RealGM All-Time Greatest NBA/ABA Franchises Ranking - #13

[trex_8063]

1. Minneapolis/Los Angeles Lakers
2. Boston Celtics
3. Dallas Chaparrals, San Antonio Spurs
4. Chicago Bulls
5. Syracuse Nationals/Philadelphia 76ers
6. Philly/SF/Golden State Warriors
7. Miami Heat
8. Fort Wayne/Detroit Pistons
9. Houston Rockets
10. New York Knicks
11. Indiana Pacers
12. Seattle Supersonics/OKC Thunder

.....

26. Vancouver/Memphis Grizzlies
27. New Orleans Hornets/Pelicans
28. Charlotte Bobcats/Hornets
29. Buffalo Braves/(San Diego)/Los Angeles Clippers
30. Minnesota Timberwolves

[Dr Positivity]

Vote Trail Blazers

They are a slightly less wealthy version of the Sonics/Thunder. They have a title, made some other finals, and have generally been above average. You could make a case for the Cavs here.

[trex_8063]

Vote Trail Blazers

They are a slightly less wealthy version of the Sonics/Thunder. They have a title, made some other finals, and have generally been above average. You could make a case for the Cavs here.

Too early for the Cavs, imo. They've got like a .465 rs win%, made the playoffs just 22 times in 49 seasons (don't have my spreadsheet available presently, but .449 is not remotely close to the front of the remaining teams (is, in fact, toward the bottom)); and outside of the Lebron era, have relatively limited success in those playoffs (21-8 playoff series record with Lebron around, but 4-13 otherwise).
EDIT: Upon reflection, though, the success around Lebron does put them somewhat nearby; could see myself supporting them somewhere in the #14-16 range, potentially.

[penbeast0]

Correct me if I'm wrong:
Utah, Portland, Phoenix, Milwaukee, Denver, and Dallas are above .500 regular season for their history.
Cleveland is the only one with an above .500 playoff record (though a very low percentage of playoff appearances)
The Nets have 2 ABA titles, nothing in the NBA. Tor, Cavs, Mavs, Wash, Port, Mil, Atl (in reverse chronological order) have 1 NBA title/

I think it's pretty tough sailing. No one standing out for me. Numbers say Portland but looking at it from fan enjoyment, they were an unpleasant team to root for in the Walton years with his yearly injury apart from that one magical season, they had the Jail Blazers, and don't enjoy watching their current team either. Phoenix has the SSOL Suns but think i will throw a sacrificial vote for Utah because Stockton and Malone were so great for so long (and then the Deron Williams/Carlos Boozer teams I always thought performed above their talent). Willing to listen to arguments.

Vote: Utah Jazz

[Fadeaway_J]

Portland and Utah have been the most consistently good of the remaining franchises (Phoenix knocked themselves out with their horrendous 2010s performances). I give Portland a boost for having so many different successful cores (Walton and Co, Vandeweghe-Paxson, Drexler-Porter, Jail Blazers, Roy-young Aldridge, Aldridge-Dame, Dame-CJ) and of course the championship doesn't hurt. They also managed to accummulate this level of success despite repeatedly having rotten luck with franchise players getting injured (Walton, Bowie, Roy, Oden). I'll vote Portland here.

[trex_8063]

Below are possibly the top 6 candidates [Jazz, Blazers, Cavs, Suns, Bucks, Hawks] by a variety of measures....


rs Win%
Jazz - .539
Trailblazers - .538
Suns - .529
Bucks - .515
Hawks - .495
Cavs - .465

% of Seasons in the Playoffs
Trailblazers - .714
Hawks - .657
Jazz - .622
Bucks - .608
Suns - .569
Cavs - .449

% of Seasons going as far as Conference Finals
Hawks - .186
Suns - .176
Bucks - .176
Cavs - .163
Trailblazers - .143
Jazz - .133

Playoff Series Win%
Cavs - .543
Suns - .473
Jazz - .462
Bucks - .400
Trailblazers - .393
Hawks - .392

% of Seasons going to Finals
Cavs - .102
Trailblazers - .061
Hawks - .057
Jazz - .044
Suns - .039
Bucks - .039

% of Seasons Winning Title
Trailblazers - .0204
Cavs - .0204
Bucks - .0196
Hawks - .014
Jazz - n/a
Suns - n/a


Hmm......that's a total mess; depending on which factors you value most (e.g. consistency vs infrequent deep playoff runs, etc), you could go a number of different ways, imo.

