RealGM Top 100 #37

[Lever2Beaver]

It would seem to me from where I sit
that neither Pierce of T-MAC will fit
Pierce was never great and Tracy never proved it
Numbers are fantastic but it takes more than that to do it
I'd submit Cousy and Cowens and Reed and Schayes
Unseld and McHale, plus Walton and Hayes
All did more over their careers or reached a higher peak
In many cases both if I may be so bold to speak

Why take a guy like Pierce over seven MVP's (plus rose)
He was never even close to All-NBA first team
And as for McGrady it's not that lazy, and I hate to call him a loser
but in three game sevens he was outplayed by Chauncey Billups, Jason Terry and Carlos Boozer

Walton at his best was maybe the greatest, certainly one of the best of his time
Without a great center you could not contend when Unseld, Cowens and Reed were in their prime
But with those guys in the line-up their teams were right there
As for McGrady and Pierce they just don't compare
And what about Schayes, he can pass any test
A 12 year prime and at his peak he was the best
Took a team to a title without a sidekick star
Played well into the sixties, still an all-star

Hayes career was just a better version of Pierce
More honors, awards and distinctions
yet he is ignored while less options explored
C'mon what are we thinkin'?

[drza]

Good stuff drza, but I digress a few points

- I've been the guy pushing Reed, but I don't think he ever had an argument for best in the league. From 71 on Kareem is definitely better than him. In 69 and 70 you've got West, Oscar, Russell and Wilt in 69, rookie Kareem in 70. Reed's MVP IMO was like Rose's MVP, the Knicks/2011 Bulls made for a good and new story but everyone except Ric Bucher knows Lebron, Wade and Dirk are better players than Derrick Rose. I can't buy that 70 Reed was better than 70 West, Oscar, Kareem and Wilt if you count him. Likewise with some other players on the board, I don't see evidence that Iverson had a real argument against Shaq and Duncan, that Nique had a real argument about Magic, Bird and Jordan, Cowens against Kareem, etc.

I think it's just a difference in scale, that we seem not to be paying much attention to. With Pierce, there is serious question as to whether he was ever one of the top-5 perimeter players in the game in any one season. He missed most of '07 injured, and since '08 he's definitely not been as good as at least LeBron, Kobe, Wade, Paul and Nash. Before '02 he definitely wasn't as good as Kobe, Kidd, Payton, Iverson or even Vince. So we've got this window between the '02 and '06 where he could even have an argument to be a top-5 perimeter player in any given season, and that's still a tough sell with several of those guys I mentioned above still better than him in any given season (and I haven't even mentioned TMac, or guys like Melo, Durant, Manu, Rose, Ray, Deron...any of which have either had year(s) clearly better than Pierce or else multiple years where they were extremely arguable with him). And that's not even including the bigs, who were really the dominant players over the course of Pierce's career.

Meanwhile, Reed legitimately had an argument as the best PLAYER at his peak. Maybe you don't believe he was, and that's fine, but by 1971 he could stand proud against whoever you matched him up to. And it's not just because of the MVP/Finals MVP combo...as I said, in his peak he led the league in win shares, he was top-5 multiple times in PER, he was 2nd in the league in offensive win shares one season then led the league in DEFENSIVE win shares the next. So even if we set the accolades aside, on stats alone Reed would have been in the mix for the best player in the league. Which is, again, just an order of magnitude difference from where Pierce has been competing.

And while Reed's longevity isn't great, we're still talking about a 7-time All Star with a legitimate 5-year peak over a 10-year career. We're not exactly talking Walton longevity here.

The more I look at it I really can't even see why Pierce is being mentioned with this guy, let alone about to be voted in well before him. TMac has huge warts of his own, but at least I feel like he can look someone like Reed in the eye and say "my best was as good as your best", and not blink. I don't see where Pierce should even really be on the tier. It's like the rock-paper-scissors analogy I made way back with Shaq/Bird/Duncan...except that it's kind of twisted because one of the branches just doesn't work for me. I can imagine Pierce having an argument over TMac or vise versa, and I can see TMac having an argument over Reed or vice versa...but I can't for the life of me see any way Pierce has an argument over Reed, which is a pretty big stumbling block for me right now.

(And note, this post has just focused on Reed as the 3rd point of the triangle, but the above argument fits IMO for several of the candidates. Howard has been better on the season than Pierce in each of the last 5 years consecutively, and has been better over at least the last 3 - 4 years than Pierce ever was in his career. In the rock-paper-scissors game, he's another that I just can't see Pierce having a good argument over. Similar with Mchale, especially after I really fleshed out where I'd grade him in that comp with Howard. I haven't really fleshed out Hayes like that, but from the impressions I got in RPoY and the comments from the old heads in here I can imagine that he, too, could be on this list. Etc.

