<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ghoti @ Jan 3 2008, 01:48 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>LeBron plays all positions between 1-4. The offense runs through him, he is the team's primary ballhandler and he is the best distributor by miles and miles. What position does that describe? In ten years I think he will be a dominant power forward.</div> Wow, that's a pretty bold prediction. I'd love to see how that would go...
Id start with D. Howard....if he ever gets his free throw % up to 80%(hes not a bad shooter, just inconsistent), he will be unstoppable....he has the ability to score down low every night while pressing your frontline into foul trouble which in turn screws with them on the offensive end....whats interesting is that these guys could eventually play together if they wanted too and it would seem like a perfect partnership to me....
I take Dwight, even though Lebron in my eyes is the second most valuable player in the league to Dwight. It's not just because he's a big man, I think Dwight is the more valuable player. Measured Wins Above Replacement Player, PW%, WP48, and the Elias MVP Monitor, 4 of the most commonly utilized metrics for a player's value, Dwight Howard is ranked above Lebron. This is because he scores just as efficiently, plays far better defense, gets far more boards, and is only outdone in passing. Lebron's is good in all these metrics, but more like an All-NBA player than an MVP. With the sole exception of Iverson (who was one of the most controversial mvps ever), no player has won mvp with a player win percentage as low as Lebron has (which, don't get me wrong, is still a superstar percentage to put up). Right now, in my opinion, and based on the combination of a plethora of stats and monitors, Lebron is the fourth most valuable player in the league after Kevin Garnett, Chris Paul, and Dwight Howard. I am personally not of the opinion that having a great center is any more beneficial than having a great small forward, and I reject the notion that there aren't many good centers in the league (seeing as how Yao, Gasol, Camby, Amare, Duncan, Jermaine O'neal, Kaman, etc are all suiting up at the center position). That being said, Dwight Howard, by every measure, generates more wins for his team than Lebron. And I have a gut instinct that Howard has a lot more improving to do than Lebron since Lebron's skill set is more refined.
