duncan would not have 4 championships if he got drafted by the clippers or celtics instead of the spurs. you grossly underestimate playing for a first class franchise, coach, and multiple all star caliber teammates basically his entire career. After sampson went down, dream was basically by himself and mind you playing in the defensive era of the 90s. dream is greater without question. dream is a 2x DPOY. duncan zero. dream is a 2x rebounding champ. duncan zero. dream is 3x blocks champ. duncan zero. when dream retired he was like top 10 in points, block, rebounds, and steals!!! he's still top 10 in total steals as a center!!!!! dream has 1 quadruple double game (should be 2). dream has the most 5x5 games (at least 5 points, blocks, rebounds, assists, and steals) in nba history. Dream >>>>>>>>>>>> Duncan Dream was more dominant, more athletic, more versatile, more artistic than duncan. His playoff per game number are better. duncan's highest point per game in a season was 25 ppg. dream surpassed that number several times. and their level of competition was crap compared to dream and shaqs. stop mythologizing the past in order to preserve history. they played in a undeveloped, unrefined league, and the weakest era talent, skill, and size wise in the history of the nba. there is no denying that. they dribbled with one hand for chriss sake. & babe ruth? that fat ass wouldnt crack triple a if you magically transported him in his prime to todays mlb. he didnt play with black people or international competition. would you crown a basketball player the greatest if he never played against black players? get freaking real.
I sort of find this comparison to be apples to oranges being that Duncan has been playing the 4 for his entire career. Granted, Olajuwon was not your traditional center as he's always been a sort of in between 4/5 who used his quickness to dominate the slower 5, he still played the majority of his career at 5. I hate to compare eras because I truly believe that the best era is always the current era. Technology in fitness is always improving and the current athletes are always more athletic than that of even 5-10 years before. That said, one argument that can be made for Duncan is that he beat the best in his era and won 4 titles along the way. What I mean is that the Spurs won 2 of their titles in an era with a Lakers team that included Shaq and Kobe. The Rockets with Olajuwon won their 2 rings with Michael Jordan suspended for a couple years...I mean temporarily retired. You can argue the supporting cast was better for Duncan or that his competition was weaker, but the fact is that Tim Duncan has 4 championship rings that the Spurs would not have if he was not on the team speaks loudly. I think a better comparison would be between Akeem Olajuwon and David Robinson in which case I would give Olajuwon the slight edge. And Robinson never won a ring without Tim Duncan either.
Shaq was dominated by Olajuwon and Robinson when he was younger, but it was his Laker years under Phil Jackson where he learned to hone in his game and reach his prime. I would take Shaq in his prime over any center ever.
Ginobli and Parker > Horry and Kenny smith. Both G and P are future hall of famers, one nearly a MVP and Duncan has had the benefit to play with them his whole career. Kenny/Ellie was serviceable but didn't create and set up olajuwon like Tony p. does for Duncan routinely. While Robert Horry could shoot, so can Ginobli and take you off the dribble or finish you with the sweet euro we see from Harden. Duncan is super heady, highly skilled, and very consistent but there's no way he'd be able to stop Hakeem back in the day. Hakeem also was a MONSTER on defense, good luck with that timmy.
I would have to agree. Duncan made his team mates better, not the other way around. Good point the Spurs never had an outside big time free agent to help. With the advance of medicine, training methods, huge money the league offers to its players, the professional help the players can afford, one would natually come to a conclusion that today's players are better than the ones of 60s, and 70s.
I agree - but I think we're on opposing sides of the coin here. I watched Duncan pull himself out of games in college when he was on the verge of triple doubles because the game was in the bag. I have watched Duncan defer when there's a better shot for a teammate even if it's not going to lead to an assist. I have seen Duncan put so much more energy into sealing off his man (and at times another) to allow his teammates to rebound the ball. I will never look at Duncan's "stats" alone and say that defines the player; he's way too lacking of self for them to complete the picture. If he's had a uber team around him, give him credit for being a superstar that only makes guys around him look better. If the Spurs have a great coach and you want to make it out that he was so before Duncan, good luck with that - he had one Bobcat-like NBA head coaching season w/out Duncan and has said many times that when Tim retires, so will he. Ergo, folks talk the success of the "system" of Popovich but if that system yields 70% winning percentage and the only other constant to that record is one Tim Duncan, you might want to revisit who is the chicken and who is the egg here. Recall, Tim didn't just work his way to being great for the Spurs, he won every ROTM, ROTY, All-NBA First Team and even garnered some POTMs all in that rookie year. Had Tim not had the flu during his senior year NCAA Tourney run, he might have gotten Wake Forest back to the Final Four for the first time in then some 32 years. Is he a better "player" than Dream? No, he's not. Olajuwon was as graceful and amazing to watch as anyone to play the game. And as someone that loves to watch amazing footwork on the soccer field, it's even more amazing to watch it w/ squeaks from shoes of a near seven footer. But sometimes these arguments need to be stuffed back in the can - for every bit as great a player Hakeem was, Duncan has redefined selfless and fundamental basketball. In an era where everything is "show," Duncan is business and if I could ask for only one guy to build my coaching resume or my team around, there is no easier #1 pick than Tim.
Your post its just speculation. You dont know what duncan would have won if drafted by another franchise. You just got to look at what he did. Second listing some random stuff hakeem won and duncan didnt dosent prove anything. Duncan have : 2 regular season mvp > 1 dream 3 finals mvp > 2 dream Duncan got 13 consecutive trips to all nba and all nba defensive teams, dream only got 12 all nba team in his hole career. Duncan also is the all time leader on playoff blocks. What that this prove? Nothing, its just some random stuff. Dream was probably better player, but its closer than a lot of people care to admit. And of course Guys from the sexties would get destroyed on todays game. Hell i even think jj redick may have dominated the 70s liek jerry west did. But u cant compare like that, in fact why would you? This guys played to their lvl of competition and dominated their lvl and their eras. They should be compared to their peers and not to guys that play now. I actually feel russell on today nba would get dominated by almost any center in the league.
