How great is Shaq, really?

[MasterBlaster]

When Shaq went into the NBA, he was playing against centers for the next 4 years who were on the downside of their careers. Ewing, Hakeem, Parish had already 10 years of pounding on their bodies. The only other center I can think of that was remotely the same age as Shaq was Zo.

The other centers around the league were not as powerful or as dominating as Shaq, so to say that Howard isn't in the same boat as shaq was at the same time in his career would be not giving Howard or Shaq their due.

When its all said and done, you will have to look at pure numbers to see if Howard should get as much fan fair as Shaq.

The other thing Shaq has on his side is his persona and playing with Kobe. How would he be looked at now if he didnt get all those rings with the Lakers?

Would he be another Ewing, dominant but no rings to show for it?

I will give Howard his props if he has longevity in the league. Until then, I am going to enjoy watching him become a force to deal with and hopefully he will have a long career.

 

[jimboiitmac]

When Shaq went into the NBA, he was playing against centers for the next 4 years who were on the downside of their careers. Ewing, Hakeem, Parish had already 10 years of pounding on their bodies. The only other center I can think of that was remotely the same age as Shaq was Zo.

The other centers around the league were not as powerful or as dominating as Shaq, so to say that Howard isn't in the same boat as shaq was at the same time in his career would be not giving Howard or Shaq their due.

When its all said and done, you will have to look at pure numbers to see if Howard should get as much fan fair as Shaq.

The other thing Shaq has on his side is his persona and playing with Kobe. How would he be looked at now if he didnt get all those rings with the Lakers?

Would he be another Ewing, dominant but no rings to show for it?

I will give Howard his props if he has longevity in the league. Until then, I am going to enjoy watching him become a force to deal with and hopefully he will have a long career.

Sorry mate but I just can't accept your point of view.

You talk about giving Shaq/Dwight their due, but your not giving Shaq his due at all?

Sure Hakeem, Robinson and Ewing were all veteran centres by this point, but back then players had longer careers and seemed to dominate for longer before declining. After all didn't MJ get his final ring in the late 90's?

To say that Hakeem was on his downslide or "downside of his career" as you put it - how can that be when Hakeem won back-to-back championships with the Rockets just a few seasons after Shaq's arrival and he dominated.

Those years were also when Hakeem won his share of MVP awards and D-Rob also won his MVP and D-POY Awards..

I don't think you could say those centres were on the "backside of their careers" to any extent...

And as you said,

When its all said and done, you will have to look at pure numbers to see if Howard should get as much fan fair as Shaq.

If we're looking at pure numbers, you could clearly see that guys like Ewing, Olajuwon and D-Rob all put up 20+ ppg, 10+ rpg for countless seasons after Shaq was drafted, showing that his competition was STIFF! Whereas who can you put up against Dwight and say is an elite centre and puts up those numbers?

Apart from Yao, who probably misses half of the season games against Orlando because he only plays about 55-65 games a season.. there's not reallly an elite centre in the league right now. JO is injured and not in the form he was 3 seasons ago and unless you want to classify Tim Duncan or Amare as C's, their really true PF's though.. there's nobody..

so when talking about giving due to Shaq and Dwight.. seems like you need to give Shaq a bit more in relation to who he had to go up against and how much stronger his competition was.

Oh and i left out Dikembe.. he gets props too

 

[Chris_paul]

I aint seen or know a center that can jump like dwight ever before check out hes top ten carrer dunks thats unstopable. Its a non arguemnt untill dwight has played as many season as shaq and with the calibre of player that shaq has. Dont know if shaq has ever got a tripple double with blocks and there are some decent centers in this leauge Z bosch camby is sick chandler duncan and yeah there not true centers all but thats who dwight matches up with.

Shaq is still the man though I agree. When oden played on him he got killed the first time and i seen a game he got trippled in miami by duncan and gino and bowen and he ravaged all three and duncan got elbowed out of the way from a dunk. Most dominant player ever!