Retro Player of the Year 1950-51 — George Mikan

[OhayoKD]

Not sure I'm going to be voting in the early threads where the primary arguments are going to revolve around(historian voice) second-hand sources, but I am pretty impressed with the level of argumentation and insight offered by those who are considering the circumstances.

[Owly]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

So starting from substantial uncertainty given lack of data ... minutes especially ... ("option" status may be contingent on minutes ... Manu is third option by rs ppg for most of his best years) ... but more broadly as well.


"Double the shot volume" (not quite, and Wanzer getting to the line relatively more) ... but your words and not totally wildly out ... Davies 15.9ppg, Wanzer 12.5ppg. And this is of course because Wanzer is vastly more efficient. I'm not, otoh, perfectly au fait with whether so quirk of free throw rules could be part of it (in the only one FT attempt era that could hurt a guy but doesn't seem to be what's happening here). But it ends up as a pretty large gap (and a relatively smaller scoring one).

It drives a WS gulf. Now that's a number that tilts (too) heavily on shooting efficiency and is working with a less complete boxscore. But WS is one thing we have and we can just as well play ...
"how often does the playoff WS leader, OWS leader and also champion [with or without "and a hall of famer"] not get credit for being a 'top impact guy'".

The efficiency gap isn't as striking with Risen ... but my guess is that it opens up a bit more if you curve for position. The top few shooters of the early to mid 50s are mostly centers e.g. Groza, Johnston, Mikan, Share, Foust and many of those names top the ppg charts too.

Then broader picture, for whatever it's worth, depending on how much reputation and outside years are affecting priors...
Wanzer is a HoFer, has some recognition (including for a long time at the HoF, and at one time in an Official NBA Encyclopedia) as an MVP and has a career playoff PER of 21.4 ... with (off WS and OWS) perhaps his two best PER numbers ('50 is a tiny sample, affecting how much it would alter a career number and how reliable it is and making rounding more of an issue, but it's his best OWS/game ratio) and one weaker one missed. I'm not sure how many fourth or fifth options put up that number or have his historical status/accolades.

It feels like the "you can't win with Jokic" argument. "We haven't seen anyone this bad defensively at starter C win since ...". As though NJ wasn't a crazy outlier among centers for net productivity and the ratio of which end his value comes and/or these two things.

Even if you are sure he's a 4th/5th option (minutes unknown, playoff clearly 3rd in ppg) a "this isn't normally probable" argument comes up against the fact that Wanzer isn't close to "normal" for that archetype.

As before, limited info, depends how much one tilts playoff ...

[Dutchball97]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

I get where you're coming from but I fail to see how shot volume is the biggest indication of how impactful they were. Like obviously I'm putting forward Risen as he might have legit been the most important player for the Royals on both sides of the court this season but much like the previous seasons' voting I don't really get the love for Davies. Like I know Davies was who the offense was technically built around but just that doesn't seem to be an argument for many of the high volume, low efficiency players we're going to be seeing through the years either so why is it different now? It's true Davies has nearly double the field goal attempts of Wanzer in the play-offs (16,7 to 8,6) but is that all that impressive when it only leads to about 3.5 more PPG (15,9 to 12,5)? Even in terms of assists Davies is barely ahead of Wanzer and Coleman this time around.

And I know WS isn't the best indication of a player's impact but can it really be ignored when Coleman has double the WS in the play-offs as Davies? Not to even speak about Wanzer, Johnson and Risen all having 2+ WS, while Davies was stuck on 0.8. A lot is pointing to Davies being considered the star of the team but I'm not seeing a lot of reasons for why he actually was the most impactful player on the Royals this season.

[Djoker]

VOTING POST

Not to say that every accolade ever given out has been foolproof; a few throughout history have been awarded blatantly incorrectly and a larger number are at least debatable. Still, I always exercise a great deal of caution when I'm ranking players completely differently than how contemporaries of that era did. For example if player A is 1st Team All-NBA and player B is not on either All-NBA team, I would be extremely cautious about ranking player B over player A even if statistics, team results etc. seem to warrant it. There could be and in fact, there probably is more to the story. Pertaining to this particular thread, I'd be extremely cautious ranking Wanzer or Johnson over Davies for that exact reason.

Player of the Year

1. George Mikan - He built so much separation in the regular season that I don't see how anyone else surpasses him. Led the league in scoring at 28.4 ppg (2nd place is 21.7 ppg), 2nd in rebounding at 14.1 rpg, 19th in assists with a healthy 3.1 apg and 5th in efficiency with 50.9 %TS (+8.1 rTS). Also very likely the best defender in the league with the Lakers finishing 1st in DRtg. In the playoffs he gets injured and outplayed by Groza but actually wins that series and then loses to the eventual champs. Though his numbers are down he still puts up 24.0/10.8/1.3 on 47.7 %TS (+4.9 rTS) in the postseason. There is big gap in individual level of play between Mikan and everyone else so not winning the title brings him down from unanimous to strong favorite.

2. Arnie Risen - Best player on the title winning team in the playoffs. Averaged 16.3/12.0/2.4 on 47.5 %TS (+4.7 rTS) in the regular season and then went up to 19.5/14.0/2.4 on 45.7 %TS (+2.9 rTS) in the playoffs. He's also a very real defensive presence so while he was the second most impactful Royal offensively after Davies, he had the biggest overall impact on his team.

3. Bob Davies - Offensive engine of the Royals. 1st Team All-NBA. Averaged 15.2/3.1/4.6 on 45.7 %TS (+2.9 rTS) in the regular season then 15.9/3.1/5.2 on 41.2 %TS (-1.6 rTS) in the postseason. Not a fan of his efficiency or else he would probably be #2 instead of his teammate Risen.

