RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #6

[Xherdan 23]

What is Dirk's case over Hakeem? His defense was as good as anyone besides Russell, and his offense was way more impacful than Dirk's defense.

Hakeem didn't peak on both ends at the same time. 90 is one of the best defensive seasons of all time. People rave about it. Why don't they rave about 91? 92? 88? 93-95 is one of the better offensive big man peaks in history. But it's widely acknowledged his defense slipped those years, especially in the RS.

I don't want Hakeem's 93-95 stretch to be projected over his whole career. He wasn't always that guy. His effort waned, he was a hothead (to the degree he had a religious conversion and added the 'H') he feuded with management, and he's admitted he was not a great guy to be around in his 20s. He could absolutely explode, like he did in the 86 playoffs, but he could also be over aggressive, biting on fouls and having extreme tunnel vision. He didn't really "get" how an offense should flow early in his career, and would demand the ball and shoot over double teams with alarming frequency.

I don't think it's incorrect to say Dirk had a better career based on his off-peak seasons even if Hakeem peaked higher.

But has any of that stuff ever prevented him from playing at a high level or succeeding? And does he have any seasons in there where his team got upset from his own poor play like Dirk in 07 or 06?

I can say that Dirk wasn't always the same guy that we saw in 06 and 2011. Still great, but he had his issues like weaker defense earlier in his career, and even when his defense improved I don't think he was much over neutral if at all.

'07 is a 6 game sample against a bad matchup.
True, Dirk played bad in the series but every player had at least one series like that (I don't hold Hakeem's 4 straight first round exits followed by a missed playoff against him, do you?).

I don't think it would be remembered that much if the Mavs hadn't overachieved in the regular season and Dirk wouldn't get the MVP in a suit.

As for '06, how did his team got upset from his poor play?
They came into the season, playoff and finals as the underdog with a team that had no business sniffing the playoffs without Dirk, let alone the finals.
How was Dirk supposed to stop D-Wade in that series? Especially from the free throw line.

Yes, he had trouble with shorter, stronger, aggressive defenders like Haslem and Captain Jack, but he did a fine job against Miami and wasn't his team's problem in any way.
The season after the "we believe" series he came back with a complete post game to punish these smaller defenders which is something I don't think gets enough credit for (same with MJ and LeBron improving their post game or Duncan improving free throws as opposed to Shaq not working on FT and KD still not having a post game).

[ardee]

1st Vote: Shaquille O'Neal
2nd Vote: Wilt Chamberlain

This a difficult one for me. I have Shaq/Wilt/Magic/Bird/Kobe/Hakeem all in the same ballpark and I am having a hard time ranking them. The reason I went with Shaq first is that I trust his peak the most. I do feel both my picks in terms of being face of the franchise probably have actually the most issues out of the rest of the deserving candiates this high, but I can't deny their dominance.

I have Wilts longevity better, which typically for me is enough to have him ahead when everything else is close (which it is) but I'm choosing Shaq because I feel like he had more of a mean streak in terms of imposing himself to win. Shaq could clown around, be a diva---but once he began to enter his peak, if it was a big game you can count on him being the best player on the court -- against anyone and he would do it in incredible fashion over and over and over. I feel like that was Shaqs best quality, he may have been able to impose himself more than anyone in a 3 to 5 year streak in the playoffs. While he has some durability concerns, he was still typically healthy enough to win his team enough games to get into the playoffs, and from there he typically showed up and played through whatever injuries he had lingering.

I want to touch on KG again, as I did before in I believe the #3 thread. I really feel
like I am hating on KG but I really like him as a player (whats not to like? which is maybe partly for his ranking reach?) I would be reacting this way if people were arguing for Barkley, Both Malones, Etc this high ie: great players but great players that just dont deserve to be this high.

