Positions

Maybe there are 4 positions in the Association:

QB, Guard, Forward, Goalie

Take the Heat; LeBron can be a big QB, and Haslem, Howard, or Anthony (and Bosh kinda)can be banger/goalie types. After that positions on the Heat are irrelevant. Any combo of Wade, Miller, Allen, Bosh, Battier, Lewis, Chalmers, Cole can work. Some of those guys are either guards or forwards, but many of them can be either. And if one of the others becomes a QB, LeBron can play any of the other spots.

I understand the argument that positions are becoming irrelevant, but 5'10" speedy guys can't do what 6'10" 275 lb. guys can do and vice versa. And a team needs diversity of skill sets to match up on defense against size and speed, and also need to bring different looks on offense.

I used to break it down to three positions (probably on a lost blog somewhere); Points, Wings, and Bigs. My "research" tells me that the newest position is the point guard, and that back in the day they were just "guards." I think that's why for things like the all-nba team, and the all-star team, there are two guards, two forwards and a center. Although the all-star voting got rid of the center spot this year, and went to two back court players, and three front court players.

The other wrinkle is that two of the best "point" guards are Derrick Rose and Russell Westbrook. They are bigger, and look to score more that what we think of as PGs. Those two create match up problems against most point guards, mostly because they are so good, but also because other trad PGs aren't big enough or accustomed to guarding a go-to 1st (or 1Ast) option scorer.

The very successful Jackson Triangle offense utilized a ball-dominant 2 man, and a capable 3 man (like a point forward) along with a trad PG, but the PG would usually camp behind the 3 point line or in the corner for three point shooting, and was usually a 4th or 5th scoring option. I wonder why Jackson didn't go all the way and play two bigger 2 men from time to time. I guess the Ron Harper Bulls did some of that, but I don't remember it so much on the Lakers, and I remember seeing a lot of Kerr, Paxon, and Armstrong on the Bulls.

With LeBron running as QB from the 4 spot, and quick bigs making the beef cakes obsolete maybe it is time to let go of  positions and replace them with verbs and adverbs that can apply to multiple guys at the same time, such as post-scorer, rebounder, ball-handeler, and post-defender. I think it would help a lot of teams to not depend on a PG, and spread some facilitating and leadership around. And a big goalie enforcer type may be useful in limited situations, but not for long stretches of being useless on the break and too slow in the pick and roll. The same could go for the little speedy guys; good for matching up against a slow team for a change of pace, but probably not all game to get posted on and shot over.

How about this for a team? Harden, Bryant, Durant, Anthony, James. Chris Paul probably should be in there, and you'd probably want someone who is bigger to defend in the post, but I'm just sayin...