Peak Project #15

thizznation · Post #21 » by **thizznation** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 6:28 pm

theonlyclutch wrote:
thizznation wrote:
theonlyclutch wrote:
You have got to be kidding me..
2009 Heat: 107.8 (-0.5)
2010 Mavs: 109.2 (+1.6)

That's a pretty significant difference to me....

Marion was also taking significantly more offensive usage in his time on the Mavs than in the Heat...

2011 Wade on-court ORTG: 115.1 (+7.8)

Respectable, but what happens when Dirk had two good offensive players around him? (With the rather unrealistic implication that Mavs Nash + Finley=Lebron + Bosh on offense)

2001 Dirk on-court ORTG: 109.4 (+6.4)
2002 Dirk on-court ORTG: 114.6 (+10.1)
2003 Dirk on-court ORTG: 113.7 (+10.1)
2004 Dirk on-court ORTG: 113.9 (+11.0)

That's a pretty substantial difference right here...

You cherry picked a Wade that was not in his prime and that had to adjust to a new team with redundant skillsets that makes the team's talent level look overstated on paper rather than how it functions on the actual court. Giving Dirk a multi year representation where he was able to build upon team chemistry year after year where Wade only gets one year where he had to undergo major changes of roster is also extremely unfair.

Wade wasn't in his prime in 2011? In any other thread he get mentioned as a definite top 5 player that year and now he's not in his prime?

The point is, it's way easier to find a team with redundant skillsets by adding Wade to it than by adding Dirk to it, this isn't something that can just be waved away.

Wade had a higher PER in 2012 than in 2011, he had a year to adjust to his teammates, and yet, his oncourt ORTG is now:
110.7 (+6.1)

No, Wade was not in his prime in 2011.Wade was not the same physically due to multiple injuries. The second is not even debateable.

Then you take a multi-year of Dirk in his early and mid 20's, and compare it with one year of Wade in his 30. When the closest year to 2011 of Wade's prime that has been suggested is in 2009.

Look, I'm on board with you about Wade having a more redundant skill set than Dirk, it's more common to find Wade-lites than Dirk-lites I guess you could say. The thing is you don't have to portray unfair and biased statistics to support your point.

Dr Spaceman · Post #22 » by **Dr Spaceman** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 6:41 pm

Ballot will be the same as last time:

1. Stephen Curry
2. Dirk Nowitzki

For the 3rd ballot I am probably going West again, although I want to see arguments for CP3 and Durant, and especially vs. each other. I said in the previous thread that I think 2015 is Paul's peak (for non-box reasons so take that for what it's worth).

So yeah, West Paul and Durant are the guys I'm considering at 3. I think if Oscar is on people's ballots West should at the very least be in the conversation. I saw the Kobe comparison made- they're really just different players, stylistically. West was far more Curry- lead ball handler with the constant creeping three of him launching off the dribble with that lightning release. Keep in mind he played in an era without the 3 ball- we know unequivocally he had that range but when he shot from there it only counted as 2. This is something you need to consider when looking at his efficiency.

ElGee's WOWY data is in my Google Drive here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cFY3Qk8eLJo8_bKK0z4k8K-A3UpwQRGOCAsrSuUeQl0/edit#gid=2089101043

West's scores top Robertson's; in fact I came away from looking at that data thinking "West was the 2nd best player of the 60s", even over Wilt.

There's a lot of context to discuss with West, so I hope to see lots of productive discussion to hash it out. For one thing, the Baylor situation hampered his stats for years and years. He was completely capable of scaling up his volume- look at the freaking 69 Finals: 38/7/5 with a 42 point closeout game. Absurd.

There's also the fact that multiple people have called him the best defensive guard who ever played- hell, Bill Russell called him the greatest defensive player in the league. I don't want to tear open a wound- but if we're okay going off Erving's rep as an elite defender we have to at least consider that West was an elite perimeter defender. He was also a PG, and posted great assist #s- I just think he was a lot better offensive player than Kobe.

Also- Nowitzki has the 10th higher score on Elgee's WOWY, food for thought

Dr Spaceman · Post #23 » by **Dr Spaceman** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 6:45 pm

Clyde Frazier wrote:
Quotatious wrote:
How about Barkley and Karl Malone, guys? I haven't seen anyone mentioning them yet, but they may be worth looking at, at this point in the project.

Yup, edited my first post in this thread earlier as i had thought about it, too. Dirk vs. the 2 of them would be a good discussion.

Here's my thing with Barkley: Even if we accept his offense is on par with Nowitzki, his defense is quite bad. I think he was a negative on that end throughout his prime.

Here's my thing with Malone: He wasn't close to Nowitzki as an offensive player.

