Tyus Jones vs Bob Cousy

[One_and_Done]

I'm not a fan of arguments that rely on Ted Talk videos.

[tsherkin]

I'm afraid it's a lost cause. Players from earlier eras can transcend bad eras but nobody before Kareem is worth even considering for today's league.

I wasted my time with him on this subject for too long.

Yeah, it does appear not to be discourse in good faith, to be sure.

[xdrta+]

I'm not a fan of arguments that rely on Ted Talk videos.

Right, you rely on "dumb cavemen who invented the wheel" type of arguments.

[One_and_Done]

I'm not a fan of arguments that rely on Ted Talk videos.

Right, you rely on "dumb cavemen who invented the wheel" type of arguments.

I rely on "who was objectively better" arguments. The cavemen stuff comes up when people want to substitute their imaginations for what actually happened based on a subjective assessment of who has the biggest sob story. I don't find the latter useful, or the answers as meaningful. We have a HoF, statues, and jersey retirements to honour legends, we don't need to pretend they were better than they were as well.

[FarBeyondDriven]

except he wasn't.

But definitively, he was. Sure, you can look at other weak scorers at the point and say he was better than them, but that still doesn't say much when that was a below-league-average option all across the board. That was a tactical error on part of the coaches for continuing to run with that, but that doesn't change that Cousy wasn't a good volume scoring choice. It just means they hadn't recognized how to properly evaluate such at that time in the league... which was like 70 years ago. So, unsurprising.

you're left with a guy leading the league in assists every season,

Irrelevant to my remark about scoring, and something which I did also address in my post.

Poor efficiency for point guards was a product of the time for a variety of reasons and does not equate to him not being a good scorer. Just take the L

But there's no L, you're wrong. Your entire point of comparison is "other guys at his position were worse," which is true, but that doesn't change the fact that he wasn't a good scoring choice. They were just less effective scoring choices.

I really shouldn't bother since it's clearly pointless but I'll go ahead one last time.

YOU are the one that falsely claimed he wasn't a good scorer. I proved you unequivocally wrong by showing he was in fact a good scorer since he was among the league leaders in scoring. You then moved the goalposts and said he had poor efficiency compared to his peers. I proved you wrong again by comparing him to the other point guards, his peers, and showed he was in line with them efficiency wise (even though he had higher volume) but that still isn't good enough for you. He was wildly ahead of "his peers" in scoring AND assists. I bring assists because there's been only a handful of players in NBA history that have been among the league leaders in scoring AND assists and Cousy is one of them. The added responsibility of running the offense surely wouldn't benefit his efficiency. Without a doubt, Cousy was a great scorer for his time. It's not debatable. But here you still are

People can bring up advanced stats but they don't measure what they think they do because it was a completely different sport then. His lack of shooting teammates and bigs early in his career likely forced higher degree of difficulty shots but he was obviously the best option they had so he took them. It was a bigs dominated sport with some transition scoring predominantly. Guards didn't practice outside shooting and with bigs parked in the paint it was much harder for guards to score amongst the trees. His FG% increased once the scoring load was lessened with the addition of better teammates helping to prove my point. Your argument against Cousy using efficiency is like trying to claim Iverson, McGrady and Kobe weren't great scorers because versus their peers they had poor effiency. It's really really dumb. Those guys had poor FG% because like Cousy, they were their team's best option and often had to (or chose to) take tough shots often against double or even triple-teams. Take the well-deserved L.

[One_and_Done]

You have no problem speculating the other way though.. if it's an even comparison they are at least playing on the same rules / sneakers / ball right? So why do you assume this Jones can do step back 3 pointers when he has never used those sneakers, ball, and the court doesn't even have a 3 pt line? If given time to acclimate he could probably still be good, even a star back then.. but straight in a game, with a ball and sneakers he's never used? Good chance he gets injured and can't even finish the game much less be a shooting god.

Your average just graduated astronomer, if teleported to 5000 years back to England they wouldn't be able to design Stonehenge (with all of its astrological alignments, proportions etc) much less build it, unless you sent them with a computer, gps, telescope, and so on.

That's exactly why (reasonable) people don't compare across eras and consider contextual impact

The barriers on Tyus are all easily overcome. Wow, adapting to new shoes. How will he manage. I also generally compare players operating at the highest level, which is a modern setting, not how will these guys play on ashpalt next to a volcano. But here it's irrelevant, as Jones would maybe be considered the GOAT in the 50s & 60s.

