Greatest Peaks series (Thinking Basketball/Ben Taylor)

[Doctor MJ]

What do you think about Taylor's season selection for James?
I'd probably go 2012-2013 but 2016-2017 span also has a great case.

His regular season performance & motor was better and his defensive effort was more consistent in Miami.
Though he was a better floor general in Cleveland and the way he directed offense was certainly better, especially in the playoffs.

I could be wrong, but I feel like he's been choosing three-year stretches for everyone. Definitely let me know if I need correcting on that though. Under that assumption, I'm going to say 2012-2014. I believe I listened to a podcast once where he said he liked 2013 the best, so I'm pretty sure it's going to be in there.

Yup, he's trying to avoid being too tied to the narrative of one season.

[Odinn21]

What do you think about Taylor's season selection for James?
I'd probably go 2012-2013 but 2016-2017 span also has a great case.

His regular season performance & motor was better and his defensive effort was more consistent in Miami.
Though he was a better floor general in Cleveland and the way he directed offense was certainly better, especially in the playoffs.

I could be wrong, but I feel like he's been choosing three-year stretches for everyone. Definitely let me know if I need correcting on that though. Under that assumption, I'm going to say 2012-2014. I believe I listened to a podcast once where he said he liked 2013 the best, so I'm pretty sure it's going to be in there.

Yup, he's trying to avoid being too tied to the narrative of one season.

He had '77-'78 Walton and '85-'86 Bird.
Walton was a situation dictated by his injury. It was interesting to see him leave out '84 Bird though. It was Bird's 2nd strongest season, 1984 playoffs Bird was the peak Bird and including '84 wouldn't be disruptive to that time frame.

I don't think he has a certain criteria for 3 seasons though. At least not as set in stone. As for James' case, I feel like 2012-13 has a very strong case over 2016-17 but when we make it 3 season spans, I think 2016-18 time frame will be expected from him.

[KTM_2813]

I could be wrong, but I feel like he's been choosing three-year stretches for everyone. Definitely let me know if I need correcting on that though. Under that assumption, I'm going to say 2012-2014. I believe I listened to a podcast once where he said he liked 2013 the best, so I'm pretty sure it's going to be in there.

Yup, he's trying to avoid being too tied to the narrative of one season.

He had '77-'78 Walton and '85-'86 Bird.
Walton was a situation dictated by his injury. It was interesting to see him leave out '84 Bird though. It was Bird's 2nd strongest season, 1984 playoffs Bird was the peak Bird and including '84 wouldn't be disruptive to that time frame.

I don't think he has a certain criteria for 3 seasons though. At least not as set in stone. As for James' case, I feel like 2012-13 has a very strong case over 2016-17 but when we make it 3 season spans, I think 2016-18 time frame will be expected from him.

Ooh. Nice catch, I didn't realize some guys weren't getting three full years. I wonder if he'll try a plot twist on us and list random years like 2009, 2013, and 2016. Just to be safe though, I'll stick with my 2012 - 2014 guess.

[LakerLegend]

So Ben studied and watched countless of 1989-91 MJ games for this project with experience of evaluating defense with other players, he made a long and comprehersal video to make his points and came up with conclusion a lot of people agree with here.

Then you came in the party and said that his opinion is "laughable" because it's different than yours. If anything is laughable, it's your approach.

No, I'm leaning on the opinions and observations of countless players, coaches, general managers, and whoever else you want to name some of whom were around since the 1950's who gave Jordan all the defensive accolades he accrued in his career.

Not random youtube goobers who watched a few games on tape and think they can breakdown a player of Jordan's stature in the game and supersede those opinions and his accomplishments.

So in other words you're just going off of blind hype and you're totally ignoring that the "random youtube goober" (by this notion aren't you a random forum posting goober?) didn't say he was bad.

Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and make a video response? Prove your point.

Someone put in a ton of hard work to make an analysis video and you get cheeky because he said your hero was a 9.9 instead of a 10 and that you know so much more than him. He presented his argument, where is yours?


In before you say "I have better things to do" - no, you do not, hence why you post here. You aren't going to make a response to his video because you don't know what you're talking about.

Blind hype? We're not talking about a rookie having a good stretch of 10 games and people calling them a hall of famer.

This is Michael Jordan, some guy watching 20 games and basing his analysis off that does NOT supercede everything else we know about Jordan.