Post #24 » by **Clyde Frazier** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 6:58 pm

Dr Spaceman wrote:
Clyde Frazier wrote:
Quotatious wrote:
How about Barkley and Karl Malone, guys? I haven't seen anyone mentioning them yet, but they may be worth looking at, at this point in the project.

Yup, edited my first post in this thread earlier as i had thought about it, too. Dirk vs. the 2 of them would be a good discussion.

Here's my thing with Barkley: Even if we accept his offense is on par with Nowitzki, his defense is quite bad. I think he was a negative on that end throughout his prime.

Here's my thing with Malone: He wasn't close to Nowitzki as an offensive player.

Hmm… i’ll put it this way: I don’t think barkley was necessarily a defensive liability. By defensive liability i mean guys like amare, boozer, david lee, etc. Would you pick 90 or 93 as his peak?

As for malone, it’s always been about volume, longevity and durability with him, so I really haven’t looked into his peak nearly as much as the other 2. I can certainly see an argument for him peaking lower than the other 2.

E-Balla · Post #25 » by **E-Balla** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:16 pm

The-Power wrote:I actually don't know what you're arguing right now. You seem to realize Curry's impact on the ORTG, so for obious reasons he also has an impact on the players' efficiency. The 111.6 is, by the way, slightly misleading if we take it at face value because of the distrubution of minutes due to the dominance of the Warriors. And I don't feel like discussing pure guesses here, that's pointless.

It wasn't a complete guess. Dray and Klay without Curry had a 107 ORTG which is where I got that upper boundary from. Hard to separate Bogut and Harrison as they almost exclusively played with Curry on the floor.

Anyway, some notes:
- if by 'a ton of great playmakers' you mean three or four players with above average playmaking for their position (Iggy, Green, Bogut and Livingston, although that's not a given), sure. But neither is a 'great playmaker' aside from maybe Iggy and all of them have major flaws in their scoring game which hasn't been exposed that much because of how good Curry runs the show.

I'd call Bogut and Iggy great playmakers. Livingston and Dray are merely "good" but my overall point was that even without Curry they still have passers.

- two very good scorers? Still calling Lee a good scorer makes it look like you ware asleep for quite some time now. After he completely lost his midrange-jumper somewhen in 2014 he wasn't a good scorer by any means. Also you can't say 'Lee was hurt half the year' and then walk on to fully include him in a hypothetical scenario without Curry.

He averaged 18/9 on 57 TS% in 2014 even without his jumper. Also he wasn't fully included but I was just saying he was there and for about half the season they'd have him.

- some shooters? Well, Klay and Curry are obviously great but other than that the team isn't blessed with shooters at all. Barnes can only shoot open corner threes which he get due to playing with this team an Curry, Iggy can't really shoot, Draymond is a below-average shooter for the amount of threes he takes, Livingston has no range whatsoever, Bogut can't shoot at all, Barbosa certainly isn't known for his shooting, Lee lost his jumper completely and this leaves us with Speights, who had a career-year in terms of shooting from 10-16ft (guess why, the answer is already somewhere in this list).

Barnes is a 37% 3 point shooter. Yes Curry helps get him open but he can still make his shots. Iggy is a career 33% shooter from deep. I wouldn't call that can't really shoot when league average is 34-35%. Draymond shoots 34% from deep which like you said is below average but he's a PF. No matter how you cut it that's good for a PF (look at Paul Millsap). Barbosa is a career 39% from deep. Also why mention Speight's shooting from 10-16 when he takes way more 16-23 foot jumpers and he's one of the best bigs in the L with that shot? IDK how to describe these guys outside of some shooters. I never said great shooters and I never said a lot of them but they aren't the Bobcats out there.

- I also fail to see the players who we know are certainly better than this year with Curry suggests. Speights wasn't, Livingston wasn't really, Lee is washed up, Barbosa made a huge leap last year compared to the years before and Iggy wasn't more efficient during his prime.

Speights benefitted majorly from Curry no disagreement there. Livingston had a better season last year in Brooklyn (where he averaged 9/4/3 on 54 TS as a starter) which is why I said that he's shown himself to clearly be better than the 51 TS% he had minus Curry. Lee isn't even close to washed up. Being sent to the bench and being given a smaller role doesn't make you washed up and his per 36 stats and Finals performance in the only 2 games he played proves that. Barbosa is a strange case but he still produced without Curry on the floor which again shows it's the coaching and his role. Iggy wasn't much more efficient but he was the best player on a 57 win team the year before going to Golden State and he's still one of the top 15 SFs in the league.

If you want to argue that without Curry the offense drops from best in the league (had Curry played regular minutes, otherwise second best) to league-average (which is what 105-107, your guess, is) then we're not even far off. But we seem to look at the impact in a different way because the difference from top to average is absolutely huge.

