RealGM Top 100 List #4

[RayBan-Sematra]

Surprised to see Wilt getting voted in.
Feel pretty strongly that Shaq was the better playoff performer.
Peak or Prime wise he scored at a similar or greater rate on much better efficiency and he did a better job of stepping it up in key playoff/finals series.

Like Colts just said Wilt had some good teams around him after the early 60's and his own poor play in some key series arguably cost him a chance to win at the very least 1 more Ring if not 2-3 more.
I have no problem with people pointing out the poor play of his teammates but that doesn't excuse his own poor play.

Wilt had some amazing years but as a playoff performer Shaq had even greater Peak years and was much more consistent performance wise in his other regular years.

Even looking outside of Ring's or performance in big series (both areas where Shaq clearly has the edge) I would also say that Shaq was the better individual player.
He was the better scorer/offensive anchor and equal to Wilt on the defensive end.
Wilt's edge in rebounding isn't enough to make him the more valuable individual star.

Ardee brought up durability and while Wilt did indeed miss less games in the regular-season that wouldn't sway me to vote in his favor.
I will take the superior playoff performer who will miss 10-15 games in some years (and occasionally more) over the inferior playoff performer who usually plays 75-80+ games.

[ElGee]

Some thoughts from someone trying to keep up with this project:

-All the different criteria is a bit disorienting. With the exception of a few posters who explicitly link back to their criteria, I have no idea who values what in a GOAT list. The amount of discussion in the last thread about judging players based on the modern era was really surprising and incredibly abstract for me.

-I'm big on consistent criteria when it comes to the rankings for (hopefully) obvious reasons. Since this project is a free-for-all, people are really talking past each other. One conversation will be about in-era impact. Another about transporting to the modern game. Another about some abstraction of peak/prime goodness.

-Speaking of consistent criteria, I'm especially interested to see if the people who rank based on today's game will do stuff like consider Steve Nash soon. Lots of 3-point shooters. Lots of spaced, PnR basketball. Lots of freedom to move for perimeter guys. If those were my criteria I'd start thinking about Nash awfully shortly. I'm also looking to see if Bird gets a boost with an emphasis on spacing and 3-point shot...

[E-Balla]

Why Wilt over the Shaq/Duncan/Hakeem trio and Magic? I saw arguments for Wilt but not really arguments for Wilt vs these 4.

Cliffs:

Wilt vs Shaq: Durability, defense and rebounding. Shaq was injured basically every year of his prime except 2000. Wilt is the biggest iron-man in NBA history. Wilt is what happens when you take Shaq's body and give him Kobe's workout ethic. Shaq consistently had the likes of Penny/Kobe/Wade on his team so it didn't hurt his team too bad when he was injured but in a vacuum, it's gotta count against him. Wilt was also definitely superior on consistent defensive effort, and rebounding isn't a debate. Shaq may be the slightly better scorer but the whole package doesn't compare.

Well first I completely disagree with the notion that Shaq is only a slightly better scorer. Beyond that I can see the injury concerns but Shaq's prime is longer and he played more games total. I'm guessing you're trying to say with Shaq you get more value total but due to injuries you get less value per season?

Wilt vs Duncan: Wilt is the better player plain and simple. If you look at their combined best seasons, I'd probably take Wilt with 6 of the top 8. Duncan has maybe one or two years that compare to Wilt's '64-'68 prime. Also, durability again, Duncan had injury problems from '04-'06, Wilt never missed games. If post-prime is important to you, '72 and '73 Wilt crush anything post-prime Duncan put together.

How do you take into account Duncan really leading scrubs to a ring and Wilt never doing that? It's what puts Duncan in top 5 territory for me.

Wilt vs. Hakeem: Hardly even close to a debate. I'd take Wilt with 7 out of the top 10 seasons between the two. Wilt was just as efficient on more volume, better rebounder, better passer, and yes, worse as a defender but it's the holistic view that counts. '93-'95 Hakeem was a better defensive, worse offensive and worse rebounding version of Wilt's entire prime.

Hakeem has 4 postseasons better than or as good as Wilt's best postseason performance. Sure Wilt is better for the first 82 but in the most important 16-28 Hakeem is on a completely different level populated only by Jordan, Shaq, and himself.

Wilt vs Magic: Close, to me. Magic is the better offensive player, Wilt has the overall impact. I'd give it to Wilt based on his longevity, basically a top 5 player every year of his career, and the fact that Wilt was able to modify his game multiple times to suit his team while Magic needed a specific playstyle to suit his game.