4. Dolph Schayes - Fantastic all-around player. 2nd Team All-NBA. Averaged 17.0/16.4/3.8 on 46.8 %TS (+4.0 rTS) while leading the league in rebounding and then took it up a notch in the playoffs with 20.4/14.6/2.9 on 53.7 %TS (+10.9 rTS). His team lost a tightly contested division finals in which he was the standout player.

5. Alex Groza - Second best C in the league. 1st Team All-NBA. Averaged 21.7/10.7/2.4 on 55.2 %TS (+12.4 rTS) in the regular season and was the most efficient player in the league by some distance although at much lower volume than Mikan. In the postseason he had a monster 3-game series outplaying Mikan but putting up 32.3/14.0/0.7 on 55.4 %TS (+12.6 rTS). Still his team lost in the 1st round and did nothing of note despite having real talent including another 1st Team All-NBA Ralph Beard.

HM:

Ed Macauley - Slightly worse than Groza and similar circumstances. Nice stats but no team results to speak off and defense also problematic. 20.4/9.1/3.7 on 55.1 %TS (+12.3 rTS) in the regular season then 22.0/9.0/4.0 on 51.1 (+8.3 rTS) in the playoffs.

Bob Cousy - He didn't make it as a rookie but starting from 1951-52 he's making my ballot. He just gets too good offensively thanks to his playmaking impact. He probably wins a bunch of OPOY in the coming years.

Paul Arizin - Like Cous, likely to feature on future lists.

Offensive Player of the Year

1. Bob Davies - Very good playmaker lifting his whole team on the offensive end.
2. Alex Groza - He's just too efficient scoring the ball that he takes it over Mikan.
3. George Mikan

Defensive Player of the Year

1. George Mikan
2. Ernie Risen
3. Harry Gallatin - He's the best defender on a Knicks team that makes the Finals.

[Dr Positivity]

Vote

1. George Mikan - Too much defensive advantage over everyone else and his over .50 efficiency for the time is pretty good for his volume

2. Ed Macauley - He is a better passer than Groza while having a similar scoring profile, a worse defender than Schayes but has much better scoring numbers this year between volume/efficiency, and the latter's team isn't better for once.

3. Dolph Schayes - Much like the last thread, Schayes just seems more well rounded than Groza

4. Alex Groza - His playoff stats are great in small sample, but overall his short tenure in the NBA make him seem more stats than winning to me.

5. Arnie Risen - I vote Risen as the most significant Royal, he was their top scorer all year including in the conference finals he scored 18ppg while Davies was at 13ppg and 26%, while having the Mikan assignment, and in the finals he shined again with a 22/14. Then being their main rebounding and presumably positive on defense.

Offensive player of the year

1. Ed Macauley
2. Alex Groza
3. George Mikan

Defensive player of the year

1. George Mikan
2. Nat Clifton
3. George Senesky

[eminence]

So I know this is something you've been itching to see more discussion on, and now is probably the time to do it.

Key anchor points for me:

1. The Olympians were made from scratch using the Kentucky Wildcat core - including the coach who wasn't Adolph Rupp but merely one of the players, and not one of the two big stars (Groza & Beard). Hence, whatever success the team had in their first year ('49-50), I don't think it makes sense to try to knock it as some kind of a system product that overrated its players. So when they do come right in and have a successful team season in their first year, to me that's utterly legit for '49-50 level play.

I agree it shouldn't be seen as some form of 'system' setup. I'm not surprised Barker was chosen as the coach/seen as the leader, eldest by a meaningful margin, had certainly seen the most of life (1.5 years as a POW in WWII...). I do think them being labeled 'successful' in season 1 is in significant part due to the overexpansion of the first NBA season. By the standards of the very next season I feel they were a pretty average team. Average is impressive for a team of young guys, but I don't see '50 as a homerun from the franchise.

2. In '51-52, after the scandal breaks, the team is extremely different from what it had been before, including a new coach who probably was the most powerful person on the team. Schaeffer, it should be noted wasn't simply a member of the champion Lakers previously, but was the team captain and was known as the guy on the team - more so than coach Kundla - who would actually stand up to Mikan.

3. In '51-52, the offense doesn't actually improve relative to the league. The leap forward came on defense.

To me this paints a story of a collection of players who previously didn't focus on defense as much as they might have, and a new (legit) coach coming in and tightening up the ship.

Much credit to Schaeffer here, it does seem (in '52 at least) he got great defensive buy in (there's pretty convincing evidence from various coaching +/- type studies that coaches can have a similar level of impact as defensive superstars). I agree with you that it wasn't so much a lack of talent on defense previously but a lack of focus - unsurprising for a team headed by guys unused to the pro ranks. Groza has a decent length interview from Sport Magazine where he talks about defending Mikan (I believe it's from the end of the '49-'50 regular season), and I remember reading through it thinking how little of it actually talked about defense - a lot of time was spent focusing on how to wear Mikan out on the other end, and how him individually outscoring Mikan was a 'win' (which it kinda is and the Olympians did actually win the game he was referencing, but I'm worried it shows a bit of shortsightedness in regards to team goals).

But - that still doesn't explain why the Olympians went from an elite offense in their first year to a below average offense in their 2nd year when they still had all their Kentucky guys.

Possibilities?

1. The NBA got better, and specifically got more used to the Kentucky approach.
2. Some kind of injury or health thing.
3. The boys heard the footsteps of the law stalking them. While the Kentucky players didn't get arrested until just before the '51-52 season, the scandal itself really broke during the '50-51 season and these guys knew full well they had done the same stuff that others were being arrested for.

