[ESPN Insider] Projecting Top 10 Point Guards for 2013-14

Parker is there.

1. Chris Paul
2. Russell Westbrook
3. Kyrie Irving
4. Stephen Curry
5. Deron Williams
6. Mike Conley
7. Derrick Rose
8. Kyle Lowry
9. Ty Lawson
10. Damian Lillard
11. Kemba Walker
12. John Wall
13. Tony Parker
14. Jose Calderon
15. Ricky Rubio

1. Chris Paul
2. Russell Westbrook
3. Kyrie Irving
4. Stephen Curry
5. Deron Williams
6. Mike Conley
7. Derrick Rose
8. Kyle Lowry
9. Ty Lawson
10. Rajon Rondo
11. Damian Lillard
12. Kemba Walker
13. John Wall
14. Tony Parker
15. Jose Calderon
16. Ricky Rubio

 

Hmmm... Why? I think he still needs some good amount of experience and improvement before he can be part of this list. Timberwolves needs to be in the playoffs just for him to be in consideration. Granted he's been injured much of last year but still, he needs to prove it this year just like many others in that list.

 

Can you imagine the ****storm we'd have in the GARM if Lin was in this top-10? LOF/LOH battle royale.

 

lol conley and lowry? ha. double ha that parker is not in the top five and uncle drew who breaks down before finishing a complete season is listed ahead of him.

 

I think alot of people here dont really understand WARP. I guess the easiest way to describe it would be irreplacable to their teams success.

Tony Parker is definitely a much better player than Mike Conley, Kyle Lowry, or even Kyrie Irving(at this point in his career), but when Tony Parker isn't on the basketball court, their team doesn't suffer as much because the rest of the team is strong enough to not drop off in production as much.

Im sure this could easily turn into a Lin thread, but the truth of the matter is that when Lin is replaced by Beverley or Brooks, the Rockets really dont drop off that much in production because the other pieces in the rotation are so solid.

I wouldn't buy into this article too much as a player ranking of overall value or quality of play, but merely as a pole to show which player swings the pendulum the furthest for their current team.

Case in point- If Chris Paul goes down in a season ending injury, Im not even sure they make the playoffs. If he's healthy throughout the year, their a contender.

If Tony Parker goes down in injury, they are probably still a playoff team, if not still a top seeded team (assuming Duncan is healthy & they are getting some production out of Manu).

 

LOL they lost all credibility leaving out Tony Parker

 

Leaving out Parker is a head scratcher. Putting Conley at #6 is more so.

 

Actually, no. If Lin played as well as Lillard or Lawson last year, the last 2 spots on this top-10, I'd have sang praises of Lin and wrote essays on his awesomeness last year.

 

I think the way you word it might have give the impression that it's affected by each player's backup. When it doesn't. Probably a better way to put it is imagine if said player was replaced by a random nobody, say Toney Douglas. Put Douglas playing the same minutes on the Spurs and they may lose 7 more games. But replace CP3 with Douglas playing the same minutes, and the Clippers lose 16 more games.

Personally, I still think Parker being worth 7 games is a little low, unless he falls off significantly. But I have no issue with Rondo not being on there, given his injury situation.

 

Neither Lillard or Lawson (or several other listed PGs for that matter) would play that "well" and "awesome" as you "expect" if they were playing next to Harden.

 

For all intents and purposes Rondo might as well fall out of the top 10 point guards.

1) He's a ball-dominant player who can't shoot, so he needs a roster built around his strengths (lots of good off the ball players who can make the shots he can't) in order to even be a playoff caliber point guard, let alone championship

2) No other stars want to play with him because he's a total a-hole

3) He's nowhere near good enough to carry a team of roleplayers to title contender status, so he needs something of a rarity, other stars who can play well off the ball (and they also would need to want to play alongside the douchebag that is Rondo)

4) He's convinced everyone, including himself, that he's good enough to deserve max money, so it's that much harder for him to get into a winning situation. (He's not good enough to deserve max money, FYI.)

So now that the Boston team has broken up, where is he gonna find another team he fits in that can contend? I'm not seeing it. If I were trying to build a title contender, I wouldn't want Rondo on my team. Too much of a locker room cancer, too much money for his talents, too hard to fit a PG who can't shoot (AT ALL) into a team.

 

Lawson averaged 13.9 shots/36 minutes with a 22.3% usage.
Lillard averaged 14.6 shots/36 minutes with 24.2% usage.
Lin averaged 12.2 shots/36 minutes with 20.8% usage

Over the course of ~30mpg, or Lin's minutes, that comes out to Lawson using up ~.9 extra possession, or ~1.4 extra shot(meaning Lawson turns the ball over a lot less). With Lillard, that comes out to ~1.8 extra possessions or ~2 extra shots.

Are you implying that hypothetically, if Lawson or Lillard both give up 1~2 extra possessions during the game to Harden, that they would be much worse players?


Note: Numbers are calculated based league average pace. If you adjust by teams' paces, Lawson's numbers become better and Lillard slightly worse. But overall doesn't change a great deal.

 

Obviously, it's not that simple, their whole style of play would've been different. Running PnR a lot less, spotting up a lot more... and maybe that would reflect positively on their stats, but who knows, maybe they would regress each month like Lowry did since that Rudy Gay trade.


Hell, you can make a case that Lin actually had better second half of the season than Lillard.


http://www.basketball-reference.com...&c4comp=gt&c4val=&order_by=fg_pct#stats::none


http://www.basketball-reference.com...&c4comp=gt&c4val=&order_by=fg_pct#stats::none

 

I see conley as better than deron williams. other than that, pretty good list.

 

i also think that people really don't understand how to evaluate point guards.

conley's resume':
-took team to western conference finals.
-all second team in defense.
-played cp3 to a standstill in the opening round 2 years in a row.
-second in steals to cp3 two years running.
- multiple big shots in the playoffs.
-his steal against manu 2 years ago won the game and possible the series.
-his 3 in the thunder game 5 triple overtime game keep his team alive.

basically, conley is the best defensive pg in the league who runs his team
efficiently with very like tos, and does EVERYTHING right.

the only knock on conley at this point is the fact that he isn't scoring 20 a game, but that might change this year.

 

Conley is no 20 PPG scorer. Keep dreaming.

 

Yea, did someone miss the playoffs.

 

How the hell is Kyle Lowry on this list? He's maybe top 20. And how is Tony Parker not on this? He was the best point guard in the league last year and I don't see him declining that much. And DRose at 7? He's gonna show the world he's still the best point guard in the league next year.

 

He's too passive. All of these guys that made the list play with confidence.

 

Good post. Thanks.