NBA Top 50: Tyson Chandler (No. 40)

FanHouse's Tom Ziller argues his ranking of the top 50 players in the NBA.

Defense is a hard potato to weigh. At the team level, it's simple: you can slice how teams fare in shot defense, in turnover creation, in fouling, in rebounding. At a player level ... well, you can measure steals and blocks and fouls and boards. But without shot defense, you're missing the meat. You have something to work with, but it's not all that you need to make a perfect assessment.

Tyson Chandler is, by anecdote, one of the great defenders in the NBA. But by what measurement we are able to capture, he's also damn fine. A perennial top five finisher in rebound rate (the percentage of available rebounds a player captures), a decent shotblocker, the anchor of one of the league's best defenses.

This last part, to that I lend some credence. And it lets us peak into what impact Chandler might have but of which we cannot measure.

New Orleans finished #7 in defensive efficiency last season. It was a bit surprising at midseason when the Hornets appeared near the top of the association in team defense. We knew, with Chris Paul and David West and a perhaps healthy Peja Stojakovic, N.O. would have a fine offense. But the defense? The craftwork of Byron Scott, perhaps. Or some Morris Peterson trickery. Or ... Tyson Chandler.

Paul and West have middling defensive reputations, Peja's is (fair or not) nonexistent. Center is said to be the most important defensive position on the floor -- the backstop, the goalie, the quarterback, if you will. But Chandler doesn't block many shots. He doesn't foul a ton, which (perhaps incorrectly) is seen as an indicator of activity. Why do we assume he's the keystone to the N.O. defense?

Sadly, it is a guess. But watching Chandler play, hearing Scott talk about how focused Tyson has become, looking at how valuable the guy is ... I think it's a safe assumption to say Chandler defends his position well. It's a shame there's no reliable measure to reaffirm our beliefs here, but you take what you can get.

On offense, we know Chandler as one half of the most lethal alley-oop in the league (R.I.P. Nash-to-Amare). Chandler doesn't take a shot he can't make, which is to say he takes few shots which are not dunks. 82games has Chandler's dunks amounting to 33% of his total shot attempts, which is simply a ton. (Stoudemire is at 18%, for what it's worth.) A lot of those dunks come thanks to Paul, but getting in position and finishing are important steps in the proceeding, as well. Tyson does his job on offense, and limits mistakes.

If you were building a team next year, with the entire player base as your oyster, and you wanted an elite defensive-minded center, there's only one guy you'd take over Chandler. (That guy happens to be a four-time NBA champion, and a former MVP.) Nice company, especially considering interior defense is at such a premium in the slashing NBA.