tinygiant

I'm curious to see what everyone thinks about KJ's place in basketball history. He is my 2nd favorite player of all time, and I think it is clear that he was one of the best point guards of the last 20 years. Unfortunately, I don't think he'll ever be considered for the Hall of Fame because his career totals probably aren't high enough. Injuries later in his career limited him to just over 700 games.
His career totals were 13,127 points, 2404 rebounds and 6711 assists.
However, compared to some of the other all time great point guards, I think he stands up pretty well. Not only is he one of the few players to average 20+ ppg and 10+ apg for a season, he did 3 years in a row from 88-91 and just missed it in the 91-92 season. He was 2nd team All NBA 4 times and 3rd team once. It was a little tough to break into the 1st team with MJ, Magic and Stockton around.
Here's how his career averages compare to some of the players who are either already in the Hall, or likely to be there.

KJ 17.9 ppg, 3.3 rpg, 9.1 apg, .493 FG%, .841 FT%
Isiah Thomas 19.2 ppg, 3.6 rpg, 9.3 apg, .452 FG%, .759 FT%
Dave Bing 20.3 ppg, 3.8 rpg, 6.0 apg, .441 FG%, .775 FT%
Nate Archibald 18.8 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 7.4 apg, .467 FG%, .810 FT%
Bob Cousy 18.4 ppg, 5.2 rpg, 7.5 apg, .375 FG%, .803 FT%
Lenny Wilkens 16.5 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 6.7 apg, .432 FG%, .774 FT%
Tim Hardaway 17.9 ppg, 3.3 rpg, 8.3 apg, .432 FG%, .782 FT%
John Stockton 13.2 ppg, 2.7 rpg, 10.7 apg, .517 FG%, .826 FT

Basically, he doesn't seem too far off from these players. I think his shooting percentages are really interesting. Other than Stockton (who is a different kind of player, whose scoring numbers aren't nearly as high as the rest of these guys) KJ's FG% is the highest and his FT% is even better than Stockton's. Overall, I would love to see him make the Hall, but I don't think he ever will.

TheRifleman

I think he will eventually make the HOF. Maybe it won't happen his first couple years of eligibility, but his high FG %, his 5 times first, second, or third all NBA and his more than 10,000 points to go with more than 6000 assists will eventually get him into the HOF, imho.

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mike

I think that is his best season not career.

"Matt!"

I hate to break it to you, even Wilt never scored 10,000 points in a season..

tinygiant

What the hell are you guys talking about?

Wiggum

Huh...? He said 10,000 points over his career, not in a season. To score 10,000 points in a season, you'd have to play all 82 games and average 122.0 PPG!

TheRifleman

Uhhh, we were discussing the CAREER averages of KJ. You know, more than 10.000 points, MORE than 6,000 assists, etc.

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sundevilPAT

I used to live in Phx. and he was huge there, I do think that after a while KJ will become a HOF, also one of my favorite playoffs was when KJ came back to play with Phx. to replace the injured Kidd!

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