Moderators: Doctor MJ, trex_8063, penbeast0, PaulieWal, Clyde Frazier
ThaRegul8r wrote:C-izMe wrote:I'm voting Lebron 09.
Surprised he couldn't make the top ten.
Psst.
This is voting for the 10th highest peak of all time.
Meaning the top ten hasn't been set yet.
Which makes it odd that you would say it's surprising a player couldn't make the top ten when voting for the top ten is still ongoing. If this were the "#11 Highest Peak of All Time" thread, then the comment would be valid.
mysticbb wrote:Starting with game 57 and going to game 81. Well, we could remove 57 and 58 due to the fact the Thunder played those two games without a center. When Mohammed came in, they started to work much better.
The Bulls in 2012 were better than 2011. When they had their healthy starting lineup (Rose-Deng-Noah-Boozer) they had a +10 MOV. The Bulls-Heat battle would have been something to watch. I feel bad for the Bulls, they could have been 2peating, but Rose's injury messed that up.It just shows that the Thunder in 2011 were better against the league average than in 2012, and all while the league average in 2011 had a higher level than in 2012.
I would have really liked to see the 2012 playoffs with a healthy Rose and a Lamar Odom playing on the 2011 level (at least in comparison to the league average). I'm pretty sure the finals would have been Dallas Mavericks vs. Chicago Bulls instead. And I guess a lot of people would not think of James as being better in 2012 than in 2009. Just the simple fact that the Heat were worse in comparison to the league average in 2012 than in 2011 seems to be completely overlooked. And all that while the league average level of play dropped in a similar fashion as back in 1999.
That point wasn't talked about much last year. The lockout and injuries lowered the level of play in the NBA last season. The Heat in 2011 crushed a better 2011 Celtics in 5 games. The 2012 Celtics were worse and the Heat struggled vs. them. The 2011 Bulls and 2012 Thunder were on the same level. The Heat's competition in 2011 was stronger.A big part of him looking more "LeBron-like" was due to the league-wide drop in playing level while James stayed the same. He dominated inferior competition more in terms of production and efficiency. That made him the clearly best player in the league, but not per se better than in 2011. Also, James was more often in situations where he could succeed than in 2011, that added to his "better look". Play those 2012 Heat against the 2011 Mavericks and James looks worse again and the Heat would likely even lose in a more convincing way. Look at the teams the Mavericks beat in 2011 and compare that to the 2012 competition of the Heat. The Heat play a Knicks team in the first round with a banged up Baron Davis as their starting point guard and a banged up Amar'e Stoudemire. Then they play a overachieving Pacers team, which wouldn't been there, if Howard wouldn't have had the back injury. In the next round they get in trouble against an older Celtics team, which lost their best guard defender to an injury and has no backup point guard left. A washed up Ray Allen also causing chemistries problems, which lead to his departure, and yet, the Heat need 7 games to win against that 2.3 SRS team. In the finals they play against a OKC team which was actually worse against inferior competition than the 2011 version. And then we look at the Mavericks in 2011 beating two teams which are basically on the level of the 2012 Thunder (Blazers and Lakers) and two superior teams than anything the Heat saw in 2012 (Thunder and Heat). That is the reality here, and people seem to completely ignore that and just focus on the fact that James looked better against worse competition in 2012 while having the ball much more often in his hands than in 2011? Yeah, he better looks better than in 2011, if we don't want to claim that he actually declined.
