battle of the hoops unicorns

once again I implore the good folks of the jury to recognize the immense pressure visited on me by my peers and also the fact that embiid was in the middle of a really nice run at the time

i wanna vote for ben simmons

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, December 26, 2017 1:19 PM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

jordan really went hard for ben for a while

i think KAT could have something to say here if he ever gets out of minnesota

simmons never got better in three years, possibly got worse. hard to do

if you put bam on this list you'd at least have one guy who has played in an nba finals, food for thought

and if you put giannis in here you wouldn't even have a conversation

if you put bam on this list you'd at least have one guy who has played in an nba finals, food for thought

― J0rdan S., Thursday, November 18, 2021 8:17 PM (twenty minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

bye troll

giannis was explicitly excluded for being too advanced

zinger being on here speaks to a more innocent time

zinger came out that season on fire made the allstar team then tore his acl rip

what they don’t want you to know about porzingis is he’s had the exact same stats every year since then perhaps even has been better but was so overrated that year it’s skewed everyone’s perception of him

I mean you expect young bigs to get better in their mid 20s and he just didn’t

the thing with zinger was that he had the promise of being an elite floor stretcher on offense and an elite rim protector on defense. there still is basically no one in the NBA who has that skill set. some are close in various ways but an exponential arc in his game back from his healthy knicks days would have made him a unicorn, like KAT crossed with roy hibbert or something. alas he can still shoot bcuz he’s so tall but the injuries robbed him of all defensive value, and also he keeps getting hurt.

also it’s insane no one ever made him figure out a way to score over 6’ 6” guys in the post, just completely inexcusable

Zinger still looks the most like an actual unicorn out there, like he just doesn’t make sense by the laws of physics and human anatomy. But I guess maybe that’s why he can’t stay healthy…

yeah zinger couldve been an alltimer but the human body just isnt designed to be 7-3

just some fun comparing big dudes. through first 8 seasons, per 36 minutes

player A: 23.2 pts, 10.1 reb, 4.9 ast, 1.3 stl, 1.4 blk; .532/.287/.717, .600 ts%, 23.7 PER; 2 MVPs, 1 DPOY, 1 championship

player B: 24.8 pts, 6.4 reb, 6.2 ast, 1.5 stl, 0.8 blk; .479/.329/.744, .566 ts%, 26.9 PER; 2 MVPs, 0 DPOY, 0 championships

player C: 23.5 pts, 12.2 reb, 7.5 ast, 1.4 stl, 0.8 ast; .546/.344/.827, .625 ts%, 27.4 PER; 2 MVPs, 0 DPOY, 0 championships

player D: 30.2 pts, 12.9 reb, 3.9 ast, 1.0 stl, 1.9 blk; .492/.338/.814, .604 ts%, 27.3 PER; 0 MVPs, 0 DPOY, 0 championships

player E: 21.2 pts, 11.4 reb, 2.9 ast, 0.7 stl, 2.4 blk; .507/.194/.692, .554 ts%, 25.3 PER; 2 MVPs, 0 DPOY, 2 championships

player F: 26.2 pts, 11.8 reb, 2.6 ast, 0.7 stl, 2.6 blk;
.577/.059/.534, .583 ts%, 27.9 PER; 1 MVP, 0 DPOY, 1 championship

without looking this up...
a - giannis
b -
c -
d - embiid
e - duncan
f - shaq

i am stumped on b and c bc i know one of them is jokic and i cant figure out the other.

(ok i looked it up, lol at making player b a big, feels like thats misleading!!!!!!)

just giving a little context, careers take different shapes, have evolutions and so forth :)

merry christmas ILH!

