Do you agree with ISH Legend Thorpesaurous regarding Kevin McHale?

[Im Still Ballin]

Insight from one of InsideHoop's greatest minds. Do you agree with his view on Kevin McHale?

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...l=1#post142057

I think they're both a little overrated. Malone is a better defender, but he's an on ball defender. He wasn't a good help defender at all for a PF. And offensively, he's consistent, but he lacked the creativity that most great players had.

Barkley is an anomaly. He's as difficult a cover as the leagues probably ever seen. Too quick and crafty for PFs, and too strong for SFs. And at times, he was quicker and had more ball skills than even SFs, and could overpower even the best PFs.

But defensively, his size was always an issue. He had to go after everything, shots and rebounds, so much, that he was often out of position. It wasn't as much an issue of effort as it's made out to be.

At his peak, I'd definitely take him over Malone. But I don't think either of them is as good as Duncan, or even McHale.

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...l=1#post142098

Duncan's game most resembles McHale's. And my preference for both of them stems from their both being better at defending the rim.

Obviously, there's a lot of projection with McHale not being a number one option, but none of the other guys would have been either with Bird on their team. And only Duncan has proven that he could win it on his own, so if Mchale were a number one option on a team, he wouldn't have to even win a title to prove he was in the neighborhood of Malone and Barkley.

Barkley is clearly the hardest to defend in the group.

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...l=1#post142171

I know I'm in limited company with my opinion of McHale, and that's completely understandable. It's just something I've believed for a long time. And I don't put much weight into any of those kinds of quotes that players make. But it's always fun to read Barkley's ramblings, and Andrew Toney was a monster.

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...1#post11508210

In terms of historical achievement, it's obviously Malone.

But as someone who saw both guys, if it were my team I'd take McHale in a heartbeat. McHale is one of the most unique ability vs. numbers guys ever because of how much he bent himself for the good of the team.

Malone to me was maybe the best player ever at getting and making the easy shots. Whether it was using his physicality to get way deep in the post to make an easy shot. Outrunning his opponent, which he's really underrated at. And obviously just finding space in that pick and roll. But his game lacked much in the way of counters. If those handfuls of things were taken away, he didn't adjust well.

McHale's post game could serve as an offensive foundation. It would've been nice had he been a better passer, but that to me is a smaller sin. And defensively the gap is enormous. McHale has a great rep as a rim protector, but is underrated as a perimeter guy before he destroyed his ankle playing through the playoffs on a broken foot.

My fondness of McHale is admittedly higher than pretty much anyone. I'd take him over Barkley for similar defensive reasons. And I'd consider him over Garnett, who's an all-time defender and an excellent offensive player, but his game on that end has some of the same flaws as Malone's in that while it's very versatile, it lacked some of the forcefulness that McHale's post game had that feels more foundational.

McHale would be a fascinating player as a center in the current league. He could be a switching machine. Something like Jo Noah on that end, and a more efficient Zack Randolph on the other.

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...1#post11512017

I am saying Malone isn't an offensive foundation. And I know that seems weird considering the ridiculous number of points he scored.

But it's your second point that is the reason. I do care how easy the points were, because it's exactly that reason that I have concerns running an offense through him. And I think it defines some of his post season failures because teams knew they could change looks at him and affect his play. I think that's the reason so many of the big situations those Jazz teams were in, the ball wound up in Stockton or even Jeff Hornacek's hands. They may make a decision to go to Karl, but it was more often or not their decision.

And like I said, if we're doing a historical list, some kind of a ranking, then Malone is clearly ahead. But if I'm running the team and I get to choose between these two skill sets, I'd take McHale.

[Round Mound]

Untill the injury in 1987 McHale was the best PF. I'd like to call Kevin McHale and Tim Duncan as Forward-Centers and Barkley and Malone as Power-Forwards. These last 2 had Power in their games while the first 2 had more grace and fundamentals.

[NBAGOAT]

yes and no, underrated on defense but that passing gap is enough of a sin for me. You need just a bit even as a big to be an offensive foundation. Malone and barkley were putting up 4-5apg, you could run a lot of high post stuff for them you dont see as much from mchale.

His assumption that all those other PFS are 2nd options to bird are correct but we dont know how far his numbers drop in the playoffs as a no1. It helps to play with bird and very talented starting lineups in boston. I think the lack of passing could really hurt. hakeem is considered as skilled as a mchale and he has 6 straight seasons leading below average offenses from 87-92 before tomjanovich came along and he improved his passing, granted rockets were mediocre to bad rosters

[Round Mound]

yes and no, underrated on defense but that passing gap is enough of a sin for me. You need just a bit even as a big to be an offensive foundation. Malone and barkley were putting up 4-5apg, you could run a lot of high post stuff for them you dont see as much from mchale.