Well look at Nash's offensive impact where the Suns went from GOAT level to average without him on the floor. Look at the 88 Lakers going from slightly above average in the games Magic missed to ATG level in the games Magic played. Look at the Royals with and without Oscar from 68-70 in a quarter of a season combined time (7.8 SRS change most of that impact probably offensive). I think you might be underestimating the impact we usually see from the GOAT offensive candidates.

Some fun numbers from the RS:

Player - TS% with Curry on-court - TS% with Curry off-court
Livingston - 62.6 - 49.8
Iguodala - 55.8 - 53.0
Bogut - 57.8 - 42.3
Lee - 54.3 - 53.3
Green - 53.2 - 59.2
Barnes - 57.8 - 54.6
Ezeli - 61.9 - 51.0
Thompson - 59.7 - 54.1
Barbosa - 56.1 - 55.6
Speights - 57.3 - 51.5

Aside from the outlier Green is, I don't know how someone can look at this and don't see incredibly huge impact. It shouldn't be possible.

But the problem is that I don't think overall the team is a 102 ORTG team without him. Then you look at the individual players and Green is an outlier but IMO it shows his efficiency is not tied to Curry, Bogut has a whole career without Curry where he was never close to 42 TS% and he barely played without Curry, and Livingston (like I said before) was even better prior to this season overall so I don't think Curry is making him efficient (also where did you get your numbers because NBAWOWY has different numbers than this... unless I included the postseason in the query...).

The reason why the offense was great had, in my book, more to do with Curry's abilities. You simply can't run a system like the Warriors did with Wade or McGrady as the lead guys and expect it to be this successful - and frankly I don't believe you can run any system with them as the main guys and expect them to be as successful as a Curry-run system with comparable talent.

Here's where we disagree. I think T-Mac's scoring in 03 at least was spectacular and as a passer he's one of the GOAT SGs if not the GOAT. Wade is tougher but his ability to slash and hit midrange jumpers in the postseason makes him deadly as a postseason centerpiece for a team with a ton of shooters/post threats.

E-Balla wrote:No, that's definitely wrong. Curry had freedom under MJ, true, but that's true for basically every player - even when that means icnredibly inefficient offense like frequently posting up Barnes. This led to the fact that Curry had less offensive supremacy than he has under Kerr. It remains true that this season has been the first season in which Curry could lead an offense which is predicated on his strengths - and it was brillant.

You are 100% right but at the end of the day Curry was the PG and Curry had the ball. If the coach isn't taking control IMO it's the PGs job to do it. You don't have to (like I don't take points from Lebron for not controlling the whole team offense in Miami) but guys like Magic, Bird, and Nash did do that and it benefits them in a h2h comparison.

I don't believe T-Mac was nearly the scorer Curry is, he also was a worse playmaker. I have no other to believe that TMac - as great as he was - could have even come close to what Curry did with the Warriors. Curry's impact goes far beyond the box-score and I can't say the same about McGrady.

Why don't you believe TMac is nearly the scorer CUrry is? TMac in both the regular and postseason was at 32 ppg on +4 TS% compared to league average and he had a +10 ORTG in the postseason (+12 in the regular season). Curry with a better team in the postseason was at 28 ppg on +7 TS% compared to league average and a +9 ORTG. I understand if you think Curry has a better non boxscore impact scoring the ball (like I do) but with Tracy's superior playmaking IMO (honestly I see no signs of great playmaking from Curry. He struggles with double teams and traps, throws waaay too many passes that get picked off, and misses way too many open men under the rim in semi-transition ala Tyreke Evans. I wouldn't put him over Jeff Teague as a passer) and defense (I'm sure you can agree here) the argument in my eyes is Curry's gravity/shooting edge vs Tracy's passing and defensive edge.

E-Balla · Post #26 » by **E-Balla** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:19 pm

Quotatious wrote:
RebelWithACause wrote:Yeah, hardly productive because the DrJ crew wasn't really able to counter anything that he was critiqued of.

It's funny because I could say the same thing about the anti-Dr J crew - all you guys did was talk about his NBA career, and draw conclusions based on that, when things could be different in his '76 season. I understand that we don't have the same data for his '76 ABA season, but for this exact reason, I don't see why anyone would speak with the kind of conviction you did, that he was supposedly the same player in '77 as he was in '76, but his competition was just stronger in '77 so he looked worse impact and stats wise. I'm still not buying that argument. Well, none of us should speak with conviction (no matter which side each person is on) about his '76 season as none of us saw a lot of footage of his game from that season.

RebelWithACause wrote:We even had scouting reports like yours, calling him the defensive anchor with great help D and initimidation factor, when Spaceman and I both said we hardly ever saw someone with such a bad off-ball focus, not in the right place, with bad man to man defense.

