LA Clippers’ DeAndre Jordan named NBA’s best center by GMs

According to NBA GMs in the latest NBA.com survey, DeAndre Jordan of the LA Clippers is the best center in the league. Chris Paul came second at point guard.

LA Clippers star DeAndre Jordan is the best center in the NBA. Well, according to how he made the All-NBA First Team and made the All-Defensive First Team for the second straight season, that’s the case according to all those who voted.

It’s easy to make the argument for his place on those teams, with the Clippers’ success in the absence of Blake Griffin being a large help to Jordan showing off his value for the First Team honor. But, of course, many would disagree, saying that DeMarcus Cousins should have made the team instead.

Now, more have come to support DeAndre Jordan as the best center in the world, and the support this time comes in the form of league general managers in NBA.com’s annual GM survey.

They answer a host of questions, including who they believe is the best player at each position. Jordan led the way with 33.3 percent of the center votes, a fairly solid margin ahead of 2nd place (you guessed it) Boogie Cousins.

While there’s no doubt Cousins has more skill and range offensively, it looks like GMs valued Jordan’s superior defense, ability to run the floor, and the devastating threat of his pick-and-roll play, a vastly underestimated attribute to have due to what it can do for an entire offense (click to read why). All those strengths are incredibly sought after in today’s NBA.

To complete the full starting five from the GM’s votes, Stephen Curry obviously came in at point guard, joined by James Harden, LeBron James, Anthony Davis and Jordan.

All the answers are as you’d expect. There’s argument to be made at shooting guard if someone would choose Jimmy Butler, Klay Thompson or another elite player who offers far more two-way impact than Harden, but The Beard’s place here is hardly surprising given his rare offensive talent.

As for other members of the LA Clippers, Chris Paul came a rightful 2nd place to Curry among the point guards.

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Paul received 20 percent of the votes, which is rather surprising when you’d expect almost all fans, critics or GMs alike to think the reigning two-time MVP Curry is the best in the game right now. Clearly some GMS were swayed by Paul’s superior floor general and defensive ability.

Meanwhile in the power forward rankings, Blake Griffin only tied for 4th place with LaMarcus Aldridge with 12.9 percent of the votes each. There’s no way I would hesitate to at least put Griffin ahead of Aldridge, but we won’t dive into a lengthy discussion right now. There were plenty of questionable thoughts from the GMs.

To complete the power forward list, Davis unsurprisingly came at the top with 29 percent of the votes (a major drop from 82.1 percent the previous year, though) while LeBron forced his way in at 2nd (19.4 percent of the votes) and Draymond Green came 3rd (16.1).

LeBron is just that great that he almost came top at both forward positions.

Next: Why Jordan's offense is way too underrated

At least the LA Clippers were still well represented, with DeAndre Jordan in particular making his mark after the best season of his career.