2019-20 NBA Season Discussion

[Jaivl]

It's odd to me this conversation is happening, and people are pretending that Isiah's legacy and wins shouldn't matter. Isiah won because he performed when it mattered most. His legacy and wins matter because you play to win rings, not to win the most regular season games.

Isiah averaged 23.2/4.7/9.6/2.6 on 52.8 TS% with a 111 ORtg in the playoffs from 84-88 with a 21.5 PER, .157 WS/48 and 7.4 BPM.

Isiah averaged 19.4/4.9/8.2/1.9 on 52.3 TS% with a 111 ORtg in the 89 & 90 playoffs with a 19.9 PER, .167 WS/48 and 6.1 BPM.

Stockton averaged 16.5/3.4/12.8/2.3 on 58.2 TS% and a 117 ORTG in the playoffs from 88-94 (I'm just copying your numbers) with a 20.6 PER, .160 WS/48, and 7.2 BPM. (sidenote, wild how the new BPM overrates both Isiah and Stockton huh)

If Stockton was put on a similar position than Isiah on his prime, he'd have two rings.

[E-Balla]

Billups and Isiah are very comparable. In fact, the Pistons of the 80s and 00s are similar too.

80s Pistons (87-91):
52 wins
54
63
59
50
55.6 win average

3 Finals Appearances
2 Titles
5 ECFs
15-3 Playoff record

00 Pistons (04-08):
54 wins
54
64
53
59
56.8 win average

2 Finals appearances
1 Title
5 ECF
13-5 Playoff record

I don't see much of a difference.

The 84 Pistons were a +6.1 offense and +1.6 defense in the playoffs.
The 85 Pistons were a +5.0 offense and +2.5 defense in the playoffs.
The 86 Pistons were a +3.8 offense and +6.4 defense in the playoffs.
The 87 Pistons were a +7.6 offense and -3.8 defense in the playoffs.
The 88 Pistons were a +0.7 offense and -8.1 defense in the playoffs.
The 89 Pistons were a +6.4 offense and -5.8 defense in the playoffs.
The 90 Pistons were a +2.1 offense and -8.3 defense in the playoffs.
The 91 Pistons were a +4.3 offense and -0.8 defense in the playoffs.

On average the Pistons offense was better than the defense in Isiah's postseason career and in the 5 years you singled out the Pistons were +10 or more overall more often than not.

Let's compare that to Chauncey's offenses in Detroit:
The 04 Pistons were a -0.1 offense and a -10.7 defense in the playoffs.
The 05 Pistons were a +3.1 offense and a -6.6 defense in the playoffs.
The 06 Pistons were a +3.4 offense and a -2.2 defense in the playoffs.
The 07 Pistons were a +4.5 offense and a -2.2 defense in the playoffs.
The 08 Pistons were a +5.3 offense and a -2.7 defense in the playoffs.

The 80s Pistons are just better than the 00s Pistons outside of 2004 and 2005. Like it's not even particularly close. If the 80s Pistons didn't consistently overperform in the playoffs I could see he relevance of bringing up the regular season but they did. From 87-91 they were a +3.8 offense and -5.9 defense on average in the playoffs.

[E-Balla]

It's odd to me this conversation is happening, and people are pretending that Isiah's legacy and wins shouldn't matter. Isiah won because he performed when it mattered most. His legacy and wins matter because you play to win rings, not to win the most regular season games.

Isiah averaged 23.2/4.7/9.6/2.6 on 52.8 TS% with a 111 ORtg in the playoffs from 84-88 with a 21.5 PER, .157 WS/48 and 7.4 BPM.

Isiah averaged 19.4/4.9/8.2/1.9 on 52.3 TS% with a 111 ORtg in the 89 & 90 playoffs with a 19.9 PER, .167 WS/48 and 6.1 BPM.

