100 Greatest NBA Players (The Ultimate List)

[BasketballJedi]

You're right, Neil Paine, it's not quite that simple. You and others here are brilliant analysts and statisticians, but I think that coaching and team philosophy plays an important role in this as much as anything else. It's the same reason why, for one of many examples, some in basketball circles think Chris Bosh of Miami is more talented than his pedestrian numbers indicate; he's being asked to execute roles for his team that don't take full advantage of his own skillset (shooting midrange jumpers to space the floor for LeBron James and Dwyane Wade in the post). It's also why, for another one of many examples, many rolled their eyes at the hiring of Mike D'Antoni as coach of the Los Angeles Lakers; for he has demonstrated that he would rather fit the skills of his personnel to his preconceived offense, instead of approaching this the other way around. Even metrics like RAPM can swing and miss when you apply them at face value, without carefully accounting for other nuances and influences that can affect on-court action.

In a complex sport with many variables that affect team dynamics and perofmance; we need to do better than generic, blanket statements such as "Dantley held the ball too long, that's why the Utah Jazz offense was mediocre". The numbers are interesting, and are worth researching, but we're doing ourselves a disservice by drawing hasty conclusions from the numbers that (by own own admissions) are incomplete in some manner.

For the record, I believe that Dantley's case falls somewhere-between: a truly great offensive player whose mercurial personality affected his teams. But, as stated before, it's not that simple.

[AcrossTheCourt]

The 1983 Jazz were 9-14 (.391) when Dantley went down for the season; finishing 30-52, they were 21-38 (.356) without him. Just a couple of wins less than that .391 pace.

Dean Oliver used to say certain players will drag a team toward mediocrity. If it's a lousy team, that's good. If it's a team full of good players, it's not good.

It's worth noting that Dumars missed 13 games with Dantley still on the team and none with Aguirre.

The 1989 Pistons were 54-15 (.783) with Dumars in the regular season, and 9-4 (.692) without him.

The 1983 Jazz, as I showed up, were actually worse with Dantley.

After the 1986 season, the Jazz traded Dantley at the height of his powers for Kelly Tripucka and Kent Benson. Kelly Tripucka was actually a pretty big scorer (20 a game) who made all-star teams, but on the Jazz he was reduced to a role player. Benson was a former number one pick and was pretty disappointing overall. Both are far from the reputation Dantley typically has.

1986 Jazz before Dantley trade:
-0.67 SRS, 104.2 Off Eff, 104.6 Def Eff

1987 Jazz after Dantley trade:
0.05 SRS, 104.1 Off Eff, 103.7 Def Eff

1986 Pistons before Dantley trade:
1.44 SRS, 109.0 Off Eff, 107.9 Def Eff

1987 Pistons after Dantley trade:
3.52 SRS, 109.2 Off Eff, 105.8 Def Eff

Jazz didn't miss a beat without Dantley, but the Pistons got better. However, they got better on defense while their offense remained the same, so I wouldn't really credit Dantley.


In the middle of the 1989 season the Pistons traded Dantley for Aguirre. Aguirre, like Tripucka, was a 20 points per game wing scorer but nowhere near the efficiency Dantley had.

1989 Pistons
With Dantley:
4.0 point differential, 4.8 SRS, 108.5 Off Eff, 104.4 Def Eff

Without Dantley:
9.5 point differential, 9.6 SRS, 113.3 Off Eff, 103.3 Def Eff

1989 Mavericks
With Dantley:
-4.7 point differential, -5.9 SRS, 105.4 Off Eff, 110.3 Def Eff

Without Dantley:
0.9 point differential, 0.7 SRS, 108.6 Off Eff, 107.7 Def Eff

Pistons traded Dantley and their offense exploded, and they won the title that year. Mavericks traded for Dantley and went from a mediocre but slightly above average team to one of the worst.

So yes, there's little evidence Dantley's incredible efficiency led to any great impact.

