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We actually fire shots at each other on some issues here,
with spurraider21, but you just have the hability of bringing people together against your goal posting and twisting abilities son.
You mean Philo your lap dog? I think he's licking his balls near your recliner.Whatever happened to "Big Dog", tbh?
We actually fire shots at each other on some issues here,
with spurraider21, but you just have the hability of bringing people together against your goal posting and twisting abilities son.
I have to call you out on this - you may not like him but he's far from a mediocre player. His record speaks for itself, both in the US and elsewhere. There's only 2 people who have happened to win in Europe, USA, and the Olympics. Manu is one of them.
His Argentina team beat the US with a super team in 2004 and he was the best player in their roster - playing "franchise" minutes
To me Manu's legacy has already been cemented and it cannot be moved, no matter how much people could hate on him. It was done by him, on the basketball court, where you and I don't exist.
tbf, I qualified that opinion on a later post.
Even Manu's agent and Manu himself agrees with me.
Like I said, there's a lot of coulda, woulda... he certainly had the talent to be, IMO...
He would have been fun to watch on a bad team for sure. Probably a 25 PPG guy but also injury prone. 2005 he was a of a player, his best year IMO. Better he had the career he did though. Lots of winning and chips, and still going to the HOF..
I am not sure Manu gets the minutes on another team. Sure, if you took hindsight Manu and made him Prime manu, he's a lock, but he didn't come into the league that way. The fact that every other team in the league passed on him and he went 57th says enough about how other teams viewed what he could do.
So you have to consider 1st year Manu, else you consider he was traded in his prime which I'd buy then that he could be an important part of another team, maybe the best player. His unselfishness though doesn't jive well with typical best player types from that era.
Gordon Hayward is a franchise player, D Rose was one for 3 seasons before turning into a walking dead.
I agree if the premise is that he comes over when he came over... the reality is that Manu didn't look all that great 4 years before he got to the Spurs (when he was drafted in 1999), but by 2001 onwards, he was lightning it up in Europe and doing a lot of winning.
That's why I said that if you change the premise to 'he grew up in the US college system', then maybe we'll be looking at this differently. But then you enter the coulda, shoulda I was talking about earlier. Things didn't pan out that way.
If he grew up in the US college system he'd be a much worse player because he'd not have the freedom to create. He'd be pushed into the AAU program and fall in love with the 3 and isolation basketball. His background is part and parcel of his game. It's why those other Argies were good in the NBA as well as the Brazilians. That type of play is conducive to team ball and good team ball beats good isoball any day. Colleges rarely put out a team baller who makes it in the NBA.
Teams should be sending rookies to Argentina to learn how to play ball. Even the d-league is heroball.
What numbers would prime Manu average on today's NBA? Since he isn't a Harden/Westbrook type stat-padder, I think he would average around 22/25 ppg, 7/8 apg and 6/7 rpg. And he would be a top 5/10 player in the league, tbh.
Never missed the playoffs in his career, tbh... respect
And a pretty strong case could be made that without him finishing some close games the team wouldn't have made the playoffs. The difference between making the playoffs or not, at age 40. Crazy, tbh.
he definitely a huge reason, like LMA...And a pretty strong case could be made that without him finishing some close games the team wouldn't have made the playoffs. The difference between making the playoffs or not, at age 40. Crazy, tbh.
Already the best shooting guard of his generation.
I love Manu, but there's no way in he's better than Kobe or Wade. Controlling for all other factors, Manu's biggest issue in his career has been an inability to stay healthy, especially during his prime (2005-2011). Still one of the best, and my personal second-favorite Spur ever
Manu was more efficient than Kobe - and that's not really debateable.
I love Manu, but there's no way in he's better than Kobe or Wade. Controlling for all other factors, Manu's biggest issue in his career has been an inability to stay healthy, especially during his prime (2005-2011). Still one of the best, and my personal second-favorite Spur ever
And as was shown in a previous post, Manu's best post-season rivals any post-season produced by either Wade or Kobe. Ginobili was never a chucker - not even on his Argie or European teams.
Does that mean he was better than those two? It's all subjective and in most people's minds they "led" their teams to Championships... which "automatically" makes them better in their eyes...
What I'm trying to say here is that the difference between Manu and Kobe/Wade is not as wide as people seem to think.
Jordan, Kobe and maybe Wade. Those are the only SGs I've seen who are better than Manu. Not Iverson, not Reggie Miller, not Ray Allen, nor any other SG from the modern era.
Manu never had a season with a PER over 25. Kobe and Wade had several. Further, aside from 2005 and 2014, Manu's efficiency took a dive every year in the playoffs. As the minutes went up, his effectiveness decreased.
So yeah, I'd say your opinion is very debatable.
Despite it's name PER isn't the best tool to determine efficiency since it tends to favour chuckers, tbh.
No it doesn't. Tim Duncan and LeBron James have some of the best PER numbers in league history, and both players were FAR from chuckers. The season when Kobe had the most FGA/game for his career (04-05) was also one of his lowest in terms of PER (23.3).
Manu was great, but he's in a tier below Kobe and Wade, right there with AI, Ray Allen, and Reggie. He's still one of the best to ever do it at the 2 guard position and imo the best passing SG of all time.
Don't get me wrong, I agree Manu is behind Kobe and (probably) Wade. In fact, I said it above. But as advanced stats got deeper, PER started to get more and more exposed as a stat that favoured the guys that shoot more, and although guys like Lebron and Duncan aren't chuckers, they were guys that tended to shoot more than the rest because, well, they were fricking superstars.
The criticism behind PER is that it doesn't punish bad shooting as much as Turnovers, and that the trade off between shot made/shot missed is always better the more you shoot. I don't know the exact formula but there are some articles about it out there if you are interested.
Bottom line is that if Manu would have taken more shots over his career, chances are his PER would have been better, even if his FG% would have decreased because of the extended workload.
Most likely would lead the league in turnobilis
Maybe, but I doubt it. Manu as a number one option would still not be as ball dominant as the guys who lead the league in turnovers like Harden, Westbrook and Lebron.
I always thought that, if anything, PER tended to favor big men, but I see your point. Personally, I think there's a big "what if" in Manu's career. How successful would he have been as a number 1 option?
I think he would've been almost what Harden is now, offensively, but idk for how long. He played wrecklessly and incredibly hard every minute, and he already had a tough enough time staying healthy in his more limited role. Would've been fun to watch.
As a Spurs fan, I just wish he would've been healthy for more playoff runs. I think we get to the finals in 2008 with a healthy Manu. 2009 might've been tougher though. Then there was the broken nose in 2010
Maybe for one or two seasons, max three. He’s to injury proned because he puts it all on the line every game. Plus all the international ball he played while he was hurt, the Spurs were nice enough to rest him during the early parts of the season, and limiting his minutes. He really owes the Spurs for his long career. Not sure other franchises would’ve allowed that.
So yes, he could have, but only for a short stint.
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