How do you evaluate a player's year under those circumstances?

[dygaction]

How do you evaluate a player's year under those circumstances?

1. MVP level regular season but seriously under perform in the playoffs, like Embiid this year?
2. All-nba level performance but the team did not make the playoffs, like KG's 2005 and Luka's 2023?
3. All-nba level performance regular season but got injured in the playoffs, like CP3 in many seasons and Giannis this year?
4. All-nba level performance regular season but best teammates not available in the playoffs, like Jokic last year?
5. All star level performance but taking undeserved high salary, making the team difficult to build a competitive roster, like Beal $46.7M/yr, PG13 45.6M and Klay $43.2M/yr?

[Colbinii]

I only take into account salary as a small bonus but never penalize a player for a contract he signed in the past.

I don't consider 2005 Garnett significantly worse than 2004, and since he was the best player in the NBA and had a super-season [Top 10 all-time for me], then I don't see a reason to penalize Garnett in 2005 when he had already proven to be that type of player the year prior.

[eminence]

1. If bad enough I would bump it down to All-NBA, though it needs to be pretty dang bad, I don't think Embiid qualifies this year. Maybe something like '09 CP3 (first to come to mind).

2. Stay at same level, I feel fine with this, as only in really poor cases do I 'punish' guys who made the playoffs.

3. Usually knock down to the bottom of their level or the top of the one below it, somewhat depending on injury. If they get injured in game 5 with something that'll cause them to miss a game or two and they get eliminated that may not cause me to drop them. If they take a major injury I'll drop them.

4. Doesn't change my evaluation of them directly. Hurts their chances to move up with a deep run of good play.

5. I don't factor in salary. I feel every player should take the best contract offered to them, rest is up to the GM.

[dygaction]

I only take into account salary as a small bonus but never penalize a player for a contract he signed in the past.

I don't consider 2005 Garnett significantly worse than 2004, and since he was the best player in the NBA and had a super-season [Top 10 all-time for me], then I don't see a reason to penalize Garnett in 2005 when he had already proven to be that type of player the year prior.

You do not penalize but do you give him benefit of doubt for potential playoff success? Otherwise, how does it contrast to other players who actually played in the playoffs? Kobe in 06 and Jokic in 22 dragged similar or worse cast into the playoffs. Luka improved as a player in 23 but to me his 22 season carried more value with much better playoff success. Not trying to find/establish a rule just want to see how people view such things from different perspectives.

[Colbinii]

I only take into account salary as a small bonus but never penalize a player for a contract he signed in the past.

I don't consider 2005 Garnett significantly worse than 2004, and since he was the best player in the NBA and had a super-season [Top 10 all-time for me], then I don't see a reason to penalize Garnett in 2005 when he had already proven to be that type of player the year prior.

You do not penalize but do you give him benefit of doubt for potential playoff success? Otherwise, how does it contrast to other players who actually played in the playoffs? Kobe in 06 and Jokic in 22 dragged similar or worse cast into the playoffs. Luka improved as a player in 23 but to me his 22 season carried more value with much better playoff success. Not trying to find/establish a rule just want to see how people view such things from different perspectives.

Benefit of the doubt? No, but I don't penalize a player for not making the playoffs when his team is as bad as the 2005 Timberwolves supporting cast.

Garnett was an excellent player in the playoffs from 1999-2004, averaging 24/14/5/1.5/2 with an On/Off of +12.6 [Never below 6 BPM in any post-season, nearly 25 PER and > 7 BPM over this period]. He was also, unlike Embiid, extremely consistent in the post-season, which doesn't give me pause about how he would perform in 2005 in the Post-Season.

I don't really consider 2006 Lakers or 2022 Nuggets as similar, but it is worth noting the 2005 Timberwolves won 44 games, had a 1.73 SRS and by all accounts were just as good as the Lakers [45 wins, 2.53 SRS] and Nuggets [48 wins, 2.16 SRS].

And, if you would like to go deeper, the Nuggets had at least a cohesive core around Jokic [All starers > 70 games, Top 8 players > 1000 minutes and 65 games]. The Lakers are also similar, with three other starters with 80 games [4/5 starers next to Kobe over 70 games, Top 8 players > 1300 minutes and 59 games the outlier with everyone else at 69+ games].

Then you look at Minnesota, who had no idea what they were doing around Garnett. They had 7 players around KG with over 20 starts, with the 2nd starts next to KG at just 51 starts. They had key-starters [Players who had > 20 starts] ranging in games like 46, 59 and 62 games.

Second, they had Latrell Sprewell and his -84.1 TS+. Devean George was the most inefficient player on the 2006 Lakers at -47.8 TS+ [George had just a 15.3 USG%, Sprewell at 22.2%]. The most inefficient player on Denver was Campazzo [-41.9 TS+, 14.7 USG%].