You're right, Neil Paine, it's not quite that simple. You and others here are brilliant analysts and statisticians, but I think that coaching and team philosophy plays an important role in this as much as anything else. It's the same reason why, for one of many examples, some in basketball circles think Chris Bosh of Miami is more talented than his pedestrian numbers indicate; he's being asked to execute roles for his team that don't take full advantage of his own skillset (shooting midrange jumpers to space the floor for LeBron James and Dwyane Wade in the post). It's also why, for another one of many examples, many rolled their eyes at the hiring of Mike D'Antoni as coach of the Los Angeles Lakers; for he has demonstrated that he would rather fit the skills of his personnel to his preconceived offense, instead of approaching this the other way around. Even metrics like RAPM can swing and miss when you apply them at face value, without carefully accounting for other nuances and influences that can affect on-court action.

In a complex sport with many variables that affect team dynamics and perofmance; we need to do better than generic, blanket statements such as "Dantley held the ball too long, that's why the Utah Jazz offense was mediocre". The numbers are interesting, and are worth researching, but we're doing ourselves a disservice by drawing hasty conclusions from the numbers that (by own own admissions) are incomplete in some manner.

For the record, I believe that Dantley's case falls somewhere-between: a truly great offensive player whose mercurial personality affected his teams. But, as stated before, it's not that simple.

I'm not making a blanket statement but a summation of why Dantley's offensive game doesn't help his team like you think it would by describing what he actually does on the court. It's also a "blanket statement" backed up by lots of results from Dantley switching teams or missing games. Dantley has a great TS%, of course, but when you see that teams didn't seem to miss his offense, then you go back to the games to see how he's accomplishing this. When you do that, you see that he's a ball-stopper who often halts defenses and doesn't appear to help other people to score. You can hurt a team's offense while still posting great numbers, right? We can agree to that? It's not impossible. (I don't think Dantley is all that damaging to a team's offense because he's still a great scorer, but I don't think his impact is very good either.) And can you be a great offensive player if your offense doesn't greatly impact a team?

[BasketballJedi]

I'm not making a blanket statement but a summation of why Dantley's offensive game doesn't help his team like you think it would by describing what he actually does on the court. It's also a "blanket statement" backed up by lots of results from Dantley switching teams or missing games. Dantley has a great TS%, of course, but when you see that teams didn't seem to miss his offense, then you go back to the games to see how he's accomplishing this.

Are you, actually? Never mind the fact that entire game footage for the NBA during this period is quite limited; who is actually taking the time to dissect prime Dantley's game under a scrutinizing microscope? And that of his teammates? Along with how those talents are being put together?

I don't think anyone is questioning the numbers; you don't even need advanced metrics to claim that Dantley wasn't "helping" his teams (simple win total suffices for this exercise). Causation is the key here, and how one carefully draws his reasoning lines from his hypothesis to his conclusion. It's akin to saying that MJ guy wasn't that great of a player, since his team played pretty darn well without him in the mid-90s.

[AcrossTheCourt]

The Bulls were pretty good without him but when he came back full-time in 96 they were the greatest team ever, broke the record for games won, and their point differential jumped from 4.8 to 12.2. So yes, I think the stats point to Jordan having a great impact....

The problem is, people sometimes bring him up because of his wicked efficiency and assume he's an offensive savant, but he didn't appear to be that valuable a player.

[BasketballJedi]

The Bulls were pretty good without him but when he came back full-time in 96 they were the greatest team ever, broke the record for games won, and their point differential jumped from 4.8 to 12.2. So yes, I think the stats point to Jordan having a great impact....

This misses the point I was making (along with the fact that this is irrelevant to the datapoint in question, the Bulls surprising success sans MJ in the 1994 season), but I won't beat the proverbial dead horse here. I'd advise caution with your brazen foray into the field, however. There is still much we don't know, and these metrics are only a broad (albeit handy) paintbrush.

An interesting modern analogue to Dantley is one Carmelo Kyam Anthony, who I think has heard the "ballstopper" criticism applied to him throughout his entire career. A better outside shooter than Dantley, about similar passers, and more questionable shot selection (I'll overlook the defensive side the ball, since that is not focus of this discussion). Even he has shown that he can positively "lift" a team on offense when inserted into the right system, and I don't have him as high on my all-time list as Dantley.

