Shaq/Hakeem/Duncan

[feyki]

Who has the better career ?

And explain with your arguements .

[keep-itreal]

Duncan - 5 rings

[brownmamba00]

best career: Duncan

best peak: Hakeem

best player: Shaq

[Prime_Shaq]

1. Shaq
2. Duncan
3. Hakeem

[Big164]

Everyone in the top 11 is great, they all have multiple rings and all were alphas on there teams.

In a room full of GOATs you need more than just rings to seperate yourself from the herd. Tim Duncan has no impressive peaks that puts him above anyone else. All he has is rings and even in that category he is in a 3 way tie for 4th place!

Shaq otoh has almost God-like Final averages. His 3 peat numbers crush every center and are only rivaled by MJs first 3 peat.

Hakeem has good peaks, but easily the most inconsistent career of all the greats.

Shaq

[Nowoco]

best career: Duncan

best peak: Hakeem

best player: Shaq

Cant disagree with this.

A better question would be who would you take first in a draft?

[iamgine]

Everyone in the top 11 is great, they all have multiple rings and all were alphas on there teams.

In a room full of GOATs you need more than just rings to seperate yourself from the herd. Tim Duncan has no impressive peaks that puts him above anyone else. All he has is rings and even in that category he is in a 3 way tie for 4th place!

Shaq otoh has almost God-like Final averages. His 3 peat numbers crush every center and are only rivaled by MJs first 3 peat.

Hakeem has good peaks, but easily the most inconsistent career of all the greats.

Shaq

How about averaging 25-15-5-3 in the playoff and winning the title? Not sure anyone had done that before or after him in the modern era.

[brownmamba00]

Cant disagree with this.

A better question would be who would you take first in a draft?

Hakeem first

Shaq would feud with my other star players, come in out of shape and lazy and maybe leave the team after a couple of seasons. I'd still take him second tho too dominant not to.

[Big164]

How about averaging 25-15-5-3 in the playoff and winning the title? Not sure anyone had done that before or after him in the modern era.

Ill take 35 points 15 rebounds on 59% true shooting in 3 straight finals over anything duncan ever did.

If u wanna have a nice laugh compare Duncan's #s vs the Nets in finals vs shaqs against the same team a year earlier. Shaq is the man.

[Dr Hawk]

Ill take 35 points 15 rebounds on 59% true shooting in 3 straight finals over anything duncan ever did.

If u wanna have a nice laugh compare Duncan's #s vs the Nets in finals vs shaqs against the same team a year earlier. Shaq is the man.

And that wasn't even Shaq's peak form

[ILLsmak]

Shaq. Best player had the best career, is how I see it.

Shaq has become super underrated which is strange. To be fair, when I was watching Shaq I knew he was a beast, but I didn't realize how beasty he was, all time level.

Duncan is really, really good, as is Hakeem. They are both probably top 10, but I really feel Shaq is a tier above them, even tho nobody wants to hear that. Shaq was so good he got lazy and was still a beast for like 15 years.

Everyone is like oh his FTs... **** off. Or his pick and roll defense? heh. Sure they were 'weaknesses' but when he had a good team around him, Shaq in the post on offense and defense made more of a difference than those two things, by far.

It's just one of those 'hip' things to say, to start talking about players who are more skilled than Shaq, and they were, but otoh if you look at Shaq's skill for his build, he was probably more unique. Shaq was a ****ing beast and for some reason people seem to think he was garbo except for about 4 years.

-Smak

[ArbitraryWater]

Shaq. Best player had the best career, is how I see it.

Shaq has become super underrated which is strange. To be fair, when I was watching Shaq I knew he was a beast, but I didn't realize how beasty he was, all time level.

Duncan is really, really good, as is Hakeem. They are both probably top 10, but I really feel Shaq is a tier above them, even tho nobody wants to hear that. Shaq was so good he got lazy and was still a beast for like 15 years.

Everyone is like oh his FTs... **** off. Or his pick and roll defense? heh. Sure they were 'weaknesses' but when he had a good team around him, Shaq in the post on offense and defense made more of a difference than those two things, by far.

It's just one of those 'hip' things to say, to start talking about players who are more skilled than Shaq, and they were, but otoh if you look at Shaq's skill for his build, he was probably more unique. Shaq was a ****ing beast and for some reason people seem to think he was garbo except for about 4 years.

-Smak

agreed

[T_L_P]

Ill take 35 points 15 rebounds on 59% true shooting in 3 straight finals over anything duncan ever did.

If u wanna have a nice laugh compare Duncan's #s vs the Nets in finals vs shaqs against the same team a year earlier. Shaq is the man.

36.3/12.3/3.8/.5/2.8 -- 55.7 total

24.3/17.0/5.3/1.0/5.3 - 52.9 total

Duncan had the 2nd highest Finals PER of all time behind 06 Wade (LeBron's most recent ones may have eclipsed it).

Comparable #s, but this doesn't account for Duncan playing some of the best defense ever in a series. He held K-Mart to 3-23 shooting in the final game.

You can do the same for Shaq's peak run vs Duncan's. His 00 numbers are slightly better than Duncan's 03 ones, but Tim played better defense (and Shaq was a DPOY-level defender himself in 00).


Shaq does edge him out, but you're nuts if you don't think 03 Duncan is one of the greatest peaks ever. He won a ring without anything close to a secondary star. Shaq never did that. He was his team's primary scorer, passer, defensive anchor and leader. Shaq was never that. He had the most Win Shares ever in a Playoff run and the 2nd highest +/- for a title run ever behind 91 Jordan. There are very few peaks better than it.

To answer the question:

Best career (achievements): Duncan
Best player: Shaq

They are all in the same tier for me overall (I have them ranked 5-6-7).

[SouBeachTalents]

All 3 had one of the greatest peak seasons of all time ('94 Hakeem, '00 Shaq, '03 Duncan)

[rmt]

Cant disagree with this.

A better question would be who would you take first in a draft?

This answer (imo) would be the same as to OP's question - Duncan. Knowing how the careers panned out - no drama, loyal, great team mate - just plug in the pieces.