Magic in the beginning of his career won while basically playing all sorts of roles. He was a PG at times, a C at others. Basically his first 4 years Magic had every role. Now of course he played way better when he got a steady role at PG but everyone has a role best for their game. Magic is the most versatile player ever. Also Wilt has one more season. They're basically even in longevity.

[JordansBulls]

Here are the players that have a shot at this spot and there records while having the HCA.

Code: Select all

 vs 50 win teams/non-50 win teams
Wilt:     4-3 (57%)/   9-2 (82%)
Magic:    9-2 (82%)/   20-1 (95%)
Bird:     10-6 (63%)/  14-1 (93%)
Olajuwon: 4-0 (100%)/  5-2 (71%)
Shaq:     11-3 (79%)/  13-2 (87%)
Duncan:   19-5 (79%)/  11-1 (92%)
Lebron:   3-3 (50%)/   15-0 (100%)
Kobe       18-2 (90%) / 7-0  (100%)


Wilt 13-5 with HCA
Magic 29-3 with HCA
Bird 24-7 with HCA
Hakeem 9-2 with HCA (amazing he only had so few series with HCA)
Shaq 24-5 with HCA
Duncan 30-6 with HCA
Lebron 18-3 with HCA
Kobe 25-2 with HCA

Code: Select all

Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +2 SRS:
Magic 80-91'14-2 87.5%
Bird 80-91' 13-5 72.2%
Wilt 60-73' 10-4 71.4%


Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +4 SRS:
Magic 80-91'4-1 80.0%
Bird 80-91' 6-5 54.5%
Wilt 60-73' 3-3 50%

Leaning towards Magic Johnson for the #4 vote.

Finished top 3 in MVP for 9x times which is the 2nd most in NBA History. Has 3 league mvp's, 3 finals mvp's, only other players with that was MJ and Russell would have that if finals mvp's existed at the time.

Vote: Magic Johnson

[penbeast0]

I would think their ability to win without HCA would also be important . . . and for playoffs, I value series W/L a lot more than individual games.

[Purch]

I would think their ability to win without HCA would also be important . . . and for playoffs, I value series W/L a lot more than individual games.

Yea, if anything when a star players on the road they have to perform at a higher level, because role players tend to become less productive

[E-Balla]

Spoiler:

My quick responses to a reasonable argument

From Elgee's in/out study. Wilt is 2nd worst among superstars in in/out

Player Years Games MOV Net SIO
Walton 77-78 41 9.3 13.0 11.2
Nash 01, 05-07, 09 36 5.6 9.5 7.5
Duncan 00, 04, 05 37 8.4 6.5 7.5
King 84-85 33 1.8 11.2 6.5
McHale 86, 88, 91 45 7.8 4.3 6.0
Bird 91-92 44 6.3 5.8 6.0
Rodman 93, 95-97 100 7.8 3.5 5.6
Pippen 94, 98 48 7.6 3.3 5.4
Penny 97, 00 55 3.8 6.9 5.3
Garnett 06-11 72 5.7 4.9 5.3
Shaq 96-98, 00-04 142 6.4 4.1 5.3
West 67-69, 71 76 4.7 5.8 5.3
Hakeem 86, 91-92, 95-96 72 3.5 6.3 4.9
Kareem 75, 78 37 3.1 6.7 4.9
Mourning 94, 96-98 74 4.1 5.2 4.7
McGrady 02-04 28 -0.6 9.9 4.7
KJ 90, 93-97 129 4.7 3.7 4.2
Erving 73, 78, 83 29 4.1 4.2 4.1
Kidd 00, 04-05 46 2.9 4.9 3.9
Kobe 00, 04-07, 10 79 3.9 3.5 3.7
Barkley 87, 91, 94-97 100 3.5 3.5 3.5
Odom 05, 07 44 0.3 5.7 3.0
Cowens 75, 77 47 2.8 3.1 3.0
Pierce 07, 10 46 0.1 5.3 2.7
Ewing 87, 94-96 31 -1.1 6.4 2.6
Baylor 61-62, 66 54 2.3 2.4 2.4
Drexler 90, 93, 94, 96 90 2.4 1.0 1.7
Moses 78, 84 36 -1.1 4.2 1.6
Iverson 00-02, 04, 06 89 0.5 2.7 1.6
Webber 95, 97-98, 01-03 104 2.5 0.7 1.6
Wilkins 92-93 51 -0.3 3.1 1.4
Allen 02, 04, 07 66 -0.7 2.6 0.9
Hill 95, 00, 05 35 -2.5 4.2 0.9
Wade 04-08 95 -1.5 3.2 0.8
Wilt 65, 65, 70 156 -0.3 0.8 0.3
Paul 07, 10 55 -1.6 1.2 -0.2