[trex_8063]

If I do a simple point system for the above categories where I award 6 pts for each category a team ranks 1st, 5 pts for 2nd, etc etc (1 pt for 6th), and add up each team.....

Blazers - 25.5
Cavs - 22.5
Hawks - 21
Suns - 19.5
Jazz - 18.5
Bucks - 18


Far from perfect methodology, but the Blazers do appear to have far and away the most "balanced" success as measure by these things (and I have been taking a fairly balanced approach [I think] to this point). They rank 5th/6 in Playoff Series Win% and % of seasons going as far as CF.....but they otherwise rank no worse than 2nd in any other category.

Since I was kinda leaning toward them going into this round anyway, I'll make it official: vote Portland Trailblazers.

[trex_8063]

I'm wondering if the Denver Nuggets are a team worth looking at yet.

I'm going to copy the above comparisons I did, inserting the Nuggets into the mix (will use their NBA/ABA combined numbers, but separate them out parenthetically; NOTE: making playoffs in the ABA was [statistically/proportionally] easier)......

rs Win%
Jazz - .539
Trailblazers - .538
Suns - .529
Bucks - .515
Nuggets - .501 (.490 in NBA, .555 in ABA)
Hawks - .495
Cavs - .465

% of Seasons in the Playoffs
Trailblazers - .714
Hawks - .657
Nuggets - .654 (.581 in NBA, 1.000 in ABA)
Jazz - .622
Bucks - .608
Suns - .569
Cavs - .449

% of Seasons going as far as Conference Finals
Hawks - .186
Suns - .176
Bucks - .176
Cavs - .163
Trailblazers - .143
Jazz - .133
Nuggets - .115 (.070 in NBA, .333 in ABA)

Playoff Series Win%
Cavs - .543
Suns - .473
Jazz - .462
Bucks - .400
Trailblazers - .393
Hawks - .366
Nuggets - .277 (.286 in NBA, .250 in ABA)

% of Seasons going to Finals
Cavs - .102
Trailblazers - .061
Hawks - .057
Jazz - .044
Suns - .039
Bucks - .039
Nuggets - .019 (n/a in NBA, .111 in ABA)

% of Seasons Winning Title
Trailblazers - .0204
Cavs - .0204
Bucks - .0196
Hawks - .014
Jazz - n/a
Suns - n/a
Nuggets - n/a


OK, maybe not. They don't shape out awful, but they're clearly not quite in this tier of teams.
The fact that they've never been to an NBA finals, never won a title (in either league), and have by far the worst playoff series record.......yeah, too early for them.

[penbeast0]

Portland and Utah have been the most consistently good of the remaining franchises (Phoenix knocked themselves out with their horrendous 2010s performances). I give Portland a boost for having so many different successful cores (Walton and Co, Vandeweghe-Paxson, Drexler-Porter, Jail Blazers, Roy-young Aldridge, Aldridge-Dame, Dame-CJ) and of course the championship doesn't hurt. They also managed to accummulate this level of success despite repeatedly having rotten luck with franchise players getting injured (Walton, Bowie, Roy, Oden). I'll vote Portland here.

If you think Utah has been consistently good, you clearly don't remember the New Orleans Jazz.

[trex_8063]

Blazers - 3
Jazz - 1

Calling it for Portland; will have the next up in a sec.

[DavidSterned]

Blazers