Defense is one of the more oft-overlooked aspects of basketball because it isnt as pretty as what happens on the offensive end. At 63, with a wingspan of almost 68, he has decent size. While Rose is slightly faster, Westbrook is slightly bigger. Chris Paul had the awkward situation this year of being smarter than his head coach, Vinny Del Negro. There arent a lot of players that could lock down Michael Jordan, the greatest player of all time. He was an All-Star every year of his career and led the Lakers to nine NBA Finals appearances. Mario Chalmers lacks the speed and athleticism of most point guards in the league, and as a result, he usually gets the best seat in the arena to see various point guards blowing by on the way to the rim. Over the last decade, the best point guards such as Stephen Curry, Damian Lillard, Chris Paul, Russell Westbrook, and others have dominated the position. He also knew when he needed to score, as evidenced by his 42-point performance in Game 6 of the 1980 NBA Finals for a Lakers team missing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. This year, without Rose, the Bulls were 23rd, at 21.0 points per game. What color was his tie? Tony Parker is one of the fastest players in the league if youre going by pure speed. His on-court coaching and leadership is probably the biggest reason the Clippers had the eighth most-efficient defense in the NBA last year. Exciting feature: Check out news exactly for YOU find "Recommended for you" block and enjoy! Who's the best offensive point guard of all time? Paul gets caught in a trap that WAM cant entirely avoid because it can only look at what happens, not why it happens. He gets easily overpowered when bigger point guards post him up. Bledsoe is not a great help defender, in spite of boasting a -4.9 net defensive rating. Hes not just ordinary quick, either; hes pesky-quick, with fast hands that dart in and take the ball out of the ball-handler's dribble with alarming frequency. While he does benefit from help defense, its not as often as you might think. He doesnt have to race around to get in position because hes almost never out of position. A decade of playing and a plethora of injuries havent helped him get any faster. No question hell be inducted into the Hall of Fame, and hes one of the greatest rim-attacking players in NBA history. He literally may be the least athletic guard in the Association. As Kyrie Irving showed in the decisive Game 7 versus the Warriors when he beat Stephen Curry to the game-winning jumper, Kyrie Irving is also one of the finest guards in NBA history, and he possesses some of the best hands of all time. They have value when there arent such extremes like the difference between Boozer and Gibson. He has two ways of guarding the isopray for help or flop. For a position that was highly valued at the time, he brought a lot of sparkle, style, scoring, and domination to the court. -- Adande, Nash is the only player in history to go 50-40-90 while averaging 10 assists per game. READ ALSO: James Harden's age: stats, contract, family, dating, net worth in 2022 and more. One of the greatest point guards ever, Jason Kidd could make the flashy pass or the simple play with the best of them while also loving to hightail it in transition to wear opponents down in. On and off the court, Dave Bing was an excellent high-scoring NBA point guard who achieved greatness. Were shooters able to shoot over them? That Paul was able to keep the Clippers on track through much of the season with the ever-changing defensive schemes the team had is pretty miraculous. He gives up too much space and still gets beaten. He doesnt help much, but he doesnt get a lot of help either, so its a bit of a wash. To his credit, he has the best WAM score of any point guard without a great defensive center to back him up. Refusing to back down because youre afraid of being put on a poster is a good thing, not a bad thing. Per Synergy, he forces turnovers 18.5 percent of the time, and he does so barely giving up any points. That helps him to dominate games defensively without having to leave the ground. In his 20 seasons, Bryant. Finally, both are improving on the defensive side of the ball. A defensive point guard will also pressure opponents in passing lanes in an attempt to generate steals and scoring opportunities for their own team. Steve Nash 7. Although Wilkens is best known as a head coach, he was once an outstanding athlete. The five best defensive point guards of all time Jarrod Castillo Dec 16, 2019; Oklahoma City, OK, USA; Oklahoma City Thunder guard Chris Paul (3) directs his team during a play against the. Damian Lillard's nuclear 71-point explosion Sunday night was jaw-dropping and somehow not all that surprising. When he went up and challenged DeAndre Jordan, and then got blown up, the entire basketball world acted like theyd just seen the greatest basketball play ever. Needless to say, you dont see a lot of LeBron-Jamesian-chase-down blocks from Conley. However, the other side of the ball cant be overlooked because as the saying goes: defense wins championships.. Only two other players besides Moncrief have won the NBAs defensive player of the year award twice. It also helps him to have the second-most defensive plays per 36 minutes of any of the point guards on this list. His length is better; he has a 65.75 wingspan. 