I won't claim to know the answer.

In terms of this project, it's hard to know what to do with Groza. Him volume scoring on obscene efficiency was the focal point of a) Kentucky's national championships in college, b) Team USA's Gold Medal, and c) the Olympians great offensive first season, so do we really have reason to say that he's some kind of "empty stats" guy? I'm not comfortable saying that.

Statistically, he continues to have a strong case for being OPOY this year on his own. Team-wise, he sure doesn't. How do we square this circle?

Not sure, but something I will point out is a dramatic shift in his teammates TS Add.

In '49-50, Groza had a +377.4 TS Add while his teammates had +9.5.
In '50-51, Groza had a +321.0 TS Add while his teammates had -427.0

Whatever happened to the team's offense, it would seem to have a lot to do with his teammates becoming less effective in the second year. Maybe they were the one's that all got worse. Maybe defenses realized that they could let Groza go off and still win if they just focused on stopping the rest of the guys.

On the last, this is of course something of a known basketball phenomenon. Mikan & Wilt both had issues where they themselves put up huge numbers and their teammates looked terrible. In the case of Mikan, they seemed to find a balance that worked well enough without totally changing Mikan's role, but "well enough" might be the key word there as unlike Wilt's Warriors, Mikan's Lakers didn't have to top Russell's Celtics to win titles.

I'm not aware of any #2 situation, but I can certainly see a balance of #1/#3, I'll also propose a #4. The franchise was built for Beard/Groza, they got all the accolades, they got all the scoring glory, and as a duo were very clearly the Alpha/Omega of the team offensively. I wouldn't be overly surprised if the 'help' got a bit tired of their jobs and didn't give 100%. It doesn't happen in every situation - the best stars/leaders get buy-in, but Walther/Barnhorst/Lavoy all look like reasonable pros going forward, and them all struggling to be efficient next to Beard/Groza doesn't reflect well on the stars (whether it was more of a leadership issue or an on court situation where Beard/Groza were monopolizing all the easy counting stats I have no idea).

Overall I come down much harder on Beard of the two. With few exceptions it's the guards on-court job to get the teammates involved in good positions on offense. Beard failed at that part of the job in '51. Could Groza have done more, maybe, but he did seem to hold up his end of the bargain as an elite play finisher. I am still slightly less impressed with Groza this season than last, and the competition has stepped up, so I'm not sure of him getting onto my ballot.

Any input on the Lapchick Knicks? I know he'd be winning my COY vote for several of these seasons, but I struggle to see any of the players in particular on a POY level.

[eminence]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

I get where you're coming from but I fail to see how shot volume is the biggest indication of how impactful they were. Like obviously I'm putting forward Risen as he might have legit been the most important player for the Royals on both sides of the court this season but much like the previous seasons' voting I don't really get the love for Davies. Like I know Davies was who the offense was technically built around but just that doesn't seem to be an argument for many of the high volume, low efficiency players we're going to be seeing through the years either so why is it different now? It's true Davies has nearly double the field goal attempts of Wanzer in the play-offs (16,7 to 8,6) but is that all that impressive when it only leads to about 3.5 more PPG (15,9 to 12,5)? Even in terms of assists Davies is barely ahead of Wanzer and Coleman this time around.

And I know WS isn't the best indication of a player's impact but can it really be ignored when Coleman has double the WS in the play-offs as Davies? Not to even speak about Wanzer, Johnson and Risen all having 2+ WS, while Davies was stuck on 0.8. A lot is pointing to Davies being considered the star of the team but I'm not seeing a lot of reasons for why he actually was the most impactful player on the Royals this season.

High volume/moderate efficiency players are often less impactful than high volume/high efficiency players. Very rarely are they less impactful (offensively) than meaningfully lower volume players, nearly no matter the efficiency gap (and only scoring efficiency at this point in time). Go look at any mid term APM type study, who are the players coming out on top offensively? It's the high volume guys time after time.

I can always ignore Winshares, approximately equal predictive power with Minutes * Team SRS at this point in time as of my last check.

[Doctor MJ]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

I get where you're coming from but I fail to see how shot volume is the biggest indication of how impactful they were. Like obviously I'm putting forward Risen as he might have legit been the most important player for the Royals on both sides of the court this season but much like the previous seasons' voting I don't really get the love for Davies. Like I know Davies was who the offense was technically built around but just that doesn't seem to be an argument for many of the high volume, low efficiency players we're going to be seeing through the years either so why is it different now? It's true Davies has nearly double the field goal attempts of Wanzer in the play-offs (16,7 to 8,6) but is that all that impressive when it only leads to about 3.5 more PPG (15,9 to 12,5)? Even in terms of assists Davies is barely ahead of Wanzer and Coleman this time around.

And I know WS isn't the best indication of a player's impact but can it really be ignored when Coleman has double the WS in the play-offs as Davies? Not to even speak about Wanzer, Johnson and Risen all having 2+ WS, while Davies was stuck on 0.8. A lot is pointing to Davies being considered the star of the team but I'm not seeing a lot of reasons for why he actually was the most impactful player on the Royals this season.

So chiming in here:

1. I think it's important to recognize when there was a clear-cut decision maker that was both leading the offense and the focus of the opposition's defense. Doesn't mean I rank his offense above others, but it's something to bear in mind.

2. When we bear this in mind, we should also factor in a) was this offensive approach working? and b) do we see clear cut signs of the clear-cut decision maker making bad decisions such as calling his own number way too much.

So was it working? Yes, the Royals continue to be the best offense in the league yet again working through Davies.

Was Davies actually inefficient? Not relative to the league. He has positive TS Add this year just as he does in every year of his career.