I got the same impression when I watched the '77 finals (I mean bad man to man defense), but his help D was somewhere between very good to great in that series, so he was still at least average defensively, overall, but again - this is based on something that happened a year after the season we all considered his peak ('76), and considering that defensive effort from superstars tends to vary far more than their offensive output, from one season to another (look at Shaq or Kobe, for example), and you really can't judge it if you didn't watch a player on a consistent basis (we can rely on stats to evaluate offense to a FAR greater degree than we can rely on them to evaluate defense, I think we'll agree about that).

I don't agree here at all the Dr. J was a good defender in 76. Average is more like it. He wasn't even seen as a good defender back then...

Post #27 » by **Clyde Frazier** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:36 pm

I'm all over the place now, but throwing one more out there... thoughts on 03 mcgrady vs. 14 durant? Is durant's efficiency edge in the reg season the clear difference maker here, or is it more up for debate? I can see mcgrady having the case for being the slightly better all around player that year.

Post #28 » by **Quotatious** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:50 pm

Clyde Frazier wrote:I'm all over the place now, but throwing one more out there... thoughts on 03 mcgrady vs. 14 durant? Is durant's efficiency edge in the reg season the clear difference maker here, or is it more up for debate? I can see mcgrady having the case for being the slightly better all around player that year.

They're extremely close - slight edge to Durant for RS because he played 6 more games (their numbers and impact was pretty much equal, so I think this is a good tiebreaker), but as I've already mentioned earlier, I really think that McGrady was better against strong defenses, so I'd give him the edge, overall. Durant is the better scorer (but it's close, and KD's edge in terms of efficiency is smaller when you adjust for league average), better rebounder (also fairly close), McGrady is the better playmaker, ball-handler and post-up player, defense is about equal. McGrady had to create a lot more of his offense, while Durant got more assisted shots. Very similar players overall.

I wouldn't really argue if someone preferred KD, but personally, I'd take T-Mac. For what it's worth, I think McGrady's efficiency would've gone up if he played in 2014, Durant's efficiency would've gone down if he played in 2003.

Dr Spaceman · Post #29 » by **Dr Spaceman** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:57 pm

Clyde Frazier wrote:
Dr Spaceman wrote:
Clyde Frazier wrote:
Yup, edited my first post in this thread earlier as i had thought about it, too. Dirk vs. the 2 of them would be a good discussion.

Here's my thing with Barkley: Even if we accept his offense is on par with Nowitzki, his defense is quite bad. I think he was a negative on that end throughout his prime.

Here's my thing with Malone: He wasn't close to Nowitzki as an offensive player.

Hmm… i’ll put it this way: I don’t think barkley was necessarily a defensive liability. By defensive liability i mean guys like amare, boozer, david lee, etc. Would you pick 90 or 93 as his peak?

As for malone, it’s always been about volume, longevity and durability with him, so I really haven’t looked into his peak nearly as much as the other 2. I can certainly see an argument for him peaking lower than the other 2.

I take 93 as Barkley's peak. I guess "liability" is the wrong term- your right, it's not like teams were going out looking to take advantage of him. Still, though, I think he had a negative effect on his teams, and even a small negative effect is still super important when we're talking about players who are peaking in the top 20. I assume it's the reason Nash isn't being seriously discussed now, despite him being at worst roughly equal to Curry's offensive impact, and at best the GOAT. FWIW, I have Nash>Barkley offensively and Barkley>Nash defensively. Compared to Dirk, who I think teams actually benefitted from his presence, and Malone, who I actually consider a real plus defender, he falls well short.

Re: Malone, the thing with him is that his raw production is outstanding, but not materially better than Dirk's (Dirk was more efficient), but when you consider everything else Dirk brings to an offense I just see a decent sized gap forming, although admittedly Malone's passing could close it to a degree depending on how one feels about it.

E-Balla · Post #30 » by **E-Balla** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 8:08 pm

Quotatious wrote:
Clyde Frazier wrote:I'm all over the place now, but throwing one more out there... thoughts on 03 mcgrady vs. 14 durant? Is durant's efficiency edge in the reg season the clear difference maker here, or is it more up for debate? I can see mcgrady having the case for being the slightly better all around player that year.

They're extremely close - slight edge to Durant for RS because he played 6 more games (their numbers and impact was pretty much equal, so I think this is a good tiebreaker), but as I've already mentioned earlier, I really think that McGrady was better against strong defenses, so I'd give him the edge, overall. Durant is the better scorer (but it's close, and KD's edge in terms of efficiency is smaller when you adjust for league average), better rebounder (also fairly close), McGrady is the better playmaker, ball-handler and post-up player, defense is about equal. McGrady had to create a lot more of his offense, while Durant got more assisted shots. Very similar players overall.