I could cherry pick a bunch of plays from any player. Unless this guy has watched the majority of the games Jordan played and has analysis of every game/play then what he says should be taken with a grain of salt.

He didn't just figure something out the whole world hasn't in 40 years.

[Doctor MJ]

Blind hype? We're not talking about a rookie having a good stretch of 10 games and people calling them a hall of famer.

This is Michael Jordan, some guy watching 20 games and basing his analysis off that does NOT supercede everything else we know about Jordan.

I could cherry pick a bunch of plays from any player. Unless this guy has watched the majority of the games Jordan played and has analysis of every game/play then what he says should be taken with a grain of salt.

He didn't just figure something out the whole world hasn't in 40 years.

Actually to some degree you're right, he really didn't come up with anything fundamentally new here about Jordan, he just went through and collected examples of how things played out with Jordan, and talked about what was causing these things to happen. He just explained things well to those unfamiliar but willing to learn. But we always knew Jordan played with hyper-aggression on both sides of the ball and that hyper-aggression on defense sometimes gives openings to the offense. That's just how basketball is.

It doesn't mean he wasn't All-D, it doesn't even necessarily mean he wasn't DPOY, but there is a shape to everyone's game with pros and cons, and that's all he's illustrating for people. You're reading far more negativity into it than that because your emotions are involved. His work makes you defensive, and you lash out at it. If you could take away the emotional lens you have, you'd see he's not actually saying anything that radical, he's just not shying away from pointing out more than just the cherry picked highlights. And that's making you feel threatened.

Also, you clearly don't realize how foolish you look when you say "some guy watching 20 games". We know him here. We know better than that. You're trying to attach a negative characteristic on to him to further attack his character and credibility, but you're hanging things on him that aren't simply wrong, they are things you never bothered to even try to find out the truth of before you started asserting them as fact.

You don't get to just make s**t up in a way that everyone can see its s**t without turning your name to trash. I'd suggest you take a step back and consider how you should behave if you want anyone to think that you have any integrity at all.

[LakerLegend]

Blind hype? We're not talking about a rookie having a good stretch of 10 games and people calling them a hall of famer.

This is Michael Jordan, some guy watching 20 games and basing his analysis off that does NOT supercede everything else we know about Jordan.

I could cherry pick a bunch of plays from any player. Unless this guy has watched the majority of the games Jordan played and has analysis of every game/play then what he says should be taken with a grain of salt.

He didn't just figure something out the whole world hasn't in 40 years.

Actually to some degree you're right, he really didn't come up with anything fundamentally new here about Jordan, he just went through and collected examples of how things played out with Jordan, and talked about what was causing these things to happen. He just explained things well to those unfamiliar but willing to learn. But we always knew Jordan played with hyper-aggression on both sides of the ball and that hyper-aggression on defense sometimes gives openings to the offense. That's just how basketball is.

It doesn't mean he wasn't All-D, it doesn't even necessarily mean he wasn't DPOY, but there is a shape to everyone's game with pros and cons, and that's all he's illustrating for people. You're reading far more negativity into it than that because your emotions are involved. His work makes you defensive, and you lash out at it. If you could take away the emotional lens you have, you'd see he's not actually saying anything that radical, he's just not shying away from pointing out more than just the cherry picked highlights. And that's making you feel threatened.

Also, you clearly don't realize how foolish you look when you say "some guy watching 20 games". We know him here. We know better than that. You're trying to attach a negative characteristic on to him to further attack his character and credibility, but you're hanging things on him that aren't simply wrong, they are things you never bothered to even try to find out the truth of before you started asserting them as fact.

You don't get to just make s**t up in a way that everyone can see its s**t without turning your name to trash. I'd suggest you take a step back and consider how you should behave if you want anyone to think that you have any integrity at all.

1. What percentage of Jordan's combined regular and playoff games did he watch to conclude his assessment?

2. Watching games on tape is different then watching them unfold in realtime with all of the other factors involved(ie how have teams and players been playing and how is that influencing what's happening on the court)

IE.....if some guy came into the game on a hot streak the Bulls/Jordan's gameplan on how to play defensively is probably different than if the guy is coming in on a cold streak.

[LukaTheGOAT]

Yup, he's trying to avoid being too tied to the narrative of one season.

