Gary Harris and Nikola Jokic: the next Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom? Nuggets fans might balk at comparing the great Nikola Jokic to Lamar Odom, who was never a star but was one of the best passing bigs of his time, and they might chuckle at the idea that Harris can compare to the Kobe Bean. But let’s take a step back and think about it for a second. Jokic is already better than Odom ever was, although he doesn’t have the playoff experience nor the longevity. That part we can agree with.
But Gary Harris compared against Kobe Bryant seems ridiculous on the surface. Kobe was an all-time great scorer and he is one of the few players who met my extremely narrow definition of “superstar” (a superstar has to be a consensus top-three player for five consecutive years). But then you look at things like scoring efficiency and Harris starts to look better and better. The highest effective field goal percentage Kobe ever had was 50.4%. He once reached 50.2% while scoring over thirty per game. Gary Harris will, by his fourth year in the league, have had three seasons with significantly higher scoring efficiency than Kobe ever had. He won’t have the scoring volume, and he won’t have had as much defensive impact, but he will, in some kind of twisted way, have been a better scorer than Kobe.
Yeah, it looks pretty dumb when I go back and read all of what I just wrote. But keep it in mind. Kobe + Odom (+ Gasol + Bynum) won two rings. You want the Nuggets to win some rings, right?