Now, given that we know that basketball players would become more efficient going forward, there is room to consider the argument, "Sure he was efficient compared to his own era, but he was inefficient compared to his teammates so he should have passed it more."

Additionally, it makes sense to ask: "Is it possible that a teammate (like fellow Seton Hall guard Wanzer) was nearly as good of a creator for others as Davies?"

If Wanzer could have taken over for Davies without a playmaking disadvantage, and he could have done this while also scoring more efficiently, then it makes sense to argue he was the superior player.

But I don't see evidence for this. Reputation aside, Wanzer literally never leads his team in assists in his entire pro career. It's Davies all the way until '54-55, and then the following year he isn't just behind bigger minutes guys in assists, he's behind a guy like Jack McMahon. Perhaps that was a mistake by the coach...which of course, was Wanzer.

So I see Wanzer as a pretty classic shooting guard who recognized that he needed to play with point guards.

And which point guard made him look best? Davies.

Now, because Davies & Wanzer are close in age it's reasonable to wonder how things might have gone differently if Wanzer hadn't been so used to following Davies as the head of the snake, but this is the career Wanzer had - playing on Davies' team, and non-coincidentally because they went to the same college (Seton Hall) and Davies very much was the leader/mentor of the two.

[eminence]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

So starting from substantial uncertainty given lack of data ... minutes especially ... ("option" status may be contingent on minutes ... Manu is third option by rs ppg for most of his best years) ... but more broadly as well.


"Double the shot volume" (not quite, and Wanzer getting to the line relatively more) ... but your words and not totally wildly out ... Davies 15.9ppg, Wanzer 12.5ppg. And this is of course because Wanzer is vastly more efficient. I'm not, otoh, perfectly au fait with whether so quirk of free throw rules could be part of it (in the only one FT attempt era that could hurt a guy but doesn't seem to be what's happening here). But it ends up as a pretty large gap (and a relatively smaller scoring one).

It drives a WS gulf. Now that's a number that tilts (too) heavily on shooting efficiency and is working with a less complete boxscore. But WS is one thing we have and we can just as well play ...
"how often does the playoff WS leader, OWS leader and also champion [with or without "and a hall of famer"] not get credit for being a 'top impact guy'".

The efficiency gap isn't as striking with Risen ... but my guess is that it opens up a bit more if you curve for position. The top few shooters of the early to mid 50s are mostly centers e.g. Groza, Johnston, Mikan, Share, Foust and many of those names top the ppg charts too.

Then broader picture, for whatever it's worth, depending on how much reputation and outside years are affecting priors...
Wanzer is a HoFer, has some recognition (including for a long time at the HoF, and at one time in an Official NBA Encyclopedia) as an MVP and has a career playoff PER of 21.4 ... with (off WS and OWS) perhaps his two best PER numbers ('50 is a tiny sample, affecting how much it would alter a career number and how reliable it is and making rounding more of an issue, but it's his best OWS/game ratio) and one weaker one missed. I'm not sure how many fourth or fifth options put up that number or have his historical status/accolades.

It feels like the "you can't win with Jokic" argument. "We haven't seen anyone this bad defensively at starter C win since ...". As though NJ wasn't a crazy outlier among centers for net productivity and the ratio of which end his value comes and/or these two things.

Even if you are sure he's a 4th/5th option (minutes unknown, playoff clearly 3rd in ppg) a "this isn't normally probable" argument comes up against the fact that Wanzer isn't close to "normal" for that archetype.

As before, limited info, depends how much one tilts playoff ...

I'm using option to refer to players ranked by offensive volume on their team (measured through some combo of FGA/FTA/Ast to estimate at this junction - in modern times I like to look primarily at touches/time of possession in the halfcourt). Wanzer is very clearly behind Davies/Risen, and more slightly behind Coleman. Johnson is even lower still. Roughly matches what I've seen on the limited film available (I would describe Johnson as an ancient Daniel Gafford on offense). A bit of fluctuation with Risen/Wanzer/Coleman from 2-4 through their competitive era, but this year in particular I'd clearly describe Risen as the #2.

Manu* was A) the clear 3rd option (not 4th) and is B) the absolute best case for the role (2nd ballhandling guard paired with a notable big man) from what we've seen in the impact era, practically lapping the field (possible exception to Hornacek). An argument leaning on Wanzer being a historical outlier to that level (in terms of impact) does not reach me, given the impact we do see from him (doesn't seriously move the needle when he arrives in '48, then the team slowly collapses as Davies ages out and retires). And his role in '51 is smaller than what prime Manu was tasked with.

*I think it's worth noting Manu spent a decent portion of his playing time as functionally the #1 option due to coming off the bench and staggering with Parker/Duncan, perhaps allowing some magnification of impact relative to the average #3. This is not something I see with Wanzer at this point in time (more true later as Davies minutes drop).

I asked Josh Elias about the MVP and he said he'd never found anything from the time period referencing it and referred to it as an outright mistake by the HOF/NBA.

[Doctor MJ]

Any input on the Lapchick Knicks? I know he'd be winning my COY vote for several of these seasons, but I struggle to see any of the players in particular on a POY level.

Good thoughts on the Olympians. I'm going to speak to that a little bit more elsewhere, but wanted to hit this.

When I did this previously, I didn't include any Knicks this year. The guy I expect to consider is Vince Boryla.

The guy who broke through for me and eventually made my ballot last time was Sweetwater Clifton, who I see as the star defender on a team that eventually ends up with a great defense.

[eminence]

Now, because Davies & Wanzer are close in age it's reasonable to wonder how things might have gone differently if Wanzer hadn't been so used to following Davies as the head of the snake, but this is the career Wanzer had - playing on Davies' team, and non-coincidentally because they went to the same college (Seton Hall) and Davies very much was the leader/mentor of the two.