Yup. This is my issue when people say things like "well he lost to Russell and Russell is already in". Russell doesn't deserve to be in first because he won - even casual fans know this is a team sport - he deserves it because he clearly outplayed Wilt when you look at helping his team win.

Is it clear though. Sportwriter accolades went clearly to Wilt at the time. You've got George Kiseda saying 1 in 3 nights, Wilt won, one in three Russell won, and one in three Wilt dominated. Russell has great with/without numbers so long as you're willing to ignore '57 (the largest sample, and one in which the team hadn't built a style around Russell). And you've got the above which seems to suggest Wilt didn't have great impact, except as Colts notes they got significantly worse when he left, and as we will discuss later, Wilt was seriously ill at the time.

And you know who else did? Look at that list.

See above.

I realize that things have progressed since then but basketball had been around over half a century at the time and everyone instantly recognized the physical talent of Wilt. That he wasn't able to do more was a shock to them because as people here suggest, it seems like it should be simple. What Wilt instead proved to be was a bed sheet too small for the bed. You pull one corner to solve one problem and next thing you know it's something else.

Hard to argue with a metaphor. I suppose I'd say you need someone not incompetent at bedmaking in charge, not trying to put him on sidewise. I'd also note his obvious initial impact.

I think in general people have far too much faith in their own superior ability to handle Wilt...and I actually think that makes them a lot like the more problematic people of that time.

I don't think I'd be a good coach for Wilt. I think a decent or better NBA coach (i.e. not a good ex-pro who the owner likes, or whatever, with little or no experience; or an unflexible combatative coach who rigidly abides by one system), would be a good coach for Wilt. And they were.

I think if you aren't awestruck by Hannum's move you aren't seeing things how they were, and if you're not discouraged that even Hannum's struggled to maintain Wilt's focus for what today would be a fraction of the duration of a max deal I really don't know what else to say.

I think if you don't see Chamberlain's immediate impact on D or that teams were successful with Wilt as a low post scorer (see '62) in spite of poor floor spacing, or that Hannum had Wilt in plenty enough focused for the '68 Sixers to be clearly the NBA's best team who got crippled by injuries in the playoffs. Or if reffering to '65 I'd note serious injuries including the possible/suspected heart attack/pancreatitis and weight loss, the fact his team was 1-4 when he arrived. "At times the Warriors look like out-clinic patients at St. Mary's Hostpital" said the SF Chronicles Stu Herman (per The Rivalry p220). Then John Thompson broke his nose on December 4th (in his absence SF lost twice 81-105 to Boston and 93-113 to St Louis both at home). I think Wilt did slip back into scoring Wilt at this time, but partly out of necessity with other players injured and ineffective. And to be honest I do tend to care more what a guy does to a good team rather than to a lousy one. With trade rumours, the team not fully healthy and lousy without him (1-6, with 680 points scored, 748 conceded, a net loss of 68 points, or -9.714285714 per game) ill-health and a broken nose, I think Wilt didn't help as much as he might have. He's probably a poor guy (of these all-time elites) to have in this situation. I don't think anybody really helps make your team relevent here though.

Well how come when Wilt gets to great teams his impact looks minuscule. I can't get out of my head that he raised crappy teams to average levels but didn't really help great teams as much as others here and unlike Hakeem he didn't raise bad teams to championship levels because he didn't perform in the post season.

[ceiling raiser]

Some thoughts from someone trying to keep up with this project:

-All the different criteria is a bit disorienting. With the exception of a few posters who explicitly link back to their criteria, I have no idea who values what in a GOAT list. The amount of discussion in the last thread about judging players based on the modern era was really surprising and incredibly abstract for me.

-I'm big on consistent criteria when it comes to the rankings for (hopefully) obvious reasons. Since this project is a free-for-all, people are really talking past each other. One conversation will be about in-era impact. Another about transporting to the modern game. Another about some abstraction of peak/prime goodness.

