Thought this was interseting, from hoopsanalyst.com:

"2. Perpetuating Myths: We are in the midst of experiencing the Suns' surprising turnaround but I recognize the byproduct of this phenomenon, Stephon Marbury will take it on the chin again from some writers. We know have two instances of Marbury leaving a club, and the club quickly turning from a lottery team to a championship contender. First it was the Nets in 2001-02 and now this year's Suns. The conclusion that people drew with the Nets (and will draw with the Suns once they notice) was that Marbury is missing an intangible/team player ingredient that raises Jason Kidd and Steve Nash above him. This in fact might be true. Kidd was slightly better than Marbury back in 2001-02 and 2002-03 (especially defensively and in rebounding). Nash also seems to be a more efficient offensive player than Marbury (though he is not a better defender than Stephon).



The combined outcomes of the two Marbury trades are sure to brand him a scarlet "L" for loser. This, of course, is completely unfair. The improvement of the Nets and the Suns was/is not due solely to Marbury's point replacements. Just for a reminder let's look at the Nets from the 2000-01 (the year before Kidd) and 2001-02:

2000-01 Nets (26-56) 2001-02 Nets (52-30)

PG: Stephon Marbury (23.9 ppg, 7.6 apg, 3.1 rpg) Jason Kidd (14.7 ppg, 9.9 apg, 7.3 rpg)

SG: Lucious Harris (9.4 ppg, 1.8 apg, 3.9 rpg) Kerry Kittles (13.4 ppg, 2.6 apg, 3.4 rpg)

SF: Assortment (Johnny Newman, Keith Van Horn, Stephen Jackson) Kenyon Martin (14.9 ppg, 5.4 rpg)

PF: Kenyon Martin (12.0 ppg, 7.4 rpg) Keith Van Horn (14.8 ppg, 7.5 rpg)

C: Evan Eschmeyer (3.4 ppg, 4.9 rpg) Todd Macculloch (9.7 ppg, 6.1 rpg)



As you can see, the 2001-02 Nets had a bit more talent outside of the point position. This chart doesn't even reflect the bench, which had Richard Jefferson, Jason Collins (not great but certainly no Eschmeyer), and Harris sliding to the bench. The differences between Marbury and Kidd, on offense, were not much if anything. (Indeed, John Hollinger rated Marbury's 2000-01 season as better than Kidd's 2001-02). Defensively though, Kidd came out better. Based on that, it is fair to infer that Kidd was the more valuable player but really not by much.



Now let's look at the Suns with Marbury versus Nash. This comparison will be a bit more difficult because Marbury was traded midway through the year. So to get a fairer picture, let's compare the 2002-03 Suns (Marbury's last full year in Phoenix) with this year's Suns:



2002-03 Suns (44-38) 2004-05 Suns (31-6)

PG: Stephon Marbury (22.3 ppg, 8.1 apg, 3.2 rpg) Steve Nash (15.3 ppg, 10.9 apg, 3.1 rpg)

SG: Penny Hardaway (10.6 ppg, 4.1 apg, 4.4 rpg) Joe Johnson (15.3 ppg, 3.5 apg, 5.6 rpg)

SF: Shawn Marion (21.2 ppg, 9.5 rpg, 2.4 apg) Quentin Richardson (15.3 ppg, 6.4 rpg)

PF: Amare Stoudemire (13.5 ppg, 8.8 rpg) Shawn Marion (19.6 ppg, 10.5 rpg)

C: Jake Tsakalidis/Scott Williams Amare Stoudemire (26.0 ppg, 8.7 rpg)



Like with the Nets, Marbury found himself in a situation where the team had some talent holes at center and two guard and some young developing players (Johnson and Stoudemire). Well since Marbury left, Stoudemire and Johnson developed. Does Nash deserve some credit for the development? Certainly. But the operative phrase is "some credit." Stoudemire did not double his scoring average solely by changing point guards. Marbury is a good passer too. The one thing he doesn't do well is push the fast break, a talent that both Kidd and Nash are famous for. Where would the 2001-02 Nets and 2004-05 Suns be with Marbury? Probably slightly worse than they are/were with Kidd and Nash. I suspect the Nets of 2001-02 would still have been a 45 to 47 win team. This year's Suns would probably be a 20-something win team at this point.



The bottom line is that Marbury is a very good point guard. He is not an untouchable. The Suns traded him because his value as a player was frankly less than Penny Hardaway's debilitating deal that the Knicks had to take as well. But human nature will probably cause people to label him as one of those guys who doesn't "get it." Indeed, the same conclusion was drawn of Walt Bellamy when the Knicks traded him to Detroit for Dave Debusschere right before the team became a championship contender back in 1968-69. Marbury, himself, foolishly feeds into this strain of thinking but protesting that he's the best guard out there and so on. Marbury is a very good guard, the fact that he's been traded for other very good guards shouldn't take away from his reputation."

tephon Marbury has been called a loser mostly because he hasn't won a playoff series or carried a team to new heights. He has made it to the playoffs only 4 times out of his 9yr career. His first 2 yrs in Minn, 1 with Suns, 1 with Knicks.

