Is James Worthy one of the most overrated players of all time?

[The Iron Fist]

Wade is more overrated than Worthy will ever be.

[Mr.JB]

How is Big Game James overrated in the first place?

Nobody calls him the GOAT forward. Nobody says he is better then such and such.

Really nobody says anything except he was a great player who won rings with Magic.

I see no reason for this thread.

[Xiao Yao You]

He played with a prime Darell Griffith (good SG before his injuries)

He had a foot injury. What derailed him was a coach that put a white stiff in the line-up ahead of him because he held out one year not the injury.

Rickey Green (decent point guard)

He was one of the best pg in the league for a few seasons.

John Drew (when he wasn't injured)

Drew was with them very briefly and he lit it up too! The benefits of coke on display. Don't remember injury just a lifetime ban.

Thurl Bailey (ok centre)

SF. Very good 6th man.

He played with Mark Aguirre in Dallas

Was traded for Aquirre.

[97 bulls]

Kind of how you are ignoring that he was plagued by injuries in 92 and also the psychological impact that Magic's sudden, pre-early retirement and what caused it might have had on him and his game, right?

Lol pshycological impact? James worthy is a grown ass man. That was a 10 year vet when magic anouned his retirement.

And I acknowledged worthys injuries. But the lakers were 28-26 with him in the lineup. Now you caan excuse him for having nagging injuries but then that's literrally 90% of the players in the nba. Especially after 8-9 seasons. Id say most players have nagging injuries. He still played an avg of 37 minutes if I remember correct in 92.

Psyschologial impact lol

[Kovach]

Lol pshycological impact? James worthy is a grown ass man. That was a 10 year vet when magic anouned his retirement.

Yes and? That wouldn't make him immune to a possible and, considering the circumstances, very probable loss of motivation.

And I acknowledged worthys injuries. But the lakers were 28-26 with him in the lineup. Now you caan excuse him for having nagging injuries but then that's literrally 90% of the players in the nba. Especially after 8-9 seasons. Id say most players have nagging injuries. He still played an avg of 37 minutes if I remember correct in 92.

Worthy was not the same player in 92 as he was in the seasons prior by any stretch of imagination, one only really needs a functional set of eyes (focused on the games instead of b-r.com) to be able to comprehend that. Of course, you are a guy who takes pleasure in using past-prime, injury-ridden seasons players had against them (unless of course the player in question happens to be Pippen) so it doesn't really matter to you. Heck, you were even using the 93/94 season when he was barely walking to make some silly, meaningless points against him.

[D.J.]

Overrated? He's underrated if anything. 20 PPG, above average defensively, consistent and reliable, clutch, and a good hustle guy. But, playing with Magic and Kareem will do that. For someone that was putting up 20/6/3 regularly, he sure didn't get much recognition.

[KevinNYC]

That is simply not true. Dantley is a great illustration of why the way in which you score your points can be almost as important as the amount you score.

As you mentioned, he was a 6"5 (at the very most. I've heard people say he was actually closer to 6"3) post player. He was nicknamed 'the black hole'. That should tell you all everything you need to know. When he got the ball in the post it never came out (partly because he was a poor passer) and he often used up a lot of time on the clock.

In his 5 highest scoring seasons, his teams records were 24-58, 28-54, 25-57, 45-37 & 42-40. In 1982, with dantley pouring in 30.3 ppg on 57%, the Jazz were 25-57. The very next season, with dantley missing 3 quarters of the season with torn wrist ligaments, they improved to 30-52. WHAT??

Dantley was a product of his era.

Dantley was the Pistons top scorer when the Pistons traded him for Aguirre. Aguirre did not score as much as Dantley was scoring, but you know what happened? The Pistons offense improved and they scored more points per game. They went 31-6 after the trade. Their winning percentage before the trade was .711, after the trade it was .838

Daly wanted Dantley out of there because he was choking the flow of the offense, by dribbling and dribbling and slowly trying to back his man down. When he passed the ball it was often with just a few seconds in the shot clock. There is a reason the Pistons won the title the year they traded Dantley. Aguirre could move the ball.

Aguirre was a little bigger than Dantley but--more importantly--he could play in the post with his back to the basket and either score or else draw a double team and make the correct pass leading either to an open shot or else one more ball reversal that resulted in an open shot on the weak side (Aguirre delivered a lot of what would now be termed "hockey assists").

[97 bulls]

Yes and? That wouldn't make him immune to a possible and, considering the circumstances, very probable loss of motivation.

Worthy was not the same player in 92 as he was in the seasons prior by any stretch of imagination, one only really needs a functional set of eyes (focused on the games instead of b-r.com) to be able to comprehend that. Of course, you are a guy who takes pleasure in using past-prime, injury-ridden seasons players had against them (unless of course the player in question happens to be Pippen) so it doesn't really matter to you. Heck, you were even using the 93/94 season when he was barely walking to make some silly, meaningless points against him.

Unless you can provide a statement of him saying magics retirement hurt him emotionally to the point that he did his job half-assed I'm calling BS. I do agree it effected him due to him not being the recipient of about 3-4 layups per game thanx to magic.

The difference between worthy and pippen is that pippen was 34-35 years old. Worthy was 30.

To be honest, you need to stop arguing for worthy. If I didn't know any better, id be led to believe worthy was a paraplegic and emotionally weak, player incapable of functioning without magic johnson, based on your view on what james worthy was at 30 years old.