Dr Positivity wrote:Vote 2012 Lebron
I think 2012 Lebron is a better player than the 2009 version for his extra offensive versatility (ie post game) but most of all for epic defense. I know 09 Lebron has great defensive RAPM scores but I'm not buying he's on 2012's Lebron's level on that end. Especially considering how in the playoffs, Lebron didn't guard Hedo or Lewis
So it really comes down to whether 09 Lebron was at a different level in the playoffs enough to make up for this. I'm semi-buying the idea that his ORL series stats could've been effected by the Magic playing a "Let Lebron get his, cover the rest" strategy, similar to like, Dwight Howard destroying the Hawks in the 2011 playoffs while that was exactly what ATL wanted to happen as long as the 3pt shooters got shut down
Dr Positivity wrote:I think 2012 Lebron is a better player than the 2009 version for his extra offensive versatility (ie post game) but most of all for epic defense. I know 09 Lebron has great defensive RAPM scores but I'm not buying he's on 2012's Lebron's level on that end. Especially considering how in the playoffs, Lebron didn't guard Hedo or Lewis
Dr Positivity wrote:So it really comes down to whether 09 Lebron was at a different level in the playoffs enough to make up for this. I'm semi-buying the idea that his ORL series stats could've been effected by the Magic playing a "Let Lebron get his, cover the rest" strategy, similar to like, Dwight Howard destroying the Hawks in the 2011 playoffs while that was exactly what ATL wanted to happen as long as the 3pt shooters got shut down
Dr Positivity wrote:Walton, KG, Dirk are all strong contenders soon. What do you guys think of Wade 06? His "weakness" is the regular season, but I care about playoff impact in regards to winning a title. And he basically has one of the greatest finals performances of all time + cut up the Pistons pretty well on the way to MIA's 3-1 lead
Dr Positivity wrote:Disagree about the Cavs having all the offense they needed. For example in the second half of G1 when the Cavs collapsed, arguably the key half of the series, they scored 43 pts. They scored 89 pts in Game 3 and 90 pts in Game 6. They went a combined 11 for 48 from 3 (22.9%) in Games 3 and 4 in ORL where they had to take a road game to avoid going down 3-1. The other Cavs and in particular Mo Williams sucked at hitting the open shots they were getting and it hurt them a lot.
As for Lebron's post game. I'm of the mind that having a post game as good as 2012 Lebron's and extra scoring versatility will help a team in any situation. Lebron was producing at such a ridiculous level offensively in that series that it's hard to blame him, but I do believe 09 Lebron having a post game would've made him an even better player
That reminds me of the people after the Suns lost to the Spurs, saying "see the Suns offense doesn't work in the playoffs when the game slows down!"Doctor MJ wrote:Dr Positivity wrote:Disagree about the Cavs having all the offense they needed. For example in the second half of G1 when the Cavs collapsed, arguably the key half of the series, they scored 43 pts. They scored 89 pts in Game 3 and 90 pts in Game 6. They went a combined 11 for 48 from 3 (22.9%) in Games 3 and 4 in ORL where they had to take a road game to avoid going down 3-1. The other Cavs and in particular Mo Williams sucked at hitting the open shots they were getting and it hurt them a lot.
As for Lebron's post game. I'm of the mind that having a post game as good as 2012 Lebron's and extra scoring versatility will help a team in any situation. Lebron was producing at such a ridiculous level offensively in that series that it's hard to blame him, but I do believe 09 Lebron having a post game would've made him an even better player
Let me clarify:
I'm not saying the Cavs had all the offense they could have ever needed. Nobody ever has that, and any time a team loses, you can point to things they could have done better on the offensive end.
What I'm trying to do is have people keep perspective. In a series where:
The team that loses outperforms expectations on offense by 4.6 points, because the other team outperforms expectations on offense by 10.0 points, it does not make sense to say, "See, the losing team's offense just didn't work when went up against strong defense."
Cleveland would have won this series in a landslide with this offensive performance if they had just been effective defense. It's as simple as that.
Of course this doesn't mean you can't critique LeBron's performance, but what I want you to avoid is a form of winning bias. Which to me that's what it is when someone nitpicks a player's offense after a loss when all general indicators show his offense to be more than adequate. Had the player's team won, people would have talked about LeBron's offensive performance as legendary, and to my mind, rightly so. This should not change simply because the Cav defense got torched.
colts18 wrote:
Let me clarify:
I'm not saying the Cavs had all the offense they could have ever needed. Nobody ever has that, and any time a team loses, you can point to things they could have done better on the offensive end.
What I'm trying to do is have people keep perspective. In a series where:
The team that loses outperforms expectations on offense by 4.6 points, because the other team outperforms expectations on offense by 10.0 points, it does not make sense to say, "See, the losing team's offense just didn't work when went up against strong defense."
Cleveland would have won this series in a landslide with this offensive performance if they had just been effective defense. It's as simple as that.
Of course this doesn't mean you can't critique LeBron's performance, but what I want you to avoid is a form of winning bias. Which to me that's what it is when someone nitpicks a player's offense after a loss when all general indicators show his offense to be more than adequate. Had the player's team won, people would have talked about LeBron's offensive performance as legendary, and to my mind, rightly so. This should not change simply because the Cav defense got torched.
Dr Positivity wrote:Disagree about the Cavs having all the offense they needed. For example in the second half of G1 when the Cavs collapsed, arguably the key half of the series, they scored 43 pts. They scored 89 pts in Game 3 and 90 pts in Game 6. They went a combined 11 for 48 from 3 (22.9%) in Games 3 and 4 in ORL where they had to take a road game to avoid going down 3-1. The other Cavs and in particular Mo Williams sucked at hitting the open shots they were getting and it hurt them a lot.