Pierce just doesn't seem like he was ever as good at basketball as several of the people he's about to go in front of. TMac may have been, but he has flaws of his own as well. This is just a wholly unsatisfying vote for me.)

[FJS]

Vote Iverson
Nominate McAdoo

[penbeast0]

Just continuing, I think you can make a clear hierarchy from

Tier 1
Superstar for full career (10-15 year prime) - Amazing thing to have, by far your best chance at a title. All voted in

Tier 2
True perenniel all-star for full career
Best in the league candidate for limited career

Which is what I think we're looking at right now. Both these options needs a serious injection of luck for you to win a title. With the true perenniel all-star, you need a jacked team with another true star on it. Willis Reed had Frazier, Debusschere, etc., Cowens had Havlicek, Jo Jo, etc., Pierce had Allen and KG (more than he needed), Gasol had Kobe, Manu had Duncan and Parker, Hayes had Unseld and Dandridge, Drexler had a deep Portland roster. Players on this tier who didn't have as much luck - Dominique, English, Iverson, Kidd, Richmond, not 03 Tmac, Dantley???, etc.

With the best in the league candidate with the small timeframe, the luck you need is everything lining up just for that season or few seasons. Bill Walton had this, Chris Paul, Bob McAdoo, Bernard King, Thompson and Tmac didn't. (I'm counting Tmac and Paul as 1 and 2 years at 'best in the league' candidcy, respectively. Tmac's career is a weird hybrid of the two groups though to be honest, I don't care much for having non 03 Tmac on my team most of the time)

So I think no matter whom you choose here, we're at the point where luck is a major factor. You probably need both Pierce and Reed on the same team to win a title at this point, or you need things to lineup around 08, 09 Paul or 03 Tmac at a higher level than roughly "West, Chandler and shooters." I think that's more to ask than Pierce finding his way onto another perenn all-star team, tbh

I certainly see the second tier guys here though most don't even rank as legit best in the league really. (McAdoo's defense was always a real issue even before the drugs, scorers like King and Thompson get overrated to my mind, even Paul I never saw as on the level of a LeBron, Dwight, or Kobe although his stats said differently).

For Elvin Hayes, he had Unseld (and visa versa) but Dandridge wasn't there on the first trip to the finals where they lost to a hot Rick Barry (Dandridge may have been able to slow him down), the SF was Mike Riordan.

Nique's supporting cast is badly underrated quite frequently. He had a lot of excellent defensive players around him, many of whom were solid two way. Good defenders included Doc Rivers, Fast Eddie Johnson, Stacey Augmon, Dan Roundfleld, Cliff Levingsotn, Tree Rollins, Moses Malone, and even Jon Koncak and Jon Battle. All except Koncak would not have been a ridiculous choice for the All-Def team and Fast Eddie and Dan Roundfield were legit two way all-stars while only Tree and Jonny Contract were really weak offensively. The only seriously defender he played with as a regular starter was Kevin Willis; these were talented defensive teams around him -- the problem was that he was playing in the Bird Celtics/Erving Sixer era where there were multiple HOF caliber players against him. (Milwaukee was simlar talent levels but better results though).

English's talent around him on the other hand is overrated because they had a lot of scorers who didn't play much defense (Issel, Vandeweghe, Thompson, Michael Adams); English was not only the most consistent star, he was frequently the best defender on the front line (English came into the league as a "next Bob Dandridge defensive SF for Milwaukee -- they did have front court "stoppers" Wayne Cooper and Danny Schayes replace Issel at center for a bit and their defense improved a lot). I think he may be the best of the long term scoring stars as he scored in great consistent volumes with great efficiency . . . and was that efficient before the 3 point shot playing different roles and within a balaced offense. Certainly he, Allen, and Reggie are my top 3 of the long time scoring champs (and maybe Paul Pierce too as the posts here have caused me to rate PP higher) -- well above Nique or Iverson.

I don't see Richmond anywhere near this high. He was solid as his nickname but never that dominant, that efficient, or that successful even at his peak. Just a very good scoring 2 for a long time. Around the Dominique Wilkins level for me which is below the English/Allen/Miller level and below the Bobby Jones/Dennis Rodman/Alonzo Mourning level by a long way too.

