RealGM Top 100 List #16

[ThaRegul8r]

This is by far the lowest vote volume so far too.

The players with large fanbases are already in, so the number of voters is going to decline henceforth, as it does usually. It remains to be seen if people lose interest altogether as early as they did for the last project, despite how gung-ho some were about it beforehand.

[magicmerl]

My runoff vote is for Karl Malone.

[penbeast0]

Reg, didn't you predict that voting would drop off when Kobe got it?

...that and Baller2014 was worth about 5 pages of argument all by himself.

[trex_8063]

Ahh, thanks for the run-off correction. I was about to cry "foul".

[Sports Realist]

My Vote: Dirk Nowitzki

Same Argument as before.

Barkley isn't a better Defender than Dirk...
Malone was a better defender, not by much. He wasn't KG or Duncan...

11 straight 50 win seasons (been done only by Magic/Kareem, Duncan, Russell, and was broken up by the lockout year, injury year and 49 wins in 2014.)
1 of 3 teams to make it out of the West from 1999-2011
1 of 4 players to average over 25 and 10 for his career in the Playoffs (26/10)
Led the worst team to ever win 67+ games
One of the 5 best elimination game players ever
One of the 5 best game 7 players ever (Just now in 2014 lost his first to the Champions)

And all of that playing with decent but not great teams and coaches. Just complimentary casts, shooters, role players... Dirk is a player who you can do that with, and still get in the playoffs and contend. LeBron also. Guys that can go far with shooters, complimentary role players.

He's one of the most durable star players ever, and on his way to a great "prime longevity" as I call it... Just in his 15th season and he was still a top 6 Player! (LeBron/KD/Griffin/Paul/Howard... Wouldn't take anyone else over Dirk)
Playing in something like 98% of all his games.

Dirk's Defense is his only “weakness” on a basketball court. However even that is over-done...

From Wiki about his defense:

"Some critics have alleged Nowitzki's defense is a weakness, as he averages just over one block per game and never made an All-Defense Team. However, playing more around the perimeter takes him out of position where a typical power forward would be detracts from his overall defensive stats.
...he is ranked 8th in active players for defensive win shares, placing him higher than Kobe Bryant, who has made the All-Defensive team 11 times."


I rarely see Players go off on Dirk... dude never gets pushed around.

That whole "super extremely awful defensive liability" thing is a myth. DRAPM proves him to be a solid defender, that's what my eyes tell me too.


Dirk Nowitzki is in fact also one of the greatest Rebounders of all time.

Did you know that Dirk Nowitzki has had 3 Post-season Runs of averaging 10+ DENSIVE REBOUNDS?

Offensively Dirk plays out on the Perimeter, and thereby can't really grab many Rebounds.. This creates major spacing for his Team mates throughout the entire game, which is far more valuable than 1-2 more Rebounds, as it helps your teammates on basically every shot.

On Defense we can see his true Rebounding Greatness.
Dirk has 3 Post-season Runs of 10+ Def. Rebounds peaking out at 11.
Moses Malone has 1 at 10.5, Howard has 3 peaking out at 11, Dennis Rodman has 0, Kareem has 4.
Duncan and Garnett have 4, Barkley has 2, Karl Malone has 2.

Dirk's first 9 Years 2001-2009 in the Playoffs: 11.0 Rebounds per Game.
Not 1 Year of under 10 Rebounds
2002-2009: 11.4
2002-2008: 11.5, 12 rounded. Peaking at 13.1.

Dirk, one of the greatest scorers and shooters of all time, great Rebounder, Team Player, clutch Player, big game Player, and does about as much besides the box score as anyone else in history. From leadership in the locker room, being a good team mate, to soaking opponents from the basket and stretching the floor for his Team.

If you go beyond the raw numbers, Dirk clearly is the best offensive player and the best clutch performer. These are by far the two most important assets in a franchise player.

Major advantage to have a 7 foot pf that can stretch the defense at the 3 point line and get his shot in the post at any time and have no problem consistently making plays/shots late in games. And being one of the best ft shooters ever.

Dirk made his teammates better. Dirk's impact is not fully captured in the offensive stats.

Dirk then has an all-time great playoff run, top 10 ****.