[D-rell]

This is great to see. There are lots of tools only recently available, which may be incorporated into such lists.
I do these alltime rankings without regard to awards and accolades. Just stats, heavy on playoffs.

Here are some players not in your top 100 but in my top 75. Their shortcomings may include lack of titles or awards:

Code: Select all

46  Pau Gasol
48  Shawn Kemp
53  Reggie Miller
55  Chauncey Billups
58  Manu Ginobili
63  Rasheed Wallace
65  Terry Cummings
68  Larry Nance
69  Vlade Divac
71  Kevin Johnson
74  Walt Bellamy
75  Shawn Marion

Some others that I've got ranked significantly higher (showing your rank, my rank) :

Code: Select all

Chris Webber     86  37
Karl Malone      11   5
Dan Issel        89  47
Vince Carter     92  49
Hakeem Olajuwon  13  7
Paul Pierce      53  30
Bob Lanier       67  38
Tracy McGrady    69  40
Scottie Pippen   34  20
John Stockton    40  24
Robert Parish    57  36
Jack Sikma      100  64
Kevin Garnett    17  11
Clyde Drexler    38  25

Mostly moderns and bigs.

Guys you've got ranked a lot higher:

Code: Select all

Slater Martin    72  459
Bill Sharman     47  180
Willis Reed      36  122
Tiny Archibald   74  236
Connie Hawkins   60  191
Kevin Durant     46  127
Hal Greer        49  131
Gus Johnson      96  252
Spencer Haywood  56  143
Kobe Bryant       7   16
Paul Arizin      48  109
Mel Daniels      64  144
Chris Bosh       63  141
Ed Macauley      68  152
JoJo White       80  178
Sidney Moncrief  77  168
George Yardley   82  169
Lenny Wilkens    61  124
Dennis Rodman    93  188
Dave Bing        88  175
George Gervin    30   59

Forgot to mention, I haven't updated thru this season. But I doubt Kobe or Bosh or Durant will have moved that much higher.
You're clearly including ABA numbers. Are they given just as much weight as NBA? For awards, even?

Since I used the NBA HOF factor (which obviously doesn't factor ABA stas & awards) in each players to help determine the CPE, I adjust each ABA players HOF factor to reflect the lowest NBA players that resembled their raw offensive/defensive ability to create an ABA version HOF factor. Then, if an ABA player such as Artis Gilmore played a portion of his career in the NBA, I averaged his ABA version to his actually HOF factor and plugged in into the computation - this obviously penalizes ABA players in what I think is a fair way.

I familiar with some of your work, and I'm interested in some of the "other tools" that you're referring to, especially for pre-70s NBA/ABA careers.

[AcrossTheCourt]

No, it's still different because Carmelo isn't very efficient at scoring, although last season wasn't bad. Again, it's Dantley's absurd scoring efficiency. Read criticism of Carmelo and it comes down to his efficiency a lot of the time. That is in no way a problem with Dantley.

Reference EvanZ's chart:
http://thecity2.files.wordpress.com/201 ... _lines.jpg

There are four seasons of a TS% above 65 and a usage above 25. Dantley has two of them, while Barkley and Amare are the others. If you relax the usage standard there are a bunch of Barkley seasons and then one from McHale.

So by this, one may conclude that Dantley is some amazing offensive weapon.

However, he had a bad reputation in his time, and when you look at his team results he doesn't appear to have a huge impact. Those with/without stats are really noisy and prone to errors from other guys missing games, lineup shifts, etc. but it's hard to find evidence he was a top 25 offensive weapon.

I'm not saying I know for 100% certain he's a huge net negative (I think he can make a team a little better, depending on the team), but I think his scoring stats are a bit misleading. If you go purely by box score stats you will probably miss that. If you look at his circumstances and how the team performed with him, you get a better snapshot of the player.

[BasketballJedi]

Keep in mind that I first cited Dantley's teammate issue in my post above, so I'm well-aware of his baggage. It's also why he doesn't rank as high from my POV despite his production.