C is Jokic, right? No historical big would shoot 3s like that.

xp to kevin, that is true however player b has played literally every position more minutes than the center position in his career including PG and i object

okay i figured it out and kevin is a con artist of the highest order, i salute his work

it’s not supposed to be a con! just showcasing some of the best to do it the last 25 years or so

who is it

This has been bugging me since last night. I've thought I had a it a couple times.

i looked at the list of multiple mvp winners and it doesnt seem like its any of them unless its dr j in the aba or some shit but im not about to try to figure that out

oh i missed the per 36 part

dont need to go back that far for things of this nature

I'm not about to figure out per 36 myself, but Lebron played a ton of minutes his first eight years, so his numbers are going to look a little weird. Is Lebron B?

yes

basketball reference has the per 36 stats fwiw

I know, but I'm being lazy.

yeah I did per 36 because lebron averaged 39.9 mins a game his first 8 seasons which even though it’s documented and I watched a lot of it I still can’t really believe

Fun comparison!

printing this thread out and plastering it all over my walls

i definitely voted for jokic here even though there's no proof

― ciderpress, Sunday, October 28, 2018 11:30 PM (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

btw because I started this thread no one is allowed to quote my post where I said the answer was embiid, that never happened

if we get jokic vs tatum in the finals it could end up being a really interesting data point in a larger positional value debate

even putting embiid's specific issues aside i think we just saw in this series why ppl think wings > bigs, generally speaking, given what tatum was able to do at the end of game 6 & his overall performance in game 7

i don't think that tatum necessarily showed that he's better than embiid in that series, tho he might be, just that he often shows (when he is on) why his archetype of player is the most sought after in the league, even if he also kinda leaves something to be desired when compared to, like, peak kawhi or whatever

i've thought since last playoffs that even tho he was not the best player in any series after round 1 i'd prob take tatum over any player in the league aside from giannis bcuz of the position he plays. but if jokic knocks everyone out including a boston team that would have the best ability of any team left to test him defensively, then he may be the true hoops unicorn of them all

tatum is a great player man but I mean, as you alluded to, he’s sort of an ersatz lebron/kawhi archetype you’re referring to. his specific value is in no small part thanks to playing on a very deep switchy team on which he happens to be the best player. imo…

I will wait a month or so (winky face) to post my giannis thoughts but the short version is he’s a big toe and a couple of really hot nights at the free throw line away from being perceived quite differently…

his specific value is in no small part thanks to playing on a very deep switchy team on which he happens to be the best player. imo…

he has a well built roster around him but his specific value is in being able to get a shot off against any player in the league at the end of a series deciding playoff game, and having the ability to make them. or perhaps more generally what we saw yesterday or in game 6 vs milwaukee last year where he is a very specific type of unguardable offensive fulcrum who also can't easily be exploited on defense bcuz he's pretty good at 6' 9"

I will wait a month or so (winky face) to post my giannis thoughts but the short version is he’s a big toe and a couple of really hot nights at the free throw line away from being perceived quite differently…

this is true although he's at a level where the staying power of one title will only last so long. he's probably out of the grace period now, quite frankly. the expectation for the next 2-3 years, regardless of what else happens w/ the bucks' roster, is that we'll see them in the finals again at least once at minimum. and if he doesn't win another one it will in all likelihood result in lots of ppl having more explicit conversations along the lines of what you just said about him. and look if jokic or tatum win it this year they'll be on the same clock too. that's the game. but certainly giannis getting the first has helped, and you could argue it was a funky title! the nets were hurt, the hawks were a paper tiger, all 4 bubble conference finals teams were evidently sapped of energy. so we'll see, lots of chapters still left to be written for these guys (except maybe embiid...)

did we ever determine whether jokic was the most impactful half court offensive player in the league

he was pretty impactful against markieff morris

sadly for us all the snarky revives of this thread lose their impact given that k3v reminded us that he voted for embiid :[ the honesty is very much appreciated tho

lol

hahaha

this thread would be your magnum opus if only you could delete that one double post in your moment of weakness

it’s fuckin embiid btw
― k3vin k., Wednesday, April 18, 2018 7:20 PM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

it’s fuckin embiid btw

― k3vin k., Wednesday, April 18, 2018 7:20 PM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

― Spottie, Thursday, November 18, 2021 5:22 PM (one year ago) bookmarkflaglink

it’s Shakespearean

This is the single worst hot take of all time.

Ever

Makes me laugh every time
pic.twitter.com/6BpyMsB3BE

— Tommy Beer (@TommyBeer) June 22, 2024

lol rough