KG was really really good, but he won one championship with Boston in 4-5 possible years, its great but hardly better than what others have done that have not been voted in. I know its not all about rings, winning, etc but he also has some production shortcomings as well. I just dont get it, there is a lot of thought and research that people are putting in backing KG and its really good stuff but its ignoring a lot of simple and basic facts that occured, and it occured really recently. I watched KG a lot, he was a player I really wanted on my team, but I never even felt like he was the best player in the league except perhaps 03-04, where he certainly played like the best player in the league, but I still probably didnt feel like he was the very best when push came to shove. So in hindsight we have these wonderful impact type stats that show us all the MVP voters were wrong most of his career (he was only top 5 MVP voting half the time as more than a handful of other candiates still not voted in were) I was wrong in my assessment of him, he actually was the greatest player of his era but he just had really bad teams...And when he had a great team, he won one championship. I need to ignore so much in order to rank him this high, we might as well take all impact stats we have, make a little formula with them and do a decending +\- ranking for all the ATG ranking and call it a day. My other issue with KG was his general imprint beyond the court was weak, hell Paul Pierce was more of the face of that Boston team. Anyhow, I think a lot of the arguements for KG are good, and do make me sway towards him... when you are comparing him to like level greats. CP3 has incredible impact too, but I'm not about to take arguements of him over Magic Johnson seriously in terms of a GOAT ranking.... compare him to GP, Kidd, Nash.. great! OK thats my 2cents again, Ive put in more effort bashing KG picks than defending my own :\ , so I think Ive talked about enough on this matter.

I don't think KG only winning once with the Celtics should be held against him at all, while still a high impact player he was clearly past his prime from 2010 on, none of his stats by 2010+ are close to what they used to be. KG got one chance in his prime to win one and he went 1/1.

Huh? He didn't have chances when he played in Minny? He had HCA in the first round in 2003 and was the 1st seed in 2004. Then had the exact same team in 2005, which fell apart on his watch. If that's not a "chance" I don't see what is.

[ardee]

Do you consider '04-'07 KG an elite defender?

Definitely wasn't outside of 2004. His teams were decent on that end in 2004 and 2006 but finished 15th in 2005 and 21st in 2007.

[colts18]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

[colts18]

The 07 TWolves cast was an all-time bad cast.

3. Kevin Garnett's teammates/circumstances were what we'd expect for an all-time bad team

Consider the facts:
[*]In the 12 games KG missed in those 2 years, Minnesota was a -11.7 team.
[*]From 2006-2007, Minnesota played 2,021 minute without KG at -11.9 per 48 minutes.
[*]Minnesota lost 4 first round draft picks prior to this
[*]Minnesota had a player die prior to this
[*]Minnesota lost two all-star level players to career-ending injuries prior to this
[*]Mark Blount would be out of the league within 2 years, with one more season over 800 MP on a 15-win team
[*]RIcky Davis out of the league in 3 years, with one more season over 300 MP on a 15-win team
[*]Trenton Hassell would be out of the league in 3 years, never over 1106 MP again.
[*]Craig Smith, a rookie, is out of the league by 28 and is currently in Israel.
[*]Marko Jaric played 605 more minutes and was out of the league the following year.

Only Randy Roye, who was a rookie and Mike James (50 starts on a -7 Was team) have proven themselves as serviceable NBA players. Of the low-minute players on the team:

[*]Rashad McCants was out of the league by 24 (2 years later)
[*]Mark Madsen would play another 267 NBA minutes
[*]Troy Hudson would play 93 more minutes in 2008 before flaming out of the league.
[*]Bracey Wright and Justin Reed would never play in the NBA again.

In total, within 3 years, 11 of Garnett's 13 teammates were out of the NBA, none due to age.

[Gibson22]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

This is a thing I noticed. That peope here often think that, if the statistical impact of a player on defense improve or get worse, it means that he became a far better or worse defender. That's not how basketball works. If you committ more on D and you are put in the position to be a more valuable defender, you can be slightly better.. but that's it

[THKNKG]

Huh? He didn't have chances when he played in Minny? He had HCA in the first round in 2003 and was the 1st seed in 2004. Then had the exact same team in 2005, which fell apart on his watch. If that's not a "chance" I don't see what is.

You don't actually believe this, right?

As I've said like 3 times in this thread and others, the Lakers had lower seeding in those Shaq years because he missed so many RS games. With Shaq, they were 45-22. Without him, they were 5-10, bumping them down in the seeding. A team with Shaq and Kobe is better than any team KG had with the Wolves, but they managed to take it to six games.

2005 was not remotely the same team. Cassell and Sprewell were drastically different, and their second leading scorer was Wally Sczerbiak. To say that is the same team is dishonest.

What about Wilt's "chance to win" in 69 with the Lakers?

