All-time NBA Players #37 - #33. Klay Thompson vs James Harden?
Relax, this is just to honor the greats
Eric Apricot says: This is an original series written by a friend of DubNationHQ.com. This analyzes and ranks the Top 75ish NBA players of all time. Some of you will be angered, some will think you can do better, but hopefully everyone can find something to enjoy in this journey appreciating the great historical achievements by past and present players.
The Top 75ish NBA Players series index with full details on the ranking process
We intend for the series pieces to come out each week, covering approximately 10 players per piece.
Notation: * Means active player.
37 James Harden (198 BEAST points)
Honors
Runner-up (5)
MVP (25)
MVP Runner-up points (18)
7x all nba (6x First Team) (20)
All Star (10)
3x Scoring Champion (15)
2x assists season leader (4)
6th man of the year (1)
Olympic Gold (3)
FIBA World Cup Gold (1)
Individual career stats
top 20 total points (15)
top 15 total assists (10)
top 5 threes (20)
top 30 steals (3)
top 30 points per game regular season (1)
top 30 assists per game regular season (1)
top ten threes per game regular season (3)
top 20 threes per game playoffs (3)
top 20 TS% regular season (5)
top 20 TS% playoffs (10)
top 30 Win Shares regular season (3)
top 30 Win Shares playoffs (15)
top 30 RAPM (5)
Bonus points
multiple 60 win games (2)
WTAF beastie?! He ain’t even that good!! Hold on, did you eat that entire tray of special brownies??
Try as I might I can’t find a legitimate way to dock one of my least favorite players of all time some points. He might drop down the charts slightly as his per game averages drop down over time at the tail end of his career but we’re talking only a few points there.
Meanwhile the advanced stats absolutely love him, showing some of the limitations on just relying on them. He’s obviously racked up the counting stats with his insane usage in Mike D’Antoni’s system. (As an aside do you know who is the Knicks all time single game record holder for assists? Chris Duhon! He had 22 against the Warriors that one time. Perhaps D’Antoni the point guard whisperer’s finest hour!)
Anyway back to Harden. He’s got tons of MVP runner-up points and All NBA accolades, as well as his actual MVP award which even I have to acknowledge was an all-time campaign deserving of said recognition.
So is it me that is the problem here? Let’s examine the case more objectively. Yes he made a living grifting the refs for years but is getting to the free throw line not a basketball skill in itself however boring and nauseating it is to watch? And for all that questionable grifting his actual basketball skill is undeniable. Few can score in isolation like he can, and while he’s been deployed as a classic iso-scorer he has also proven to be an outstanding playmaker for others when asked.
So then the case against him rests on a lack of postseason success. If James Worthy is Big Game James, then is James Harden Small Game James?
I have long held the view that this is down to two things. One, D’Antoni’s approach relied on big minutes and heavy usage throughout the regular season which racked up the stats and accolades but didn’t leave enough in the tank for the marathon of a deep playoff run (0-for-27 being the prime example of that). Two, the refs just don’t call the game so tightly in the playoffs, thereby limiting the impact of one of Harden’s main weapons.
On the other hand Harden’s Rockets came as close to anyone at knocking off the prime dynasty Warriors (though it never really felt that close…). As the dynamic 6th man on the young Thunder they probably wouldn’t have made the Finals without his contributions and his departure narrowed their window considerably.
I am left wondering whether Harden’s career could have been different in a system geared more towards a team-first, championship-winning approach rather than Daryl Morey’s analytically intense focus on threes and layups (which remains ringless), paired with D’Antoni’s heavy usage system (which also remains ringless). Sure it got him all those statistical accomplishments and the love of advanced stat models, but you can pretty confidently say now that he’ll never win a ring that way. There’s another super-crafty leftie who provides a potential counterfactual coming up.
Anyway this is further proof you can get a pretty high score from our beast without winning anything. Dialling down some of the points for stats and advanced metrics means other players elsewhere who may have a strong case get missed out. So I guess this is one of those cost of doing business things. I still don’t feel great about it.
