Greatest Peaks Project (2022): #16 - 2021-22 Nikola Jokic

[falcolombardi]

Is it easier to build a better defence around Jokic or around Nash?

Theory says bad perimeter defebders are easier to hide than flawed defensive centers

I think nash is not getting enough discussion and may feel tempted to put him next after my current top 3

I am a bit unusual here in that i honestly think he is as good or better in offense than curry but worse defensively cause his size.

I tend to be of a similar mentality.

I will say this for Jokic, if you replaced Nash with him on the 2006 Suns, I can at least envision a scenario where the results are better. I am less comfortable once Amar’e is part of the equation, but then maybe the better hypothetical would be to replace both Nash and Amar’e with Jokic and an Amar’e equivalent (Jamal Murray? ), in which case there again I am not sure the results would be worse.

Jokic could conceivably fit with traditional rim protectors, so I am not taking the position that Jokic removes their value in the way some argue Nash fundamentally cannot fit well with other ball-handlers. That might be enough to advantage Jokic… but when pretty much all Jokic’s advantage comes down to generating offence, I do not think the gap is quite clear.

But then the question becomes to what extent that is reflective of their eras? An argument for Jokic has been that this era specifically is the worst suited for him defensively. I probably agree, but then that leaves open the idea that Nash suits the modern era now even better than he did in his prime.

This era suits jokic defense as bad, as it suits his offense well

Nash is the opposite, this era would suit his offense even more (although he would lose the advantage of being in the most modern-ish offensive team) but his defense would be a bigger weakness imo as teams would target him more in the pick and roll or isolation

Great stuff, both of y'all.

Just a small addition: I tend to agree that poor perimeter defenders can be slightly easier to hide than poor defensive centers (in general, not always, at least for this current era). That said, I would say in absolute terms (not relative to position) Jokic is the better defender... I have Jokic as a slight positive (at least in the 22 regular season), while Nash is a clear negative.

Jokic is also more scalable offensively, though I know neither of you weight scalability too heavily. I'm personally not sure about Jokic's resilience -- like you've said, Jokic's defense gets hunted more in the playoffs, but that might be an era difference. I'd want too see one more postseason run with peak Jokic (with either less injured teammates or more than just a 5-game sample against Jokic's worst matchup) to start judging him with any confidence.

It's an interesting comparison though, and I'm glad it was brought up. They're the last two Tier 1 All-time Offensive Peaks remaining (besides Jordan/Curry/Magic/LeBron/Bird/Shaq), so it'll be interesting to see how much further they drop.

Nash literally led the best offenses ever - or thereabouts - relatively to his era

Scalability is not somethingh i worry about here

This is somethingh i harp on and on and on because how important i think it is to remind it

When you have arguably he best offenses of all time (nash lebron, magic) it doesnt matter at all how theorically portable you are

[trelos6]

16. David Robinson. 1994. Not his defensive best, but pretty close to it. And definitely his offensive peak. 29.4 pp75 at +4.9rTS%

17. Comes down to Kawhi v Jokic. And I think I’m going Kawhi. 2016-17. He took a big step up to the offensive machine he is today. And his defence took a small step back from its stratospheric levels, but it was still there on key possessions. 29 pp75 at +5.7 rTS%

18. Jokic 21-22. The guy was phenomenal. His advanced statistics were all time numbers. It’s hard being an all-time centre who isn’t primarily an A+ defender, but Jokic smarts and hand eye helps him be a slight positive on the defensive end. And on offence, he’s what I imagined prime Sabonis and Walton fused together. His passing is spectacular, and his scoring is unstoppable.


Next 3 for tiebreakers are Durant, Kobe, Wade

[f4p]

1. 2017 Kawhi (alternate 2019)

Multi-series playoff ranks:
PER = 8th
WS48 = 6th
BPM = 3rd (actually I can't look this up but '09 Lebron at 17.5 and '91 Jordan at 14.6 are the only ones I know ahead of Kawhi's 14.2)
TS% = 6th

Like I really don't get the David Robinson arguments over Kawhi. One guy threw down a playoffs for the ages, so good the most talented roster ever had to put a hit out on him to protect their legacy, and the other dropped off massively (-8.7 PER, -10.5 TS%, -65% WS48) while losing to a "meh" team in the 1st round (1994) or got worked by his rival in the WCF (1995). Your life is on the line, is anyone really comfortable saying they'll take Robinson to win a title in 1994/1995 over Kawhi 2017?

This is an excellent regular season with a monster playoffs where he showed that his playoff resilience didn't even care about facing the greatest roster ever, only to be taken out on one of the more famous cheap shots in recent memory. A full WCF would make people like this season more and I can't blame him for a cheap shot injury. 2017 Kawhi wins on lots of teams that had guys who will be listed above him here:

Kawhi's 31.5 PER is 13th all time based on 100 MP and 8th all time for multi-series playoffs. His WS/48 of .314 is 9th all time based on 100 MP and 6th all time for multi-series playoffs. And that's with 1954 mikan included above him. Even with very generous 100 MP and 20 PPG limits, his TS% of 67.2% is 24th all-time. For 200 MP and 24 PPG, it jumps to 6th, and one of the people ahead of him is himself.

If this was a one year phenomenom, I might understand the hesitancy. But "Kawhi puts up huge playoff performance" is not a one year phenomenom. If we are truly talking about peaks, there aren't many higher than 2017 playoffs Kawhi.