[penbeast0]

This is a thing I noticed. That peope here often think that, if the statistical impact of a player on defense improve or get worse, it means that he became a far better or worse defender. That's not how basketball works. If you committ more on D and you are put in the position to be a more valuable defender, you can be slightly better.. but that's it

Speaking anecdotally as a very low level player and coach, if there's one person on your team who isn't putting in the effort on defense (and the big difference for a player is effort, much more so even than injuries), (a) it puts a lot of extra pressure on the other defenders who have to leave their man more often to help creating open looks and (b) causes dissension as the other players feel they are doing someone else's job. Conversely, when the star of the team truly commits to defense with consistent effort, it can inspire the rest of the team to really step up the energy level.

So yes, I feel that one player, particularly a star player, can make a large difference on the whole team's defense.

[trex_8063]

It doesn't bode well that the video provided by Blackmill of '83 Magic (stated to be one of his better defensive years) shows him making fairly frequent defensive mistakes (though sample size obviously an issue there).

I would never consider Magic much better than a net-zero defender. Maybe just slightly at his best. And he definitely had years where he was worse. But I'm a little surprised you thought he made frequent defensive mistakes in the video I posted. I count 12 (52%) good plays, 7 (30%) bad plays, and 4 (18) neutral plays. I don't know for sure, but remembering when Vantage Sports was publishing detailed tracking data, my guess is making a mistake (of varying degree) 30% of the time isn't too different than what your average player does if you look closely.

Spoiler:

Magic does a good job at covering the open man once the Lakers start trapping and correctly doubles Moses late in the shot clock to force a tough shot. (good)

Kareem rotates to Iavarony since no one picked him up in transition and Magic gets in front of Moses's rim run. This surprises Moses enough that he misses the layup. (good)

Magic tries to strip the ball from Moses after a defensive rebound and fouls, which is non-shooting, but moves the Lakers towards the penalty. (bad)

Magic helps on Toney's drive and forces a traveling violation. (good)

Cooper gambles on a backcourt steal leaving the rest of the Lakers defending 4-on-5. Magic fronts Dr. J rather than contest Cheek's jumper. I think this is an acceptable play given the situation. (neutral)

Cooper falls down, and Cheeks drives, but Magic rotates and stops the penetration. (good)

Magic gives up a lob to Dr. J. (bad)

Magic makes a good read, as he notices Dr. J is looking to pass, getting the deflection and almost the steal. (good)

Dr. J blows by Magic. (bad)

Magic argues with the ref and doesn't get back in transition. (bad)

Magic helps on Moses after an offensive rebound and draws offensive foul. (good)

Magic gets back in transition and contests the jumper. (good)

Magic has to guard Moses in transition, sags off him enough to cut off Cheeks drive, while preventing the pass to Moses. (good)

Magic has to guard Moses again in transition, and does a good job keeping vertical and close, forcing a tough shot. (good)

Magic gets a defensive rebound. (neural -- because it wasn't that contested)

Iavarony is able to get just inside the paint because Magic is off to his side. Magic could have contested better. This play is tricky, though, because Toney was unguarded on the weakside. I'll call it a bad play but with a better camera angle it may have been neutral. (bad)

Magic looks like he's unaware of Toney, but suddenly helps, and Toney turns the ball over as a result. (good)

Magic is slow following Jones since Moses has a mismatch with Landsberger. Magic weakly contests the jumper. (neutral)

Magic and Landsberger miscommunicates on the PnR which allows Cheeks to get free throws. Magic stunted so I'm not so sure his plan was actually to switch. I think it's bad especially since there was no reason to switch. (bad)

An offensive play somehow made it into the video...

Magic sags towards Dr. J who's guarded by Landsberger in transition, which lets Toney get into the paint, but with help nearby I think this is the correct read. Ideally, though, Magic is quick enough to still get in front of Toney. (neutral)

Magic helps on Dr. J's drive and then on Toney's drive. Does a real good job contesting Toney's shot but a foul on McGee is called beforehand. (good)

A weird offensive rebound on a free throw has Magic guarding Moses. Magic gets off balance which lets Moses drive and gets to the rim. (bad)

Magic contests Dr. J's jumper. (good)

There are a few plays I'd classify differently. For example, the play where he is slow to follow Bobby Jones and [very] weakly contests the jumper: I'd call that bad defense (you'd labelled it neutral).

otoh, I could potentially see giving a grade of neutral to that play where he gives up the lob to Dr. J; that seemed more like great offensive play by Erving than it was a bad defensive play by Magic.

