunchtime players and streak scorers. Here’s a list of some of the things he did in the playoffs:
>16 points in 96 seconds to force overtime in game five of the 1984 playoffs vs. the Knicks. (L)
>24 points in third quarter of game three of the 1987 ECSF @Atlanta (W)
>25 second half points, 17 in the third vs. the Hawks in game four of the 1987 ECF @Atlanta
https://youtu.be/9AqmjZHIDLo?t=46m12s>11 points 3 assists in fourth quarter of 1987 ECF Game seven @ Boston (L)
>15 points 3 assists on 4/6 fgs, 2/2 3-pt and 5/5 fts in fourth quarter of 1988 ECF Game one @Boston (W)
>20 points in fourth quarter and 4 points in last 9 seconds of third quarter in 1988 ECF Game 5 @Boston (W)
>25 points, 11 after spraining ankle in third quarter of 1988 NBA Finals Game six @Los Angeles (L)
>17 points in fourth quarter of 1989 ECF Game six @ Chicago, outscored Jordan 15-2 in final 9 mins (W)
>10 points 3 assists in fourth quarter as Pistons come back from down 8 to win game two of the ‘89 Finals. (W)
>16 points 2 assists in fourth quarter of game one of the 1990 Finals leading Detroit back after trailing the entire game. Ten points on 3/3 fgs and 4/4 fts in last 3:45. (W)
>30 second half points, 22 in the third quarter, 8 in the final 3:20 of the fourth on 2/2 fgs and 4/4 fts of game game four of the 1990 NBA Finals @ Portland (W)
The thing that’s most impressive, is that, that reads almost exactly like a list of Detroit's most important playoff games during that era. In fact, using those games and just a few more details, I can walk you through the Pistons run from 1984-1990 and show you how Isiah was essential at literally every crucial step along the way.
The first playoff series in 1984, they were close and they knew for sure Isiah would be clutch. The 1987 Hawks series, winning both games on the road against the team that eliminated them the year before behind Isiah who scores more than 50 second half points in the two games combined. The closeout game in 1987, losing to the Celtics at the garden, but Isiah was clutch in his first game back in Boston since the game five disaster. And he would begin a pattern of being absolutely dominant late in big late round playoff games on the road. What’s more clutch than that?
The Next year, Game one of the 1988 ECF, back in Boston, Isiah dominates the fourth and Detroit wins. Game Five at Boston, series tied at two, Isiah dominates the fourth and Pistons win. Clinch series at home in six. What should have happened in 1987. On to the Finals, he struggles for parts of first five games but Detroit leads 3-2, seeing a chance to take the title, he does just that with 25 point, heroic third quarter. Pistons lose on bad call, he’s not healthy for game seven, they lose. On to 1989, Bulls starting to look like a threat, game six @ Chicago, Isiah closes it out on the road by outscoring MJ 15-2 down the stretch. Gets his team off to great start en route to blowout in game one of the 1989 Finals and closes out game two with 10 points in final 7:30. Pistons go on to sweep depleted Lakers.
Pistons go a combined 16-1 in first two rounds during ‘89 and ‘90 playoffs. In the 1990 ECF Isiah averages 26-6-9 in three road games and goes for 21-8-11 in blowout game seven win at home. Then in the Finals he dominates the fourth quarter, specifically the last six minutes and Detroit comes back after trailing all game to beat Portland. The teams split the next two games, then in game four, at Portland, Isiah goes for 32 points. 2 in the first half, 22 in the third quarter and eight in the final three minutes and change as the Pistons take control of the series and break the Blazers will. That’s why at the end of game five, even though Vinne Johnson just hit the shot a few minutes earlier that won the title, the Pistons flock to Isiah and mob him.