-Speaking of consistent criteria, I'm especially interested to see if the people who rank based on today's game will do stuff like consider Steve Nash soon. Lots of 3-point shooters. Lots of spaced, PnR basketball. Lots of freedom to move for perimeter guys. If those were my criteria I'd start thinking about Nash awfully shortly. I'm also looking to see if Bird gets a boost with an emphasis on spacing and 3-point shot...

Good post. I'm trying to remain consistent in what I value (looking at both skillset translates to today and evidence of team level impact, in the context of your championship odds method), but if I appear inconsistent going forward, I have absolutely no problem if a poster asks me to reconsider my analysis/voting in the context of my criteria.

Regarding the bolded, Bird actually had a great discussion on the three-point shot in his 1990 autobiography "Drive". I'd like to type it up (or maybe scan it, if I'm too lazy) and share it in the project for posters to consider when evaluating him.

[penbeast0]

... (Magic) was a PG at times, a C at others. Basically his first 4 years Magic had every role....

Magic never played C, that was a myth. He played high post PF with Rambis being the center. Unless you define setting up in the high post as being a center in which case it's not that uncommon. Bob Cousy did it for Boston way back in the 50s.

Magic was versatile but he didn't guard centers and for that matter had trouble guarding PGs. (Actually, he didn't guard anyone that well which is the biggest knock against him; not longevity.) His game was offense and in that he is one of the true offensive GOAT candidates.

[ceiling raiser]

Here are the players that have a shot at this spot and there records while having the HCA.

Code: Select all

 vs 50 win teams/non-50 win teams
Wilt:     4-3 (57%)/   9-2 (82%)
Magic:    9-2 (82%)/   20-1 (95%)
Bird:     10-6 (63%)/  14-1 (93%)
Olajuwon: 4-0 (100%)/  5-2 (71%)
Shaq:     11-3 (79%)/  13-2 (87%)
Duncan:   19-5 (79%)/  11-1 (92%)
Lebron:   3-3 (50%)/   15-0 (100%)
Kobe       18-2 (90%) / 7-0  (100%)


Wilt 13-5 with HCA
Magic 29-3 with HCA
Bird 24-7 with HCA
Hakeem 9-2 with HCA (amazing he only had so few series with HCA)
Shaq 24-5 with HCA
Duncan 30-6 with HCA
Lebron 18-3 with HCA
Kobe 25-2 with HCA

Code: Select all

Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +2 SRS:
Magic 80-91'14-2 87.5%
Bird 80-91' 13-5 72.2%
Wilt 60-73' 10-4 71.4%


Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +4 SRS:
Magic 80-91'4-1 80.0%
Bird 80-91' 6-5 54.5%
Wilt 60-73' 3-3 50%

JB - Do you have numbers for those guys in terms of record without HCA? I think that would be interesting to look at as well.

Also, could you add Oscar and KG to both lists? Not that I expect either guy to make it in just yet, but it would be interesting to look at for comparison.

[Doctor MJ]

Oh and too the point about the lack of shooters in the 60s impacting the efficacy of a low post scorer that is something worth considering.

I'd be cautious going too far with it though. Something I've pointed out before is how Wilt's actual impact didn't correlate much at all with his stats. By that I mean not that he didn't have impact but that he maintained his stats while his impact seemed to fluctuate drastically.

Case in point: as a center then and now, it's the defense that makes you the highest ceiling guy around. There's never been a way to get around the fact that you can keep a low post guy from getting the ball and this is why we're less and less likely to seeing volume scoring at all from a big. wilt had the clear cut way of doing what bigs do to make reliable huge impact right in front of him always.

Last when we talk about the limitations of shooters in the day. It's important not to envision the game as all drives all the time. Quite the opposite really. Handles were one if the last things to develop historically due to the need for quality materials (ball and court) and the more rigid carry over rules.


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[JordansBulls]

Spoiler:

Here are the players that have a shot at this spot and there records while having the HCA.