Third, the coach. The Timberwolves fired their coach half-way through the season. The Lakers had Phil Jackson. The Nuggets had Michael Malone.

So yeah, all 3 teams are relatively comparable in terms of results, yet KG had the most inconsistent roster around him [both in terms of production and moving pieces] and the worst coached team.

[Doctor MJ]

How do you evaluate a player's year under those circumstances?

1. MVP level regular season but seriously under perform in the playoffs, like Embiid this year?
2. All-nba level performance but the team did not make the playoffs, like KG's 2005 and Luka's 2023?
3. All-nba level performance regular season but got injured in the playoffs, like CP3 in many seasons and Giannis this year?
4. All-nba level performance regular season but best teammates not available in the playoffs, like Jokic last year?
5. All star level performance but taking undeserved high salary, making the team difficult to build a competitive roster, like Beal $46.7M/yr, PG13 45.6M and Klay $43.2M/yr?

Overarching thing here: Depends on what I'm evaluating. Things like team context don't change how good a player is, but they change what the player can achieve, and what a player achieves has a large influence on how good we think the player is.

To try to hit each item on your list:

1. In general I try to keep a philosophy where a player doesn't fall based on the playoffs so much as others can rise past him. In your example, with the post-season Tatum & Butler moved ahead of Embiid for me.

2. So, I'll break this into 2 sub-parts:

a - The fact that a guy with a worse team context does not get the opportunity to prove himself on the biggest stage forces the split between goodness and achievement. When evaluating player achievement, this can be said to hurt the player. When evaluating player goodness, I actively try to normalize this variant of winning-bias away.

b - A distinction needs to be made between guys who were still clearly impacting their team a ton, and guys whose team seemed to have diminishing returns with him. Kevin Garnett is a perfect guy to bring up here because he has a lot of years where he's an MVP-level impact guy hindered by lack of team achievement...and then there's '04-05 his impact numbers imply diminishing returns. It's just one year so it could be noise...but it's also the year when his two co-stars went rogue, and while we might expect this would only make on/off data look more stark, I feel most comfortable saying that the whole team - Garnett included - was thrown off by these disruptions.

Re: Doncic. To be clear, he's never had a season where he's shown superstar-like +/- impact in the regular season, and this absolutely holds him back for me in general. As I always take pains to say: Doncic is remarkable in what he can do, and his approach seems remarkably resilient to volume and defensive intensity, which means that he might not be far away from being the best playoff-series-player in the world...which would make him the best player in the world in my reckoning. But when all you have is a regular season because you couldn't make the playoffs, what you achieve is inherently tied to your regular season impact, which isn't really Doncic's thing.

3. See #1.

4. See #2...but I'll note that Jokic last season isn't really a great example here. His co-star was gone all-year, and his team didn't experience a seeding upset in the playoffs.

5. See #2 but let me elaborate. I'm not going to directly penalize you for taking as much money as you can, but if this results you have less opportunity for achievement, then yeah, it might hurt you.

[dygaction]

How do you evaluate a player's year under those circumstances?

1. MVP level regular season but seriously under perform in the playoffs, like Embiid this year?
2. All-nba level performance but the team did not make the playoffs, like KG's 2005 and Luka's 2023?
3. All-nba level performance regular season but got injured in the playoffs, like CP3 in many seasons and Giannis this year?
4. All-nba level performance regular season but best teammates not available in the playoffs, like Jokic last year?
5. All star level performance but taking undeserved high salary, making the team difficult to build a competitive roster, like Beal $46.7M/yr, PG13 45.6M and Klay $43.2M/yr?

Overarching thing here: Depends on what I'm evaluating. Things like team context don't change how good a player is, but they change what the player can achieve, and what a player achieves has a large influence on how good we think the player is.

To try to hit each item on your list:

1. In general I try to keep a philosophy where a player doesn't fall based on the playoffs so much as others can rise past him. In your example, with the post-season Tatum & Butler moved ahead of Embiid for me.

2. So, I'll break this into 2 sub-parts:

a - The fact that a guy with a worse team context does not get the opportunity to prove himself on the biggest stage forces the split between goodness and achievement. When evaluating player achievement, this can be said to hurt the player. When evaluating player goodness, I actively try to normalize this variant of winning-bias away.

b - A distinction needs to be made between guys who were still clearly impacting their team a ton, and guys whose team seemed to have diminishing returns with him. Kevin Garnett is a perfect guy to bring up here because he has a lot of years where he's an MVP-level impact guy hindered by lack of team achievement...and then there's '04-05 his impact numbers imply diminishing returns. It's just one year so it could be noise...but it's also the year when his two co-stars went rogue, and while we might expect this would only make on/off data look more stark, I feel most comfortable saying that the whole team - Garnett included - was thrown off by these disruptions.