Stockton averaged 16.5/3.4/12.8/2.3 on 58.2 TS% and a 117 ORTG in the playoffs from 88-94 (I'm just copying your numbers) with a 20.6 PER, .160 WS/48, and 7.2 BPM. (sidenote, wild how the new BPM overrates both Isiah and Stockton huh)

If Stockton was put on a similar position than Isiah on his prime, he'd have two rings.

Isiah was just as highly rated in the old BPM and Stockton, if he was at his peak, would probably win in 89 and 90 on the Pistons sure, but Isiah was winning almost 5 years after his best seasons compare Isiah in 89 and 90 to Stockton in any year past 91 and Isiah wins.

Also Isiah didn't play up to his statistical standard in the 1989 postseason but I have no reason to believe John Stockton can lead a +6.4 offense in the playoffs like Isiah did. Stockton could be higher all time, IDK, but it would be because of his longevity. Isiah definitely accomplished more and played at a higher level when it mattered. Maybe if Stockton could take over a game like Isiah he'd have rings.

[limbo]

Lol, how does Isiah get credit for 'leading' a +6.5 PS offense in 1989 by scoring 26.5 pts/100 on 48%TS with a personal ORtg of 108...? Consistently finishing behind multiple teammates in ORtg...

That's somehow better than when Stockton lead a +5.6 PS offense in 1997 by scoring 24.2 pts/100 on 63%TS with an ORtg of 122... Finishing at or near the top in every series the Jazz played...

At what point do you acknowledge that most of Stockton's cast shot under 53%TS that postseason (including Karl Malone volume scoring 26 ppg on 50%TS) and compare that to the much better conversion rate Detroit had?

Also the fact that the Jazz played tougher defenses every series?

[LA Bird]

Not sure what Isiah is doing in the 2019-20 season thread but since he is here, I'll just join in and say that he has no case for top 3 point guard. Even if you ignore all the stats and go purely by rings, Cousy, Magic and Curry will be ahead of him. Some of Isiah's supporters will point to his playoffs stats (especially scoring) as to why he won those rings but the issue is that Isiah still wasn't good enough a point guard scorer to justify a top 3 placing. Walt Frazier, despite being best known for his defense, was a better postseason scorer than Isiah and also won two rings - where are all the pundits on national media crowning Frazier as a surefire top 3 point guard and going crazy if you say otherwise? Isiah's legacy at this point is less about how good he was as a player and more about the implications he brings for other all time greats. Isiah is only ranked a top 3 PG by the public because he "beat" MJ, Magic, Bird and, by their faulty logic, ranking him any lower would reflect poorly on those players.

[Strepbacter]

Not really discussion for this season, but does anyone have a link to the '97-'00 on/off data lying around they could share?

I have stint data from 1997 to 2017. The format is [players], possessions, mov, quarter where home players have a "+" prepended before their name and away players a "-". Since I only kept the margin of victory/defeat for the home lineup, only total RAPM can be computed. That is, you can't distinguish between offensive and defensive impact, you can only estimate total impact. Unfortunately I no longer have the raw PbP otherwise it would be easy to update the stint data for ORAPM and DRAPM. And since I wrote this code years ago, I don't expect the scraper will work any longer. But let me know if you'd like the data.

Top-10 from 2000-2007 using this data (no priors other than the ridge penalty):

0 (Tim Duncan). 6.500221252441406
1 (Kevin Garnett). 5.95599889755249
2 (Dirk Nowitzki). 5.492483615875244
3 (Kobe Bryant). 5.328146934509277
4 (Manu Ginobili). 5.262575149536133
5 (Paul Pierce). 4.795802116394043
6 (Rasheed Wallace). 4.647972106933594
7 (Ray Allen). 4.319425582885742
8 (Shaquille O'Neal). 4.274540424346924
9 (Andrei Kirilenko). 4.141995906829834

Here's 2006-2010:

