Kobe Bryant vs. ESPN: Are There Really 6 Players Better Than Kobe?
ESPN and TrueHoop recently released a list of their top 500 players, and to some observers' surprise Los Angeles Lakers star guard Kobe Bryant was found to be the league's seventh-best player.
I applaud ESPN for undertaking the monumental task of categorizing an astounding 500 players, but in truth, the top 10 players on the list have generated most of the discussion.
Particularly Bryant's placement at seventh, which I feel is dead-on.
The players rated above Bryant by ESPN in order were LeBron James, Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade, Chris Paul, Dirk Nowitzki and Kevin Durant.
At least reasonable arguments can be made in the case of James, Wade and Howard based on the fact that each player is capable of dominating a game consistently in multiple arenas, but the selections of Nowitzki, Paul and Durant ahead of Bryant are a little strange.
Strange, maybe, but not without merit when you consider the most recent body of work by all players concerned.
Paul, by his standards, had a mediocre regular season in which he averaged 15.9 points, 4.1 rebounds and 9.8 assists per game while shooting 46.3 percent from the field.
Those numbers are certainly enough to thrust Paul into the conversation as the league's top point guard, but the New Orleans Hornets floor general's performance in the first round of the 2011 NBA Playoffs against the Lakers may be why ESPN chose to place him ahead of Bryant.
Paul's Hornets lost to the Lakers in six games, but Paul turned in one of NBA history's top postseason performances of all time, as he averaged 22 points, 11.5 assists and 6.7 rebounds per game, while shooting nearly 55 percent from the field.
Paul's legendary postseason definitely certified him as one of the NBA's top three point guards, but did he prove he was a better player than Bryant last season?
Nowitzki also seems to have ridden a wave of momentum into ESPN's top five, as his Dallas Mavericks team surpassed all odds by capturing the 2011 NBA championship.
Dirk has always been a great player, but how many people were listing him as one of the NBA's five best before the Mavericks' improbable playoff run?
Nowitzki averaged 23 points and seven rebounds during the 2010-11 regular season, and while those numbers may not raise many eyebrows, Dirk's intensity and motivated play in the postseason surely did.
Winning the NBA's most recent finals MVP award will never hurt when it comes to a top player list, and while I don't feel Nowitzki has proved he is a better player than Bryant, he was better most recently when it counted the most.
However, ESPN may have a little harder time explaining their selection of Durant over Bryant.
I am well aware that the Oklahoma City Thunder's young forward is the flavor of the moment, but beyond filling up a basket what else has Durant proved during his brief time in the NBA?
Every single player in the top seven of ESPN's list has at least reached the NBA Finals, with the exception of Paul, and it can be argued that Paul did a lot more with lesser talent surrounding him than Durant last postseason.
In fact, there are whispers that Durant may not even be the best player on his own team.
Some analysts have said that point guard Russell Westbrook is Oklahoma City's best player, and although Durant scores more points, Westbrook's ability to score, defend and distribute does matter in the debate.
Still, I can understand ESPN's reasoning for placing Bryant seventh on their list of the NBA's top players despite the fact that he is unquestionably the most accomplished player out of all 500.
The NBA has increasingly become a league that is much more concerned about recent success as opposed to sustained brilliance.
Maybe the attention span of the general public is not big enough to accommodate a sequence of events that spans more than one NBA season.
You don't believe me?
Where do you think most of ESPN's analysts rated Bryant after the 2009-10 season?
After capturing his second consecutive NBA Finals MVP award in 2010, Bryant was firmly entrenched among the league's top five players in most people's opinions (including ESPN's), but what a difference a season makes.
None of the players ranked ahead of Bryant did anything to prove they are absolutely better players, but each one of them finished the season on a higher note.
Also, Bryant being rated seventh by ESPN shouldn't matter too much to Lakers fans since their subjective ranking provides Kobe with motivation to elevate himself back into their top five, and the home of SportsCenter was at least kind enough to make it a short journey.
In hindsight, at least Bryant isn't Derrick Rose, who was good enough to be named the NBA's 2010-11 league MVP but wasn't quite good enough to crack the list of ESPN's top five players.