Code: Select all

 vs 50 win teams/non-50 win teams
Wilt:     4-3 (57%)/   9-2 (82%)
Magic:    9-2 (82%)/   20-1 (95%)
Bird:     10-6 (63%)/  14-1 (93%)
Olajuwon: 4-0 (100%)/  5-2 (71%)
Shaq:     11-3 (79%)/  13-2 (87%)
Duncan:   19-5 (79%)/  11-1 (92%)
Lebron:   3-3 (50%)/   15-0 (100%)
Kobe       18-2 (90%) / 7-0  (100%)


Wilt 13-5 with HCA
Magic 29-3 with HCA
Bird 24-7 with HCA
Hakeem 9-2 with HCA (amazing he only had so few series with HCA)
Shaq 24-5 with HCA
Duncan 30-6 with HCA
Lebron 18-3 with HCA
Kobe 25-2 with HCA

Code: Select all

Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +2 SRS:
Magic 80-91'14-2 87.5%
Bird 80-91' 13-5 72.2%
Wilt 60-73' 10-4 71.4%


Playoff Series Record with HCA against teams with a +4 SRS:
Magic 80-91'4-1 80.0%
Bird 80-91' 6-5 54.5%
Wilt 60-73' 3-3 50%

JB - Do you have numbers for those guys in terms of record without HCA? I think that would be interesting to look at as well.

Also, could you add Oscar and KG to both lists? Not that I expect either guy to make it in just yet, but it would be interesting to look at for comparison.

Here is KG and Dirk's

Code: Select all

 vs 50 win teams/non-50 win teams
Garnett:   3-2  (60%) /6-0 (100%)
Dirk:      6-2 (75%)  /2-1 (67%)


Total for Garnett is 9-2 in series with HCA
Total for Dirk is 8-3 in series with HCA

Here are those guys without HCA

Code: Select all

 
              Road(50+)/non-50
Shaq:         8-6 / 0-0
Magic:        3-4 / 0-0
Duncan:        5-5 / 0-0
Olajuwon:     7-8 / 1-1
Bird:         0-4 / 0-0
Wilt:         1-7 / 2-0
Kobe:         5-5 / 0-0
Lebron:      2-3 /0-0


[E-Balla]

... (Magic) was a PG at times, a C at others. Basically his first 4 years Magic had every role....

Magic never played C, that was a myth. He played high post PF with Rambis being the center. Unless you define setting up in the high post as being a center in which case it's not that uncommon. Bob Cousy did it for Boston way back in the 50s.

Magic was versatile but he didn't guard centers and for that matter had trouble guarding PGs. (Actually, he didn't guard anyone that well which is the biggest knock against him; not longevity.) His game was offense and in that he is one of the true offensive GOAT candidates.

Well I mainly was thinking of offensively and you are right he wasn't a true low post scoring C when he "played" C in the Finals. And yes he couldn't check PGs and Cs but he was good enough at guarding SGs, SFs, and PFs to not be taken advantage of. Plus he was amazing in pressure defensive schemes. I think his defense is underrated (he's about average on that end).

[Doctor MJ]

Surprised to see Wilt getting voted in.
Feel pretty strongly that Shaq was the better playoff performer.
Peak or Prime wise he scored at a similar or greater rate on much better efficiency and he did a better job of stepping it up in key playoff/finals series.

Like Colts just said Wilt had some good teams around him after the early 60's and his own poor play in some key series arguably cost him a chance to win at the very least 1 more Ring if not 2-3 more.
I have no problem with people pointing out the poor play of his teammates but that doesn't excuse his own poor play.

Wilt had some amazing years but as a playoff performer Shaq had even greater Peak years and was much more consistent performance wise in his other regular years.

Even looking outside of Ring's or performance in big series (both areas where Shaq clearly has the edge) I would also say that Shaq was the better individual player.
He was the better scorer/offensive anchor and equal to Wilt on the defensive end.
Wilt's edge in rebounding isn't enough to make him the more valuable individual star.

Ardee brought up durability and while Wilt did indeed miss less games in the regular-season that wouldn't sway me to vote in his favor.
I will take the superior playoff performer who will miss 10-15 games in some years (and occasionally more) over the inferior playoff performer who usually plays 75-80+ games.

Yeah it's interesting. This time around it seems like people are putting more emphasis on how someone would do in an ideal situation in space and time, and that's one valid criteria to go by...I suppose I just have my doubts that they'll follow through with it as we progrsss.


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[penbeast0]

. . .
Here are those guys without HCA

Code: Select all

 
              Road(50+)/non-50
Shaq:         8-6 / 0-0
Magic:        3-4 / 0-0
Duncan:        5-5 / 0-0
Olajuwon:     7-8 / 1-1
Bird:         0-4 / 0-0
Wilt:         1-7 / 2-0
Kobe:         5-5 / 0-0
Lebron:      2-3 /0-0


More spread than the HCA numbers. Wilt and LeBron come up a bit short it seems. BTW, I edited your post so we wouldn't waste a quarter page on you quoting yourself. Please try to self-edit to the essentials in the future.