2. 1983 Moses Malone (alternate 1982)

Moses may not be this board's cup of tea. He doesn't play an aesthetically pleasing type of basketball. He doesn't always find the open man or protect the rim. He doesn't do the things impact metrics love. Just give him the ball and get out of the way. Get out of his way even more if a rebound was to be had. I tend to think of the NBA as much simpler and more primitive the further back you go. You guard your guy, he guards you. Possessions weren't valued like now. People weren't breaking down film and doing analytics on their team strategy. Sometimes an ass-kicker like Moses was what you needed (and sometimes you still do).
I just watched a highlight from Game 2 in 1981 against the Lakers, which the Lakers actually won. Kareem played well but he never looked like he wanted to guard Moses. Malone would get the ball against whoever in the post and, even if a double came, he just got to the basket. They didn't show a lot of rebounds, but Moses did get a few impressive blocks. There's nothing pretty about his game except the result. Anyway, back to the regularly scheduled copy and paste...

Fo' Fo' Fo'. Led the league in regular season PER and WS48 while putting up 24.5 ppg and 15.3 rpg and winning MVP. Then led the playoffs in PER (25.7) and WS48 (0.260) while putting up 26 ppg and 15.8 rpg on 58.7 TS%. In the Finals, he demolished (35 year old) Kareem with 25.8 ppg and 18.0 rpg in a sweep. I was actually just looking at this season to see where I might put it and then convinced myself when I looked at the rest of the Sixers in the playoffs. After Moses at 25.7 PER and 0.260 WS48, the next highest was Maurice Cheeks at 17.3 PER and Bobby Jones at 0.164 WS48 (Dr J really fell off in the playoffs). That puts Moses as far and away the best player in arguably the most dominant playoff run ever. One that he called before it happened just to make it more impressive. This isn't Shaq with Kobe or KD/Steph all having each other's backs in dominant 1-loss runs (and as far as I know, Moses didn't have Dr. J injure anybody to keep his team from losing more than once in the playoffs). Here are 6 dominant title runs I could think of off the top of my head and the separation between the #1 and #2 player on those teams, sorted by WS48 differential:




We can see that for the 2001 Lakers, 2017 Warriors, and 1999 Spurs, the #1 and #2 were practically identical. Except for BPM, Moses ends up there with MJ as being easily the best player on his team. And for what it's worth, BPM had Moses as the 4th best Sixer in the regular season, almost 3 behind the team leader, so that shows how much more it liked him in the postseason that he led the team. This may have been a guy who joined a stacked team, but it ended up a one man wrecking crew.

Also, 1982 Moses averaged 31.1/14.7 playing on the second slowest paced team in the league, with only a 97 pace.

Moses gets disrespected enough on all-time lists, a 3-time MVP with a side hustle of smacking Kareem around in the playoffs shouldn't get the same on peak lists.

3. 2006 Dwyane Wade (alternate 2009)

I'm a floor raising kind of guy I guess, which doesn't seem typical on this board. People who have everything put on them and come up big in the biggest moments with little to no margin of error impress me more than ceiling raisers putting the finishing touches on an already great team. It just seems like a more common problem to solve throughout NBA history than what to do with all this extra talent. Wade had a very good 27/7/6 regular season as a 3rd year player but obviously this is about the playoffs. On one of the jankiest looking title rosters you'll ever see, on a team where Antoine Walker played the 2nd most playoff minutes and White Chocolate played the 4th most, and Shaq was often getting outplayed by Zo, Wade saved his best moments for the biggest series.

Shot 61.7% in the ECF (68.4 TS%!!) against a still very good Detroit team that had just held Lebron to 81 ppg in the previous series. 26.7/5.5/5.2 looks even better when you realize the pace was 83.8. And then of course there are the Finals. Did he shoot 2 to 3 to 40 more free throws than he should have? Sure, but free throw totals were pretty elevated that year so his totals are only sort of absurd. Put up 34.7 ppg, 7.8 rpg, and 2.7 spg on 57.2 TS% while maybe leading the best overall Finals comeback ever. Weirdly, the only team that has probably come closer to losing the Finals before winning is also a team with Wade in the 2013 Finals (with 3rd probably also including Wade in the 2011 Finals). The Heat were down 2-0 and down 13 in the 4th quarter of Game 3. That's dangerously close to "1, 2, 3 Cancun!" time and instead Wade just went crazy and put up 42, 36, 43, and 36 in the next 4 games. In a series with a pace of 90! With 3 of the games decided by 1, 2, and 3. In other words, turn those 42/43 games into just 39 point games and the Mavs are celebrating. Efficiency may not be crazy but on that volume with such a weird, offensively limited roster around him against a very solid defense, this is perhaps the best Finals performance ever by anybody not named Lebron or Jordan. It's a title snatched out of thin air that very few players can say they would have been able to pull off. This is a peaks project and it's hard to peak much higher.




I also don't really get putting any David Robinson seasons over Jokic 2022. Jokic has conventional and impact advanced stats on lock in the regular season and, if playoff results concern you, then DRob was seemingly worse!

[ceoofkobefans]

10. 2008 Kobe Bryant

I know this is probably going to be controversial on this forum since he’s usually fringe t15 on peak lists around here (due to what seems like RS impact metrics). Most Impact metrics generally do have him around the fringe t15 range (like 13-17ish) but Kobe is one of the biggest PO risers ever. Here’s 08-10 Kobe from the RS to PO (biggest peak PO sample we have without 2 first round exits skewing results).