Duncan played the vast majority of his career classified as a power forward but I guess you can still argue which you would rather have, and I think you can't really go wrong with either one. I think Dream wins a one on one competition every time, but it isn't a one on one game they are playing and Duncan is argueably the better passer and more willing and able to actually run different plays, which Matt Bullard has said several times, Dream just wasn't willing to do. For example, Bullard said they would try to run different defenses like have Dream come up and show on a pick and role, and Dream just wouldn't do it, he had it set in his mind that he was going to stay back and protect the paint and there was no way to convince him otherwise. So the offenses and defensive sets that they could run were limited by what Dream was willing to do. I would take Dream as a Rockets fan, but I can certainly see why a Spurs fan would go with Duncan. As for modern atheletes being better than those from the 70's and earlier, I tend to agree, but you can't just take a modern athelete and assume he is going to have the same training and tools he does now if he were to go back to that era, and likewise if one of those players was to play now he would have more access to better weight training, sports medicine, and film study, along with probably starting to play basketball at a much younger age against better competition. Even the film study just from the 90's to now is incredibly more accessible for young players. As a kid in the 90's, if you wanted to learn how a player did a move back then you had to have been lucky enough to record the move on vcr, and then rewind it over and over again with typically no slow motion or very crappy slow motion. Now you can catch every high light move from every player along with tons of instructional videos on youtube and other sites and it is incredibly easy to slow motion or edit the videos. Now think back to the pre-80s and most NBA games weren't even on TV for the kids to watch and learn from.
it wasn't as bad as people make it out to be, it certainly wasn't like what he did to ewing and robinson, shaq was incredibly athletic as well as a giant when he was younger. Was it the only time Shaq was beaten by his man in a playoff series? yes, was it by that much? no not really.
I agree with this, thats why u cant really compare players from different eras. Different tools, different training, different rules, different game. You can only guess and check their game against their competition.
This is a pointless thread, there is no comparison on an individual level, we know Hakeem is one of the most underrated superstars of all time. I think Jordan and Joe Dumars would consider him one of the top 5 individual players of all time. Duncan has had a more accomplished team career because he has been in a much better situation all his career. He's played with Parker and Ginobli for most of his career and also 5 years with David Robinson. He has also had the same coach his whole career and for the most part inferior big men talent in the league. Plus no Michael Jordan, Bird, or Magic to compete with. I think a better question is Karl Malone vs Tim Duncan. Many people write Malone off in this debate because of no championships. But he was going up against the Lakers, Blazers, Rockets, and Bulls not the 99 Ewingless Knicks, 03 Nets, and the 07 Cavs.These were much more superior teams. Statistically Malone has Duncan beat in ever category other than rebounds and block shots. Pts, Assists, FG%, Stls, and Ft% Also the best front line team Duncan ever face were the 05 Pistons. His numbers are not so hot in that series especially Fg% Today's media also has alot more hype with everything. When Kobe was peaking, the comparisons with MJ were going crazy justifying equality. Today since he is starting to fade, there are no comparisons.
lol wut do those number prove? THAT DREAM WAS BETTER!!!! LMFAAOO what else could it be? Do you consider steve nash better than shaq, kobe, and dream? he has more mvps than them. MVP awards have become politicized and plenty of times incorrectly awarded to the wrong players. Same thing with first team nba designations. Just see this year the DPOY not getting first team defense. And who you play for has a lot to do with first team defense. This goes back to Duncan's luck of playing for a great coach, franchise, and always having all star caliber teammates around him his entire career. Notice how my evidence of Dream being better were all individual statistics accrued by the talent and brilliance of the player while your evidence of duncan being better where all AWARDS subjectively handed out by media? please GTFO with your piss poor dishonest reach and rationalization of why duncan was better than dream. HE IS NOT.
that's the point of the argument. if you give old athletes the point of having the same modern advantages wtf is the point of arguing? you have your cake and you ate it too. that's why modern athletes are better than athletes of the early 60s. modern athletes have the advantage of having all the players knowledge and techniques who came before him. the modern athlete can learn from them but bill russell and wilt had nobody to learn from. that is the argument. you cant have it both ways. If you magically transported shaq and dream to any time period in the nba their greatness and talent would translate over. The same cant be said for wilt, russell, and the one handed dribblers.
In a 1on1 match Hakeem would wipe the floor with Duncan just like he did with David Robinson. Actually I think D-Rob was more athletic and better defensively then Duncan so it would be even easier for Hakeem.
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Let me tell one more stat you probably dont remember, and its not subjectively handed out by the media. Rings: 4 to duncan dream : 2 And i know u probably dont know how to read, coz if u take the time to at least read my post, u will c i already said dream was better than duncan. Its just that i dont feel he is just that much better as some guys here think. And to the guy who said that robinson was a better defender, i dont think anybody could really guard dream alone, but duncan had a better chance than robinson, since hes got better defensive fundaments, and he wont jump on every fake.
I don't think he would wipe the floor with Duncan, but the odds are, they likely wouldn't match up against each other. Duncan would likely match up with Otis Thorpe if the teams time warped for a fantasy matchup. David Robinson would cover Hakeem, but if it were this years team, it would be Tiaggo Splitter.
