Dime is the premier basketball magazine, covering the NBA, NCAA, High School, Playground and International basketball - as well as sneakers, fashion and music.
Issue link: http://dimemagazine.epubxp.com/i/56522
LETTERS Somewhere along the way Kyrie Irving picked up a few haters. Maybe it's the Duke pedigree or the too-fast college career or the fact that he doesn't jump out at anyone the way 2010's No. 1 pick John Wall did. But either way, as the saying goes: With success come the haters. Tis is nothing out of the ordinary though for rookie point guards. Yes, it's a difficult position to jump into, but we've seen a lot of little guys come through to light up the NBA in their first year including Bob Cousy, Oscar Robertson, Allen Iverson and Chris Paul. Irving has already left his imprint on the league, scoring 20-plus points four consecutive times not even a month into his career. Upon the heels of the ugly lockout, no one represented hope more than the best rookie guard in the league, so around the time we told his story and put him on the cover of Dime #67, we asked our readers: WHO WAS THE BEST ROOKIE POINT GUARD IN NBA HISTORY? Gotta go MAGIC. One of the best ever hits the ground running and caps it off with one of the best games of all time starting at C to take home a title. This generation's gotta be CP3. To take a moribund, drowning franchise from upper lottery to the preci- pice of the playoffs is amazing. -Celts Fan It's gotta be MAGIC JOHNSON. What rookie in modern time could possibly have the maturity to play all five positions in the Finals, in a Game 6 for the championship, on a road game? -Reg I swear CP3 is overrated. Isn't this for his rookie year, not what he was able to do his third year in the league? His rookie year was no more impressive than Rose, Wall, Stou- damire, Francis, Marbury, Isiah or J-Kidd. They all had good rookie years, nothing spectacular, but very good. Now in terms of the best, OSCAR ROBERTSON, with Magic coming in a close second. Magic did win the Finals but that's a team accomplishment and I refuse to give him all the credit. Allen Iverson's rookie year was pretty great as well. -Slick Ric Well I'm gonna go with JASON KIDD, for this reason: I didn't see Magic or Oscar's rookie seasons. You'd have to be pretty damn old to be saying either of them from memory. You can't really judge a guy's play from an ESPN Classic highlight reel or a stat sheet. Even as a rookie Jason was a pure point. Magic seems to be getting accolades from winning a chip (he did have multiple HOFers playing with him) or the fact he played multiple positions has nothing to do with being a point guard at all. Matter of fact, playing as a center should detract from your season as a point guard, if anything. -Me What about TYREKE EVANS? His team may not have been the most successful, but he was only the fourth player in history to average 20-5-5 in his rookie year, and only the second PG to do it after Oscar. -D.H. No one has made a case for ANFERNEE "PENNY" HARDAWAY yet, and since he was my favorite player growing up, here we go. In the 1993-94 season he averaged 16.0 points, 6.6 assists, 5.4 rebounds and 2.3 steals a game on a Magic team that featured a young Shaquille O'Neal. That was the year of Jor- dan's first retirement. He and Shaq got the Magic to the first round of the playoffs and got swept by an Indiana team that made it to the Eastern Conference Finals. -BiGShoTBoB Others were better players, but my pick for my time is J-WILL a.k.a. White Chocolate. He helped save the NBA after the lockout. -ctkennedy I think TYREKE's rookie season was sen- sational! Especially considering the awful team, the fact that defenses were geared towards stopping him and that it's the 21st century and opposing teams can watch hours and hours of actual game tape and set their defenses like that. I think it's amazing what he did. -Jade Pre-1980 you have to go with OSCAR ROBERTSON. 30-10-10 pretty much kills the competition. Problem is, there was 10 only eight teams in the NBA so any stats back then should be taken with a grain of salt. Post-1980, MAGIC JOHNSON with- out a doubt. 18.0 points, 7.7 rebounds, 7.3 assists, 2.4 steals a game, shooting 53 percent from the field is just unreal. My sleeper, Damon Stoudamire. Dude put up 19.0 points, 9.3 assists, 4.0 rebounds a game and shot nearly 40 percent from three-point land as a rookie in '95. -Chicagorilla I gotta say SAM CASSELL because he pro- duced when it mattered. He was decent during the regular season during his rookie year, but exploded in the NBA Finals to propel his team to the championship. He made big bucket over huge bucket over gi- ant bucket in those Finals! Kenny Smith was okay, but his backup Cassell was bet- ter. I think he scored 30 points in one or two of those Finals games. I know Magic won a ring too his rookie year, but it's hard for me to view a 6-9 back-to-the-basket, post-up player as a true point guard – es- pecially since he's famous for also playing center. I choose Sam I Am. -rob stewart As much as I'd love to somehow make this an argument, none exists. Not only did MAGIC average 18.0 points, 7.7 rebounds and 7.3 assists on a beautiful field goal per- centage, he came on to a veteran team, as a rookie, and took control of the reins. Then without the league's best player, in the big- gest game of his life, throws up 42 points, 15 boards, seven dimes and three steals to take the chip. There's been a bunch of legit rookie point men in league history… but why do we play the games? -K Dizzle