0 (LeBron James). 6.657414436340332
1 (Kobe Bryant). 6.563058853149414
2 (Vince Carter). 6.485203742980957
3 (Manu Ginobili). 6.1238603591918945
4 (Dwight Howard). 5.78971529006958
5 (Tim Duncan). 5.780171871185303
6 (Kevin Garnett). 5.3996477127075195
7 (Dwyane Wade). 5.073834419250488
8 (Steve Nash). 4.619450569152832
9 (Baron Davis). 4.204566478729248

"B-b-b-b but Kobe has zero argument for being the best player of the 2000's"

[E-Balla]

Lol, how does Isiah get credit for 'leading' a +6.5 PS offense in 1989 by scoring 26.5 pts/100 on 48%TS with a personal ORtg of 108...? Consistently finishing behind multiple teammates in ORtg...

Because the impact of a PG, especially a playmaking PG, goes beyond their scoring. He still averaged 8.3 apg, 2.5 topg, and had a 108 ORTG despite his terrible scoring (also let's not pretend a 108 ORTG on high volume is bad, or that him having such high playmaking volume and skills didn't help his teammates be more efficient). The game is beyond the numbers, if Zeke was scoring near his regular efficiency (53 TS%) his ORTG would've been around a 120 because of his great playmaking.

That's somehow better than when Stockton lead a +5.6 PS offense in 1997 by scoring 24.2 pts/100 on 63%TS with an ORtg of 122... Finishing at or near the top in every series the Jazz played...

Cool we're comparing 1997 which is Stockton's 2nd best postseason over a 10 year prime to Isiah's 2nd worst postseason over a 8 year prime. See the gap in their abilities here?

At what point do you acknowledge that most of Stockton's cast shot under 53%TS that postseason (including Karl Malone volume scoring 26 ppg on 50%TS) and compare that to the much better conversion rate Detroit had?

He's the PG. If your usually good teammates are sucking across the board as you put together still high but prime low assist totals and 2nd lowest assist % totals you're going to look kind of funny in the light. Now that's not to say 97 Stockton didn't have a better postseason than 89 Isiah because he did, but it's not that much better and we're comparing one of Isiah's lows to Stockton's highest of highs.

Also the fact that the Jazz played tougher defenses every series?

I mean they did but they didn't perform as well against them. Detroit's 2 best offensive performances were against the 2 best defenses they played while the Jazz played amazing in the WCP but flopped offensively in the Finals. There's a reason we're using relative ORTGs here, the defensive quality is already taken into account.

[limbo]

Because the impact of a PG, especially a playmaking PG, goes beyond their scoring. He still averaged 8.3 apg, 2.5 topg, and had a 108 ORTG despite his terrible scoring (also let's not pretend a 108 ORTG on high volume is bad, or that him having such high playmaking volume and skills didn't help his teammates be more efficient). The game is beyond the numbers, if Zeke was scoring near his regular efficiency (53 TS%) his ORTG would've been around a 120 because of his great playmaking.

I get it... Isiah was the primary playmaker on that Pistons squad and deserves to get credited for that... What i'm asking is why are the rest of the supporting cast offensive contributions being ignored after that like they're not relevant to the overall discussion? Is this what we are doing now? Identifying a team that had an elite rORTG PS run and then assigning the bulk of the credit to their primary playmaker just because he was making the most decisions on the team?

In that case, we can start putting Sam Cassell up there with the GOAT PG conversations... The '01 Bucks finished the regular season with a +5.8 rORTG (and upped that to +6.3 rORTG in the PS...) Cassell was their primary playmaker, his impact goes beyond the numbers... How many PG's led their teams to such an elite offensive rating throughout a course of the season and Playoffs?

Cool we're comparing 1997 which is Stockton's 2nd best postseason over a 10 year prime to Isiah's 2nd worst postseason over a 8 year prime. See the gap in their abilities here?

No, i don't see the 'gap in their abilities here', because your claim is easily explained by the fact that Stockton had horrid offensive casts up until 1995 when Hornacek played his first full season with Utah... Prior to that it Stockton only had 1 elite offensive player in Malone (who had much more problems translating his offensive impact in the PS than Stockton did at the time) and the rest of the Jazz roster consisted of below average to absolutely horrific offensive players...