[eliteballer]

97 shut your adolescent mouth. Worthy went in deep playoff runs every year of his career and physically broke down at the end of his career, and even on a bum leg in the 91 Finals was giving it to Pippen in the post on the regular.

[jlauber]

Dantley was the Pistons top scorer when the Pistons traded him for Aguirre. Aguirre did not score as much as Dantley was scoring, but you know what happened? The Pistons offense improved and they scored more points per game. They went 31-6 after the trade. Their winning percentage before the trade was .711, after the trade it was .838

Daly wanted Dantley out of there because he was choking the flow of the offense, by dribbling and dribbling and slowly trying to back his man down. When he passed the ball it was often with just a few seconds in the shot clock. There is a reason the Pistons won the title the year they traded Dantley. Aguirre could move the ball.

You couldn't argue with the results of that Dantley trade, however, there are those Piston fans who believed that Detroit would have won a title with Dantley instead of Aguirre. In fact, they claim that Thomas was behind the trade, and that he was freezing Dantley out of the offense. And there were Detroit players that were not happy with that trade, too. As for Aguirre, his Dallas teammates would have paid to ship him out. He was never the player that Dantley was, and his contributions to the Pistons was considerably less.

http://www.pistonpowered.com/2010/12...-mark-aguirre/

[QUOTE]Dantley was a huge part of the Pistons becoming a title contender in the 1980s. In Detroit

[La Frescobaldi]

10-24-2011, 05:38 AM * #3
Kobe 4 The Win
Legendary NBA Expert
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Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Earth
Posts: 480

Re: Classic Confrontations: James Worthy vs Dennis Rodman
In his last book Rodman said of Worthy....

"I'm one of the best defensive players of all time and I couldn't guard his ass."

"He would be coming off of a screen and I'd be trying to figure out whether he was going over the top or underneath. Next thing I knew, he was at the rim."

"There was nothing but Frustration with James Worthy. Clever, quick, a great player-he's one of the few guys who flat pissed me off. I want him on my team just so I don't have to guard him."
Last edited by Kobe 4 The Win : 10-24-2011 at 05:43 AM.
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[Force]

Worthy had the fastest first step in NBA HISTORY. Right now it's Melo but Worthy was clearly much quicker with his first step. Just beautiful to watch and he was excellent at finishing on the break. Super competitor and also great in big games, hence the nickname.

[Kovach]

I apologize for bumping an old thread but I have completely forgotten about it.

Unless you can provide a statement of him saying magics retirement hurt him emotionally to the point that he did his job half-assed I'm calling BS.

I don't need any, I drew my conclusion from the fact that he is a freakin human being. Perhaps you have forgotten what a major deal HIV was at the time.

I do agree it effected him due to him not being the recipient of about 3-4 layups per game thanx to magic.

If you truly believe healthy and motivated Worthy wouldn't be able to compensate for that you are either delusional or have never seen him play. You are aware we are talking about the guy who was the ultimate matchup nightmare, right? You are aware that NOBODY in the bloody league could guard him at the time, right? Teams used to throw every single SF and PF on their roster at him, and he would still score close to 20, by half-time. Countless of times he would score 12-15 in the first quarter alone and then simply pass the ball to his teammates for remainder of the game. He could score at will, literally, and no defender could ever do anything about it. The guy used to make a mockery out of the infamous Bad Boys defense almost every single time they matched up for crying out loud. The notion that a healthy Worthy wouldn't be at least a 25ppg player on a less talented team is just absurd.

The difference between worthy and pippen is that pippen was 34-35 years old. Worthy was 30.

When your knees give up they give up, who cares if it happens by the age of 30 or 4-5 years later? Doesn't make him any less of a player. By the age of 30 he did more than enough to warrant himself a place among the 50 greatest.

To those so certain Nique was a superior player, have you ever seen a game between those 2? Worthy actually was able to contain Nique to some extent, on the other hand Nique attempting to guard Worthy was, to put it lightly, comical. Same goes for English and Aguirre.

As for his low ppg, why does everyone seem to forget that besides Magic and Kareem, Worthy had to "compete" for points with yet another 20 ppg player on that team? He was even the teams top scorer in one of Worthy's prime years if I'm not mistaken. He used to play a shooting guard, look him up.

As for his low rpg, kind of hard to grab boards when you job is to be on the opponents half court the moment your team gets into possession, don't you think?

To the thread starter, he is anything but overrated. He wasn't even the 3rd option for most of his career. He was the 1st-2nd option on the repeat team and was clearly the best player on the team during the '89 playoffs, and if the Lakers managed to win that year it is very likely you'd be looking at the guy with 2 consecutive final MVP's.

[Xiao Yao You]

yes he is

[BoutPractice]

No. Worthy is one of the typical cases of what you might call the overly competent sidekick.
(Worthy is the rare member of that category to be primarily a scorer. The category would also include guys like Pippen and Gasol, truly elite basketball players who had everything to be a dominant force on their own but spent the better part of their career as a second or third option for one reason or another. )

Worthy's pure basketball skill is obvious from watching him play, it shouldn't surprise anyone that he's held in such high regard by those who played in his era.

I actually think he should be talked about more.
In the current era, teams tend to draft a lot of 6-8, 6-9ish SF/PF "tweeners". Many of them, despite their talent and athleticism, have a tough time figuring out how best to put their abilities to use on the court.
They should study James Worthy - he plays exactly the way they should. His moves, the way he positions himself on the court, everything.