RealGM Top 100 List #51

[penbeast0]

Looking at:

Players with long, consistent careers . . . mainly wings: English, Dantley, Sam Jones, Vince Carter, and Nique. My head says English, my heart says Jones.

Players with reasonable but not long careers and some peak seasons: Dave Cowens, Kevin Johnson, Chauncey Billups, oh, and Mel Daniels with his 2 MVPs and 3 rings (2 as clearly the best player) -- played like Alonzo Mourning offensively and Moses defensively.

Players with unreasonably short peaks but who were really extraordinary and special. Bill Walton, Connie Hawkins, Sidney Moncrief. Walton only had 1 year where he made it to the playoffs as a starter; Hawkins similarly only 1 great year though 1 pretty good year after reinventing his game following his first big knee injury; Moncrief 4-5 good years but not as good as the other two.

Vote: Alex English.

***********************************************************************************************************************************
Alex English was on some great offense/bad defense teams but that was with Dan Issel and Kiki Vandeweghe inside -- possibly the worst pair of defensive bigs to ever play; Kiki was worse than Amare and Issel was nowhere near Marion's ability to compare with Phoenix. And . . . like those Suns, English was the offensive focal point who led them to 5 top 5 offenses in 5 years (2 times best in league). When Issel retired and the Nuggets rebuilt around English and Fat Lever (Wayne Cooper and Danny Schayes were the main centers), they instantly went from bottom 5 in the league to top 10 DEFENSIVELY for 4 of the next 5 years. It was just disguised by the fact that they were still top 3 in the league in pace. During that period English played the role of go to scorer for a full decade but within that, with Kiki and Unseld, English was the primary post option, with Lever and normal bigs, he was the stretch the floor outside shooter, he even was the point forward when they used Mike Evans at 1.

Defensively he was a willing defender for a scorer; better than the likes of Nique, Dantley, King, or Aguirre, though not as good as Marques Johnson or James Worthy among his contemporaries. He guarded 3s and 4s most of the time, rarely 2s, though that was probably more personnel than talent since his best defensive asset was lateral quickness and he was slim and not that strong.

So, to sum up. English was not only the leading scorer of the 80s (over Bird, Nique, Kareem, etc.) on very good efficiency, he showed himself capable of leading a #1 offense for 5 years (as long as some players' peaks), a consistent above average defense for another 5 years and showed the ability to adapt his game to whatever the team's needs were without sacrificing efficiency or scoring volume.

[Moonbeam]

I'm in the midst of crazy final exam grading, so not sure how much time I'll have. For now, I'll post what I posted in the last topic:

Vote for #51 for Adrian Dantley.

He has a great case to be considered one of the top 10 scorers ever, if not top 5. In fact, he's the all-time leader in Score+, PosScore+, and TeamScore+ (metrics aiming to combine volume and efficiency) for players with over 5000 MP.

I don't want to make a marathon post, but I'll link to some posts I've made about Dantley:

Scoring comparison (volume x efficiency) of Dantley, Wilkins, and English.

A look at whether his gaudy offensive statistics were poaching from his teammates by examining expected offensive win shares.

A similar comparison for other leading 80s SFs.

Head to head matchup summaries of leading 80s SFs. Dantley had the biggest margin in scoring and efficiency, and surprisingly, his high-flying SF opponents did not tend to torch him, even when Utah had poor defenses from 1980-1982.

Addressing his impact for the 1982-83 season. Open question: was he part of a rebounding problem?

Frank Layden talking about the 1984-85 contract holdout. This formed the basis of their relationship going south, and Layden takes his share of the blame.

An overview of Dantley's playoffs with Detroit in 1987 and 1988 and how important his offense was, as well as quotes about his changed role and his noticeable effort on defense.

A brief look at the 1988 Finals, in which I think Dantley had a great case for Finals MVP had the Pistons won.

After Dantley, I've got Robert Parish (could be persuaded to switch my vote), then Alex English, then Pau Gasol/Sam Jones/Dave Cowens. Nique would soon follow. Not sure yet where to put Vince Carter or Iverson. I'm interested in hearing more about Ginobili, Hayes, Thurmond, Lanier, Worthy, Squid, Rodman, etc. A name I haven't heard mentioned yet but I think merits a look soon is Chauncey Billups. How does he compare to these guys, and to his Wallace teammates? What about some old-timers like Neil Johnston, Paul Arizin, or Bob Cousy? Torn about Bill Walton - amazing peak but very, very short. I'd have to hear some solid support based on his Clipper and Celtic days to consider him soon, I think.

