vince carter....could of been alot better than he is/was
And JR Smith always seems to pop up on these lists and i disagree.
He's athletic as and has a nice shot but that's about it. People say he's as talented as Kobe and that's ridiculous. The guy really has no go to move of any sort just the same predictable step back jumper.
be stupid as too. He would be on the streets if he wasn't gifted basketball talent
He's probably not as talented as Kobe, but not far off.
His issue is that he doesnt know how to use his talents. He only uses that one move because its the only one he probably has really worked on. Imagine if he had Kobe's work ethic... I think we would see him doing a lot more amazing things.
Never got to see him play but my uncle would agree with you.
i think Emeka Okafor is a waste of talent. hasnt done after winning ROY.
has vince carter been mentioned yet?
imho you call it talent i just call it athleticism.
Obviously if he worked on more moves he'd be extremely good. But you can say that about a lot of guys in the NBA who were just raw athletes (Ben Wallace, Shannon Brown, Jamario Moon, etc.)
That's the difference between a JR Smith and a Rasheed Wallace. I've seen Wallace do the exact same move, the opponent knows its coming, and he still scores everytime. But then he'll just settle at the 3 point line the rest of the game. There's no move that I feel that Smith can do consistently well just make some athletic plays and be a pretty good spot up shooter
I think it's hard just to assume a player could be as talented as another player if he just worked harder on his game. Athleticism can take a player only so far and isn't always the true measure of potential. Some players just have a natural feel for the game that allows them a higher ceiling. I look at a guy like Corey Maggette, who had all the necessary physical gifts to be a superstar and from what I've heard has a good work ethic. But he didn't have a natural talent for basketball to cultivate to be even like Vince, much less be a player like Kobe. Dwight Howard could work on his game 24/7 for years and still never have the offensives skill Hakeem had, even though Dwight has the athleticism, agility, and quickness that would make you think he has the "potential" for it.
Talent isn't just athleticism. Maybe JR Smith just doesn't have the natural talent to have the wide range of offensives skills great wing players possess. He has the size, athleticism, and jumper, but I'm not convinced that even if he had great work ethic and really worked hard on his game, that he'd be one if the best players in the league. There's more to talent than just size and athleticism. There are intangibles that go beyond just working on your game.
I don't think shooting ability, passing ability, finishing ability, defensive ability, and ball handling ability has a whole lot to do with athleticism. He has shown an ability to be in the upper echelon of players in all of those areas. Unfortunately, he rarely uses the neccesary smarts to utilize all those things well, but he certainly has shown many flashes of being able to do all those things exceedingly well. He's not like Shannon Brown or Moon or as Jamstone mentioned, Corey Maggette, who are all freakish athletes, but look completely unnatural playing the game of basketball. Smith is very smooth and natural looking when he plays the game, to go along with his incredible athletic ability.
I don't think talent is what holds JR Smith back. What he has between the ears (or lack of) is what holds him back.
nope, you are the first
I think in a lot of sports, especially at the highest professional levels, the mental aspect of the game is extremely important. Having all the talent in the world carries a player to a certain point but can be sabotaged by the player's brain. I mentioned a guy like that in this thread, Ricky Davis. Ricky was kind of like JR Smith that way, but I think Ricky actually had more talent. But his brain got in the way.
I think JR has a fantastic skillset too. IMO he's stupid and lazy, which is what holds him back.
Ooh, I forgot about Ricky Davis. He was definitely a great talent too, but lazy, like you said. But I agree completely with your post. Most people think there are just two aspects, talent, and athletic ability. But there is a third, which is mental, which is what is lacking from most of the players listed in this thread.
The "feel for the game" that I talked about is something that can't necessarily be measured. There's a reason why some of the greatest players ever to play the game, like Magic and Bird and even Duncan to an extent, were not the athletic marvels Jordan and LeBron and Wilt and Shaq are/were. There are intangible things great players have. JR doesn't possess those intangibles no matter how hard he works on his game.
Ricky may have been lazy but I don't think that's the main reason he wasn't a much better player. His downfall had way more to do with the fact that he was extremely stupid.