I also want to highlight game two of the 1988 ECF, also at Boston. The Pistons should have won this game, would have if modern review rules were in place and it would only add to Isiah’s legacy. This was the double overtime game, and it is a perfect example of how dependent the Pistons were on Isiah offensively if there wasn’t a hot hand to ride. In the last 6:30 of regulation and all of the both overtimes, Isiah either scorers or assists on every Pistons basket. He is the only Piston to score a field goal in the last six minutes of regulation, scores all seven of the Pistons points in the first regulation and assists on Dumars two buckets in double overtime. His Piston teammates shot a combined 2/10 from the field in the final 18 minutes plus. Isiah also hit a three-pointer with seven seconds left in the first overtime that put Detroit up by three. On the Celtics last play, designed for Bird, the pass was thrown behind Larry and landed in a surprised Kevin McHale’s hands who rushed up a shot not knowing he had a ton of time and hit the second three-pointer of his career. Except, replay showed that his toe was (barely) on the line. It should have been a two, instead, double overtime, Celtics win.
And it wasn’t always just one quarter. From time to time, more often than most more prolific regular season stars, even on the ultra-balanced slow it down Pistons, Isiah did put up superstar stat lines and of course reserved them for crucial games. Take a look:
During the 1987 playoffsRound 1 Game 1 - 34-9-9-4, 15/29 fg 3-5 ft, (W) setting tone for playoffs and series sweep
Round 2 Game 1 - 30-4-10-2, 11/18 fg 6-7 ft, (W), The Hawks eliminated Detroit in 1986.
Round 2 Game 3 - 35-8-8-5, 11/23 fg 12/14 ft (W) @ATL
Round 2 Game 4 - 31-3-3-3, 12/24 fg 6/9 ft (W) @ATL
Round 3 Game 6 - 21-5-9-1, 10/19 fg ⅓ ft (W)
Round 3 Game 7 - 25-4-9-4, 10/28 fg 4/7 ft (L) @BOS
During the 1988 playoffsRound 1 Game 1 - 34-9-3-4, 13/26 fg 8/10 ft (W)
Round 1 Game 5 - 16-6-11-6, 7/16 fg 2/2 ft (W, Isiah does all his damage in first half of blowout to close series)
Round 2 Game 5 - 25-5-9-1, 9/20 fg 7/7 ft (W, closeout series)
Round 3 Game 1 - 35-2-12-1, 12/19 fg 2/3 3-pt, 9/10 ft, (W, @ Boston Garden)
Round 3 Game 5 - 35-8-5-4, 14/20 fg, 7/9 ft, (W, @ Garden to take 3-2 series lead going home)
Finals Game 6 - 43-3-8-6, 18/32 fg, 2/3 3-pt, 5/7 ft, 25 4th quarter points, (L, phantom foul decided game and took Finals from Pistons)
In the 1989 playoffs he closed out the Milwaukee series with a triple-double, closed out Michael and the Bulls with 33 points on the road in game six and averaged 24 and 8 in the first three games of the NBA Finals as the Pistons took control of what would eventually be a sweep.
In the 1990 NBA Finals, Isiah averaged 27 points and 7 assists per game while being NBA Finals MVP. Only Jerry West (‘69, ‘70), Michael Jordan (1991) and LeBron James (5 times) have posted the same numbers.
In the postseason from 1984-1990, over a 93 games sample size, Isiah averaged 22 points, 5 rebounds and 9 assists on 45/35/77 shooting. You’ll also see a significant jump in his advanced stats and especially impact numbers. His PER jumped from 19.4 to 20.9. His WS/per 48 increased from .133 to .161. His BPM goes from 3.4 to more than double that at 7.5 and his VORP adjusted to an 82 game average goes from 4.1 to 7.5. Now even if I don’t think these stats fully demonstrate his value and impact, they clearly show he is turning up his level of play significantly in the postseason. And of course, that game six third quarter in the 1988 Finals is still one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen in the NBA playoffs and one of the seminal moments in NBA Finals history.
Finally, furthering the narrative that Isiah is at his best when he most needs to be. In games facing elimination he elevates his play significantly. Throughout his career, the Pistons faced elimination fourteen times. In those games they have a very solid 7-7 record. Excluding game seven versus the Lakers in 1988 when he was not able to go at full speed, Thomas has averaged 24.2 points, 6.4 rebounds, 10.2 assists and 1.7 steals while shooting .473 from the field (113-239), .333 from three (7-21) and .736 from the line (81-110) in thirteen games. Those games are copy and pasted from a file a have poorly below...