Davies was the coach at Seton Hall for Wanzer during his final season ('46-'47). It's why Davies missed a few games while winning the MVP in the NBL, he was commuting to coach at Seton Hall.

[Doctor MJ]

Macauley out of the discussion for me because I think both Groza and Arizin were better players among the less relevant teams.

Groza had a crazy playoffs performance so I understand if someone uses that to put him over Macauley, however looking at his stats vs Arizin's

Macauley 20.4 pts, 9.1 reb, 3.7 ast, .551 TS% (39-30 record)
Arizin 17.2 pts, 9.2 reb, 2.1 ast, .512 TS% (40-26)

Macauley's non boxscore is questionable but I'm not sure I should be super high on rookie Arizin in that department either. I like Phillip this year as much as Cousy so who's supporting cast is better probably depends on whether Fulks (taking 21 shots a game at TS% below the lowest team in the league, yikes!) is a genuine negative or attracting enough attention to be slightly positive like a Derozan. Senesky also seems like more of a real guy than the non Cousy/Macauley Celtics unless I'm missing someone, in addition to the defensive rep he was also 3rd in the league in assists.

Okay, will work through this a little more.

The 1950 Warriors go 21-30 with Ron Livingstone. From what I can infer, they start Senesky, Gardner, Fulks, and Livingstone, with a rotation of Mogus, Bobb, Fleishman, Bornheimer, and Crossin around that “core” four. In 1951, they add rookie Arizin, Phillip from the Stags, and Closs from the Packers, and lose Fleishman, Bornheimer, and Crossin. That group starts off 19-14 (+1.5), then they add Ed Mikan after the Capitols fold to go 21-12 (+6!) the rest of the way. In 1952, Arizin improves, and they add rookie Neil Johnston, but they lose Mogus, Livingstone, and Closs, and the team is a disappointing 33-33 (-1 SRS).

So you are probably right to question Arizin’s rookie impact.

The problem is that the Celtics are much messier. They do go from 22-46 to 39-30, and they maintain that the following year at 39-27, but they add Macauley and Cousy and Bob Donham and Bob Harris and Bones McKinney (all of whom stick around in 1952)… and they also add Red Auerbach.

I will walk back my outright exclusion of Macauley, but I am still skeptical he was a truly more valuable player that year than someone like Harry Gallatin or Arnie Risen.

Good stuff here.

I don't think Arizin will make my ballots this year...but I wonder what might have been had the Warriors cut Fulks off once he stopped being efficient.

He stopped being super-efficient after '46-47 (BAA's first year) when he led the team to a title.
He stopped being even decent after '48-49.

This then to say that give the fact that Arizin was already quite efficient relative to the league as a rookie, and from both college and subsequent NBA years seems to have no problem scaling to volume, I think the Warriors would have been a better team by a good margin in '50-51, had they given the ball to Arizin and made Fulks a hot dog vendor.

But they didn't, so while I can say that Arizin definitely looks like an all-star level player from day 1 and that Fulks was quite possibly the least valuable player in the history of the league by this point (given how ineffective he was in his high primacy role, and there was literally another teammate who would emerge as the premier volume scorer in the league immediately after given the opportunity to volume score), there's a ceiling on what I feel comfortable saying Arizin achieved just as there's a ceiling on what I'd say these Warriors achieved.

[Doctor MJ]

Interesting year. Mikan is still obviously the best player, and the Lakers separate themselves more in the regular season than they had the prior year. However, Groza thoroughly outscores him in a tight three-game series win for the Lakers (who were outscored overall by one point). Then Mikan is similarly reduced from his regular season level against the Royals.

1949: 28.3 points per game on 49.8% efficiency —> 30.3 points per game on 54.1% efficiency in the postseason
1950: 27.4 points per game on 48.7% efficiency —> 31.3 points per game on 48.1% efficiency in the postseason
1951: 28.4 points per game on 50.9% efficiency —> 24.0 points per game on 47.7% efficiency in the postseason

Does not mean anyone else will take the crown, with the champion Royals splitting team credit and the runner-up Knicks not having a clear MVP talent, but certainly a vulnerable year, and I hope people are willing to not just automatically lock him in at the top spot. If nothing else, he is completely out from my consideration for Offensive Player of the Year (which is suddenly much more competitive with Cousy/Arizin’s entrance and Beard’s improvement).

Mikan, Davies, and Schayes are all Player of the Year locks for me. In strong ballot consideration are Arizin, Risen, Groza, Beard, and one of the Knicks. Macauley out of the discussion for me because I think both Groza and Arizin were better players among the less relevant teams.

League’s “Best” Scorers (alphabetically):
- Alex Groza
- Arnie Risen
- Bob Davies
- Dolph Schayes
- Ed Macauley
- Frankie Brian
- Fred Schaus
- George Mikan
- Paul Arizin
- Ralph Beard
- Vern Mikkelsen
- Vince Boryla

All of them were in the top 15 for points per game, and all of them except Frankie Brian were in the top 25 for TS Add (sympathetic to Brian here because that team had terrible scoring alternatives, and his efficiency was positive in both surrounding seasons).

So, one of the things I think is interesting this year is that both Mikan & Groza continued to put up absolutely massive TS Add, but their teams became less effective offensively and really ceased to be anything that could be called elite.

The widening of the key comes with the 1951 off-season, and while we can't know how that affected Groza, we know that Mikan really stops being a dominant TS Add guy despite the fact that he continues to lead the Lakers to titles.

