RealGM 2023 Top 100 Project - General Thread

[AEnigma]

Will probably write thoughts later, but may as well share the screenshots now for others to use as material for commentary:

Top of the Teens

(Time will tell whether Garnett will hold onto his new #9 high-mark or be kicked back out by Magic or possibly Curry.)

Declining Top Twenty


Securely Top Thirty


Declining Top Thirty


Declining Top Forty


Fighting for Top Fifty


Star Guards with Postseason Equity


Second Tier Stars of the 1950s/60s


Second Tier Stars of the 1980/90s


Second Tier Star Guards of the ‘00s


Secondary Star Power Forwards


1970s Star Centres…


… and the rest of the 20th Century Centres

[Doctor MJ]

Hey y'all,

I've updated the spreadsheet adding 3 new tabs:

1. Trajectory Trends - graphs up to 5 players rankings from project to project (players editable)
2. Common Origins (California, France, etc.)
3. Common Colleges (North Carolina, UCLA, etc.)

Please take a look and share thoughts.

This is a lot of fun to peruse.

Starting with origins, while I do not have much comment on patterns, the high proportions for North Carolina and D.C. are interesting given their size (and is definitely a blow for how Kentucky and Indiana see themselves ). Also of note how there was a historical skew to New York and Illinois (Chicago) which has declined in a way not true of California and North Carolina.

Lots of good thoughts that are worth further discussion, but I thought I'd hit the deep history origins stuff on its own to start.

So, Indiana & Kentucky do make some sense to mention together, but I'm going to address them separately.

With Indiana, first and foremost what you have is the birth of super basketball fever among fans with their state high school basketball tournament, and a radiating out of passion across the country from there. I wouldn't say there was ever a time where the relatively small state of Indiana was actually producing the most tippy, top tier adult players. Professionally, the heyday was the Zollner Pistons in Fort Wayne, but even there, their star - Bobby McDermott - was not only from New York, but was a New York pro before Zollner offered him enough money to come to the Midwest.

I'll add that the lack of population density in Indiana, while it obviously made them less likely to produce all the best players, contributed to basketball popularity. You had a whole bunch of towns that realistically couldn't have built competitive high school teams for sports that required larger teams, but basketball only required 5 players, and even small towns tended to have at least 5 boys graduating every year...and the townsfolk would cheer out their boys like religious zealots.

With Kentucky, I think the starting point to understand is that Kentucky is adjacent to Indiana, and to some extent could be seen to grow out for Indiana - more accurately to say that Kentucky grew out of midwestern basketball which had its heart in Indiana and its brain in Kansas with James Naismith & Phog Allen. The University of Kentucky becomes the top college basketball program in the country with coach Adolph Rupp who came out of Kansas.

Now, I'd note that this also wasn't the same thing as Kentucky being the place where all the top players were coming from. I'd say the two most celebrated players of that early UK era were Leroy Edwards and Alex Groza, but neither of them were Kentuckian.

Still, given Kentucky's place as the greatest college program of the pre-Wooden-at-UCLA era, it's noteworthy that Wildcats don't have much of a place on this list. And if we're going to point to one reason that's an elephant in the room it's this:

UK became known as the capital of White Basketball, in a sport that would become dominated by Blacks. As an example of how stark this was, Wes Unseld was one of the first Black players that Rupp recruited (after Rupp had been coaching at UK for over 30 years), and Unseld turned him down to go to Louisville instead. While Unseld being from the city of Louisville implies a general "stay close to home" factor, Unseld has said he specifically didn't think he'd be a good fit at the White mecca that UK was.

This makes it all the more ironic, and noteworthy, that the only UK player to make the 100 this time is Black (Anthony Davis). Obviously that's coming from a much later era where the UK had long since stopped being known as a place for White basketball.

Last note: While think all of that answers what was going on with Indiana & Kentucky, some thoughts on other deep history, as well as the states dominating this list:

- In early basketball history, I think it's clear that elite basketball was dominated specifically by the Eastern Seaboard which could be said broadly to be from Massachusetts down to DC, but I'd say was truly most dominated by the inner part of that - New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania - which was probably the most densely populated part of the country.

