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Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6: LaMarcus Aldridge vs. Rasheed Wallace runoff

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Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6: LaMarcus Aldridge vs. Rasheed Wallace runoff 

Post#1 » by Moonbeam » Thu Aug 6, 2015 11:59 am

The list so far is here.

Project Guidelines:

Spoiler:
1. Each thread will be open for 48 hours. After 48 hours have passed, the thread will close if a single player receives a majority of the votes. If not, the top 2-3 candidates will enter a runoff period of 24 hours. During this period, you may switch your vote to one of the reduced list of candidates if you voted for someone else.

2. When making a formal vote, please include the player's name in bold. This helps me keep track. Please include a justification for your choice. It may be brief, but simply writing the name of your choice will not be a counted vote.

3. You may switch your vote, but please emphasize this in bold.

4. Please only consider each player's performance with Portland.

5. We all have our favorites, and we all have our own criteria. I believe the discussion and learning from this project will be more important than the placement of the individual players.

6. Have fun!


Runoff Guidelines:

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If at the end of 48 hours, no single player has more than 50% of the votes cast, the top 2* candidates will enter a runoff vote.

1. Original votes for one of these 2 players still count.

2. Those who voted for one of the candidates outside of the top 2 must cast a vote for one of the top 2 candidates for their votes to count.

3. Those who did not vote in the first 48 hours are still welcome to vote in the runoff.

4. Anyone is welcome to change his/her vote if swayed by the arguments of others.

* If there is a tie, more than 2 candidates may enter the runoff. In this case, please list your preferred order among all of the candidates, and a point system will determine the victor. The points will be allocated as follows (using a 3-player runoff as an example): 3 points for 1st place, 2 points for 2nd place, 1 point for 3rd place. If votes don't make a preference beyond #1, the remaining candidates will get the average points for the other ranks. If at the end of this process, there is a tie, the winner will be the player with the most preferences in a 1 on 1 comparison.


Looks like a Sheed vs. LMA vs. Sabonis showdown, but can any other candidates gain some traction?
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#2 » by Masterfully » Thu Aug 6, 2015 12:37 pm

I'm going Lamarcus Aldridge here. It's hard for me to vote for Sheed due to his technical fouls and racism. And longevity counts for a lot with me. Lamarcus is a team leader in many statistical categories, and he will hold his place for years to come. Always a quiet professional. Came up huge in that one playoff series over Houston.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#3 » by PDXKnight » Thu Aug 6, 2015 1:22 pm

Lamarcus Aldridge

It burned the way he left but I've gotta put him from a ration standpoint here as much as it pains me to from an emotional standpoint
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#4 » by zzaj » Thu Aug 6, 2015 1:41 pm

Rasheed Wallace

Could easily have an argument that he should be higher than #6. He gets the #6 nod from me because he was always my wife's favorite player...
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#5 » by mojomarc » Thu Aug 6, 2015 2:34 pm

Rasheed Wallace. He was the clear best player on the last team we had that was a title contender, was hugely impactful on both sides of the court. Yes, there were off-court issues. Yes, there were technicals. But he was simply a better player on a better team than Aldridge was.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#6 » by Norm2953 » Thu Aug 6, 2015 2:58 pm

I'm going to pass on this round for if the main choices are the one of the most hated players at
the end of his run in Portland (Sheed) and a guy who put up stats but had only one
playoff series win in nine years (Aldridge)...

Great players lead their teams to playoff success which is why ultimately Dame will end up in the
top 5 unless he's stuck on bad teams due to the rebuild.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#7 » by Wickzki » Thu Aug 6, 2015 3:30 pm

Buck Williams

Reasoning: More heart than LaHeartless Aldridge and more maturity than Sheed.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#8 » by Agenda42 » Thu Aug 6, 2015 3:51 pm

Rasheed's my pick. Compared to Aldridge, he was more efficient offensively, a better defender, and more impactful in the playoffs.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#9 » by DavidSterned » Thu Aug 6, 2015 4:25 pm

Not sure I buy Sheed being a better playoff performer than Aldridge. Blazers lost in the first round in 5/7 years that Rasheed made the playoffs in Portland. Sheed was generally just so-so in those years, especially the ones where he was the de facto leader of the team (2001-2003). He was good in 1999 and 2000, being one of the few who stepped up in that infamous Game 7, so at the end of the day he did have a little more team success than Aldridge. But he also had better teammates.

