It's a cyclical thing. Different skills are more highly valued at different times depending on supply and demand.

A bit of both is necessary.

All offence and no defence won't get you far e.g. Phoenix Suns 2006ish

All defence and no offence won't get you far e.g.
Chicago Bulls 2014

Being in the right place at the right time. That way the spacing is right for everyone on offence and defence, and the resulting team defence can matter more than individual defence.

Someone like Boucher was really effective in the NBL not because he could score or was an athletic defender but because he rotated properly and knew when to help, when to switch, etc. That same skillset works for scorers and defenders and role-players who aren't exceptional at either.

My thoughts are along the lines of decision making and sacrifice.

If you find a player with decent ball skills, can shoot and pass and handle the ball etc... Then apply the intangibles to make that player one who can help his/her team win; I think these two combined into one skill set may come under something called 'character'.

Decision making and being able to sacrifice some of your own personal ego on court is huge for me.

Not easy to teach as the character of a player, probably shows up early in juniors actually, then it is a hard thing for a coach to change a player's character as they mature.

Not saying ego is a bad thing, got to have self confidence at the elite level, not many greats have a small ego, but their character in this example is important IMHO...

Can you win without ego though? Even the defensively-oriented teams had their ego-driven players to step up at times - Wilkinson, Bruton, Ennis, etc.

I agree with Bear. Decision making smarts very important. Leave your selfishness at the door. It's the team score at the end of the day that counts.

They gotta make the players around them better. You can have all the talent in the world, but if you can't make the players around you better, you are never going to win a championship. Doesn't matter how they make the players around them better. Might be a great rebounding who allows the guards to get in space on the break quickly. Might be a great distributor. Might be a scorer who spreads the floor. Just needs to compliment the players around him/her. All about putting 5 players on the floor who when combined, have an overall team talent level that is significantly greater than the sum of their parts.

Sounds cliche, and it is to an extent. But there's a lot more than 1 or 2 things that you need to value, and even then, it's even more ridiculous to isolate them without looking at the talent around said individual.

I agree with bear! These type of players are invaluable

"You guys seem to be living in a fantasy world where the 5 pass Hoosiers team from the old school Hollywood movie beat the Miami Heat in a best of 7 series."

Miami win as much because they have the best player in the world as because they defer when appropriate. Watching the game right now and there are countless passes back to Bosh or Lewis or the spacing that allows LeBron to take it inside. They have smart role players and excellent team men too.

And you can see that despite talented players, Indiana are a mess of guys who don't do the little things everyone has talked about above. Bad body language, silly spacing mistakes, not working hard, etc.

Agree Isaac, also it just seems that teams in the current playoff series are really struggling away from home.

Mentally, psychologically they just aren't the same team as they are when playing on home court.

Early playoff games were awesome, close and the teams were not getting blown off as they seem to be right now.

Mind you, it is very demanding playing 6 or 7 games in a row almost, so I can see that if you are off 5% it really hurts you, especially in such a competition like the NBA where teams that are on will just kill you if you are slightly off...

Maybe the true character of the player comes out in crunch games like the one today? Stephens for example, I feel he is hurting his team more and more as he carries on with his silly antics. That smack on Cole's face was pretty bad really!

Offensive rebounds end of story

being coachable!!

please have a look at this study for the value of the rebounding skill
The Case for Dennis Rodman

http://skepticalsports.com/?p=1201