1997 was actually the first time Stockon had comparable offensive support to what Isiah Thomas basically had his whole career...

What you are doing is comparing two PG's on offense with vastly different levels of help around them and then pointing towards team results as the ultimate telltale of who the better player was, while completely ignoring every other metric...

''WELL, THIS GUY WAS THE PRIMARY PLAYMAKER FOR HIS TEAM, AND HIS TEAM REGULARLY PREFORMED BETTER IN THE PLAYOFFS; ERGO, HE MUST BE THE BETTER PLAYER''

Or his teammates simply offered more value on offense and contributed more themselves than the other guy's teammates? That could also be a possibility, mind you... it's not like most of the metrics aren't saying to us exactly that...

Also, it's funny how you keep emphasizing that Isiah's '89 PS contributions are underrated because his 'playmaking went beyond the numbers'... You do realize that Stockton had a bigger playmaking 'footprint' for the Jazz in '97, right?

Isiah was averaging 12 apg (36.7 AST%) with 3.7 TO per 100
Stockton was averaging 14.3 apg (47.5 AST%) with 4.7 per 100

Isiah had a better passing cast and received notably more help in playmaking from his backcourt mate Dumars who averaged 5.5 apg with 1.8 TO in that PS...

[limbo]

double post

[limbo]

Also

If we isolate the sample size to Playoff games only, you see this:

Average ORtg and DRtg in 1989 Playoffs: 110.2

Detroit Pistons:

113.2 (+3.0) ORtg
104.5 (-5.7) DRtg

Average ORtg and DRtg in 1997 Playoffs: 107.4

Utah Jazz:

110.5 (+3.1) ORtg
106.7 (-0.7) DRtg

I mean... It's crystal clear where the HUMONGOUS difference between these two teams in power lied (psst, not on offense)... Unless you'll try and argue that Isiah was actually anchoring the Pistons defense 'beyond the numbers'...

[Dr Positivity]

I think everyone believes Isiah is still a great PG and deserving HOFer, and had highly positive impact on Pistons offense. But you can be a great PG and be worse than John Stockton. Isiah was ranked 11th best PG on the 2017 RealGM list and 39th overall which is an excellent career.

The man is ranked 151st all time in NBA Win Shares. By my count he has the 25th highest WS in NBA only for a PG. Now WS isn't flawless, but if he's to be top 3 PG in history, what other situation comes even close to this for an aberration in WS vs actual value? Russell is actually 18th all time in WS overall and 7th for Cs, and his best category wasn't tracked. Cowens has weak WS at 125th, making him only 28th highest for C (more like 25th for post shotclock) ... except on the RealGM list he was the 18th highest ranked C, nobody is arguing he's top 10 all time. Plus as I mentioned in the other thread, it's easy to point at the defensive things Russell or Cowens do that don't show up in stats. AI is only 142nd all time in WS, but value or lack thereof is widely recognized, finishing 58th on the RealGM list which was good for 11th for SGs. Since his volume blows away Isiah there is at least an argument for volume vs efficiency in his case. Why should I believe Isiah was having superstar impact in 89 and 90 when he was putting up worse offensive stats and probably playing worse defense than Derek Harper? Because his 18ppg was putting such immense pressure on the game compared to Dumars 17ppg and Aguirre's 20 pts/36? This wasn't an Iverson 2001 Sixers situation or anything... First off cause his scoring volume wasn't that high, and secondly because they had other talented offensive players. I don't have a problem with saying three very solid creators on the perimeter in Isiah, Dumars and Aguirre was enough to make up for lacking one mega option. And the idea that Isiah could've been this 25ppg guy and sacrificed it all for the team isn't backed by anything, his already below average efficiency would've tanked if he shot that much, and his FGAs didn't go down as his talent went up. The real hero in terms of sacrifice is Aguirre.