Doctor MJ wrote:Dr Positivity wrote:Disagree about the Cavs having all the offense they needed. For example in the second half of G1 when the Cavs collapsed, arguably the key half of the series, they scored 43 pts. They scored 89 pts in Game 3 and 90 pts in Game 6. They went a combined 11 for 48 from 3 (22.9%) in Games 3 and 4 in ORL where they had to take a road game to avoid going down 3-1. The other Cavs and in particular Mo Williams sucked at hitting the open shots they were getting and it hurt them a lot.
As for Lebron's post game. I'm of the mind that having a post game as good as 2012 Lebron's and extra scoring versatility will help a team in any situation. Lebron was producing at such a ridiculous level offensively in that series that it's hard to blame him, but I do believe 09 Lebron having a post game would've made him an even better player
Let me clarify:
I'm not saying the Cavs had all the offense they could have ever needed. Nobody ever has that, and any time a team loses, you can point to things they could have done better on the offensive end.
What I'm trying to do is have people keep perspective. In a series where:
The team that loses outperforms expectations on offense by 4.6 points, because the other team outperforms expectations on offense by 10.0 points, it does not make sense to say, "See, the losing team's offense just didn't work when went up against strong defense."
Cleveland would have won this series in a landslide with this offensive performance if they had just been effective defense. It's as simple as that.
Of course this doesn't mean you can't critique LeBron's performance, but what I want you to avoid is a form of winning bias. Which to me that's what it is when someone nitpicks a player's offense after a loss when all general indicators show his offense to be more than adequate. Had the player's team won, people would have talked about LeBron's offensive performance as legendary, and to my mind, rightly so. This should not change simply because the Cav defense got torched.
ElGee wrote:Dr Positivity wrote:Disagree about the Cavs having all the offense they needed. For example in the second half of G1 when the Cavs collapsed, arguably the key half of the series, they scored 43 pts. They scored 89 pts in Game 3 and 90 pts in Game 6. They went a combined 11 for 48 from 3 (22.9%) in Games 3 and 4 in ORL where they had to take a road game to avoid going down 3-1. The other Cavs and in particular Mo Williams sucked at hitting the open shots they were getting and it hurt them a lot.
"Collapsed?"
How can you say on one hand you are so affected by variance that you want to ignore in/out data, but then consider a 43-point half an offensive collapse? This is normal stuff, and as I've harped on before, 3-point "live-and-die" strategy is high variance. Since BOTH teams used this strategy, it explains why the scores throughout the series were so swingy without literally changing a thing about the narrative.
The Cavs scored 19 points on 21 3rd Q pos in G1 in what you call a "collapse." In that time they went 0-3 from downtown. If they made 1 (below season average) they would have scored 22 pts in 21 pos. THey also went 3-5 from the FT line (below season average). In the 4th Q they scored 24 pts in 22 pos (109 ORtg) before a 14 second final possession (such possessions are worth, on average, like 0.7 points). Meanwhile, Orlando was 6-11 from downtown in the second half.
I welcome anyone to explain WHY these blowout/comebacks were occurring (ball pressure, rotational breakdowns, one team started eating McDonald's?) because it just looks to me like open 3-point shooting differences. And that's what it looked like watching the games at the time.
Furthermore, this was a really close series. To view it as otherwise is just not right.
"Dr Positivity wrote:I should point out one of the reasons I am not that enthusiastic or invested in this project so far if I have a different method than the way 90% of the discussions have gone. I make my votes based on player skillsets. A player's playoff performance helps me evaluate what their skillset is in value for that year (ie Dirk getting a boost offensively because of how on he was as a shooter in 2011 playoffs). I am fine with people using a heavy, heavy statistical slant to their voting, but it's not how I'm making my votes. I am attempting to make votes based on which player (via their playoff performances) is fundamentally/through their skillset, the better basketball player, and right now I'm leaning towards 2012 Lebron being better than 2009 Lebron
bastillon wrote:"Dr Positivity wrote:I should point out one of the reasons I am not that enthusiastic or invested in this project so far if I have a different method than the way 90% of the discussions have gone. I make my votes based on player skillsets. A player's playoff performance helps me evaluate what their skillset is in value for that year (ie Dirk getting a boost offensively because of how on he was as a shooter in 2011 playoffs). I am fine with people using a heavy, heavy statistical slant to their voting, but it's not how I'm making my votes. I am attempting to make votes based on which player (via their playoff performances) is fundamentally/through their skillset, the better basketball player, and right now I'm leaning towards 2012 Lebron being better than 2009 Lebron
same thing here, I also make my picks based on skills and not raw numbers. but it's not like we're just bringing up stats, we're actually looking at context.