[penbeast0]

. . .
Good post. I'm trying to remain consistent in what I value (looking at both skillset translates to today and evidence of team level impact, in the context of your championship odds method), but if I appear inconsistent going forward, I have absolutely no problem if a poster asks me to reconsider my analysis/voting in the context of my criteria.

Regarding the bolded, Bird actually had a great discussion on the three-point shot in his 1990 autobiography "Drive". I'd like to type it up (or maybe scan it, if I'm too lazy) and share it in the project for posters to consider when evaluating him.

I know I've said this before but if you are going to look at how skillsets transfer to today, shouldn't you also be looking at how modern skillsets transfer to earlier eras?

[drza]

This was an interesting turning point in the project, as apparently there was a consensus top-3 and then an explosion of others. A lot of interesting cases can (and have) been made, but I actually fear that the numbers of worthy candidates makes it impossible to give every candidate their just due. Whereas we hit Kareem's and Russell's cases in thorough depth, it feels like we've gone a bit more superficial in this thread. And again, I can understand why...you just can't go max depth on so many players at once. I missed the first day of posting, and which kind of makes me feel like I lost contact with the thread. It appears that Wilt has the sure momentum here. That said, I at least would like to paint thumbnails for the various candidates and what I see is their initial strengths and weaknesses.

*Wilt: Clearly his box-score stats are ridiculous. But it's very interesting to me how his seeming lack of impact for those stats has been swept under the rug in this vote. Colts18 posted his in/out list, and DocMJ quoted it, but no one else really seems to lend it any credence at all. The last few posts on Wilt have spoken of how the poster worried about Wilt's lack of success, but then they read that Wilt's support wasn't so strong so now they're ok with it. They relate it to players like KG and his situation in Minnesota. The big difference, though, is that no matter what you may think of the team results of the Timberwolves, Garnett's impact stats (on/off, in/out, APM, RAPM, pick your poison) were always off the charts high. It is very clear, in every in depth analysis of impact, that Garnett was pulling superstar weight as far as helping his team's results. Wilt, to the extent that we have data on, did not. Repeatedly. In different situations, over the course of his career. That is something I would have liked to have seen some analysis/commentary on from Wilt supporters before he was voted in.

(For full disclosure, if you go back to the 1965 thread of the Retro Player of the Year project, you'll see that I was actually voting FOR Wilt higher than most despite that being one of the seasons where his in/out didn't measure well at all. I don't think the in/out or +/- stats are a be-all end-all, but I do think they deserve more consideration than they've gotten thus far for Wilt.

Shaq and Duncan: I think this is and will continue to be a rich discussion. While I regret that I wasn't around to try to generate more discussion on Wilt's impact, I am happy that I will be able to participate in this discussion in future threads. With Shaq and Duncan being in greatly overlapping generations and the fact that it is the one where we have the most statistical evidence, I think there is a great opportunity to do a more complicate quantitative argument for these two than we've had for any of our candidates so far. Shaq's peak is beastly, Duncan's consistency is wonderful, and both have lots of other areas to discuss as well. I look forward to it.

Magic and Bird: I'm pretty shocked that there has been little to no discussion of them so far. Magic has seemingly gained more consensus over Bird around here, and I know in the last project I argued for him over Kareem. In fact, I was greatly looking forward to building on that Magic over Kareem case in this project, but Kareem snuck in past Russell and thus made that discussion thread moot. But Magic's offensive and overall argument has a lot of similarities to Russell's, and I thought we might see more of it here. And since many believe that Bird was clearly better than Magic early in their career and debatable later, I thought that we'd start hearing his name here as well. ElGee isn't voting here, but I know he's extremely high on Bird. Surprised at the silence.

Olajuwon: He's an extremely interesting case, because he's very modern...I can remember watching him all the way back to his Phi Slamma Jamma days...but his career ended just before the current level of statistical analysis becomes relevant. He has an outstanding on-paper skillset description, and he had his beastly peak run. He also had other great production indicators throughout, though there are some question marks as well that. I think there is rich discussion to be had here. And I hope that Dipper 13's work scouting and quantifying a bunch of Hakeem's games gets some good attention in this project moving forward.

