Variation in Supporting Casts

[Texas Chuck]

Glad to see the 06 Mavs make the worst list. I know I have attempted in a defense of Dirk to point out that the post-Nash, pre-Kidd teams didnt have a great deal of talent. The fit was better around Dirk obviously which helped a lot, but Dirk from 05-07 was beasting and carrying a pretty mediocre team. JHo is probably the only other guy on that team to be even an above-average starter at his position and even that's debatable. Damp was avg at best, JET was avg at best as a pg and guys like Daniels or Diop or Devin or Griffin werent even close. And Jerry Stackhouse and his 40% was the top reserve.

[ElGee]

@UBF -- No method is perfect, and clearly using unadjusted +/- has its flaws and is going to come with confounding results. I think the more important thing to glean from the results is the big picture, while certainly some teams will have results that aren't perfect by any means.

@Chuck and Colts -- remember, Colts asked for worst *of the best* teams.

The 06 Mavs did have a good supporting cast. It wasn't a great one. And it wasn't good by elite standards. But relative to the league, that cast (by this measurement) was still +1.0 standard deviations, which means that they were better than more than 80% of the Supporting Casts by this measurement.

IMO, both of those concepts are consistent with the team. Reinforced bigs. Wing defense. Self-creators. Terry was a good shooter. But obviously flawed and not ideal across the board. Good, but not great. And among "great" teams, not very good.

[Texas Chuck]

The 06 Mavs did have a good supporting cast. It wasn't a great one. And it wasn't good by elite standards. But relative to the league, that cast (by this measurement) was still +1.0 standard deviations, which means that they were better than more than 80% of the Supporting Casts by this measurement.

IMO, both of those concepts are consistent with the team. Reinforced bigs. Wing defense. Self-creators. Terry was a good shooter. But obviously flawed and not ideal across the board. Good, but not great. And among "great" teams, not very good.

Right its a good cast because of Dirk. He always a had true center to play next to him instead of a PF or more regularly pre Damp--a SF manning the other power position. A much improved defense with the bigs, JHo and Griffin on the wings and Devin a sizable upgrade from Nash at handling quick pgs. But talent wise not all that impressive and despite that cast supposedly being better than 80% of the league's I cant imagine that if you plucked the best player off of every team in the league in 06 that the Mavs would finish in the top 1/2 much less the top 20% of the league.

And thats always been my main argument in choosing Dirk over KG. Talent-wise little separates them and if anything I would give KG the nod. He's really good offensively and great defensively and Dirk is great offensively and adequate defensively. KG is more versatile on both ends when you take into account playmaking. Dirk is a good rebounder, KG a great one. But where Dirk wins out is his ability as a truly elite offensive anchor allows you to have some relatively weak supporting casts (I believe you mentioned he and Lebron have had the worst, correct?) and still succeed at a really high level. That and of course his PS performance where he always elevated his play against the tougher competetion and better defense you face in the PS.

[ElGee]

Supporting Cast of Superstars RAPM Era

Many players like Shaq played half this team period as a post-prime journeyman bouncing from team to team. For individual players, let's instead segment their different Supporting Casts by major team shifts. (NB that the average Supporting Cast in the league is -2.1 -- see the post at the top of the page for more detailed information.)



Summary: Many of the top players are widely considered to be secondary players (not the best player on the team), and as such have inflated "Supporting Casts" because the actual team star is part of the "cast" calculation. The first lead player we hit is Allen Iverson in Philadelphia, followed by Kobe Bryant's Gasol-Lakers. Some other general observations:

-Tim Duncan has basically never been on a bad team. By this metric, his career Supporting Casts lap the field. Here's how he looks if we include all years 2002-2012 when compared to the other clear No. 1 players:

Career 2002-2012
Duncan +2.5
Nash +1.1
Kobe +1.0
Dirk +1.0
LeBron 0.0
Garnett -0.1
McGrady -0.7
Wade -1.2
Paul -1.8

Dwyane Wade has had without a doubt the most hit-or-miss teams of the decade. Two title contenders with Shaq, then four absolutely dreadful teams, incluing a -10 (!), then two more title contenders. Ironically, the 2006 championship team was the worst SC of any title team in the period (-0.9) and the second-worst of any Finalist behind the 07 Cavs (-1.7).

Besides Duncan, Nash, Kobe and Dirk have been on the best teams.

As for nadirs, Wade's post-Shaq Heat, McGrady's Magic and Garnett's 05-07 Timberwolves take the cake. Per their reputations, those teams come out looking horribly. Kobe Bryant's post-Shaq years aren't far behind...which according to this measurement is what Paul Pierce had to suffer through for most of his career until Garnett arrived.

[colts18]

Here is Dirk's finals team vs. LeBron using the 08-11 RAPM study since it was more predictive than single year RAPM.

Overall:
Mavs: +11.9
Heat: +17.2 (+10 offense)

minus Dirk/LeBron:
Mavs: +6.4
Heat: +9.7

Using only 2011:
Mavs: +8.9
Heat: +10.1

Minus Dirk/LeBron:
Mavs: +2
Heat: +5.2

So by any measurement, Dirk won as a huge underdog.

[ElGee]

I don't understand what you're doing here. You are using RAPM from a season to determine how an individual played in a series?

[colts18]

I don't understand what you're doing here. You are using RAPM from a season to determine how an individual played in a series?

Im using RAPM to determine how much of an upset it was

[ElGee]

I don't understand what you're doing here. You are using RAPM from a season to determine how an individual played in a series?

Im using RAPM to determine how much of an upset it was

Do you think RAPM is a better indicator of team strength than SRS?

I don't think of the 2011 Finals as much of an upset -- the Heat were 4.5 pt favorites at home (barely above average) and dogs on the road in Dallas -- so I'm a bit confused as to your point.