Re: Mark's points about points

["Berry, Mark S" <berrym@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Josh wrote:

And of course, the history of the
league is filled with great scorers and shooters who
were also great point guards (Cousy, Isiah, Fat Lever,
Magic, Oscar, Kevin Johnson, Tiny Archibald, etc.).

--- end ---

Yeah, I didn't do a very good job of expressing what I wanted to express. I
know there were great shooters/scorers who also were good point guards, and
your list is a good one. What I was trying to say is no player who was a
shooter first ever was a great point guard. In other words (again, I'm
mangling this), even the great scoring point guards thought pass first and
understood that their first job was to help their teammates. There have been
other shoot-first, me-first types who have played point guard (Iverson,
Marbury come to mind recently), but none of them have been great point
guards. They're still good players, obviously, but they're not great point
guards because they operate from the wrong direction-get my shot first, and
if I can't, then get it to someone else. Again, it's a subtle difference
that can be masked by stats (Marbury has a good assist average, but watch
him play).

Bird, who as Josh pointed out was a dominant scorer, was committed to making
his teammates better. He always was looking for the better shot for the
team-whether that was McHale, Maxwell, Parish or whoever. Sometimes it was
him. Antoine (and this REALLY isn't meant to be a knock on Antoine-rather on
the way they plan to use him) looks for his shot first and passes when it
isn't there. Subtle difference, but significant.

I don't know if that's any more clear or not.

Mark