(Box numbers are IA/75)
RS
28.3 PTS
5.3 AST
5.8 TRB
3 TOV
+1.8 rTS
+5.3 BBR BPM (+3.9/g)
+5 BP BPM/g (+6.7/100)
+4.1 AuPM/g (+5.5/100)
+5.96 RAPTOR (+4.4/g)

PO
30.5 PTS
5.6 AST
5.8 TRB
3 TOV/75
+3.9 rTS
+7.8 BPM (+6/g)
+6.3 BP BPM/g (+8.2/100)
+4.7 AuPM/g (+6.1/100)
+8.07 RAPTOR (+6.2/g)

Here’s just 2008 since that’s his best season

RS
28.1 PTS
5.3 AST
6.1 TRB
3 TOV
+3.6 rTS
+5.8 BBR BPM (+4.5/g)
+6.1 BP BPM/g (+7.9/100)
+4.2 AuPM/g (+5.4/100)
+7.09 RAPTOR (+5.5/g)

PO
30.5 PTS
5.6 AST
5.6 TRB
3.2 TOV
+4.9 rTS
+7.4 BBR BPM (+5.9/g)
+6.7 BP BPM/g (+8.4/100)
+2.1 3yr AuPM/g (+2.6/100 this is obviously skewed by the 2 previous years)
+7.63 RAPTOR (+6.06/g)

31 IA PTS/75 on +5 rTS is absolutely insane when you consider that he’s playing in 2 center lineups with his best spacer being him and facing more gravity than anyone in nba history that’s name doesn’t start with an S. Him being able to pretty much maintain that in the PO over a 3yr stretch of finals runs against GOAT tier PO comp (same points on +4 rTS) is pretty damn good evidence for him being not only an all time PO riser but this scoring production being real for him. Him being an all time PO riser makes since because he’s arguably the best tough shot maker of all time and is a clear all time self creator which is the number 1 way for your scoring to be resilient in the PO against tougher defenses and more defensive attention. His defense was also pretty solid in 2008. He did still have a bit of a motor issue in the RS but it consistently would shoot up in the PO and this was no different in 08. He was a very good on ball defender but was also a good off ball defender (really good trapper, was the lakers’ primary communicator, and I thought his off ball awareness was improved from his past few years, although his closeout D wasn’t great which hurt his overall off ball D)

Overall i think it’s pretty fair to put Kobe in that top 10 range although I could see him at like 14ish(?) depending how high you are on others/low on him

14. 1996 David Robinson

David Robinson is another O2 D1 player with really really good impact metrics in the RS (which are inflated by his lack of a backup center) that is a clear PO dropper. Robinson is lower than KG because KG is much better off the ball and a much better passer which makes him better offensively (although Drob is a > scorer and arguably better defender). I could see him a little bit lower and I don’t like to go higher than 14 for him

15. 2009 Dwyane Wade

Dwyane Wade is arguably a t15 offensive player ever and is an elite to arguably all time great defender at his peak. He’s a t15 scorer a t20 playmaker and one of the best rim protecting guards ever. he’s held back mainly by his lack of shooting and his major on ball dominance / lack of off ball activity. I may go deeper in detail on him in the future but this is as much as I’ll say for now. I can see him at 14 or at ≈ 16

[SickMother]

01 Erving 75-76: 28.7 PER | .569 TS% | 110 TS+ | 17.7 WS | .262 WS/48
01 Erving 75-76 Playoffs?!?: 32.0 PER | .610 TS% | 3.7 WS | .321 WS/48
[a peak so high the NBA absorbed a whole other league to get this guy under their banner. Doctor turned in a top tier do it all regular season, then followed it up with one of thee largest postseason efficiency increases of all time.]

02 Hawkins 67-68: 28.8 PER | .597 TS% | 124 TS+ | 17.5 WS | .273 WS/48
02 Hawkins 67-68 Playoffs?!?: 30.0 PER | .651 TS% | 4.0 WS | .310 WS/48
[for what amounts to spot #13 on my ballot I'll go with maybe thee unluckiest player in basketball history, robbed of his collegiate & early NBA career by completely spurious gambling allegations, then derailed by a knee injury which occurred amidst the ABA Championship in this very season.

but there was never any doubt Connie could ball from the outset as one of the original NYC greats at Rucker Park & being named the best high school player in the country in 1960. As for his 67-68 peak, the Hawk simply did everything. Topped the brand new ABA in PPG on monster efficiency, 2nd in the league in RPG, 3rd in the league in APG. Then took his game to a whole other level in the playoffs, hurting his knee during the Championship series & returning to lead his team to the top in heroic fashion even before Willis Reed (or Giannis) did it.

I get it, the 67-68 ABA is probably the 2nd weakest competition level to receive a vote so far besides 49-50 Mikan, but Hawkins had no alternative, it was the best league available to him due to his illegal blacklisting from the NBA & he thoroughly dominated it across the board. Also think that Connie's peak game works in any era with his mix of size, athleticism and all around skillset.]

***I have a tier break here which goes from #14 to #25 with the following seasons under consideration (in chrono order) 63-64 Oscar, 65-66 West, 82-83 Moses, 94-95 Admiral, 03-04 Garnett, 05-06 Wade, 05-06 Nowitzki, 08-09 Kobe, 16-17 Kawhi, 16-17 Durant, 20-21 Giannis and 21-22 Jokic.***

03 Kawhi 16-17: 27.6 PER | .610 TS% | 111 TS+ | 13.6 WS | .264 WS/48
03 Kawhi 16-17 Playoffs?!?: 31.5 PER | .672 TS% | 2.8 WS | .314 WS/48
[ultimately going with Kawhi for two main reasons, his elite defense as a wing defender is unique among the remaining contenders, and his postseason was shaping up as a best ever candidate with Leonard posting absolutely insane efficiency before Zaza stepped in.]

[70sFan]

I finally found enough time to come back with a vote, although Russell's death makes me less focused on making long, in-depth posts. Instead, I will make it short, but I hope it will be enough to count my vote:

1. 1949/50 George Mikan
(1950/51 George Mikan)
2. 2021/22 Nikola Jokic
3. 1975/76 Julius Erving

Mikan is my 1st choice, because I don't see any other player reaching his level of dominance. We have to adjust that for significantly weaker competition, but still - I don't care about time machine argument. He did everything he could against the best competition he faced. Although some might view him as some kind of slow, lumbering oaf who relied heavily on his size, I don't view him that way from what I've seen. He was a very smart passer with soft shooting touch and he seemed to have a very strong defensive impact (although this one likely wouldn't translate to the same degree as his offense).

