Who Is The Biggest Ball Hogger in History?

[madridken]

I say pete maravich
he makes them but hogs it

[benji]

Somebody would have to define "ballhog" for us first.

But maybe, John Drew?

[Al Ka Pwn]

Kobe Bryant or Allen Iverson.

[vinceair]

phpBB [video]

Kobe Bryant hands down !!!

[shadowgrin]

Michael Jordan.

[Patr1ck]

I want to say Wilt Chamberlain, but wouldn't you shoot if nobody except Bill Russell could stop you?
Stephon Marbury? No, assists are too high. He could be a stat whore, but not necessarily the biggest ballhog.
Jordan is a ballhog, but he is also an exception looking at his performance and what he was able to accomplish.
Kobe is not the biggest ballhog. Ever since the rape case/post-Shaq era, his poor plays have been exaggerated. He's just a really bad shot taker who forces them up sometimes because he has a very high confidence level, making things harder for himself because he's not good enough to make it easier for himself, unlike MJ.

So, basically, what benji said. Define it first.

[shadowgrin]

Taking into account benji (usg%) and Pdub's (exceptions) suggestions, I say it's Zach Randolph (after glancing and comparing John Drew and Randolph's stats)

[Moz]

Pistol Pete (both college and NBA) and Allen Iverson (especially his rookie season) comes to mind. Steve Francis is a "can be" one.

[Fcuk Orlando]

i'll take a shot in the dark and say Yinka Dare? He only had 4 assists in his whole career.

[Alejandrov011]

4 assists in 1000 minutes? OMG!

[shadowgrin]

Yinka "god" Dare also belongs to the exception that Pdub mentioned. If god is your teammate, you feed him the rock damn it and let him do his thing.

[benji]

I don't know if his 1995-96 can ever be matched. 17% usage which is not too high but is still "fourth" option level. But he not only turns it over 30% of the time but only hits 48% of his shots. And he goes 626 minutes without ever getting an assist. Plus he couldn't even play 34 or more minutes at his foul rate.

And now to quote from Loose Balls on what Dare thought the Captain C on Christian Laettner's jersey meant:

He looks over at Laettner, who's a white guy, and he looks back at me, and Yinka goes, "'Caucasian'?"
We're losing so I can't be laughing on the bench. I put my head down, got a towel over my face. And then Benoit Benjamin, another NBA genius on the Nets' bench, looks over at me and he says, "Wooo, child. That Yinka Dare sure is silly, isn't he? Everybody knows 'caucasian' starts with a 'k'."

Btw, here's that Yinka "God" Dare site.

[NovU]

Wow, and I thought Joel Anthony was the greatest, but this Yinka dude... amazing.

His first season yinka average 87.6 ppg 67.0 rpg 55.2 apg and 35.9 bpg

[shadowgrin]

god's greatness cannot be observed or quantified with mere stats.

[Andrew]

He looks over at Laettner, who's a white guy, and he looks back at me, and Yinka goes, "'Caucasian'?"
We're losing so I can't be laughing on the bench. I put my head down, got a towel over my face. And then Benoit Benjamin, another NBA genius on the Nets' bench, looks over at me and he says, "Wooo, child. That Yinka Dare sure is silly, isn't he? Everybody knows 'caucasian' starts with a 'k'."

Classic.

The stats probably don't back it up, but Jannero Pargo is one of those players who seems to put up the shot every time he touches the ball. On the plus side, he can shoot a team back into the game when his shot is falling but when it's not, it's just ugly to watch.

[vinceair]

Ball hog- it's like kobe , you know that other players are at better position and they are completely free, NO i will shoot the rock never mind that i am double teamed!

[Andrew]

A lot of the dominant scorers throughout history have shown that mentality at times though.

[deihatein]

The stats probably don't back it up, but Jannero Pargo is one of those players who seems to put up the shot every time he touches the ball. On the plus side, he can shoot a team back into the game when his shot is falling but when it's not, it's just ugly to watch.

How about JR Smith? He is also the same?

[benji]

The one problem with picking current players, and secondary or worse level players like Smith and Pargo, is that the 1970s and 1980s featured "star" players whose entire point was to just jack up shots. For example, George Gervin, Kiki Vandeweghe, Alex English, etc. who flung up shots like mad and got assists mostly because they had the ball.

Now, these guys were often catch and shoot scorers. Like Pargo, like Smith. Are these guy ballhogs? Is Kyle Korver a ballhog? He basically just shoots whenever he gets it. So on.

And nobody has used a higher percentage of his teams possessions than Michael Jordan. (And Kobe holds the single season record.) Yet I don't think we have a problem with Jordan doing so. He is the best post-merger player after all.