I think I'm going to have to pick LaMarcus Aldridge here, as much as it pains me since he quit on the team at the end and he left in one of the lamer ways imaginable. Individually I feel that he was ever so slightly better than Rasheed, although Rasheed probably had even more talent. I wish Sabonis had played longer here so I wouldn't have to feel inclined to choose either of these guys.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#10 » by Agenda42 » Thu Aug 6, 2015 4:34 pm

DavidSterned wrote:Not sure I buy Sheed being a better playoff performer than Aldridge. Blazers lost in the first round in 5/7 years that Rasheed made the playoffs in Portland. Sheed was generally just so-so in those years, especially the ones where he was the de facto leader of the team (2001-2003). He was good in 1999 and 2000, being one of the few who stepped up in that infamous Game 7, so at the end of the day he did have a little more team success than Aldridge. But he also had better teammates.


The playoff stats are an absolute whitewash for Sheed here. Aldridge had a career playoff TS% of .494 and WS48 of 0.69. Sheed shot .546 TS% for the Blazers and has a WS48 of .126. Over in BPM, it's Rasheed +1.2 and LaMarcus -1.5. The only category LaMarcus does well in is PER, and even there it's 19.0 versus 17.9, which comes almost entirely from LaMarcus's huge usage% of 28 versus 20 for Sheed.

Very high usage times very low efficiency equals very low winning chances. Simple as that. These two players are in a different league come playoff time. Aldridge played one good series in 9 years.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#11 » by DavidSterned » Thu Aug 6, 2015 4:56 pm

Agenda42 wrote:
DavidSterned wrote:Not sure I buy Sheed being a better playoff performer than Aldridge. Blazers lost in the first round in 5/7 years that Rasheed made the playoffs in Portland. Sheed was generally just so-so in those years, especially the ones where he was the de facto leader of the team (2001-2003). He was good in 1999 and 2000, being one of the few who stepped up in that infamous Game 7, so at the end of the day he did have a little more team success than Aldridge. But he also had better teammates.


The playoff stats are an absolute whitewash for Sheed here. Aldridge had a career playoff TS% of .494 and WS48 of 0.69. Sheed shot .546 TS% for the Blazers and has a WS48 of .126. Over in BPM, it's Rasheed +1.2 and LaMarcus -1.5. The only category LaMarcus does well in is PER, and even there it's 19.0 versus 17.9, which comes almost entirely from LaMarcus's huge usage% of 28 versus 20 for Sheed.

Very high usage times very low efficiency equals very low winning chances. Simple as that. These two players are in a different league come playoff time. Aldridge played one good series in 9 years.



Rasheed was mediocre to bad in 1998, 2001, 2002, and 2003 in the playoffs. The latter three being the years in which he was actually considered the team's go-to option. He stepped up in 1997 in a very one sided series loss against the Lakers, then played generally very well in 1999 and 2000 (but didn't put up "star" production for the most part either). I think you're overstating his playoff resume. WS/48 versus the eye test, which showed that Sheed was never comfortable being more than a complimentary playoff piece, as he would later be in Detroit.

That era of Blazer teams were incredibly frustrating in the playoffs, often getting their asses kicked in or blowing big leads while only occasionally rising up to their talent. The 2001 postseason for example was a total joke, getting annihilated by a Lakers team that they had looked better than for most of the season, while Rasheed chucked up bad shots and threw towels in teammates' faces.

Aldridge was quite decent in 2009 against Houston, the problem was the rest of the team sans Roy. He was pretty underwhelming in 2010, decent again in 2011, and had a strong overall postseason in 2014, marked by one amazing series and one mediocre one. No excusing his crappy quittiness in the Memphis series, but overall his playoff performance resume is pretty comparable to Rasheed's, particularly as first options. Neither guy was good enough to really lead a team to the promised land or ascend to that next tier of starpower, but Aldridge came closer in 2014 to doing that than Sheed ever did.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#12 » by Agenda42 » Thu Aug 6, 2015 5:25 pm

DavidSterned wrote:at the end of the day he did have a little more team success than Aldridge. But he also had better teammates.


Are you sure he had better teammates?