- As basketball blossomed nationwide this didn't mean that the Midwest was producing more elite players than the East, but it did mean that the distribution of elite basketball players got spread out across the country, and while New York remained the mecca of elite basketball for a very long time, eventually, as with many other things, California came to dominate. The combination of it becoming the most popular state and its sunny weather was just too much for anywhere else to match, and while it's noteworthy, it's not really surprising.

But what about North Carolina?

- First thing, is that NC also has deep basketball roots at the youth level. Indiana may have been the most rabid basketball state along these lines, but basketball became a major hit basically everywhere it was brought, and NC got it earlier than most.

- Second thing, NC was in the South, and thus had a sizable Black population.

- Third thing, the University of North Carolina had Dean Smith as their coach in the time period where basketball became dominated by Black players, and Smith was a civil rights activist. Smith, like Rupp, would also come out of Kansas, and under his tenure, he would lead UNC to become the great college basketball program of the South (until eventually being surpassed by Duke, UNC's local rival).

- Finally, I just think a state like NC can't be this high on the list without some luck. For just one example: Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn and I don't think there's any reason to think that he had to move away from NYC in order to turn into Air Jordan...but his family moved to NC when he was young and the rest is history.

[sp6r=underrated]

Great post. Thanks for putting this together

Will probably write thoughts later, but may as well share the screenshots now for others to use as material for commentary:

Top of the Teens

(Time will tell whether Garnett will hold onto his new #9 high-mark or be kicked back out by Magic or possibly Curry.)

KG is really scaling up due to re-assesment of his Minnesota years. I don't mean this as an attack BTW. But he didn't do much from 2011 on to keep climbing.

Bird is falling a bit due to longevity. The brevity of his career hurts him.

Declining Top Twenty

David, Moses and Karl are fairly static. I expect they'll drop slightly with time due to new players. If there is a re-assesment ala KG, I could see Karl dropping if the credit he gets for the Jazz run gets allocated to Sockton and David could rise if the +/- movement continues gaining steam. But he'll always be held down more due to Bird longevity/some really weak post-seasons.

Dirk's assent is due to 2011. The Mavs breaking through really helped shake the undeserved reputation as a bad playoff player.

Securely Top Thirty

Out of these guys, I'm most interested in how Wade ends up regarded. Brief career and a playing style that goes against the modern norm. But he really seems like a franchise cornerstone in a way that other elite players aren't.

Paul would be my pick for a KG reassessment. The analytical argument for Paul is super strong.

Declining Top Thirty

I'm surprised how little traction Stockton has made given the turn in basketball evaluation. I am a Stockton skeptic but I'll confess I would have thought he would have attracted more supporters than he has. I suspect if either Paul or Stockton were 6'7 with the exact career they would have a few more backers.

I'm going to read over the Barkley threads to see why he dropped so much. The lack of lift in Phoenix is concerning.

I'll try to work out the rest of em but thanks for graphing this out. I like it.

[Special_Puppy]

How come Grant Hill, Alex English, and Hal Greer made the list 6 times straight at some point in time and then were excluded?

[Doctor MJ]

How come Grant Hill, Alex English, and Hal Greer made the list 6 times straight at some point in time and then were excluded?

"excluded" is an understandable word to use but do understand that we don't vote "Who isn't worthy?". Guys get in because they get championed, and so if there's no one doing the championing they tend to slip.

I frankly think all of those guys are still worthy Top 100 contenders who can make it again in the future, but they just never had anyone pushing their candidacy to the forefront this time.

[sp6r=underrated]

How come Grant Hill, Alex English, and Hal Greer made the list 6 times straight at some point in time and then were excluded?

"excluded" is an understandable word to use but do understand that we don't vote "Who isn't worthy?". Guys get in because they get championed, and so if there's no one doing the championing they tend to slip.

I frankly think all of those guys are still worthy Top 100 contenders who can make it again in the future, but they just never had anyone pushing their candidacy to the forefront this time.

