Rudy Gay, SF, Memphis Grizzlies (5): It's certainly no surprise that the first two gentlemen on this list play the bulk of their minutes at small forward. I have no doubt that his contribution in field-goal percentage will continue to increase for the balance of the season, so it's possible his 3.1 assists per game will end up being the weak link in his game, which seems about how it should be. Bear in mind, he was hovering right around 40 percent for the first month of the season and is currently at 51 percent for December. That's after shooting an impressive 48 percent from the floor (considering the shots he takes) for two straight seasons. Kevin Durant, SF, Oklahoma City Thunder (2): Amazingly, Durant's worst category this year on the Player Rater has been his shooting from the floor. (Players' current Player Rater ranking - based on per-game average stats - in parentheses.) I appreciate their all-around contributions and wish them luck in bumping those numbers above the league average in the coming weeks, but I have to draw a line somewhere. They have a combination of skills other guys just might not have.įor the record, LeBron James, Manu Ginobili, Wilson Chandler, and Mike Dunleavy missed being on this list by the slimmest of margins.
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They can step to the line and consistently make their free throws. They can block a shot, dribble down the other end, and knock down a 3-pointer (or pass for one). It may not seem at first like they are the best all-around players in basketball, but they do put together a combination of statistics unlike any other players. What follows is the complete list of players who contribute positively in every category the Player Rater measures (in terms of per-game average stats). In one category, these rankings can be an anomaly, but take all the categories together, and maybe we can start to figure out which players are good at everything (literally!). The Player Rater tells us how good individual players are at accumulating individual statistics relative to the league as a whole. This, I reasoned, is one instance in which fantasy basketball can help us. The other day, I started thinking about the term "all-around player." I rolled it around in my brain, and pretty quickly, I was looking at the Player Rater. If you want to argue that Michael Jordan is the greatest player of all time (which I do), you're going to lean pretty heavily on the six rings, but you're also going to lean on the insane combination of points, rebounds, assists, steals, and percentages - the exact numbers we would use if we were discussing his greatness in fantasy basketball. To be sure, statistics can't provide us with a complete picture, but it is also undeniable that when we discuss the long history of basketball, our discussion usually centers on numbers. Still, this line of thinking usually leads me into trying to figure out where fantasy basketball can - on some level - help me actually learn something about how actual basketball works. It has something to do with numbers, and probably the many hours I logged staring at basketball cards over the years. I don't play much anymore, yet I'm obsessed with basketball just as much as ever. Basketball has always been my favorite sport, but when I was a kid, I was not the type of kid who would sit and watch an entire game by halftime, I was usually out in the driveway playing. Often, I find myself considering the reasons I love fantasy basketball (I promise, this will not be some long-winded, post-holiday missive).
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