Retro POY '97-98 (Voting Complete)

[Doctor MJ]

Okay, well let's go into the playoffs, where Jordan rises as he always does and Malone falters as he always does. Jordan: 32/5/4 on 55% TS. Malone: 26/11/3 on 53% TS. Jordan is better, but not to the extent that Malone was over the course of the longer regular season.

Here's the thing I'll say: I feel like when you judge players like this, you're judging them on a criteria that they themselves aren't aiming for. Jordan lifts his game in the playoff time every year because he paces himself to play his best to achieve the goal that he's been taught is most important.

I liken it to tennis (my apologies, no idea if you follow tennis at all). There are people who insist on heavily weighting doubles career when evaluating the best players. I love doubles - I wish the tennis community took it more seriously - but they don't. So it's kind of bizarre to judge a player based on a criteria that they are falling short on specifically because they've basically been told that it isn't a criteria they need to worry about.

This is not to say I advocate not factoring in the regular season, but when you consistently see guys go 2-1 in the regular season, and then 1-2 in the post-season, it's safe to say that that guy who was #1 in the regular season is the one who is unhappy with his results, not the guy who was #1 in the post-season.

[Sedale Threatt]

Fairly small gap? I think you're looking at the name in those stats before you're looking at the stats.

Yes. Other than the efficiency and rebounding -- both of which are expected considering Karl is a PF and Jordan is a SG -- I don't see significant gap.

[Baller 24]

Gongxi,

1) Scottie Pippen only played in 44 games throughout the season, the Bulls were 36 and 8 with Pippen, and 26 and 12 without him, also not so great in the playoffs.

2) David Robinson was good, but I think towards the end of the season (three months where Duncan started to take a lot more of the offense) showed who the better player was between Robinson and Duncan, and while it especially showed in the playoffs as Robinson's efficiency dropped by a significant margin. BTW, Spurs were 6-3 without Robinson.

3) Grant Hill didn't make the playoffs, I absolutely don't see a reason to why he should be up there, coaching switches that didn't necessarily help the team, just an off year for him.

[Gongxi]

That's fine, but I'm not ranking guys by who is the best in the postseason or who's the most happy with their year. I'm ranking guys by who was the best, November to June, with May and June being roughly double as important as any other months.

That's great if Jordan paced him self and turned it on and it worked out the best for the Bulls; it didn't work out the best as far as him being the best player that entire season, though. Two different things.

[Gongxi]

Fairly small gap? I think you're looking at the name in those stats before you're looking at the stats.

Yes. Other than the efficiency and rebounding -- both of which are expected considering Karl is a PF and Jordan is a SG -- I don't see significant gap.

Well, that's why people say go with the big over small. Because even though it's "expected", it's still better. Guards make it up through assists, usually. Jordan vis-a-vis Malone didn't.

[Sedale Threatt]

Well, that's why people say go with the big over small.

And in this case, they'd be utterly wrong.

[Gongxi]

Er...I think you missed my point. You just shrugged off scoring more efficiently and grabbing more rebound because "that's what bigs are supposed to do". Like it's not a huge mark in his favor. Well, it is. That's why bigs are seen as more important than perimeter players. It's not something to just gloss over, like it's some competition relative to the players themselves: "Yeah well Chuck usually bowls a 170, so today when he bowled a 150, I beat him with my 130! See, I usually bowl a 110!"

That's not what we're doing. We're not just dismissing rebounds and efficiency like that. Malone as a pretty sizable lead going into the playoffs, and the only reason you can discount that is by saying, like Doc is, that Jordan was coasting (I know he was, I watched every Bulls game that season) or just by looking at his name and assuming, well, production be damned, I know Jordan is better than Malone.

During the regular season of 1997-1998, he was not and that was pretty clear*. It all comes down to whether the difference in the postseason was enough to make up for it. Obviously, it was enough to propel the Bulls to the championship, but that's not the question. I know many people get those confused, and maybe people are taking this whole project to mean "Who would you want on your team for this year?" and in that case my vote would be Jordan. But that's not how I'm approaching this project. It's "Who was the best player that year?" for me.

More to the point, the Bulls won that series 4-2. Imagine some arguable calls went the other way, they could've easily lost 4-3. Now, honestly imagine that that happened- it definitely wasn't outside the realm of possibility. Does your vote change? If so, that means you should probably look deeper into your initial vote.

*In relation to the KG/Duncan, Kobe/McGrady/Carter, and Duncan/Shaq arguments we've had during this project, where there was very, very little statistically and sometimes even with team success to separate them.