[eminence]

Also the fact that the Jazz played tougher defenses every series?

I mean they did but they didn't perform as well against them. Detroit's 2 best offensive performances were against the 2 best defenses they played while the Jazz played amazing in the WCP but flopped offensively in the Finals. There's a reason we're using relative ORTGs here, the defensive quality is already taken into account.

Put simply, no they weren't. The Bucks and Lakers were both decimated by injuries in their series against those Pistons.

[E-Balla]

I get it... Isiah was the primary playmaker on that Pistons squad and deserves to get credited for that... What i'm asking is why are the rest of the supporting cast offensive contributions being ignored after that like they're not relevant to the overall discussion? Is this what we are doing now? Identifying a team that had an elite rORTG PS run and then assigning the bulk of the credit to their primary playmaker just because he was making the most decisions on the team?

Did I do that or did I say Isiah led better postseason offenses than Stockton did? We're just going to act like Malone, Hornacek, and a bunch of good role players are trash support now? Like Utah was having +6-8 offenses with only Stockton being good?

In that case, we can start putting Sam Cassell up there with the GOAT PG conversations... The '01 Bucks finished the regular season with a +5.8 rORTG (and upped that to +6.3 rORTG in the PS...) Cassell was their primary playmaker, his impact goes beyond the numbers... How many PG's led their teams to such an elite offensive rating throughout a course of the season and Playoffs?

Did Cassell lead that offense? No. No way in hell. Ray Allen was averaging 25/4/6 while Cassell averaged 17/5/7 in that postseason the reason they performed was Ray had a postseason for the ages. Not because of Cassell being a solid point next to him. That's nothing like Detroit where Isiah used way more possessions than any other player and was the clear primary playmaker.

No, i don't see the 'gap in their abilities here', because your claim is easily explained by the fact that Stockton had horrid offensive casts up until 1995 when Hornacek played his first full season with Utah... Prior to that it Stockton only had 1 elite offensive player in Malone (who had much more problems translating his offensive impact in the PS than Stockton did at the time) and the rest of the Jazz roster consisted of below average to absolutely horrific offensive players...

And about Stockton's individual performances? What about his individual performances in 95 and 96? Why aren't those on Isiah's level?

1997 was actually the first time Stockon had comparable offensive support to what Isiah Thomas basically had his whole career...

This is ****.

''WELL, THIS GUY WAS THE PRIMARY PLAYMAKER FOR HIS TEAM, AND HIS TEAM REGULARLY PREFORMED BETTER IN THE PLAYOFFS; ERGO, HE MUST BE THE BETTER PLAYER''

Or his teammates simply offered more value on offense and contributed more themselves than the other guy's teammates? That could also be a possibility, mind you... it's not like most of the metrics aren't saying to us exactly that...

Most metrics also tell us Isiah's individual performances were better as well so why is that being ignored?

Also, it's funny how you keep emphasizing that Isiah's '89 PS contributions are underrated because his 'playmaking went beyond the numbers'... You do realize that Stockton had a bigger playmaking 'footprint' for the Jazz in '97, right?

Isiah was averaging 12 apg (36.7 AST%) with 3.7 TO per 100
Stockton was averaging 14.3 apg (47.5 AST%) with 4.7 per 100

Isiah had a better passing cast and received notably more help in playmaking from his backcourt mate Dumars who averaged 5.5 apg with 1.8 TO in that PS...

Yes because Joe Dumars is so clearly better production wise than Jeff Hornacek offensively, right? Oh wait, he isn't. I think the 97 Jazz are easily a better supporting cast. Isiah's 2nd best player would've been Stockton's 3rd best offensively.

Also I'm not denying 97 Stockton might be better than 89 Isiah. Actually I've already said he is. My main point is that Isiah's worst is comparable to Stockton's best. **** on Karl Malone and Jeff Hornacek while pretending Joe Dumars is a God with the ball won't change that.