Nobody as good as Roy on Rasheed's teams.
Nobody as good as Sabonis on Aldridge's teams.
Nobody as good as Matthews on Rasheed's teams.
Old Pippen comparable to Batum.
Stoudamire probably less good than Lillard.

At the least, I wouldn't say it's an open and shut case here.

DavidSterned wrote:That era of Blazer teams were incredibly frustrating in the playoffs, often getting their asses kicked in or blowing big leads while only occasionally rising up to their talent. The 2001 postseason for example was a total joke, getting annihilated by a Lakers team that they had looked better than for most of the season, while Rasheed chucked up bad shots and threw towels in teammates' faces.


I think you're hanging a lot of stuff on Rasheed that is a team thing. Individually, Rasheed had two bad series out of 11. Even with those games in his record, he absolutely crushes Aldridge on average playoff performance.

There's also a raw scoreboard factor here. Aldridge won one playoff series in 9 years. Rasheed won four in 7 years.

DavidSterned wrote:Aldridge was quite decent in 2009 against Houston, the problem was the rest of the team sans Roy. He was pretty underwhelming in 2010, decent again in 2011, and had a strong overall postseason in 2014, marked by one amazing series and one mediocre one. No excusing his crappy quittiness in the Memphis series, but overall his playoff performance resume is pretty comparable to Rasheed's, particularly as first options. Neither guy was good enough to really lead a team to the promised land or ascend to that next tier of starpower, but Aldridge came closer in 2014 to doing that than Sheed ever did.


I feel like you're missing the core story here. Aldridge shot the Blazers out of series after series. You can't live with 28% usage, 50% TS. Just won't work. He put up decent raw stats, apart from the awful rebound rates, but that was only because he used a huge number of possessions quite poorly.

As far as who came closest to ascending, I think that's obviously Sheed, who almost got the Blazers past a really good Lakers team in the WCF. It turns out they crumbled under the pressure, but I can't see any way to pin that failure on Sheed. He was absolutely magnificent that series -- 23 and 7 on 58% TS. Dude was more important in that series than Kobe. Aldridge has never sniffed that level of performance in the playoffs.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#13 » by a_sensei » Thu Aug 6, 2015 6:13 pm

I am voting for LaMarcus Aldridge for the same reasons as #5. Overall numbers, longevity, contributions to two very good groups. I would definitely argue that Sheed's teams were much better than LMA's of the past two years. Sure the starting lineups may have been arguably close, but the 99-02 groups were crazy deep while the 13-15 group's bench varied between historically bad and highly mediocre.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#14 » by DavidSterned » Thu Aug 6, 2015 7:09 pm

Agenda42 wrote:Are you sure he had better teammates?

Nobody as good as Roy on Rasheed's teams.
Nobody as good as Sabonis on Aldridge's teams.
Nobody as good as Matthews on Rasheed's teams.
Old Pippen comparable to Batum.
Stoudamire probably less good than Lillard.

At the least, I wouldn't say it's an open and shut case here.


I would take that 1998-2001 era supporting cast 100 times out of 100 over what we've had the last few years. Without hesitation really. The key is the veteran depth. Pippen, Sabonis, Smith, Grant, Stoudamire, Wells, Augmon, Anthony, Schrempf. That was a pretty stacked group with few weaknesses. Just lacking a truly superior first option, or else the Blazers would've won a title or two.


I think you're hanging a lot of stuff on Rasheed that is a team thing. Individually, Rasheed had two bad series out of 11. Even with those games in his record, he absolutely crushes Aldridge on average playoff performance.

There's also a raw scoreboard factor here. Aldridge won one playoff series in 9 years. Rasheed won four in 7 years.


If you're going to give Rasheed the lion's share of credit for those 4 series wins, then you have to give him the lion's share of the blame for all the losses that surrounded them. In reality basketball is always a team game. Sheed was certainly solid in 1999/2000, but those two years were totally about team effort and having a wide ranging distribution of shots and options on offense. The wins were about Portland capitalizing on their stacked talent at the time. Many felt the team still underachieved.

Those 2001-2003 years were Rasheed's teams. By then he was the designated first option and he had the opportunity to lead the team and didn't. The team's poor playoff showing in those years (record of 3-10) reflects upon his inability to be a reliable go-to guy, similar to Aldridge's failings. Sheed's best regular season was 2000-01, and he followed that up with his worst playoff performance. Similar to Aldridge in 2014-15.