But my Anthony example was simply intended to show this: when you coach a team well and implement a system properly, you can make anyone look good. It's still on the players to execute, but think these are areas of study that are sorely missing fromdiscussion (higher up on the food chain, the Peltons and Olivers of the world absorb all the information they can get their hands on). It's more nuance to account for, but it shouldn't be overlooked. Even Anthony's teammate Raymond Felton was shown to be one of the most valuable PGs in the league, when he missed games due to injury and the Knicks struggled without him. Now, out of curiosity, do you think Felton is a better (not more valuable) player than, say, Tony Parker, whose Spurs seemed to chug along without him?

[AcrossTheCourt]

It feels like you're trying to put me in a corner by implying I'm a slave to team results/on-off stats but I'm saying we shouldn't be slaves to any stat and should use the proper context before judging players. A full bevy of stats should be used along with understanding how the games actually functioned (how Dantley played) with a wide range of information considered, including anecdotal accounts and team strength.

Could Dantley be used better? Could he be a great player? Sure, but we judge players on what happened. Amare could have been a good defender in the right situation, but he wasn't, and his horrible defense dragged down his value. Dantley was a great isolation, post-up scorer. In a vacuum that's great, but the ultimate point is to outscore the other team and I don't regard Dantley as a star in that respect, unless I see other evidence.

And I'm in Portland, so asking me about Felton is a loaded question. He showed up fat, out of shape for the season, and played like garbage. I can't discuss him reasonably.

You're asking about system players, famously Tony Parker and Deron Williams, among others. For one, not every player can work in the system, and while Tony relies on their pick and rolls with Duncan and their shooters, they rely on him too: few are as good running the pick and roll, and it's not hyperbole to say he's either the rest or nearly the best at dodging and darting through players, finding cracks in the seams. Parker rates well by the "impact" stats, better than Felton -- not Chris Paul/Nash elite but up there. Felton is significantly lower by RAPM most seasons. As for a more conventional analysis, Felton is a pretty good point guard sometimes, but he doesn't keep up his conditioning and his outside shot is too inconsistent to make up for his lack of elite skills elsewhere.

Sure, the Spurs were okay with Parker, but they started off at a high level. It's like saying Jordan isn't good because the Bulls in 94 and 95 were good teams. '95 was a decent, but with Jordan in '96 they were supernaturally good (of course, the rosters weren't exactly the same.)

I've done enough on/off stats today that I don't want to look into Felton/Parker, but those stats are pretty noisy and sometimes they have huge swings. For instance, the pre/post trade analysis of the 2004 Pistons. You'd think Rasheed was prime Shaq with how much better they got. I already had the numbers calculated once -- the SRS jumped from 3.9 to 12.2 (including the playoffs.) That was pretty much all from defense, however.

Obviously, with all the variables (who else was playing, new offensive systems, etc.) involved you never want to take a one season, 20 game sample as gospel, which is why I looked at every major point in Dantley's career (when he was good: i.e. not his rookie or twilight years) to look for patterns.

I'm not the Reverend of On/Off stats, but I felt the need to defend them here. It's nice to live in a world where we have stuff like SportsVU data, but it's good to look past box score stats for guys from the 80's and further back.

[BasketballJedi]

Could Dantley be used better? Could he be a great player? Sure, but we judge players on what happened. Amare could have been a good defender in the right situation, but he wasn't, and his horrible defense dragged down his value. Dantley was a great isolation, post-up scorer. In a vacuum that's great, but the ultimate point is to outscore the other team and I don't regard Dantley as a star in that respect, unless I see other evidence.

I'll preface this by saying that +/- (and its variants) remains my first and go-to metric of choice with regards to today's players. In fact, I don't make any conclusion about a current player's impact without employing those metrics. Carrying on...

If you're going to admit that Dantley could've been "used better", you're implicitly saying that the suppressed impact that Dantley had on his teams was, by and large, not Dantley's fault. Same with Amar'e and his defense, but I think that is more inherent with his actual ability to play defense (lack of instincts and desire to play that end of the floor), not how he was used.