They forget his 48 point game on 15 attempts in game 1 of the WCF, against perennial DPOY candidate Serge Ibaka... Leading a 15 point comeback in game 4 while making heroic shot after heroic shot, scoring 11 points in the last 3.15 minutes, and the game tying free throw with 6 seconds left, even though the OKC ball boys "accidentally" spilled their ice bucket, so we had a good 1 minute break between 1st and 2nd free throw...
His 3 to give the Mavs a 1-point lead with a minute left in game 5 to ultimately win the series... His 8 points in the last 2 minutes of game 2 of the finals, including the game winner... His next go-ahead shot to seal it off in game 4, and then in game 6 scoring 10 of his 21 points in the 4th quarter AGAIN to seal the deal and close out the team of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, as virtually all of America went on to celebrate him... ala MJ in 1997 he had his hands in 2-3 game winning plays, and the highest playoff 4th quarter ppg since it's being recorded...

No other PF in history (except Duncan) has had an extended playoff run that can compare to Dirks 2011 post season. Surely this has to count for something, right?

Just being "good" wasn't good enough for the Mavericks in 2011, replace Dirk with a Karl Malone, Charles Barkley, and those things don't happen... They don't win. And this isn't a Wade 2006 case, where I could use the same argument for Wade against clearly superior players... Why not? Because Wade has fallen off.
Dirk hasn't. This argument is legit. Put those same players in Dirk's spot and they don't win a title and probably don't win 50 wins every season, either.

WRAPPED UP:

Dirk's statistics aren't mind boggling. **** been done before. Now watching the games, and looking at his results with relatively mediocre rosters over DECADES, can only lead to the logical assumption of him doing far more beyond the box score. His ability to raise his game in big moments is a difference maker.

Dirk is definitely on the short list of guys along a Bill Russell that impact the game far more than the box score numbers. That's the difference.

He's a guy whose impact runs deep well beyond the box scores, which are already similar to the one's of Malone and Barkley, WHILE being the best Playoff Performer of the 3 and having capped it all off with a legendary post-season / title run.

edit: Suck my dick chazzy. Arb

[therealbig3]

Vote: Karl Malone

I feel like Moses is in general an overrated player whose actual impact was highly questionable. Dirk imo is the best peak player of the 3, and he does have legit longevity...but Karl Malone's longevity is on another level, and he was still a fantastic player during his prime. From 94-97, there was no question who the best PF in the game was.

Offensively, the only thing he really lacked was elite ISO scoring...which as all of you recall, was the same criticism hurled at KG, and is the same criticism of Robinson. And my personal belief is: the importance of this is vastly overrated. Can K. Malone catch and finish? Yes. Can he shoot? Yes. Can he reliably secure the ball? Yes. Can he read defenses and make good passes? Yes. Can he set good screens? Yes.

If he did do all of those things at an elite level (and he did)...he's already having a large offensive impact from the PF position. On top of that...his ISO scoring ability wasn't ever that bad either, even in the playoffs.

[Basketballefan]

Cmon... karl malone was still a beast in scoring in po. He averaged 26.4 ppg in po with jazz. Higher than his rs averages. His TS is worse than dirk because dirk is better in ft and 3pt but his fg% it's not better. Neither his rebounds or deffense.

I hear you on this, people act like Dirk is on a different level than Karl. I guess thats the case if one is obsessed with advanced stats and the fact that he has a ring. Because lets be real they have similar playoff success and Dirk wouldnt have beaten Mj either. I voted Moses but Karl is my next guy. Then Dirk after him.

One, I was merely voicing my current thoughts on the matter. I am not trying to convince anyone to do anything, as I couldn't care less. It's up to each person to make his own choice based on what they value.

