I disagree. Though his playing career was marred by chronic injuries, he was a beast when he was on the court. He could do everything; pass, shoot, defend, rebound, block shots et al. His passing abilities and court vision were incredible for any player, let alone a center. He isn't overrated.
Bill Walton is the only real challenger to Lew Alcindor as the greatest NCAA player of all time, IMO. Anyone that suggests Walton is overrated probably is just looking at his career totals.
Finn, I'm with you on Walton, but 'Nique definitely deserves a little more respect than you're giving him. You don't score 30 point per game just by dunking the ball. He could score from anywhere on the floor. He didn't have anywhere close to the supporting cast that Jordan and Bird had. Hell, he led a team with Dina Radja, Dee Brown, Sherman Douglas, and Eric Montross to the playoffs...that should count for SOMETHING.
what's the over/under on the number of times BobFinn yells "hey you kids, get off my lawn" everyday? 5.5, 6.5? just because someone, God forbid, thinks someone from today might be as good as the immortals that played back in the day doesn't make them 13 years old. flashy dunks, espn, the media, 16 year olds, don't sound too old or bitter or anything. and to say other people don't know how well-rounded past players are in a post in which you diss kevin garnett, basically Mr. Well-Rounded, is pretty funny and ironic. is this where i say, lemme guess...you are 80 years old? oh, and shouldn't one of the greatest shooters in nba history be able to get the field goal percentage up over 43%?
that's the thing, walton isn't really overrated in terms of his play, but does he belong in the top 50? he played the equivalent of five and a half seasons (468 games) and only played 28 mpg in those games. his prime, if you will, was really only 3 seasons in portland where he averaged 18 ppg, 13.7 rpg, 4.3 apg, and 2.5 bpg. now if you do that for 12 years, then you can be on the top 50 list. but the other seasons were a significant drop from that and then led to 2 years as a bench player. so while he had top 50 talent, you're not a really one of the 50 best ever if you don't actually produce like one of the 50 best ever. it sucks that he was robbed of a career, but just like injuries can hurt hall of fame chances*, they can hurt this, too. *although they better not hurt jeff bagwell's chances b/c he played 14 hall of fame worthy seasons before his shoulder took away the chance to reach some milestones as a declining player, whereas someone like walton missed out on a huge chunk of their prime.
LOL, exactly. they only know about what they see. the logic seems to be "oh, i've never heard of this guy so he needs to go."
As an NBA player only, I think you could easily argue that he was overrated; he had 2-3 very good seasons and that was it.
and i love when over the hill men tell me some guy who got by with a set shot could hack it in today's nba. you know these game are actually shown on nbatv so a lot of youngsters, middle aged, ederly, whatever, guys get to see a lot of these games and sometimes I think its you older guys who really need to go back and watch how the game has evolved. believe me, the media has more "living in the past" old men than ignorant youngsters.
I was just about to post that. this guys proves to be one of the greatest problem with these lists, a guy plays one of the most talented teams of of all time, he automatically gets lumped into the greatest player lists. while a guy like dominique who played on some good teams, but was continually beaten by some great teams is considered a ball hogging highlight film. and debusschere is considered a great team player because he played on a great team.
the biggest example is k.c. jones who I don't know if he is a top 50 but is a hall of famer as a player with probably the most minimum stats of any player in the hall of fame. and it hurts the truly greats because when people say how great bill russell was, someone comes in and says, yeah but look at all the hall of famers he played with when it turns out some of those guys only reason for being considered great is that they played with bill russell.
wow. i remembered someone from those teams having really bad stats and it's definitely kc jones. but i didn't realize how bad they were. 7.4 ppg, 4.3 apg, 3.5 rpg. and those are the good stats. i know fg percentages were lower in the 60s but he shots 38.7% and actually had full seasons of 33.8 and 33.9. only 2 above 40%. also shot 64.7% from the line. career PER of 10.4. ten point effing four! i would've been embarrassed to stand up and make my hall of fame acceptance speech. also, for some reason his stats start in 1959 when he was 26. did he really start playing that late? played 9 seasons and won the title in his first 8.
a guy like bird gets credit for making true hall of famers better, which is ridiculous, like mchale, nate archibald, and dennis johnson, while the best player nique every played with was doc rivers and kevin willis.
I would be embarrased to accept a million dollar paycheck to play basketball if I were one of these USA players *supposedly the best players in the world because ESPN told me they were* 4 Joe JOHNSON 5 Kirk HINRICH 6 Lebron JAMES 7 Antawn JAMISON 8 Shane BATTIER 9 Dwyane WADE 10 Chris PAUL 11 Chris BOSH 12 Dwight HOWARD 13 Brad MILLER 14 Elton BRAND 15 Carmelo ANTHONY Greece- 101 USA- 95
Oh and here is the team that beat them: 4 Theodoros PAPALOUKAS 5 Sofoklis SCHORTSIANITIS 6 Nikos ZISIS 7 Vasileios SPANOULIS 8 Panayotis VASSILOPOULOS 9 Antonios FOTSIS 10 Nikos HATZIVRETTAS 11 Dimos DIKOUDIS 12 Konstantinos TSARTSARIS 13 Dimitrios DIAMANTIDIS 14 Lazaros PAPADOPOULOS 15 Michail KAKIOUZIS
Carmelo Anthony vs. Papodopolus smack? What does that have to do with anything? Garnett has an Olympic gold medal and has never played on a losing team in international constitution, not that it is that germane to who the NBA's 50 greatest players are. And if you'd followed the Olympic selection process, you'd know that the goal was specifically NOT to select the 12 overall best players and throw them together, unless you're arguing that Brad Miller and Shane Battier are among the 12 best.