[Notanoob]

Vote: Bill Walton

Best player left on the board, IMO of course.

MVP, Finals MVP, 6th man of the year, 2xChampion, 2xAll Defensive First Team, First Team All-NBA, 2nd Team All NBA

Walton had the most awful luck in terms of injuries, giving us only a handful of years of play. However, the magnitude of his greatness should get him some more traction here.

In Walton's only prime season where he was healthy for the playoffs, Walton lead the league in rebounding and blocks. He anchored Portland's 2nd ranked offense and 5th ranked defense (first team all-defense, remember). In the playoffs, he helped sweep the Lakers led by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, then defeated the favored 76ers after going down by two games, and earned the Finals MVP.

The next year, he lead his team to win 50 of their first 60 games, earning 1st Team All-NBA honors and the MVP over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who is ranked 2nd on our Top 100 list here. Sadly, he basically didn't have a healthy season after this until 1986, when coming off the bench for the Celtics he won 6th Man of the Year and got his second ring.

Walton was a beautiful player to watch with a complete game. His IQ was off the charts, as was his effort level (why else would he suffer through so many injuries to play if he didn't love the game?). He was a very active and mobile defender, using his instincts to contest every shot possible, giving him a huge defensive impact. Despite the fact that this level of activity would drag him away from the basket and out of rebounding position, Walton was an incredible rebounder, as demonstrated by the fact that he led the league in RPG with 14.4 at the same time he led the league in BPG with 3.2 (his '76 season). Walton also led the league in DRB% 4 times, topping out at 34.2% in his MVP season.

On the other end of the court, Walton was the centerpiece of Jack Ramsay's offense, serving as a high post hub and spreading the wealth. His passing was incredible for a big man, and he is one of the best passing centers to ever play the game, dishing 5 dimes a game in his MVP season. Walton was also a credible scorer, possessing a solid jump shot and post up game, peaking at 18.6ppg on 56.3TS%. Later in his career he'd work more on the offensive glass as well.

Here's some footage:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmxRIEyBiXo[/youtube]

[SinceGatlingWasARookie]

How do you rank Wikens, Carter, Berard King, English, Dantley , Grant Hill and Worthy?
How do you rank McAdoo, Cowens, Walton, Eaton, Jermaine O'neal, Bob Laneir, Sikma, Ben Wallace nd Kemp?
How do you rank Iverson, Keven Johnson, Mark Price, Billups, Anfernee Hardaway and Tim Hardaway?

[E-Balla]

I'm voting Allen Iverson again. Its like people around these parts completely discount a player after looking at their TS% (the Rose vs Curry thread being a hilarious example with many saying Curry is way better just because he's more efficient). Iverson wasn't the most efficient but I don't see how anyone else here had a career as impressive as him.

Iverson is the only player left in consideration with a (deserved) MVP (yeah I went there - Shaq was hurt and playing lazy). Iverson had the ability to completely carry a team and that's my main choice for picking him.

[penbeast0]

That's not what is happening E-Balla. People look at Iverson and see a poor defender, a player not big enough to play shooting guard but not suited to the point, a guy who skipped practices regularly and blew off his coaches, basically a guy whose only reason to be in the NBA is because of his scoring. Then they look at his scoring and see that he's also an inefficient scorer.

On the other side, many Iverson supporters just seem to look at ppg and ignore the rest of the player (this includes a lot of the award voters so I'm not as impressed by the awards as you are). There's more to basketball than scoring, especially when you take 30+ shots a game to do it.

[Owly]

I'm voting Allen Iverson again. Its like people around these parts completely discount a player after looking at their TS% (the Rose vs Curry thread being a hilarious example with many saying Curry is way better just because he's more efficient). Iverson wasn't the most efficient but I don't see how anyone else here had a career as impressive as him.

Iverson is the only player left in consideration with a (deserved) MVP (yeah I went there - Shaq was hurt and playing lazy). Iverson had the ability to completely carry a team and that's my main choice for picking him.