He had '77-'78 Walton and '85-'86 Bird.
Walton was a situation dictated by his injury. It was interesting to see him leave out '84 Bird though. It was Bird's 2nd strongest season, 1984 playoffs Bird was the peak Bird and including '84 wouldn't be disruptive to that time frame.

I don't think he has a certain criteria for 3 seasons though. At least not as set in stone. As for James' case, I feel like 2012-13 has a very strong case over 2016-17 but when we make it 3 season spans, I think 2016-18 time frame will be expected from him.

Ooh. Nice catch, I didn't realize some guys weren't getting three full years. I wonder if he'll try a plot twist on us and list random years like 2009, 2013, and 2016. Just to be safe though, I'll stick with my 2012 - 2014 guess.

He says in this vid that it just has to be 2 consecutive seasons. He could just end up focusing on 12 and 13 with this logic, albeit he does think 14 is Lebron's offensive peak.

[Doctor MJ]

Blind hype? We're not talking about a rookie having a good stretch of 10 games and people calling them a hall of famer.

This is Michael Jordan, some guy watching 20 games and basing his analysis off that does NOT supercede everything else we know about Jordan.

I could cherry pick a bunch of plays from any player. Unless this guy has watched the majority of the games Jordan played and has analysis of every game/play then what he says should be taken with a grain of salt.

He didn't just figure something out the whole world hasn't in 40 years.

Actually to some degree you're right, he really didn't come up with anything fundamentally new here about Jordan, he just went through and collected examples of how things played out with Jordan, and talked about what was causing these things to happen. He just explained things well to those unfamiliar but willing to learn. But we always knew Jordan played with hyper-aggression on both sides of the ball and that hyper-aggression on defense sometimes gives openings to the offense. That's just how basketball is.

It doesn't mean he wasn't All-D, it doesn't even necessarily mean he wasn't DPOY, but there is a shape to everyone's game with pros and cons, and that's all he's illustrating for people. You're reading far more negativity into it than that because your emotions are involved. His work makes you defensive, and you lash out at it. If you could take away the emotional lens you have, you'd see he's not actually saying anything that radical, he's just not shying away from pointing out more than just the cherry picked highlights. And that's making you feel threatened.

Also, you clearly don't realize how foolish you look when you say "some guy watching 20 games". We know him here. We know better than that. You're trying to attach a negative characteristic on to him to further attack his character and credibility, but you're hanging things on him that aren't simply wrong, they are things you never bothered to even try to find out the truth of before you started asserting them as fact.

You don't get to just make s**t up in a way that everyone can see its s**t without turning your name to trash. I'd suggest you take a step back and consider how you should behave if you want anyone to think that you have any integrity at all.

1. What percentage of Jordan's combined regular and playoff games did he watch to conclude his assessment?

2. Watching games on tape is different then watching them unfold in realtime with all of the other factors involved(ie how have teams and players been playing and how is that influencing what's happening on the court)

IE.....if some guy came into the game on a hot streak the Bulls/Jordan's gameplan on how to play defensively is probably different than if the guy is coming in on a cold streak.

I'm not sure where you got the idea that he didn't follow Jordan in real time. He's not a kid. He's been an obsessive watcher of basketball for decades, and like most of us was particularly focused on Jordan in the '90s.

But you're also under a fundamental misconception:

He's not watching games and making a bunch of holistic assessments. He's focusing on specific moves and plays trying to understand players based on their tendencies. He's scouting them. That's the real value-add.

Is he going to have ranking stuff at the end? Of course, but whatever that ranking is, that will just be his opinion. A very informed opinion, but just one man's view. But the footage he's serving up right now is objective. It's something everyone can use to understand these players better unless they've already done something similarly intense themselves, and frankly if you haven't done this by compiling and analyzing video over thousands and thousands of hours, you've done nothing close to this.

[Heej]

Say what you want about Ben's perceived biases and inconsistent weighting/reasoning with players from time to time, but you absolutely cannot deny that the man has put in the work. More work than any of us have ever put in to analyzing basketball combined if we're being honest. It's perfectly fair to disagree with the conclusions if that's how you feel, but don't belittle the work the man has put in to this stuff. That's some low energy s***. And honestly, show some respect for one of our own lol. Our guy is really doin his thing and it's been a treat for all of us hoops junkies.

