Stats don't Lie

Posted by kplumley on 12-21-2007 in Who is currently the best player in the NBA?

When you talk about the best player it gets difficult because of what you look at when you decide who is the best player. Are you looking at winning, or at offense, defense, or what. When you look at a player all around I think it does become clear that their are only really a couple of players who could be called the best.
The first of these would be Dwight Howard. With all due respect to Duncan, who is one of the if not the best pf of all time, Howard has taken over the top big man role, 23-15-3 is just too much to ignore. Combined with the fact that he is on a winning team, even in the east, that has managed to take down a tough Boston team.
The next one would be the commonly claimed Kobe Bryant. Averaging 27-6-5 along with 2 steals puts him in big number land. In addition to this he has his team winning in the tough west, including a big win against the suns early on.
The last player who I feel deserves discussion is LeBron James. The numbers he has put up have been insane so far this year, 30-7.5-7.5 along with 2 steals and 1.25 blocks. Well he certainly has some flaws, mostly on the ft lane, and beyond the arc, along with some questions on defense, I still feel that those huge Jordan like numbers, compared to Jordan's best overall season of 32.5-8-8-3-1. I think coming this close to those numbers is super impressive, along with the fact that James is pretty much singlehandedly keeping the Cavs afloat as seen when he went down recently.