Ruzious wrote:payitforward wrote:Above all -- Paul George is paid almost $20m a year. He's not worth that $. We have Otto for the next 2 years for significantly less than George will make in one year next year.
Sure Otto will get a sizable raise, but he'll be worth it. He's not likely to be overpaid the way PG is -- guys who score a lot of points are routinely overrated and overpaid. The ball's always in their hands, they look good, etc. But basketball ain't ballet. At the end of the performance there's a winner and a loser. It's efficiency that produces the win.
Otto's an RFA after next season, so
if NBA GM's think he's as good as you do, he should make Paul George type money. But he's not anywhere near as good, so he won't. The cap is projected to be over 90 mil next season and considerably more than that the season after. So paying George 20 mil a year is not over-paying him.
Respectfully, I don't think that's a good way to determine whether someone's over-paid. I'd make the judgement by comparing what players produce for their teams. At any given salary, a player who produces less for his team is over-paid compared to a guy who produces more for his team.
In the case of Paul George, Kevin pointed out that he doesn't perform (produce) at the level at which he's paid. You may disagree w/ him about this, but surely production is about numbers (see below) -- I can't see it in his numbers.
As to "if NBA GMs think (Otto) is as good..." he'll paid as good (as well) "...but he's not... so he won't" -- that assumes the NBA is what economists call "an efficient market," right? Pretty clearly, tho, it's not. As I wrote above, guys who take a lot of shots are routinely overpaid, and there are any number of other factors that militate against it being an efficient market. Wouldn't you say there are players making *a lot* less than Carmelo who are more valuable than he is? And they'll never make what he makes?
It's just that fact which *supports* my point about Otto. He's a terrific player already, and he's not even 23 yet. But he's not a volume shooter, so he's likely to be a bargain salary-wise.
Ruzious wrote:Acting like usage doesn't matter is stupid. Defenses focus on stopping George. They don't focus on stopping Otto. Otto's generally the 4th or 5th option on the Wiz. George is Indy's #1 option. Individual efficiency stats are very useful, but when you rely on them to the extent you do, you render them useless. If I make 2 out of 3 shots every 40 minutes, I'm not a good scorer, and I'm not helping my team. Again, I'm usually the guy defending Otto, but this is ridiculous.
My bad -- I wrote in a sloppy way. You're right, it's not "individual efficiency stats" that matter, it's the combination of productivity and efficiency that matters. Your "2 out of 3" example produces a high TS%, but it would not produce a high WP48 rating or a high rating in TSW's system either. I.e. I expressed myself in a stupid way (not an infrequent problem).
With that out of the way... first off, maybe you are right but here's why I don't think so:
*Team* stats account 100% for wins and losses, right? I.e. a team can't have better stats (overall) than its opponent in the 48 minutes of a game but lose the game anyway. That's impossible by definition.
But *team* stats are no more than all the individual player stats added up. Otto gets one less offensive board, so does the team. Hence, another way to state my previous point is: "individual player stats account 100% for wins and losses, right? I.e. a team's players can't have better stats (overall) than the opposing team's players but lose the game anyway. That's impossible by definition."
I'm not going to deny your point about usage, but it should be investigated for "circularity." Sure, defenses focus on stopping Paul George -- you "focus on stopping" the guy who has the ball in his hands all the time, who takes the most shots, etc.! How could you *not* focus on stopping the guy w/ the ball in his hands?
But, concluding that *because* he's higher usage than someone else he's a better player than that guy is like assuming that because an actor is the star of a film he's a better actor than someone else. You want it to go the other way evidentially. See my point above about Carmelo.
Not trying to convince you of anything, Ruz -- but this is why I prefer having Otto over having PG. Along w/ Otto still having lots of upside and being cheaper. That's my thinking, and I hope that at least you don't think it's "ridiculous" after reading this post.