I don't think it even has anything to do with how Dantley was used, although I would hardly accuse Frank Layden of being an exceptional coach. Similar to coaching styles, when you played basketball is important as well. Strategies and philosophies of the game aren't static, and they have changed throughout history. It can make someone's valuable skill yesterday not so valuable today (and vice-versa). Dantley brought great skills in the paint and in the post, which also happened to be where most of his Utah teammates needed the ball to score: they weren't great outside shooters, and only one player (Darrell Griffith) was any kind of 3-point specialist. Different game then, with teams still getting used to the 3-pt line. It's similar to Dantley's tenure in Detroit: that team already had interior scorers, and Aguirre, despite being an inferior player to Dantley, had a midrange game that better complemented the Pistons attack. That's more value, which is heavily influenced by context and environment, than ability. Dantley's game would be essential for an offense where outside shooters need a paint presence to draw defenders away from the perimeter and 3-pt line, like teams in today's game. Put him there, and your qualms about his lack of impact don't exist. That's basic knowledge of the sport. You have to look at skills in a vacuum, then figure out how those skills fit the team you're building. Magic Johnson had gobs of impact on his teams from the on-off data, but you'd be foolish to conclude he'd have anywhere close to the same impact on a team that already has solid pure passing PG and a couple post players, unless he added new wrinkles to his skillset. That's not how the game works.

Now, if you want to knock Dantley, knock him for actually being unwilling to add to his game to fulfill his coaches' real needs; it was documented in Detroit that he was unhappy with shifting his game to the midrange to help with the Pistons floor spacing. That's on him, and coachability (especially when presented with a valid criticism to benefit your team) is part of the evaluation of a player. But if you're questioning Dantley's offensive greatness, i.e. his ability to play the game and help your team win, I respectfully (and adamantly) disagree with you. He possessed elite skills that could help plenty of teams win games. Just not his teams at the time, and as constructed. This put him from being with the Magics, Jordans, Wests, etc. of the world as greatest ever NBA guards, but "good not great" he is not.

[D-rell]

Given how often Wilt is on top, I assume box score stats are hugely important. There's also very little information about basketball back then, so it's hard to use anything else. Turnovers weren't even tracked, which is crazy.

I also saw guys like Adrian Dantley high. Box score stat guys can be really deceiving. We just had a mini-revolution with +/-, where the point was guys can have impact beyond the limited box score and some guys actually have limited impact despite the pretty numbers. I don't know if there's any of that here.

And it's so hard to compare across eras because we have different amounts of information available.

Well, actually Dantley is ranked btw #22-24 in raw ability, but finshed 81st as far as his basketball career assement. While Dantley was unremarkable defensively, '83-84 he averaged a league leading 30.6 ppg on 18 FGA per game which is historically efficent scoring, .640 TS% btw '79-'84 (@ only 6'4). In my opinion when assessing individual player value in the NBA offense is a bit more important than defense. For example, no perimeter denfender can consistently stop a great scoring guard one-on-one without good help defense down low. What would Bruce Bowen have been w/o Duncan down low, and what would Duncan have been on a good perimeter scorer? NBA Defense is inherently more team-oriented in my opinion. You cannot deny Dantley efficient offensive output. But then again thats the whole point of this list, from one perspective Dantley could be top 25 all-time primarily due to his incredible scoring ability, but only the other hand when you consider team-impact, playoff or career success, I have him ranked #81.

[AcrossTheCourt]

Given how often Wilt is on top, I assume box score stats are hugely important. There's also very little information about basketball back then, so it's hard to use anything else. Turnovers weren't even tracked, which is crazy.

I also saw guys like Adrian Dantley high. Box score stat guys can be really deceiving. We just had a mini-revolution with +/-, where the point was guys can have impact beyond the limited box score and some guys actually have limited impact despite the pretty numbers. I don't know if there's any of that here.

And it's so hard to compare across eras because we have different amounts of information available.

