What a tough exercise.
https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nca...nded-bracket-era/4y8yasn2xsyx1vxykm2il4mg8/62
https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nca...nded-bracket-era/4y8yasn2xsyx1vxykm2il4mg8/62
Sporting News best 68 players of the 68 team NCAA era
- Thread starter boilerzz
- Start date
Maybe he should be ahead of Kevin Durant but why would he be ahead of anybody else?
I counted 15 players ahead of him that didn't have a national title on their resume. Some even a final four. Davis won every award imaginable. Not to mention, he's just a better player than a lot of the guys in front of him. If you are a better player, and accomplished more, how do you get ranked that low?
Some people just value longevity more. Davis had one of the greatest seasons in CBB history but it was just 1 year. Many of those guys ahead of him were 4 year starters, have several school records and were named to multiple All-American teams.
It's kind of like if Mike Trout retired today, who would be considered the better all time player, him or Pete Rose? One is clearly superior to the other but a lot of people would value the longer career over the other.
Probably not. But we should all take the author's rankings with a grade of slaw. Tell me wtf this is even supposed to mean;
"Manning also was a major contributor as a manager on the 2006 Kansas team that lost in the national semifinal."
Yeah, that's weird. Didn't even get the year right.
I think it looks fairly good overall. Wouldn't have Hansbrough nearly that high though.
Durant was as dominant of a scorer as I've seen since following the game. If he was on, there was nothing you could do. I'll take the dominant scorer over the dominant shot-blocker.
I’ll take the guy who won the national title over the guy who didn’t. We are taking accomplishments into consideration, obviously.
One of your reasons for having Davis higher than most everybody ahead of him was because he's a better player. Well, Durant was a better player than Davis so the argument has some validity to it, atleast in your eyes it should.
No, my main reasons were they weren’t as accomplished as Davis OR better than him. I said there were 15 players on that list that didn’t win the title and some of them hasn’t even made a final four. Davis is more accomplished than Durant in college. Obviously Durant is an all world talent but all things considered he shouldn’t be above AD
This is basketball. It's a team sport. Davis played on a much better team than Durant did. Had Durant been on 2012 Kentucky they may have gone 40-0. We don't know. What we do know though is Durant is probably the better player between the 2 so it's not yikes to think he belongs higher on the list.
I never have liked the reasoning for why Player A is better than Player B is how many titles one won over the other. I feel like that didn't really become a thing until ESPN started including former NBA players on their panels. That's literally their main argument for why Player A is better than Player B. It's always been kind of silly to me. It's a team sport. There's been several players who didn't win titles who were better than guys who were the main player on a title winning team. The difference between them shouldn't come down to who won and who didn't.
I agree it is difficult to rank the two. There really is no wrong answer, however I do think Durant was the better basketball player.
You can throw Zion and maybe Carmelo into the mix as well. Those 4 are pretty interchangeable, IMO.
It should if that’s the criteria the list is using. Which it obviously is taking accomplishments into consideration.
Durant probably is the better player. I guess I’m just questioning the criteria being used.
This list puts way too much into longevity over talent. Durant and Davis wayyy too low.
I thought the same thing when I read the list. he should be ahead of Durant for sure, but that's it. Everyone else has him either crushed with longevity. Aside from Durant, only 2 players ahead of him played less than 3 seasons, LJ and Big Dog. LJ is obvious with 2 FF and a national title to go along with his dominant play. Big Dog scored 1700 in two seasons and went to an elite 8. AD didn't even get 600 career points despite his amazing 1 year run.
It’s a common saying.
“Take this with a grade of slaw”
What are you? Some kind of pre-Madonna where you’re out of touch with the common folk and their lingo?
I would put him ahead of Durant, but everyone else on that list had a better college career. Most of the guys who didn't win titles had 2000+ points and many post season accolades over multiple seasons.
I think the classification title is rather dumb. How about the top 68 performers since the 68 field began.And the 68 field began much later than their inclusion. So their time frame is even incorrect.
If you didn't do great things in the tournament, you don't belong on the list. And if you played before the 68 team inclusion, well its damn obvious lol
If you didn't do great things in the tournament, you don't belong on the list. And if you played before the 68 team inclusion, well its damn obvious lol
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For all intensive purposes you should do your do diligence on the saying “grade of slaw”.
im fine with that. But if that’s true, than you have to move both of them into the top 10 easily.
I didn't say that. But your reasoning of that he won a title and others didn't is largely irrelevant to the discussion.
So accomplishments are largely irrelevant to who the best basketball player has been? Just making sure I read that right.
Yeah, this...I mean, pretty sure when Keith Lee guided Memphis State to the FF in 1985, there were only 64 teams....I mean, ****, they're not even Memphis State anymore. Same with Manning at KU....Alford with Indiana....And many, man more.
Stupid article.
Titles are largely a team dynamic. That Kentucky team won a title because AD was there but also because they were loaded. Hell, you had 6 dudes drafted that year, including #1 and #2. UK might have won a title without AD.
A guy like Glenn Robinson (last player to average 30 and 10) fell short because he played with a bunch of dudes you've never heard of. Should that instantly make AD better than him?
It’s not all black and white, though. Davis won every award in the book that year. Take away his title and he still has a list full of accomplishments and records. Does Glenn Robinson? Probably not.
I’m not arguing he should be first, maybe not even top ten. But 28 is a joke of a ranking if we are considering absolutely everything in our criteria.
Well, Glenn Robinson was National Player of the Year and the #1 pick in the draft while scoring more than 1,000 points in a single season so.....
Memphis had some great runs under Bartow, Kirk and Finch. Kirk just wasn't very good at cheating. Bartow was hence the UCLA job lol
