The assister or the scorer who is the better player?

Wrong forum? Or maybe by player you meant "playa", and by scoring do you meant ... you know.

 

It might have to depend on the sport.

I would think you could still possibly win a game with just the scorer/finisher. The setup guy won't get very far if he doesn't have the players to finish.

 

It depends on the degree of difficulty on the scorer's shot. The tougher the shot, the more importance the scorer has.

 

In general, I would attach more importance to a PG than a SG/SF in NBA offenses. I'll take John Stockton over Dominique Wilkins, for example.

Don't know about the other sports.

 

You can't be a good assister in the NBA without being a decent scorer. This is what separates TJ Ford and Steve Nash.

 

It seems like dominant wings usually trump dominant PGs when teams face off. In other words, if Team A has the best PG in the league and Team B has the best SG/SF and all else is roughly equal, I would expect the team with the dominant wing to win.

I have no idea if I'm correct but that is my sense. I wonder how much of that has to do with the fact that PGs are almost always the smallest individual on the court. No matter how gifted they are, they are faced with a fundamental physical disadvantage. If you need a basket late in a tight game, a wing who can isolate and create his own shot has more value than the smallest guy on the court.

I've always felt that a dominant wing + a dominant big is the ideal combination to build around.

There are obviously exceptions like Parker and Duncan but I would argue that Parker is more of a scoring guard who just happens to be such an exceptional finisher around the basket that he is able to compensate for his relative lack of size.

Edit: I also wanted to add that dominant wings typically (not always) have some level of PG skills while even the best PGs rarely possess the scoring ability of dominant wings. Combine this with the natural physical advantages and I would say that the best wing player in the game will usually be more valuable than the best PG in the game.

 

Does Chris Duhon have more value than Nate Robinson?

 

To answer the OP's question, I would say you need both but a good assister can get more out of lesser surrounding talent.

At the same time, to be the best of the best, you need an elite finisher/closer as much as anything else.

 

Neither one of them are more than role players on a crappy team, so to answer your question, neither have much value..

 

The better player is this better player. Catch my drift? Marc Jackson was not better than Reggie Miller but Magic Johnson was better than an aging Kareem. So ya. The better player is the better player.

 

Other than maybe Oscar and Magic in their primes, I would probably take the most dominant wing or big over the best PG at any given point in time in league history.

Even with Oscar and Magic, there are probably some strong alternatives if you had to pick one player. I'd take Jordan over Magic, for example.

Look at today... who would you rather have, Chris Paul or LeBron James? Deron Williams or Kobe Bryant?

 

I'd take Kobe Bryant over John Stockton. The Lakers won the championship last season with no player averaging 5 assists per game (Kobe led with 4.9). Tony Parker has led the Spurs in assists for 7 straight years. In that time frame they won 3 championships. Is anyone going to argue that TP isn't more of a scorer than anything else? In the last 18-19 years, only 2 teams have won championships with "traditional" "pass-first" PGs (Pistons/Billups, Celts/Rondo). But nearly every team had an elite "go to" scorer carrying the water.

Does this clearly prove elite scorers are more important than elite assist guys? When it comes to championships, does this prove that guys who can score when the going gets tough in the playoffs are more valuable on offense than anything else?

The question is too hypothetical for me because there are too many other variables. Name some specific players within a sport (especially the NBA ) and we can go from there.

 

Even with the recent rule changes on the perimeter, I would still lean toward the dominant wing, who is obviously also a perimeter player benefiting from the new rules.

 

One of his sons can assist to his brother so he can score.

 

I think DD is confusing leadership and team chemistry with having an "assist master". They are not equivalent.

 

You've got the right idea but I'd substitute Brevin Knight for TJ Ford. Ford is actually a decent scorer.

 

DD said scorers that don't set up teammates versus passers that don't do a lot of scoring. Kobe Bryant would qualify as a scorer who doesn't set up teammates, and Tony Parker doesn't qualify as a passer who doesn't do a lot of scoring.

Who do you like more for an offense: Mark Jackson or Kevin Durant?

 

Why does the assister get to score some and the scorer never sets up his teammates? To be fair, shouldn't you say the scorer sets up his teammates sometimes? Or the assister never scores.