They don't [completely discount a player after looking at their TS%], they just weight it more than you. So does, I think probably every boxscore metric. For instance

PER leaders for '01

1. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL 30.23
2. Vince Carter-TOR 25.01
3. Tracy McGrady-ORL 24.88
4. Karl Malone*-UTA 24.70
5. Chris Webber-SAC 24.66
6. Kobe Bryant-LAL 24.46
7. Allen Iverson-PHI 23.95
8. Kevin Garnett-MIN 23.86
9. Tim Duncan-SAS 23.83
10. David Robinson*-SAS 23.69

WS/48 leaders
1. David Robinson*-SAS .2457
2. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL .2453
3. Marcus Camby-NYK .2330
4. Dirk Nowitzki-DAL .2242
5. Karl Malone*-UTA .2167
6. John Stockton*-UTA .2155
7. Ray Allen-MIL .2107
8. Vince Carter-TOR .2080
9. Tim Duncan-SAS .2002
10. Shawn Marion-PHO .1961

WS
1. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL 14.94
2. Dirk Nowitzki-DAL 14.60
3. Ray Allen-MIL 13.73
4. Tim Duncan-SAS 13.24
5. Karl Malone*-UTA 13.07
6. Vince Carter-TOR 12.91
7. Steve Francis-HOU 12.21
8. Tracy McGrady-ORL 12.15
9. David Robinson*-SAS 12.14
10. Allen Iverson-PHI 11.79

Even if you don't think the MVP was Shaq (it was Shaq; if that's him lazy then his lead over the pack when focused ...) Iverson isn't some clear cut lock as the next best player (by the metrics, he's an outsider).

Other stuff has been covered by Pen here and by others in prior threads, for instance possible concerns with regard to his role and value on a good offensive team.


Anyhow I'm thinking Lanier. If I get time (and the materials, I've got Hollander yearbooks, may look for other opinions) to read up on his D and it supports where think he's roughly at (i.e. that Detroit's team level performance isn't a great indicator) I'll likely go that way that. The next guys on my modified-EWA, WS career rank list are Lanier, Dantley, Marion and Allen (then Bellamy, Carter, Nance), this isn't something I rigidly follow at all, but I am looking at it to flag up if any would be choices look crazy (obviously with the ability to throw in intangiable/non-boxscore type factors as an explanation.

[E-Balla]

That's not what is happening E-Balla. People look at Iverson and see a poor defender, a player not big enough to play shooting guard but not suited to the point, a guy who skipped practices regularly and blew off his coaches, basically a guy whose only reason to be in the NBA is because of his scoring. Then they look at his scoring and see that he's also an inefficient scorer.

On the other side, many Iverson supporters just seem to look at ppg and ignore the rest of the player (this includes a lot of the award voters so I'm not as impressed by the awards as you are). There's more to basketball than scoring, especially when you take 30+ shots a game to do it.

This is what I'm saying. We are boiling his career down to one thing (his scoring) and dismissing him because some other guys have prettier looking numbers. Allen Iverson playing and shooting 5-23 is better than Iverson not playing at all for those Sixers. On a better team maybe he doesn't chuck like that like for example in Denver (past his prime) he had a 57 TS in his full season. If Iverson averaged 22 ppg on 56 TS for his career instead of 27 ppg on 52 TS but outside of that he was exactly the same and overall his effectiveness was the same he'd be voted in already. He was forced into a chucking role. And even in his early career when he had help he used it. In 98 he averaged 22 ppg on 54 TS (109 ORTG). They got rid of his offensive help and in 99 he averaged 27 ppg on 51 TS (105 ORTG).

The blew off coaches and missed practice thing is nothing. He showed up to play on the court and he did. If I was being played 46 minutes a night because that was the only way to keep the team afloat I'd skip practice too.

[E-Balla]

I'm voting Allen Iverson again. Its like people around these parts completely discount a player after looking at their TS% (the Rose vs Curry thread being a hilarious example with many saying Curry is way better just because he's more efficient). Iverson wasn't the most efficient but I don't see how anyone else here had a career as impressive as him.

Iverson is the only player left in consideration with a (deserved) MVP (yeah I went there - Shaq was hurt and playing lazy). Iverson had the ability to completely carry a team and that's my main choice for picking him.

They don't [completely discount a player after looking at their TS%], they just weight it more than you. So does, I think probably every boxscore metric. For instance

PER leaders for '01

1. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL 30.23
2. Vince Carter-TOR 25.01
3. Tracy McGrady-ORL 24.88
4. Karl Malone*-UTA 24.70
5. Chris Webber-SAC 24.66
6. Kobe Bryant-LAL 24.46
7. Allen Iverson-PHI 23.95
8. Kevin Garnett-MIN 23.86
9. Tim Duncan-SAS 23.83
10. David Robinson*-SAS 23.69