[E-Balla]

Also the fact that the Jazz played tougher defenses every series?

I mean they did but they didn't perform as well against them. Detroit's 2 best offensive performances were against the 2 best defenses they played while the Jazz played amazing in the WCP but flopped offensively in the Finals. There's a reason we're using relative ORTGs here, the defensive quality is already taken into account.

Put simply, no they weren't. The Bucks and Lakers were both decimated by injuries in their series against those Pistons.

Decimated? They both had one major injury each, and one of those injuries replaced Magic Johnson with Michael Cooper (the undeniably better defender) in the lineup.

[E-Balla]

Also

If we isolate the sample size to Playoff games only, you see this:

Average ORtg and DRtg in 1989 Playoffs: 110.2

Detroit Pistons:

113.2 (+3.0) ORtg
104.5 (-5.7) DRtg

Average ORtg and DRtg in 1997 Playoffs: 107.4

Utah Jazz:

110.5 (+3.1) ORtg
106.7 (-0.7) DRtg

I mean... It's crystal clear where the HUMONGOUS difference between these two teams in power lied (psst, not on offense)... Unless you'll try and argue that Isiah was actually anchoring the Pistons defense 'beyond the numbers'...

What reason do we have to isolate to playoffs only? I mean outside of you attempting to come up with ways to justify crapping on Detroit's offense?

And no one is saying there was a big offensive gap but the Pistons were a better offense slightly and you still haven't addressed the fact that we're comparing one player's worst to another's best.

[eminence]

I mean they did but they didn't perform as well against them. Detroit's 2 best offensive performances were against the 2 best defenses they played while the Jazz played amazing in the WCP but flopped offensively in the Finals. There's a reason we're using relative ORTGs here, the defensive quality is already taken into account.

Put simply, no they weren't. The Bucks and Lakers were both decimated by injuries in their series against those Pistons.

Decimated? They both had one major injury each, and one of those injuries replaced Magic Johnson with Michael Cooper (the undeniably better defender) in the lineup.

Paul Pressey and Terry Cummings (1st and 2nd in the Bucks rotation). Byron Scott and Magic Johnson(1st and 3rd in the Lakers rotation).

[E-Balla]

Put simply, no they weren't. The Bucks and Lakers were both decimated by injuries in their series against those Pistons.

Decimated? They both had one major injury each, and one of those injuries replaced Magic Johnson with Michael Cooper (the undeniably better defender) in the lineup.

Paul Pressey and Terry Cummings (1st and 2nd in the Bucks rotation). Byron Scott and Magic Johnson(1st and 3rd in the Lakers rotation).

You're right I forgot about Cummings and Scott. Still I don't think that effected the Lakers defense much, it definitely affected Milwaukee being without Pressey though.

At the end of the day we're still comparing Isiah's worst to Stockton. No one would compare 84-88 Isiah to Stockton in the playoffs. At least I hope not. Isiah is criminally underrated same as Reggie Miller based off coasting through the regular season.

[HeartBreakKid]

Isiah averaged 21.7/4.8/9.0/2.3 on 52.6 TS% with a 111 ORTG in the playoffs from 84-90 with a 20.9 PER, .161 WS/48, and 6.9 BPM.

Stockton averaged 16.5/3.4/12.8/2.3 on 58.2 TS% and a 117 ORTG in the playoffs from 88-94 (to have an equivalent 7 year prime) with a 20.6 PER, .160 WS/48, and 7.2 BPM.

It's odd to me this conversation is happening, and people are pretending that Isiah's legacy and wins shouldn't matter. Isiah won because he performed when it mattered most. His legacy and wins matter because you play to win rings, not to win the most regular season games. If Stockton played like him in the playoffs during his prime, he'd have a ring.

No he wouldn't.

Also, unless I am reading incorrectly those stats you posted suggest that Stockton was better.

[Clyde Frazier]

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[Clyde Frazier]

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