[Fencer reregistered]

This is a good thing to bring up, but it must also be brought up that we have ORtg estimates for Boston that include their massive rebounding.

How do those work?

[Fencer reregistered]

^^^Did Pierce quit the team during the losing streak and then return right after?

No. Why? Did TMac ever do something like that?

Seems like an awfully selective way to view intangibles, no?

Huh?

I can't tell if you're being serious or not. Maybe I need to communicate more clearly with you.

In a discussion about intangibles, vis a vis team's quitting/collapsing, Paul Pierce was on a 24-win team with an 18-game losing streak. Obviously, if intangibles are so powerful, the leader of the team surely would avoid such a meltdown. You said

It's not really relevant to a Pierce/TMac comparison to equate the two situations, given that Pierce wasn't around for EITHER one of them.

That's just false. He was "around" for the one that happened in Boston.

Oh. Now I get your point, sort of. You seem to be opposing some kind of a straw man argument, whose nature I haven't fully guessed from your snide and cryptic comments.

[Fencer reregistered]

What about Durant? 4 years in the league, 2 post-seasons, hardly enough to make a case for the top 50 and yet doesn't he just FEEL like he's better than pierce? and not just by a little - a lot.

Potential. Hasn't done it yet.

[Dr Positivity]

^^^Julien, what about all the championship teams I outlined a few posts back who did it in the first 2 years?

Or that Russell, Duncan, Kareem, Bird and Magic (if we count him) all won in their first 2 years (and Hakeem lost in the Finals in 6 against a GOAT team)? Wade, even, won in his 3rd and was on a title-level team in year 2 but had the rib injury...

Walton isn't the outlier because his team won early...he's the outlier because he's the only one to reach that level early and then basically stop playing due to injury.

Well, I was only mentioning players not voted in yet.

That list of players winning doesn't signify a ton to me because a) Those 5 players are in my top 6 of all time and on a different level of 'can virtually guarantee contention' than anyone in discussion here and b) All had very rare fortune - Russell having Cousy + Sharman, Duncan having Robinson, Magic having Kareem, Kareem having Oscar, Wade having Shaq. Having an MVP on your team when you join it can certainly make that 1 or 2 year prime feasibly title filled. But it's clear to me that the vast majority of players enter a situation far worse than that, especially in the modern era where you can't land a #1 pick by trading for it years beforehand like the 79 Lakers, 80 Celtics and 86 Sixers did. So it's even more likely you're looking at Lebron, Howard and Paul's start to their careers teammate wise

I'll be considering Walton soon. I am a bit wary that the 75 Warriors, 76 Celtics, 78 Bullets, 79 Sonics are all on my shortlist of weakest champions ever and looking at the teams the Blazers beat, they were good, but if the 77 Nuggets and Sixers won the title, they'd be on my shortlist of weakest champions too. So while Walton's team was seriously impressive, there's an argument to be made that they struck at the perfect time

[Fencer reregistered]

Reactions:

Russell,

-- Arrived on a team with 2 All-NBA players already there, plus a rookie of the year who wasn't him.

Duncan,

-- Arrived on a team which already had an MVP.

Kareem,

-- Better example. But entered the league after multiple years of playing for Wooden, into a questionable era.

Bird

-- Only won the championship when two other guys were added who will be on our list.

Magic

-- See Duncan.

... Hakeem lost in the Finals in 6 against a GOAT team)?

-- Fellow #1 overall pick on the team, and they didn't win.

Wade, even, won in his 3rd and was on a title-level team in year 2 but had the rib injury...

-- Shaq.

Walton isn't the outlier because his team won early...he's the outlier because he's the only one to reach that level early and then basically stop playing due to injury.

-- You're not entirely wrong, but let's beware of oversimplification in either direction.

[ElGee]

^^^ I don't understand what your point is. Frankly, I really feel like we're reading different threads or something.

Mufasa's argument is that longevity has some built-in importance because it's hard to just instantly join a team and win in that 1 or 2-year peak. He lists a bunch of the short-peak players who haven't even been to the Finals and thinks such circumstances illustrate how tricky it is to win without sustained high-level play. He often points to Walton as the only exception.

I reject that and have presented a number of high-peak players who won instantly...they just happened to keep playing at a high level. The last time it was discussed, I also listed all the teams who came together and instantly won (eg 08 Celtics) and think that there's a bit of a myth that he was perpetuating about needing sustained excellence to win with the same team. (eg build, take lumps, build more, get experience, finally win)

So I don't follow your "reactions" at all. What were you speaking to, exactly?