WS/48 leaders
1. David Robinson*-SAS .2457
2. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL .2453
3. Marcus Camby-NYK .2330
4. Dirk Nowitzki-DAL .2242
5. Karl Malone*-UTA .2167
6. John Stockton*-UTA .2155
7. Ray Allen-MIL .2107
8. Vince Carter-TOR .2080
9. Tim Duncan-SAS .2002
10. Shawn Marion-PHO .1961

WS
1. Shaquille O'Neal-LAL 14.94
2. Dirk Nowitzki-DAL 14.60
3. Ray Allen-MIL 13.73
4. Tim Duncan-SAS 13.24
5. Karl Malone*-UTA 13.07
6. Vince Carter-TOR 12.91
7. Steve Francis-HOU 12.21
8. Tracy McGrady-ORL 12.15
9. David Robinson*-SAS 12.14
10. Allen Iverson-PHI 11.79

Even if you don't think the MVP was Shaq (it was Shaq; if that's him lazy then his lead over the pack when focused ...) Iverson isn't some clear cut lock as the next best player (by the metrics, he's an outsider).

Other stuff has been covered by Pen here and by others in prior threads, for instance possible concerns with regard to his role and value on a good offensive team.


Anyhow I'm thinking Lanier. If I get time (and the materials, I've got Hollander yearbooks, may look for other opinions) to read up on his D and it supports where think he's roughly at (i.e. that Detroit's team level performance isn't a great indicator) I'll likely go that way that. The next guys on my modified-EWA, WS career rank list are Lanier, Dantley, Marion and Allen (then Bellamy, Carter, Nance), this isn't something I rigidly follow at all, but I am looking at it to flag up if any would be choices look crazy (obviously with the ability to throw in intangiable/non-boxscore type factors as an explanation.

I don't think Shaq winning 56 games with Kobe playing the way he did was as impressive as Iverson. Its close though. The Lakers were 5-3 without Shaq and the Sizers were 6-5 without Iverson.

And the argument I hear against him is that he never led a top 5 offense. He's never had a top 15 offensive supporting cast though. The only thing I can look at objectively with AI is his personal ability and we all know he can score at a great level. Why does his lack of efficiency matter? You could be more efficient and still worse at scoring. On this board and project if you are mainly a scorer and you aren't super efficient you will fall 5-10 spots lower for no reason aside from "he was scoring inefficiently". Evaluate why AI was inefficient. Look into why Adrian Dantley was efficient. Then make a educated decision on their careers.

[colts18]

I'll ask again, but what makes Iverson a better offensive player than Kevin Johnson?

Johnson provided good scoring on great efficiency while actually playing team basketball unlike Iverson. Johnson was part of some really good offenses even before Barkley came along. KJ also had more playoff success than Iverson.

Some impressive playoff runs for KJ:
89: 24-12
90: 21-11
92: 24-12
94: 27-10
95: 25-9

[Clyde Frazier]

Vote for #51 - Adrian Dantley

As I took a closer look at english vs. dantley, english had a slightly longer prime and better durability. However, dantley still had a substantial prime in his own right, and his 29.6 PPG on 63.2% TS and .205 WS/48 from 80-86 is pretty staggering. He was also a better playoff performer in similar sample size. I admittedly came away more impressed with english’s skill set as a scorer (just more fluid and gervin-esque in my opinion), but you can’t argue with results, either.

One other point of reference: as a rookie in 77, dantley scored 20.3 PPG on 60.1% TS. The league average TS% that season was 51.1%.

I then look at the controversy with dantley leaving DET and them winning the championship following his departure, and it seems overblown. Dantley’s averages in the 88 finals (loss) are as follows:

21.3 PPG, 5 RPG, 2.3 APG, .6 SPG, 57.3% FG, 85.6% FT, 67.6% TS, 127/112 OFF/DEF RTG

Games 6 and 7 of the 88 finals were decided by a total of 4 points, and this was with a substandard game 7 by the injured isiah thomas. If he’s healthy, they very well could’ve won the title that year. I don’t hold the turn of events against dantley all that much relative to general perception.

Some great research here by Moonbeam on Dantley and other star SFs of the 80s:

I love looking at these guys because most of my favorite players are small forwards, and it was such an exciting time to watch, as these guys were each capable of amazing offensive outbursts.

Spoiler:

One thing I've taken a hard look at is how to weigh up offensive statistics in the context of team offense. There has been a fair bit of discussion in the Top 100 poll about how to gauge individual performance based on team performance (e.g. Garnett's Minny teams did not generally excel on defense, how to compare Kidd's team offenses to Payton's given teammate quality), so I tried to come up with a rough model of expectations for team offense.