Has anyone brought up Jamal Tinsley yet? Dude has some badass games but he never seemed to get anywhere and ended up having a ty end to his career (unless he's still playing and I'm not aware) but I remember watching Pacer games back in the day thinking this dude was gonna be a stud and nothing really happened
VC should top everyone's list, or be close to it IMHO..
and I strongly disagree with those mentioning Shaq.. there's a difference between having some wasted talent and being THE biggest waste of talent.
I believe Tinsley is an end of the bench back-up with Utah, and he's gotten some time because of injuries. He had nice vision. Needed to be quicker to become an elite PG. He was too pudgy and thus slow for the position.
Speaking of which, what about Baron Davis? Imagine if his playing weight was around 205-210 instead of 225+. Could have avoided those back problems. He was a beast when he was healthy.
In the same vein then, Vince shouldn't be at the top either. He put up very good to great seasons. He's had a long NBA career with 8 all star selections. And statistically, he's a borderline HOFer. Did he underachieve? Yup. But the "biggest" waste of talent should probably be a guy with a world of talent and didn't do with it.
They aren't in the same vein at all.
I don't think Shaq wasted hardly any talent, actually; he WAS overweight but he actually used it to his advantage a la Barkley many times. I only mentioned him because of other posters bringing him up.. in reality, he wasted very little - leading a team to a 3peat is no small task. I don't agree with some of how the arguments against him are being gauged, either. For example, being bad at FTs isn't necessarily proof of a waste of talent - many people have confirmed Shaq practiced the out of FTs through his career.
VC consciously, selfishly did not try his hardest in Toronoto and likely, in manyother points of his career.. his athleticism was unmatched, and he could've contended for the GOAT IMHO, but he CHOSE not to take advantage of his incredible abilities. Extremely mentally weak. You've completely ignored this aspect by comparing the two.
You brought up the notion of "biggest" waste of talent compared to wasting "some" talent. Now say if Vince never averaged more than 10 points in a season and then only lasted in the league for 4 years, then you're talking about a huge waste of talent. I'm suggesting that at least Vince took advantage of some of that talent. Wouldn't the "biggest" waste of talent be more like a player who didn't take advantage of his potential and talent hardly at all, even if his ceiling of potential wasn't as high as Vince? For example, how about Pervis Ellison? #1 overall pick who proved his worth in college and in the NCAA tournament before college basketball got diluted with high school kids and underclassmen leaving for the draft. Ellison might not have had the ceiling Vince had, but he didn't even come close to tapping into his talent and potential as sn NBA player. That makes more sense than Vince under your idea of being the "biggest" waste of talent.
I can't tell if you're arguing with me or not because this is exactly what I'm saying.
There are two types of players being discussed in this thread. Raw athletes (Ben Wallace, Jamario Moon, Samuel Dalembert, etc) and "wasted talents" (McGrady, Rasheed, Coleman, etc.)
The raw athletes are the ones with freakish athleticism, who aren't known to be lazy, but just don't have a great skillset. The wasted talents are the ones that do have the skillset of elite players but lack something mentally that keeps them from performing on that level consistenly. Some of it is laziness, some of it is other things.
I feel like JR Smith falls somewhere in the middle of the two categories
Agree to disagree, I suppose.. our criteria are simply much different.
Those with the most talent who did not utilize it to the max deserve to be at the top of the list. I don't care about the supposed speculative disparity - if VC could've been the goat, but barely or doesn't crack the top 50, then he's easily at or near the top for me. Additionally, the amount of hype his incredible athleticism received most definitely factors in.
Conversely, random supposedly talented college kid who never did well for long at the pros means very little in my book. I'm swayed more by players such as VC, who did well at the highest levels but could have been the best. Which is exactly why Shaq doesn't belong anywhere near the same category as VC - he led a team to a 3pt, put up gaudy playoff numbers and was the best player in the league at least 1-2 years.
PS Pervis Ellison suffered lots of injuries and so IMHO would be disqualified from this discussion.
Good call; Baron Davis may be the most athletic point guard I have ever seen, and no one lately other than CP3 can go into beast mode at Davis' level when he was motivated. That guy should have been MVP of the league at some point of his career.
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