If every current roster this season were in their prime...

[thispego]

Kidd, Carter, Marion itself could own the league. The reason the Nets never got past the 2nd round was because their third fiddle was RJ.

huh?

[MavDynasty]

One of my favorite games ever that featured n!gger dirk and prime Duncan

Dirk-38 points 15 boards
Duncan- 40 points 15 boards

[MavDynasty]

2003 Dirk was Nash-level defensively. I would much rather have 2006-2012 Dirk.

Yeah, his defense was awful. He has definitely evolved his game from a fast outrun you and shoot player to a slower break-you-down via triple threat/post player

[Robz4000]

Bulls with a 2011 Derrick Rose, mid-2000s-Pistons Rip, not-completely-worthless Boozer, Noah, and their ridiculous D would be up there too. Not to mention Brian Scalabrine...

[cheguevara]

If you include Odom, Mavs hands down.

otherwise,
Spurs over Boston. Prime DUNCAN

[benefactor]

Boston. Spurs/Lakers/Dallas would all be scary but all three would still be playing for second.

[cheguevara]

Just give us Prime Duncan, clowns.

this

[mingus]

Spurs with blair with both acls would dominate the league

[Latarian Milton]

06' dirk was the best he's ever been tbh, even the god-like one last year was not as good as the german allah who carried a load of s into the NBA finals in 06

[DMC]

Prime Gortat fortifying prime Nash though.

[Kidd K]

the knicks are actually a top 3 defensive team this year after Lin took over

The Knicks were already high in the defensive standings because of Chandler. Don't give matador Lin credit for Chandler's work. The Knicks were much better defensively when Lin went out. Don't play revisionist historian. . .Lin was getting destroyed game in and game out by the opposing PG (any time he actually played one who was worth anything, which wasn't that often).

Lin would not play much with prime Davis and Bibby in the backcourt. Knicks defense inproved because Bibby, Melo and Amare were out for part of that sreak. I love Davis, but he was no great defender either even in his prime ...

Baron Davis was actually a terrific defender in his prime. Stop lying.

[OZWIN]

Boston, Dallas, and the Spurs.

[rascal]

spurs.

TP currently in prime
Duncan in prime was phenomenal
Ginobli prime would probably not matter.

Spurs would not be much better than what they currently are.

[jimbo]

Spurs would probably be second because a prime spurs also has great offense and defense plus they get Diaw and SJAx in their primes. Both had pretty short primes but in optimum position I think Spurs are better than Mavs.

Lakers in prime gets DPOY Artest, young Kobe and Pau ...Drew before his knees exploded. I know he has improved but I would take that trade off. Heck we even get Barnes in his Gstate days .... but I say: 1. Boston or SAS 3. Lakers 4. Mavs But I would have no problems switching the first two or the last two.

Also others to consider:

Heat (Big 3 plus young Juwan Howard, Battier, pre-injury Haslem)
Knicks (Pre knee surgey Amare, Melo, Sacramento Bibby, JR smith, Baron Davis, Jeremy Lin, Tyson)

Screw that no defense but Knicks maybe at least top 3 ....on paper. Not sure how a team with 3 dyanamic PG's and so many ty defenders would beat those other squads but they would be fun to watch ...

Heat would also have prime Eddy Curry which isn't a joke. Him + Juwan Howard or Bosh would be crazy. And maybe prime Wade if you want to consider that. Toss in prime Mike Miller who would actually knock down some of these wide open 3s he gets. PG position is still really weak though.

Top tier would probably be
Spurs
Celtics
Lakers

Next tier
Mavs
Heat
Knicks

But any team on this list could win on any given night with that much talent. Just a matter of who's hot.

[tesseractive]

Spurs would not be much better than what they currently are.

Umm, no. If you dropped Prime Tim Duncan into this offense, it wouldn't even be fair. He's feasting right now because he's seeing fewer double teams because teams key on Parker and are playing catchup with the motion offense. The ball usually only goes into the post only when Timmy has a mismatch. Which is perfectly fair given his age.

But replace him with Prime Duncan, and suddenly he's destroying anything that isn't a well-positioned double team, and using the motion to make it even harder for teams to deny him his spots down on the blocks. And with Diaw moving around the perimeter like crazy, swinging a double team down onto Duncan is nearly impossible without giving other players more or less all day to shoot.

And Manu at his peak was a freaking assassin, and an above average defender who made a ton of brilliant plays. We haven't seen nearly as much of that lately, but take the current offense, plus Prime Duncan on the block, plus the peak of Manu's form? Not even fair, tbh.

Meanwhile, on the other end, Prime Duncan is what, a Top 5 All-Time help defender? Somewhere in that zone. He's wreaking complete havoc, and making 4 superior wing defenders look even better than they do already. And pulling down a crazy number of boards besides.

Remember those 8 1/2 minutes when we outscored the Clippers 24-0? With Prime Duncan backing everyone up, all those wing defenders, and an offense that can't possibly be stopped? Runs like that are just another day at the office against an average NBA team.

Against other Prime teams like Boston, Miami, and Dallas though -- that's where it gets harder to figure. But I like our chances.

[Latarian Milton]

the all-prime version miami wouldn't be much better then we currently are tbh, our s are all right in their primes and we're set to win