[ElGee]

I figured looking at a few stats -- the legendary per possession box score summation of PER and our default "efficiency" measurement TS% -- that some people would conclude Jordan somehow wasn't the best player in the NBA in 1998. But then why was he so successful? Why did he "feel" like the best player from about December on?

First of all, I think people are clouded by the 98 Bulls success relative to the 96 and 97 Bulls, who were two of the most dominating teams ever (the top two SRS in the 3-point era). The 1998 Bulls still had an SRS of 7.24, good for 31st in the same time period and comparable to the 07 Suns and Mavs, the 96 Sonics, the 83 Sixers, the 02 Kings, the 02 Lakers and the 99 Spurs.

How does that reflect well on Jordan?

Scottie Pippen missed the first 35 games of the season!

Chicago struggled out of the gate but was 24-11 when Pippen returned. Longley, Kerr and even big body Jason Caffey missed large chunks of time. This was still a quality basketball team, elite when healthy, but it was hard for them to win without Jordan playing well when Pippen was out. In wins he shot .485%, in losses just .410%. He had a number of big games early in that season while ironing out some inconsistencies with his shot without Pippen for support, such as this game that somehow has a youtube highlight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkWm00nVorU. Jordan scores something like 28 points in the final 5 minutes of regulation and the two OTs. And yes, that's Rusty LaRue logging big minutes.

Jordan still provided elite defense (along with Brown and Harper he gave the Bulls the most successful defensive backcourt in the league that year: http://www.hoopsstats.com/basketball/fa ... /2/pts/1-1). He shouldered a larger offensive burden for the beginning of that season, and steadily ramped up his FG% as the season progressed.

Despite a TS% of just +.09% relative to league average, MJ was still quite efficient offensively because he rarely ever turned the ball over. Of players with a usage over 30, who played 25 mpg, Jordan had the 3rd lowest turnover rate of the 3-point era in 1998 (only bettered by Jordan in 97 and Jordan's 17 games in 95).

Despite the age and other injuries, the Bulls finished 36-8 with Pippen.

Then came the playoffs and he was even better. Jordan's WS/48 was the 11th best in the era, and we've only encountered three seasons in the project that have been better (09 James, 03 Duncan, 99 Camby). MJ's TS% jumped to .545 and his TO% decreased. Shaq and Grant Hill were the only candidates on my board who improved their TS% in the playoffs.

Then there's that G6 of the NBA Finals, with Pippen out nursing a sore back, but I think we all remember that...

So who had a greater impact on the league that year? Who was better? Malone and Shaq seem to be the only two within striking distance. Shaq missed 22 games. Malone, with a healthier team than Jordan, finished well below Chicago in SRS (5.73). Stockton missed 18 games and Utah was 11-7. And of course, there's the matter of Jordan having a better postseason than Malone.

This isn't a runaway, but I think I'd need someone to make a much stronger case for Malone.

[Doctor MJ]

That's fine, but I'm not ranking guys by who is the best in the postseason or who's the most happy with their year. I'm ranking guys by who was the best, November to June, with May and June being roughly double as important as any other months.

That's great if Jordan paced him self and turned it on and it worked out the best for the Bulls; it didn't work out the best as far as him being the best player that entire season, though. Two different things.

Well, just a specific scenario as food for thought: If you believe that by re-allocating his effort there's a scenario where Jordan loses the title but rates higher by your standards due to a superior regular season, I think there's a problem with that line of thinking. Now I'm not talking pure hypothetical here - I'm talking based on how you see Jordan's actual capabilities, so I'm not saying it's wrong to rate Malone at #1 as long he's far enough ahead that you're not punishing a player for valuing winning a title more than you do.

[ElGee]

Er...I think you missed my point. You just shrugged off scoring more efficiently and grabbing more rebound because "that's what bigs are supposed to do". Like it's not a huge mark in his favor. Well, it is. That's why bigs are seen as more important than perimeter players. It's not something to just gloss over, like it's some competition relative to the players themselves: "Yeah well Chuck usually bowls a 170, so today when he bowled a 150, I beat him with my 130! See, I usually bowl a 110!"

That's not what we're doing. We're not just dismissing rebounds and efficiency like that. Malone as a pretty sizable lead going into the playoffs, and the only reason you can discount that is by saying, like Doc is, that Jordan was coasting (I know he was, I watched every Bulls game that season) or just by looking at his name and assuming, well, production be damned, I know Jordan is better than Malone.

During the regular season of 1997-1998, he was not and that was pretty clear*. It all comes down to whether the difference in the postseason was enough to make up for it. Obviously, it was enough to propel the Bulls to the championship, but that's not the question. I know many people get those confused, and maybe people are taking this whole project to mean "Who would you want on your team for this year?" and in that case my vote would be Jordan. But that's not how I'm approaching this project. It's "Who was the best player that year?" for me.