I think we need to "rethink" the ballhog into not just someone who shoots a lot, often or early, but someone who dominates the basketball to the detriment of their team. In which case we'd look for high usage players with poor ORtg's. (We can use TS% and TOV% which I'll add to the table, but ORtg works better for an "all purpose sum up" for offensive efficiency. Think of it as "points per possession." I.E. how many points can the team expect if this guy has the ball for this possession.) So I of course, used B-R.com and threw out anyone outside the three pointer era, and required at least 10,000 minutes. We'd expect a fair team to use 20% usage, 22% is actually more accurate for a "priority scorer" and I set the cut off at 25%. And then after ten, I added the next six people over 27%. (Gordon and Anthony have the same 106.6 ORtg.) For comparison, I have also added Kobe and Jordan. (And Yinka. )

Player	P/36	R/36	A/36	TS%	TOV%	Usg%	ORtg
Antoine Walker	17.9	7.9	3.6	.484	13.4	26.5	97
Darrell Griffith	20.8	4.2	2.7	.509	11.8	26.3	99
Cliff Robinson (The 1980s one)	20.2	9.8	2.3	.505	12.8	26.3	100
Jermaine O'Neal	18.1	9.6	1.9	.512	12.5	25.8	101
Quintin Dailey	22.1	3.9	3.5	.508	12.2	27.9	101
Glenn Robinson	20.2	5.9	2.7	.529	13.8	28.1	102
Isaiah Rider	19.0	4.4	3.1	.526	13.8	26.0	102
Tony Campbell	19.0	5.0	2.4	.509	12.1	25.2	103
Jamal Mashburn	18.4	5.2	3.8	.504	12.1	25.8	103
Jerry Stackhouse	19.9	3.7	3.9	.524	14.4	27.8	103
Zach Randolph	20.1	10.0	2.0	.520	12.1	28.3	104
Chris Webber	20.1	9.5	4.1	.513	12.1	27.1	104
Allen Iverson	23.5	3.3	5.4	.519	12.1	32.0	105
Patrick Ewing	22.0	10.3	2.0	.553	13.6	28.0	106
Carmelo Anthony	24.1	6.1	3.1	.543	12.2	30.7	107
Ben Gordon	21.3	3.5	3.4	.554	12.7	27.3	107
Michael Jordan	28.3	5.9	4.9	.569	9.3	33.3	118
Kobe Bryant	24.8	5.2	4.6	.558	11.4	31.2	112
Yinka Dare	8.4	10.1	0.1	.441	26.7	15.6	79

A personal favorite not on the list is Steve Francis (25% usage, 17% turnovers, 106 ORtg) simply because of how many times I saw him pound the ball into the floor until there was two seconds left and then pass it or fling up a crappy shot. (Or turn it over.)

One interesting thing to notice, is that until you get down around Iverson/Ewing/Anthony (who either have insane usage or superior shooting) all these guys don't really get much better than 20 points per 36, indeed most are below that, yet they were all 20ppg scorers. Yet another piece of evidence that per game stats tell us more about minutes played than performance.

I multiplied ORtg times usage. No, I won't make a table for this.

Code: Select all

walker   2571
campbell   2596
griffith   2604
o'neal   2606
c robinson   2630
rider   2652
mashburn   2657
dailey   2818
webber   2818
stackhouse   2863
g robinson   2866
gordon   2921
randolph   2943
ewing   2968
anthony   3285
iverson   3360
bryant   3494
jordan   3929

[Lamrock]

LOL @ Yinka's 0.1 assist average.

[Andrew]

Now, these guys were often catch and shoot scorers. Like Pargo, like Smith. Are these guy ballhogs? Is Kyle Korver a ballhog? He basically just shoots whenever he gets it. So on.

True. I suppose in basketball parlance, one could refer to players like Pargo as "black holes" as once the ball goes to them it's not coming back (well, most of the time anyway) but not necessarily ballhogs because they don't actually have the ball in their hands long enough possession-to-possession; as you put it, they don't dominate the ball.

[bee-boy]

It all depends on what you think ballhog means. Some people define it as a person who shoots all the time so right off the bat someone would say kobe or mike because they are the most prolific scorers in NBA history. But they don't think about other ways they score. They aren't ball hogs they are Scorers...it's a huge difference.

[Andrew]

In all fairness, I think both Kobe and Jordan could still be called ballhogs but their efficiency and the success of their teams arguably balances it out. Being a detriment to the team would have to factor in there somewhere in the definition of "ballhog".

[Valor]

Now, these guys were often catch and shoot scorers. Like Pargo, like Smith. Are these guy ballhogs? Is Kyle Korver a ballhog? He basically just shoots whenever he gets it. So on.

True. I suppose in basketball parlance, one could refer to players like Pargo as "black holes" as once the ball goes to them it's not coming back (well, most of the time anyway) but not necessarily ballhogs because they don't actually have the ball in their hands long enough possession-to-possession; as you put it, they don't dominate the ball.

speaking of 'black holes', i am surprised that no one has mentioned Sam Cassell thus far

[Al Ka Pwn]

You saw the vids. Kobe's only been a teamplayer since he realised he is a total dick. If nobody told him about youtube, he'd be a selfish bastard. So he still gets my vote.