I used offensive win shares as the basis for this analysis. I know many aren't happy with OWS, but on a team-level, it is very strongly correlated with offensive rating, which is a good measure of overall team offensive performance. I looked at all regular season data from 1977-2014 to come up with a set of aging curves to encompass different types of peak shapes. I've used five different levels of peak sharpness and five different peak ages (21, 24, 27, 30, and 33), which makes it possible to model a player's career based on OWS/48, like this:



This is a very simple approach, but I wanted something specific enough to broadly capture the relationship between offensive production and aging, but not too specific as to produce perfect models - I'm interested in the deviations from expectations, after all, so I'm happy with a bit of noise.

Based on these curves of expected OWS/48, I then looked at team offense relative to expectations as judged by total OWS. I'm still looking to road-test this analysis, so if you know of any instances where you felt a team overachieved or underachieved its talent level, I'd be eager to check it against my model!

I parsed out performance relative to expectations for each of these players plus Larry Bird (in >28 MPG seasons) and their respective teammates as a whole. Why 28 MPG? I wanted to include enough seasons to get a big picture view, plus I wanted to avoid discontinuities where I could (e.g. Bernard King's 1988 season). Here are the resulting plots of player OWS, player expected OWS, teammate ("help") OWS and expected teammate OWS:

















Over this span, here are the MP-weighted averages for player OWS, % of team OWS, both rate and raw difference of help OWS to expectations:

Code: Select all

Player   WtOWS   %Off  Help Rate  Help Diff
Aguirre  5.112  0.166    1.018      +0.428
Bird     7.429  0.220    1.048      +1.056
Dantley  8.803  0.394    0.844      -2.155
English  6.536  0.246    1.016      +0.307
Johnson  5.954  0.253    1.040      +0.636
King     4.466  0.269    0.887      -1.413
Wilkins  6.084  0.255    1.015      +0.260
Worthy   5.065  0.155    1.116      +2.809


On the surface, it looks like Dantley (and to a lesser extent, King) may be getting their Win Shares somewhat at the expense of teammates, while Bird and Worthy are associated with boosts for their teammates. How much praise (or blame) should be apportioned for performance of teammates is up for debate, but I think it at least provides a framework for comparison.

Taking a look at the 5-year intervals in the OP:

Code: Select all

Player  Years   WtOWS   %Off  Help Rate  Help Diff
Aguirre 84-88   5.920  0.187    1.041      +1.005
Bird    84-88   9.933  0.302    0.989      -0.257
Dantley 80-84  11.213  0.553    1.083      +0.606
English 82-86   7.849  0.268    1.026      +0.548
Johnson 79-83   7.192  0.275    1.057      +0.984
King    81-85   6.675  0.323    0.919      -1.268
Wilkins 86-90   7.835  0.270    1.158      +2.891
Worthy  86-90   6.465  0.180    1.181      +4.496


Dantley is clearly the leader in both OWS and percentage of team offense (some of those supporting casts in Utah look dreadful), but perhaps he didn't provide the "lift" as others (or worse, perhaps his presence deflated his teammates offense). If we split his career into phases, it seems his early career is where his teammates fared the worst (0.731 rate, fit issues with Lakers?), while in Utah they performed nearly to (awful) expectations (0.968 rate), while in Detroit during 87-88, the rate fell to 0.801 (problems of fit with Isiah?), and across 89-90, it was 0.935.

I don't think Worthy's help numbers are attributable to him so much as they are to Magic, but he clearly fit into Showtime quite well. Wilkins looks like he could have provided decent lift across 86-90, and Aguirre's apparent issues with teammates did not seem to affect his teams' offenses.

I've got H2H stats I can post later, but I thought I'd put this out there as it's a fascinating comparison for me.

Entire discussion here:

viewtopic.php?p=41264223#p41264223

[penbeast0]

That's not what is happening E-Balla. People look at Iverson and see a poor defender, a player not big enough to play shooting guard but not suited to the point, a guy who skipped practices regularly and blew off his coaches, basically a guy whose only reason to be in the NBA is because of his scoring. Then they look at his scoring and see that he's also an inefficient scorer.

On the other side, many Iverson supporters just seem to look at ppg and ignore the rest of the player (this includes a lot of the award voters so I'm not as impressed by the awards as you are). There's more to basketball than scoring, especially when you take 30+ shots a game to do it.