[penbeast0]

This seems even more true of Bob McAdoo who is getting strong nomination considerations. In addition to having a rep as a me first stat guy who was dumped from both Buffalo (for John Gianelli!) and New York after MVP numbers as if he was contagious, he also couldn't play defense as a center (when being a defensive center was even more important than today) and then you had the substance abuse issues . . . there's a reason he wasn't on the NBA 50 at 50 team where guys without half his numbers were even before advanced stats.

Wow at Tmac being on the verge of #37. Time to get on my soapbox a little...

I understand not following the winning narrative to the grave, but team culture, warriors beating loafers, and leadership is *not* a myth.

Does anyone believe the 08 Celtics play with the tenacity and fire they did if Tmac was on the team?

What about the 70 Knicks or 74 Celtics? Would they have the mindset of more defense and energy than you, better passing and 5 man for 1 than you, if it was a Tmac team? I'm almost certain that KG, Walt Frazier, Willis Reed, Dave Cowens would absolutely *hate* playing with Tmac. There's a reason no contenders last year wanted Tmac anywhere near their team. Sure they'd want prime Tmac, but personality wise, he's not a fit with tight knit basketball teams and culture based organizations. This would be true even in his prime. Those teams do not have the superior basketball mindset with Tmac on it. They'd probably say yes to having Tmac just from talent level, kind of like Nets did with trading for Vince and they went from 2 Finals + crazy 04 Pistons series to easy 2nd round knockout, or the Magic did by adding Vince to a Finals team to get over the top. That worked out well.

I don't want to call Vince's failures his, but because they have remarkably similar frustrations personality wise, we can look at the effect of Vince on a team culture as a semi comparison for Tmac as well. Plus Vince may be getting consideration soon so it's worth the paragraph. I think Vince had an unbelievably bad cultural effect in New Jersey and Orlando (and had lol effort level in Phoenix, albeit in a small time frame). I remember thinking near the end of his run for both franchises that Vince had completley drained the heart out of teams who had once made Finals based on heart/defensive commitment/ball movement, and that their list of things they needed to do was 1. Trade Vince 2. Trade Vince 3. Trade Vince. It's clear that he had made those teams flat out miserable. (edit: For the Nets I mean the end of the Kidd/RJ/Vince era here, the 09 team was practically a new team) Vince getting traded to an Orlando was an ultimate litmus test moment for his career. I remember Bill Simmons roughly saying "Think about it, has Vince ever played for a great team? Has Vince ever gotten a chance to redeem himself like Paul Pierce did in 2008? If Vince has ANY greatness in him, we're going to see it this year" I remember thinking 08-09 Vince was the most underrated player in the league and thinking before 2009-2010 that yes, Vince was now in the exact same situation as 2008 Paul Pierce and I believed that he would bust his ass in the summer, come out with a 20, 5, 5 season on a 60 W #1 seed Orlando, get Finals MVP and change his entire career. Then he proved his skeptics rights more than we could ever imagine by taking a Vince all over the Magic's team culture, which they still haven't recovered from. In the future someone may look at the Magic's 2010 season where they won as much games as in 2009 despite Hedo's departure and Shard falling off, at the 2010 Nets who fell apart without Vince, and determine Vince deserves credit for the 2010 season. No way. To me that guy just killed the Magic and the spirited gusto they had built up in their 2009 Finals run

But back to Tmac. He proved that he could dominate statistically... on a team with nothing else and no pressure to win, with no pressure for him to build chemistry with a star. When he went to Houston, the team didn't have. Sorry, I don't buy the decent in/out numbers for Tmac and Yao. Remember the way Kobe and Gasol ripped apart the league their first half season together? That definitely never happened with Tmac and Yao. They were together in the 05 and 07 playoffs and lost in the 1st round. They didn't have it chemistry wise like Kobe and Pau... IMO. The Rockets then made it past the 1st round with him sitting. I just don't think this is all coincidence. If we're talking top 37 players of all time, Tmac just doesn't fit the bill for me as someone I can depend on to lead consistently dominant and superior teams, because being a great TEAM goes far beyond having a lot of talent, that's something we've seen over and over again among all the teams that win and all the teams that lose. There is much more going on here than putting together the highest 2k11 ability scores.

[Fencer reregistered]

I'll pile on and switch my nomination to Reggie.

Just nobody please try to put him on the list over Pierce. Pierce has been an outright excellent defender at times; Reggie has just been a not-crippling part of good defensive teams. And Pierce can score in more ways than Reggie can, specifically without expecting all his teammates to stand in exactly the right series of screen-setting places.

