Defense only - Dikembe Mutombo vs Dwight Howard

[One_and_Done]

As I noted, pace is not always indicative of how 'fast' a team played

Wrong.

This is exactly what game pace measures, how fast a team - as a whole - gets up and down the floor. The higher the game pace, the faster a team as a whole gets up and down the floor.

and especially not how much they had to move around the court

Correct. This is not what game pace measures. You clearly do not understand the concept of game pace.

At stats.nba.com there is tracking data for speed and distance data for players. You can easily calculate the distance covered by players, and not only that but their average speed over the course of a season.

This data has been publicly available for over a decade. Where have you been?

Pace doesn't necessarily measure 'speed' either.

Again, you can claim to yourself that your diction is more meaningful than the words of others. It's not. How about you state your definitions first before claiming to know what you are talking about?

Game pace measures a team's pace, how fast it is, it's speed, whatever you want to call it - as a whole.

but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace.

Watch a lot of basketball do you? Like how today many offenses will park one or two players on offense somewhere on the court behind the 3pt line as action occurs elsewhere just to open up the lane? What's their speed, or fastness, as they stand there simply to draw their defender away from the paint?

I'm guessing you've never seen an NBA team run a true motion offense.

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

Care to explain to all of us novices just exactly what you are trying to say here? What demands exist today in NBA offenses that did not exist 1, 2, 3, or 4 decades earlier?

Or is this again just your typical the-NBA-is-better-now-than-it-was-back-then bluster that is in reality meaningless?

or they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

Once again this is you making statements that profess expertise when in reality you are showing you clearly have no idea.

There is no correlation between game pace and the number of turnovers a team commits. None whatsoever. An NBA team does not get more possessions - either by committing more turnovers on offense or by forcing more turnovers on defense.

Had you bothered to look at the game paces of NBA teams over the past decades and their turnovers committed you would know this.

It feels like it's redundant to reply to most of this until you look up what pace measures on bballref. It is literally a calculation of how many possessions you have per game. This will apparently shock you, but if a team turns the ball over then they lose possession.

As I explained, pace and speed are two different things. One team might casually dribble the ball up the court, and 12 seconds into the shot clock, while everyone except the ballhandler and his man stand mostly stationary in their spots, someone takes a bad midranger. Possession over. Conversely, a team can run at full speed up the court, run 2 PnR actions as both teams scramble from one side of the floor to the other, then get a shot off at 12 seconds. The 2 possessions had the same 'pace' on paper, but were nothing alike in terms of the speed of the team or the exertion involved.

Similarly, if you turn the ball over 15 times a game in under 10 seconds each time, that looks like 15 high pace possessions, but you really just lost the ball.

Pace often correlates with speed, especially in the 90s and early 00s when many teams were playing slow it down and grind it out ball, but not always. It certainly doesn't indicate how much you need to run around the floor, and if we had sport tracking data on Mutumbo then it would certainly rank him poorly compared to modern bigs (and yes, I obviously know what synergy and sport tracking data is).

Once the pace question is sorted, happy to link you to one of the many posts where I explain why modern players have to move alot more (hardly a novel claim).

[tsherkin]

but I can't see Gobert is a reasonable comp. I'm not even sure you could say Deke was faster than Zubac.

The point wasn't a direct comparison of Gobert, to be fair, but that's fine. Zubac is an excellent defender and he manages just fine with the Clippers. Yes, there will be matchups where Deke's footspeed is a disadvantage; there were those in his own time as well. But he's still a dude who is going to exert humongous pressure on an offense.

[therealbig3]

I mean, it's getting pretty predictable, compare anyone who was a star before 2010 to anyone who was a star in the 10s/20s, and One_and_Done will pick the later player.

Except when it comes to Duncan of course.

[One_and_Done]

I mean, it's getting pretty predictable, compare anyone who was a star before 2010 to anyone who was a star in the 10s/20s, and One_and_Done will pick the later player.

Except when it comes to Duncan of course.

Kareem is in my top 3, Magic is in my top 10, and Bird might be too. Shaq is as well. Aside from Lebron and Curry I'm not sure any of my top 10 were in their primes in the last 15 years.

viewtopic.php?t=2423374#p116005522

[penbeast0]

I mean, it's getting pretty predictable, compare anyone who was a star before 2010 to anyone who was a star in the 10s/20s, and One_and_Done will pick the later player.

Except when it comes to Duncan of course.

A warning. You may disagree with this poster, I have done so myself often enough, but keep your comments in threads to the content of his posts. Putting him on ignore is also a possibility (though one that as a Mod, I cannot avail myself of).

[kcktiny]

It feels like it's redundant to reply to most of this until you look up what pace measures on bballref. It is literally a calculation of how many possessions you have per game.

