Retro POY '91-92 (Voting Complete)

[Doctor MJ]

Stockton's best stuff is going to be killed by Utah's bad rosters. 17, nearly-15 and 3 is an outlier that no one else has put up for a season, but Utah was mediocre when this was going on.

Well, let's remember, Utah was a 40+ win team before Stockton became a starter. He didn't inherit THAT weak of a supporting cast.

Yeah, but that was also with 'stars' (Adrian Dantley; Ricky Green made an All-Star team or two, didn't he?) that were no longer there by the time Stockton was really doing his thing.

Utah improved with Stockton and Malone, pretty much alone. I look at something like that 88-89 team and I can't believe how bad the roster is, and it really showed in playoff gameplanning.

Looking at Utah's rosters in the late 80s/early 90s, they were good at hiding flaws and maximizing talent in the regular season, but faced exposure in the playoffs.

I think Stockton will end up in a similar position to what Barkley's faced with this year.

Right or wrong, people will look at the numbers in a less awed light because Utah wasn't that good of a team.

There was no Dantley in '86-87 when the Jazz were winning 44 games and Stockton was a backup. He started the next year, the team won 47. Now, truthfully, the 3 game gap doesn't do justice to the improvement - it was bigger than that - but this supporting cast was not that bad.

Part of the reason it looks bad, is because the strength of the team was the defense. This was THE dominant defensive team of the 80s with Eaton intimidating shooters at an unheard of level.

[kaima]

Just wanted to add that the Knicks shot even worse on threes in the conference finals.

8.6 attempts, 1.8 makes over 7. 20.9%.

Considering that, I'm going to start looking at spacing between teams more closely as the playoffs progress; who exploits and who is exploited.

Threes may or may not be the best guidepath to answering those questions.

[kaima]

Well, let's remember, Utah was a 40+ win team before Stockton became a starter. He didn't inherit THAT weak of a supporting cast.

Yeah, but that was also with 'stars' (Adrian Dantley; Ricky Green made an All-Star team or two, didn't he?) that were no longer there by the time Stockton was really doing his thing.

Utah improved with Stockton and Malone, pretty much alone. I look at something like that 88-89 team and I can't believe how bad the roster is, and it really showed in playoff gameplanning.

Looking at Utah's rosters in the late 80s/early 90s, they were good at hiding flaws and maximizing talent in the regular season, but faced exposure in the playoffs.

I think Stockton will end up in a similar position to what Barkley's faced with this year.

Right or wrong, people will look at the numbers in a less awed light because Utah wasn't that good of a team.

There was no Dantley in '86-87 when the Jazz were winning 44 games and Stockton was a backup.

A lot of that could probably be credited to Malone+Eaton, which is also why Utah was happy to see Dantley go.

He started the next year, the team won 47. Now, truthfully, the 3 game gap doesn't do justice to the improvement - it was bigger than that - but this supporting cast was not that bad.

For what it's worth, Utah jumped in SRS from 0.05 in 87 to 2.96 in 88. They played real well against LA, and I'd say Stockton+Eaton is arguably the biggest reason. Stockton was fantastic in that series.

That being said, I think SRS is worthy in some cases, but can also be a bit of smoke and mirrors in others. Still, there's at least a measurable example, as argument, to Stockton's worth.

Part of the reason it looks bad, is because the strength of the team was the defense. This was THE dominant defensive team of the 80s with Eaton intimidating shooters at an unheard of level.

I agree. But there's a danger in playing goal line defense night after night.

There was something critically flawed about Utah, that's all I'm asserting. The series from 89 is an example. They finish second in the West, have the best defense in the league, but are easily swept by a Nellie team in the first round.

Exploited.

Looking at individual performances, Malone (30.7 and 16.3) and Stockton (27.3 and 13.7) played really well. It's not a situation where it's easy to point the finger at them and say that they played below expectations.

Stockton and Malone shot at 50% clips, but no one else, excepting Eaton, shot over 40.8 percent, and this is from a six-man rotation.

Looking at those stats, I tend to think that the team was way too limited and predictable in offensive personnel.

This could be OT, so consider this as a comparison of or companion to, say, Barkley's treatment in this year's vote. How much should a star player be blamed for an awful or critically flawed team?

[Baller 24]

Great point on KJ, fantastic season, lost to a Jazz team with HCA, but still nonetheless, fantastic season, and great in the playoffs.