This is what I'm saying. We are boiling his career down to one thing (his scoring) and dismissing him because some other guys have prettier looking numbers. Allen Iverson playing and shooting 5-23 is better than Iverson not playing at all for those Sixers. On a better team maybe he doesn't chuck like that like for example in Denver (past his prime) he had a 57 TS in his full season. If Iverson averaged 22 ppg on 56 TS for his career instead of 27 ppg on 52 TS but outside of that he was exactly the same and overall his effectiveness was the same he'd be voted in already. He was forced into a chucking role. And even in his early career when he had help he used it. In 98 he averaged 22 ppg on 54 TS (109 ORTG). They got rid of his offensive help and in 99 he averaged 27 ppg on 51 TS (105 ORTG).

The blew off coaches and missed practice thing is nothing. He showed up to play on the court and he did. If I was being played 46 minutes a night because that was the only way to keep the team afloat I'd skip practice too.

Iverson averaging 22ppg on 56TS for his career with his minutes, defense, and attitude wouldn't make the top 100 much less be competitive for top 50. There are too many guys with those kind of numbers that you'd rather have on your team than Allen Iverson, not just the guys we have looked at already but guys like Cris Mullin, Mitch Richmond, Chet Walker, and a slew of others who give you more outside of scoring than Iverson. He'd be more along the lines of Calvin Murphy (but with a longer prime) who isn't going to make or probably even get a mention in our top 100.

For Iverson, it's all about the points.

[E-Balla]

I'll ask again, but what makes Iverson a better offensive player than Kevin Johnson?

Johnson provided good scoring on great efficiency while actually playing team basketball unlike Iverson. Johnson was part of some really good offenses even before Barkley came along. KJ also had more playoff success than Iverson.

Some impressive playoff runs for KJ:
89: 24-12
90: 21-11
92: 24-12
94: 27-10
95: 25-9

When KJ went down his teams seemed to get along nicely from 93-96.

[ronnymac2]

Vote: Alex English

My true contenders for this spot are Nate Thurmond, Alex English, Allen Iverson, and VC.

English is a very good all-around player and might be the most consistently great player left. His 1985 REG SEA and playoffs is one of the underrated peak seasons on this board in my opinion. He could score, pass, rebound, and handle. Took pretty good care of the ball. He led the first 110+ offense in NBA history, too.

Spoiler:

Bigs: Nate Thurmond, Dave Cowens, Ben Wallace, Bob Lanier, Bob McAdoo

Worms: Dennis Rodman

Wings: Vince Carter, Allen Iverson, Paul Arizin, Alex English, Dominique Wilkins, Penny Hardaway, Manu Ginobili, Sidney Moncrief

Point Guards: Nate Archibald, Kevin Johnson, Chauncey Billups, Deron Williams, Mark Price

[colts18]

When KJ went down his teams seemed to get along nicely from 93-96.

Why did you cherrypick the 93-96 span? If you look at the other years of his prime (89-97) his team went 7-19 in the games he missed.

You can ask the same questions for Iverson. Why did the 76ers play better in the huge sample size (34) of games AI missed in 2004? Why didn't the 76ers decline in 2007 when they traded Iverson?

Using Elgee's in/out numbers, it looks like KJ looks better than AI.

Player Years Games MOV Net SIO
Walton 77-78 41 9.3 13.0 11.2
Nash 01, 05-07, 09 36 5.6 9.5 7.5
Duncan 00, 04, 05 37 8.4 6.5 7.5
King 84-85 33 1.8 11.2 6.5
McHale 86, 88, 91 45 7.8 4.3 6.0
Bird 91-92 44 6.3 5.8 6.0
Rodman 93, 95-97 100 7.8 3.5 5.6
Pippen 94, 98 48 7.6 3.3 5.4
Penny 97, 00 55 3.8 6.9 5.3
Garnett 06-11 72 5.7 4.9 5.3
Shaq 96-98, 00-04 142 6.4 4.1 5.3
West 67-69, 71 76 4.7 5.8 5.3
Hakeem 86, 91-92, 95-96 72 3.5 6.3 4.9
Kareem 75, 78 37 3.1 6.7 4.9
Mourning 94, 96-98 74 4.1 5.2 4.7
McGrady 02-04 28 -0.6 9.9 4.7
KJ 90, 93-97 129 4.7 3.7 4.2
Erving 73, 78, 83 29 4.1 4.2 4.1
Kidd 00, 04-05 46 2.9 4.9 3.9
Kobe 00, 04-07, 10 79 3.9 3.5 3.7
Barkley 87, 91, 94-97 100 3.5 3.5 3.5
Odom 05, 07 44 0.3 5.7 3.0
Cowens 75, 77 47 2.8 3.1 3.0
Pierce 07, 10 46 0.1 5.3 2.7
Ewing 87, 94-96 31 -1.1 6.4 2.6
Baylor 61-62, 66 54 2.3 2.4 2.4
Drexler 90, 93, 94, 96 90 2.4 1.0 1.7
Moses 78, 84 36 -1.1 4.2 1.6
Iverson 00-02, 04, 06 89 0.5 2.7 1.6

viewtopic.php?f=344&t=1128625

[E-Balla]