To look at prime Mikan footage, here is a small sample (by the way, you can the ball being far from round in this game, something to consider when we talk about shooting performance of these players):

Watch on YouTube

Here is another nice Mikan play that shows his high level vision as a post playmaker (one of my favorite ones):

Watch on YouTube

Why Mikan over Jokic? For two main reasons:

1. Mikan was excellent defender for his era, while Jokic struggles a lot in the postseason defensively. It may be unfair for Jokic, because I'm afraid Mikan would have similar problems on defense in 2020s, but as it was - Mikan was a very impactful defender who was quite innovative with his approach (not to the excent Russell was, but still).
2. Mikan was more dominant against his competition vs Jokic and he was unquestionably the best player in the world during his peak. His postseason dominance is a key factor to put him ahead of Jokic (and Robinson).


Jokic is my second choice, I thought a lot about him vs Walton and Robinson and in short, it came down to these things:

Jokic vs Walton - mostly durability issues, even in his 1976/77 season
Jokic vs Robinson - I think Robinson's offensive issues are slightly more problematic than Jokic defense, I can change my mind after a bigger sample from Jokic, but that's how I see it now

Jokic's combination of scoring and playmaking is just ridiculous. The guy has no weakness on offensive end - even as an offensive rebounder, he has a huge value. If only his defense was more resiliant in postseason, he'd fight for top 10 peak.

My third choice is peak Julius Erving. It was a close call between Julius/Walton/Admiral/Wade/Kobe, but I decided to go with the most complete season of the bunch.

A lot of people feel uncertain about Julius skillset, but I think the questions are overblown. Julius jumpshot wasn't nearly as questionable as some imply here (he wasn't a worse shooter than Wade for example). His driving game and inside finishing was GOAT level for a wing player (only behind LeBron). On top of that, he was a very versatile offensive player with strong off-ball play, nice post game and underrated passing. On top of that, he was probably the best transition defender ever (including defense).

Watch on YouTube

I think he improved notably on defensive end later in his career, but even in 1976 he was a capable defender that had a lot of value as a help defender and in transition.

[DraymondGold]

1. 94 David Robinson
1b. 95 David Robinson
2. 2022 Jokic. HM: 2021 Jokic.
3. 1977 Walton
HM: Kobe/KD. Then Wade/Dirk.

Another shorter ballot from me. Hopefully I'll have time to expand this post or the next soon.

Reasoning:
Don't particularly feel like a long post. In short:

A) Robinson clearly has the best impact data, and despite others' disagreement, I don't feel like the impact metrics are biased enough by era/teammates/fit/etc. to put him lower. Defensively, he's the only remaining person in Tier 1/2 of my GOAT defenders (along with Russell obviously, Hakeem, Duncan, KG, Wilt not in order). I love his rim protection, big man man defense, and help defense. His ability to raise regular season defenses is like a rich-man's Gobert, but I see his perimeter mobility as less of an liability (at least in that era). The fact that he was the center on the GOAT Defensive Dynasty of the modern NBA (both statistically and by the eye test) also says a lot, and while credit goes to Tim Duncan for that, I'm not sure there's anybody left who could do this well defensively in that era (e.g. Giannis' rim protection isn't on the same level).
Offensively, he's a great scorer (though not the same level as others in this tier), and great off-ball player. He's a great first option in the regular season (trex_8063 joked that he was basically asked to be Russell and Jordan in the regular season haha), and while this scheme alongside his poor fitting/low-value teammates did become more vulnerable in the playoffs, I see this as an issue of fit/situation, not an inherent limit to Robinson. He performed much better and showed more resilience as a defensive 1 and offensive 1b/2, which is a fairly common archetype in history on championship teams (Thinking Basketball estimates ~50% of championship teams have this archetype). He basically never got to play with an all-star guard, despite having one of the best big-man off-ball games. That lob threat would be legendary.

Edit: I recently saw one stat that further supports the idea that Robinson's atrocious teammates were pulling his value down in the playoffs, and that he would have far better impact if he had a better team around him: from 98-01, with a better team / offensive fit, despite clearly not being at his peak, Robinson had the highest multi-year playoff on/off of any high-minute player. Ever.
98-01 Robinson's at +25.1 on/off (per 48), while 00-04 Shaq is second all the way dow at +21. [source: thinking basketball's latest Jordan +/- video]

As for 94 vs 95, I'm open to discussion. There's a trend of all-time players having a better regular season early on in their career (with their more athletic motor), and then losing athleticism but gaining enough experience/skill/BBIQ to offset their lost motor and have a better playoff performance when they're older. This trend isn't universal, but it does raise a question of whether this is the case for Robinson in 94 (clearly best regular season) vs 95/96 (likely better postseason). I see 96 as enough of a drop in athleticism to put it below 94. In the film I've seen, I haven't been convinced yet that 95 showed sufficient skill/experience improvement (compared to say 09 vs 13 LeBron's visible growth in skillset, with his off-ball game, shooting, post-game, and improved passing). Not for certain, just the way I'm leaning now. If anyone wants to do any film analysis of 95 vs 94, that would probably be the way to convince me otherwise.

We've already debated Robinson vs Giannis too much, so no need to re-sour the discussion with that.
The similarities with Walton are highly interesting, and not lost on me. Walton's one of the few players ever to have a comparable defensive impact, his passing is clearly better, and his shooting was (odd but) ahead of its time. Like with all players, each comes with some uncertainty, but I have higher uncertainty for Walton, given how short his healthy peak was. Probably the single greatest loss in basketball history in terms of greatness we didn't get to see due to injury.
One poster mentioned that Walton's peak has the best single-season WOWY on record. Wow! That does raise an eyebrow, but I'm not (yet) convinced for two reasons. 1) WOWY Biases. WOWY tends to like offensive quarterbacks (i.e. playmakers who run the offense > finishers who make the last shot) and defensive centerpieces (i.e. high volume defensive rim protectors). Walton's basically the perfect archetype to be highly rated in this stat. Is there some truth to this? I'd say so... I do personally value offensive playmaking > finishing more than the average RealGM person, and WOWY does support this. But this may also be a slight systematic overrating by WOWY... it can be harder to replace a playmaker who runs the offense or a defensive rim protector for just a few games without totally changing your offensive/defensive scheme. 2) Robinson is still Tier 1 in WOWY, even if his best season is a hair behind Walton's.