Well, actually Dantley is ranked btw #22-24 in raw ability, but finshed 81st as far as his basketball career assement. While Dantley was unremarkable defensively, '83-84 he averaged a league leading 30.6 ppg on 18 FGA per game which is historically efficent scoring, .640 TS% btw '79-'84 (@ only 6'4). In my opinion when assessing individual player value in the NBA offense is a bit more important than defense. For example, no perimeter denfender can consistently stop a great scoring guard one-on-one without good help defense down low. What would Bruce Bowen have been w/o Duncan down low, and what would Duncan have been on a good perimeter scorer? NBA Defense is inherently more team-oriented in my opinion. You cannot deny Dantley efficient offensive output. But then again thats the whole point of this list, from one perspective Dantley could be top 25 all-time primarily due to his incredible scoring ability, but only the other hand when you consider team-impact, playoff or career success, I have him ranked #81.

Would the analogue then be Allen Iverson? Iverson has a lot of inherent ability, but I wouldn't rank him as high as Garnett (although Iverson's problem was largely height.)

Maybe if you make conditions perfect for Dantley, surround him with defensive players and shooters, feed him the ball a lot, keep his personality in check (though I think the team cancer stuff is a bit overblown), then he can led a successful team. But that's a lot of maybe's and it hasn't been proven yet....

I'm not going to fault a guy for being in a bad position. People doubted Garnett, but once he had good teammates and a good system in Boston his team won the title. I'll give the guy the benefit of the doubt, but the problem is Dantley was traded again and again, had loads of teammates, and still had problems finding the right situation. If it's so difficult to find a situation for him, and he can't fit well with a Detroit team that soon won a title, is he really all that great?

I feel like I need to write a long article following his career, looking at every change in his career and his role, putting the numbers in better perspective....

[Mike G]

Just as it wasn't any fault of Dantley's that Detroit did not win the title in '88, it was not due to his absence that they won it the next two years. They were just a team on the rise, and most people close to that team have said it was specifically Isiah Thomas that didn't like sharing the scoring with AD, much less being 2nd-fiddle to an alltime-great scoring machine.

The Pistons were known as the deepest team in the league, AND they had superstars.
In 1986, they had the league's #7 offense and #15 defense.
In 1987, they had Dantley; and the #9 offense plus #5 defense.
In 1988, their last full year with AD, the #5 offense and #2 defense.

Dantley worked very well with the other Pistons. He was not the main reason their defense went from below-average to elite; but he certainly didn't undermine it, either.

[BasketballJedi]

But that's a lot of maybe's and it hasn't been proven yet....

Of course not; the guy is retired. I would also like to provide MJ with Dantley's teammates and coaches and prove that he'd have better impact with them, but I can't do that either.

I find this inquiry into "player impact on his team" frivolous in the first place. We can pretend that everyone played with the same teammates, coaches, systems, franchises, and under the same set of circumstances throughout their respective careers, but they did not. We can also pretend that these numbers are 100% married to the actual basketball ability of the player in question and are not influenced by other factors, but they are not. This is why direct skillset evaluation is important (especially for team builiding purposes), and also why scouting and coaching has not been rendered extinct.

I'm not going to fault a guy for being in a bad position. People doubted Garnett, but once he had good teammates and a good system in Boston his team won the title. I'll give the guy the benefit of the doubt, but the problem is Dantley was traded again and again, had loads of teammates, and still had problems finding the right situation. If it's so difficult to find a situation for him, and he can't fit well with a Detroit team that soon won a title, is he really all that great?

How much of this do you think was under Garnett's and Dantley's control?

You say that you're not a slave to on-off numbers, but when you look at Dantley's numbers and conclude that was he wasn't a great player purely from the on-off numbers, you're doing yourself a disservice.