[VanWest82]

I thought some of the language in the MJ video was a little suspect. Is the "gambled, gambled, gambled" stuff supposed to be double entendre? I wonder if we'll get to hear about how Lebron got "torched" by Jet/KD in the Finals or if he finds Lebron standing in one place for entire defensive possessions "difficult to evaluate." (not slagging Bron here, just questioning if this is actual analysis or just bias coming through...seemed like it might've been the latter)

MJ was overly aggressive on D at times but this characterization left me wondering if we were talking about Allen Iverson repeatedly whiffing trying to jump passing lanes instead of one of the greatest perimeter defenders of all time. Does he think MJ's DPOY season was just one big lucky gamble? A lot of the free safety stuff in that period was born out of miscues with young Scottie and Horace, and then the defense made a leap in 91 when those guys finally got better on that end (a lot better).

I have no doubt Taylor came by his opinion honestly, and it seems clear he wants to go even further in his criticism of MJ's aggressive style...I just think he's a little off on this one.

[70sFan]

The funniest thing is that Ben probably ranks Jordan as the best peak ever, but some fanboys still can't accept any criticism. That's just sad, some people really treat certain players (mostly Jordan or LeBron) like semi-gods who are above all criticism.

I mean, most people would agree that being overly agressive is valuable, but usually causes defenders making more errors and it's high risk high reward startegy. Most people who understand basketball knows that it's not optimal way to play defense, but you can get away with that if you have special physical gifts. Then here comes Micheal Jordan and all these reasonable conclusion don't matter anymore, because Jordan must be the GOAT so he can't be anything less than that in any part of basketball.

Jordan was elite defender who wasn't close to the best ever and his style could cause problems to a lot of teams, but it could also be exploited by smarter players.

[70sFan]

Also, I am in touch with Ben and I know how much work he put up in this project. I know that he bought rare games from the collector to get bigger sample of each player (specifically KG and TD as I helped him with these). I gave him hours of footage for his first three videos and he watched all of them, likely more than once or twice. We all know that Ben's involved in scouting players for years if not decades.

But here comes one Jordan fan who says that he watched random 20 Jordan games and came with "wrong" conclusion. Seriously, it's so lazy that it drives me mad. You can disagree with his conclusions like Odinn does for example, but he uses completely different approach - he spends a lot of time himself analyzing basketball and he shares his arguments here instead of saying "smart boy knows nothing".

[CumberlandPosey]

1. What percentage of Jordan's combined regular and playoff games did he watch to conclude his assessment?

well just a educated guess here but for playoff games i would assume he watched all of them.so 100% really.even myself did that.some important games i have watched even more.know many people who did the same.with watching i mean not live but but for joy/anaylytic/scouting reasons some time afterwards.safe to assume that a scout/analyst/writer of his caliber did the same.

for regular season games i have no clue.could be anything from just a handful to 50-100 to hundreds.but as we all know its the postseason where the money is made

[LukaTheGOAT]

I thought some of the language in the MJ video was a little suspect. Is the "gambled, gambled, gambled" stuff supposed to be double entendre? I wonder if we'll get to hear about how Lebron got "torched" by Jet/KD in the Finals or if he finds Lebron standing in one place for entire defensive possessions "difficult to evaluate." (not slagging Bron here, just questioning if this is actual analysis or just bias coming through...seemed like it might've been the latter)

MJ was overly aggressive on D at times but this characterization left me wondering if we were talking about Allen Iverson repeatedly whiffing trying to jump passing lanes instead of one of the greatest perimeter defenders of all time. Does he think MJ's DPOY season was just one big lucky gamble? A lot of the free safety stuff in that period was born out of miscues with young Scottie and Horace, and then the defense made a leap in 91 when those guys finally got better on that end (a lot better).

I have no doubt Taylor came by his opinion honestly, and it seems clear he wants to go even further in his criticism of MJ's aggressive style...I just think he's a little off on this one.

I think he was making a joke about Jordan with the constant mention of gambling since it is a well-known fact that Jordan liked to gamble in his free-time. Ben likes to crack jokes throughout his vids. For example, he also mentions in the vid that "Jordan hit some balls" with his gambling, poking fun at the fact that while Jordan got plenty of steals he also might've hit plenty of male private parts swiping for steals.