Second, neither you nor the person you quoted know my criteria that I'm looking at. This is merely an example of tribalism, where you big up someone (who also has an impact on this list unlike me) who also thinks the way you do, and thus you come to the defense of another fellow ingroup member against a member of the outgroup with a different opinion. If you don't know my criteria, it's ignorant in the negative way to simply dismiss the outgroup member as "obsessed with advanced stats and the fact he has a ring" because you're ignorant when it comes to what I value, and in your ignorance presume to make a statement about what you don't know. I have West above both Dirk and Malone, and would do so whether he won in '72 or not, because of his consistent performance against the best teams of his era. I care about performance. I specifically have a criterion that ensures a player doesn't get penalized if he doesn't win if his performance doesn't warrant it. I've quoted it during the course of this project. So dismissing the outgroup member as "obsessed with rings" is uninformed and ignorant in the negative sense because you presumed to speak without knowledge.

I have no problem with one choosing Dirk over Karl it is perfectly reasonable, but i think the things i mentioned people do think about subconsciously, my assumptions were not directed at you. I'm not assuming your criteria to be of that i mentioned but it is out there. Again getting bent out of shape because of something a poster said. Get over yourself please.

[Narigo]

Runoff vote: Dirk Nowitzki

Between, Karl, Nowitzki and Moses, the player I want to build around the most is Dirk Nowitzki. While Karl Malone has more longevity than him, Dirk makes up for it by being a better playoff performer. I think Dirk is a better number 1 option than Karl Malone.


The only thing that Moses does better than Dirk is offensive rebounding. Dirk is a better scorer and defensive rebounder. Dirk is more portable because of his ability to stretch the floor.

[Texas Chuck]

Sorry I missed last round of voting and the main part here tho I was able to post some Dirk stuff itt.

My run-off vote is for Dirk

I could give a bunch of reasons, but 'I'll try and limit myself.

He anchored an ever-changing roster with no other superstar player(don't believe Nash was quite a superstar in 04) to 50 wins every year, multiple teams over 60 including a 67 win team that didn't even have another all-star, 2 finals trips, and a championship in a brutally tough conference.

His offensive brilliance is almost unmatched and for a man of his size it is unmatched. His deadly shooting from all over the court, especially his elite mid-range game, combined with his early ability to get to the rim and finish and draw fouls and his later ability to work in the post made him virtually unguardable by one guy and created great offenses out of defensive-minded rosters. He may not be as a good a basketball player as KG, but he's absolutely the easier guy to build a contending team around. KG gets lot of love for being a guy who makes a good team great and rightly so, but Dirk took mediocre teams and made them really good, and often made them great.

The one-legged fade. Only the skyhook compares as a shot where essentially the defense is reducing to hoping he misses. And he used that weapon not only to create shots for teammates, but also for his other vast array of offensive skills.

Best shooting big-man we may ever see, loyal to his teammates, his franchise, his country, and his adopted city. Took the worst team in professional sports and made them a model franchise. Still an elite player last year at 35. Can't match Karl Malone yet for longevity or durability(no one can) but measured against mortals he's as good as it gets and no reason to think he won't be a really good player on his new 3-year contract(and yes he took even less than Duncan while being a better player at the time he signed the deal).

Beloved and respected by all his peers. The greatest European player in NBA history and likely will be for a long long time.

Okay I need to stop because I said this would be short and its not at all short... Im a Dirk homer deal with it.

[Jim Naismith]

Dirk is a better scorer than Moses, but most people don't know that Moses had 8 top-10 scoring seasons himself to Dirk's 10. Also, Moses was scoring leader runner-up twice.

Dirk
2012 #8
2011 #10
2010 #7
2009 #4
2008 #7
2006 #6
2005 #4
2004 #9
2003 #6
2002 #8

Moses
1987 #9
1986 #6
1985 #9
1983 #5
1982 #2
1981 #2
1980 #5
1979 #5

[ceiling raiser]

I know I linked this thread earlier: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1307648 but I still don't feel like I have a good handle on Moses's offensive game. I'll reread the last couple of threads just to be sure I didn't miss anything, but I'd love to see a detailed breakdown of his play on that end from posters who watched him a ton.

At this point, all I know is:

• dominant offensive rebounder
• played a power game, super strong
• pretty good or better reaction times/recovery (second jumps, etc.)
• solid footwork
• some pump faking

The burden is probably on me to try and get a hold of as much tape as possible and watch until I have a better idea, but some commentary would be a great start (again, apologies if I missed any detailed breakdowns, I'll reread this and the past couple of threads in the morning).

