Dwyane Wade has indeed surpassed Kobe Bryant as king of the shooting guards this season, for all intents and purposes.
Bleacher Report’s most respected NBA Featured Columnist and certainly one of my favorite writers, recently came out with an article with a highly debatable claim as reflected by his comment:
“Wade is younger and clearly the superior athlete at this point in his and Bryant's careers, but the perception that Wade has passed Bryant as a player is not supported by their numbers during the 2010-11 season.”
While I agree with Mr. Jones and his exceptionally compelling views 99 percent of the time, he does after all, exhibit a very sound knowledge of the game—this was one of those one percent times that alarm bells began to ring.
And I will respond to this statement with the kind of exclamation point that it demands:
This season, without a doubt, Kobe Bryant has relinquished his shooting guard throne to Dwyane Wade of the Miami Heat.
Whether that statement also holds true over the last couple of seasons is debatable, especially since history records Bryant as a two-time champion over that period—but after this season, that highly-charged debate is dead in the water.
Here are three overwhelming reasons why:
First of all, Mr. Jones points to the two superstars’ 2010-11 NBA season statistics as too close to call and as the leading indicator in Bryant’s favor.
And for the most part, while looking at the surface only, that’s quite true. Wade averaged barely more PPG (25.5 to 25.3) and RPG (6.4 to 5.1). Bryant averaged barely more APG (4.7 to 4.6).
But Wade beats Kobe handily in field goal shooting percentage (50 percent to 45 percent), a significant difference over games where the final ...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Los Angeles Lakers