Really? Is that a fact.

This will apparently shock you, but if a team turns the ball over then they lose possession.

You are brilliant.

Did you or did you not write this:

they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

This will apparently shock you.

Team possessions where a turnover occurs are not - whatsoever - on average shorter in time than other team possessions where a turnover does not occur, whether a team is committing them on offense or forcing them on defense.

A turnover can occur just seconds into a team possession or at the end of a 30-60 sec team possession where there have been multiple offensive rebounds and/or defensive fouls called.

Had you taken the time to look at data (and historical data) that shows game pace and average time per team possession to turnovers committed or committed per 100 possessions (or some equivalent measure) you would know this. It is clear you have not done this.

And this:

This years Warriors also played at a 98 pace, but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace.

Is patently false. You have no idea what you are talking about here. Had you watched games back in the 90s or 80s (or even 70s) you would know better than to make such a erroneous statement.

And this is classic:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

A statement that sounds as if you know what you are talking about but you clearly do not.

How about explaining how the demands of today's offense and defense is different (or harder as you seem to be inferring) than earlier seasons? Let's hear your best Hubie Brown impersonation.

[One_and_Done]

There doesn't seem to be anything for me to rebut above, so I will leave it there.

Also, I feel I speak for everyone when I say that it would be great if you stop removing people's handles when you quote their posts. You do this for every reply you make, and since it doesn't save any time (quite the reverse) I can only assume you do it to make it less likely that people will see you have replied to them. I know I'm not the only one to mention this.

[kcktiny]

There doesn't seem to be anything for me to rebut above, so I will leave it there.

Of course not.

You like making posts as if to express expertise, yet when called upon to express that expertise you choose to walk away.

What a surprise.

[One_and_Done]

Well, all you did above was make a bunch of rhetorical statements, and refuse to admit you were wrong about pace and TOs not being connected in any way, so I don't see much to respond to.

[kcktiny]

Did you or did you not make this statement:

This years Warriors also played at a 98 pace, but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace.

Care to explain this? You make a statement as if fact, with no evidence in context.

And did you or did you not make this statement:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

As I asked before, and you just ignored, just what demands are you speaking of? This statement - in and of itself - says absolutely nothing.

Since when is asking a question a rhetorical statement? Or are you just calling them that because you cannot answer them?

and refuse to admit you were wrong about pace and TOs not being connected in any way

Where is this convoluted statement coming from? Or are you now trying to revise your original statement because your original statement was nonsense.

You said, quote:

or they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

How exactly does a team get more team possessions by generating more turnovers (or broken plays), as opposed other ways to end a team possession, like a FGM or FGmissed followed by a defensive rebound?

[One_and_Done]

Did you or did you not make this statement:

This years Warriors also played at a 98 pace, but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace.

Care to explain this? You make a statement as if fact, with no evidence in context.

And did you or did you not make this statement:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

As I asked before, and you just ignored, just what demands are you speaking of? This statement - in and of itself - says absolutely nothing.

Since when is asking a question a rhetorical statement? Or are you just calling them that because you cannot answer them?

and refuse to admit you were wrong about pace and TOs not being connected in any way

Where is this convoluted statement coming from? Or are you now trying to revise your original statement because your original statement was nonsense.

You said, quote:

or they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

How exactly does a team get more team possessions by generating more turnovers (or broken plays), as opposed other ways to end a team possession, like a FGM or FGmissed followed by a defensive rebound?

The claim I made was never that TOs generated more possessions than other ways a team ends a possession, it was that TOs affected how many possessions you got. You disagreed with that rather obvious statement, making the following incredible claim.

"There is no correlation between game pace and the number of turnovers a team commits. None whatsoever"

When you're willing to retract that claim and admit you were wrong, I'll be happy to respond to the rest of your post.

[kcktiny]

The claim I made was never that TOs generated more possessions than other ways a team ends a possession, it was that TOs affected how many possessions you got.

You wrote, and this is your exact quote:

or they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

You did not write:

it was that TOs affected how many possessions you got.

This is the second time you are claiming that what you wrote is not what you meant to write. Maybe you should stop writing. Or perhaps think before you write.

You disagreed with that rather obvious statement

Now that you understand that what you wrote is not what you meant to write, you put the onus on readers of what you wrote that it's obvious it's not what you meant to write? Are you serious? Are you in possession of your full faculties?

And you still have not responded to this:

This years Warriors also played at a 98 pace, but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace. With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

What demands are you talking about? Or is this - again - just more nonsense from you?

You are clearly trying to assert here that you know something about today's offense and defense that is somehow different/harder/what? than the 90s. I am interested in hearing what you know about today's game that causes more demands than in the 90s.

So fess up. What's so different about the today's game that has more demands than the 90s game?