And the farther you go down the list the smaller the gap. The gap between 5 and 1 is much larger than 80 and 100.

[Special_Puppy]

Some notable players who have fallen over the years:
-Dominique Wilkins was 41 in 2011 and is now 96
-Bob McAdoo was 43 in 2008 and is now 97
-Bob Cousy was 29 in 2008 and is 79 now

Some notable players who have risen over the years:
-Manu Ginobili was 62 in 2014 and is 39 now
-Rasheed Wallace didn't make the list in 2011 and is 74 now

[OldSchoolNoBull]

Specifically with regards to Hal Greer, I feel like the lack of agreement about the pecking order on the 67 Sixers after Wilt resulted in support being split between Greer, Walker(who I championed), and Cunningham. Cunningham did eventually get in at the tail-end and Walker got a nomination in the project's final weeks, but I feel the indecision between those three hurt all of their candidacies. That said, I personally felt that, looking at box data and team success, outside of 67 Greer didn't do anything that stands out to me as much as what Chet did in Chicago and what Cunningham did in the ABA(even though I'm not super high on Cunningham, I did end up voting for him).

[Special_Puppy]

Delete

[Special_Puppy]

Delete

[Special_Puppy]

Great post. Thanks for putting this together

Will probably write thoughts later, but may as well share the screenshots now for others to use as material for commentary:

Top of the Teens

(Time will tell whether Garnett will hold onto his new #9 high-mark or be kicked back out by Magic or possibly Curry.)

KG is really scaling up due to re-assesment of his Minnesota years. I don't mean this as an attack BTW. But he didn't do much from 2011 on to keep climbing.

Bird is falling a bit due to longevity. The brevity of his career hurts him.

Declining Top Twenty

David, Moses and Karl are fairly static. I expect they'll drop slightly with time due to new players. If there is a re-assesment ala KG, I could see Karl dropping if the credit he gets for the Jazz run gets allocated to Sockton and David could rise if the +/- movement continues gaining steam. But he'll always be held down more due to Bird longevity/some really weak post-seasons.

Dirk's assent is due to 2011. The Mavs breaking through really helped shake the undeserved reputation as a bad playoff player.

Securely Top Thirty

Out of these guys, I'm most interested in how Wade ends up regarded. Brief career and a playing style that goes against the modern norm. But he really seems like a franchise cornerstone in a way that other elite players aren't.

Paul would be my pick for a KG reassessment. The analytical argument for Paul is super strong.

Declining Top Thirty

I'm surprised how little traction Stockton has made given the turn in basketball evaluation. I am a Stockton skeptic but I'll confess I would have thought he would have attracted more supporters than he has. I suspect if either Paul or Stockton were 6'7 with the exact career they would have a few more backers.

I'm going to read over the Barkley threads to see why he dropped so much. The lack of lift in Phoenix is concerning.

I'll try to work out the rest of em but thanks for graphing this out. I like it.

The difference in support between KG and Stockton+CP3 is interesting. People seem way more willing to accept advanced stats-based historical revisionism when it comes to KG as opposed to CP3+Stockton.

[sp6r=underrated]

Great post. Thanks for putting this together

Will probably write thoughts later, but may as well share the screenshots now for others to use as material for commentary:

Top of the Teens

(Time will tell whether Garnett will hold onto his new #9 high-mark or be kicked back out by Magic or possibly Curry.)

KG is really scaling up due to re-assesment of his Minnesota years. I don't mean this as an attack BTW. But he didn't do much from 2011 on to keep climbing.

Bird is falling a bit due to longevity. The brevity of his career hurts him.

Declining Top Twenty

David, Moses and Karl are fairly static. I expect they'll drop slightly with time due to new players. If there is a re-assesment ala KG, I could see Karl dropping if the credit he gets for the Jazz run gets allocated to Sockton and David could rise if the +/- movement continues gaining steam. But he'll always be held down more due to Bird longevity/some really weak post-seasons.

Dirk's assent is due to 2011. The Mavs breaking through really helped shake the undeserved reputation as a bad playoff player.

