The Commish presents: 10 Greatest Point Guards in NBA History

(Note: Remember I said I was gonna novel-blog on this? Well I had started the list way back in May, saved it and never finished. I explain why further down. Anyways, here's what I've got thus far.)

My first sports hero was Magic Johnson. I think most of you know that and know why, as well. Long story short, though: I grew up in the 80s. I also grew up, basically rooting for whomever my Pops rooted for. In the 80s, that meant the Georgetown Hoyas and Los Angeles Lakers. And it all had to do with his version of black power.

The Hoyas were coached by a defiant big black hulk: Grandpa John Thompson. They played mean and nasty. Everyone that came after them -- Arkansas' 40 Minutes of Hell, UNLV's gangsta squad, Fab Five -- they got their swagger from those early Gtown teams, on thru the Alonzo squad, on thru the 90s Iverson squad. But check this: The Bad Boy Pistons, 90s NY Knicks and the physical, stingy defensive NBA squads also got alot of their strut and ideology from those Gtown teams. It was a historic program and Granpa John was a historic figure that represented, perhaps, the first strong-black figure on a collegiate bench. You knew my Pops was riding with that squad, if for no other reason than the aforementioned social significance...they also happened to be really, really good.

But more than anything, the LA-Boston battles represented a lot of social/racial issues in this country. It's been well documented, so no need to get into to indepth. But it's from here that, I think, Pops rooted for LA so fervently. In fact, I know it is. He'd tell me. So, naturally, the Lakers were my squad, too. And, Magic was by far my favorite player. He remains my favorite athlete ever.

What I'm gettin at is this point guard list. I told you a while ago I was gonna be postin this list and in that blog I told u that I know point guards better than I know anything else sports related. That's because Magic was a point guard and I spent COUNTLESS hours examining and reexamining his games. Every nuance, every intricacy, every abstract idea, every intangible. My Pops friends used to call me Stat Man, because I'd memorize NCAA, NBA and NFL players statistics like I was some pseudo-John Nash. I was also the only one of my peers that would get invited into the grown-up sports discussion. This isn't one of my many delusions, this is striaght up. I'd be like 10 or 11 years old and men were askin me things like, "Lil Vince, whatchu think about KJ?" Then I'd talk and they'd listen. When discussions had anything to do with point guards from that time, until this day, I get on some encyclopedic/Hubie Brown steez.

So when I you read this list, as always, take it as biblical fact. We're startin from 10 and working our way to 1. Ya dig? Let's get it...

Top 10 Greatest Point Guards in NBA History

10. Air Raid: You remember that commerical. The commercial for the Nike Air Raids. The ill joints with the big, clunky, gray, velcro 'X'? Know what the 'X' stood for? Yeah, nigga. Remember that commercial? 'Member Tim Hardaway on his native Chicago playground breakin niggas ankles with the "Killer Crossover" (that's what the 'X' stood for, coincidentally or not) before Iverson and Kobe made it pop-culture-popular. As sick as Ive was with his crossover, it'll never be as dope as Tim's. Why? Because it wasn't as controlled. Some of my peers might only have true vivid memories of the Tim in the latter part of his Miami career, after a couple knee injuries had wore on his lateral mobility and he turned into more of a perimeter player.

But in that nigga's heyday, it was a wrap. What seperated his crossover from Ive's is that Tim's was more controlled. AI always had the habit of dribbling especially high, so as murderous as his crossover was, it wasn't as efficient as Tim's. And Tim remains the strongest finishing little man ever, in my estimation.

But why Tim instead of KJ or Nash or some older cats like Lenny Wilkens or JoJo White? Tim was one of the games clutches players ever. EVER. How many games did he win? How many fourth quarters did he drop 12 points or 8 in the final 5 minutes. Sun was a force. And he ran his squad with moxie. His career numbers of about 18 points and 8 assists aren't necessarily indicative of his career. He had a good 6 or 7 years stretch where he was doing close to 20 and 10 which is unheard of now, and only him, KJ, Zeke and Magic did so in the 1980-93 era. Here's my test: If I put Timmy on that Barkley Suns squad that lost to the Bulls in 6, Pheonix wins the championship. KJ was my favorite player for the beginning of the 90s, Tim was 2nd. But in hindsight, Tim was that dude. Pheonix wouldve been tougher with Tim. He wouldve done something to help Barkley, maybe even more so than Barkley, to get that team some Ws, instead of the Bulls winning 4 in a row. KJ was never known as especially tough or clutch. Tim was. And he's the 10th greatest point guard of all-time.

9. Lil Nate: Sometimes I get a little skittish about getting really authoritative when it comes to players that didn't play in my era. But here are things that rarely lie -- stats and significance. Nate "Tiny" Archibald has those on lock. The season we hear about all the time, that sort promotes Tiny's legacy, is the 72-73 season. It's the year he led the league in scoring and points which is just ridiculous. He averaged 34 points and 11 assists. That's a numbing statline right there. But lets look at this season a bit, because there are aspects of that can make u appreciate that season or undermine it.

