NBA Blog

Alright, so immediately after I posted my story about Tim Duncan being the greatest power forward of all time, there were numerous attacks demanding I look at the facts.  They all requested that I place Kevin Garnett ahead of Tim Duncan.  Just ain’t happening.  Sorry.  Too bad.  I don’t care how many times you say that Tim has had better support around him.  Anyway, I will go ahead and counter some of their arguments for you.

One person had the gall to say that Tim’s supporting cast was better, because he had Hall of Famer David Robinson alongside of him for two championships.  You will never, EVER hear me say anything negative about The Admiral, who I believe is the greatest human being to ever play professional sports.  However, David was not even a shell of himself during his final season, which was championship number two.  Check out his stats that season.  Then, that person went on to use the name Rasho Nesterovic, which completely discounted his opinion.  Hello, the Spurs signed Rasho from Minnesota (go here to refresh your memory).  He was playing alongside Kevin Garnett first where he had his best statistical season, and Rasho lost his job to Nazr Mohammed during championship number 3.  Yes, that is the same Nazr Mohammed who started 33 games for the Pistons this season.  The point being, Tim took Rasho a heck of a lot farther than K.G. was able to do.  In my opinion, Rasho was worthless in both locations.  Meanwhile, Nazr Mohammed has been worthless in Atlanta, Detroit, and New York.  The only time he was relevant and useful was during his late season play after being dealt to the Spurs during 2005.  Other than that, he’s been a stiff.  I think that production had something to do with the guy on the other end of the post with him. 

Also, during the first title season, Tim was the only All Star.  The rest of his starting five consisted of severly UNDERRATED Avery Johnson, the rapidly aging Mario Elie, Sean Elliott on dialysis (seriously because of his kidney failure, yet he played his tail off every game of the postseason), and David Robinson who was having serious back problems by that time. 

During the second title season, Tony Parker was still figuring it out, and even spent the majority of the finals series on the bench being replaced by Speedy Claxton.  Manu Ginobili was still figuring the NBA out, and Stephen Jackson, when not losing his mind, was the second most important player on that roster.  Oh yeah, go ahead and check out Tim’s stat line in the closeout game.

During title number three (2005), Tim once again had a monster game in game 7.  This was his most frustrating NBA finals, and arguably, Manu Ginobili could have been the Finals MVP.  Instead, Tim got Finals MVP number three to go along with his three titles.  This team, however, began to show the evolution of the Spurs, especially when they ran through the Mavericks and the Suns, outscoring their running-and-gunning opponents as well as beating them up defensively.  And who can forget Robert Horry’s 21-point performance?

During this last title, which by my count is four, the Spurs continued their push towards a higher octane offense, despite the incessant labeling of ‘team vanilla’ by the media.  Once again, that makes four titles in ten years.  The first one came during Tim’s second season.  Each of these titles have had different key players, except for these last two where the Spurs have relied on the three-headed monster of Tim-Tony-Manu.  The 1999 title team and the 2003 title team were completely different rosters, with the only returning players being David Robinson, Tim Duncan, and Steve Kerr.  Yep, you read that right.  If you really need more information than this, I’ll let USA Today break it down for you as well.

Is Tim as entertaining as Kevin Garnett?  Hell no.  I once watched K.G. get all in Steve Nash’s grits as Nash tried to break him down off the dribble on the defensive end.  All Garnett did was man him up, beat Nash to every spot, and then clap in Nash’s face as Steve got frustrated.  That was during a first-round playoff series against Dallas.  The problem, Minnesota lost.  That is exactly what they’ve done every year in the postseason since K.G. became their guy (with the exception of the first year of the Sam Cassell, Latrell Sprewell experiment).  Has K.G. had a lot of help from the front office?  No.  In fact, that front office has been, in my opinion, the worst in basketball over the last six years.  I know that such a statement pisses off Billy Knight, Billy King, and Elgin Baylor.  However, this was a franchise that had players pining to play alongside Garnett, unlike Atlanta.  K.G. was also willing to openly accept a potential star, unlike Philly, who had to ship out potential stars like Larry Hughes and Jerry Stackhouse during the early Iverson years.  And Elgin Baylor actually fleeced Kevin McHale in the Cassell-Jaric swap.  Unbelievable, when Elgin, the veteran of the lottery process, makes you look dumb as a general manager, you know you are in over your head.

The only problem, Kevin Garnett, the supposed greatest power forward of all time, has missed three consecutive postseasons.  Three.  There is no way that happens when over half of the NBA teams get into the postseason.  Therein lies the problem.  As it stands right now, with Duncan’s four titles and K.G.’s one foray into the second round of the playoffs, this argument is somewhat (repeat, somewhat) like comparing Tracy McGrady to Kobe Bryant.  (By the way, Tracy is the other uber-talented star to never play in a second round).  Much to my chagrin (and Tracy’s), Kobe has three rings while T-Mac can’t get out of the first round.  Has Kobe had a better supporting cast? Um, yeah, until recently, yet without Shaq, Kobe has gone just as far as T-Mac has gone (with Yao). 

Their regular season statistics are very close, with Tim edging out K.G. in field goal %.  But, I will break it down accordingly for everyone, because I am the person who believes that winning is the most important factor of them all.

Tim                                                           K.G.
4 titles                                                     0 titles
2 regular season M.V.P.’s                        1 regular season M.V.P.’s
3 Finals M.V.P.’s                                       0 Finals M.V.P.’s
4-0 in NBA Finals                                      0 NBA Finals

By the way, Tim has been higher in voting for regular season MVP and Defensive Player of the Year for the duration of his career.  Even when nobody is talking about him, just like this past regular season, he ends up finishing in the top-3 in both categories.  Just thought I would throw that in there for good measure.