A modern scientist could definitely be taught and understand how to build stonehenge if teleported back. They may not have that specific knowledge, but it would easily be within their ability to learn. Cousy can't be teleported to our time and learn to play; he'll just be a water boy.

WTF? Cousy might not make the league as today he'd be undersized and his athletic ability even as the league transitioned into the 60's started to get tested. But he's sure as hell be able to adapt and learn to play the modern game. The game hasn't changed that much for crying out loud.

I mean he could learn it, a common fan can learn that, but it won't result in him making the league is the point.

[ellobo]

Absolutely not a ridiculous choice.
Who you got? 100 meter sprint Olympic champion 100 years ago or a scrub in 2020 Olympic semi finals?

Very harsh.

Out of curiosity, does anyone know the times in this example?

Easy to find:
Olympic Record 10.6 Donald Lippincott (USA) Stockholm (SWE) July 6, 1912

The last one in the past Olympic Semifinal out of 24 players was 10.3; First person to ever run within 10sec was in 1968, but in last Olympic all qualified runners in the finals were within 10sec.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athletics_at_the_2020_Summer_Olympics_%E2%80%93_Men%27s_100_metres

Bob Beamon still holds the Olympic long jump record, set 56 years ago in 1968, and it's still the second longest jump in history. Mike Powell's world record is 33 years old, and 9 of the top 10 jumps in history are at least 30 years old (one jump tied for 10th all time is "only" 15 years old).

Obviously, when it comes to jumping, human evolution has regressed. With today's equipment and training methods, Bob Beamon, Mike Powell, and Carl Lewis would be lucky to jump 26 feet .

BTW, Beamon was drafted by the Phoenix Suns in the 15th(!) round of the 1969 NBA draft, number 189 overall (but the FIRST pick of the 15th round!). However, he never played in an NBA game.

[dhsilv2]

The barriers on Tyus are all easily overcome. Wow, adapting to new shoes. How will he manage. I also generally compare players operating at the highest level, which is a modern setting, not how will these guys play on ashpalt next to a volcano. But here it's irrelevant, as Jones would maybe be considered the GOAT in the 50s & 60s.

A modern scientist could definitely be taught and understand how to build stonehenge if teleported back. They may not have that specific knowledge, but it would easily be within their ability to learn. Cousy can't be teleported to our time and learn to play; he'll just be a water boy.

WTF? Cousy might not make the league as today he'd be undersized and his athletic ability even as the league transitioned into the 60's started to get tested. But he's sure as hell be able to adapt and learn to play the modern game. The game hasn't changed that much for crying out loud.

I mean he could learn it, a common fan can learn that, but it won't result in him making the league is the point.

The only reason Cousy might not make the league is his size and athleticism. If he'd been 2 inches taller and a bit more explosive naturally, he'd make the nba today without any question. Even as he was, he might make it today.

[batmana]

...

Bob Beamon still holds the Olympic long jump record, set 56 years ago in 1968, and it's still the second longest jump in history. Mike Powell's world record is 33 years old, and 9 of the top 10 jumps in history are at least 30 years old (one jump tied for 10th all time is "only" 15 years old).

Obviously, when it comes to jumping, human evolution has regressed. With today's equipment and training methods, Bob Beamon, Mike Powell, and Carl Lewis would be lucky to jump 26 feet .

....

Similarly, the women's high jump record was set in 1987 and is currently in the top 3 of the longest-standing world records in athletics (both men's and women's). It was set by a Bulgarian athlete, Stefka Kostadinova, that's why I'm bragging about it
In fact, the top results in the discipline all occurred in the 1980s...

[One_and_Done]

An aberration is not a trend, and it's exceptions that prove the rule. I think Flo Jo from the 80s still has some records too, but we all know why they mean nothing.

[70sFan]

An aberration is not a trend, and it's exceptions that prove the rule. I think Flo Jo from the 80s still has some records too, but we all know why they mean nothing.

"Exceptions that prove the rule" is one of the dumbest phrases people created. It means absolutely nothing.

[hauntedcomputer]

All I know is if they were suiting up tonight I'd a million times rather watch Cousy than Tyus Jones.

[One_and_Done]

All I know is if they were suiting up tonight I'd a million times rather watch Cousy than Tyus Jones.

Watching Cousy get dunked on and punked repeatedly would be pretty entertaining I admit.