[Doctor MJ]

This could be OT, so consider this as a comparison of or companion to, say, Barkley's treatment in this year's vote. How much should a star player be blamed for an awful or critically flawed team?

It's an excellent question.

My take, is that I tend to go by actual value contributed to making the team better. When you've got redundant parts, then that decreases value contributed relative to potential. Now though, I don't use a "value contributed" that's simply how much they numerically improve a team's SRS. It's easier to lift a team as certain parts of the W-L spectrum, and I do try to also to do some thought experimentation putting guys in each other's places.

It's not what I'd call a perfect approach. However, I really don't buy that when a team falls apart for no justified reason you should blame everyone but the star who's still putting up his numbers.

As far as a guy on a team that isn't falling off, but just has yet to reach elite status, I tend to play skeptic. Way too many guys put big numbers on mediocre teams, and every single one of them gets defended by "but look at that supporting cast, they wouldn't win a game without him!", and generally gets followed by the team becoming "scrappy overachievers" without him. This skepticism is admission of ignorance, but I still think it's more accurate than the alternative.

[Optimism Prime]

This could be OT, so consider this as a comparison of or companion to, say, Barkley's treatment in this year's vote. How much should a star player be blamed for an awful or critically flawed team?

It's an excellent question.

My take, is that I tend to go by actual value contributed to making the team better. When you've got redundant parts, then that decreases value contributed relative to potential. Now though, I don't use a "value contributed" that's simply how much they numerically improve a team's SRS. It's easier to lift a team as certain parts of the W-L spectrum, and I do try to also to do some thought experimentation putting guys in each other's places.

It's not what I'd call a perfect approach. However, I really don't buy that when a team falls apart for no justified reason you should blame everyone but the star who's still putting up his numbers.

As far as a guy on a team that isn't falling off, but just has yet to reach elite status, I tend to play skeptic. Way too many guys put big numbers on mediocre teams, and every single one of them gets defended by "but look at that supporting cast, they wouldn't win a game without him!", and generally gets followed by the team becoming "scrappy overachievers" without him. This skepticism is admission of ignorance, but I still think it's more accurate than the alternative.

Isn't that Bill Simmons' Ewing Theory?

[Doctor MJ]

Isn't that Bill Simmons' Ewing Theory?

Ha, related. Ewing Theory, as I understand it, applies to the situation where the team is literally better without the star. Most of the time, the star is making the team better, it's just often that he's not helping the team as much as you'd think.

[Jimmy76]

Isn't that Bill Simmons' Ewing Theory?

Ha, related. Ewing Theory, as I understand it, applies to the situation where the team is literally better without the star. Most of the time, the star is making the team better, it's just often that he's not helping the team as much as you'd think.

the more I learn about basketball the more I suspect this

[TrueLAfan]

1. MJ—Pretty much at his overall peak. ‘Nuff said.
2. Drexler—Best year of his career; leade rof a top level team. Got shyut down as much as a great player can be shut down by the the one player who happened to be measureably better. It happens.
3. Malone—A top player at his peak. Was a one man wrecking crew in the playoffs. Close between Malone and Drexler, but Drexler was just as good or better in the first three playoff series, and went farther. I remember thinking Drexler was more of a leader, although I was impressed by Malone’s coming through when Stockton had several (like, 5 or 6) poor to really poor playoff games…almost of which the Jazz won because of Malone. I could be persuaded to switch 2 and 3 here.
4. Ewing—A little below Drob in the regular season, but played in all 82 games…and came to play in the playoffs. I was always a little surprised at how well Ewing did in MVP voting, but now that I’m doing the voting, I get it. Terrific player in 1992.
5. Drob—Missed 14 games; played under 2400 minutes. That keeps him out of the top 2-3. Didn’t play in playoffs. Can’t put him in the top 4 because of that. I could be convinced to drop him out of the top 5.

HM: Pippen, Chris Mullin. You forget how good Mullin was a for a few years. This is the end of his peak (well, his full season peak). I don’t know if he’ll ever crack the top 5 for me--or anyone--but he was right near that level.