B) Jokic.
Jokic has the advantage over the competition in usual impact metrics. (https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=100727032#p100727032.

The gaps seems clearly over Kobe/KD (with Kawhi/Moses/Erving/Wade even further behind), at least in the regular season.

I do have playoff resilience concerns (specifically with his defense), but with injured costars and short playoff samples often against bad matchups, it's just hard to know how impactful these concerns are. Ultimately Trex's arguments about resilience assuaged my concerns enough, as did Ty's argument about league difficulty (particularly vs Walton, but also vs Erving/Moses).[/quote]

C) Walton. Among the remaining older players, his impact metrics clearly stand out. He has the highest 1-year WOWY ever (and the gap is absolutely massive over Wade). Again, you can see the linked post above for impact details.

[LA Bird]

Just a reminder this round ends in around 24 hours.

Spoiler:

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[capfan33]

1. 77 Walton
Lack of a large sample-size makes it hard to rank Walton, like a more extreme example of CP3, but I think around here is ultimately where I'll put him. I do think he get's overrated to an extent when people talk about him essentially being Kareem's equal because he was in close to an ideal ceiling raiser situation and comparing his impact to Kareem's in 77 specifically is an apples to oranges comparison if I've ever seen one.

With that being said, his overall skillset is undeniable. Basically a less athletic Bill Russell, his defensive activity was absurd and he has a demonstrably enormous impact on that end. Combine that with being the 2nd greatest passing center ever and you get an incredibly portable, scalable and synergistic player. However, his scoring was nothing to write home about and in a situation where he needs to be the primary or even 2nd best scorer on a team I'm skeptical of his ability to meet that criteria, which does count for something. His relative lack of athleticism could also be a problem in more recent times, I have more questions about his defense in today's game than say Hakeem.

2. 1994 Robinson
Similar to KG in many ways, I ultimately have him below KG largely because I like KG's skillset and baseline impact more and think he's a bit more portable. While Robinson was an incredible regular season player and is one of the greatest athletes ever, I'm not a fan of how basic Robinson's scoring game seems to be. The empirical evidence suggests it made him very predictable and easy to gameplan against. Some of the posts regarding Robinson in the last thread reminded me of just how bad Robinson's scoring was in the playoffs, and while scoring isn't everything, it's hard to just hand-wave away how poorly Robinson's scoring seemed to translate to the playoffs. Add onto this his lack of passing/playmaking, even compared to someone like Hakeem, his scoring ability becomes even more problematic.

Moreover, his defensive impact also seemed ot have issues translating to the playoffs, and while this may not be as conclusive, the fact that one can even call into question his ace skill in a playoff atmosphere is a major issue when his playoff offense is conclusively problematic. Overall, he was an extraordinary regular season player with severe postseason limitations and with that mix a 16-20 ranking sounds about right.

3. 22 Jokic
I think Jokic has some major defensive issues in the playoffs but I do think a large part of that has to do with era and team composition. I'm honestly not sure Walton wouldn't have issues in the modern game and Robinson would probably have muted impact on that end as well today. The game today has become so optimized that it is really difficult for non hyper-mobile bigs to impact the game the way they once could, and as such I think there's an excellent case for Jokic to be above both Walton and Robinson.

[Proxy]

Forgot about the deadline again so my last two votes gonna be very brief
16. 1977 Bill Walton (Explained in previous threads).
17. 2020 Anthony Davis??? I'd say I've been pretty convinced by UnibrowDavis' explanations in previous threads(could link if needed), I still think alot of his conclusions are pretty extreme like the KD offensive value comparison but upon revisiting his playoff run I I think not only was he not really optimized offensively(honestly he may not have been all that much for full seasons since like 2015, and his value wasn't optimized in the 2020 RS defensively and you could see the massive difference in Lakers' scheme from the RS vs the PS), but also the majority of things that made it great were pretty replicable to me(so much reasons for his dominance besides shooting luck honestly where he underperformed from true mid range if anything - the interior scoring, some of the self creation, the off ball stuff and relentless opportunity hunting where is truly all-time in that regard have all been pretty consistent things to me and why he looks like a general PS riser in his prime in the small sample). Offers so much value even with his secondary skills and allows for so much scheme versatility.

HMs: Drob, Jokić, Kobe, Wade, KD, Erving, Dirk(i've expressed some of my concerns with pretty much all of them in much earlier threads, less on Dirk though and don't have much time rn i'd probably go 08 Kobe, 17 KD, or 22 Jokić for 4th on my ballot though) - i'm not super confident in arguing for Mikan or Hawkins based on what I know about them right now

18. 2022 Nikola Jokić
My pick for the best or second best offensive bigman ever, arguably a top 5 or 6 offensive peak ever with his combination of ATG scoring, spacing value+off ball game, and being a top 3 passer ever IMO(i'd take only Bird and Magic higher but his height allows him to see things they both probably weren't able to), I believe his value would also be so additive in so many different circumstances. I mentioned it before but when Murray, MPJ, and Jokic were on the court together in any lineup in 2021(1559 possessions) the Nuggets had a 126.7 ORTG via CTG(+15.6 Net Rating)
https://cleaningtheglass.com/stats/team/8/lineups?season=2020&on=1883&on=2631&on=4433&all_or_any=all#tab-four_factors

