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The most overrated player in basketball is Alperen Sengun, at least according to his peers. The Athletic dropped their 2026 installment of player voted awards, and according to a whopping 12% of the players who voted on it, Sengun, who's now been an All-Star in back-to-back seasons, is the most overrated player. He beats out guys like Rudy Gobert and Trae Young, who were tied for second at 8.5%. Karl-Anthony Towns was there at 7.5%. Paolo and Ja Morant at 5%. My question for you, Cash, is he really the number one guy when it comes to getting too much respect? And even if he isn't, why do you think players view him to be so overrated?
Okay, so number one, I disagree with the players that Alperen Sengun is the most overrated player in the league, but I agree with them in the sense that he is overrated. Like, if you look at the numbers he puts up, if you look at the All-Star accolades, even the way he's viewed reportedly internally by the Rockets the last couple years where they didn't want to include him in talks for, you know, bigger stars, then yes, I think it's fair to say he's overrated. In terms of what about his game makes him overrated, I think you can go back to what Get Off My Dickerson uh was talking about with random fanboys and message boards, you know, aka Kevin Durant, allegedly, a few months ago. And that is that, listen, in the modern in
the NBA in general, but in the modern NBA, you want your big man, especially your star big man, ideally to do at least one of two things, if not both. Space the floor on one end of the court, on the offensive end, and protect the rim on the other end of the court. Alperen Sengun does neither. Right? He And that was what Get Off My Dickerson was saying, like, your franchise player can't shoot or defend, we're in trouble. And it's true, like, Alperen Sengun is an incredibly talented offensive player, insane playmaker for his size, and once in a while, when he plays bully ball inside, yeah, he could be a devastating
force. But by and large, he is not a good enough finisher even inside. He's got no shooting range or touch whatsoever once you get him out of the restricted area of the paint. And so, there is, you know, a way where he can bog down your offense. And then, he is such a liability on the other end of the court. And if you're going to be that big of a defensive liability when you're that big of a player, when you're manning the middle, then you better have a Jokic-like or, you know, a Kat-like I know Kat was on this list as well. Right. But, like, that's another guy, Karl-Anthony Towns. There's like, "Yeah, he's a defensive liability. There's some issues with his game." Karl-Anthony Towns brings so much value on the
offensive end that he actually negates a lot of that defensive liability in the overall. He's a net positive overall. With Sengun, I think there's a big question there. And so, I think those things make him overrated. And I also will say, too, I think the flopping hurts him. Yeah. Like, a lot of stars flop, but you can just go back to the other night. I don't know if you saw in the first round, uh LeBron James at the free-throw line draws free throws. He flopped a little bit. And Sengun of all people, I guess called LeBron a flopper. And LeBron just so perfectly and so seriously was like, "No, don't do that." Like, anyone on your roster can say that, but not you. You are not
allowed to say that cuz guys know, like, Sengun is one of the most egregious floppers. And you just add all the deficiencies of flopping, the whining, you put it all together, and I can see why players think he's overrated. Yeah. I mean, fair enough. It is funny that, you know, in the context of this generally, you don't hear too much when these awards come out, the overrated ones especially. You don't get too much insight into the actual thoughts of the players. But, when you have a Kevin Durant on your team who Yeah. Exactly. his burner. And we can see not even just players in the league, we can see his teammates' thoughts on him. It helps a lot. I will say this to Sengun's defense because I wanted to sift through
past years and see how accurate players are. The two guys that were at the head of this list last year, obviously, Tyrese Haliburton, who had an electric postseason, proved all them wrong. And Cade Cunningham who now is just taking the Pistons to the one seed. Um Rudy Gobert's gotten votes like almost every single time they've done this poll who say what you want, but I don't think he's overrated at least anymore. Um and then the year before Pascal Siakam was on this list. He was right near the top with See, I think he's underrated. And Julius Randle, exactly. I mean, Scotty Barnes got votes this year. So, I don't know how much of the NBA
players voting on this are maybe jealous and envious versus, you know, what they actually feel. Do I think Sengun deserves to be at the top? Sure. Players are also a little hooper-pilled, let's call it. There's a whole concept of hooper and like for example, like Brandon Ingram was considered underrated. But I think if you talk to a lot of people around the league and like decision-makers, they might look at it the other way. He's actually overrated cuz I think players a lot of times get so caught up and I get it from their perspective. The pure skill factor and the like a guy's ability to create his own shot, break someone down off the dribble, you know, and like they see that as like
those are the skills we need and sometimes some of like let's call them the winning basketball skills are like, you know, a guy like Derrick White Yes. who is, you know, I know he had a bad playoffs, but is such an underrated player, but isn't the flashiest player. He's not going to be breaking guys down off the dribble. He's not about creating his own shot from the mid-range. That stuff gets overlooked, it seems, by peers even though that's the stuff that helps win basketball games. Yes. Yes, totally agree. So, you said it that you don't actually think Sengun is the most overrated. I've got my own pick for most overrated and it's also not Alperen Sengun. Um I'll just say I think it's Ja
Morant. He just had I know he played 20 games, but I it's tough to talk on injuries, especially when it comes to basketball, cuz guys love to sit out. I don't think that he's actually been hurt. Not even this season, the past 3 years. The guy's played 79 games in the last 3 years and it was funny because, you know, 3 years ago when the talks of who should have gone one, Zion or Ja, Zion's played almost 100 more games than him in the last 3 years and he's playing well. And in year where Ja I think needs to prove it, he posts a season low in field goal percentage, three-point percentage, uh um almost his
career high in turnovers, he's got the suspension problems. All this, in my eyes, Ja Morant is without the uh athletic ability that he used to have. He's like Derrick Rose on the Knicks, but I don't think everyone's come to terms with that [snorts] quite yet. Yeah. That's how I'm viewing him. He can still bounce back. I He's still young, obviously. That's my pick for the most overrated. Who do you think is the most overrated player? interesting I Ja, cuz I agree he's overrated, but I think the thing with Ja Yeah, like you know, you can look beyond even the injuries, look beyond all the off-court stuff, which is obviously a big part of this.