When you're willing to retract that claim and admit you were wrong, I'll be happy to respond to the rest of your post.

Perhaps if in the future you do not make nonsensical statements you won't have to keep backtracking.

[One_and_Done]

The claim I made was never that TOs generated more possessions than other ways a team ends a possession, it was that TOs affected how many possessions you got.

You wrote, and this is your exact quote:

or they can get more possessions because they are generating more TOs

You did not write:

it was that TOs affected how many possessions you got.

This is the second time you are claiming that what you wrote is not what you meant to write. Maybe you should stop writing. Or perhaps think before you write.

You disagreed with that rather obvious statement

Now that you understand that what you wrote is not what you meant to write, you put the onus on readers of what you wrote that it's obvious it's not what you meant to write? Are you serious? Are you in possession of your full faculties?

And you still have not responded to this:

This years Warriors also played at a 98 pace, but I can't imagine you think that players on the 90s Nuggets had to move around the court anywhere near as much as today's Warriors, despite their identical pace. With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

What demands are you talking about? Or is this - again - just more nonsense from you?

You are clearly trying to assert here that you know something about today's offense and defense that is somehow different/harder/what? than the 90s. I am interested in hearing what you know about today's game that causes more demands than in the 90s.

So fess up. What's so different about the today's game that has more demands than the 90s game?

When you're willing to retract that claim and admit you were wrong, I'll be happy to respond to the rest of your post.

Perhaps if in the future you do not make nonsensical statements you won't have to keep backtracking.

There is nothing contradictory in those 2 bolded statements. If you can't see that then I'm not the one with a comprehension issue.

[kcktiny]

Of course not. Surprise.

Same exact verbiage?

If you can't see that then I'm not the one with a comprehension issue.

No, just a vision issue.

What about:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

You've now ducked an explanation for this statement of yours a third time.

Surprise.

What demands are you referring to?

The rebuke of 'you never watched these guys' is irrelevant and tired.

Funny how it always seems to be directed at you. Wonder why.

happy to link you to one of the many posts where I explain why modern players have to move alot more (hardly a novel claim).

Actually, this is in fact a novel claim. Never heard it from anyone but you, and I watch alot of NBA basketball. If it is as you say not novel, how about you post some links where you have heard others claim this?

[One_and_Done]

Of course not. Surprise.

Same exact verbiage?

If you can't see that then I'm not the one with a comprehension issue.

No, just a vision issue.

What about:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

You've now ducked an explanation for this statement of yours a third time.

Surprise.

What demands are you referring to?

The rebuke of 'you never watched these guys' is irrelevant and tired.

Funny how it always seems to be directed at you. Wonder why.

happy to link you to one of the many posts where I explain why modern players have to move alot more (hardly a novel claim).

Actually, this is in fact a novel claim. Never heard it from anyone but you, and I watch alot of NBA basketball. If it is as you say not novel, how about you post some links where you have heard others claim this?

I find it's easier to pin you down to one issue at a time, but if you search my post history you'll find the explanations I have given on the era related points many times, including in threads you have participated in.

I'm not inclined to reply further because you are unwilling to admit you were wrong in relation to the TO/pace issue, to the point you appear to be employing a different version of the English language to the rest of us. Those 2 bolded statements I made do not contradict each other in the slightest. It would be more becoming if you just admitted you didn't know how pace was calculated.

[kcktiny]

Backtrack four.

Simple solution. Don't make statements as if factual that you have no ability to authenticate.

[SHAQ32]

Relative to their eras, it’s easily Mutombo.

That ’94 first-round series might be one of the best ever—averaged 6.2 blocks per game against the high-powered Sonics and helped the Nuggets win as an 8-seed.

And Mutombo wasn’t just Mark Eaton out on the perimeter. He wasn’t Dwight or KG, but he could move.

[One_and_Done]

Backtrack four.

Simple solution. Don't make statements as if factual that you have no ability to authenticate.

You should follow that advice yourself, since you clearly didn't know how pace was calculated.

[kcktiny]

You know what else I don't know?:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

What the demands are on today's offense and defense. Neither do you.

You just talk like you do.

[One_and_Done]

You know what else I don't know?:

With the demands of today's offense/defence that's almost certainly untrue.

What the demands are on today's offense and defense. Neither do you.

You just talk like you do.

I mean, I've discussed that in many threads on this forum, as other posters here will all know. I just don't feel like explaining it to you right now because it seems pointless when you are ignoring the plain English meaning of words above. You said TOs had nothing whatsoever to do with pace. You were wrong. When you can admit that, I am happy to discuss era differences further.

Otherwise, there's literally a dozen threads like this one discussing era differences that you can weigh in on.
viewtopic.php?t=2447065&start=40#p117693325