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Originally Posted by Thespiralgoeson
If the argument is Dirk vs. Malone, I'll go ahead and skip the extended stats and go straight to the eyeball test. Admittedly, my eyes might be a bit biased, but I gotta go with Dirk. The thing that Dirk has over just about any other power forward in the history of the game is the ability to consistently create his own shot. I can't immediately think of any any other PF ever who could create offense the way Dirk can. Indeed, few players in history of ANY position have been able to score on their own as proficiently and prolifically as Dirk can. It's the reason he's even in the same league as someone like Duncan, and the reason he's better than Garnett (both of whom outstrip Dirk in virtually ever other facet of the game.)
Malone was absolutely phenomenal off the pick-and-roll. Maybe the best pick-and-roll PF ever. Beyond that, however, his offense was a bit limited. It would be interesting to see (and I'm sure someone who was motivated enough could find this out) what percentage of Malone's total points throughout his career came off of P'n'R assists from Stockton. Pretty much anyone will concede that Stockton was one of the greatest P'n'R point guards ever, and Malone had him for his entire career (save for that last year he spent with the Lakers.)
I seriously doubt Malone could've scored at the same rate or efficiency if he'd been stuck with the mediocre guard play that Dirk has had ever since Nash left for Phoenix. Conversely we can only wonder how much better Dirk's numbers would be if he had one of the all-time greats in his backcourt through his whole career. Imagine if Dirk had gotten to play with Stockton, or a young Jason Kidd or even if Nash had re-signed in Dallas. It's impossible to know for sure, but common sense tells me that Dirk's numbers would be even better.
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This is a very good post. I don't think Malone's offensive game was limited but he did have the advantage of playing with a great PG for his entire career. However, Barkley and McHale were just as good at creating their own shots as Dirk is. Their offensive games were just different. In the case of Barkley, he didn't always have good PG play and he had crazy efficiency. Although I will admit his peak wasn't as long as Dirk's.