I feel like you're missing the core story here. Aldridge shot the Blazers out of series after series. You can't live with 28% usage, 50% TS. Just won't work. He put up decent raw stats, apart from the awful rebound rates, but that was only because he used a huge number of possessions quite poorly.


I'd say you're overvaluing TS%. Other than 2015, I don't feel there was a single series that Aldridge "shot Portland out of". He was Portland's best player in the 2010, 2011, and 2014 postseasons. Had a solid showing in 2009 behind Roy. His postseason stats were largely mirrored by his regular season stats, no big dropoff, and while he clearly wasn't a good enough first option for a contending team, he was also clearly better than the rest of his team for the most part. Aldridge's game, as has been discussed ad nauseum in the past, isn't really about maximizing his shooting efficiency, and it never will be. You can take it or leave it, I suppose, but he is who he is, just as Sheed was a maddeningly inconsistent and temperamental first option who often looked way too passive for his talent level.



As far as who came closest to ascending, I think that's obviously Sheed, who almost got the Blazers past a really good Lakers team in the WCF. It turns out they crumbled under the pressure, but I can't see any way to pin that failure on Sheed. He was absolutely magnificent that series -- 23 and 7 on 58% TS. Dude was more important in that series than Kobe. Aldridge has never sniffed that level of performance in the playoffs.


Aldridge put up 30/11/2/3 against Houston in 2014. I'd say he sniffed and maybe even fully inhaled that level of performance in the playoffs.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#15 » by JasonStern » Thu Aug 6, 2015 8:01 pm

this is where I will go with the currently unpopular, but correct, choice and vote LaMarcus Aldridge.

seasons with Portland:
Aldridge 9
Sabonis 7
Wallace 6.5

playoff series wins as #1 option
Wallace 4
Aldridge 1
Sabonis 0

All-Star Appearances With Portland
Aldridge 4
Wallace 2
Sabonis 0

2nd Team All-NBA Appearances With Portland
Aldridge 1
Wallace 0
Sabonis 0

All-NBA Third Team Apperances With Portland
Aldridge 3
Wallace 0
Sabonis 0

NBA All-Rookie Appearances With Portland
Aldridge 1
Sabonis 1
Wallace 0

Franchise Points
Aldridge #2
Wallace #9
Sabonis outside the top 10

Franchise Rebounds
Aldridge #1
Wallace #7
Sabonis #8

Franchise Blocks
Wallace #3
Aldridge #4
Sabonis #9

Points Per Game With Portland
Aldridge #6 - 19.4ppg
Wallace, Sabonis outside the top 10

Rebounds Per Game
Aldridge 8.4
Wallace, Sabonis outside the top 10

PER
Sabonis 21.2
Aldridge 20.3
Wallace outside the top 10

if you could count "what ifs?", then Sabonis wins this. but ultimately, he was already broken down by the time he finally started playing for Portland. greatest player? sure, but the poll is about the greatest Blazer.

if Wallace won a championship instead of passively letting the 2000 Western Conference Finals slip away, then I could see voting for him. but instead, he was a headcase on a stacked team that underperformed.

hate him for leaving in free agency, but Aldridge had the better career as a Blazer.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#16 » by Agenda42 » Thu Aug 6, 2015 9:21 pm

DavidSterned wrote:I would take that 1998-2001 era supporting cast 100 times out of 100 over what we've had the last few years. Without hesitation really. The key is the veteran depth. Pippen, Sabonis, Smith, Grant, Stoudamire, Wells, Augmon, Anthony, Schrempf.


I'm not so sure. The comparable RAMBO Blazer team had, assuming we can't trust Oden (PER):
Roy 24.0,Miller 18.1,Batum 17.3,Camby 17.0,Rudy 15.5,Przybilla 15.4,Outlaw 15.1,Blake 14.4, Cunningham 14.3

The 1999 team had (PER):
Sabonis 20.4,Smith 17.3,Wells 17.3,Grant 16.7,Anthony 16.6,Pippen 16.4,Stoudamire 15.5,Schrempf 14.5,Augmon 13.0

Given that I have (Aldridge or Sheed), I think I want Miller/Roy/Batum/Camby more than I want Stoudamire/Smith/Pippen/Sabonis. The bench for the 1999 team is better, but Roy and Miller is just fantastic.