When KJ went down his teams seemed to get along nicely from 93-96.

Why did you cherrypick the 93-96 span? If you look at the other years of his prime (89-97) his team went 7-19 in the games he missed.

You can ask the same questions for Iverson. Why did the 76ers play better in the huge sample size (34) of games AI missed in 2004? Why didn't the 76ers decline in 2007 when they traded Iverson?

Using Elgee's in/out numbers, it looks like KJ looks better than AI.

Player Years Games MOV Net SIO
Walton 77-78 41 9.3 13.0 11.2
Nash 01, 05-07, 09 36 5.6 9.5 7.5
Duncan 00, 04, 05 37 8.4 6.5 7.5
King 84-85 33 1.8 11.2 6.5
McHale 86, 88, 91 45 7.8 4.3 6.0
Bird 91-92 44 6.3 5.8 6.0
Rodman 93, 95-97 100 7.8 3.5 5.6
Pippen 94, 98 48 7.6 3.3 5.4
Penny 97, 00 55 3.8 6.9 5.3
Garnett 06-11 72 5.7 4.9 5.3
Shaq 96-98, 00-04 142 6.4 4.1 5.3
West 67-69, 71 76 4.7 5.8 5.3
Hakeem 86, 91-92, 95-96 72 3.5 6.3 4.9
Kareem 75, 78 37 3.1 6.7 4.9
Mourning 94, 96-98 74 4.1 5.2 4.7
McGrady 02-04 28 -0.6 9.9 4.7
KJ 90, 93-97 129 4.7 3.7 4.2
Erving 73, 78, 83 29 4.1 4.2 4.1
Kidd 00, 04-05 46 2.9 4.9 3.9
Kobe 00, 04-07, 10 79 3.9 3.5 3.7
Barkley 87, 91, 94-97 100 3.5 3.5 3.5
Odom 05, 07 44 0.3 5.7 3.0
Cowens 75, 77 47 2.8 3.1 3.0
Pierce 07, 10 46 0.1 5.3 2.7
Ewing 87, 94-96 31 -1.1 6.4 2.6
Baylor 61-62, 66 54 2.3 2.4 2.4
Drexler 90, 93, 94, 96 90 2.4 1.0 1.7
Moses 78, 84 36 -1.1 4.2 1.6
Iverson 00-02, 04, 06 89 0.5 2.7 1.6

viewtopic.php?f=344&t=1128625

I picked his seasons where he was injured. Its way easier to check. We've already went through Iverson in 04 when he was hurt and playing bad. I don't know if the same was applicable from KJ but KJ was injured way more often than Iverson.

[Moonbeam]

And the argument I hear against him is that he never led a top 5 offense. He's never had a top 15 offensive supporting cast though. The only thing I can look at objectively with AI is his personal ability and we all know he can score at a great level. Why does his lack of efficiency matter? You could be more efficient and still worse at scoring. On this board and project if you are mainly a scorer and you aren't super efficient you will fall 5-10 spots lower for no reason aside from "he was scoring inefficiently". Evaluate why AI was inefficient. Look into why Adrian Dantley was efficient. Then make a educated decision on their careers.

Adrian Dantley was that much more efficient because he was a vastly superior scorer. He has a great argument for the GOAT combination of efficiency and volume, and he seems to have had much worse offensive support than Iverson: viewtopic.php?p=41591450#p41591450

Of course scoring is not the only important feature of team offense, but the overall impact of Dantley on those Utah teams seems far greater than the impact Iverson had on those Philadelphia teams. I don't think Iverson's edge defensively is enough to overcome the offensive gap.

