Why Is Allen Iverson Considered To Be so Great? He was a chucker..

To me, it was his fantastic play with Denver that was most impressive. Look at those shooting percentages and free throw attempts.

 

Iverson wasn't 6 foot either. I've met him. We were eye to eye. I am a 5'10".

He may have been the most exciting player I've ever watched play.

 

One full season is IMO not enough to assess his ability to coexist with other stars or his contributions to winning with more of an ensemble cast.

However, OP claimed that Allen Iverson was an inefficient chucker. The one full season with the Nuggets:

56.7 TS%, 45.8% FG, 34.5% from 3.

Those are all better than, for example, the career numbers for.... Kobe Bryant.

And I would say, at this point, AI was past his prime.

 

Well, I really liked the 'little guy' ... he was a great player with a bit of a bad attitude 'sometimes'. :grin:
I made an AI mix 4 years ago ... when I look back, he was really something. NBA MVP in 2001, folks!

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How is it not a valid argument? He didn't get a training camp or complete season his first year in Denver. At that point he's a year away from rapid decline and trying to adjust to a new team and the team has to adjust to him as well. A guy like Melo doesn't just mesh instantly with other scorers, we've seen proof of that already. They did go from 45 wins that season to 50 the next, in AI's first full season there.

The AI on the nuggets is not close to prime AI. He had already declined some at that point, so although his performance was very good, it wasn't steallar anymore. The whole argument here was about AI in his prime years, and whether he was a star talent then or just a chucker. Put prime AI on that Nuggets team and they definitely improve by more than just 5 wins. My guess is they'd win 55-57 games. His improvement in FG % was probably a result of him finally playing with another big threat.

 

Because everybody knows that statistics always tell the whole story

 

Best athlete of his era and could have probably beat anyone else in the league one on one. Best player of all time with that bad an attitude, and not the off-the-field crap, even though that was related; just an inability or unwillingness to lead and motivate by example. I suspect that probably inhibited his ability to successfully strategize, or possibly even learn enough that he might have coached or managed some day. When you look Jordan or Bird and see how much their drive and leadership allowed them to accomplish, for themselves and the league as a whole, it's frustrating to see so much less from someone with just as much individual talent.

 

In one of his interviews (if I remember correctly, he was talking with a color commentator about deep draft during a summer league game), Daryl said that if he were a gm in 96 NBA draft, he would have selected AI with the number one pick.

 

Eddie Winslow goofed. Morey has also gone on record and said he likes scoring point guards. Not surprising at all to hear he'd pick AI.

 

Definitely a chucker, but he could always generate a decent (though not great) shot by getting into the lane. He also was a beast in the passing lanes and had very good bball IQ. That's what put him ahead of guys like Monta Ellis, Steve Francis, etc.

He was more suited to being an instant offense guy off the bench for a good team, rather than a first option. For a first option, you want a guy who generates easy shots. None of AIs shots were ever easy.

 

Ever heard the saying when you single out and point at someone you end up having 4 fingers pointing back at yourself........which means he played on a team of 4 other guys that had a lot to do with the outcome of their seasons. Carmelo is a chucker for sure and you can most definitely put a large share of losing on him.the chemistry was all wrong on that team

AI is a HOF and was terrific from his younger youth to his pro years.

 

This isn't true.
Now maybe Ray Allen just had some usage % that he couldn't get past, and as such if he were to ever pass that level, his "efficiency" level would have dropped... that we'll never know.

But we do know that as Ray Allen's usage rate went up, his PER went up. We have the numbers. Had Ray Allen had AI's career usage rate, his trendline would put him at a career 24.6 PER, much higher than AIs career. Had Allen ever reached AI's max usage rate of 37.8, Allen's trendline would put him at a PER of 29.2 that year... again, meaningfully higher than anything AI ever did. Allen's trendline has an r-squared north of 75%... granted, we're not talking about a huge sample size given this is annual data. It would certainly be interesting to do it on a per game basis... basketball reference does have the game log info, but I'm not taking the time to do it. I suspect it'd still be a positive correlation.

Steve Nash has an even higher correlation. Kobe has a positive correlation. Tim Duncan is positive. KD is positive (though really small sample size, not best r-squared). Lebron is positive. MJ is positive, although less so than the others

Anyway, I'm sure someone else has done this study much better and in more depth than me. It just APPEARS at least, that if anything, amongst superstars, higher USAGE absolutely DOES equate to higher PER. And as noted, there is always the argument that player x didn't have that usage because that was their limit.... But I don't put a ton of faith in that. I think Ray Allen absolutely could have played more minutes, and had more usage, and been more effective. He didn't because situationally he shouldn't have.

