NBA's Best Kept Secret

If Eminem, Jay-Z, Nas and 50 Cent all dropped albums during the month of November (each on a separate week), you might have trouble realizing that perhaps new sensation Drake dropped a new album as well. It’s only normal right? When you follow the best, it becomes about them, and then there’s everybody else. So, in a league that is home to the likes of Kobe Bryant, Chris Paul, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Dwight Howard, Dirk Nowitzki, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett and Carmelo Anthony, it might be hard for anybody else to stand out. Well there’s one guy in the NBA that no one seems to be talking about and he is tearing up the league right now. Although it’s still young in the season, my friend Money was telling me the other day that this guy should be an MVP candidate. I laughed it off and said that his statement was premature considering how early we are in the NBA season.. But then I did some digging and the picture became clearer. Let me take the time right now to apologize to Money from dismissing his statement because right now this guy is balling. Let me give you a hint: his nickname stems from a movie in which a young aspiring rapper from the suburbs adopts the name and moniker of a gangster that’s gone to prison. By adopting the persona of this jailed individual, the rapper gets a tremendous amount of street credibility (I know it’s exactly the story of 50 Cent, but I’m not talking about him). Give up? I’m talking about Toronto Raptors starting power forward Chris Bosh. See, I almost lost you just by mentioning his name. But bear with me for a moment, and let me make his case. Cool?

If I asked you to name me the best players in the league; you would probably give these players in some type of order:

-LeBron James

-Chris Paul

-Kobe Bryant

-Diwght Howard

-Dwyane Wade

That’s pretty solid group right there; put them up against anybody in the world and they kill them. Well, if you go by John Hollinger’s Player Efficiency Rankings (for a detailed explanation of PER, click here), Chris Bosh is better then all of those guys in terms of his production this year except one. Have a look at the rankings below:

By Hollinger’s rankings, Bosh is playing like the second best player in the league. Better then the likes of LeBron, Wade and Howard, that’s crazy right? But then again, what does John Hollinger know right? He’s just a guy that crunches numbers and knows nothing about basketball. Hypothetically speaking, if Lil’ Wayne sells more records then Eminem, that doesn’t make him a better rap artist. It just makes him a guy that’s more popular and has better marketing. That’s the opinion that some of you might have, but it turns out that he’s not just a random guy coming up with formulas based on statistics without actually watching the games. Nonetheless, I can understand your skepticism, so let’s take a different route. Let’s look at it fomr a different angle. The top power forwards in the NBA are Duncan, Garnet, Nowitzki  and Stoudemire. Chris Bosh is currently 24 years old and is in his 7^th NBA season. Let’s look at what the consensus top four did in their respective 7^th NBA season:

By the way, I made sure to include Amare “I'm better than Chris Bosh” Stoudemire. After seeing their production through seven seasons, let’s look at Chris Bosh’s numbers this season:

That’s staggering right?  I’m amazed that it took me so long to realize how well Chris Bosh has been playing so far this season.  For far too long, he has been pegged as just another decent big man, a guy not worthy of the franchise player tag, the other guy in the LeBron-Wade-Carmelo draft and the dude that plays in Toronto. Well this season, CB4 is taking his game to another level is hoping to get his team back into the playoffs this season. In order to do so, he will have to play his best when facing the best; time will tell if he will be able to do so, but let’s look at what he has been able to produce so far this season against some of the top teams in the NBA:

You know what those performances say? Let’s ask Tupac:

“ I won’t deny it,

I’m a straight ridah,

You don’t wanna f*ck with me

Got the police bustin at me

But they can’t do nuttin to a G”

Bosh’s averages against Cleveland, Orlando, Dallas and San Antonio: 28.5 points per game, 13.5 rebounds per game, 1.3 assists per game and 0.75 blocks per game. I wont go as far as say that Chris Bosh is the best big man in the NBA, however it’s pretty clear at least in my opinion that he has now joined the elite. The summer of 2010 is no longer the summer of Wade and LeBron; it is now becoming the summer of Wade, LeBron and Bosh. I just hope that NBA fans take the time to watch him play because he is well worth the price of admission, except nobody besides Raptors fans know this yet. Remember the list of best NBA players I showed earlier?

-Chris Paul

-Dwyane Wade

-Kobe Bryant

-LeBron James

-Dwight Howard

That could be our All-NBA team at the end of the season. With that said, wouldn’t you feel compelled right now to add CB4 as the sixth man to that squad? Hell, he’s even playing better then Dwight Howard is right now…..But then again you might not believe me. And the reason is simple: Chris Bosh is the NBA’s best kept secret. Not for long though.