There were a couple other plays (like that one where Toney beats him toward the end) that I'd lean more toward bad (as opposed to neutral); not that his effort or attention was bad, but rather the lack of lateral quickness relative to other guards makes it, by default, a little bit bad.

At any rate, having basically 1 of every 3 defensive plays getting a label of "bad" does seem like it's giving up a lot on that end, but maybe I'm being too harsh a critic.

[Colbinii]

I just spent over 2 hours on a post only for me to somehow get "logged out" when I went to submit. I guess doing everything in word first is a good idea

Was it your vote or just data on some players?

It was a very big Kevin Garnett write-up with a lot of videos and pictures about his defensive impact.

Well, I will be re-writing it this afternoon with a few drinks

[trex_8063]

Huh? He didn't have chances when he played in Minny? He had HCA in the first round in 2003 and was the 1st seed in 2004. Then had the exact same team in 2005, which fell apart on his watch. If that's not a "chance" I don't see what is.

You don't actually believe this, right?

As I've said like 3 times in this thread and others, the Lakers had lower seeding in those Shaq years because he missed so many RS games. With Shaq, they were 45-22. Without him, they were 5-10, bumping them down in the seeding. A team with Shaq and Kobe is better than any team KG had with the Wolves, but they managed to take it to six games.

Don't forget that Sam Cassell got injured in that series, too.

[Gibson22]

This is a thing I noticed. That peope here often think that, if the statistical impact of a player on defense improve or get worse, it means that he became a far better or worse defender. That's not how basketball works. If you committ more on D and you are put in the position to be a more valuable defender, you can be slightly better.. but that's it

Speaking anecdotally as a very low level player and coach, if there's one person on your team who isn't putting in the effort on defense (and the big difference for a player is effort, much more so even than injuries), (a) it puts a lot of extra pressure on the other defenders who have to leave their man more often to help creating open looks and (b) causes dissension as the other players feel they are doing someone else's job. Conversely, when the star of the team truly commits to defense with consistent effort, it can inspire the rest of the team to really step up the energy level.

So yes, I feel that one player, particularly a star player, can make a large difference on the whole team's defense.

This is true. But when somebody says like, 83-84 bird was a very good defender, 86-87 bird was a below average defender.. I don't think that a player, unless something big changes, can be so different in a few years or just one year

[trex_8063]

I just spent over 2 hours on a post only for me to somehow get "logged out" when I went to submit. I guess doing everything in word first is a good idea

Was it your vote or just data on some players?

It was a very big Kevin Garnett write-up with a lot of videos and pictures about his defensive impact.

Well, I will be re-writing it this afternoon with a few drinks

The site doesn't seem to register time spent typing a post as time being "active"; so basically your session can time out and it will log you off.

Take note: highlight and copy long posts before you click "submit". That way, you can just log back in, go to post reply and simply paste in the long post you were wise enough to copy, instead of having to start all over.

[penbeast0]

1. Michael Jordan
2. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
3. Lebron James
4. Bill Russell
5. Tim Duncan
6. ????

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Shaq, Wilt

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Wilt, Mikan

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Shaq, Magic

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Magic, Bird

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Wilt, Magic

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Magic, Wilt

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Shaq, Wilt

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(Wilt, Shaq) Joao, you need to show me your argument for your vote to count

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Wilt, Shaq

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Bird, Magic

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Hakeem, Wilt

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(Shaq but no alternative, need that for vote to count)

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Shaq, Wilt

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Wilt, Magic

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Wilt, Bird

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Wilt, Magic

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Hakeem, Magic

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[quote=”oldschooled”].

Wilt, Shaq[/quote]

Here are the votes I have (need support from Joao and alternative from colts), if I missed you, quote yourself in a followup post but please don't quote and show this entire post.
[/quote]

Wilt 7
Shaq 5
Magic 2
Hakeem 2
Bird 1

[Colbinii]

Was it your vote or just data on some players?

It was a very big Kevin Garnett write-up with a lot of videos and pictures about his defensive impact.

Well, I will be re-writing it this afternoon with a few drinks

The site doesn't seem to register time spent typing a post as time being "active"; so basically your session can time out and it will log you off.

Take note: highlight and copy long posts before you click "submit". That way, you can just log back in, go to post reply and simply paste in the long post you were wise enough to copy, instead of having to start all over.

