Asked recently to choose the NBA's best player at each position, Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors went with a biased choice at shooting guard.
"I'm going to go with myself," Thompson told the Bay Area News Group. "We're 26-1."
Looking at metrics more advanced than Golden State's record makes it more difficult to justify picking Thompson as the NBA's best shooting guard.
So, who merits the honor instead?
Klay's advantage: playing with Stephen Curry
Before choosing himself at shooting guard, Thompson also made the less controversial choice that backcourt-mate Stephen Curry is the NBA's top point guard. Thompson should know. Perhaps no player has benefited more from Curry's playmaking and unparalleled gravity than Thompson.
Consider this: When playing with Curry this season, Thompson has averaged 22.9 points per 36 minutes and shot 45.2 percent from 3-point range, according to research by NBA.com/Stats. In the 86 minutes he has played with Curry on the bench, Thompson has averaged 13.4 points per 36 minutes and shot an even 30 percent from the field (29.4 percent from 3-point range). The Warriors have been outscored by 11.5 points per 100 possessions in that span. (They're plus-23.6 with both Curry and Thompson on the court.)
Naturally, 86 minutes isn't a particularly meaningful sample size. However, Thompson was also far more efficient when playing with Curry last season, if not as dramatically so.
To some extent, this effect runs the opposite direction, too. Thompson's shooting and floor spacing makes Curry more efficient when they play together. But Golden State has been better as a team when Curry plays without Thompson, outscoring opponents by 16.9 points per 100 possessions this season and 12.8 points per 100 possessions last season.
The fact that the Warriors have been close to a league-average team when Thompson plays without Curry over the past two seasons makes it difficult to use their record as evidence that Thompson is the league's best shooting guard. While Thompson has certainly been a key factor in Golden State's record start, he hasn't been the driving force behind it. That's Curry.
Best two-way shooting guard: Jimmy Butler
The last time we were debating Thompson's place in the shooting guard pantheon was before the 2014-15 season, when his agent Bill Duffy told the USA Today that Thompson was "the top two-way, 2-guard in basketball."
In truth, the best two-way player should be redundant -- the best two-way player is simply the best player. In practice, though, the term appears to mean the player whose weaker skill, offense or defense, is the best. And though Thompson can lay claim to that title among shooting guards, Jimmy Butler of the Chicago Bulls has the stronger case.
Offensively, Butler is the better shot creator. Although the two players have similar usage rates -- both about 24 percent of their teams' plays -- nearly 80 percent of Thompson's field goals are assisted (many of them by Curry). Meanwhile, Butler has been assisted just 55.6 percent of the time, according to research by Basketball-Reference.com.
At the other end, Butler is the top wing defender for a Chicago team that ranks second in defensive rating, just ahead of the Warriors (fourth). Unlike Thompson, who can cede more difficult assignments to teammates Harrison Barnes, Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston, Butler has no such luxury. He's also a bigger factor in the passing lanes, averaging 1.7 steals per 36 minutes as compared to Thompson's 0.6.
As a result, ESPN's real plus-minus (RPM) rates Butler as the NBA's second-best defender at shooting guard, behind only Brooklyn Nets rookie Rondae Hollis-Jefferson. Thompson has actually rated below average defensively each of the past two seasons, throwing a wrench in his two-way case.
Best shooting guard: James Harden
The problem with the "best two-way player" discussion is that it tends to imply that both ends of the court are of equal importance. Though generally true at the team level, that doesn't appear to be the case for players. Because offenses get to pick where to attack, and because of the importance of defensive scheme, individuals can have more impact on offense than defense.
James Harden's 2015-16 season is a good example. After improving his defensive effort last year, when he led the Houston Rockets to the Western Conference finals, Harden has taken a significant step backward this season. RPM rates him just outside the bottom 10 among shooting guards defensively, more than two points per 100 possessions worse than an average player.
However, Harden's offense has more than made up for his pitiful defensive effort. RPM estimates Harden's offensive impact at more than seven points per 100 possessions better than an average player. Despite a slow start from beyond the arc, Harden has scored more efficiently than Butler while finishing nearly a third of Houston's plays with a shot, a trip to the free throw line or a turnover. An even 70 percent of his shot attempts have been unassisted. And Harden is a far better playmaker, handing out more assists per 36 minutes (6.4) than Butler (3.1) and Thompson (2.8) combined.
Then there's the matter of playing time. On a deep Golden State team, Thompson averages 31.7 minutes per game. Butler is averaging 37.5 a night and Harden a league-leading 38.3 minutes -- down from the nearly 40 he was playing before requesting less playing time.
As a result, value statistics -- including RPM, along with Basketball-Reference.com's win shares and box plus-minus -- put Harden atop shooting guard rankings and among the league's top-10 players. Frustrating as Harden's play has been at times this season, there's a reason a pair of Rockets coaches have kept him on the floor for heavy minutes: His offense is worth dealing with his indifferent defense.
Thompson hasn't reached that level. So sorry, Klay. While you're still part of the league's best backcourt, you're not the NBA's best shooting guard.