Seeing as how Jokic improved even further as an offensive player in my eyes from 2021 I decided to give his offense the benefit of the doubt. I still have some concerns for his defense in a playoffs setting and in terms of roster construction flexibility(but his offensive value might just be so good that it mostly alleviates these concerns - we'll have to see) which is why I haven't ranked him higher than someone like Oscar who I believe is probably worse offensively and isn't adding too much positive value on the defensive end either. Otoh he did improve defensively this year and the sample this year for the PS was very small in a awful circumstance -Hopefully next year we get to see what it would look like in a more optimal situation because the Nuggets roster looks fairly promising on paper. When push comes to shove I think his offensive value is just so absurdly high(better than anyone left besides Nash by a small but distinct margin IMO, and I see him as a clearly worse defender even with how I view Jokić rn - he'll be up here soon though) and even if he isn't strong defensively as a center, his position tends to add more value over a replacement player than any other position in the game, so being a slight negative there isn't TOO bad in the grand scheme of things. Honestly Jokić is one of the players I believe have one of the larger ranges on a list like this(is he top 10 like his RS production at face value may indicate? Is he even top 20 because of his defense?) and hopefully by the next peaks project we have a clearer idea of where he could rank.

Other players i've brought up: If I viewed players like Kobe or KD comfortably as all-defense type players at their peak I would probably vote them higher, but for right now I think Jokić's offensive value has lapped both of theirs and I don't see either as being more than a pretty marginal positive defensively in their peak seasons. Wade and Erving have a lot more scalability and portability concerns for me(looking absurd in some circumstances and having pretty predestrian value signals in others) and i'm not *entirely* sure they added more value in general either, I could definitely buy arguments for either to be voted in already though. Drob's offense against elite defenses(not just in a PS setting - it was a trend in the RS as well) is still pretty concerning to me and on the very low end of resilience for players considered this tier, his scoring drops off tremendously and it's not like he has the flexibility of someone like KG whose offense I believe is still so additive even when his scoring value gets blunted. We know he boasts insane value signals in his post-peak in the PS but i've talked about why I look at those with a grain of salt when thinking about his actual value in much earlier threads(collinearity), i'm not entirely how sure how resilient his defense was relative to his contemporaries but in the games i've studied he seemed pretty fine there. Dirk's argument at this point kinda feels like a worse version of Jokić's, I think his era allowed him to still be better defensively and keeps them in a similar tier for me as players, but the offensive gap is more distinct to me right now.

[AEnigma]

Dirk's argument at this point kinda feels like a worse version of Jokić's, I think his era allowed him to still be better defensively and keeps them in a similar tier for me as players, but the offensive gap is more distinct to me right now.

Been thinking about this for when names start coming off my ballot. I kind-of agree, but I do hold some small reluctance for the questions of whether Dirk does fit better next to guys like Tyson Chandler and whether Jokic has truly done enough to show that he is a better scorer than Dirk outright (better offensive player is pretty tough to deny because of Jokic’s passing). Accomplishments go to Dirk, era value could theoretically go to Dirk (but it is close), but if we move away from either, I wonder if Dirk has much left. Does someone like Gobert make more sense next to Towns or next to Jokic? And which of them is more comparable to Dirk?

Next would be Jokic, Dirk and Robinson for me.

Tagging Ardee here because his ballot has been the same as mine and he marked both of them as his next two. I have in a similar vein also been struggling with Dirk versus Durant. Might prefer Dirk slightly as a scorer at his peak, but Durant is a better creator and defender…

[capfan33]

Dirk's argument at this point kinda feels like a worse version of Jokić's, I think his era allowed him to still be better defensively and keeps them in a similar tier for me as players, but the offensive gap is more distinct to me right now.

Been thinking about this for when names start coming off my ballot. I kind-of agree, but I do hold some small reluctance for the questions of whether Dirk does fit better next to guys like Tyson Chandler and whether Jokic has truly done enough to show that he is a better scorer than Dirk outright (better offensive player is pretty tough to deny because of Jokic’s passing). Accomplishments go to Dirk, era value could theoretically go to Dirk (but it is close), but if we move away from either, I wonder if Dirk has much left. Does someone like Gobert make more sense next to Towns or next to Jokic? And which of them is more comparable to Dirk?

Next would be Jokic, Dirk and Robinson for me.

Tagging Ardee here because his ballot has been the same as mine and he marked both of them as his next two. I have in a similar vein also been struggling with Dirk versus Durant. Might prefer Dirk slightly as a scorer at his peak, but Durant is a better creator and defender…

I think Dirks a better scorer but Jokic is a better offensive player. The fit argument is an interesting one I hadn't though of much, I do wonder how much Jokic's impact would be affected with a non-shooting rim-runner next to him, because that's by far the best way to build a championship contender around Jokic IMO. And I also agree that Dirk would have even bigger defensive issues in today's game.

[iggymcfrack]

Thought I had already posted my votes for this one, but apparently I posted my new votes in the #15 thread instead.

1. 2021/22 Nikola Jokic- Best regular season ever by PER and BPM, 5th best postseason ever by PER with impact numbers that dominate the competition much more than the box score metrics. Incredible playmaking as Jokic combines the best passing from a big man ever with a surprisingly low amount of time holding the ball for such an offensive hub. He also has the highest RAPTOR since that started being tracked in 2013/14.

2. 1995/96 David Robinson- Led the league in PER in both the regular season AND postseason while anchoring the 3rd best defense in the league. Early impact metrics had him neck and neck with Michael Jordan for best player in the league. When Robinson missed the vast majority of the following season, the Spurs defense went from 3rd/29 to 29th/29. They were 9 points worse per 100 possessions. The following season when he returned, the defense improved 13 points per 100 possessions. His defensive impact vastly outpaced his box score value and you can argue that at this point in his career, he was right there with anyone else in the history of the league for most valuable defensive players. I have a hard time believing that Bill Russell ever peaked higher than David Robinson for instance since Robinson had such a strong offensive game while providing at least 95% of the same value on defense.