[D Nice]

I know I linked this thread earlier: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1307648 but I still don't feel like I have a good handle on Moses's offensive game. I'll reread the last couple of threads just to be sure I didn't miss anything, but I'd love to see a detailed breakdown of his play on that end from posters who watched him a ton.

At this point, all I know is:

• dominant offensive rebounder
• played a power game, super strong
• pretty good or better reaction times/recovery (second jumps, etc.)
• solid footwork
• some pump faking

The burden is probably on me to try and get a hold of as much tape as possible and watch until I have a better idea, but some commentary would be a great start (again, apologies if I missed any detailed breakdowns, I'll reread this and the past couple of threads in the morning).

There is an abundance of good Moses discussion the #15 thread. Most of your questions are answered there. Beyond watching some more film yourself I'm not sure you're going to get any more/better info than what is in that thread (there is some stuff in this thread, but the discussion is much more fleshed out in the #15 thread).

My week of freedom is coming to an end soon but if I'll see can put together a collection of excerpts from that thread that may help you feel informed before bed (although for you I feel like it's never gonna be detailed-enough man )

[ceiling raiser]

There is an abundance of good Moses discussion the #15 thread. Most of your questions are answered there. Beyond watching some more film yourself I'm not sure you're going to get any more/better info than what is in that thread (there is some stuff in this thread, but the discussion is much more fleshed out in the #15 thread).

My week of freedom is coming to an end soon but if I'll see can put together a collection of excerpts from that thread that may help you feel informed before bed (although for you I feel like it's never gonna be detailed-enough man )

Thanks, I'll definitely check it out. I probably need to watch more film, I'm definitely going to check out ihaveplanet.com and see which games are out there.

I'll check it out myself, but if you have the free time, would be a great addition to this thread. I know a lot of the conversation about Moses has revolved around box score stats and accolades, so I've tuned out a little. I'm going to read more closely, shouldn't have allowed myself to become disengaged.

[colts18]

My vote is coming down to Dirk and Malone.

I'm voting for Malone:

#3 all-time in Win Shares
More career win shares than Michael Jordan

[D Nice]

Didn't take as long as I thought.

My Stuff

#1

Spoiler:

Careful with Moses's offensive rebounding. It's a valuable skill in that you are creating more possessions for your team, but nobody in history rivals Moses' propensity for playing volleyball with himself and the backboard. What this does is create a statistical trade-off where he is diminishing his TS% in favor of more OReb's, essentially understating his offensive efficacy a bit in exchange for seemingly GOAT offensive rebounding. The problem ends up being people don't really knock him that much for his self-inflicted TS% drop but they weigh his offensive rebounding the same as, say, a Ben Wallace, when it couldn't be further from the truth.

TLDR: He's a more efficient scorer than he seems and a worse offensive rebounder than he seems, but the #s skew his offensive-rebounding impact up to a greater degree than the extra misses skew his offensiv efficacy downward.

#2

Spoiler:

As an aside though you can't compare their OREB% when one guy attempts 5 shots a game and one guy attempts 20+, and the former is primarily pulling down offensive rebounds that result in possession resets while the latter is generating a large chunk of his OREBs from his own misses (even if through strategic design).

Some data on the % of Moses's offensive rebounds that came from his own misses would be invaluable here, but gathering such data would require painstaking film analysis. I'm actually watching the '83 Sixers title run now, so I'll try and keep some kind of running track in my head as some sort of baseline

#3 (Karl vs Moses on defense)

Spoiler:

I mean, they're not really very similar defensively at all. Moses's defensive "appraisal" if you will is kind of dependent on how much you value defensive rebounding as part of defensive (I've literally seen people say Barkley or even Kevin Love are average/slightly + defenders because of their DREB ability), but even if you allot a big portion of defensive value to Moses' rebounding he doesn't really come off as anything special. He's no liability, he's very good individual defender (perhaps these are where the similarities come into place), but only when matched up against other elite post scorers. He was a big "rise to the challenge guy," especially in the regular season. Like Kobe he had a propensity for forcing big-name guys into sub-par performances while role-player type guys typically saw no dip in performance when matched up against Moses (this could also simply be a function of the fact that he's not really a very good rotation guy and the non-elite post players are primarily catch-and-finish types rather than back you down and get their own shot types). When it comes to denying good position, finishing off possessions with a rebound, etc, Moses was certainly solid, but at a position where rotation is at a premium (IMO the single-most important defensive trait for center) Moses comes up short, and this is a big problem posters like me have with him as the hub of a team.