[bchaikin]

Dantley was not a respected player in his time

nonsense - he was in fact one of the most respected players during his career...

he was the league's dominant scorer for a long 7 year stretch, 79-80 to 85-86. whenever teams played the jazz they designed their defenses to do primarily one thing - try to stop dantley. and they couldn't. when teams design their defense to specifically stop one player - 7 years in a row - that's respect of the highest regard...

he was named the league's rookie of the year in 76-77. that's respect...

despite being a known poor defender, he was still named all-NBA 2nd team in 80-81 (on a team that went just 28-54) and 83-84 (on a team that went just 45-37). that's respect...

he was named comeback player of the year in 83-84. that's respect...

he was named an all-star 6 seasons. that's respect...

and kept getting traded for a reason.

dantley played for 7 teams in his 15 year career, but for 1 team for over 1/2 of his career minutes played, during the prime of his career. he played for 3 different teams his first 3 years in the league, and 3 different teams his last 3 years in the league. but in 15 seasons he played the middle 7 for the same team from the ages of 23-30...

and players who played similar career minutes as dantley did (34,000) often played for alot of teams. players with 32000 to 35000 career minutes that also played for 6-7 different teams include the likes of glen rice, dale ellis, reggie theus, mike bibby, tom chambers, terry cummings, chauncey billups, and ben wallace...

what were the reasons that they kept getting traded? same as dantley?...

billups played for 5 different teams his first 5 years in the league, and 4 different teams his last 3 years. but in the first decade of the 2000s he was one of the league's elite PGs...

ben wallace played for 3 different teams his first 5 years in the league, 3 teams his last 5 years. but he played 2/3 of his career minutes for one team, and was one of the league's elite Cs in the prime of his career...

He was an empty stats,

yes when one does not understand the implications of his offensive stats one can come to this conclusion...

isolation scorer,

that got double teamed more than anyone did in the early to mid 1980s yet still scored at a high rate and very efficiently. also from 79-80 to 85-86 passed for more assists than all but 5 other SFs...

and people didn't seem to want to play with him

like who? and other than isiah thomas, who wanted to play alongside his childhood friend aguirre...

and see these crazy efficient scoring seasons

yes they were...

and assume this guy was a huge offensive force

yes he was, just like george gervin was, and michael jordan, karl malone, shaq, lebron james, and kevin durant...

He has nice stats and all, but the effect on the team isn't a significant net positive... I'm not saying Dantley is definitely a negative player, but I really don't think he has much of a positive impact..."

yes - when you base your analysis on these few missed games:

1983 (PER of 24.4, 66.6 TS%, missed 60 games):
1985 (PER of 22, 61 TS%, missed 27 games):
1988 (PER of 19.9, 62 TS%, missed 13 games):

try looking at all of his stats, not just a select few games that may (or may not) validate your opinion...

where's your analysis for how good he was in 76-77, 77-78, 79-80, 80-81, 81-82, 83-84, 85-86, 86-87, when he played his most minutes? you know, the prime of his career?...

So yes, there's little evidence Dantley's incredible efficiency led to any great impact.

yes, when you ignore all but on/off data, including other data mentioned in this thread, it's easy to come to this conclusion...

backed up by lots of results from Dantley switching teams or missing games.

"lots"? from 76-77 to 88-89, dantley played in 13 seasons. you are ignoring his stats from most of those seasons...

You can hurt a team's offense while still posting great numbers, right?

wrong... not high scoring with high efficiency...

We can agree to that?

no...

It's not impossible.

yes it is...

And can you be a great offensive player if your offense doesn't greatly impact a team?

no... and he greatly impacted his team on offense...

An interesting modern analogue to Dantley is one Carmelo Kyam Anthony, who I think has heard the "ballstopper" criticism applied to him throughout his entire career. A better outside shooter than Dantley

false - dantley was one of the game's best midrange shooters during his prime, in particular his set shot from 15'-18' anywhere near the foul line. if you had actually seen him play you would know this...

one may conclude that Dantley is some amazing offensive weapon.

you bet...

However, he had a bad reputation in his time, and when you look at his team results he doesn't appear to have a huge impact.

try looking at stats other than on/off plus/minus. his impact on offense was huge...

but it's hard to find evidence he was a top 25 offensive weapon.

try looking at stats other than on/off plus/minus. there is plenty of data showing he was...

Could Dantley be used better?

from 76-77 to 87-88, 12 seasons, he scored 21058 points, 4th most during that time. you mean better than that?...

Could he be a great player?

he was a great offensive player, one of the best the league has seen in 40 years...