You don't think Bark's troubles late in his career had more to do with his body breaking down (and a cheating bearhug of a moving pick) than with not having KJ on the team? Barkley won the MVP in '93 coming off of his Dream Team MVP year. It was pretty much the only year in his career that he came into training camp in midseason shape. I find it hard to give KJ credit for his performance. He actually had better individual seasons in Philly, but less team sucess because they just didn't have the amount of talent the Suns had. With a better fit though (say replacing KJ with Stockton), the Suns may have won a title.
Moniker, you can't have it both ways, you argue that Barkley had his best individual years in Philly, and team success in Pheonix, but that he could have had even more success in Pheonix with a different PG. I agree that KJ was a terrible three point shooter, but Pheonix had others, Ainge, Marley, and I think Chambers, that made up for KJ's shortcomings from three range. I"m not saying KJ was responsible for Barkley's success, as you wrote he finally came into a season in the best shape possible for him, I'm just saying that a three point shooting pg wouldn't have made that much difference. They had a great season and the only things that kept Barkley from winning rings was Michael Jordan and Hakeem.
They wouldn't have won. They couldn't defend the SG/ spot, of the center position. They were knocked out by the Bulls (Jordan) and Rockets (Dream and Clyde). KJ was putting up 40 and 10 on us. Don't blame him....
Happened to KJ and Rod Strickland. I don't remember the Starks one on a layup. I remember Dream guarding Starks on the perimeter and blocking his 3-pointer.
He's probably the best non dunkin' finishers I've EVER seen. With the exception of a couple of highlight dunks, he hardly ever dunks when he takes it in traffic. He just has that knack when he attacks the basket to use his body to shield off the bigmen and finish it with either hand. Just an unbelivable penetrator/finisher.
That's funny Kam. Here's another question, who had a better career among underappreciated pg's, Kevin Johnson, or Tim "I got skillz" Hardaway. Very similar numbers although Hardaway wasn't the shooter KJ was 20 and in but was a better shooter 20 and out.
i wouldn't say Hardaway was a BETTER shooter from the perimeter. The dude was pretty good in his GS days from outside, but in miami, he was even more of a volume shooter. If you shoot 13 3s a game, you're bound to hit at least 3
If he could have stayed healthy his entire career, i believe he would've been a hall of famer. He was deadly off the dribble, and then developed a killer mid range jumper. I remember him just torching the rockets cause no matter how they defended him he was always got in the lane, and when they played back, he would just nail jumpers at the top of the key.
just looking up some other scoring pg seasons, In 1973, Nate "Tiny" Archibald went for 34 and 11 every night in the NBA. That's just sick.
choujie, I love that first quote, I normally wouldn't agree with a mother coming out to protect her grown son like that but she hit the nail on the head about Barkley's off the court popularity.