Securely Top Thirty

Out of these guys, I'm most interested in how Wade ends up regarded. Brief career and a playing style that goes against the modern norm. But he really seems like a franchise cornerstone in a way that other elite players aren't.

Paul would be my pick for a KG reassessment. The analytical argument for Paul is super strong.

Declining Top Thirty

I'm surprised how little traction Stockton has made given the turn in basketball evaluation. I am a Stockton skeptic but I'll confess I would have thought he would have attracted more supporters than he has. I suspect if either Paul or Stockton were 6'7 with the exact career they would have a few more backers.

I'm going to read over the Barkley threads to see why he dropped so much. The lack of lift in Phoenix is concerning.

I'll try to work out the rest of em but thanks for graphing this out. I like it.

The difference in support between KG and Stockton+CP3 is interesting. People seem way more willing to accept advanced stats-based historical revisionism when it comes to KG as opposed to CP3+Stockton.

Stockton and CP3 are pretty different to me. I'll explain why. With Stockton the Box Score/plus minus stats are super strong but:
1. The team peaked during the era when they were least Stockton-centric.
2. The assessment of most observers of those Jazz teams was that Malone was the driving force.
3. Less important but for me an issue is the lack of collapse from the Jazz in 2004. The stats says those teams were losing a guy who was still borderline top 10. Their drop off is fairly minor and in a couple of years he's replaced by another PG playing the same system and the Jazz return almost to the exact same level of play.

I don't think it is impossible that Stockton was as good as his numbers. The data, both box score and plus minus is on his side. That matter a lot. It is possible contemporary observers all screwed up.

But the fact still remains, during the Stockton-centric era the Jazz rarely reach the WCF and often don't even win a series despite a decent supporting cast on paper (Malone/DPOY/Good Coach), then when they pivot towards Malone they become a championship contender. That's strange.

I think you can understand why middle aged folks who watched these clubs are skeptical on Stockton. We didn't have the full analytics argument back then. But even in the 90s people joked about his stats. They were known.

I don't agree with everything I wrote way back when I created this thread. But some of the posts capture my skepticism. And I really like this post which I'll quote in full. It is both an argument against Malone and Stockton.

viewtopic.php?f=64&t=977550&p=21976871#p21976871

As for the specific example of the Warriors in 1989, yes, Malone and Stockton still have to be held accountable because, again, there are TWO of them. And for franchise level players, let alone top-30 of all time players, they have more responsibilities than just scoring + 1 other category. Part of their greatness is that they are considered to be great on both sides of the ball...I've read several times in this and other thread that their defense is underrated, and both were All Defense in that time period (Malone in '88, Stockton in '89). So for the Warriors to just torch the Jazz defense in that series, both Stockton and Malone have to partially answer for that.

The Warriors were a terrible matchup for the Jazz that year, similar to the Warriors against the Mavericks a couple of years ago. Coincidentally the coach was Don Nelson both times. The Warriors used Manute Bol, a nonfactor on offense who was hanging out in the perimeter, to pull Eaton out of the middle, negating Eaton's defensive effectiveness. There was no zone defense at that time. The Warriors used their speed, quickness, and outside shooting to beat Utah's size. Chris Mullin killed the Jazz with his outside shooting and nobody on the Jazz could slow him down. Bailey couldn't keep up with him. Besides Stockton the Jazz lacked ball handlers and guards who could create their own shots.

I agree with your assessment of that series, as that was my memory as well. Which was actually one of the hidden points of my post: Malone and Stockton were IMO too limited to be considered among the best-of-the-best All-Time. On offense they were stupidly ridiculous at the pick-and-roll and also very good at some other things, but as a duo they weren't able to either volume-score or facillitate enough team offense to outgun the best opponents. And on defense, while they were good at their particular skill sets (i.e. 1-on-1 D against a good big man, annoying perimeter D for Stockton) they weren't difference makers at that end of the court.

So what you were left with was 2 players that put up outstanding numbers over the course of their long and illustrious careers but could only be difference-makers in certain, specific ways. If the opponent didn't cooperate and play the game in a way that fit their skill sets (which the very best opponents tended not to), they couldn't win.

