If I were advising Presti this would be my current list of ranked NBA players 1-30 for the upcomng NBA season. I have excluded both Kyrie Irving and Ben Simmons from this list because both seem to possess serious emotional issues of delusion.
1 Giannis, 2 Lebron, 3 Steph, 4 Kevin Durant, 5 Luka, 6 Kawhi Leonard, 7 Anthony Davis, 8 Nicola Jokic, 9 Joel Embiid, 10 James Harden, 11 Jimmy Butler, 12 Paul George, 13 Klay Thompson (before injury) 14 Chris Paul, 15 Damian Lillard, 16 Devin Booker, 17 Jamal Murray, 18 Zach Lavine, 19 Jrue Holiday, 20 Donovan Mitchell.
21 Rudy Gobert, 22 Russell Westbrook, 23 Trae Young, 24 Khris Middleton, 25 Draymond Green, 26 Bradley Beal, 27 Bam Adebayo, 28 Jason Tatum 29 Ja Morant, 30 Domas Sabonis.
My next five on my Pyramid Bubble would be… 31 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, 32 CJ McCollum, 33 Karl Anthony-Townes, 34 Brandon Ingram, 35 Tyler Herro (no one else would do this except me, but I have a gut feel with Tyler).
I’ll need to go back and evaluate my list in a month and see who I missed, but for now this is how my 2021-22 Top 30 NBA Player Pyramid would roll.
My Pantheon Top 10 has been morphed since I last scribbled it on here. This is my new Top 10 Pantheon….
1 Michael, 2 Bill Russell, 3 Kareem, 4 LeBron, 5 Magic, 6 Kobe, 7 Bird, 8 Shaq, 9 Wilt, 10 Steph. All one namers except Bill Russell. Our affinity for the one namers reveals our deep affection for the way they played the game.
You youngsters and new Thunder fans to the NBA game must read ‘Wilt’ by Gary Pomerantz to have an understanding of his greatness. It’s a tremendous hoops book and centers around the night Wilt scored a hundred points in Hershey, Pennslyvania. Epic…just epic.
- Note: My gut feel tells me Shai could be better than #31, but his place on my list was held in check because quite simply we haven’t seen him play in a real NBA game with competitive ramifications since 2019. And in reality–in those Bubble Playoffs with Chris Paul his play was nothing special or worthy of note.
- Note: Klay gets a pass from me until we see how he’s moving by February. Klay is gold on my blog.
Note: Kobe scored 81 points in 2006 in a game versus the Toronto Raptors. Gary did this interview before Kobe’s historical game.