My assessment of the most likely scenario here is this: Widening of the key hurt the scoring of interior volume scoring bigs directly (lower efficiency relative to league)...but it's possible that evolutions to team strategy had already done most of the souring of the milk with this approach, even if league offensive strategy hadn't caught on. We know that a situation can exist where forcing the ball to your big to volume score can lead to good volume & efficiency based on his numbers, but cause all sorts of problems (turnovers, etc) with the offensive process, so maybe that was what was going on.

I should say when noting this, it's not like the danger of too predictably going to Mikan was something that the Lakers had no sense of. It's something that was pointed out as an issue during MIkan's rookie season. But while they found work arounds to allow the Lakers to be a very successful offense for several years, perhaps the improvement of the league both in mitigating defensive strategy and alternative offensive strategy effectively nullified this even before the rule change.

[eminence]

Any input on the Lapchick Knicks? I know he'd be winning my COY vote for several of these seasons, but I struggle to see any of the players in particular on a POY level.

Good thoughts on the Olympians. I'm going to speak to that a little bit more elsewhere, but wanted to hit this.

When I did this previously, I didn't include any Knicks this year. The guy I expect to consider is Vince Boryla.

The guy who broke through for me and eventually made my ballot last time was Sweetwater Clifton, who I see as the star defender on a team that eventually ends up with a great defense.

Mmkay, currently unless a convincing case comes in for a Knick I'm expecting to not have one on my ballot.

On the race overall:
-I feel like I'm looking for an excuse to give it to someone other than Mikan, but I can't quite get there. Davies doesn't do quite enough in the playoffs, Schayes maybe if he'd made the finals, and probably if he'd won the title, but as is he went down in the same round as Mikan after a clearly inferior RS (imo). I can't really sell myself on Risen over Mikan. So it'll probably be Mikan #1.
-Schayes/Davies/Risen the guys I'm thinking of 2-4. Weighing individual play vs team accomplishment, as is tradition.
-#5 looks like a race between the big name scorers (Groza/Macauley/Arizin). Risen on a similar level as a player in my view, but a clear step up in team accomplishment this year. I classically lean towards perimeter scorers over interior guys, and the Warriors were more impressive than the Celtics/Olympians, gives Arizin the inside track, but not a given.

[Owly]

I don’t get it with Wanzer/Johnson - these guys were distant 4th/5th guys on offense. When have 4th/5th options been their teams top impact guys on elite offenses no matter their efficiency?

Risen/Davies were at double their shot volume in the playoffs and are clearly the team MVPs in my view.


Johnson maybe if you bought he was a truly elite defender - but the film/team results aren’t there for me. His offensive skillset looks non existent on film, limited to open layups on cuts/putbacks when defenders help off him.

So starting from substantial uncertainty given lack of data ... minutes especially ... ("option" status may be contingent on minutes ... Manu is third option by rs ppg for most of his best years) ... but more broadly as well.


"Double the shot volume" (not quite, and Wanzer getting to the line relatively more) ... but your words and not totally wildly out ... Davies 15.9ppg, Wanzer 12.5ppg. And this is of course because Wanzer is vastly more efficient. I'm not, otoh, perfectly au fait with whether so quirk of free throw rules could be part of it (in the only one FT attempt era that could hurt a guy but doesn't seem to be what's happening here). But it ends up as a pretty large gap (and a relatively smaller scoring one).

It drives a WS gulf. Now that's a number that tilts (too) heavily on shooting efficiency and is working with a less complete boxscore. But WS is one thing we have and we can just as well play ...
"how often does the playoff WS leader, OWS leader and also champion [with or without "and a hall of famer"] not get credit for being a 'top impact guy'".

The efficiency gap isn't as striking with Risen ... but my guess is that it opens up a bit more if you curve for position. The top few shooters of the early to mid 50s are mostly centers e.g. Groza, Johnston, Mikan, Share, Foust and many of those names top the ppg charts too.

Then broader picture, for whatever it's worth, depending on how much reputation and outside years are affecting priors...
Wanzer is a HoFer, has some recognition (including for a long time at the HoF, and at one time in an Official NBA Encyclopedia) as an MVP and has a career playoff PER of 21.4 ... with (off WS and OWS) perhaps his two best PER numbers ('50 is a tiny sample, affecting how much it would alter a career number and how reliable it is and making rounding more of an issue, but it's his best OWS/game ratio) and one weaker one missed. I'm not sure how many fourth or fifth options put up that number or have his historical status/accolades.

It feels like the "you can't win with Jokic" argument. "We haven't seen anyone this bad defensively at starter C win since ...". As though NJ wasn't a crazy outlier among centers for net productivity and the ratio of which end his value comes and/or these two things.

Even if you are sure he's a 4th/5th option (minutes unknown, playoff clearly 3rd in ppg) a "this isn't normally probable" argument comes up against the fact that Wanzer isn't close to "normal" for that archetype.

As before, limited info, depends how much one tilts playoff ...

I'm using option to refer to players ranked by offensive volume on their team (measured through some combo of FGA/FTA/Ast to estimate at this junction - in modern times I like to look primarily at touches/time of possession in the halfcourt). Wanzer is very clearly behind Davies/Risen, and more slightly behind Coleman. Johnson is even lower still. Roughly matches what I've seen on the limited film available (I would describe Johnson as an ancient Daniel Gafford on offense). A bit of fluctuation with Risen/Wanzer/Coleman from 2-4 through their competitive era, but this year in particular I'd clearly describe Risen as the #2.