DavidSterned wrote:I'd say you're overvaluing TS%. Other than 2015, I don't feel there was a single series that Aldridge "shot Portland out of".


TS% is the single best indicator of offensive efficiency we have. Aldridge has always been a slightly inefficient player. That's in the nature of his game. The problem is that he's a very different player in the playoffs. He goes from being similar to being similar to Allen Iverson. It's hard to find anyone with USG > 28% and TS% < 50% in the playoffs -- the list is three guys long (AI, Derrick Rose, and Aldridge). This is historic shooting inefficiency here.

http://bkref.com/tiny/CnOP1

If you instead search on Aldridge's regular season USG and TS%, you get dozens of matches, including guys with similar games like Karl Malone and Patrick Ewing.

http://bkref.com/tiny/Znzf6

To put it another way -- if Aldridge shot the same %s he did in the regular season, the Blazers probably win two more playoff series in his time in Portland.

DavidSterned wrote:His postseason stats were largely mirrored by his regular season stats, no big dropoff


The only place Aldridge doesn't fall off a cliff in the playoffs is in raw stats and usage.

Career TS% - Regular season .532, playoffs .494
Career WS48 - RS .145, playoffs .069
Career USG% - RS .258, playoffs .280
Career BPM - RS +1.2, playoffs -1.5

What kind of star player has a negative BPM (box plus/minus)? For reference, Rasheed's playoff BPM for Portland was +3.2, which is up in Kobe territory.

DavidSterned wrote:Aldridge put up 30/11/2/3 against Houston in 2014. I'd say he sniffed and maybe even fully inhaled that level of performance in the playoffs.


I don't see it that way. The 2000 Lakers were a historically good team. Arguably the best of the post-Jordan era. The 2014 Rockets were a pretty good basketball team, but wouldn't be a title contender in any modern NBA season.

Even in the 2014 Rockets series, where Aldridge played quite well, it's not difficult to argue that Lillard was the best Blazer. Lillard had a crazy ridiculous 135 ORtg, was the guy the Blazers counted on in the fourth quarter, and made the most important play of the series. Aldridge scored 17% more points while using 43% more possessions. Now obviously, Lillard's a sieve defensively, but it's not like Aldridge was a defensive stalwart in that series either. I think many people would give series MVP to Lillard.

If you go look at the 2000 WCF, there's absolutely no question that Wallace is the best Blazer. Not only is it not close, he continued to play great basketball even as the rest of his team imploded around him. By most measures, Sheed had more impact in that series than Kobe.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#17 » by DavidSterned » Thu Aug 6, 2015 10:17 pm

Agenda42 wrote:
I'm not so sure. The comparable RAMBO Blazer team had, assuming we can't trust Oden (PER):
Roy 24.0,Miller 18.1,Batum 17.3,Camby 17.0,Rudy 15.5,Przybilla 15.4,Outlaw 15.1,Blake 14.4, Cunningham 14.3

The 1999 team had (PER):
Sabonis 20.4,Smith 17.3,Wells 17.3,Grant 16.7,Anthony 16.6,Pippen 16.4,Stoudamire 15.5,Schrempf 14.5,Augmon 13.0

Given that I have (Aldridge or Sheed), I think I want Miller/Roy/Batum/Camby more than I want Stoudamire/Smith/Pippen/Sabonis. The bench for the 1999 team is better, but Roy and Miller is just fantastic.


You're talking about 2010? Outlaw and Blake were traded for Camby midseason, and Roy was playing on half a leg by the time the playoffs rolled around in 2010. No Przybilla or Oden for most of that season either and Batum was still young and raw. Had they all stayed healthy and gained playoff experience together, I'm sure they could've eventually been better, but as it was there is no way that Aldridge's supporting cast in the 2010 or 2011 postseasons was anywhere near our 1999-2000 era teams. The 2000 team had some of the deepest all around veteran talent ever assembled in the NBA IMO.


TS% is the single best indicator of offensive efficiency we have. Aldridge has always been a slightly inefficient player. That's in the nature of his game. The problem is that he's a very different player in the playoffs. He goes from being similar to being similar to Allen Iverson. It's hard to find anyone with USG > 28% and TS% < 50% in the playoffs -- the list is three guys long (AI, Derrick Rose, and Aldridge). This is historic shooting inefficiency here.

http://bkref.com/tiny/CnOP1

If you instead search on Aldridge's regular season USG and TS%, you get dozens of matches, including guys with similar games like Karl Malone and Patrick Ewing.

http://bkref.com/tiny/Znzf6

To put it another way -- if Aldridge shot the same %s he did in the regular season, the Blazers probably win two more playoff series in his time in Portland.