And again, this criticism likely comes out harsher than I intend, but the fact that there were TWO of them is what sways me. One All-time great player, by himself, is generally able to put a stamp on his team barring a perfect storm epic-failure to put anything around him. So if you have TWO of those players, in a stable environment for a decade-plus, I just can't buy the "there wasn't enough support" argument.

If Malone is a top-15 of All-time player, he should only have required a modicum of help to get his team to at least 50 wins on the regular. Any more than a "modicum" of help should have been a legit contender. There shouldn't be a whole lot of holes in his game that couldn't be covered by reasonable teammates. A great player with him should lead to at least one ring.

But if you go beyond even "great player" and put a TOP-30 PLAYER OF ALL-TIME with him, one that happens to be great in areas where Malone wasn't perfect (playmaking, clutch scoring), if both are REALLY that impactful as players, then that should lead to titles (plural) over 15 years. Luxuries like a DPoY, a great coach, a 6th man of the year candidate...those should just be piling on, taking an already championship caliber core to dynasty-level status. And the fact that it WASN'T...that they needed all of this extra support and still rarely even got to the big stage and never won...that is telling to me. It tells me that they aren't quite as impactful as their "All Time Rankings" suggest they should be.

With Paul, the skepticism is a little bit easier to understand. First, his body has broken down at the end of the seasons. Second, his teams never reached the full championship contention level despite a decent supporting cast. Third, he could grate on teammates.

The second critique doesn't carry much water for me. The Clippers got absurdly unlucky with playoff draws despite winning 2/3 of their games in the RS they were constantly getting draws where they met 4-6 SRS clubs in the 1st round. That is ridiculously bad luck. The teams would have done way better if they had had normal draws.

The third critique doesn't bother me that much because I am very high on his peak but if you aren't, like his skeptics, it is a big problem. If you think he needs a super strong supporting cast the fact he irritate people is a problem.

With regards to the first, I do have concerns. Durability matters and Paul isn't perfect on that front.

[AEnigma]

The difference in support between KG and Stockton+CP3 is interesting. People seem way more willing to accept advanced stats-based historical revisionism when it comes to KG as opposed to CP3+Stockton.

Do you care to quote any specific perceived contradictions or “historical revisionism,” or is this just a gesture at what you are assuming must be a contradiction based on posts you do not seem to have read.

[Special_Puppy]

The difference in support between KG and Stockton+CP3 is interesting. People seem way more willing to accept advanced stats-based historical revisionism when it comes to KG as opposed to CP3+Stockton.

Do you care to quote any specific perceived contradictions or “historical revisionism,” or is this just a gesture at what you are assuming must be a contradiction based on posts you do not seem to have read.

"Advanced Stats based Interpretation of their careers" is probably a better way to put it than

[AEnigma]

The difference in support between KG and Stockton+CP3 is interesting. People seem way more willing to accept advanced stats-based historical revisionism when it comes to KG as opposed to CP3+Stockton.

Do you care to quote any specific perceived contradictions or “historical revisionism,” or is this just a gesture at what you are assuming must be a contradiction based on posts you do not seem to have read.

"Advanced Stats based Interpretation of their careers" is probably a better way to put it than

Making the statement vaguer does not change what I asked.

I do not need any particular reliance on “advanced stats” to see that Garnett was pretty comparable throughout his career with Duncan — who has been a pretty commanding #5 for this board — just with less consistent team support.

[Special_Puppy]

Do you care to quote any specific perceived contradictions or “historical revisionism,” or is this just a gesture at what you are assuming must be a contradiction based on posts you do not seem to have read.

"Advanced Stats based Interpretation of their careers" is probably a better way to put it than

Making the statement vaguer does not change what I asked.

I do not need any particular reliance on “advanced stats” to see that Garnett was pretty comparable throughout his career with Duncan — who has been a pretty commanding #5 for this board — just with less consistent team support.