His assumption that all those other PFS are 2nd options to bird are correct but we dont know how far his numbers drop in the playoffs as a no1. It helps to play with bird and very talented starting lineups in boston. I think the lack of passing could really hurt. hakeem is considered as skilled as a mchale and he has 6 straight seasons leading below average offenses from 87-92 before tomjanovich came along and he improved his passing, granted rockets were mediocre to bad rosters

Why do you write Barkley with no cap? You dislike him?

[NBAGOAT]

Why do you write Barkley with no cap? You dislike him?

no reason. I like barkley more than malone lol.

[Round Mound]

no reason. I like barkley more than malone lol.

[Jasper]

I miss Thorpesaurous posts ... what ever happened to him ?

[Full Court]

Yes, I agree with everything he said about McHale.

[John8204]

It's hard to rank a guy that only really started 5 seasons in the NBA especially over MVP's like Malone, Barkley, Giannis, Dirk, etc. The guy was a major factor in the Celtics winning rings but the only guys you can rank him ahead of are the Hayes, Rodmans, and Schayes.

[Im Still Ballin]

New comment from Thorpesaurous regarding McHale:

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...1#post14733610

McHale injured his foot that season and was never quite the same defender. This young McHale could switch onto perimeter guys about as effectively as any big I've ever seen, like in the KG range. I think McHale is criminally underrated, not in terms of historically, like achievement wise, but in terms of skill set. I would personally take him over Barkley and Karl Malone. And because of his post game consistency, I could be talked into over KG, from a team building perspective, if you caught me on the right night. His numbers just don't pop because of the quality of team he played on. The only real weakness is he wasn't a great passer. It was in him. You'd see it in spots. But there was so much ball going around on that team, and he was so good in the post, that when it did get into him, it didn't often come out. I think he could stretch his range out some, and would be a more willing passer in a different setting, and would be a great center in the modern game, because he'd score super efficiently with the spacing, and he'd be super switchable defensively.

[L.Kizzle]

One All-NBA Team ... not even a full time starter for the majority of his career.

[Im Still Ballin]

Found another old comment:

McHale is tricky, because of the careers of other guys he can't possibly rank above 7 or so. But if I'm starting a team, I'd take him over most of the guys ranked ahead of him based on his peak and particular skill set.

In response to:

People usually have Duncan as the greatest PF of all time... then there's the giant mess of trying to rank KG, Dirk, Barkley and Malone (lately it seems KG and Dirk are more often than not placed above Barkley and Malone due to the spectacular second half of their careers, but it's still close enough to be debatable). Throw in Bob Pettit somewhere and you've got 6 PFs in the 25ish greatest players of all time.

But where do you rank Kevin McHale, who used to be seen as one of the all-time greatest at the position? Is he your next on the list? How would you round out your top 10 all time PF list?

Just to set the context, Kevin McHale is a 7 time all-star, 3 time champion, 2 time 6th man of the year, 3 time member of the all defensive first team, and widely acknowledged as one of the (if not the) greatest low post scorers in the history of the game, including a year scoring 26 ppg on 66 TS% (the words "second option" don't do him justice, and he probably would have been the first option on most teams... certainly he would be on most teams today).

[Im Still Ballin]

Good comment from Fatal9:

I don't particularly care for where they rank on an all-time list, but McHale was the better player. Really wish Celtics won in '85 or '87 but the team was dealing with injuries ('85 it was Bird's shooting elbow, '87 it was basically the entire team). McHale would have won the finals MVP if Celtics won in either of those years, and also had one of the best non-finals MVP winning series against Hakeem in '86.

McHale was the better scorer (probably the best half court scorer ever at his position for me), better defender and I prefer his type of offense to Dirk's. McHale's passing sometimes gets diminished because he was a "black hole" but that's because he was so damn efficient. It wasn't a skill he was lacking, can't really compare assist numbers to measure ability when one guy can score on you at will and as a result is a bit less likely to pass back out. He played on the best passing team that I've ever seen in the '86 Celtics, and did nothing to hurt their ball movement.

[ArbitraryWater]

I used to read old threads for hours to gain insights.


Those same threads are probably all gone now.

[Im Still Ballin]

I used to read old threads for hours to gain insights.


Those same threads are probably all gone now.

A lot of great threads & posts lost.