Garnett: It is extremely interesting that DocMJ brought KG up in this thread. I don't think that many of you realize just how remarkable of a transition that this is for DocMJ. When we did the Retro Player of the Year project four years ago, DocMJ was a) not a big fan of KG as a player and b) not all that impressed with his contributions. People see that in the last couple of years Doc has been arguing more for KG and think of him as a "KG guy", but in reality Doc MJ (to his credit) did his analysis over years in a lot of detail, then over time the picture that emerged elevated Garnett in his esteem. Whether you agree with him or not, I really like seeing someone open minded enough to make conclusions outside of his apparent interests.

That said...my initial thoughts on KG. I think that Garnett very well may be the best player left on the board. He and Duncan were always a classic debate, and I'd love it if that happens here though I don't know if it will. Garnett had the versatility of impact that no one outside of Wilt (and maybe David Robinson) showed, but he seems to have more of the mentality and mindset of Russell. He is the only person in the last 15 years that measured out at any given time as both the highest impact offensive player and the highest impact defensive player in the league (though at different times). Along with Robinson, Garnett is the modern player most readily tied to momentous regular season team over-achievement given circumstances. Unlike Robinson, though, Garnett continued to squeeze maximal impact out of himself and his team in the postseason as well as the regular season. Garnett may be the best "make his teammates better" player that I've ever seen, because his skillset and mentality are such that players of any type can play to the best of their ability on the teams that he leads. Some argue that this makes him a #2 player...to me it makes him one of the best possible choices to be a #1 that the league has ever seen. I'm sure there will be plenty of time to expound upon this as the project goes along, so I'll cut it short for now.

Official Vote: Kevin Garnett

[D Nice]

Some thoughts from someone trying to keep up with this project:

-All the different criteria is a bit disorienting. With the exception of a few posters who explicitly link back to their criteria, I have no idea who values what in a GOAT list. The amount of discussion in the last thread about judging players based on the modern era was really surprising and incredibly abstract for me.

-I'm big on consistent criteria when it comes to the rankings for (hopefully) obvious reasons. Since this project is a free-for-all, people are really talking past each other. One conversation will be about in-era impact. Another about transporting to the modern game. Another about some abstraction of peak/prime goodness.

I saw this problem coming in. It's why I would've been strongly in favor of a more thorough vetting process, we kinda just jumped in without ensuring the quality of not only the participants but general discussions that would be generated on a thread-to-thread basis.

Most people are terrible analysts without some kind of structural guidelines in place for them. Before we progress to 5 I would STRONGLY recommend we go back to the "ruminations thread" or whatever it was called and hammer some kind of template out that posters need to adhere to before including their vote, and if there isn't consistency and adherence to SOME degree (that would be discretionary) the vote wouldn't count. I literally predicted that the first 3 threads would be awesome because virtually everybody has Jordan, Russell, and Kareem in some order for the top 3 but after that there's too much chaos for posters to be left to their own (sometimes agenda-based) devices.

I'll be voting Magic and will make my explanation post tonight but Elgee's point really can't be harped on enough here. It's kind of a make or break thing for me in regards to further participation, I don't want to feel like I'm wasting my time.

[ceiling raiser]

. . .
Good post. I'm trying to remain consistent in what I value (looking at both skillset translates to today and evidence of team level impact, in the context of your championship odds method), but if I appear inconsistent going forward, I have absolutely no problem if a poster asks me to reconsider my analysis/voting in the context of my criteria.

Regarding the bolded, Bird actually had a great discussion on the three-point shot in his 1990 autobiography "Drive". I'd like to type it up (or maybe scan it, if I'm too lazy) and share it in the project for posters to consider when evaluating him.

I know I've said this before but if you are going to look at how skillsets transfer to today, shouldn't you also be looking at how modern skillsets transfer to earlier eras?

In the past I would agree, but rather than looking at rule changes as merely defining eras, I now think of the rules/league climate as evolving as we move forward in time. For better or worse, this is the direction in which the game is headed, so I'm placing plenty of value on whether or not guys could thrive in this era. While I think it's interesting to look at it both ways (especially when considering historical similars), I think juxtaposing a guy in todays game is more valuable than the other way around.

Obviously I think some of the tremendous players would be dominant today, and some could actually thrive more today than they did in their eras (I mentioned Baylor as one such guy in the pre-project lists thread, and I think Bird is another guy who would be even more dominant today).

[colts18]

Official Vote: Kevin Garnett

Why do you have KG ranked higher than Shaq? Shaq was consistently better in RAPM stats and was a much better playoff performer.