Manu* was A) the clear 3rd option (not 4th) and is B) the absolute best case for the role (2nd ballhandling guard paired with a notable big man) from what we've seen in the impact era, practically lapping the field (possible exception to Hornacek). An argument leaning on Wanzer being a historical outlier to that level (in terms of impact) does not reach me, given the impact we do see from him (doesn't seriously move the needle when he arrives in '48, then the team slowly collapses as Davies ages out and retires). And his role in '51 is smaller than what prime Manu was tasked with.

*I think it's worth noting Manu spent a decent portion of his playing time as functionally the #1 option due to coming off the bench and staggering with Parker/Duncan, perhaps allowing some magnification of impact relative to the average #3. This is not something I see with Wanzer at this point in time (more true later as Davies minutes drop).

I asked Josh Elias about the MVP and he said he'd never found anything from the time period referencing it and referred to it as an outright mistake by the HOF/NBA.

You're sensible enough about this. I still disagree about the overall conclusions.

As above option will depend on minutes.
In the end I'm looking at goodness. If, as in your initial point, you're looking at goodness in the playoffs ... I don't care to reward a player for missing shots. I like Davies. I'll generally boost for him. I'm not going to do that based on a "primacy" of missing more. Wanzer isn't scoring much less.

I'm not aware of anything vaguely resembling a full game out there for this Royals team ('51 or any vaguely somewhat adjacent year). Or any vaguely extended game highlights. I'd very happily be proved wrong. If I'm not, I'm not sure there's much to build conclusions on.

Per my own post yes Manu is 3rd (not 4th) by some per game measures. And he's amazingly impactful offensive player. I don't see that either
a) a window that is appears to be open at 3 should slam shut at 4 (though again 3rd in playoff points)
b) I don't like the idea that that "atypical" could be used against Manu as notionally the third guy.

I'm particularly claiming "Wanzer is Manu" re impact ... I don't know. That said regarding "arrival impact" it wouldn't particularly peg Manu as great either. He also had Davies, Cervi and Holzman presumably ahead of him in the guard rotation. A team suspension further muddies any impact. More broadly (and this applies to the following point too) changing league standards (and here changing leagues) makes marking impact even tougher.

"then the team slowly collapses as Davies ages out and retires)" ... I don't know. Maybe. I don't pretend to accurately be able to parse out impact really accurately off the limited info. As before I like Davies. Insofar as the BAA/NBA Royals status is from the titles and/or playoffs ... I'm not one to use the tiny late career sample to knock Davies, earlier on in his career his status within the offense rose in the playoffs (at least as I interpreted it looking at some early career numbers for a recent discussion) ... the efficiency gap and relative lack of a scoring gap and WS chasm makes me think Wanzer was important in the playoffs.

Not aware of Mr Elias, but see he's written a book ... I may check it out. I've inquired more generally with others and not got much back. If I had to guess I'd guess it's an error as an official MVP, I don't really know what if anything it was or how/why the Hall would claim that if no sources ... IDK. Thanks for sharing what you've heard.

[One_and_Done]

As per last time I'll vote for Mikan again, as he was clearly the best player on both ends in this primative proto-league, but I don't feel confident enough to rank the other top players definitively.

[eminence]

The most complete game available online* of the Royals from the era that I'm aware of is this one:

Watch on YouTube

;t=18s

It is frustratingly not the game described in the video description (Sharman is clearly playing and Sharman did not play in the described game), I figured out which game it was once, but don't remember off the top of my head, some other game from '52 or '53 as Arnie Johnson is also playing.

*I spent an afternoon ~decade ago watching a couple of similarly complete games of a couple of their tilts vs the Lakers in person at the U of M library, but have never seen them uploaded online.

[IlikeSHAIguys]

Thanks for adding me to the ballot!

[Dutchball97]

Player of the Year
1. George Mikan - This is probably Mikan's most shaky year but I don't think any of the competition was able to take enough advantage of it to push Mikan from the top spot. Mikan was once again the clear best player in the regular season and while his post-season wasn't particularly dominant by his standards, his closest competition in the regular season either got eliminated early (Groza, Macauley, Arizin), had a very similar but worse overall season (Schayes) or didn't do enough individually in the play-offs to warrant serious consideration (Davies). Once again the clear DPOY, although unlikely to also win the offensive category this time around imo.

2. Alex Groza - I might be a little high on Groza here judging by where others are placing him so far but he was a powerhouse once again in the regular season and then had an insane scoring performance against the Lakers where he outscored Mikan by a good margin. I considered Schayes and Risen here due to having deeper runs but I'm not convinced either of them really did enough to prove they were more impactful than Groza.

3. Dolph Schayes - Even though there are so many candidates to choose from this season, I end up with the exact same top 3 as last round and in the same order as well. Schayes is the solid all around choice here. Top 5-ish regular season and two strong rounds in the post-season. I think he did enough to pass Davies, Arizin and Macauley but I still came away a bit more impressed by Groza, despite the small sample size. Risen vs Schayes is also interesting but I think Risen had a lot more to work with in terms of teammates and I'm not sure it'd be fair to have Risen this high up and then leave out his teammates when it was such a collaborative run for the Royals.

4. Arnie Risen - Here he is then, the man who was able to contain Mikan while also being the leading scorer and rebounder for the champion Royals. Like I've expressed multiple times before, I don't think Davies deserves the lion's share of the credit for the Royals because of his offensive primacy when Risen was so impactful on both sides of the floor.

5. Ed Macauley - This last spot mostly came down to Macauley vs Arizin. They had very similar seasons but I think Macauley was able to do a bit more. I do think Arizin would grow into a notably more impactful player than Macauley but purely judging by this season I'm not convinced Arizin is already there.

