Yes, but again - what's Malone without Stockton? Stockton/Malone and Payton/Kemp are packages that can't be separated. Malone without Stockton wouldn't have gone anywhere. Stockton/Payton made those teams work. And I do agree that SAC should have advanced to the Finals - that was a travesty.
Well yeah, but that can be said about any championship team. What's Jordan without Pippen, what's Magic without Kareem, what's bord without Parish and McHale? You can go down the list and say that for any tandem.
Jordan, Magic, and Bird were all transcendent players and didn't RELY on others, they were relied upon. Over the past couple decades there have been numerous examples of teams trying to build around some of the best PFs and not going very far. There's a clear pattern that teams with PFs as their centerpiece just don't work as well as teams with guards/wings as their centerpiece. Setting aside transcendence there are only two teams (SEA/UTH) in the last 30 years that made it to the Finals with a team "built around" a PF...and even then, the PG was just as, if not more, important to the team's success.
Jordan had 7 years without Pippen and failed to get past the second round. Kobe required Shaq and Gasol. Shaq couldn't do it by himself, Kobe couldn't do it by himself. LBJ couldn't do it by himself either. Even Magic couldn't. And let's talk about Duncan.... Without Robinson the first title, it wouldn't have happened. Without Parker or Ginobli it wouldn't happen thereafter.
Nobody can do it alone. That doesn't change the fact that teams built around PFs don't get to the Finals (very often).
Why ignore dirk then from that? Because it was only one year they won? They made it one other time and were consistently a top team in the west. Pointing to Iverson and Clyde to support your opinion and ignoring dirk makes no sense. For every example you use, there's plenty to counter. McGrady never getting out of the first round. Carmelo. Dominique. jerry Stackhouse. Why use Iverson and ignore dirk?
And that's all I'm getting at - building around PFs will only get you so far. And now maybe you'll understand that my distaste for LMA stems from my belief that you don't build around PFs. All of the evidence suggests that PFs don't win championships. PFs should be ancillary players, not your highest paid, go-to player.
I said if you want to count Dirk, feel free. I personally don't because I feel like it was a one-and-done fluke - an exception to the rule. As I've already illustrated using the best PFs from the past 30 years, building around them doesn't work. You're countering my apples with oranges. If you could provide examples (other than "transcendent" Duncan/Dirk or the Payton/Kemp and Stockton/Malone "duos" already discussed) of teams built around PFs that made it to the Finals, then that would be an apples to apples counter.
Having a power forward as your #1 has generally been a hard life for most teams (in terms of Championships, not including the spurs).
But ALL the evidence doesn't support that. You make excuses knocking pfs, ignoring similar benefits of wing players. Iverson missed the playoffs more often than he made them and yet you use him as someone easy to build around?
To be fair, Philly gave Iverson so very little to work with. He was basically LeBron in his first stint of Cleveland in terms of talent around him.
wait so take out transcendant talent, take or dirk, and take out anyone who played with another great player. Well shit. If you or that many criteria on finding one, then sure. What wings are you going with? Can we also eliminate those that played with another top player?
My point is about teams built around PFs. There are 28 teams that miss the Finals every year - a good portion of them are going to be lead by wings, so there will be a lot of "evidence" showing that wings don't make it to the Finals (except it's not evidence of anything). But of the two teams that make the Finals each year, hardly any of them are headlined by a PF. I'm not sure why that's difficult to understand.
But most of those teams making the finals are lead by transcendent talent like LeBron, Durant, Jordan. So if you take out Duncan, we take those out as well. Then what teams are you left with?
