ESPN Top 100 list

[ehh]

RealGM's list isn't half bad outside of KG being rated way too high at #12.

[ojandpizza]

Most are pretty solid, they all have basically the same groups just a few spots difference.

KG is a difficult rank to me. For one he didn’t play on enough really good teams to give a large enough sample size of playoff production to compare. But at the same time a lot of guys we would put ahead of him never took any bad teams to the levels he did either. It’s tough to know what situationally he could have been if he and Duncan switched shoes for example. But we do know from a small sample size that the one time he had a chance to play on a top level team (pre injury) he took them all the way.

It’s a hard pick. His biggest flaw to me is that he didn’t really have the strength to get inside and finish easy. More finesse offensively which hurt his production a tad in the playoffs. Though small sample size, and relatively weak supporting casts.

I consider Duncan superior to him, but it’s also hard for me to listen to people who would call Duncan a top 5 player and turn around and say KG is 20 something. There definitely wasn’t that large of a gap between the two, and I would take KG over Karl Malone 10/10 times.

Peak vs career comes into play here big for him too. Excellent peak level player with a not so elite career.. but still some of that goes back to what he had to work with.


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[AlexBrady]

Kevin Garnett was unreliable in the clutch and was certain to miss open jumpers, free throws, botch rebounds, and pass to no one.

Besides his turnaround jumper from the left box his scoring was highly erratic. He was a very active team defender but struggled when maneuvered into iso situations against power players.

Boston won a title in 08 mostly because Paul Pierce and Ray Allen were legitimate Hall of Famers.

Tim Duncan was a player who demanded a double team because of the pressure he could put on the rim with his dreadnaught arsenal of pivot moves. This situation, in turn, increased the effectiveness of his teammates. Compare that to Garnett who took most of his shots fading away from the basket. Teams had zero qualms about playing KG straight up knowing he couldn't win the game by himself.

Seems to me that guys like Chauncey Billups (who became a go-to scorer on a title team shortly after his Minnesota stint), Sam Cassell (a vaunted clutch guy and past champion with Houston), Trenton Hassell (a mirror image of Bruce Bowen), Wally Szczerbiak (a Stephen Jackson type), and Latrell Sprewell (over the hill but still a capable two-way player) were plenty good enough to take to a Championship round.

A great big man is supposed to be able to take over the endgame and carry his teammates to victory. Hakeem Olajuwon and Tim Duncan were willing and able to do this.

Karl Malone was prodigiously strong. A truly great rebounder and he thrived in screen/roll set ups. Not as lively a body as Garnett but he could establish pivotal position more consistently and bang to the middle for his jump hook. He was equally as undependable as KG in the last 10 minutes of a game. Neither man would crack my greatest 50 list.

[ehh]

I have KG in the Patrick Ewing tier. KG earned more accolades (and had the good fortune of staying healthy for a longer period) but I think they were similar players in terms of their greatness and limitations. Neither was a truly dominant force throughout their career and there were always a handful of better players in the league. Both had issues in the clutch. They were great, just not quite great enough.

I've long felt that KG is the primo Second Banana. A great, versatile defender but his offense was a bit too limited and unreliable in key moments to be a Top 20 player of all time. I rank guys like Barkley, Malone, West, Dr. J, and the Big O over him without hesitation. Even someone like Dirk gets a higher nod in my book--though KG was a much better two-way player--what Dirk did in the 2011 Finals was so legendary. He gets huge legacy points for that. I do think there's a big gap between him and Duncan, even if that gets OJ's goat.

I'm not as insane as AB to say neither Malone or KG are in my Top 50 though.

[dubcity]

Funny, I've always rated that Boston team KG >PP>RA, in terms of importance. Mostly because the hype for Paul Pierce annoys me. But they are all overrated to a degree. But that's what happens when you win a ring in Boston.

[AlexBrady]

Quote: Originally Posted by dubcity

Funny, I've always rated that Boston team KG >PP>RA, in terms of importance. Mostly because the hype for Paul Pierce annoys me. But they are all overrated to a degree. But that's what happens when you win a ring in Boston.

Pierce was the number one option in the clutch on the Boston team. Those clear-outs at the foul line extended was Boston's money play.

Garnett keyed the defense rotating to seal up driving lanes and swallowing screen/rolls with his length. They ran screen/rolls to get switches to get KG matched up against smaller guys and then having him dive into the low post.

The key to the offense though was Ray Allen's ability to plug long balls. This kept the defense spread and prohibited defenses from clustering around Pierce and KG. Like Pierce, Allen was a deadly clutch player.

