10 best point guards in Los Angeles Lakers history
By Amaar Burton
10. Gary Payton (2003-04)
The first time I heard the term “super team” was in reference to the 2003-04 Los Angeles Lakers. That was the year when L.A. brought in Karl Malone and Gary Payton to join incumbent superstars Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant.
In hindsight, a lot of people will lie about the expectations they had for that squad, claiming those Lakers didn’t fit their definition of a “super team” after we’ve seen more successful rosters put together in Boston, Miami and Golden State since then.
Don’t buy it.
Malone and Payton were past their respective primes when they came to L.A., but never forget that across the basketball landscape it was almost a foregone conclusion that those two stalwarts would help the Lakers cakewalk to a championship.
Payton was a big reason for such optimism.
“The Glove” is widely considered the best defensive point guard ever, winning Defensive Player of the Year in 1995-96 and earning nine All-Defensive selections.
Payton was 35 years old when he debuted for the Lakers, but he wasn’t washed up. He was coming off a season in which he’d averaged 20.4 points, 8.3 assists and 1.7 steals per game (splitting time with the Seattle SuperSonics and Milwaukee Bucks) while getting another All-Star nod.
Lonzo Ball’s 26 ASTS are the 2nd-most for a player over his 1st 3 games with the @Lakers. Gary Payton had 29 through his first 3 gms in '03. pic.twitter.com/XIecNwmApe
— NBA.com/Stats (@nbastats) October 23, 2017
Revisionist historians will portray the Lakers’ star-studded team as ancient and broken by injuries, but Payton started every single game in the regular season and playoffs, averaging over 34 minutes each night.
Payton put up 14.6 points, 5.5 assists and 1.2 steals per game in the regular season, but his scoring plummeted to 7.8 points in the postseason. He really struggled in the NBA Finals, averaging 4.2 points on 32.1 percent field goal shooting while watching opposing point guard Chauncey Billups win Finals MVP for the Detroit Pistons.
That offseason, the Lakers traded Payton to the Celtics. He went on to win a championship as a sixth man for the Miami Heat in 2006 before retiring the next year.