How many points per game would Hakeem Olajuwon average in today's NBA?
This league now has become all about spacing and shooting ability and has moved away from having a big man in the paint using his post moves to get two points. A player like Jahlil Okafor has good post moves, but his defense is bad. People use his bad defense and time-consuming offense as reason to say that he's virtually unplayable. He's reached the point where even though he's only played two seasons and has shown much better health than the best players on the Sixers, he's essentially buried on the depth chart and not worth trading because no team is willing to give good value for him.
Hakeem has the best post moves ever and is one of if not the best defenders/rim protectors ever. His defense is enough to ensure that he would start for every single team. Would teams want to use his offense skills though? How can a post-specialist offensive player fit into today's NBA? Would feeding Hakeem the ball early and often mean that shooters take longer to get into a rhythm? Hakeem averaged 20+ ppg for his first 13 seasons, including leading the league in scoring in 1994-95 with 27.8 ppg, but I find it hard to say that he'd average over 15 ppg nowadays if his offensive tools stayed the same.
Posted Jun 26, 2017, 8:43 PM UTC