There are signs, and there have been for a couple years, that his athleticism, his ability to get to the ring is rim is diminishing. And if you take that away from Ja, who can't shoot and refuses to defend, that's a problem. So, I agree he's overrated. The reason I wouldn't call him the most overrated is because I think more people are starting to have this conversation, or have been for the last few years. And so, you've seen his stock drop big-time. You saw this year, or the last couple years, reportedly like no market emerging from The Grizzlies were reportedly willing to trade him. You know, no one wanted him. And so, that's the only thing where I'd be like, I agree with you he's overrated, but I don't think we can call
him the most overrated when we've seen his stock and his perception drop. fair. The guy I would go with for most overrated is actually one of the guys that the players deemed one of the most underrated. I'm going The most overrated player in the NBA for me is the league's MVS, most valuable streamer, Jaylen Brown, okay? This is a guy that averaged 29, seven, and five for a 56-win team that no one expected to be a 56-win team, right? And so, there's that. The numbers are there. He was arguably the best player on a two seed on a an overachieving team until Jay- Jason Tatum got back. He's a former Finals MVP. He's going to make All-NBA first or second team this year, which would insinuate he's a top five to 10
player in the league. He's got the seventh highest average annual value, the seventh highest average salary in the league. And again, insinuate he's a top 10 player. So, if we go by definition of overrated in my opinion, where it's like, you know, the traditional numbers, the salary, the way he's talked about, the way his peers view him, the way his like awards and accolades, I think the guy whose impact is most out of line with all of that is Jaylen Brown. Jaylen Brown's not a bad player, but he is not a top five to 10 player in the NBA, which all of those things would have you believe.
He is a guy that even if you look at the numbers, he's a below average efficiency guy as an offensive player. So, it's like if he's your number one offensive guy, well, guess what? If you go by league adjusted data, where it's every season you can look, you know, Basketball Reference has it, the league average true shooting percentage, shooting percentages in each season. So, you're only comparing guys to the season they're in, Jaylen Brown is often below average. And he was again this year, which is not what you want for your number one guy. The turnovers, though he's cut them down over the course of his career, still an issue. The decision-making with the ball in his hands in pressure moments sometimes, not the best. I think his defense is
overrated. People see him as this like shut down wing defender on a great defensive team in Boston. Again, I think that's a little overrated. And then here's where I think it gets really interesting. For the fourth straight year, the fourth straight year, the Boston Celtics were better when Jason when Jaylen Brown was on the bench rather than when he was on the floor. Four years in a row, and that number skyrocketed in the playoffs. Now, there are caveats here. You like you can say for example that can be noisy. That data can be noisy because sometimes, if you've got a great bench, it can hurt your on-off differential.
Because say for example, and I'm just throwing it out there, when you're on the court, your team's like a plus five for 100 possessions. That's like a top 10 mark. But say you have this amazing bench that's so much better than the other team's bench. And so, they're coming out there and they're whooping teams by 10 to 12 points per 100. Now, it looks like, oh, when I'm on the court, our team's worse than when I'm off, but it's only because our bench is destroying teams. And the Celtics are a deep team whose bench is great. And so maybe there's some noise there. But it's interesting because you look at the other half of the two J's, the other half of the Celtic start duo, Jason Tatum.
Well, the Celtics have been better with him on the court as compared to on the bench in eight of the last nine years. So if this was just noisy data working against Jaylen Brown and it's no, it's just because their bench is so good and their depth is good and they're beating other benches worse, you know, by a bigger margin than their starters are winning. That's not just the case here cuz Tatum's numbers always indicate the team's better when he's on the court and Jaylen Brown's numbers always indicate that he's better when he's off the court. So I'm saying Jaylen Brown, great NBA player, good player, nowhere close to top five to top 10. He is the most overrated player in the league right now
and I know a lot of players are going to disagree. Yeah, and a lot of the guys that get in his stream chat probably will disagree too. 100%. There's not even the off the court antics I know we talked about with Ja, but I mean, what he did right after that post season game, throw that into the mix. Yeah, that defies all these stats. If Jaylen Brown is watching The Score's YouTube channel, which he should, He probably will. definitely should be. Uh then he's going to consider me just like the refs in the league as people that just have
random agendas against them. It has definitely has nothing to do with his own performance or accountability. It's all it's a it's an agenda against him. That's all you're doing right here. But there we have it. Alperen Sengun as overrated as the players think that he is not the most overrated player. It's Jaylen Brown. You heard it here first. If you agree or disagree, be sure to let us know in the comments.