First, he shot over 26 times per game. That's about the same clip as Kobe shot this season and people derided Kobe as a hog. But then again u got those 11.4 assists, which wouldve have led the league this season and most of the seasons for the past 10 years. Four of his teammates averaged close to double figures or more, so he distributed the ball. But his squad was like 36-46...it was basically a bumsquad, which was probably a bit helter-skelter, which could lead to some bloated stats for a superior player that controlled the ball. Whatever, though. That season was that season. Can't front on that. Any season that he wasn't mucked by an injury he was stellar. His stats, however are schewed because his final season he played in Boston, in an auxillary role on contender squads.

But alot of what goes into being great, is stuff like impact. As you'll see as you go down the list, I place a lot of importance on impact, trailblazing and influence. Tiny was the precursor for Isaiah Thomas. Think about that. Tiny is also a godfather of sorts for the New York City point guard (Kenny Anderson, Mark Jackson, Steph Marbury, Andre Barrett, Terrance Roberson, Lil Bassy, we could on and on and on (Grnarls!)). That type of impact is huge and Tiny is the 9th greatest point guard in NBA history.

8. Sideburns Clyde: The fact that he was the coolest shutyomouth on the planet in his heyday, doesnt really mean much for this list. But he was this: the second greatest defensive point guard in history. That means a lot. Point guards' responsibilities aren't just on the offensive side. A huge resposnibility (that not every pg does/did well) is to pressure the opposing point guard. Just as it's your responsibility to run your team's offense, you gotta disrupt the other squads offense, too. Clyde was a smooth beast when it came to puttin the clamps on a nigga.

Now, his offensive stats weren't incredible, especially his assists numbers. But he played many season with Earl Monroe, one of, probably the top 10 pure guards of all-time. They shared team-running duties. Jerry Lucas and smart players like Bill Bradley and Dave Debusshere helped facilitate the offense a lot too. But Clyde essentially kept that squad humming and he was the "creator", another hallmark of a great point guard.

And ultimately he was 6'4, 200-lb, defensive point guard, runnin the show and grabbin boards. really the first of his kind and the precursor for the nest two niggas on this list. And for these reasons he's the 8th greatest point guard of all time.

7. Ason: I love this nickname, courtesy my nigga Chuck. Ason "No J" Kidd, as in "no jump-shot". That's hilarious. But you know what's real funny? Kidd hit those jumpers with the games on the line. Homeboy was clutch.

J was actually an aquired test for me, if you can imagine that. I used to get Bob Gibbons scouting reports and read up high school prospects and scour Street Smith season previews during the summer. Kidd was touted as the greatest point guard prospect since Magic Johnson, and I don't think he dissapointed in the end. But as I watched him during his frosh year at Cal, I found myself underwhelmed. It was a crazy oversight on my part. His game wasn't necessarily slick like KJ or Tim or Kenny Anderson. He didn't really know how to score. His shot was ugly. He wasn't spectacular on the break. Instead of dribbling 4/5 of the court, increasing the degree of difficulty for a conversion, and then whippin a no look, he'd grab a board or get a steal and shoot out a quick outlet, that lead his teammate to the exact spot he needed to be in to get the easiest bucket. It was genius and a bit over my head at the time. In the halfcourt set he wouldn't always knife into the paint and kick out some John Elways pass to the three-pt shooter on the bassline. A lot of times he'd be at the top of the key, get a pass from one wing and immediately whip it across for an opponent that didn't necessarily seem open -- usually Lamond Murray -- for a three. Everything Kidd did was the right thing at the right time. Now, obviously he forced action sometimes and turned the ball over, but not much. So when me and Pops were watching young J and Cal upset Hurley and Duke, I remember Dad saying something like, "That young boy nows exactly what to do, Vince. It's uncanny." I had been served notice.

In the NBA it's been simply this: no player, save maybe Magic, has ever controlled the tempo/pace of a game like Kidd. And other than Mashburn, no player ever played better than when they played with Kidd. From his days in Dallas to Phoneix to Jersey, his teammates level of play always goes up two or three notches. That's a hallmark of a great point guard. It's what makes Nash's case for greatness compelling. The difference between a player like Nash and player like Kidd, is that Kidd did EVERYTHING on the offensive end as good or better than Nash (outside of the whole jumper thing, but it's not like that results in Nash scoring more than Kidd), but J also played lockdown defense (Nash is a defensive liability), J had a mean post-up game, J plays big minutes (coaches have to actually watch out for Nash playin more than 36 minutes which is ridiculous for a supposed franchise player)..and oh, for about the past six or seven seasons, J has averaged about 7 boards per game, which he usually takes down the other way for a bucket or assist. Ason is the 7th greatest point guard in NBA history.

