Steve Nash
I have probably only typed more words about 1-2 players on NT than Steve. Few years ago, I was simply shocked at what people were saying during his best years.
His Dallas days were fun, and tough on me back then. Nick Van Exel was my second favorite player all time (after Magic) and he was there in Dallas playing with Steve and Dirk and Michael Finley. They were certainly a fun team to watch, and Don Nelson ball will always put up TONS of points. I remember always thinking that Dirk was the star, and Nash the 2nd man on the team, but it seemed that Nick was the balls of the team. It was his style, he had no fear and a @#$% you attitude at all times. Nash was the quiet presense. No frills, just go out and do his job. Get guys the ball, run the team, that was that. I could make a case that he only did that on offense though, on defense it was sort of his rest time.
He was a solid solid player, but I never thought of him being anything elite, or special. Much the same as I never thought Mark Price was elite or special, just very very good.
Cuban played the odds, and let Nash leave as a free agent. Steve going to Phoenix was a great career move for him, one it was the team that drafted him, 2 it seems to have the magic powers to heal or some @#$%. Players all seem to rejuvinate in the Phoenix air or something. This was something else though. Steve was joining one helluva a nice young core, FULL of talent to play with. It wasn't Don Nelson, but it wasn't far from it either. They weren't very deep yet, but they had plenty of star power. Stat, Marion, Q (when he was good) and a young Joe Johnson. Stat's unique outside game for a 6-11 guy, as well as liking to be far away from rough and tumble inside play was perfect for Steve when mixed with 3 other guys that could shoot from deep. This opened the court to Nash like never before. He had lanes, room to move, vision to make passes, angles, everything. It was apparent early their style would work well for Steve. (Dirk was a similiar weapon to Stat in that sense, but in Dallas at the end they had added Jamison, and Walker, plus had Shawn Bradley's slow @#$ cloggin things up a bit. The angles weren't the same)
For reasons I will never, ever understand, Nash moving to Phoenix and them improving led the media to give Nash the MVP award. He was given so much credit for changing their team, when really the year before was just that much of a disaster. Having Marbury lead your team will make you look worse than you really are. But still, everyone gave credit to Steve for their success, and he took the MVP away from Shaq. The fact that the MVP averaged 15 points and 11 assists was stunning to me considering Jason Kidd could put numbers up like that, or John Stockton, or even Mark Jackson, and none of them ever won MVP. (Kidd did come close though)
The following year was just as bad, Nash won the MVP again, putting him in some rather select company but at least he had a slightly better argument since Stat was down for the year. Still, people were out of their minds and gave him so much credit for others success. I wish they would have realized at the time what they were doing, which is all I was ever screaming for.
Nash was SURROUNDED by shooters. Guys that could put the ball in the basket. They may not have been elite at any other things, but shooting/scoring, they could do. Spread them all out, and Nash can rack up assists with ease. Year 1 he had Stat, Marion, Q, Joe Johnson, Jim Jackson, Barbosa, scorers everywhere. The next year the Suns went even more 3 ball, giving him Marion, Eddie House, James Jones, Barbosa, Raja Bell, multi use Diaw, even Tim Thomas was brought in to shoot from outside. Their lone inside presence was Kurt Thomas, who is still in the league today battling. They gave Nash everything he could ask for, guys who could shoot when he gave them the ball. People would claim HE made THEM better, which is part true, and mostly myth. The fact was they could score, he made sure to get them the ball where they liked so they could. I argued a billion times with people, if 3 of his starters were Kwame, Smush and Luke Walton, he wouldn't get half the assists he gets in Phoenix, they either wouldn't make shots, or even catch the ball in Kwame's case.
People wouldn't listen. They still swear up and down that Nash made them all better shooters. Of course all of those guys have gone on to other teams and continued to make shots, but that will be overlooked forever.
The last few years, he's played just as well, if not better, but the Suns tried to change thier system for a bit to get more "playoff" like, but it failed quickly, so they went back to shooters galore, and whatdya know, Nash's game got better.
They put Stat, J Rich, Channing Frye, and Grant Hill around him as shooters, though Grant didn't have the 3 range they needed, so they would sub in Jared Dudley for stretches to extend the defense and help create those lanes for Nash again. This got them close to a finals again, but it was still just a gimmick offense that wouldn't last in postseason play.
Failures by the front office have kept Steve from really having a shot at getting to the finals. Smarter moves by them, and they quite possibly could have done something bigger. But they were cheap, and short sighted, and it will cost Nash in the end. Hopefully this year he will be relased from prison, and get traded by the Suns.
One of the things I have not touched on yet is, Steve may be one of thee best shooters the game has ever seen. One of my qualms of him was that he didn't shoot more. Especially as good as he is, he should have been shooting more to help his team, rather than waiting til it was too late to get them back into games. IMO he could have EASILY scored 20 a night, and lost only an assist or 2 a game and maybe more effectively and efficiently helped his team, but he was a consumate team guy, and took the losses with his teammates well. He was a fighter, and feisty, and had heart, but you need murder in your heart sometimes, and he didn't have that. He cared, he wanted to win, he tried, but he didn't have murder in him. It cost him.
Better front office work, lil extra evil in his soul, Steve could have been to a couple finals and maybe even won a title or two. As a token parting gift, the NBA gave him 2 MVP's for his troubles instead. Bet he wishes he could trade those in, and I bet the media wishes for a do over themselves. But hindsight is 20/20. %$#%%@@%@!+!* shoulda listened to me all that time. I was lonely tellin em.