I'm not sure what series Portland wins if Aldridge shoots slightly more efficiently. Memphis was going to win regardless, but Aldridge was certainly a negative overall with his horrific shooting, and then Phoenix/Dallas/San Antonio were simply better teams and Aldridge was the best player against each (so what does that say about his teammates?).

The only place Aldridge doesn't fall off a cliff in the playoffs is in raw stats and usage.

Career TS% - Regular season .532, playoffs .494
Career WS48 - RS .145, playoffs .069
Career USG% - RS .258, playoffs .280
Career BPM - RS +1.2, playoffs -1.5

What kind of star player has a negative BPM (box plus/minus)? For reference, Rasheed's playoff BPM for Portland was +3.2, which is up in Kobe territory.


BPM has never looked favorably upon Aldridge, which totally contradicts actually watching the games and seeing that he has abilities and impact that most players don't have. His BPM in the 2014-15 regular season was 6th place on the team, behind Wright even. Was he Portland's 6th best player last year?

In other words, it's a pretty lame advanced stat. Raw box score statistics clearly have more relevance than something that says that Dorell Wright is more effective than LaMarcus Aldridge.

I don't see it that way. The 2000 Lakers were a historically good team. Arguably the best of the post-Jordan era. The 2014 Rockets were a pretty good basketball team, but wouldn't be a title contender in any modern NBA season.

Even in the 2014 Rockets series, where Aldridge played quite well, it's not difficult to argue that Lillard was the best Blazer. Lillard had a crazy ridiculous 135 ORtg, was the guy the Blazers counted on in the fourth quarter, and made the most important play of the series. Aldridge scored 17% more points while using 43% more possessions. Now obviously, Lillard's a sieve defensively, but it's not like Aldridge was a defensive stalwart in that series either. I think many people would give series MVP to Lillard.

If you go look at the 2000 WCF, there's absolutely no question that Wallace is the best Blazer. Not only is it not close, he continued to play great basketball even as the rest of his team imploded around him. By most measures, Sheed had more impact in that series than Kobe.


Aldridge played better against a worse team, but he still played better. It's pretty pointless to argue how good he was in that series, he played like a superstar. Sheed never really rose to that level. He was indeed very good in the 2000 WCF (aside from Game 1 where he needlessly got ejected), but he wasn't playing at a higher level than Aldridge played at. And yeah, he was probably better than Kobe in that series but Kobe didn't really become a superstar level guy until the following season.

Overall, I think their playoff resumes are very comparable. It's too simplistic to look at Sheed's playoff series wins and conclude that that means he was a way better playoff performer. Especially as first options, they had similar levels of success and performance and neither guy was really good enough to consistently lead his team to playoff wins.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#18 » by Brandon-Clyde » Thu Aug 6, 2015 10:42 pm

Rasheed Wallace- Best player on a title contending team
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#19 » by Moonbeam » Fri Aug 7, 2015 1:20 am

Norm2953 wrote:I'm going to pass on this round for if the main choices are the one of the most hated players at
the end of his run in Portland (Sheed) and a guy who put up stats but had only one
playoff series win in nine years (Aldridge)...

Great players lead their teams to playoff success which is why ultimately Dame will end up in the
top 5 unless he's stuck on bad teams due to the rebuild.


Why not make your case for Sabas again? He's likely to get votes.
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Re: Greatest Blazers Ever: Vote for #6 

Post#20 » by Moonbeam » Fri Aug 7, 2015 1:21 am

Our fearless moderator DaVoiceMaster is away on vacation for a few days, but he mentioned he'd like to vote for Arvydas Sabonis for the same reasons as stated previously:

DaVoiceMaster wrote:Sabonis was huge and not just in size or stature. The guy did a whole lot and considering he was on the downside of his career, we all can't help but wonder what might have happened had he come over in the late 80's when the Blazers drafted him. The guy had everything you could dream of for a center. So talented, had a big heart, and he played through a lot of pain. Gotta give the guy big props!

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