[Djoker]

Like someone said the final GOAT peak list that Ben will make is subjective and in good fun. It's the work behind making the list in crunching all the numbers and watching the players that is the real value added. The enormous work that he's put in is what I appreciate this project and his channel in general.

In terms of peak lists I would love to eventually see his breakdowns by position. For example the top 10 PG's, top 10 SG's ... but ranked by their impact on the basketball court rather than legacy. At the bottom of it it's more informative comparing similar players. It's nearly impossible to compare completely different players objectively if they roles on the basketball court are diametrically different.

Hopefully as new and more footage comes from the 60's and 70's, Ben can break down Oscar, West, Baylor and even Wilt and Russell in more detail. As much as I feel I know about these players there is just too much I don't know. I try to watch new footage whenever I can.

[limbo]

I don't know what everyone is complaining about. I'm enjoying the series.

I don't need it to perfectly align with my own opinions every step of the way, and there's also so much detail you can distill into a 15 minute video, even though this supposedly takes into account player's best 3-year stretches and not entire careers.

[freethedevil]

What do you think about Taylor's season selection for James?
I'd probably go 2012-2013 but 2016-2017 span also has a great case.

His regular season performance & motor was better and his defensive effort was more consistent in Miami.
Though he was a better floor general in Cleveland and the way he directed offense was certainly better, especially in the playoffs.

I could be wrong, but I feel like he's been choosing three-year stretches for everyone. Definitely let me know if I need correcting on that though. Under that assumption, I'm going to say 2012-2014. I believe I listened to a podcast once where he said he liked 2013 the best, so I'm pretty sure it's going to be in there.

Yup, he's trying to avoid being too tied to the narrative of one season.

I think any honest peak evaluation needs to b willing to consider the different seasons that can be analyzed. Not at least considering the different seasons one could be resonably arguedmakes the anlsysi cherryicked.

Also I really don't like how he just doesn't use the same evidence for everyone. He does some apm thing for jordan for example, but he doesn't do it for robinson.....

[freethedevil]

He had '77-'78 Walton and '85-'86 Bird.
Walton was a situation dictated by his injury. It was interesting to see him leave out '84 Bird though. It was Bird's 2nd strongest season, 1984 playoffs Bird was the peak Bird and including '84 wouldn't be disruptive to that time frame.

I don't think he has a certain criteria for 3 seasons though. At least not as set in stone. As for James' case, I feel like 2012-13 has a very strong case over 2016-17 but when we make it 3 season spans, I think 2016-18 time frame will be expected from him.

Ooh. Nice catch, I didn't realize some guys weren't getting three full years. I wonder if he'll try a plot twist on us and list random years like 2009, 2013, and 2016. Just to be safe though, I'll stick with my 2012 - 2014 guess.

He says in this vid that it just has to be 2 consecutive seasons. He could just end up focusing on 12 and 13 with this logic, albeit he does think 14 is Lebron's offensive peak.

if its two consecutive seasons than i guess you have 9-10, 12-13 and 16-17?

i'd say 15-16 warrants consideration but ben definitely doesn't value 15 as much as I do to the shooting in effeicny

[KTM_2813]

I don't know what everyone is complaining about. I'm enjoying the series.

I don't need it to perfectly align with my own opinions every step of the way, and there's also so much detail you can distill into a 15 minute video, even though this supposedly takes into account player's best 3-year stretches and not entire careers.

As far as I know, no project like this has ever been attempted before. I don't think this means that everyone should accept what he says no matter what, but I do think that a certain level of awareness and respect has been earned. These videos are truly impressive.

[freethedevil]

LeBron
Bird
Hakeem
MJ
KG
Magic
Walton
Kareem
Kobe
Shaq
Duncan

Are the 11 guys that seem to be featured in the intro portion of the vid. Obviously he's already added Robinson to that list to get up to 12. I expect a couple of more recent guys to get a spot, most notably Curry imo, so still two free spots if he's really doing 15 (Dirk grabbing one?). Kobe seems perfectly arguable as top 15, no idea why some are presenting Kobe being included as an offense.

The thing is ben hates kobe's peak. or at least did as of backpicks realtive to the people on thevideo. His peak was so underwhelmigng for ben he dropped kobe 5 spots below what his corp was.

Maybe ben puts kobe there due to his popularity but ben doesn't seem all that concerned about appealing to the masses.