ElPeregrino wrote:Nobody will talk about the importance of defense more than me but even with Ray's defense, he is a first ballot Hall of Famer. He's the only Hall of Famer in Bucks history to spend more seasons with Milwaukee than any other team.
Ray was a perennial back-up all-star and a consistent scorer for many years in the league. Guys like that will always make the hall of fame, as they probably should. But he had a lot of really good years after the Bucks, and a lot of pretty unimpressive years with them. I clearly said I care more about a player's peak and his time with the Bucks, and I refuse to devalue defense the way these awards so often do. It's ridiculous how backwards the basketball mainstream still is with regard to that.
Sid was a 2-time DPOY and a very effective offensive player in his era as well. He was basically the Gary Payton of the 80's. You're talking about a guy who was just one tier below the perennial MVP candidates. Ray was never that, and with the Bucks he played his worst defense while being a bit of a ball-hog and forcing shots and bickering over touches. He couldn't dribble and didn't have very much play-making ability, but he would still spend possessions dribbling around trying to make something happen and taking the offense completely out of its rhythm. He got better at playing team ball after he left.
The Bucks were well under .500 in his time there. People have Ray, Sam, and Big Dog all over their all-Bucks squads, but even when those 3 were together, the Bucks were roughly .500 in an extremely weak conference. They advanced in the playoffs once, in possibly the East's worst year. They were the poster boys for a team that's much better on paper than on the court because it's built around overrated scorers who don't play any defense and don't have much play-making ability to make others on the team better.
Sid and Marques were total studs. There's a pretty significant chasm between their impact and Ray's. They didn't have the hall-of-fame longevity Ray did, but they both spent more time with the Bucks and were much better players for them.
Wut we've got here is... faaailure... to communakate.