3. 2016/2017 Kawhi Leonard- Yes he suffered a season ending injury in the playoffs, but it was on a dirty play that could have happened to anyone and prior to that, he hadn’t been injury prone at all. In the playoffs that year, Kawhi had a 31.5 PER on .672 TS%. He had .314 WS/48 and a 14.2 BPM. All of those are all-time numbers. What’s even more impressive though is he did all that WITH some of the best wing defense of all-time. He won DPOY in 2015 and 2016 and absolutely played at that same elite level in the playoffs. He had a playoff on/off of +22.3 and led the Spurs to a huge lead over the best team of all-time in Game 1 against the Warriors in a series where they would ultimately get swept after he got hurt.

[LA Bird]

Under the original vote counting method, there would be a massive 6 player runoff right now. I think this problem of ties and circular ties is only going to get worse as the number of votes and the gap between players decline so I am proposing a new method. Instead of counting each H2H victories as just 1-0 wins, I will sum all the H2H records for more granularity. The results are consistent with the previous method except in round 14 where West beat Oscar. But Oscar almost beat Giannis in round 13 anyway so I don't think the results are too far off.

Spoiler:

Round 1
91 Jordan: 0.950 (668-35)
13 James: 0.823 (329-71)
00 O'Neal: 0.789 (405-108)
09 James: 0.709 (227-93)
16 James: 0.695 (223-98)

Round 2
13 James: 0.888 (364-46)
00 O'Neal: 0.851 (389-68)
16 James: 0.818 (296-66)
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.759 (265-84)
12 James: 0.717 (223-88)

Round 3
00 O'Neal: 0.896 (302-35)
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.790 (215-57)
03 Duncan: 0.713 (191-77)
67 Chamberlain: 0.703 (163-69)
74 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.678 (154-73)

Round 4
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.914 (329-31)
67 Chamberlain: 0.817 (236-53)
74 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.712 (151-61)
03 Duncan: 0.692 (175-78)
17 Curry: 0.655 (127-67)

Round 5
67 Chamberlain: 0.912 (290-28)
03 Duncan: 0.747 (192-65)
64 Russell: 0.697 (140-61)
94 Olajuwon: 0.670 (130-64)
64 Chamberlain: 0.665 (107-54)

Round 6
03 Duncan: 0.866 (297-46)
94 Olajuwon: 0.797 (208-53)
17 Curry: 0.681 (139-65)
64 Russell: 0.656 (137-72)
93 Olajuwon: 0.646 (122-67)

Round 7
94 Olajuwon: 0.868 (330-50)
93 Olajuwon: 0.749 (197-66)
62 Russell: 0.734 (193-70)
65 Russell: 0.727 (192-72)
17 Curry: 0.725 (179-68)

Round 8
64 Russell: 0.845 (272-50)
62 Russell: 0.817 (237-53)
86 Bird: 0.813 (308-71)
17 Curry: 0.778 (235-67)
65 Russell: 0.746 (182-62)

Round 9
86 Bird: 0.902 (526-57)
17 Curry: 0.851 (378-66)
04 Garnett: 0.824 (378-81)
87 Johnson: 0.806 (329-79)
16 Curry: 0.706 (216-90)

Round 10
87 Johnson: 0.891 (393-48)
17 Curry: 0.847 (249-45)
04 Garnett: 0.843 (307-57)
16 Curry: 0.805 (244-59)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.665 (147-74)

Round 11
17 Curry: 0.858 (284-47)
04 Garnett: 0.844 (276-51)
16 Curry: 0.836 (281-55)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.667 (124-62)
76 Erving: 0.646 (128-70)

Round 12
04 Garnett: 0.923 (410-34)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.806 (232-56)
94 Robinson: 0.710 (164-67)
77 Walton: 0.598 (101-68)
76 Erving: 0.597 (105-71)

Round 13
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.798 (162-41)
64 Robertson: 0.782 (179-50)
94 Robinson: 0.738 (135-48)
66 West: 0.697 (129-56)
22 Antetokounmpo: 0.673 (103-50)

Round 14
66 West: 0.797 (141-36)
64 Robertson: 0.765 (150-46)
94 Robinson: 0.695 (98-43)
22 Jokic: 0.677 (107-51)
17 Leonard: 0.639 (94-53)

Round 15
66 West: 0.776 (194-56)
77 Walton: 0.735 (172-62)
06 Wade: 0.702 (160-68)
09 Wade: 0.697 (159-69)
94 Robinson: 0.678 (143-68)

Unless people really prefer the original method, I will use this new vote counting method from now.

Winner: 22 Jokic

There were 15 voters in this round: trex_8063, CharityStripe34, AEnigma, Dutchball97, Samurai, falcolombardi, trelos6, f4p, ceoofkobefans, SickMother, 70sFan, DraymondGold, capfan33, Proxy, iggymcfrack

A total of 30 seasons received at least 1 vote: 06 Nowitzki, 06 Wade, 07 Nowitzki, 08 Bryant, 09 Wade, 10 Wade, 11 Nowitzi, 14 Durant, 16 Durant, 17 Durant, 17 Leonard, 19 Leonard, 20 Davis, 21 Jokic, 22 Jokic, 50 Mikan, 51 Mikan, 58 Pettit, 59 Pettit, 62 Pettit, 68 Hawkins, 76 Erving, 77 Walton, 79 Malone, 82 Malone, 83 Malone, 93 Barkley, 94 Robinson, 95 Robinson, 96 Robinson

Top 5 seasons
22 Jokic: 0.793 (207-54)
77 Walton: 0.758 (163-52)
94 Robinson: 0.732 (142-52)
06 Wade: 0.706 (144-60)
09 Wade: 0.701 (143-61)

[falcolombardi]

Under the original vote counting method, there would be a massive 6 player runoff right now. I think this problem of ties and circular ties is only going to get worse as the number of votes and the gap between players decline so I am proposing a new method. Instead of counting each H2H victories as just 1-0 wins, I will sum all the H2H records for more granularity. The results are consistent with the previous method except in round 14 where West beat Oscar. But Oscar almost beat Giannis in round 13 anyway so I don't think the results are too far off.