More to the point, the Bulls won that series 4-2. Imagine some arguable calls went the other way, they could've easily lost 4-3. Now, honestly imagine that that happened- it definitely wasn't outside the realm of possibility. Does your vote change? If so, that means you should probably look deeper into your initial vote.

*In relation to the KG/Duncan, Kobe/McGrady/Carter, and Duncan/Shaq arguments we've had during this project, where there was very, very little statistically and sometimes even with team success to separate them.

I agree with this. I think it's clear Jordan was "better' (I'd rather have him). I also think that they're seasons were closer than you're making them out to be and MJ's postseason was a fairly convincing deal-breaker for POY.

[Doctor MJ]

Er...I think you missed my point. You just shrugged off scoring more efficiently and grabbing more rebound because "that's what bigs are supposed to do". Like it's not a huge mark in his favor. Well, it is. That's why bigs are seen as more important than perimeter players. It's not something to just gloss over, like it's some competition relative to the players themselves: "Yeah well Chuck usually bowls a 170, so today when he bowled a 150, I beat him with my 130! See, I usually bowl a 110!"

Eh, well the big reason why bigs are typically valued more than perimeter players is because of their ability to affect defense - something that doesn't really apply to Malone because even though he's a great defender, he doesn't impact the game defensively vastly more than a great defensive guard because he's not a great shotblocker.

On offense, you expect your big man to be a bit more efficient than your perimeter players because he shoots closer to the basket, but you also expect your big man to be less capable of taking over a game because he has to rely on perimeter players to get him the ball in a position where he can be extremely efficient. So if a perimeter player and a big man have similar volume and efficiency (and leaving rebounding out of this because that's a whole different conversation), the perimeter player is almost always the guy having a greater impact on the offense.

With that said, Malone's regular season efficiency advantage over Jordan this year is kinda huge.

[Gongxi]

That's fine, but I'm not ranking guys by who is the best in the postseason or who's the most happy with their year. I'm ranking guys by who was the best, November to June, with May and June being roughly double as important as any other months.

That's great if Jordan paced him self and turned it on and it worked out the best for the Bulls; it didn't work out the best as far as him being the best player that entire season, though. Two different things.

Well, just a specific scenario as food for thought: If you believe that by re-allocating his effort there's a scenario where Jordan loses the title but rates higher by your standards due to a superior regular season, I think there's a problem with that line of thinking. Now I'm not talking pure hypothetical here - I'm talking based on how you see Jordan's actual capabilities, so I'm not saying it's wrong to rate Malone at #1 as long he's far enough ahead that you're not punishing a player for valuing winning a title more than you do.

If he played as the best player for the vast majority of the sample size we're looking at? Yes, I'd call him the best player. Winning championships simply does not register in my criteria. I don't care about team accolades when comparing individual players. Are there some shortfalls in this? Certainly. They are eclipsed, though, by the pitfalls it avoids, like Ben Wallace being considered the fifth best player in 2004, or Garnett suddenly swooping into become the best player at the end of his prime, or Tim Duncan seeming to miraculously become a better player in the years the Spurs win the title and in the years where they do not, he's curiously not quite as good as a player.

You're basically asking that if Jordan played better than Malone throughout the regular season but ended in him falling short in the playoffs, if I would rank him higher. By definition, I would: he would've been playing better than Malone, whom I have first right now. I also would if he just plain played better than Malone and still happened to win a ring.

If the Suns happen to win the WCF and then in the Finals Amare dominates Dwight defensively and averages 40/20/7, I'm not going to suddenly elevate him over many other players because, for all we know, he managed to 'turn it on' at the end. I'm basing players off their whole season.

[lorak]

Gongxi,

1) Scottie Pippen only played in 44 games throughout the season, the Bulls were 36 and 8 with Pippen, and 26 and 12 without him, also not so great in the playoffs.

With Pippen they were much better: .820% vs .680% without Pippen. That’s like difference between 56 wins team (without Pippen) and 67 wins team (with Pippen), so from very good Bulls became great with Pippen. Well, I just calculated efficiency differential (that’s better than wins percentage) for games with and without Pippen:
6.2 without Pippen
9.7 with Pippen – that’s amazing result, only about 5 teams in history were so good.

BTW, Spurs were 6-3 without Robinson.