2. Dennis Rodman 4. Photos: Top 10 NBA Point Guards Of All Time. Perhaps if hes in shoes and standing on a milk crate filled with milk, thats true. Even when he has to go under the pick, which is most of the time, hes so fast that hes able to close the distance before the ball-handler has time to do something with it. Total Defensive Plays per 36 Minutes, or TDP/36 is simply the total number of defensive rebounds, steals and blocks a player accrues every 36 minutes. But he jogs when he should run, is lackadaisical closing out shooters and goes through the motions when running through his rotations. The players are ranked according to their WAMS. Players like Deron Williams, Kyrie Irving and John Wall blew by him fairly consistently. They average the number of points a player gives up when he is the initial defender, and this is represented by defensive points per play. Hes pouring out effort every minute hes on the court. He doesnt make stupid mistakes, but he doesnt anticipate plays either. Rondo may not be big, but he doesnt know that. When you combine that with his 40-inch vertical, you have a player that gets higher (139 inches) than any point guard in the leagueeven Russell Westbrook. In fact, Rondo gives more help than he getscontrary to my previous opinion. Don't get me wrong: Steph is still the league's best shooter. Chris Paul is widely considered to be one of the best point guards of the 2010s. He tends to use that speed and athleticism well when hes in position, too. There arent many point guards in the league who can match Roses pure size and strength. Always free! In addition to the traditional role of the point guard, modern teams have found new ways to utilize the position. Here are the answers to some questions readers are likely to have. To create All-Time #NBArank, we put together a ballot with the 150 greatest players ever. Some would argue that just because he went to Harvard, it doesnt mean he has a high basketball IQ, or that book intelligence isnt the same thing. Also with both, theyve shown more success utilizing their physical attributes on the offensive end than the defensive end. Its like hes just punching the clock and collecting his wages. Even though he normally does, he shouldnt have to and wouldnt if he were playing smarter. First, a range of 18 to 22 makes it easier to arrive at the eventual score of 100the baseline everything was weighted to. James Harden's age: stats, contract, family, dating, net worth in 2022. We ranked the best point guards, determining the list with the help of B-R's position splits. After the opponent scores, it is typically the point guard who brings the ball down the court to begin an offensive play. -- Pelton, Today's children will ask, "Who was the Steph Curry before Steph Curry?" Some of this is hard to know whether to ascribe to Bledsoe or to his former coach, Vinny Del Negro, who hones his X's and O's skills by playing tic-tac-toe online. It doesnt help to be fast if you dont use it, so Bledsoes score here is lower than you might expect. Big Shot, is one of the finest point guard leaders in the NBA. On the flip side, Westbrook's 4.13 turnovers per game average is the highest all-time, with Johnson (3. . The game has been graced by several incredible players whose names live on even after they retire. 5 (1980, 1982, 1985, 1987, 1988), Career stats Thats rarely going to be because of a mental error, though. Even the fastest point guards tend to get bottled up. It is startling to see the regularity with which opponents blow past Deron Williams. Hell go flying outside the play, right as his man catches the ball, and then hell not only have to make up that ground, but hell also have to fight through the pick. Take, for example, Carlos Boozer in 2012. At the very least, he could stab those quick hands of his at some more balls and disrupt the dribble from behind. He and Chris Paul are the contenders for smartest defensive point guard in the game today. In order to answer that, we introduce Weighted Averaged Metrics (WAM) and WAM with Scouting (WAMS), a pair of advanced defensive metrics which combine other stats and metrics, weight them so that each represents an equal relative value, and then use them all to derive a final score. His MVP season, he had the second-best block total by a point guard in history (although John Wall exceeded that total last year.). Anyways, we hope you enjoyed going through the rankings with Magic Johnson securing first place in the Top 10 NBA point guards of all time. He was the league's third player to reach 25,000 points (after Wilt Chamberlain and Oscar Robertson). His 48.8 DWS is 48th all-time and the fourth most by a point guard. With his athleticism and speed, there is no way that Rose should get beaten off the dribble as often as he does. While no one always guards the best player, some players are much more likely to be guarding the other teams elite players, which makes them appear weaker defensively. As a result, opponents shot 42.9 percent from deep against him in the pick-and-roll. That makes him eligible for inclusion on this list of best point guards. His quick feet give him tremendous lateral movement. There are times where he makes a bone-headed gamble and loses, trying to get the extra steal, but thats about the only flaw there is with him mentally. Sometimes his teammates bailed him out; sometimes the shot just didnt go in. What he gives up at the point of attack, he makes up for with his team defense. Surely the most underappreciated great player in NBA history because he was quietly dependable rather than flashy and never broke through on the biggest stage. Rose is arguably the most athletic point guard in the league, though Russell Westbrook could present a challenge. Because they each feel a different thing, an argument arises as to who is right. -- Doolittle, Perhaps someday Paul will reach the conference finals and we can focus more on his incredible accomplishments as a scorer, distributor and defender and less on his teams' inability to turn them into deep playoff runs. Players Stats: 17.7 PPG, 3.3 RPG, 8.2 APG, 1.6 SPG, 0.1 BPG, Honors: 5x All-Star, 5x All-NBA Selection. Simply put, defensive win shares (DWS) are defined by how many wins a player produces based on his defensive ability. His high rebound rate, while partly indicative of his speed is also a result of positioning, which relates to his IQ. He doesnt have overwhelming effort that blows you away, but he has earnest effort. There are a number of different types of metrics available from various websites.