I wouldn't really argue if someone preferred KD, but personally, I'd take T-Mac. For what it's worth, I think McGrady's efficiency would've gone up if he played in 2014, Durant's efficiency would've gone down if he played in 2003.

I don't just think KDs efficiency would drop but I think it would plummet. Physical defenses own him so imagine a league where handchecking is allowed and every game is a slowed down 90-88 slugfest.

Post #31 » by **Quotatious** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 8:09 pm

Dr Spaceman wrote:I take 93 as Barkley's peak. I guess "liability" is the wrong term- your right, it's not like teams were going out looking to take advantage of him. Still, though, I think he had a negative effect on his teams, and even a small negative effect is still super important when we're talking about players who are peaking in the top 20. I assume it's the reason Nash isn't being seriously discussed now, despite him being at worst roughly equal to Curry's offensive impact, and at best the GOAT. FWIW, I have Nash>Barkley offensively and Barkley>Nash defensively. Compared to Dirk, who I think teams actually benefitted from his presence, and Malone, who I actually consider a real plus defender, he falls well short.

viewtopic.php?t=1344019

This thread may be helpful if we're talking about Barkley.

Dr Spaceman wrote:Re: Malone, the thing with him is that his raw production is outstanding, but not materially better than Dirk's (Dirk was more efficient), but when you consider everything else Dirk brings to an offense I just see a decent sized gap forming, although admittedly Malone's passing could close it to a degree depending on how one feels about it.

Wouldn't Malone get a clear edge on defense, too? I mean, he wasn't a defensive anchor like a Hakeem, Robinson or Ewing, not even close, but he was one of the best 1 on 1 defenders in the post, and he was great in terms of denying the ball, or getting steals, against opposing bigmen, because of his very quick hands. Admittedly, lack of shotblocking ability hurts him, but he was definitely more impactful on D than Nowitzki was.

*I'm not really trying to argue for Karl as a better player than Dirk, actually I'm leaning towards Nowitzki for the exact reason you mentioned (his non-boxscore offensive impact), but these are just some things to consider.

Which year do we even take as Malone's peak? If we take '92, then playoff decline is not a problem, but he wasn't the same passer as he became in the mid/late 90s, and probably worse defensively, too. If we take '97 or '98, we have RAPM (always nice to have more data rather than less, obviously), but he didn't sustain his RS level of play in the postseason (to me that's a pretty big deal here).

Dr Spaceman · Post #32 » by **Dr Spaceman** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 8:17 pm

Quotatious wrote:
Dr Spaceman wrote:I take 93 as Barkley's peak. I guess "liability" is the wrong term- your right, it's not like teams were going out looking to take advantage of him. Still, though, I think he had a negative effect on his teams, and even a small negative effect is still super important when we're talking about players who are peaking in the top 20. I assume it's the reason Nash isn't being seriously discussed now, despite him being at worst roughly equal to Curry's offensive impact, and at best the GOAT. FWIW, I have Nash>Barkley offensively and Barkley>Nash defensively. Compared to Dirk, who I think teams actually benefitted from his presence, and Malone, who I actually consider a real plus defender, he falls well short.

viewtopic.php?t=1344019

This thread may be helpful if we're talking about Barkley.

Dr Spaceman wrote:Re: Malone, the thing with him is that his raw production is outstanding, but not materially better than Dirk's (Dirk was more efficient), but when you consider everything else Dirk brings to an offense I just see a decent sized gap forming, although admittedly Malone's passing could close it to a degree depending on how one feels about it.

Wouldn't Malone get a clear edge on defense, too? I mean, he wasn't a defensive anchor like a Hakeem, Robinson or Ewing, not even close, but he was one of the best 1 on 1 defenders in the post, and he was great in terms of denying the ball, or getting steals, against opposing bigmen, because of his very quick hands. Admittedly, lack of shotblocking ability hurts him, but he was definitely more impactful on D than Nowitzki was.

*I'm not really trying to argue for Karl as a better player than Dirk, actually I'm leaning towards Nowitzki for the exact reason you mentioned (his non-boxscore offensive impact), but these are just some things to consider.

Which year do we even take as Malone's peak? If we take '92, then playoff decline is not a problem, but he wasn't the same passer as he became in the mid/late 90s, and probably worse defensively, too. If we take '97 or '98, we have RAPM (always nice to have more data rather than less, obviously), but he didn't sustain his RS level of play in the postseason (to me that's a pretty big deal here).

Re: Malone, are we sure he gets off from the playoff drop if we go with 1992? I mean it was a consistent pattern throughout his career, and so I think those who place an emphasis on skill set have to factor in that he for one reason or another (I have my reasons but he's not in the conversation yet) he seemed to not be able to do his thing consistently in the playoffs.