Dr Positivity wrote:I put value on polished skill and experience in playoff series because I believe this is harder to stop against the greatest playoff defenses, especially post play.
I believe there are plenty of examples of this throughout NBA history. Hakeem standing out in the playoffs and David Robinson/Karl Malone freezing is not a coincidence to me, I believe the latter 2 have tangible flaws in in their offensive game and versatility that helped defenses pick them apart, while Hakeem had his bag of tricks that teams couldn't do anything about. 2007 Dirk freezing and 2011 Dirk being unstoppable also has a tangible reason to me, 2011 Dirk's ability in the post made him basically unguardable.
I make my votes based on player skillsets.
Doctor MJ wrote:bastillon wrote:"Dr Positivity wrote:I should point out one of the reasons I am not that enthusiastic or invested in this project so far if I have a different method than the way 90% of the discussions have gone. I make my votes based on player skillsets. A player's playoff performance helps me evaluate what their skillset is in value for that year (ie Dirk getting a boost offensively because of how on he was as a shooter in 2011 playoffs). I am fine with people using a heavy, heavy statistical slant to their voting, but it's not how I'm making my votes. I am attempting to make votes based on which player (via their playoff performances) is fundamentally/through their skillset, the better basketball player, and right now I'm leaning towards 2012 Lebron being better than 2009 Lebron
same thing here, I also make my picks based on skills and not raw numbers. but it's not like we're just bringing up stats, we're actually looking at context.
When I here you guys say this, I half-expect you to be championing Melo next.
When we talk about the improvement of Dirk in relationship to LeBron let's keep some things in mind:
Against GS, Dirk looked like a boy against men, and his individual stats showed his impotence. THAT is what getting exposd looks like.
Against GS, Dallas fellow below expected performance on offense by 6.5 points. THAT is what getting exposed looks like.
LeBron by contrasted looked better individually than he'd ever looked before, and his team's offense was outperforming any reasonable expectation by a significant margin.
Any attempt to paint these two situations with the same brush...I simply can't fathom. The analogy being made is essentially, "Remember Dirk in '07? Yeah, that's what I see with LeBron in '09." I just don't understand it.
Now let's go a step further and talk about why Dirk's post play improvement was important. It wasn't that Dirk added a new way to score - remember he was shot less once he mastered this role - it was that Dirk's vision and decision making became so crisp that nobody could put baby in a corner. Commit too much to stopping Dirk the scorer, and his teammates would sink the open shot.
Back to LeBron then: In Cleveland, nobody was stopping LeBron the individual, so he didn't need a paradigm shift to keep himself from being stopped. Right there, it doesn't make sense to compare his situation to Dirk's, even if the team's offense was getting shut down...which it wasn't.
LeBron adopted a new focus in 2012 for a very different reason. The issue wasn't that he was getting stopped, but rather that he had teammates too talented to justify simply using them for the open jumper (in part because Wade's a superstar talent who really isn't a good shooter). From the beginning then, we're talking about different team weaknesses and different goals, and analogies should be made with great care.
When I here you guys say this, I half-expect you to be championing Melo next.
Against GS, Dirk looked like a boy against men, and his individual stats showed his impotence. THAT is what getting exposd looks like.
Against GS, Dallas fellow below expected performance on offense by 6.5 points. THAT is what getting exposed looks like.
Any attempt to paint these two situations with the same brush...I simply can't fathom. The analogy being made is essentially, "Remember Dirk in '07? Yeah, that's what I see with LeBron in '09." I just don't understand it.
Back to LeBron then: In Cleveland, nobody was stopping LeBron the individual, so he didn't need a paradigm shift to keep himself from being stopped. Right there, it doesn't make sense to compare his situation to Dirk's, even if the team's offense was getting shut down...which it wasn't.
LeBron adopted a new focus in 2012 for a very different reason. The issue wasn't that he was getting stopped, but rather that he had teammates too talented to justify simply using them for the open jumper (in part because Wade's a superstar talent who really isn't a good shooter). From the beginning then, we're talking about different team weaknesses and different goals, and analogies should be made with great care.
Quotatious wrote: Bastillon is Hakeem. Combines style and substance.