PTS REB AST STL FG 3PT FT Result
1984 RD1 GM 4 22 7 16 1 8-15 0-0 6-7 W
1984 RD1 GM 5 35 3 12 2 13-25 2-3 7-9 L OT
1985 RD2 GM 7 37 12 9 0 12-28 0-2 13-17 L
1986 RD1 GM 3 20 3 11 4 6-10 0-0 8-11 W
1986 RD1 Gm 4 30 10 12 0 13-29 0-0 4-9 L
1987 RD3 Gm 6 21 5 9 1 10-19 0-0 1-3 W
1987 RD3 Gm 7 25 4 9 0 10-18 0-1 5-7 L
1988 RD1 GM 5 16 6 11 5 7-16 0-1 2-2 W
1990 RD3 GM 7 21 8 11 2 7-17 1-3 6-8 W
1991 RD1 GM 5 26 5 11 1 9-15 1-3 7-9 W
1991 RD3 GM 4 16 7 5 2 6-14 0-0 4-6 L
1992 RD1 GM 4 15 3 12 2 5-12 1-1 4-5 W
1992 RD1 GM 5 31 10 6 1 7-20 3-5 14-17 L
24.2 6.4 10.2 1.7 .473 .333 .736 7-6
#7 - Thomas played in an era that was much more difficult for players of his stature than today "If he were six inches taller, we're talking about the greatest player in the history of basketball." - Chuck Daly.
Imagine how much better Isiah Thomas gets with the benefits of:
a) growing up with the three-point line and using it to his full advantage
b) the spacing that is created by having shooters all around you on the floor and only having one post player as opposed to 2-3 in the paint at all times
c) being able to carry the ball and perform modern style hesitation dribbles without being called for a violation
d) Not having larger players be allowed to hand check him to contain him
e) Being past the perception that little guys are never as value as big guys.
I’ll expand on that last one a bit. Isiah got very little MVP attention during his career. But that’s not because he wasn’t worthy, it’s because he was tall enough. Isiah was fond of saying “They pay by the inch in this league” and while that’s part typically salty Zeke, it’s also true, or at least was in his day. From 1958 through the end of Isiah’s career a total of three guards won the MVP. 6’9” Magic Johnson, 6’6” Michael Jordan and 6’5” Oscar Robertson. Of the 19 players 6’4” or shorter who rank above Isiah all-time in MVP shares, only five, West, Cousy, Tiny Archibald, Lenny Wilkens and Dave Bing started their careers before Zeke and only West and Cousy received significant support in more than one season. Isiah has more MVP shares than guys like Walt Frazier and John Havlicek who won titles in the 1970’s as their team's best player but were passed up for MVP consideration in favor of taller teammates Willis Reed and Dave Cowens who usually rank behind Hondo and Clyde on all-time lists.
How different would today’s players games be without that line? Imagine Isiah Thomas in today’s game. He’d be a 40%+ three-point shooter just through repetition. His percentage sunk because he took a lot of shot clock and quarter buzzer beater shots. He made a lot too. That was one of the big draws during his first two seasons, the number of half court shots he hit. (Think it was four his rookie year) Remember that the first time he played a game with a three-point line was in the NBA. Isiah learned to utilize the line as his career went on and by the time his team was playing for Championships, he was using the line to hurl daggers at opponents in the clutch.
He shot 35% from three during the playoffs over 93 prime games averaging 2.2 attempts per game. Before the 1989-90 season he began working on his three-point shot relentlessly, anticipating extending his career when he lost more quickness. He set career highs for makes and attempts and shot over 30%, a rarity in the league at that time. In the playoffs he attempted three and half triples a game and made 47% of them. Thomas was, an inconsistent, but capable three-point shooter in his era. He was one the league's best three-point shooters in a much different NBA in 1982-83, his second season, making the fourth most triples (36) while shooting the second highest percentage (.288), my how far we’ve come. Isiah would have made the trip with us.
But it goes beyond that. Anyone who has coached basketball can tell you how much impact it has both positive and negative, but it’s unquestionably changed the game. In 1987 damn near every half court offense at every level of basketball ran through the post, in 2017, almost none of them do, save the small-town mega mismatches in the prep game. The offense today would be built around Isiah’s strength’s from the time he was ten. And his teammates strengths would have complimented all the things he was by the far the best at in his day. Like creating off the dribble, finding the open man, finishing at the basket against bigger players and creating his own shot or a shot for a teammate from anywhere on the court. Isiah would have been more valued in today’s game then he was then, and then he was considered a half step below the elite, mostly due to his size.