Yeah, I was doing that, but I was also copy-pasting images from an image site. When I found out all my information was deleted, I pressed apple+v, and it pasted an image link

Live and learn I guess

[Xherdan 23]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

Do you think '17 Kawhi is on the same level on defense as '16 Kawhi? Or '17 LeBron vs '16?

KG didn't suddenly become a GOAT defender in '08 but maybe not having to carry the offense had something to do with it allowing him to focus on defense?

[Gibson22]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

Do you think '17 Kawhi is on the same level on defense as '16 Kawhi? Or '17 LeBron vs '16?

KG didn't suddenly become a GOAT defender in '08 but maybe not having to carry the offense had something to do with it allowing him to focus on defense?

Yes, I think that kawhi is just a little bit worse, basketball is a practical thing. About Lebron, I think he in an exception because he is a situational player. Situational rebounder, situational defender. Even on offense he's samewhat situational

[BasketballFan7]

I don't have time to go in-depth, but my current vote, as was for number five, is for Hakeem Olajuwon.

My main reasoning for Hakeem over Wilt is that Hakeem is the more reliable of the two in a team-building situation. A team is more likely to be able to retain Hakeem for the entirety of his career, and Hakeem doesn't have the same character concerns as Wilt, even though I find those to be in all likelihood overblown. I also feel Hakeem is less reliant on coaching than Wilt, who was able to fill any role but had to be pointed in a specific direction. That said, this can be a negative as well because Wilt was able to change play styles and maintain impact late career whereas Hakeem didn't as easily transition away from volume scoring.

Vote #2: Wilt Chamberlain

[Xherdan 23]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

Do you think '17 Kawhi is on the same level on defense as '16 Kawhi? Or '17 LeBron vs '16?

KG didn't suddenly become a GOAT defender in '08 but maybe not having to carry the offense had something to do with it allowing him to focus on defense?

Yes, I think that kawhi is just a little bit worse, basketball is a practical thing. About Lebron, I think he in an exception because he is a situational player. Situational rebounder, situational defender. Even on offense he's samewhat situational

Well, if that's the case I guess Kobe being on 12 all-defensive teams is accurate because he had the ability to be a lockdown defender, doesn't matter that he didn't actually preform at elite level, only that he could if he wanted to.

[drza]

I can't believe that people don't believe that KG was an elite defender in 07. Was he a decent defender in 07, but somehow in 08, with an extra year of age, he became one of the best defenders in NBA history? That is not possible. No one improves that much defensively in their 30's.

Do you think '17 Kawhi is on the same level on defense as '16 Kawhi? Or '17 LeBron vs '16?

KG didn't suddenly become a GOAT defender in '08 but maybe not having to carry the offense had something to do with it allowing him to focus on defense?

RAPM gets a mixed response aropund here, so take this for what it's worth. But, Defensive RAPM is one approach that was not at all surprised that KG was the best defensive player of 2008...because according to DRAPM, he was the top impact defender of 2007 as well.

2007 DRAPM
1. Kevin Garnett
2) Erick Dampier
3) Dikembe Mutombo
4) Jarron Collins
5) Shane Battier

2008 DRAPM
1) Kevin Garnett
2) Chuck Hayes
3) Jermaine O'Neal
4) Dikembe Mutombo
5) Jarron Collins
( 6) Tim Duncan )

*It has been pointed out in this thread, that in 2006 and 2007, the Wolves without KG played at a -12 level

*It has been pointed out, in this thread, that essentially every rotation player on the 2007 Wolves (except then-rookie Randy Foye) was out of the league shortly after that season, not for age reasons

*I've pointed out that, by every publicly available quantitative approach I can think of (e.g. 3 different boxscore methods & +/-), 2007 Garnett had very arguably the worst supporting cast of any star player in history

--> DRAPM, which regresses an individual's presence on the court with changes in the team's scoring margin, indicated that Garnett was pulling HUGE defensive weight to get that team defense to average. As in, he was pulling more defensive weight than any other player in the NBA in 2007, just to get that mess of a cast to defensively average. There was (and is) a tendency to scoff at that notion, but then in 2008 his cast went from historically terrible to defensively solid, and he takes that level of cast to a historic defense. Again, with his presence correlating to the biggest positive defensive impact in the league.

Looking only (or even primarily) at global team results isn't necessarily the best way to evaluate an individual in cases when we have a lot more context and specific data to utilize to come to our conclusions. My quick 2 cents, anyway.