SB Nation Arizona Editor's Pick

BSOTS Positional Rankings - RESULTS

by brian13 on Oct 29, 2011 5:16 PM MST

Results are in

Point Guards

Honorable Mention (in order of votes): LeBron James, Rajon Rondo, Andre Miller

Shooting Guards

Honorable Mention (in order of votes): Kevin Martin, James Harden, Monta Ellis, Brandon Roy

Small Forwards

Kevin Durant (1.4)
Lebron James (1.6)
Carmelo Anthony (3.8)
Paul Pierce (4.8)
Danny Granger (4.9)

Honorable Mention (in order of votes): Luol Deng, Gerald Wallace, Grant Hill, Andre Iguodala, Rudy Gay, Shawn Marion

Power Forwards

Honorable Mention (in order of votes): LaMarcus Aldridge, Lamar Odom, Josh Smith, Chris Bosh

Centers

Dwight Howard (1.0)
Al Horford (3.8)
Andrew Bogut (4.5)
Joakim Noah (4.8)
Marc Gasol (4.9)

Honorable Mention (in order of votes): Andrew Bynum, Tyson Chandler, Nene Hilario, Marcin Gortat, Amare Stoudemire, Pau Gasol, Tim Duncan

Some semi-interesting notes:

Seems pretty obvious, but Dwight Howard was the only consensus #1 at his position. Dirk almost got there, but had one 2nd place vote.
The race for the #1 shooting guard and small forward were the closest with both Durant and DWade receiving 2 extra 1st place votes. Remember those LeBron vs. Kobe commercials debating who the best player in the league was? Guess those times are over.
Even with the obvious bias that comes with ranking players on a team blog, we only ended up with the 4th best PG and that's it.
Sorry SNQP and flagsuns, including Hakim Warrick on any top 5 ranking that isn't "NBA player most likely to be blown over by a gust of wind" gets your ranking omitted.
Former Suns who made the list include Amare Stoudemire (#2 PF) and Joe Johnson (#4 SG).
Future 2012 free agents who made the list were ,, Dwight Howard (#1 C)
All five of the top point guards will be free agents in 2012. Steve Nash (#4 PG) will be an unrestricted FA, Chris Paul (#1 PG) and Deron Williams (#3 PG) both have player options, and both Derrick Rose (#2 PG) and Russell Westbrook (#5 PG) will have qualifying offers.
The only other 2012 FA on the list is Dwight Howard (#1 C). Marc Gasol (#5 C) is a FA right now.
12 of the 30 teams in the league don't have a top 5 player at their positions (Charlotte, Cleveland, Denver, Detroit, Golden State, Houston, Minnesota, Portland, Sacramento, Toronto, Utah, and Washington).
7 of the 30 teams have 2 players that made the list (Atlanta, Chicago, LA Lakers, Memphis, Miami, New York, and Oklahoma City)

Thanks to everyone who posted their rankings. To everyone else, I stick my tongue out at you. I'll leave it with a poll.

Poll

Out of the #1 ranked players. Choose the top dog.

Chris Paul

2 votes

Dwyane Wade

4 votes

Kevin Durant

12 votes

Dirk Nowitzki

19 votes

Dwight Howard

12 votes

49 votes | Poll has closed

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Comments

Chris Paul? WTH??

He’s too overrated. No way he’s top 1.

I don't know what to put in my sig.

by shawndy on Oct 29, 2011 8:19 PM MST reply actions

Right now it's Dirk.

He led his team to an NBA Championship without any all-star help (I think). However, he did have like 11 good role players.

Steve Nash has 4 good role players. Using the above logic, that means we just need to get 7 more of em and we’re a contender. Either that or an all-star or two. Which would be easier?

Don't trade Dudley!

by Beavis 25 on Oct 30, 2011 1:52 PM MST reply actions

I believe

that it’ll be easier for Lee-Brawn to cure his receding hairline than it would be for our team to acquire those All-Stars to compliment our beloved old sage of a point guard.

I will love Steve Nash... forever and always.

by NashMV3 on Oct 30, 2011 8:36 PM MST up reply actions

Your actually right.

He could always get transplants.

Don't trade Dudley!

by Beavis 25 on Oct 30, 2011 8:54 PM MST up reply actions

I think reports of Kobe's demise may be premature.

Add him to the list of players that may benefit from a truncated season.

I think we did pretty good. Lebron’s stock is at an all-time low right now (he’s only maybe top 5 instead of 1 or 2). I think he’s still the most talented player in the game, but how can he be the BEST player after the disappearing act he did in the finals last year.

I think we did pretty good on our rankings. Thanks for putting this together.

It was only called the mildly irritated house on McDowell until I showed up.

by Jim Coughenour on Oct 31, 2011 9:31 AM MST reply actions

I was wondering if there would be much difference between our ranking vs other teams fans rankings

So I took a look at ESPNs ranks and compared them to ours thinking that might be close enough.

Similarities/Differences

Our top 5 Point Guards and Shooting Guards matched exactly.
Small Forwards matched except for the swap of LeBron and Durant. They also had Rudy Gay as #5 instead of Danny Granger. (Their order: LeBron, Durant, Melo, Pierce, Gay)
For Power Forwards, we both had Dirk #1. They had Kevin Love instead of Zach Randolph and 2-5 was switched around a bit. (Their order: Dirk, Blake, Pau, Amare, Love)
Center rankings were similar to the PF ranks in that we had the same #1. This time it was Dwight. They also had Duncan on the list in place of Bogut who didn’t make theirs. (Their order: Dwight, Duncan, Horford, M. Gasol, Noah)

Re-sign BAMF.

by brian13 on Oct 31, 2011 1:26 PM MST reply actions

Overall, I like our list better.

Even though I voted LeBron #1 at SF, I think it’s fair to knock him down after his finals performance. Rudy Gay and Danny Granger are toss-ups. They’re nearly equal on every stat line you look at, even sporting the same PER of 17.8.

I would say Zach Randolph and Kevin Love are in the same tier of PFs along with possibly Blake and Aldridge. Blake and Love may have more upside, but just as we knocked LeBron down for his postseason play, I think it’s fair to bump up Randolph for his.

ESPNs rank of Timmy in their #NBARank was one of their worst overratings. He’s no where near the player he used to be and having him that high was definitely more of a lifetime achievement award than a current evaluation of his play. Not to say he doesn’t deserve to be on the top 5 center list at all, but definitely not #2.

Re-sign BAMF.

by brian13 on Oct 31, 2011 1:35 PM MST up reply actions

It's funny.

I always thought of Horford as a PF. When it comes to guarding other centers, it seems like he’s so undersized. I guess he’s a bit like Timmy in that regard.

I definitely agree about Duncan being placed too high. I was a bit surprised to find out ESPN had Wade over Kobe in the SG ratings because we all know how much the mothership loves Kobe & LeBron. Wade’s always been one of my favorite players but his joining forces with LeBron definitely isn’t one of his brighter ideas.

I will love Steve Nash... forever and always.

by NashMV3 on Oct 31, 2011 1:56 PM MST up reply actions