I’ll take it a step further. Isiah was a coachable superstar despite having the requisite ego to be an alpha and the requisite chip on his shoulder to do so at his stature. He was willing and able to adapt his game for the best of the team when asked. The Pistons went from a run and gun team that set the NBA record for combined points in a game with the Denver Nuggets in 1983, to the definitive defensive force of the era and maybe, at that point, in NBA history. Thomas went from having complete freedom to orchestrate everything on offense, to playing off the ball at times to improve the flow of the now half-court reliant Pistons. Put him in a D’Antoni system and what do you think happens? My guess is something along the lines of a James Harden/Steve Nash hybrid the will of a champion and the willingness to step on and over anyone to get there. Perhaps D’Antoni and Isiah would both have the respect they deserve in that case.
#8 - He dominated his all-star point guard contemporaries head-to-head Isiah took these matchups personal and often made a point to demonstrate his superiority. This is the way of the game he was brought up on. He’d be different today, but then this is how things were done. I include Magic Johnson in here, who Isiah did not dominate, but also did not get dominated by. In fact you’ll see that both really brought the best out of one another.
Magic Johnson -
http://bkref.com/tiny/HUUtAMark Price -
http://bkref.com/tiny/q4cNhKevin Johnson -
http://bkref.com/tiny/HISj1Doc Rivers -
http://bkref.com/tiny/cOqssMo Cheeks -
http://bkref.com/tiny/XQtjhAnd most of all for the purpose of this post, John Houston Stockton.
I am going to focus on 1988-1993. This is the end of Isiah’s prime and a few years past it and the beginning of Stockton's prime. This will cover a total of ten games. Starting with the first time they ever matched up as starters and ending with their first meeting after Karl Malone intentionally injured Isiah with one of the dirtiest plays in NBA history.
Meeting #1 1/20/1988 - Pistons win 120-117 @Utah
Thomas - 28 points 12 assists 2 steals 9/15 FG
Stockton - 12 points 11 assists 3 steals 4/10 FG
Edge: Isiah
Meeting #2 3/9/1988 - Pistons win home game 103-98
Thomas - 20 points 8 assists 9/15 FG
Stockton - 25 points 11 assists 8/15 FG
Edge: Even
Meeting #3 3/1/1989 - Pistons win home game 96-85
Thomas - 10 points 6 assists 5/9 FG in 19 minutes
Stockton - 14 points 12 assists 4/10 FG
Edge: Even
Meeting #4: 3/29/1989 - Pistons win 108-104 @ Utah in Double Overtime
Thomas - 25 points 5 rebounds 8 assists 8/18 FG
Stockton - 18 points 12 assists 2 steals 4/10 FG
Edge: Isiah
Meeting #5: 12/15/1989 - Jazz win home game 94-91
Thomas - 18 points 5 rebounds 6 assists 6/17 FG
Stockton - 26 points 4 assists 8/15 FG
Edge: Stockton
Meeting #6: 2/4/1990 - Pistons win home game 115-83
Thomas - 16 points 6 rebounds 8 assists 7/10 FG
Stockton - 6 points 10 assists 4 steals 1/7 FG
Edge: Isiah
Meeting #7 12/05/1990 - Jazz win home game 106-85
Thomas - 21 points 5 rebounds 7 assists 9/20 FG
Stockton - 14 points 18 assists 4 steals 6/11 FG
Edge: Stockton
Meeting #8 11/15/1991 (less than two months after Dream team was announced) - Pistons win home game 123-115
Thomas - 44 points 4 rebounds 4 assists 15/22 FG
Stockton - 20 points 13 assists 6/10 FG
Edge: Isiah
Meeting #9 (one month later) 12/14/1991 - Jazz win home game 102-100
Malone delivers cheap shot in first quarter, Isiah does not return
Edge: None
Meeting #10 (the next time the two team meet) 3/3/1993 - Jazz win @ Detroit 106-98
Thomas - 40 points 6 assists 3 steals 14/29 FG
Stockton - 10 points 12 assists 4/8 FG
Edge: Isiah
Overall - Isiah gets the edge 5-2-1-1 head-to-head and when it became personal he completely dominated Stockton. You can’t tell me or anyone else who watched these games that John was better than Zeke. Including Stockton.