[Fencer reregistered]

I do think that TMac 5, Pierce 4, others a total of 9 is a bit small as a plurality. So I hope there's some vote-changing there too.

[Fencer reregistered]

So I don't follow your "reactions" at all. What were you speaking to, exactly?

I'm not sure. I often have trouble guessing what point you're making.

If you're making the empirical claim that high/short-peak guys DO commonly get the teammates needed to win championships while they're at their peak, and you're arguing for it by showing how high/long-peak guys won early in their careers, then I( think you're overstating the case. Your list of examples isn't that long, and by showing special circumstances I was making the plausibility argument that they wouldn't necessarily be repeated.

Lebron, Howard, TMac, Moncrief, et al. never won championships at all (to date). Hakeem, Shaq, DRob, Jordan (!), Dirk, Wilt et al. didn't win championships very young. Etc.

[drza]

I'll go ahead and vote. This thread has been up for almost 3 days, I think it's as cooked as it's gonna get.

Vote: Tracy McGrady
Nominate: Alonzo Mourning

If the above vote is correct then TMac already had the lead, but even so, I just couldn't go with Pierce here. There are still just guys that I believe were better than him. At least with TMac, at his best I think he was as good as them.

As for the nomination, I'm not mad that Reggie is going to win but since that one already seems to be breaking open I figured I'd nominate Mourning, since I think his time should be coming soon.

[TMACFORMVP]

pen, I think it's a bit unfair to list Eddie Johnson and Dan Roundfield as some sort of significant contributors to those Hawks teams. Wilkins hit his prime in '86, Eddie Johnson had severely declined by then and was traded mid-season. And Roundfield was gone after '84, so unless we're seriously factoring in Nique's teammates in his first 2-3 seasons, they do not deserve mentions as "two way all-stars" that Nique played with. And I'm not so sure the Hawks version of Moses doesn't raise some eyebrows making All-Defense, considering he was slower, a worse rebounder, and noticeably worse on the weakside -- while not being ridiculously great defensively even in his prime. The rest were solid defensively (though I'm not sure a few others were "All-D worthy)," but I don't think anyone is really arguing that, rather despite significant offensive talents on his teams, the Hawks still ranking consistently among the better offenses in the league is pretty impressive -- and speaks volume against the notion that he wasn't a particularly effective impact scorer.

[penbeast0]

Fair enough . . . I think I was looking at English's years rather than Nique's although I'd list Nique's 3rd year (averaging 27ppg) as within his prime pretty clearly. You are right though, the offensive ratings are a lot better (and the D ratings not as good) as I'd thought before I actually looked. There is a strong team impact going on. I may have to move Nique up in my ratings although I still am not as fond of his offense (or defense) as I am of Alex English's, Ray Allen's, or Reggie Miller's -- it's like Gervin for me; I loved watching him, he impressed the hell out of me with his talent, but it's hard to build a title team around a guy who is that one dimensional except as a top secondary star rather than primary.

[therealbig3]

penbeast0, DavidStern changed his vote to Pierce at one point.

[penbeast0]

I will change my vote to Reggie Miller though I still have him slightly behind Alex English but while Moncrief is the best short peak (yes, better than McAdoo even ignoring the drug use – defense counts and he led Milwaukee to a top 2 defense in the league with rotating centers 4 out of his 5 prime years), English and Miller were outstanding for a long long time.

VOTE
Tracy McGrady – ronnymac2, ElGee, Snakebites, TMACFORMVP, colts18, drza

Paul Pierce – Dr Mufasa, Fencer, Doctor MJ, therealbig3, DavidStern

Dominique Wilkins – JordansBulls, SDChargers#1

Dwight Howard – penbeast0

Willis Reed – lukekarts

Elvin Hayes – pancakes3

Allen Iverson -- FJS

NOMINATE
Reggie Miller – ElGee, DoctorMJ, therealbig3, lukekarts, mysticbb, penbeast0

Bob McAdoo – Dr Mufasa, ronnymac2, Snakebites, TMACFORMVP, FJS

Bob Cousy – Fencer, JordansBulls, SDChargers#1

Alonzo Mourning – ronnymac2, drza

Wes Unseld – pancakes3

[JordansBulls]

Are we really saying Tracy Mcgrady is the 37th best on this list when he never won a playoff series? Is this some type of sick joke?
Anyway, I'm happy as Wade and Mcgrady are two of my favorite players all time.