6. Ed Josey: My nigga Gary Payton -- aka G.P., aka The Glove -- is my second favorite pro-baller of my lifetime. That's right. And that's no bull either. After Magic retired, I had several flings: KJ, Tim Hardaway, Kenny Anderson. I'd toggle back and forth. But GP was my nigga from about 1993-1999. Not even Iverson has held my top spot for that long (AI was like 1999-2003)...and I was probably still callin GP my dude from 1999-2000, not yet quite ready to offer my top-spot devotion to my nigga AI. But that says alot about me and GP. He's my all-time No. 2 dude from 1979-now. Not Zeke, not AI, definitely not cornball-backwards kango-republicans buy shoes too-MJ...GP. In fact, I loved this nigga's game, swagg and steez so much, i was so enthralled with it for a good 10 years, that it's taken me close to two months to start this section of the list. I got through Nos. 10-7 way back in mid-May, all in one day. I got to GP and froze because I didn't feel eloquent or vibrant enough to truly express what I thought about his career, so I saved a draft of this post and kept it movin. To tell you the truth, I don't why I chose to revisit it tonight.

It's funny, but my first recollection of GP was during my first year as a Sports Illustrated subscriber. Before the Fall of 1989, I would ask Pops to buy certain joints (the one with Chris Jackson on the cover, the one season-previews, a Bills joint, any Lakers joint, etc.) and others I'd bum off some of my rich classmates that had subscriptions (they weren't really rich, just white). But in 1989 I convinced Pops to kop a 3-year subscription. One of the first that rolled around was this joint in Feb of 1990 with GP snarling on the cover and the words "College Player of the Year" encircling a basketball he was dribbling. The caption read something like "Oregon State's Do-Everything, Say-Anything Point Guard." Do-Everything was prophetic, because, although he was killing em in college, I'm sure there werent may that thought he'd pull off seasons like the 99-00 joint when he dropped 25, dished 9 and grabbed 7. So niggas need to get of LeBron's deek and recognize what Gary was doing some years back (I'm obviously, for arguments and devotion's sake, ignoring the fact that Bron will probably average 30-8-8 for the next 10 years).

They called him Say-Anything because the article dwelled on how dude never stopped yappin. The early 90s was the dawn of trash-talkin -- in terms of geek-sportswriting white dudes being aware of it. It semi did the league in, from a publicity stand point. UNLV niggas was screamin and scowling after boards. Fab Five niggas was was constantly yappin and jawin. They all brought that into the NBA, but GP was doin that before them -- in terms of it being on a grand stage, in an unapologetic way. He was the pioneer of that movement. Except, he did it cooler and doper.

Anyways, back to that Feb issue of SI....When you're like 11 and your bedtime is stuff like, "When Different World goes off" or "When In Living Color Goes off" or "After that Georgetown game ends" (unless a Lakers game or Monday Night Football is on), then you don't get to see too many Pac-1o games. I mean, I was like a teen, still sneaking around, staying up late to watch Harold Miner. And Oregon State, even if they were a top 10 that year, wasn't gettin no TV time on ESPN...matta fact, I don't think we had ESPN in 89. Either way, as a point guard fanatic, I read this story about this trash-talkin point guard from Oakland that played for Oregon State and I was sold. Plus his pictures looked cool. He just looked like a bad nigga. And on an inside pic he was driving, had this snarl on his face and the ball cocked in this ill way. I started checking local listings after the story ran and caught dude on a Saturday CBS game against Arizona and he dropped 33 points and had like 8 steals. Do the math, then do the knowledge. I was solder than sold.

So I rode with him from then on. No. 2 pick in the 1990 draft behind my nigga Derrick Coleman. A rough rookie season under KC Jones. That bonehead had Sedale Threatt running point like it was even close to what was up. But he got axed in 91 and George Karl took over later in the season. Next thing you know, GP was runnin the show. By 1993 -- Magic now 2 years into AIDS rehab, Zeke retired, KJ always injured (plus he was kinda soft in a white-boy kinda way which is never good for a nigra), and Hardaway out a full season with a knee injury -- GP became my full-fledge dude.

As a point guard, he was Walt Frazier, except a nastier defender, much better scorer and every bit the offense-orchestrator. For a good 5 years, he was the undisputed best point guard in the league. And, during those same years he was considered (other than Jordan and maybe Pippen) the best non-bigman in the league. Effin right, too, 'cause dude slayed me on so many diferrent levels. The things that use to kill me about GP was stuff like his post-game. Dude was the sickest post-up guard -- sub 6'5 -- in league history. He literally ran the offense out of the post like he was Magic or somethin. He also had the best left hand since Larry Bird and the illest floater ever. Straight up. PLus little things killed me too, like the way he would cock his head to the side when niggas use to press him on D, then he would smirk it all made up this aura like "nigga, get real. I'm not even fadin you, right now. next." His scoop shot was old-school. And the way back smaller guards down the court, with his head wobbling in the most arrogant of ways, was the new-school version of Earl The Pearl's steez when he used to bring the ball up.

Much like my Top 7 Hip Hop Producers List, G.P. doesn't crack the Top 5 for the same reason Pete Rock (my fav producer ever) didn't crack the Top 3: all the guards that I'm listing above GP impacted basketball in monumental ways. And this is not a "favorites" list or "best" list. It's a "greatest" list...and impact counts for almost as much as skill and accomplishment. These will be dudes that change the way basketball was played in a CONSPICUOUS way. But there's still a large part of me that says I'd pick GP over everyone besides Magic and Zeke if I had to win a game tomorrow.

Here's the problem...I'm done writing for tonight, so the Top 5 list must wait.