NBA History: Ranking the 15 greatest point guards of all time

15 greatest point guards in NBA History — No. 5: Steve Nash

We enter a new stratosphere of the list starting at No. 5, as each of these players had legitimate cases of being the best player in the NBA for one or more seasons during their career. We begin the Top 5 with Steve Nash, the longtime Phoenix Suns floor general who never broke through in the playoffs to win a title but was a regular-season offensive savant.

Five times in his career Nash led the league in assists, orchestrating first the Dallas Mavericks’ and then the Suns’ elite offenses as the initiator on essentially every play. For eight years in the heart of his career, offenses under Nash finished first in offensive rating five times and second three times. That’s right — if prime Steve Nash was running the show the floor for his team’s offense was second.

Twice Nash’s excellence was rewarded with an MVP selection, and he also logged seven All-NBA nods and eight All-Star appearances. He ranks fourth in career assists and 29th in career 3-pointers (11th in 3-point percentage) and for his career his 90.4 percent free-throw mark is second only to Stephen Curry. If Curry is the greatest shooter in NBA history, Nash is not far behind.

While his teams were incredible offensively, the defenses built around Nash were never top-notch, and as such, they struggled to break through in the postseason. Yet four times Nash made it to the Western Conference Finals in his career and his performance went up if anything. He didn’t have the longevity of the next entrant on this list, but he is a deserving top-5 point guard of all time.