After a couple stellar games, Dwyane Wade was pretty pedestrian on Wednesday night — 14 points on 5-of-11 shooting, five assists and five turnovers.
Which in some minds revived the “has Wade lost a step” that had Charles Barkley and LeBron James sniping back and forth over it.
Mark Jackson is too smart and too media savvy to get drawn into that mess. When asked about what he sees from Dwyane Wade on tape, he paid him a very high compliment, via the Palm Beach Post:
When asked, Jackson said Michael Jordan was No. 1 and Kobe Bryant was second. That is kind of the consensus today, although I think Jerry West is the guy who gets screwed in that discussion. You can also make a case for George Gervin if you want, same with Clyde Drexler. Don’t try to make a Reggie Miller case to break that top three, although top five maybe.
Wade’s career numbers (so far): 25 points a game on 48.6 percent shooting, a career PER of 25.6, two NBA titles and one NBA finals MVP, eight All-Star games and an almost certain future Hall of Famer.
That is a great job by Jackson to dodge the current debate and get us debating something else.