Post #33 » by **PaulieWal** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 8:33 pm

Ballot #1 - Wade 09

I think this was Wade's best season overall when you compare the offensive and defensive load he carried. The team he carried also had almost no consistency and I think was clearly one of the worst supporting casts for a star ever. I don't even need to say anything, I will just leave this here (full credit to SSB):

Spoiler:

Four Factors

Spoiler:

Dwyane Wade

Spoiler:

----------------------------------

Miami was able to run a +7.5 offense with Wade playing out of his mind like that.

Ballot #2 - CP 08

Am I crazy or did CP have even a better RS in 09? The only difference is that in 08 his playoffs were on another level too with 12.3 BPM and nearly 31 PER. His defense wasn't as good as it is today but he clearly had the feel for the game and in some ways I think he didn't play as controlled offensively as he plays now.

PS. I am very interested in some of the Wade vs. Curry vs. KD vs. Kobe opinions. I feel very strongly here that Wade had a superior peak though the gap isn't huge by any means.

For my 3rd ballot here I am looking at KD, Curry, Kobe, Dirk, and T-Mac.

Edit: I am open to moving CP down and putting in a ballot for someone else with some good logic.

drza · Post #34 » by **drza** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 8:57 pm

My first two votes will most likely go to Oscar and Dirk again. After that I'm wide open, at the moment. There's a lot of good discussion going on, but for some reason I'm feeling like it's time to start discussing Kobe more seriously as well. Because honestly, I have his peak above Durant's, who's already getting mention here

toodles23 · Post #35 » by **toodles23** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:27 pm

Dr Spaceman wrote:I take 93 as Barkley's peak. I guess "liability" is the wrong term- your right, it's not like teams were going out looking to take advantage of him. Still, though, I think he had a negative effect on his teams, and even a small negative effect is still super important when we're talking about players who are peaking in the top 20. I assume it's the reason Nash isn't being seriously discussed now, despite him being at worst roughly equal to Curry's offensive impact, and at best the GOAT. FWIW, I have Nash>Barkley offensively and Barkley>Nash defensively. Compared to Dirk, who I think teams actually benefitted from his presence, and Malone, who I actually consider a real plus defender, he falls well short.

Re: Malone, the thing with him is that his raw production is outstanding, but not materially better than Dirk's (Dirk was more efficient), but when you consider everything else Dirk brings to an offense I just see a decent sized gap forming, although admittedly Malone's passing could close it to a degree depending on how one feels about it.

What seperates '93 Barkley from '89-'91 to you?

Post #36 » by **Clyde Frazier** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:33 pm

Quotatious wrote:viewtopic.php?t=1344019

This thread may be helpful if we're talking about Barkley.

Do you have dipper's thread handy where they did a manual sample of barkley's pts in the paint? I will try to find it later if you don't.

[or someone else for that matter, thanks]

Dr Spaceman · Post #37 » by **Dr Spaceman** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:36 pm

toodles23 wrote:
Dr Spaceman wrote:I take 93 as Barkley's peak. I guess "liability" is the wrong term- your right, it's not like teams were going out looking to take advantage of him. Still, though, I think he had a negative effect on his teams, and even a small negative effect is still super important when we're talking about players who are peaking in the top 20. I assume it's the reason Nash isn't being seriously discussed now, despite him being at worst roughly equal to Curry's offensive impact, and at best the GOAT. FWIW, I have Nash>Barkley offensively and Barkley>Nash defensively. Compared to Dirk, who I think teams actually benefitted from his presence, and Malone, who I actually consider a real plus defender, he falls well short.

Re: Malone, the thing with him is that his raw production is outstanding, but not materially better than Dirk's (Dirk was more efficient), but when you consider everything else Dirk brings to an offense I just see a decent sized gap forming, although admittedly Malone's passing could close it to a degree depending on how one feels about it.

What seperates '93 Barkley from '89-'91 to you?

Pretty big improvement in his jumpshot, coinciding with more willingness to take it- especially on a catch and release type thing to make defenses pay attention and stay close.

I don't know how much is improvement, per se- but he was clearly more involved as an initiator in Phoenix's offense and it was something he did fantastically well. 93 was his peak as a playmaker, and while it came with a more perimeter focused game and thus less ORB, I think the shooting (3s as well as midrange) and playmaking more than make up for this.

93 was also his best playoff run, and he led that team to better offensive results than any he had previously. I think this season was him at his most capable as an offensive anchor, although increased primacy reduces his portability a bit.

EDIT: Forgot to mention effort was obviously at a peak this season (first on a new team). This matters a great deal with him, and his playoff defense in particular was better than we had seen or would see again.