[E-Balla]

And the argument I hear against him is that he never led a top 5 offense. He's never had a top 15 offensive supporting cast though. The only thing I can look at objectively with AI is his personal ability and we all know he can score at a great level. Why does his lack of efficiency matter? You could be more efficient and still worse at scoring. On this board and project if you are mainly a scorer and you aren't super efficient you will fall 5-10 spots lower for no reason aside from "he was scoring inefficiently". Evaluate why AI was inefficient. Look into why Adrian Dantley was efficient. Then make a educated decision on their careers.

Adrian Dantley was that much more efficient because he was a vastly superior scorer. He has a great argument for the GOAT combination of efficiency and volume, and he seems to have had much worse offensive support than Iverson: viewtopic.php?p=41591450#p41591450

Of course scoring is not the only important feature of team offense, but the overall impact of Dantley on those Utah teams seems far greater than the impact Iverson had on those Philadelphia teams. I don't think Iverson's edge defensively is enough to overcome the offensive gap.

I used Dantley as my example for a reason. It seems he had barely any noticeable impact but his numbers were amazing. Iverson has below normal numbers but his offense kept his team afloat.

[Moonbeam]

And the argument I hear against him is that he never led a top 5 offense. He's never had a top 15 offensive supporting cast though. The only thing I can look at objectively with AI is his personal ability and we all know he can score at a great level. Why does his lack of efficiency matter? You could be more efficient and still worse at scoring. On this board and project if you are mainly a scorer and you aren't super efficient you will fall 5-10 spots lower for no reason aside from "he was scoring inefficiently". Evaluate why AI was inefficient. Look into why Adrian Dantley was efficient. Then make a educated decision on their careers.

Adrian Dantley was that much more efficient because he was a vastly superior scorer. He has a great argument for the GOAT combination of efficiency and volume, and he seems to have had much worse offensive support than Iverson: viewtopic.php?p=41591450#p41591450

Of course scoring is not the only important feature of team offense, but the overall impact of Dantley on those Utah teams seems far greater than the impact Iverson had on those Philadelphia teams. I don't think Iverson's edge defensively is enough to overcome the offensive gap.

I used Dantley as my example for a reason. It seems he had barely any noticeable impact but his numbers were amazing. Iverson has below normal numbers but his offense kept his team afloat.

How do you figure that Dantley had little impact on Utah's offense? Take a look at their performance in 1982, 1983 (when he missed 60 games) and 1984. He had a very big impact on Utah's offense.

[E-Balla]

That's not what is happening E-Balla. People look at Iverson and see a poor defender, a player not big enough to play shooting guard but not suited to the point, a guy who skipped practices regularly and blew off his coaches, basically a guy whose only reason to be in the NBA is because of his scoring. Then they look at his scoring and see that he's also an inefficient scorer.

On the other side, many Iverson supporters just seem to look at ppg and ignore the rest of the player (this includes a lot of the award voters so I'm not as impressed by the awards as you are). There's more to basketball than scoring, especially when you take 30+ shots a game to do it.

This is what I'm saying. We are boiling his career down to one thing (his scoring) and dismissing him because some other guys have prettier looking numbers. Allen Iverson playing and shooting 5-23 is better than Iverson not playing at all for those Sixers. On a better team maybe he doesn't chuck like that like for example in Denver (past his prime) he had a 57 TS in his full season. If Iverson averaged 22 ppg on 56 TS for his career instead of 27 ppg on 52 TS but outside of that he was exactly the same and overall his effectiveness was the same he'd be voted in already. He was forced into a chucking role. And even in his early career when he had help he used it. In 98 he averaged 22 ppg on 54 TS (109 ORTG). They got rid of his offensive help and in 99 he averaged 27 ppg on 51 TS (105 ORTG).

The blew off coaches and missed practice thing is nothing. He showed up to play on the court and he did. If I was being played 46 minutes a night because that was the only way to keep the team afloat I'd skip practice too.

Iverson averaging 22ppg on 56TS for his career with his minutes, defense, and attitude wouldn't make the top 100 much less be competitive for top 50. There are too many guys with those kind of numbers that you'd rather have on your team than Allen Iverson, not just the guys we have looked at already but guys like Cris Mullin, Mitch Richmond, Chet Walker, and a slew of others who give you more outside of scoring than Iverson. He'd be more along the lines of Calvin Murphy (but with a longer prime) who isn't going to make or probably even get a mention in our top 100.

For Iverson, it's all about the points.

22/4/6 on 56 TS with an MVP, leading a team to the Finals, and being an 11 time all star? Derrick Rose won an MVP putting up 25/4/8 on 55 TS. Iverson would've still gotten a ton of accolades and he would be higher on this list because his individual success separates him from everyone else left.