Karl, OTOH, was elite, virtually from day one. Of all of the elite volume scorers who are also good defenders of the past 25 or so years (Mike, Kobe, Lebron, Wade, etc) Karl's intensity and commitment to playing every possession waned the least. No, he wasn't always giving the attention to his individual matchup he gave in '04 for example, but from a superstar, I'm not sure what more you want. The only thing wrong with Karl's defense seems to be the fact that towards the end of his career the new-age 4s capable of providing DPOY-caliber impact seem to pop up left and right (Duncan and KG are the big ones, sure, but you also have Sheed and JO).

Horace Grant, someone whose defensive impact seems to be well-documented here, is actually a great template for understanding how Karl approached defense. They were very very very similar in that regard, they did pretty much all of the same things well. Top-Notch Pick & Roll defenders, elite one-on-one defenders (not just from the post, but for face-up triple-threat oriented guys out to 15+ feet), elite rotation guys who did as much "anchoring" as humanly possible without being super-swatters or being Garnett/Russel-type "horizontal" disruptors.

Defensively Karl >> Moses >/= Dirk (any advantage Moses gives you over Dirk is probably off-set by the fact Nowitski is a 4 and Moses is a 5). Very different types of defenders, with Karl clearly being the better of the two. I can take more time and make a more organized/thoughtful post as well as go through whatever metrics are available, but off the top of the head that's how I see it shaking out.

Elgee's Stuff

#1

Spoiler:

He doesn't pass well, and he doesn't shoot well. These are probably the two most important offensive skills in basketball.

His value is derived from his offensive rebounding and well above average post-isolation game. But that game is ball-stopping. It's not supportive of a large Global lift because it doesn't benefit other players on the floor much. If you watched at Malone at his peak -- probably 1982 -- you'll see him bludgeon his man at times with face up jumpers from the mid-range, as well as an array of finishing moves around the basket (evident in the highlights posted in this thread). He's a good "scorer" in that sense, and that along with the offensive rebounding go a long way, but he would not be in my top-30 on an all-time offensive peaks list. And I don't think his offensive peak had great longevity either. Nor do I consider that kind of game very portable, for obvious reasons.

#2 - Responding to Rich’s logic (which is the same exact reasoning why me and Regul8r prefer Dirk to Karl/Moses). Not necessarily fully fleshed out but a good little post nonetheless (which is essentially that while Karl’s longevity is great the "questionability" of whether he’ll ever actually get over the hump vs. Dirk/Moses causes us to rank him below 1 or both)

Spoiler:

This is a new kind of argument to me...are you saying that you think IF you put the guy in the right situation (building pieces around him) that he can give you a bigger lift in "best case scenario" than other guys left can in "best case scenario?" I'm unclear how far you taking this. Things to consider there:

-generally, is this a good way to construct team-building scenarios? How easy is it to actually get that optimal scenario? For instance, caution you heavily not to underrate the quality of Dallas' roster over the years.

-specifically, if that's your argument, why not consider Steve Nash? Has to be one of the most situationally valuable players in NBA history. Thus, if we have Nash, we pick up some shooters, a defensive big and add in a skilled AS level player somewhere else (like a big that can PnR) and enjoy the ride for 7-10 years...

PS If that's not your argument, and you are saying "in typical GMing circumstances," than I just disagree with your conclusion and lets just leave it at that.

Doc Post

#1

Spoiler:

People are using RPOY to hammer home that he had dominance in specific years of voting most all-timers did not. But of course, such dominance is based on competition. His years of dominance come after Kareem fades and before Bird & Magic are done rising. So what do people really think?

Well, in 2012 we did the High Peak project. It was a bit of a flop to be honest. I knew it would be tougher than the Top 100 so I only intended to go to 50, but I ended up cutting it short after 33. The basic issue is just that people actually find it harder to rate a player's peak than rate his career, myself included. If this seems absurd to you, I agree. It tells us that the confidence we feel about rating a player's career is due to the fact that there's more data to hide behind and we can thus use it to brush away the matter of us struggling to actually directly rate how good a player was playing at any given moment.

