Bruce Bowen Or Shane Battier?

[$LakerGold]

Oh this is hard...

Shane Battier - I hated him when he was still with the Rockets. I hated him because of his 3's. I hated him because he was a great defender. People tend to overrate him, though.

On the other hand - We got Bruce Bowen, hitting and trippin' people, but plays great defense. Hes a dirty player, but hes one dirty player to love:) I can remember him hitting that spot-up 3 from the corner.

They both have similar skill-sets. But I'm going with Bruce, I'm a huge fan of his defense.

Lakers Vs. Spurs I miss those days

[v1ncelis]

I will go with Bruce Bowen. He is NBA champion, can injure opposite team players and destroyed Lebron in 2007 finals.

[8BeastlyXOIAD]

Bruce Lee Bowen

[Bigsmoke]

Bruce Bowen

[Rnbizzle]

Battier. Dude plays some of the best D I've ever seen, so underrated.. Him and Tony Allen both are.

[$LakerGold]

Battier. Dude plays some of the best D I've ever seen, so underrated.. Him and Tony Allen both are.

Underrated? People sometimes even overrate him.

[jlip]

Bowen. He will defend you with great defensive skills and with "extralegal" tactics that also affect the player he's guarding pscychologically.

[SCdac]

Both great man-to-defenders. Both great competitors. Both guarded the best offensive players in the league.

Bruce Bowen surely does not embody "popularity" on this board, but none the less I'd go with him.

Bowen appeared/started in 500 straight games, and was incredibly reliable for a veteran. 8 times he was selected to All-Defensive team. He was the runner up for DPOY like 3 or 4 times behind Ben Wallace.

Despite not being great at creating his own offense, Bruce has 6 seasons of over .400 % shooting from beyond the arch. That's impressive. he lead the league one season (2003).

give me Bowen's pesky defense alongside a strong post defender and I think my teams winning-% goes up

[nbacardDOTnet]

Underrated? People sometimes even Overrate him.....

this

[rmt]

Bowen - I like his versatility on defense - can guard multiple positions from SF to PG (Lebron to Nash/Billups [usually only in crunch time]). He had a wonderful attitude - his advice to kids was to find one thing you can do well and excel at it. He wasn't very talented - I cringed when he shot anything but a 3 but just relentless and such quick feet. He was a huuuuge, under-rated part of Spurs' championships.

Edit: I should have said PF too since he defended Dirk well, but then Josh Howard would go off.

[ThaSwagg3r]

Both are great defenders, the difference is that Bowen is dirty, annoying, and everybody hates him while Battier is respected and acknowledge as a great defender. I guess in some ways that makes Bowen better since he gets into player's heads even though Kobe has destroyed both of them and in the playoffs.

Battier played better defense when they took away the hand-check rule though. This is why it is an interesting debate. Battier entered his defensive prime when the hand-check was taken away while Bowen was in his prime when the no hand-check rule wasn't enforced.

[lefthook00]

Bowen is a better defender. Faster feet. Plus, he has the Sasha Vujacic factor AKA annoy the sh*t out of you pesky D.

[ihatetimthomas]

Bruce Bowen is one of the best defenders of this generation. Great hands, feet and lateral quickness. He had the ability to defend any type of player on the perimeter. I remember him shutting down Dirk on numerous occasions.

The fact that he could hit that jumper from the sides made him even more valuable. Dirty player at times, but overall, he is one of the best defenders. Great durability and very consistent.

[D.J.]

Bowen. He was so durable, reliable, and always played 110%. And he also shut down LeBron in the '07 Finals. Very few people on this planet could do that and Bowen did exactly that, and with little to no credit for it as well.

[dbugz]

Underrated? People sometimes even Overrate him.....

This. Battier defense is a bit overrated especially here on this board.


I'll take Bowen on this one.