As NBA Basketball has become more of a jump shot oriented game. There has been more focus on guards that can handle the ball, play make, and not only get their own shot but get that shot from an extended range. The question. Does that make guards more valuable than bigs?

There was a time when the basketball landscape was dominated by a few select big men. The big men of the league despite a somewhat narrow skillset typically controlled the flow of the game and historically they had been so effective at it that some of the most recognizable names in basketball history are players that were 6�10� or taller. You almost had to have one to even sniff an opportunity at a championship.

Names like Bill Russell, Wilt �The Stilt� Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, David Robinson, Bill Walton, Hakeem Olajuwan, Shaq �Diesel� O�neal. Players so great that they are known by their single name identities. Wilt, Russell and Kareem own league records that very well might never be broken. Also 3 out of the NBA�s only Quadruple Doubles were achieved by big men. Wilt�s 54pts per game season average as well as his 100pt game come to mind as unbreakable records.

Not to be out done, guards have proven more often than not to be a bit flashier or electrifying to some degree and the can also be some incredible stat stuffers. Oscar Robertson, Michael Jordan, John Stockton, Magic Johnson, Russell Westbrook, Kobe Bryant and Steph Curry to name a few. Guards have typically captivated fans with seemingly limitless bag of flashy scoring, ballhandling, nearly limitless shooting and sometimes maniacal determination.

But with that said, does any of this make one group more valuable to the success of a team than another. The rage that is analytics has created a trend were scoring from range with 3 pointers is a by their percentages the best shot to take, which historically has been a guards area of expertise. Couple that with the removal of physical defenses and the flood gates have opened for ballhandling guards to essentially toy with defense and shoot at will. An array of dribble moves and step backs has created a green light for the mentally of shoot now ask questions later.

The Houston Rockets for nearly a decade took this too an extreme where the fielded teams that often had no player bigger than 6�8� and sometimes no smaller than 6�5� Therefore attempting to eliminating the traditional smaller PG with an average height of 6�2 and Big Man Center with an average height of 6�11� As with any extreme scenario the more you lean into the less able you are to adapt on the fly. The SMALL scheme as it is called with a number of people eliminates small players that are typically better ball handlers and are a bit quicker on the court end to end. For slightly taller ballhandlers that are falsely believed to be better able to see the court because of a height advantage. Court vision is more IQ based than literal line of sight based. When running an offense in real time what you don�t see is 100x�s more important than what you can actually see as being able to take advantage of were a offensive or defensive player was or will be is critical to the success of the play.

Big man have had a bad rap of not being nearly as skilled in the ballhandling and shooting category and that has created a false narrative that they are not as valuable. Even to the point where the center position is no longer even listed on the All-Star ballot. But in the current error of basketball. Bigs such as Joel Embiid, Nikola Jurkic, Karl Anthony Towns, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Kevin Durant to name a few or supremely skilled players that are 6�11� or bigger that display a surprising level of skill versatility that is equal to or exceeds some guards. This applies to shooting, ballhandling and playmaking.

An area where guards are less likely to impact the game that is dominated by bigs is rebounding and rim protection.  These are key areas where size by default just makes the execution of those task somewhat easier for a naturally taller player and somewhat mentally and physical challenging to go up against as a smaller player. It could be argued that over the course of time Bigs have expanded their skillset at a higher rate than guards. Adding 3point shooting, ballhandling and playmaking has giving birth to the Stretch 4/5 which is essentially a tall player that can play on the perimeter. With the exception of Westbrook very few guards can achieve anything close to a double digit rebound game and rim protection from guards has always been victimized by the lack of stature. With the exception of Charles Barkley who was 6�6� no player in NBA history was able to dominate the post while being under the size of 6�9�.

No NBA team within the past Decade has won a championship without an impact player that was smaller than 6�10 or at a minimum a dominant player that was at least 6�9� Do to the vary nature of the way basketball is playing with the 5 person team concept there are unique skillsets that are associated with physical player height that require that continued balance for a team to ultimately succeed.

 The average player height has been relatively consistent over the past 20 years with only the disbursement of the various skillsets becoming somewhat more broad. Guards maybe more electrifying and sexier to the eye. There is no way a team can expect to cover every aspect of the skillset required without having the associated size advantages big and small that come with certain executable skillsets.

With that being said. Guards and bigs are equally important to the equation of winning. Additional details on the evolution of player height vs skillset over the years can be found here https://www.thehoopsgeek.com/average-nba-height/