Anyway, here's the list: (Moses ended up #26)

I don't mean to imply I endorse these placements, this is just what came, and I think with Moses in particular it's worth pointing out. The perception here was clearly that Moses peaked at a time of weak competition.

Getting more into details, as others mentioned:
Moses is a big who isn't a great shooter or passer and who can't defend in the way you typically want a 5 to defend (Barkley used to joke that they'd start running to defend before the jump ball because you knew Moses would lose it). He's a guy who had a very simple game, and it worked quite well. He's clearly a Hall of Famer. However if you just look at raw PPG and RPG numbers with him, you're going to overestimate his impact.

Owly's Stuff

#1 - Perhaps less useful without the context of what he was responding to but still useful IMO

Spoiler:

In a 3 game series (2-1, outscoring them by 2 points over the series). Over a no longer MVP Kareem and a injury year, unhappy with his coach Magic who arguably shot his team out of the series. In such a tiny sample beating big names isn't such a huge deal. Moses played well but it's not a "Wow this absolutely must move him up the career rankings ladder" type big deal (nor is it the case that other candidates are all lacking in notable playoffs versus tough competition, see Nowitzki, Dirk; West, Jerry). Unless your point is that there were good teams (the competition thing) in which case, yes of course there were. But the competition point was about the competition for best player not team level competition, so whilst I'm not sure that I look on all the 80s as a golden age as many do but I'm not basing my argument on that. So I'm really not sure sure what the point being made is here.

And regarding "the sub-.500 Rockets" Moses was on that team in the regular season you know. It was a poor supporting cast, but if you give Moses credit for the playoff run doesn't he also get blame for the regular season (indeed Calvin Murphy and Robert Reid's numbers held up better in the playoffs than Moses' did). T-Mac managed to get a worse supporting cast to .500 (and win 2 of the first 3 without homecourt, versus Detroit) in 2003. Like I say one playoffs is a small sample and I'm not sure what you're trying to say here because competition for accolades and league competitiveness are two different things anyway.

The contention isn't that he's a slouch it's that he isn't as good as other candidates and I've posted examples too. It is true that peaks carry extra value in terms of you only have so many minutes available to get far enough above average to be a contender/win, given the choice between two equal amounts of productivity you'd pretty much always take it conentrated over the shorter span.

However it isn't true to conflate peaks with a players only championship window. Of there handful of championship probability models I haven't seen one which decided to focus exclusively on a players top two or three years (Durant's 2012 might not have any value by that model, it surely won't by the time it's all said and done for him)

#2

Spoiler:

In defense of Moses he was with two clubs for most of his prime, and the reason he moved then was he wanted to move and Houston weren't in a position to build around him. All FAs were restricted but Philly put up a huge offer (including, initially some incentives that were specifically to induce Houston not to match, e.g. money if the team didn't draw large home and road attendences). The commissioner got involved but eventually Houston took a high value pick (Cleveland's '83, became 3rd pick Rodney McCray) and Caldwell Jones.

Trade analysis (for evaluating players) isn't perfect anyway (sometimes "equal value" doesn't mean much because what's of value to one team isn't to another) and a lot of team changes are at the start and end of his career. I guess the 76ers-Bullets trade trying to get cheaper (Ruland cheaper than Moses) and younger (of the picks exchanged one was already known to be late, the other would be "the latter of two"), plus Cliff Robinson was better than Catledge. But I wasn't around at the time, don't know the intricacies of the cap etc.

JUST FOR FUN – Doc’s awesome logical reasoning skills on display ( as noted by Beast )

Spoiler:

RPoY rankings for an individual year are the most stable rankings:

(1) It eliminates the different-season variable (and hence minimal differences in terms of eras, rules, and pace)

(2) Sometimes head-to-head contests between players in question actually exist in real-life, which allows for more empirical comparisons.


Thus, when there is unanimity in RPoY voting, it implies a player is #1 with very high degree of confidence.