I think that's basically true, but I think most people wouldn't really be comfortable reaching that conclusion if the advanced stats (Particularly plus-minus) didn't largely back that up

[lessthanjake]

I think it makes sense for Stockton not to rise up as much as others due to impact stats. For one thing, most impact stats don’t exist for most of Stockton’s career (he was 34 the first year of play-by-play stats), and the more crude measures that do exist further back than that (WOWY) are essentially worthless for him because he never missed games. So we have a sense that he was very impactful, but we actually should have a fair bit of uncertainty about exactly how impactful he was over the course of his career, due to a lack of data. And then you get to the fact that the baseline view of him at the time was that he was a guy who was perpetually around the bottom of the top 10 players in the league, rather than ever really knocking on the door of being the best player. I think it’s hard for partial impact data from the latter portion of his career to really overcome that baseline prior about him.

Kevin Garnett and Chris Paul are a bit different, since we have full impact data, and we also had a contemporaneous sense that they were amongst the league’s very top players (even moreso for Garnett than Paul IMO, which may help explain Garnett taking more of a leap). So it’s a case of full data bolstering a prior that wasn’t *super* far off from what the data says, while for Stockton it’s partial data that’s pretty far off from the prior.

In general, I’m not nearly as high on these sorts of guys as others are, but I think what I described can justify the fact that Garnett, Paul, and Stockton seem to have all gotten different levels of bump from impact data. There’s also the unavoidable fact that assessment of different players from different eras implicates peoples’ primary agendas in different ways which can lead to some differing conclusions being arrived at, and I’m sure that’s part of it too. But it’s not inherently contradictory IMO.

[OldSchoolNoBull]

One thing I did take notice of throughout the project is a certain apathy towards volume scoring, even very efficient volume scoring, especially if it was the only or primary thing a player was known for.

This is seen at the very beginning, where Duncan and Hakeem were voted in over Shaq and Wilt and Magic.

I recall, at #9, it came down to Magic and KG, it went to a runoff, and KG took the runoff pretty easily IIRC. That was something I disagreed with pretty strongly back then and still do now. Magic was not only a GOAT-tier playmaker, he also averaged a shade under 20ppg for his career on +7.3 rTS, breaking 200+ TS Add five times, and was very resilient in the playoffs for over a decade.

Then there's the Barkley saga, where he kept falling and falling despite by the numbers being one of the greatest volume scorers ever in his prime to go along with his MVP and Finals appearance and being an absolutely elite rebounder. As probably his biggest champion at the time, I found that very frustrating, especially as it resulted in a 9 spot gap between him and Malone that I just don't think is accurate.

Dantley didn't get in until #81 despite being one of the TS Add GOATs and performing very well for a team that got a foul call away from a championship in 1988.

Sharman missed the past two lists and it took a lot of debate and a lot of time to get him in this time, despite being an outlier of perimeter scoring efficiency in his time.

Worthy just barely made the list despite being one of the more efficient volume scorers of his era.

Then guys like Issel(who's made the list five times before) and English(who's never missed it before now), and Hagan(who lost on 38 consecutive ballots) along with guys I championed in Mullin and Walker, don't make it at all.

[OldSchoolNoBull]

Also, as long as we're talking about players for whom we only have impact data for their later years, DRob(who was in the "declining top 20" category above) is an interesting case. His RAPM and on/off absolutely sparkle in those later years with Duncan, but the question of how much of that was DRob and how much of it was playing with Duncan was a subject of pretty robust debate. People felt really strongly about it both ways. I fall in the "DRob was that good, give him his credit" camp.

[Special_Puppy]

Also, as long as we're talking about players for whom we only have impact data for their later years, DRob(who was in the "declining top 20" category above) is an interesting case. His RAPM and on/off absolutely sparkle in those later years with Duncan, but the question of how much of that was DRob and how much of it was playing with Duncan was a subject of pretty robust debate. People felt really strongly about it both ways. I fall in the "DRob was that good, give him his credit" camp.

Yeah I’m not sure there’s THAT big a gap between Hakeem and Robinson. If you have Hakeem at 6 then maybe you should have Robinson at like 12