Look Socrates... Its balance that propels teams over the top. A great defense will always stop a great offense IMO. Defense 1st. How many rings do the Suns have (in this era), how long did it take the Colts to win (until they played defense is the answer), how many rings does Adelman have (0 is the answer). The Spurs had 2 defenders in the top 5 last year.
In my model, Bonzi Wells should be an offenser. Tmac and Yao are special. Yao should be a good/great player (great offense + normal defense). Tmac should be a good/great player (great offense + good defense). .
It is based on observation. All I can see is that he is a great pure defender. You are right, I can't prove it and I may be totally wrong. .
You can always say how good a defender is. But what is a good defender's salary? What is a good offensive player's salary? Why is that? .
Ok if you mean that a good offense will beat a good defense as in the sense that if someone who is just going off and making tough shots is probably going to win even if you are doing everything you an on defense, that makes sense. But if you are saying that in general a good offense is more important than defense, you need to watch more basketball. Look who wins the championships every year, last time I checked Suns had 0 and the Spurs had 4. This is because good defensive teams if they are not able to score at certain points in the game can make sure that the other team can't score either. Whereas a team that relies on their offense to win games will always be playing catch up because when their shots are not falling and they can't stop the other team they will fall behind. Teams like the suns may get away w/ playing catch up during the regular season where the tempo is generally faster. But when you have to play against better teams that can defend in the playoffs, the tempo slows down a lot. So that is where they can't make up for their shots not falling with crazy runs later in the game because the other team will not let them score a lot in bunches. Bottom line. Defense is boring but vital to win. All offense and little defense will sell tickets but will not win championships. This is why Suns will never win. However, you still have to have a good offense to win, whats the point of holding the other team to 40% FG% if you are shooting 33% yourself. So yes a balanced attack is needed. But if you don't have good defense you will not go all the way.
You can't judge how important one is by salary. This is because salary is paid upon how many people that players puts in the seats of the arena. The casual fan does not care about the nuances of rotations and good footwork and defense. They care to see who can make the craziest dunks and score the most. However, a good defender is made by the rest of his team. A good offensive player can do it all by himself. This is why a good offensive player gets paid more. Because if you have Bruce Bowen or Artest on your team, but you have Dirk Nowitzki patrolling the paint instead of Duncan, they are not going to be nearly as effective.
So, do you mean that defenders deserve more than their current salary, and offensive players deserve less than their current salary? At least, I did see it. .
Not necessarily. Cuz casual fans buy the tickets and they pay to see the offensive player so you should pay the offensive player. Also, a defensive player is made by his team so individually he is not as affective as an offensive player is. So yes offensive player should get paid more from a business standpoint and a basketball standpoint. Because a great defensive player w/ 4 defensive scrubs will not be able to limit another team as much as he could w/ 4 avg or good defenders. However, a 25ppg scorer can score that much whether he has 4 scrubs or 4 HOF on his team. So scoring takes more of an individual effort so he should get paid more individually. I was just saying that you can't take the salary of individual players to show the importance of offense vs. defense to a team.
There's nothing to prove. You're lumping everything that a player is responsible for on defense into a single category or "dimension". My question is why you think it makes sense to do this for defense, but not offense. That's the part you haven't really explained. I think you've arbitrarily minimized the importance of defense in your model. I don't see a real rationale behind it.
I did give a new reason: You can always say how good a defender is. But what is a good defender's salary? What is a good offensive player's salary? Why is that? Their salary can tell something. There must be some real good reasons behind it. .
Why do you keep saying this? You seem to imply that good defensive players don't get paid. Shane Battier makes more than Ricky Davis. How much money did Dikembe and Ben Wallace make relative to their peers when it came time for their contracts? Marginal guys like Shandn Andersn and Tariq Abdul-Wahad got their money as well. Do you not remember the abomination that was Kelvin Cato's contract?
I think great individual offense is considered more important than great individual defense. The reason is that on offense, in a lot of sets you're really only involving 2 or 3 players. On defense, the other team controls who's involved. So, a great offensive player has more control over the outcome of an offensive possession, compared to a great defender's impact on getting a stop. That doesn't include dominant shot blockers / intimidators in the middle, who are typically highly valued and get paid quite well. But none of that means defense isn't as important or the skills needed on that end aren't varied. So calling it "one-dimensional" just doesn't make sense to me.
Actually, "one-dimensional" is nothing more than a label, just forget it if you don't like it. The real problem is whether defense is important or not. I think defense is still important, but it isn't as important as offense. If you compare the average salary of good/great defenders' with good/great offensive players', it is clear that defenders' salaries are much lower. Also how many good/great defenders are there? How many good/great offensive players are there? It can tell something as well. All these indicate that offense is more important than defense. .
Please don't use salaries as a reason why offense > defense. Players are paid by how many points they put up regardless of their other attributes (see Rashard Lewis). Rarely is a defensive specialist paid unless they are very good (Ben Wallace, Dikembe Mutombo). And defense is more of a team effort anyways. Besides, some of the best offensive players today have good to great defense like Kobe, T-Mac (when he tries), KG, etc. Also: Spurs = 4 rings Suns = 0 rings
Spurs have a great offense and great defense. Suns have a great offense and poor defense. Lets assume the NBA is a perfect market: defense > offense means that coachs will hire more and more defenders, then the number of defenders > the number of offensive players defense = offense means the number of defenders = the number of offensive players defense < offense means the number of defenders < the number of offensive players Does it make sense? .
No I don't understand what you're saying. If you're implying balance is the best solution, then of course, I'm inclined to agree (as would everyone else here).
I means that, if defense is much more important than offense, coachs/GMs will hire more and more defenders. If offense is much more important than defense, coachs/GMs will hire more and more offensive players. In current NBA, there are much more offensive players than defenders. Which means offense is more important than defense. Spurs is special.