Spoiler:

Round 1
91 Jordan: 0.950 (668-35)
13 James: 0.823 (329-71)
00 O'Neal: 0.789 (405-108)
09 James: 0.709 (227-93)
16 James: 0.695 (223-98)

Round 2
13 James: 0.888 (364-46)
00 O'Neal: 0.851 (389-68)
16 James: 0.818 (296-66)
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.759 (265-84)
12 James: 0.717 (223-88)

Round 3
00 O'Neal: 0.896 (302-35)
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.790 (215-57)
03 Duncan: 0.713 (191-77)
67 Chamberlain: 0.703 (163-69)
74 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.678 (154-73)

Round 4
77 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.914 (329-31)
67 Chamberlain: 0.817 (236-53)
74 Abdul-Jabbar: 0.712 (151-61)
03 Duncan: 0.692 (175-78)
17 Curry: 0.655 (127-67)

Round 5
67 Chamberlain: 0.912 (290-28)
03 Duncan: 0.747 (192-65)
64 Russell: 0.697 (140-61)
94 Olajuwon: 0.670 (130-64)
64 Chamberlain: 0.665 (107-54)

Round 6
03 Duncan: 0.866 (297-46)
94 Olajuwon: 0.797 (208-53)
17 Curry: 0.681 (139-65)
64 Russell: 0.656 (137-72)
93 Olajuwon: 0.646 (122-67)

Round 7
94 Olajuwon: 0.868 (330-50)
93 Olajuwon: 0.749 (197-66)
62 Russell: 0.734 (193-70)
65 Russell: 0.727 (192-72)
17 Curry: 0.725 (179-68)

Round 8
64 Russell: 0.845 (272-50)
62 Russell: 0.817 (237-53)
86 Bird: 0.813 (308-71)
17 Curry: 0.778 (235-67)
65 Russell: 0.746 (182-62)

Round 9
86 Bird: 0.902 (526-57)
17 Curry: 0.851 (378-66)
04 Garnett: 0.824 (378-81)
87 Johnson: 0.806 (329-79)
16 Curry: 0.706 (216-90)

Round 10
87 Johnson: 0.891 (393-48)
17 Curry: 0.847 (249-45)
04 Garnett: 0.843 (307-57)
16 Curry: 0.805 (244-59)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.665 (147-74)

Round 11
17 Curry: 0.858 (284-47)
04 Garnett: 0.844 (276-51)
16 Curry: 0.836 (281-55)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.667 (124-62)
76 Erving: 0.646 (128-70)

Round 12
04 Garnett: 0.923 (410-34)
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.806 (232-56)
94 Robinson: 0.710 (164-67)
77 Walton: 0.598 (101-68)
76 Erving: 0.597 (105-71)

Round 13
21 Antetokounmpo: 0.798 (162-41)
64 Robertson: 0.782 (179-50)
94 Robinson: 0.738 (135-48)
66 West: 0.697 (129-56)
22 Antetokounmpo: 0.673 (103-50)

Round 14
66 West: 0.797 (141-36)
64 Robertson: 0.765 (150-46)
94 Robinson: 0.695 (98-43)
22 Jokic: 0.677 (107-51)
17 Leonard: 0.639 (94-53)

Round 15
66 West: 0.776 (194-56)
77 Walton: 0.735 (172-62)
06 Wade: 0.702 (160-68)
09 Wade: 0.697 (159-69)
94 Robinson: 0.678 (143-68)

Unless people really prefer the original method, I will use this new vote counting method from now.

Winner: 22 Jokic

There were 15 voters in this round: trex_8063, CharityStripe34, AEnigma, Dutchball97, Samurai, falcolombardi, trelos6, f4p, ceoofkobefans, SickMother, 70sFan, DraymondGold, capfan33, Proxy, iggymcfrack

A total of 30 seasons received at least 1 vote: 06 Nowitzki, 06 Wade, 07 Nowitzki, 08 Bryant, 09 Wade, 10 Wade, 11 Nowitzi, 14 Durant, 16 Durant, 17 Durant, 17 Leonard, 19 Leonard, 20 Davis, 21 Jokic, 22 Jokic, 50 Mikan, 51 Mikan, 58 Pettit, 59 Pettit, 62 Pettit, 68 Hawkins, 76 Erving, 77 Walton, 79 Malone, 82 Malone, 83 Malone, 93 Barkley, 94 Robinson, 95 Robinson, 96 Robinson

Top 5 seasons
22 Jokic: 0.793 (207-54)
77 Walton: 0.758 (163-52)
94 Robinson: 0.732 (142-52)
06 Wade: 0.706 (144-60)
09 Wade: 0.701 (143-61)

Wouldnt it make sense to re make the west vs oscsr run off then? To reduce controversy here of west vs oscar placing

They are next to each other anway

[LA Bird]

Wouldnt it make sense to re make the west vs oscsr run off then? To reduce controversy here of west vs oscar placing

They are next to each other anway

I could redo the West vs Oscar runoff but assuming everybody votes, I think Oscar will still win it. He lost in regulation because most of his voters only showed up after the regular deadline in the runoff period. If there was no runoff, West would have won it.

[AEnigma]

Wouldnt it make sense to re make the west vs oscsr run off then? To reduce controversy here of west vs oscar placing

They are next to each other anway

I could redo the West vs Oscar runoff but assuming everybody votes, I think Oscar will still win it. He lost in regulation because most of his voters only showed up after the regular deadline in the runoff period. If there was no runoff, West would have won it.

West gets #14 Finals MVP but not the ring.

[Proxy]

Misclicked(ignore) - cant delete