I don’t want to be rude, but so what? It’s very small sample size, besides, for example in 2000 Spurs also played good when Duncan missed 8 games. Bottom line is that in 1998 Robinson was significantly better defender than Duncan and also slightly better offensive player: better efficiency (.581 TS% to .577 TS%) with much better PER: 27.8 to 22.6! In playoffs Robinson’s efficiency drop offs but he still was overall better than Duncan (better PER, WS and WS/48 with some amazing results like 6.0 BLK% and 21.2 TRB% to only Duncan’s 12.8 TRB%).

[ronnymac2]

I don't know why people are having a hard time with Gongxi's selection. He has explained this same criteria and logic in multiple threads and has been consistent about it. Based on that criteria, I'd say Malone certainly does rank higher than MJ this season.



Duncan vs. Robinson is THE COMPARISON in this thread imo. This is the last year where Robinson's production is staggering. I don't really like Robinson as a player because I feel his greatness is tied too much to simply being productive as a player as opposed to really effecting a game, and since his style of play allows for his production to decline in the playoffs, I think less of him as a player. That said, I have to question if rookie Duncan can impose his usual effects on a game as well.

This is the problem I have with even all-time great rookies. They turn the ball over a lot. Their defense can be very good, but they still have much to learn on that side of the ball. Besides the actual turnovers, their passing and ability to read defenses is usually immature. Also, understanding where to take over in games is usually not there yet. Ability to adapt to physical play (or any change in play) is still being learned.

These guys aren't the same players they will be in their primes, or even their second year.

So while I value prime Duncan's game over prime Robinson's, I think 98 Robinson is still very much in his prime, whereas Duncan isn't really close to his prime yet, despite the 21/12/2 with very good defense.

Against Utah, they lost to a slightly better team. Karl Malone was the best player on the floor at this point. Robinson, as usual, failed to produce points when it mattered, but Duncan didn't exactly raise his level of play either. And unlike just about any other prime Tim Duncan year, he couldn't effect a game as much when his shot wasn't falling or it was a slow, slug-it-out series. He's a rookie. He obviously learned. I think I'll take Robinson this year over Duncan. I like Robinson's defense over Duncan's, and I don't think Tim has enough of an offensive advantage to make it up. I'm not even sure if he's a better offensive player this year.



Shaq's team having a good record in the regular season without him should take away from him in the MVP race, not the POY race. That makes very little sense.

[Doctor MJ]

Duncan vs. Robinson is THE COMPARISON in this thread imo. This is the last year where Robinson's production is staggering. I don't really like Robinson as a player because I feel his greatness is tied too much to simply being productive as a player as opposed to really effecting a game, and since his style of play allows for his production to decline in the playoffs, I think less of him as a player.

Your thoughts on the drastic turnaround when they first got Robinson, when Robinson got hurt, and when Robinson returned? Not saying it was all due to Robinson, but it seems pretty that he was impacting W-L pretty strongly.

[NO-KG-AI]

I think I have it like this for now:

1) Michael Jordan
2) Karl Malone
3) Shaq
4) Gary Payton
5) David Robinson

Shaq would be 2 if he played more games.

Thought Payton had a really good year this year.

[ElGee]

^^^Ronny, I think for a myriad of reasons, Robinson goes ahead of Duncan here. You pointed out many of them accurately. My question is, can anyone else jump ahead of Duncan? Payton perhaps?

Individual DRtg is a ballpark stat and has to be looked at in context, but it's actually fairly decent at approximating defensive impact when I compare that with other metrics or film breakdown. Robinson's was 94, Duncan's was 95. That jives with the idea that Robinson was a little better than TD defensively that year, and that rookie Duncan was still having a large impact. Those Spurs were still devastatingly good at defending the paint.

[ElGee]

I think I have it like this for now:

1) Michael Jordan
2) Karl Malone
3) Shaq
4) Gary Payton
5) David Robinson

Shaq would be 2 if he played more games.

Thought Payton had a really good year this year.

Can you elaborate on Payton?? I have him on the cusp. He had great team success. Solid numbers. I don't have the strongest memory of that 98 team, but Vin Baker played quite well in replacing Kemp.

[NO-KG-AI]

TEam won more games than they should have IMO, and Payton went up across the board by a lot in the postseason. I just don't feel like Duncan was THAT good as a rookie to lead a team like Payton did, and then get better in the post season.

[Dr Positivity]

Just a note on the rebounding difference. It's not as simple as just saying 10 vs 6. You have to compare it to the replacement player at that position. An average SG will grab 3-4 rebounds while an average PF will grab 8-9. Jordan and a 8rpg PF and Malone and a 4rpg SG both come out to 14rpg combined. I wouldn't call Malone's rbs a significant advantage in this case. 10.3 a game is good, but not amazing compared to most PFs