Therefore, the count of dominant #1 years is one of the more objective metrics available, since it is least subject to the idiosyncrasies of the judge.

In contrast, the peaks project does not have advantages (1) and (2) and is therefore highly subjective.

Interesting. You make worthwhile points, but just don't forget as you do this:

You're taking the opinions of people to argue for Moses' peak over Player X when basically those same people when asked said they prefer Player X to Moses. This is a very questionable thing to do: an appeal to authority that relies on dismissing the authority's ability to understand its own authority.

Unfortunately Regul8r, DRZA, and Rich haven't made any in-depth Moses posts and Doc's have been pretty cursory (by his standards obviously). This is strictly from the #15 thread though, there may be some older stuff I missed. And your recollection was on point, there's enough accolades stuff in that thread to cause one to go bug-eyed.

[drza]

Regular season, 10 year primes per 100 possessions
Moses Malone (1979 - 88): 31.5 pts (57.2% TS), 17.4 reb, 2 asts, 4.4 TO
Karl Malone (1990 - 1999): 36.8 pts (59.3% TS), 14.5 reb, 5 ast, 4 TO
Dirk Nowitzki (2002 - 2011): 34.5 pts (58.4% TS), 12.3 reb, 4 ast, 2.8 TO

Playoffs, 10 year primes per 100 possessions
Moses Malone (1979 - 88): 28.9 pts (54.5%), 16.8 reb, 2 asts, 3.4 TO
Karl Malone (1990 - 1999): 35 pts (52.9%), 15 reb, 4.4 asts, 3.7 TO
Dirk Nowitzki (2002 - 2011): 33.4 pts (58.5%), 13.5 reb, 3.5 ast, 3.0 TO

I'm having a surprisingly difficult time choosing between Dirk and Karl (I really feel like both have bigger impacts than Moses). Over the last couple of threads I've been choosing between Dirk and David Robinson, so since Dirk is the only one of the two left you'd think my run-off vote would be simple. The problem is, I really need to figure out this postseason impact question that I raised earlier in the thread.

For me personally, DIrk has really benefitted from being in the databall era because his +/- scores helped identify/quantify just how much impact his unique approach and talents can have on a game. Dirk does a lot of things on the basketball court, but as far as the boxscores go (when compared to this level of competition) his primary calling card is his scoring ability. Dirk can score at high volume, and at high efficiency, pretty much regardless of how he is defended. This is obviously a huge, important ability. But if that's all there were to him, I would not have him challenging for the top-15 players of all time. It's really the +/- studies, somewhat in conjunction with his '11 championship run and the metronomic success of the Mavs during his tenure, that really helped push the analysis of Dirk to new levels. As I've mentioned before, it was from there that we really started talking about spacing and perimeter defensive warping as concepts that hold weight in analyzing a player. Minus the +/- studies I would have been hard-pressed to credit Dirk's total offensive impact with being on the level of players that were also great scorers that seemed to do more things (like Barkley or even Karl Malone).

That's why the "niggling detail" of Dirk's postseason +/- scores are potentially problematic for me, as I detailed (to an extreme degree) earlier in the thread. So much of Dirk's value in this level of company (for me) is tied to the dual-threat of his non-boxscore offensive impact and his consistent high efficiency/high volume scoring even into the postseason. Together, these two could convince me that he was a demonstrably more valuable playoff performer than Karl Malone, who was also made most of his impact on offense but saw his scoring efficiency drop precipitously in the postseason.

However, if (as I detailed in that post) Dirk was not having the same non-boxscore impact for much of his playoff career...if his scoring style wasn't leading to so much spacing/defensive warpage in the postseason (with different defensive approaches and intensity) before he developed the killer post game around 2008...then that opens the door for the Mailman. It opens the door two ways...indirectly it suggests (yet again) that scoring efficiency is a really poor way to estimate a player's postseason impact, and then it directly suggests that if DIrk may not have been having Dirk-level impact in the postseason then perhaps the Mailman's postseason value ISN'T much worse than Dirk's.

And if that's the case, then the Mailman's longevity and more well-rounded game could potentially win this vote from me.