“I was never one to back down, so I always took on the challenge of playing Isiah and he gave it right back at me, no one challenged me more.”-John Stockton on why he chose Isiah Thomas to welcome him into the Hall of Fame
#9 - Isiah was unanimously considered a Superstar by his peers and the media writ large in the era he played and observers of that era largely still hold that view of him. "I used to sit out there and look around at the crowd and say, I hope these people know what they're seeing,' " says Chuck Daly.
" 'I hope they know they will never see this again.' I'm doing that again, watching Isiah: I hope these people understand that they will never see that move again." I certainly understand that with the objective analytical approach you take, this won’t mean much to some of you, but in the era Isiah played, it mattered. We didn’t have advanced stats, but we still knew there were things you couldn’t measure with the stats we had. They were called intangibles then, and now, even though many of them are now tangibly measured but the fantastic resource that is advanced metrics, there are still intangibles. Still things we haven't figured out how to measure or express numerically. And to me, clearly, among the things we still can’t measure, is how much respect Isiah’s game demanded from other great players and what having Isiah meant to a team without other great players.
I’ll start with what on the surface seems rather trivial, but seemed very significant at the time. Isiah Thomas was a stud in all-star games. Today, the NBA All-Star game mostly sucks. Occasionally you get a few great highlights or a couple cool moments, or a close finish, but mostly it’s a half-hearted exhibition. It wasn’t always like that. Until somewhere around the time guys like Larry Johnson started making guest appearances on Family Matters, NBA players wanted to prove themselves in the all-star game. Isiah won the MVP twice, and was a major factor in every game he played, save his rookie year. Players deferred to him, he took the ball, he decided who would get the shots and he usually chose well. He was comfortable assuming a primary role among elite players, and they were comfortable with him doing so. That matters.
I don’t like when people try to change history with a fresh perspective after the fact. I think it’s valuable to look at things in new ways to understand them more fully, but I don’t think you can change the conclusions already drawn about a player. Here is a list of publications that have ranked Thomas all-time over the past 15 years. I’m not saying we always have to defer to them, but I am suggesting that if such a wide range of expert opinions all have Isiah in the same range and all but one have him above Stockton, you need more than some advanced metrics which were not used at the time the players played to make a convincing case to change a near consensus opinion. And remember that it’s only as close as it is because of Stockton’s incredible longevity. In terms of peak play accomplishments, as discussed in point #2, Isiah is in a different stratosphere.
SLAM 75 (2003) - #17
Elliott Kalb: Who's better, who's best (2003) - #25
Simmons Pyramid (2010) - #23
SLAM 500 (2011) - #19
SI Top 50 - (2016) - #29
ESPN Top 50 (2016) - #26
Not wanting to wade to deep in these waters and commit an appeal to authority fallacy, I will leave it with one more thing from Simmons and the Ringer. This is a wonderful piece in it’s entirety, but I cut out the portion that deals with Isiah and Chris Paul specifically, but the historical rankings of point guards briefly as well.
From a Bill Simmons Article, April 2017, entitled “The Last Days of the Point God”
“You know how Russell Westbrook hogs the ball too much? Chris Paul never hogs it enough. He borrows Isiah Thomas’s model of making teammates better for 42 minutes, then taking over the last six. He’s a better, more efficient, more durable version of Thomas — someone I still consider to be the best pure point guard I ever watched.
You can’t fairly compare their numbers since Isiah’s generation never valued 3s; he certainly lacked the training/dieting/video/travel/spacing advantages that Chris enjoys now. But unlike Chris, occasionally Isiah would just GO OFF, like Curry or Kyrie on their hottest nights. What Isiah accomplished in Game 6 of the 1988 Finals ranks among the best playoff performances ever. Chris Paul never could have done it. Why? Because he never would have thought about doing it. The Point God simply isn’t wired that way. It’s his biggest flaw.