In Minn he came in a 19 yr old rookie along side of Garnett & Tom Gugliotta. They make it to the playoffs but then lose to the defending champions the Houston Rockets. Next season Gugliotta goes down with a serious injury Marbury & Garnett still make the playoffs seed but then lose to #2 seed Supersonics the yr of Payton-Schempf-Baker-Dale Ellis-Hersey Hawkins. He then gets traded to NJ who put out some of the uglies lineups.

Nets in 00 the lineup was Marbury, Kittles, Gill, KVH, Mureasan, Eshmyener, Fiek, Mclvaine, Newman, Harris, Burrell. Thats just ugly.

Nets in 98-99 Marbury, Kittles, Gill, Hendricks, Fieck, Jayson Williams who was at end of his average career.

Nets in 00-01. Marbury(67gms), Newman, KVH(49gms), Martin(68gms), A.Williams. The guys that we able to stay healthy were average to below average players. Kittles was lost for the season.

He then gets traded to Suns. The suns were rebuilding at the time they already moved Cliff Robinson and traded Rodney Rodgers & Tony Delk for Joe Johnson losing there frontcourt . Suns in 02-03 were Marbury-Hardaway-Marion-Gugliotta-Voskul-Johnson-Bo Outlaw-Tsakalidis. Hardaway-Gugliotta were both past there prime and broken down. Voskul just isn't any good. Johnson was a promising rookie but they weren't good enough to make the playoffs in the tougher west confrence. They did win 36games though. Next season they add bring in Amare stoudemire *MANCHILD* win 44 games and get to the first rd. But lose to the eventual champs Spurs. Marbury outplayed Tony Parker. Next season Amare gets hurt there frontcourt only consist of Gugliotta, Tskalidis, Bo Outlaw, Voskul. Marbury then gets traded to Knicks so the Suns can dump 100million dollars and sell the team.

With the Knicks they make the playoffs but Houston & Tim Thomas 35pts goes down with injury KT breaks his finger and we couldn't matchup with the Nets.

Going over his career I see someone who may have not been able to bring an average team to new heights. But I don't see someone who brings a team down. Or is a cancer or loser. He played on some pretty ugly teams. Though he did ask for it when he left Garnett when he was on Minny. I believe Marbury will get his time to shine some day. Every player does. I just hope when he does get his turn on a contending team and does some damage in the playoffs its with the knicks.

yeah excellent post ny ny. nice analysis, I agree.

Good post NY, I think marbury has had the misfortune of having some not so great talent around him, his timing has been awful to say the least, but he is not the reason why those teams were not winning. Lets see what Jason kidd does now that the nets are 10 games under .500..

and since kidd has been back he nets still have a losing record, I wonder if losing all that talent has some effect on the sucess of the nets? of course it does, but lets see how much heat kidd takes for this one? or doesn't take..

Great article Big Smooth finally the truth has been spoken. Marbury never had the chance to play with an elite big man the year he played with garnett, garnett was still developing and plus marbury didn't have that maturity level that he have now. last year playoff wasn't an actual playoff year for knicks because when you look at our record we were not supposed to be in the playoff. plus the knicks didn't have a frontline (nazr & kurt). let us sit back and watch what kid able to do with the line up he has now.

PS
i think we should have thread for post & article of the year,month,day,or week, because Big smooth article deserve to be the article of the year or month, day, week which ever one.

Great article Big Smooth finally the truth has been spoken. Marbury never had the chance to play with an elite big man the year he played with garnett, garnett was still developing and plus marbury didn't have that maturity level that he have now. last year playoff wasn't an actual playoff year for knicks because when you look at our record we were not supposed to be in the playoff. plus the knicks didn't have a frontline (nazr & kurt). let us sit back and watch what kid able to do with the line up he has now.

PS
i think we should have thread for post & article of the year,month,day,or week, because Big smooth article deserve to be the article of the year or month, day, week which ever one.

Posted by playa2:

When is the last time the self proclaimed bets pg in the NBA "STARBURY" came close to a triple double.

It takes a lot of playing hard on both ends of the court to record a triple double or get close to it.

It's not about stats. It's about wins. Who won more playoff games by age 27: Marbury or Kidd?

If Marbury's Knicks finish strong and win a playoff round, Marbury won't be heavily criticized regardless of what the Suns do. However, the real test for Marbury and Isiah is what happens next year because Isiah will have had an offseason with huge trade assets to use to improve the team.

I will judge our best player when its worth judging. Its hard to fault his play this year. Lets put a few decent frontcourt players around him and see what happens.