It's a catch 22 with AI. He didn't have a ton of offensive talent on his team, and thus had to have the higher PER. As such, I think his stats certainly are inflated/overrated... But alternatively, bravo for taking a team to the Finals.

That said, I'm definitely in the AI overrated camp. He was a chucker, and was inefficient, and his solid PER numbers (to the extent better than Steve Nash for example, somewhat implying he's a better player than Nash which is laughable, or Pierce, etc.) are primarily a reflection of his mpg and usage. And while he did take his team to the Finals, that team was all about defense, and a weak conference. It was a middle of the pack offensive team (13th in offensive rating). You saw this in the playoffs as well. AI shot 5-27 in a ECF game that year and the team won.

Was it the era? Sure, it was a chuck happy, single superstar team era... but I'm not going to rate any of those guys any higher than they should be across eras.

AI gets credit imo for doing so much at his size... BUT, I don't care much for that crutch either. Sure he was small. He was also fast as can be - is that a learned skill, or genetic (like height)?

As an aside, I think Tim Duncan is also overrated due to the era he played in. A freaking great great great player, but the crowning of him as the best PF of all time seems a stretch. Look at the teams they played both in the Finals and in route to the Finals. Absent meeting the Lakers a few times, we're not talking any serious competition here.

 

By efficiency, people probably mean scoring efficiency. TS% and similar stats.

Anyway, how would Ray Allen get to 29 PER? That's LeBron's territory. We can't just assume that a player will take more and more shots, but the quality of those shots will be the same.

 

Small guy, hella entertaining to watch and always played hard.

 

How is it not a valid argument? Because his numbers did not indicate that he had declined, as least not much.

What objective evidence do you have that he had declined when he got to Denver? Just by guessing from his age and size? If 25-7-2 isn't stellar numbers, I don't know what is. Sure he had declined from his 30 ppg days. But then, his usage rate was much higher in Philly than in Denver.

Yes, the team did win 5 more games. The problem is, if you added a 25-point scorer on the team with together with your other superstar still in his prime, and only gave you 5 more wins, then that's not very good.

I do believe that the problem with that Denver team was not all on AI. Melo is a similar kind of offensive beast who don't know how to play with another star. Putting the two together was clearly not a very bright idea.

I don't agree with the OP on everything. I do agree that Iverson is overrated because he was "exciting" and because he led a mediocre team to the finals.

 

Another thing is that philly made AI who he was.....drafted the guy and gave him the keys to the city.Hard to coach a guy up when you give him the green light from jump street. So his game was virtually untapped and did not change much coming into the league and progression.

 

Agree with OP in the sense that AI was a lower efficiency star and chucker (low TS%. took bad shots, not the greatest court vision or team player). Incredibly entertaining, fearless, and came to play every game though (just not practice). Personally think that he is in the same category as a Vince Carter. If he's going to be put into the HoF, it's because of the culture he brought to the NBA and not so much due to his accolades or dominance as a player.

 

dominant....sorry i had to do it.

 

Ya'll need to stop.

AI averaged 7.5 and 6.2 assists his first 2 years when he had actual offensive talent around him, and had a 6 year stretch of 7+ assists from 04-05 to 07-08. Better than Tony Parker who played with Tim Freaking Duncan, Manu, Bruce Bowen, etc.

His FG% and 3pt% in Denver with actual talent around him match Kobe's career avg.

The closest comparison is a Derrick Rose. But you replace Noah, Boozer, Korver, and Deng, with Tyson Chandler, Perkins, Tony Allen, and Ronnie Brewer, fill the bench with 30+ year olds, and don't play anyone under 26 until there's a catastrophic injury.

You really had to watch the games. Stats cannot explain the superhuman feats he was pulling. It was Larry Brown's "the right way" fantasy league squad. AI was making those guys 5ppg better. Go look at Aaron Mckie, Eric Snow, and Theo Ratliff's numbers without AI.

I don't think any current players beside Dwade and KG could've taken those Larry Brown teams anywhere. MJ was too corrosive, Kobe too antisocial, Ray too passive, Vince too disinterested.

And you can talk about the strength of the east, but he went head to head with rivals at his position who had more help.