70sFan · Post #38 » by **70sFan** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:46 pm

Project become more and more interesting. Unfourtanetly, I don't have enough time to be more active on disscusions.
Anway, here my choices:
1st ballot - Oscar Robertson 1963/1964
2nd ballot - Jerry West 1966
3rd ballot - Dwayne Wade 2009/2006

I'm happy that Dr J won in last thread, he deserves it.
I explained my choices in earlier threads. After this 3 I don't know who should I vote. I think right now in cinversation are:
PG - Chris Paul (his defense gives him edge over Nash and I think he is more portable and well-rounded player than Curry)
SG - Tracy and Kobe (though I think he shouldn't be as high
SF - Durant, (Baylor and Barry around Kobe level, also Arizin should be really high)
PF - Dirk (strong candidate for next thread), Barkley (I don't think he is really worse than Dirk, he become overlooked in this project), Petit and Malone slightly behind
C - Moses (I want to see debate about Dirk vs Moses, he is also strong candidate for next 3rd ballot), after him Ewing and later Howard, Gilmore, Reed and others

mischievous · Post #39 » by **mischievous** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:50 pm

Ballot 1: 2009 Dwayne Wade. Regular season stats: 30.2/5/7.5/ 2.2 spg/1.3 blk 57.4 ts%, 30.4 PER. The only players with a higher PER in nba history are MJ, Lebron, Shaq, Wilt, AD, and David Robinson. Still respectable in his playoff series, although back spasms limited him to some degree, still did roughly 29/5/5 on 56.5 ts% 26.3 PER. Wade was a great defender in 09, made 2nd team defense, 3rd in DPOY, elite help defender, very good man defender, excellent shot blocking for a guard. Team success often hurts Wade when it comes to this season but i think sometimes people fail to realize how bad his team was. Wade's best teammate was a Rookie Beasley who averaged 13.9 ppg, after that he had 27 games from a washed up Jermaine Oneal, then half a season from a banged up past prime Shawn Marion.

Wade had a ridiculous 13 game stretch that year where he averaged 37.2 ppg 5.9 rpg 10.4 apg 2.9 spg 1.4 bpg 55.3 fg%. This is certainly one of the greatest stretches of basketball played by anyone.

Ballot 2: 64 Oscar. Excellent offesive force, could volume score on very efficient levels era wise, great playmaker, one of the best rebounding guards the game has seen.

Ballot 3: 03 Tmac. I'll add some info on Tmac in a bit. This ballot is more subject to change than the 1st 2. I'm pretty confident with Wade and Oscar as my first 2.

urnoggin · Post #40 » by **urnoggin** » Tue Sep 29, 2015 9:57 pm

1st ballot: '15 Stephen Curry
2nd ballot: '64 Oscar Robertson
3rd ballot: '08 Kobe Bryant

Haven't seen a case made for Kobe, so here it is:

RS: 28.3 ppg, 6.3 rpg, 5.4 apg, 1.8 spg, 3.1 tov on 57.6 TS%, 115 ORtg, 105 DRtg, 0.208 WS/48, 5.4 BPM, 6.0 VORP, +7.0 on/off

Great regular season by Kobe where he won MVP and lead a revamped Lakers team to a 57-25 record and a 7.34 SRS. Impressively, the Lakers went 30-16 before the acquisition of Pau with a roster that was largely similar to the ones in 2006 and 2007 where they were beaten in the first round. After the trade with Pau, the Lakers go 27-9 to get the first seed in the West. As a player, Kobe shot less in 2008 (compared to the previous two seasons) and improved his efficiency and playmaking. Was still an elite scorer consisting of an amazing post game and midrange shot, the best three point shooting of his career (36.1% on 5.1 attempts per game), and the ability to finish well (63.7 FG% from 0-3 feet). Defensively, he wasn’t at his peak, but he was a good, above average defender in 2008. Still had to potential to be elite on that end for possessions at a time when he was dialed in. Advanced stats aren’t super impressive but I think that Kobe’s impact and value isn’t fully shown with numbers. While he is inefficient compared to other superstars (which hurts his advanced metrics), his offensive versatility puts a lot of added pressure on the defense; something that is hard to quantify.

PS:
vs Nuggets (4-0): 33.5 ppg, 5.3 rpg, 6.3 apg, 1.5 spg, 2.8 tov on 59.4 TS%
vs Jazz (4-2): 33.2 ppg, 7.0 rpg, 7.2 apg, 0.8 spg, 4.0 tov on 62.9 TS%
vs Spurs (4-1): 29.2 ppg, 5.6 rpg, 3.8 apg, 1.6 spg, 2.4 tov on 58.5 TS%
vs Celtics (2-4): 25.7 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 5.0 apg, 2.7 spg, 3.8 tov on 50.5 TS%

Kobe was dominant in the first two series against the Nuggets (10th best defense in the league) and the Jazz (12th best defense in the league). However, it wasn’t until the WCF that Kobe gave an MVP-worthy performance against an elite defense (Spurs had the 3rd best defense in the league). Here is a summary of each game in the series. Overall, Kobe proved to be very clutch (3 good/great 4th quarters and 1 bad one) and comes through when his team needs.

