<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> May 18 -- Welcome to TAKE FIVE, where we take five quick questions and NBA players and legends turn them into compelling answers. A five-time All-Star, Tim Hardaway is credited with having, perhaps, the best crossover in NBA history. His ?killer crossover?, which he patented in college when it was deemed the ?UTEP two-step?, has been often imitated but never duplicated. Hardaway averaged 17.7 points and 8.2 assists for his career, most notably with the Warriors and Heat. He scored 38 points in Miami's Game 7 win in the 1997 Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Knicks. Hardaway became the second-fastest player to reach 5,000 points/2,500 assists (262 games) behind Oscar Robertson. Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE/Getty Images Q: While you spent some great years in Golden State, would you consider Miami to be your NBA home? Hardaway: If I had to pick one, my NBA home would be Miami because I love the weather. I love the atmosphere down here ? everything down here is nice. Q: Do you have a specific playoff moment, either with a team or as an individual that you can look back on and say ?That was my greatest playoff moment?? Hardaway: When we beat the Knicks in seven games here in Miami and we went to the Eastern Conference Finals. In the Eastern Conference Finals, we lost against the Bulls, but beating the Knicks down here, that is one of my greatest and finest moments that I think about. Q: Does anybody have a ?killer crossover? in the league today that rivals yours? Hardaway: No. No one. (Laughs) Everybody else carries or does something else. Nobody else really, really has my crossover where I come down and cross somebody over and deke somebody ? nobody has that. Q: What player in the NBA today most reminds you of yourself? Hardaway: Baron Davis. Baron Davis reminds me of myself because he always wants the ball in crucial stages of the game and he always gives his team a chance to win every night. Q: Who is your favorite player to watch in today?s game? Hardaway: Oh man, there are a few guys who are my favorites to watch. Dwyane Wade is one. Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Allen Iverson, Tim Duncan, Dirk, Steve Nash ? there are a whole bunch of guys I love to watch just play because they go out and play with great confidence and they just really understand the game. </div> http://www.nba.com/features/takefive_index.html
I love Tim Hardaway, he has all the qualities I like in a point guard (brains, leadership, quickness, a shot. Too bad about the injuries...
Baron does remind me of old Timmy in a few ways, but both Tim's bad qualities as well as good. For some of the good, they both have pretty good assist-to-turnover ratios, great dribbling skills, great scoring and dishing skills, and great rebounding from guards. But for the bad, the mid-season injuries, the sometimes too-much-love for the three ball also echo in Baron.
Yeah the thee ball... forgot about that. But take the good with the bad. He (Tim Hardaway) was a lock for a double double. Plus, nobody could do the crossover like he could without actually carrying the ball. I like A.I.'s crossover though.
Baron's signature dribble is that behind-the-back circle, although it's a lot of wasted motion, it works. I've looked that Timmy's crossover so many times, I still can't figure how he controls it like that.
Timmy was a fearsome leader when the Warriors were nothing, rudder-less. He breathed life back in the franchise. However, when the '94 Webber team formed, Timmy and Chris were on the outside looking in. Man that '94 team, Webber, Owens, Sprewell, Gatling, Avery Johnson, was fun to watch. Damn.
Webber + Spree would have been killer inside/outside duo. But unfortunately one was a whiner with future knee problems that would never live down the infamous technical foul incident... ...and the other was a headcoach strangler with future claims that he would never live down the insult of being compensated enough to feed his family on just the MLE alone (even with his spinning rims business and while trying to win a ring with Kevin Garnett). The truth is we should have kept the good guys like Hardaway, Mullin, and Richmond because they loved Warriors basketball enough to come back later on or at least discuss it.
This is why talent + a good attitude is so valuable. There are so many franchise players that are franchise killers at the same time. Which is why I love Monta, he lived in a tough neighborhood like other players such as Starbury, Steve Francis, etc. But he has a completely different personality, one that will make him great. I have hopes of him becoming a star in a Warriors uniform.
I want to also see Ike Diogu/Andris Biedrins do well. I think a Timmy Hardaway guard could be so much better if there's a legit inside presence as an option to throw to and reward him with an assist. Ike, of course, is the most polished, but Biedrins has signs he could be talented. I admire any prospect that has a chance to dominate inside. It will be interesting to see how 2005 #9 pick Ike Diogu will turn out. This is because some felt we should have taken projects like Gerald Green or Andrew Bynum or guys like college senior Danny Granger. Some were also rooting for Taft who we ended up getting in the second round anyway or Vasquez that Spanish dude who chickened out of the nba. Others were Hakim Warrick (blehhh no true position yet) or Sean May (injured, but good, but possible flavor of the year because he beat up on an ncca opponent with no inside presence and was surrounded by many stars). I tend to think Diogu would be higher rated than Sean May because he was a proven solo star player on his team in a relatively skilled conference who was dominating for a few years even as a Freshman. Meanwhile, May is in a better conference, but he's got lots of help from other future nba players... sort of like how Dunleavy had lots of help from other Duke players. I can't name one ASU guy outside of Diogu... but I could name a whole bunch from North Carolina that year or Duke or UConn. So maybe May could be better or equal to Diogu since he has more competition that could become or currently are nba players... Both May and Diogu have similar games in some ways with of course Diogu being a little more energetic, swift of foot, and with a longer range shot.
