JEFF HAYNES/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
Prime defensive accolades: Eight All-Defensive Group alternatives, seven years receiving Defensive Participant of the 12 months votes
NBA rank: 382nd in steals, 453rd in blocks
Probably the most tenacious wing defenders ever, Bruce Bowen earned 1st Group All-Protection honors 5 instances in his profession and 2nd Group All-Protection 3 times. Bowen was an elite 3-and-D participant in his prime, taking pictures 39.3 p.c from three for his profession and taking part in an enormous half as a task participant on three championship-winning Spurs groups.
Bowen was so effectively considered a one-on-one defender on the wing, nearly at all times in opposition to stars, that he completed second within the Defensive Participant of the 12 months vote 3 times regardless of averaging simply 0.8 steals and 0.4 blocks in that stretch. Bowen’s influence as a fringe defender went far past the stat sheet.
Then again, Bowen’s tenacity on the defensive finish bordered on the soiled at instances, with the previous standout defender creating a unfavorable fame as a result of repeated cases of him placing his ft beneath the place opposing shooters had been going to land, which might be a flagrant foul in at present’s recreation.
And people had been simply examples in opposition to Vince Carter.
However, soiled ways or not, Bowen, together with a participant developing in a while this checklist, is tied for having probably the most All-Defensive Group honors in a single profession (eight) with out being within the Corridor of Fame, so clearly his ways on the point-stopping finish of the ground had been efficient.