WCF (vs Spurs)

Game 1: Lakers are down 65-45 in the middle of the third quarter when Bryant and Gasol lead them back. Kobe scores 25 in the 2nd half (14 in the 4th quarter) and hits the go-ahead shot with 23.9 seconds left.
Game 2: Blowout for Lakers
Game 3: Blowout for Spurs. Kobe puts up a valiant effort in the 4th quarter (hits 3 threes in a row at one point) to try and lead the Lakers to a comeback but the deficit is too large.
Game 4: Lakers win by 2. Had a decent lead (7-9 pts) with about 4 min remaining but the Spurs comeback and fall just short. Poor 4th quarter by Kobe.
Game 5: Lakers win by 8. They start the 4th quarter with a 4 point lead and Kobe plays brilliantly to lead the Lakers to a 8 point win.

4th quarter stats
Gm 1: 14 pts, 3 reb, 1 stl, 6/10 FG, 0/1 3PT, 2/2 FT in 12 min
Gm 2: 2 pts, 1 ast, 1/1 FG, 0/0 3PT in 3 min
Gm 3: 12 pts, 1 tov, 4/7 FG, 4/6 3PT, 0/1 FT in 6 min
Gm 4: 6 pts, 1 reb, 1 stl, 3/9 FG, 0/0 3PT in 10 min
Gm 5: 17 pts, 1 reb, 6/11 FG, ½ 3PT, 4/4 FT in 12 min
Totals: 51 pts, 5 reb, 1 ast, 2 stl, 1 tov, 20/38 FG, 5/9 3PT, 6/7 FT in 43 min
per 36 (4th quarter only in WCF): 42.7 pts, 4.2 reb, 0.8 ast, 1.7 stls, 0.8 tov on 62.1 TS%

This was done with a great defender, Bruce Bowen (All-Defensive 1st team in 2008), being the primary defender on Kobe. Not much of a facilitator in the 4th quarters of this series but Kobe significantly raised his scoring volume and efficiency while taking very good care of the ball. Sometimes Kobe’s clutch ability gets overrated but in the 2008 playoffs and especially this series, Kobe was extremely clutch and elevated his game when his team needed it.

So Kobe absolutely dominated the Western conference in the playoffs in 2008. In the Finals, against one of the GOAT defenses (2008 Celtics), Kobe had a subpar series. It wasn’t absolutely terrible though (LeBron in 2011 Finals or Kobe in 2004 Finals) and had good games in game 2 and 3 (30/4/8 and 36/7/1 respectively) and an okay game in game 5 (25/7/4 and 5 stls). He could’ve played better in the Finals, but I don’t think his performance warrants too much criticism, since Boston was obviously the better team (9.30 SRS) and had a historically elite defense.

Why I think ’08 Kobe > ’08 Paul:

Kobe is obviously on another tier as a scorer (+7.2 ppg), on the exact same efficiency (both logged 57.6 TS%). Paul is obviously way better as a playmaker (+6.2 apg) and has a very slight edge defensively. Neither guy peaked defensively in ’08, but Paul has slightly better defensive metrics. However, I think that Kobe had the potential to be more of an elite defender than Paul for possessions at a time. Kobe had more size and was still pretty athletic and could put the clamps down on almost anyone when he was focused. Kobe’s problem was that he didn’t concentrate too much on the defensive end and he also felt the need to conserve energy for offense. Kobe was a better rebounder (+2.3 rpg) but it’s not a big factor when comparing two guards. In the playoffs, both players clearly elevated their games to a new level. Kobe was better vs the Western conference but had a bad series vs the Celtics in the Finals. For Paul, he played well vs the Mavs and the Spurs but had he faced the Celtics, it’s probable that he would’ve seen the same statistical drop-off as Kobe did. Ultimately, Paul is the better playmaker/passer and defender (arguable) while Kobe is the better rebounder and scorer. As both players were first options on their teams, I think Kobe (since he was a much greater scorer) was slightly better and more valuable to his team because he had the ability to impact the game more in close situations (see Spurs series). Kobe is a much better iso and post scorer while Paul mainly scores off of PnR. It’s easier for a defense to corral someone off a PnR than on an isolation or a post-up where the defender has to deal with Kobe one on one. Obviously, I’m only evaluating scoring because that’s the most important part of being an offensive anchor (which both were). Paul undoubtedly makes his teammates better but Kobe’s primary focus was to score (along with the ability to be an above average playmaker when he wanted to).