Isiah headed into Game 6 thinking, “We’re up 3–2, we’re on the road, they can’t defend me, I can’t let this get to Game 7, I’m going for the jugular.” He finished with 43 points on 18-of-32 shooting — only two 3s! — dished out eight assists and dropped 25 in the third quarter, many of them after badly spraining his ankle. He spent the fourth quarter limping around and persevering, filming a sports movie with a **** ending that absolutely should have been rewritten. The Pistons blew the final minute, then they blew Game 7. But Isiah’s Game 6 lives on.
What pushed Isiah to that desperate place? What pushed him to sob on Dan Patrick’s ESPN show years later while watching the tape? Years of pain. Years of falling short. Years of hearing that the Pistons couldn’t succeed with a puny guard as their best guy. They were one year removed from one of the worst playoff collapses in any sport — Game 5 and Game 7 in Boston — and after anguishing over it for 12 months, Isiah wanted redemption so badly that a swollen ankle couldn’t even stop him.
I believe Chris Paul cares just as much as Isiah did. But if Thomas brought the Clippers into Game 5 — with Griffin gone, with Redick slumping, with a one-in-four chance that Jamal Crawford might get hot, with the CP-Blake-Doc era heading for a precarious end — he would have tossed away the “42 minutes for you, last 6 for me” mantra and owned the game. Isiah would have thrown the Clippers on his back, engaged the crowd, pulled them into it, played off their energy, made everyone believe.
Like Magic and Bird, Thomas understood the balance between performance and art. It wasn’t just about winning or putting up numbers. It was about the way you resonated — with everyone. It was about extracting the best performances from every teammate, challenging their manhood, pushing them, making them believe in themselves (and you, too). Nobody had built an NBA champion around a small guard until those Pistons teams did it twice. And they did it because Thomas grasped every nuance of that position — everything — and performed accordingly.
Chris came so freaking close. Again, he’s a better version of Isiah in almost every way. Better defender. Better shooter. Better on pick-and-rolls. I believe that Chris’s signature move — go left to right, veer to the right of the foul line, hint that you’re driving, then uncork the 15-foot fallaway — doubles as the most unstoppable two-point shot in the history of that position except for Magic’s junior skyhook. It’s certainly deadlier than anything Thomas had.
But I don’t believe Isiah would have squandered Game 5, and here’s why …
38 minutes, 28 points, 9 assists, 2 turnovers, 10–19 FG, 4–4 FT.
That’s a perfectly fine line. Seriously. Kudos to Chris Paul. But if you showed me that line BEFORE Game 5, I would have said four words to you: “The Clippers are done.”
CP3 could retire tomorrow as one of the seven best point guards ever. I would rank them like this …
1. Magic
2. Oscar
3. Cousy
4. Isiah
5. Curry
6. Nash
7. Paul
(With Curry climbing and Frazier, Kidd, Stockton, GP and Russ fighting for the next five spots.#10 - Conclusion: Because he did that ****The entire argument here is as follows:
1) The goal of a superstar player selected early in the draft is to transform the culture of his team lead a group of players that can be assembled around him to a Championship.
2) I Have demonstrated that by reputation and traditionally defining characteristics that Isiah Thomas was a superstar.
3) I have demonstrated that in the most important games and most important moments during the four year stretch that Detroit contended for a title that Isiah Thomas was the player they turned too consistently in the clutch and that he came through very frequently in spectacular fashion.
4) To that effect the Pistons, led by Isiah, won two championships in between three teams that are considered among the greatest in NBA history all led by top 10 players all-time as this project sees it.
5) Isiah Thomas has thus separated himself from players like Stockton, Nash and Paul to such a degree in terms of actual accomplishment that the numbers and the hypothetical potential they represent given the right situation are not enough to justify them being rated higher.
Finally, there is this really beautiful moment at the end of the 1989 Finals. Isiah comes off the court waiting to shoot free throws while the LA crowd is saluting Kareem with seconds to go, the game in hand, and instantly starts to be overcome by the emotion of the moment. He grabs a towel and covers his face as he starts to cry and John Salley goes to him and says in his ear. “You’re the **** man. You made it happen. You hear me? You made this **** happen.” There is no advanced, traditional or impact stat that can measure that. Isiah just made the **** happen. That's what it's all about.