So really, for me it's vital to get a handle on what to believe about Dirk as a postseason performer. Was he enough better than Karl Malone in the postseason to carry the day, or should I be giving the Mailman more traction here?

[ThaRegul8r]

Interestingly, I'm not much of a Dirk fan. I don't actively dislike him, but he's never been someone that I've pulled for.

I was looking for something, and saw this. It's funny, because I'm neutral about Dirk, but since Duncan is my favorite active player, I naturally then had a rooting interest against Dirk winning whenever the Mavericks matched up against the Spurs in the playoffs which also included this recently ended season.

I didn't mind him winning in 2011, as the Spurs were eliminated in the first round, and as Jason Kidd—who was my favorite point guard in the league before he retired—was on Dallas, I was glad to see Kidd win one before he retired.

[ceiling raiser]

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Great compilation, thanks! ronnymac also had a great post (viewtopic.php?p=40874160#p40874160).

I'm gonna read the quotes you supplied in detail. I'm going to be honest, I don't think I'll be comfortable enough to vote for Moses (though I might be, just not positive either way), but as I've done in a few threads (Duncan vs Shaq, Oscar vs Kobe, Dr. J vs West), if there's enough of a question in my mind about one guy, I'll withdraw the Dirk vote I've already cast. Not the same effect as switching my vote obviously, but that way I won't have an adverse effect on the tally.

But yeah, thanks a ton. Great, great stuff from yourself and others. As you said it might not ever be enough detail for me unless I watched a guy live extensively, but the goal here for me is to learn as much as possible, and hopefully reach a point where I'm comfortable making an informed decision.

[D Nice]

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Great compilation, thanks! ronnymac also had a great post (viewtopic.php?p=40874160#p40874160).

Good catch! Definitely missed that one (both times ).

[john248]

That's why the "niggling detail" of Dirk's postseason +/- scores are potentially problematic for me, as I detailed (to an extreme degree) earlier in the thread. So much of Dirk's value in this level of company (for me) is tied to the dual-threat of his non-boxscore offensive impact and his consistent high efficiency/high volume scoring even into the postseason. Together, these two could convince me that he was a demonstrably more valuable playoff performer than Karl Malone, who was also made most of his impact on offense but saw his scoring efficiency drop precipitously in the postseason.

However, if (as I detailed in that post) Dirk was not having the same non-boxscore impact for much of his playoff career...if his scoring style wasn't leading to so much spacing/defensive warpage in the postseason (with different defensive approaches and intensity) before he developed the killer post game around 2008...then that opens the door for the Mailman. It opens the door two ways...indirectly it suggests (yet again) that scoring efficiency is a really poor way to estimate a player's postseason impact, and then it directly suggests that if DIrk may not have been having Dirk-level impact in the postseason then perhaps the Mailman's postseason value ISN'T much worse than Dirk's.

Even without some advanced stats, Dirk is still a standout. From 02 on, he's been a great offensive player and even better after 08 as you mentioned. It resonates with me that a team can be built around him to win during his career which included a few coaching changes and a few roster overhauls where he was the lead guy and led his team to the 06 Finals coming out of the WC. That 06 squad, at least on paper, really didn't have another teammate who was an all-NBA level player or even an all-star really. Then Dallas makes another trip to the Finals in 11 with Terry as the only hold over. So the counter to this can be that during the Cuban era, Dallas has had deep teams with mediocre to good fit while still being a 50 win team in 11 years without lottery picks. They've also made good moves to rebuild on the fly to reach the Finals again in a 5 year span. Having a player like Dirk to build around in this sense pretty much screams franchise player to me even without advanced stats. Then we've seen shooting percentages of his teammates when he's not on the floor dip, which can be putting it nicely (I know I've seen Terry and Barea in many Dirk threads used in this regard).

In Dirk's (or anyone) case, it only "indirectly suggests that scoring efficiency is a poor way to estimate a player's postseason impact" if you really feel that there was some type of trend in regards to the Mavs losing to worse teams (03 though Dirk is injured in game 3, 06, 07). Now, if you feel the Mavs lost series to better teams, then I don't see a problem here if we're operating under the premise that this is a team game.

To me it just comes down to how much of a gap you feel there is on defense and the extra years of longevity in Karl's favor.