Offensive Player of the Year
1. Alex Groza
2. George Mikan
3. Ed Macauley

Groza ran away with this award in my eyes, while I think these 3 guys were the clear top 3 in the regular season offensively Groza managed to seperate himself with a eye popping play-off showing. Mikan and Macauley both did well in the play-offs too so no chance for someone like Arizin to make up the difference or for Risen/Davies to accumulate enough across a deep run to convince me.

Defensive Player of the Year
1. George Mikan
2. Arnie Risen
3. Harry Gallatin

Mikan still keeps his defensive crown, although Risen makes a compelling argument with just how much he was able to slow Mikan down in their match up. In the end I don't think you can give Risen the sole credit for this though but outside of these two it's still hard to pinpoint the most impactful defenders with the data being so limited. I went with Gallatin for my final spot as we know he was a capable defender on a team that made a deep run without necessarily being surrounded by other great defenders.

[AEnigma]

Offensive Player of the Year
1. Bob Davies
Ultimately I think I will end up agreeing that Mikan holds the Player of the Year crown despite the mildly disappointing postseason. However, for offensive player of the year, I think Davies earns it as the primary playmaker for a title-winning #1 offence, with imo superior offensive production to Cousy (efficiency), McGuire (scoring), and Phillip (scoring), and more impressive results than with Beard and Brian. He is a very easy choice here for me, and I appreciate Doc’s articulation of some of my skepticism about the offensive impact of high efficiency bigs who cannot elevate the offence of their teammates.

Of the bigs, Mikan still has a reasonable regular season argument, but even if the reason is because of injury, I have him more clearly below Groza and Macauley in the postseason, and I continue to question whether he was truly driving more successful team offence than Schayes was. All three do have better guard play than Mikan did, so theoretically I can entertain the idea Mikan may look as good or better in their place, but in a year marked by postseason disappointment, I am not as invested in working through that hypothetical.

Where it matters more is trying to separate impact on the team. I am comfortable with Schayes over Cervi this year. I am more torn on Cousy versus Macauley and on Beard versus Groza, for contrasting reasons. Cousy’s playmaking was a significant boon for his team, but I agree he took more shots than he by rights should have taken, and I feel the Celtics were a strong playmaking team generally — with Macauley especially being an above-average passing big (less so than Schayes and Mikan from what I have seen, but certainly more than Groza). With Beard, it is more about Groza being such an outlier high efficiency player that I do not know whether Beard can catch up when the only guy I know seems to benefit from his brand of playmaking — and here I will acknowledge I have no film review for the Olympians — is Groza himself.

With a nod to the era, I think where I settle on this is that Groza could not realistically be asked to help his team more than he did, especially in the postseason, and that Macauley gave his team a better competitive chance against the Knicks offensively than Schayes did. This is Macauley’s most effective scoring season relative to the league, and Cousy’s least effective of his first seven seasons; for that reason, I am fine siding with the bigs this year.
2. Alex Groza
3. Ed Macauley

Defensive Player of the Year
1. George Mikan
Still the league’s best defender, now leading the league’s best defence. Like I said last thread, I am much more skeptical about his offence than I am about his defence.

2. Larry Foust?
The Pistons were a clear top three defence in 1950. They lost the combined full season of Charlie Black / Howie Schultz, seemingly dropped Bob Carpenter… and were still a top three defence. To me, that reflects best on Foust and his size and rebounding prowess, and he backed it up by defending Risen better than Mikan or Sweetwater/Gallatin did.

3. Arnie Risen?
Most of the reasons from last year still apply. Good size, strong rebounder, this year handles Mikan well… Open to changing and do not feel too strongly, but right now no one else stands out to me. Considered Jack Coleman, but Risen was the guy going up against Mikan and still has more of an impact signal. Considered Sweetwater here but think it might be too early. Considered Harry Gallatin, but Risen has a size advantage and impressed more in the Finals.

Player of the Year
1. George Mikan
Cannot really talk myself into anyone else. Unquestioned top regular season player, and I am not taking Risen or Groza over him just because they outperformed him in a three-game series while he was injured.

2. Dolph Schayes
Could have been Davies if he had better maintained in the postseason. Regardless, I believe Schayes was the league’s second-best player overall and would have won a title in Risen’s place. Even more responsible for his team’s success as Cervi starts to decline. I have some criticisms of his Games 3 and 5 against the Knicks, but he was still the overall best player in that series, his team outscored the Knicks overall, and his team was literally one point away from returning to the Finals.

3. Bob Davies
Part of me wanted to vote him second or even first just because I think he is being disrespected on this ballot, but his case is too dampened by Risen being the team’s top postseason performer and an easy pick for Finals MVP. Nevertheless, he continued to be the league’s best guard and was the lead playmaker for a title-winning #1 offence with no other recognised all-NBA or all-star teammates, and everything I said in his OPoY write-up can apply here too.

4. Alex Groza
Slight step down from his rookie season, and still not an impact defender, but I agree he was minimally responsible for his team’s failings. Regardless of whether he would have made my ballot solely off the regular season, outplaying my #1 Player of the Year in a series the Lakers were lucky to win gives him a clearer path than guys like Arizin or Macauley or one of the Knicks (who themselves were lucky to beat the Nationals and who only took the Royals to a Game Seven because Zaslofsky went on an all-time heater).

5. Arnie Risen
I think it weighs significantly against him that the all-NBA voting community did not consider him to be a top five big — although I agree they were dead wrong on Fulks at minimum — and that he could not even crack the more expansive all-star roster. However, he matched up well with George Mikan, was the best player in the Finals, was the overall best postseason player on the champion, was one of the league’s best scorers and rebounders, and was in my estimation one of the more significant defensive presences in the league. While it is possible other bigs could have replicated his success in his place, he deserves credit for making the most of his situation.