36 Karl Malone (199 BEAST points)
Honors
2x Runner-up (top 3 player with Utah Jazz) (10)
Runner-up (role player with Lakers) (3)
MVP (1st extreme error; second under 50 games) (10)
MVP runner-up points (15)
14x All NBA (11x First Team) (39)
All Defense (8)
All Star (14)
2x Olympic Gold (6)
Individual career stats
Top 5 total scoring (25)
top 10 total rebounds (15)
top 15 total steals (10)
top 20 points per game regular season (2)
top 30 points per game playoffs (2)
top 5 Win Shares regular season (15)
top 20 Win Shares playoffs (20)
top 50 RAPM (3)
Bonus points
60-point game regular season (1)
50-point game playoffs (first round) (1)
One half of the Stockton-Malone Utah Jazz who operated the pick-and-roll like a metronome and made a lot of 90s basketball fans very sleepy. They at least made Jordan’s Bulls work for their last two rings.
Malone’s consistency and longevity, and a whole lot of his signature toddler-with-an-ear-infection dunks (mostly spoon fed by Stockton it must be said) vaulted him up the career scoring charts to somewhere where he honestly feels out of place.
On paper he’s a two-time MVP, but our beast isn’t falling for that. The second occurred in the 50-game lockout season so is reasonably reduced. The first one, awarded over Jordan when the Bulls put up a 69-win season, was beyond egregious. Indeed it might be the most ludicrous thing that’s ever happened in NBA voting. So no beast points for you!
As you can probably tell Malone was not one of my favorite players but you it’s another one where you can’t ignore the resume. Other YouTube videos are available.
35 Manu Ginobili (205 BEAST points)
Honors
4x Champion (1st ring + 4th ring not top 3) (80)
Runner-up (5)
2x All NBA (4)
All Star (2)
6th Man of the Year (1)
Olympic Gold vs USA (25)
Olympic MVP (non US) (10)
Olympic Bronze (1)
2x FIBA World Cup All Tournament team (2)
Euroleague (3)
Euroleague Finals MVP (2)
2x Euroleague Finals top scorer (2)
Italian League title (1)
2x Italian MVPs (2)
2x Italian Cup (2)
Individual career stats
top 10 Finals threes (10)
top 20 steals Finals (5)
top 30 threes per game Finals (2)
top 50 TS% regular season (1)
top 30 TS% playoffs (5)
top 30 Win Shares playoffs (15)
top 5 RAPM (20)
Bonus points
most consecutive seasons making playoffs (5)
A crafty leftie who actually won stuff. Four championships as part of one of the most consistent dynastic teams of all time, and that historic Olympic Gold against the US gives Manu the recognition he deserves. He might have come off the bench for a decent chunk of his time with the Spurs but he was unquestionably a core part of their success.
As for his international resume there is no greater honor than knocking off the US…
The inventor/ popularizer of the eurostep, Manu gave the Spurs a different gear and had the ability to do something completely unexpected once Tim Duncan had lulled everyone to sleep with a bevy of mid-range bank shots. The advanced stats models love him too, suggesting maybe they aren’t so bad after all. I find it astonishing he wasn’t on the NBA’s Top 75 personally.
*33 (tied) Klay Thompson (210 BEAST points)
Honors
4x Champion (assumed 4th best player on title teams, joint 3rd banana 2018) (50)
Repeat (not top 3) (5)
2x Runner-up (top 3 both times) (10)
5 consecutive Finals (15)
2x All NBA (4)
All Defense (2)
All Star (5)
single season three point leader (2)
Olympic Gold (3)
FIBA World Cup (1)
Individual career stats
top 5 total threes (20)
Top 5 total threes Finals (15)
top 30 total points in Finals (3)
top 30 total steals in Finals (3)
top 30 total blocks Finals (3)
4 top categories Finals (5)
top 5 threes per game regular season (5)
top 5 threes per game playoffs (10)
top 5 threes per game Finals (10)
top 20 TS% Finals (10)
Bonus points
73-wins (10)
16-1 in playoffs (not top 3 player) (5)
28 consecutive series with a win on the road (5)
24/8 win streak (2)
most points in a quarter (3)
most threes in regular season game (3)
60 point game (1)
Too high for big smokey? Controversially, of course, he was another snub from the NBA’s top 75. In time I predict that snub will look ridiculous and this placement less so.