[ehh]

I agree with the KG>PP>RA order but the difference was slim. They were a three-headed monster.

[ojandpizza]

KG's offense was limited because he couldn't hold his deep post position. Pushed well off the ideal spots to catch the ball and led to lots of fade-a-way jumpers which kept him from getting to the rim or drawing many fouls. He also lacked the blow by speed and strength to have a face and go game like Amar'e or Blake type.

Otherwise he was very good and underrated for how versatile his offensive ability was. He is one of the best passing bigs to ever play. Drive and kicks, passes out of the post, passes from the high post, good 2nd passes after catching on the roll. For his era there wasn't really a "big" that passed like him. Webber was a great passer from a stand still, but lacked KG's ability to draw defenders and make drive and kick reads. His versatility allowed him to play SF/PF/C, he could handle the ball well for a guy his size, ran the floor well, set screens well, could hit mid-range jumpers, just wasn't great down on the blocks. That same ability is in large part what allowed Boston to fit together so effortlessly. And if you were to compare that to some other "all time" greats his strengths would likely fit in more scenarios than many.

Defensively he covered more ground than just about anyone in his time. He and Duncan were both elite defenders, Duncan's advantage was holding ground on the post, Garnett's advantage being his ability to cover more ground and switch on to most positions. I mean early in his career he defended the teams better players even if they were SGs.

I feel like KG was a better player than Dirk at his best, but Dirk did have a better career. And depending on how much value you give his 2011 performance that could be a big deciding factor.

KG was Bostons most important player by just about every measure. Their defense jumped to one of the best all time during that run, something no Ray Allen or Paul Pierce team ever sniffed without him. Pierce was obviously the guy you wanted to play on the isolation attempts, and Ray Allen did spread the floor, but KG was just as efficient as them, and passing/screens set up a lot for them. His offense ranked just as high as Pierce's, much better defensively, and topped the team in PER, VORP, BPM, and WS. Once he was injured that team was never the same again despite what they got from Pierce/Allen. They had a chance to get it done with those two being "legit HOFs" and weren't able to yet were right back in the finals again the ext year with a post-injury KG back in the mix.

Not coming up huge in the clutch or playoffs can be a thing, but I have a hard time deciding how much to knock him given his circumstances. When he was coming into his own the team itself was falling apart. They played at a good level early and Googs got hurt, they were stripped of 3 first round picks because of the Joe Smith ordeal, traded Marbury for Brandon who was basically forced into early retirement for his knees. Wally was injured for 3-4 straight years on and off and failed to stay on the floor. They couldn't afford to keep Billups (and comparing him at that stage to the Pistons version is completely unfair, he hadn't even taken over a full season as a starter yet and when he did played well enough to price himself out), Malik Sealy died, etc.. Despite all of that those Peeler, Hudson, Szerbiak teams were hovering around 50 wins a year because of what all KG could do well. Box score machine who (like LeBron) even at his faults covers more weaknesses than what just about anyone else in the league can.

They finally added Cassell and he's the only All-Star to pair up with him in that stretch, they pushed a Flip Saunders team into a good defensive unit which isn't common with his squads. The one year they had with a healthy Cassell and Sprewell they pushed the Lakers to 6 games, which shouldn't really be looked at as a failure.

Garnett not having elite level scoring ability is a real thing. But it's still overlooks other parts of his game. His overall abilities would line him up more-so with a player like Robinson than a player like Ewing IMO. And again the question here would be if Garnett was deferring some of the responsibility to guys like Parker, Manu, Robinson, Jackson ,Kawhi, etc would we hold it against him as much as we do that fact that he couldn't do it himself? Because Duncan had plenty of moments of also not being an elite scorer, neither ever to the level of someone like peak Dirk for comparison. But he won and wasn't forced into isolated "failures" like KG was. I feel like people focus on "he wasn't a great scorer" and "first round exits" and he gets belittled a bit while some of his strengths are overlooked.

I think KG is somewhere between the 15-25 mark. But I can understand people who put him higher because it really depends on what you're looking at. Realistically if his scoring abilities were a level higher he would likely be a top 10 player just like Duncan is. So a big part of his value determines more so on not how you value his strengths, but how much do you detract from him for his shortcomings. And also, how much to you penalize others for the same instances? For example, Malone has an even bigger regular season to playoff fall-off than KG, the same clutch deficiencies, it's just his teams were consistency good enough to have so many deep runs. KG overall defended better, rebounded better, passed better..