Re: Doncic. To be clear, he's never had a season where he's shown superstar-like +/- impact in the regular season, and this absolutely holds him back for me in general. As I always take pains to say: Doncic is remarkable in what he can do, and his approach seems remarkably resilient to volume and defensive intensity, which means that he might not be far away from being the best playoff-series-player in the world...which would make him the best player in the world in my reckoning. But when all you have is a regular season because you couldn't make the playoffs, what you achieve is inherently tied to your regular season impact, which isn't really Doncic's thing.

3. See #1.

4. See #2...but I'll note that Jokic last season isn't really a great example here. His co-star was gone all-year, and his team didn't experience a seeding upset in the playoffs.

5. See #2 but let me elaborate. I'm not going to directly penalize you for taking as much money as you can, but if this results you have less opportunity for achievement, then yeah, it might hurt you.

Doncic's stats and advanced stats this year are all superstar-like but somehow his +/- just has never been very impressive. His lack of self-regulation + injury, team's inability to make good moves - losing Brunson for nothing and trade for Kyrie with depth contributed to the disapointing missing playoffs. Otherwise, I thought do-it-all players like him, Jokic, Harden, WB, LeBron, and Kobe can all drag almost any kind of rosters into the playoffs.

[Colbinii]

How do you evaluate a player's year under those circumstances?

1. MVP level regular season but seriously under perform in the playoffs, like Embiid this year?
2. All-nba level performance but the team did not make the playoffs, like KG's 2005 and Luka's 2023?
3. All-nba level performance regular season but got injured in the playoffs, like CP3 in many seasons and Giannis this year?
4. All-nba level performance regular season but best teammates not available in the playoffs, like Jokic last year?
5. All star level performance but taking undeserved high salary, making the team difficult to build a competitive roster, like Beal $46.7M/yr, PG13 45.6M and Klay $43.2M/yr?

Overarching thing here: Depends on what I'm evaluating. Things like team context don't change how good a player is, but they change what the player can achieve, and what a player achieves has a large influence on how good we think the player is.

To try to hit each item on your list:

1. In general I try to keep a philosophy where a player doesn't fall based on the playoffs so much as others can rise past him. In your example, with the post-season Tatum & Butler moved ahead of Embiid for me.

2. So, I'll break this into 2 sub-parts:

a - The fact that a guy with a worse team context does not get the opportunity to prove himself on the biggest stage forces the split between goodness and achievement. When evaluating player achievement, this can be said to hurt the player. When evaluating player goodness, I actively try to normalize this variant of winning-bias away.

b - A distinction needs to be made between guys who were still clearly impacting their team a ton, and guys whose team seemed to have diminishing returns with him. Kevin Garnett is a perfect guy to bring up here because he has a lot of years where he's an MVP-level impact guy hindered by lack of team achievement...and then there's '04-05 his impact numbers imply diminishing returns. It's just one year so it could be noise...but it's also the year when his two co-stars went rogue, and while we might expect this would only make on/off data look more stark, I feel most comfortable saying that the whole team - Garnett included - was thrown off by these disruptions.

Re: Doncic. To be clear, he's never had a season where he's shown superstar-like +/- impact in the regular season, and this absolutely holds him back for me in general. As I always take pains to say: Doncic is remarkable in what he can do, and his approach seems remarkably resilient to volume and defensive intensity, which means that he might not be far away from being the best playoff-series-player in the world...which would make him the best player in the world in my reckoning. But when all you have is a regular season because you couldn't make the playoffs, what you achieve is inherently tied to your regular season impact, which isn't really Doncic's thing.

3. See #1.

4. See #2...but I'll note that Jokic last season isn't really a great example here. His co-star was gone all-year, and his team didn't experience a seeding upset in the playoffs.

5. See #2 but let me elaborate. I'm not going to directly penalize you for taking as much money as you can, but if this results you have less opportunity for achievement, then yeah, it might hurt you.

Doncic's stats and advanced stats this year are all superstar-like but somehow his +/- just has never been very impressive. His lack of self-regulation + injury, team's inability to make good moves - losing Brunson for nothing and trade for Kyrie with depth contributed to the disapointing missing playoffs. Otherwise, I thought do-it-all players like him, Jokic, Harden, WB, LeBron, and Kobe can all drag almost any kind of rosters into the playoffs.

And yet--as bad as Dallas has managed the roster around Doncic--it pales in comparison to what KG was dealing with in Minnesota.

Why aren't you bringing up the same defensive measures for Luka for KG?

[dygaction]

Overarching thing here: Depends on what I'm evaluating. Things like team context don't change how good a player is, but they change what the player can achieve, and what a player achieves has a large influence on how good we think the player is.

To try to hit each item on your list:

1. In general I try to keep a philosophy where a player doesn't fall based on the playoffs so much as others can rise past him. In your example, with the post-season Tatum & Butler moved ahead of Embiid for me.