Anyway here’s the case for Klay. If Reggie Miller and Ray Allen are top 75 players, then Klay Thompson is absolutely every bit as lethal a shooter as them. He was also, however, capable of the most insane explosions you’d ever see on a team with Steph Curry and Kevin Durant.
Neither Allen nor Miller ever had a performance like Klay’s OKC Game 6, which is one of the great playoff games of all time.
No-one else in NBA history has scored 37 points in a quarter.
How about 60 in three quarters?
Of course, the NBA record for threes in a game is his too…
On top of that Klay was a top-notch perimeter defender, taking on the toughest backcourt assignment every night whilst still being an explosive threat on the other end. Neither Allen nor Miller did that. Remember our beast loves defense by design.
In his prime, before the injuries, the Warriors were pretty much unbeatable because they had not one, but two, all time shooters bending the defense to breaking point. Between 2015 and 2022 they didn’t lose a playoff series with all three of Steph, Klay and Dray available for every game. We’ll see what the Warriors are like without him but even in his diminished form I fear that we will find we have greatly underestimated the impact his gravity and insane competitiveness (which might have contributed to the difficulties over the last season) had on the Warriors. That 2020-21 season without him wasn’t pretty.
For beastly senses the most questionable aspect of Klay’s ranking, which also relates to James Harden for what it’s worth, is the inclusion of three points per game. This does give volume three point shooters a boost, a fair few of them in the modern era. But somewhat counterintuitively removing it penalizes players like Reggie and Ray Allen. That’s because even with the greatly increased threes being launched nowadays those earlier shooting greats were such prolific outliers they still do pretty well out of it. So on balance I left it in to attempt to balance a bit more towards those older great shooters, with some hefty qualifiers to weed out specialists and modern chuckers (essentially someone has to be a qualifying player for this list, ie an All Star, also with a minimum number of attempts).
The most controversial thing for this site is probably what to do with his championship points given the plethora of riches the Warriors had. This is where we balance the reasonable argument that Reggie was a lone star on his team so should get more credit for any success. So Klay actually suffers in our beast metric for being on a stacked team - this isn’t just about rings. He has indeed sacrificed shit here.
To break it down in 2015 Draymond was the second best player and Iguodala was Finals MVP, yes wrongly but still he had a bigger impact on that series. In 2017 after Steph and KD, Dray was at his peak and named DPOY. Klay wasn’t actually that great in that playoffs, though he did have moments.
Skipping ahead in 2022 Klay might have led the team in minutes (you might say Kerr wtf, he’s coming off two career-threatening injuries!?) and had some important games (closeout games against Memphis - Game 6 - and Dallas, critical supporting efforts in Games 4 and 5 in the Finals) but even with Dray’s slightly uneven playoffs he was probably the top three player after Wiggins, especially in closing out the Celtics in Games 5 and 6. So it’s only 2018 where Klay’s getting some extra points where I’ve judged him and Dray to be probably about the same level (both critical pieces, another Game 6 for Klay!) and so do a banana points split.
Ironically in the two years they didn’t finish the job Klay was absolutely in the top 3. He led the charge in the 2016 playoffs while Steph was out, and then destroyed the entire KD OKC era in one fell swoop. In 2019 he might have been the Warriors best player in those Finals. I still think they would have won even without KD if he hadn’t been injured going back to Oakland tied at 1-1 and held out of Game 3, then hobbled in Game 4.
Even then, they absolutely would have won Game 6 against the Raptors without that career-altering injury and who’d have bet against them finishing the job with Klay playing at that level? You just know he’d have won Finals MVP over Steph too. As it was we had to settle for one of the all time toughest moments in Warriors history.
On the flip side he does get some team-wide credit for the enormous number of records the Warriors set. I think this is fair, and again, over time I predict when people look back at the only team in the history of the NBA other than the early Celtics to have made 5 consecutive NBA Finals, the team that holds the regular season wins record, and the team with the best playoff record ever, they might just think, “hm maybe they were actually that good.”
New thread up: https://dubnationhq.com/p/explain-scouting-your-new-2024-25
NBA: Lonzo making a comeback.
https://www.nbcsports.com/nba/news/lonzo-ball-says-he-has-brand-new-knee-i-think-ill-be-ready-for-the-first-game-for-sure