2. So, I'll break this into 2 sub-parts:

a - The fact that a guy with a worse team context does not get the opportunity to prove himself on the biggest stage forces the split between goodness and achievement. When evaluating player achievement, this can be said to hurt the player. When evaluating player goodness, I actively try to normalize this variant of winning-bias away.

b - A distinction needs to be made between guys who were still clearly impacting their team a ton, and guys whose team seemed to have diminishing returns with him. Kevin Garnett is a perfect guy to bring up here because he has a lot of years where he's an MVP-level impact guy hindered by lack of team achievement...and then there's '04-05 his impact numbers imply diminishing returns. It's just one year so it could be noise...but it's also the year when his two co-stars went rogue, and while we might expect this would only make on/off data look more stark, I feel most comfortable saying that the whole team - Garnett included - was thrown off by these disruptions.

Re: Doncic. To be clear, he's never had a season where he's shown superstar-like +/- impact in the regular season, and this absolutely holds him back for me in general. As I always take pains to say: Doncic is remarkable in what he can do, and his approach seems remarkably resilient to volume and defensive intensity, which means that he might not be far away from being the best playoff-series-player in the world...which would make him the best player in the world in my reckoning. But when all you have is a regular season because you couldn't make the playoffs, what you achieve is inherently tied to your regular season impact, which isn't really Doncic's thing.

3. See #1.

4. See #2...but I'll note that Jokic last season isn't really a great example here. His co-star was gone all-year, and his team didn't experience a seeding upset in the playoffs.

5. See #2 but let me elaborate. I'm not going to directly penalize you for taking as much money as you can, but if this results you have less opportunity for achievement, then yeah, it might hurt you.

Doncic's stats and advanced stats this year are all superstar-like but somehow his +/- just has never been very impressive. His lack of self-regulation + injury, team's inability to make good moves - losing Brunson for nothing and trade for Kyrie with depth contributed to the disapointing missing playoffs. Otherwise, I thought do-it-all players like him, Jokic, Harden, WB, LeBron, and Kobe can all drag almost any kind of rosters into the playoffs.

And yet--as bad as Dallas has managed the roster around Doncic--it pales in comparison to what KG was dealing with in Minnesota.

Why aren't you bringing up the same defensive measures for Luka for KG?

I was not comparing the stats of the two, defensive or offensive. Luka only played 66 games vs KG all 82, so it is him to blame.

[Colbinii]

Doncic's stats and advanced stats this year are all superstar-like but somehow his +/- just has never been very impressive. His lack of self-regulation + injury, team's inability to make good moves - losing Brunson for nothing and trade for Kyrie with depth contributed to the disapointing missing playoffs. Otherwise, I thought do-it-all players like him, Jokic, Harden, WB, LeBron, and Kobe can all drag almost any kind of rosters into the playoffs.

And yet--as bad as Dallas has managed the roster around Doncic--it pales in comparison to what KG was dealing with in Minnesota.

Why aren't you bringing up the same defensive measures for Luka for KG?

I was not comparing the stats of the two, defensive or offensive. Luka only played 66 games vs KG all 82, so it is him to blame.

I am saying defensive measures as in you are citing team's inability to make good moves as evidence for Luka not making the post-season. I am not comparing the statistics between the two--one an on-ball, heliocentric wizards while the other is the 2nd most impactful player since 1997.

You also didn't address my previous point about comparing the casts of Wolves/Lakers/Nuggets--though I just assume we can agree to disagree about the facts I provided.

[dygaction]

And yet--as bad as Dallas has managed the roster around Doncic--it pales in comparison to what KG was dealing with in Minnesota.

Why aren't you bringing up the same defensive measures for Luka for KG?

I was not comparing the stats of the two, defensive or offensive. Luka only played 66 games vs KG all 82, so it is him to blame.

I am saying defensive measures as in you are citing team's inability to make good moves as evidence for Luka not making the post-season. I am not comparing the statistics between the two--one an on-ball, heliocentric wizards while the other is the 2nd most impactful player since 1997.

You also didn't address my previous point about comparing the casts of Wolves/Lakers/Nuggets--though I just assume we can agree to disagree about the facts I provided.

Not directly here, but I am becoming more impressed by KG’s 05 and agree it is an MVP worthy season, as I replied to 70s top 50 topic, which I cannot say about Luka’s.

[LukaTheGOAT]

-There is no one size fits all. It depends on how good I think the player is. A player can underperform his RS, but still be a clear MVP level guy if I believe he ran into a poor matchup, had uncharacteristically poor percentages on jumpers, etc. The same is true for all level of players. I want what I think they are worth in a vacuum.

-I usually don't dock much for injury, unless I believe it is a trend with a player.

-I don't consider salary at this time.

-