About Stockton: I think we’re doing a good job with him. What I just wrote about Chris Mullin…this may rub some people the wrong way, but I’m not sure Stockton was much or any better than Mullin was during Mullin’s 4 year peak. Stockton has great career numbers, was a really good player for a really long time, and was a class guy (okay, kind of a dirty player from time to time, but…). He was respected and admired. He never cracked the top 5 in MVP voting, and I never thought that was inaccurate. Shawngoat23 and Doctor MJ have said it well…if this was top 10 voting, I’d have voted for him several times already. But, in real life, Stockton had received more than a nominal vote or 2 out of 100+ voters twice up to this point in his career…in 1995 and 1996. In our vote, it’s been in 1995 and 1997. This season (1992), Stockton received around 5 votes--a couple of thirds, a couple of fourths, and a couple of fifths—out of 96. That was before he had a fairly lousy postseason. In MVP win shares, this was one of his best seasons (tied for third highest in his career). He may get some extra juice for having good postseasons in 1988, 1989 and 1991…but I don’t know if it will be enough to get him into the top 6 in voting. He is what he is.

[JordansBulls]

Brad Daugherty anyone?
21.5/10 on TSP of 63% while doing 21/10 with a TSP of 61% in the playoffs, led his team to the ECF, without him they were 5-4, with him 52-21.

I can definitely see him in the top 5. Not sure who to replace though.

[lorak]

There was no Dantley in '86-87 when the Jazz were winning 44 games and Stockton was a backup. He started the next year, the team won 47. Now, truthfully, the 3 game gap doesn't do justice to the improvement - it was bigger than that - but this supporting cast was not that bad.

In 1987 (and 1986) Stockton already played almost 2000 minutes (above 20 per game) so he wasn't a starter but clearly had some big impact.

[Doctor MJ]

There was no Dantley in '86-87 when the Jazz were winning 44 games and Stockton was a backup. He started the next year, the team won 47. Now, truthfully, the 3 game gap doesn't do justice to the improvement - it was bigger than that - but this supporting cast was not that bad.

In 1987 (and 1986) Stockton already played almost 2000 minutes (above 20 per game) so he wasn't a starter but clearly had some big impact.

Hmm, if I'm understanding you correctly, you're implying that 1988 Stockton didn't improve the Jazz that much because Stockton already played so much - so there wasn't much lift yet to be done. However, the Jazz had been hovering at about that same level for years, and if Stockton was providing big lift in previous years, you really think he wouldn't have been getting big minutes? I mean, Stockton taking on big minutes is really about changing from a Greene-level player (which Stockton was comparable to, hence the time split) to a Stockton-level player.

You can certainly say Sloane was wrong, Stockton should have been playing big minutes years earlier, but the truth of the matter is: There's just not any huge lift associated with Stockton's rise to prominence. Doesn't mean Stockton didn't become a great player, but there are guys who show up on a team and the team gets 30 wins better. That we don't see any such lift with Stockton does put a cap on how much impact he was having immediately.

[Gongxi]

Thinking I'll probably end up with Hakeem and Nash, 1 and 2.

[lorak]

There was no Dantley in '86-87 when the Jazz were winning 44 games and Stockton was a backup. He started the next year, the team won 47. Now, truthfully, the 3 game gap doesn't do justice to the improvement - it was bigger than that - but this supporting cast was not that bad.

In 1987 (and 1986) Stockton already played almost 2000 minutes (above 20 per game) so he wasn't a starter but clearly had some big impact.

Hmm, if I'm understanding you correctly, you're implying that 1988 Stockton didn't improve the Jazz that much because Stockton already played so much - so there wasn't much lift yet to be done. However, the Jazz had been hovering at about that same level for years, and if Stockton was providing big lift in previous years, you really think he wouldn't have been getting big minutes? I mean, Stockton taking on big minutes is really about changing from a Greene-level player (which Stockton was comparable to, hence the time split) to a Stockton-level player.

You can certainly say Sloane was wrong, Stockton should have been playing big minutes years earlier, but the truth of the matter is: There's just not any huge lift associated with Stockton's rise to prominence. Doesn't mean Stockton didn't become a great player, but there are guys who show up on a team and the team gets 30 wins better. That we don't see any such lift with Stockton does put a cap on how much impact he was having immediately.

Layden was wrong. It takes him several seasons to realize how good Stockton was, and when he finally realized it, it was too late for him and he was fired at the beginning of the 1988 season. But to be fair to Layden, he doesn’t had much choice, I mean he already had All Star point guard and he have to play him, because that = more fans and money (especially in comparison to some white, skinny guy from no name university).

Unfortunately we haven’t much data from 80s, for example in 1986 Stockton started in +30 games. If only we had game logs from that season, we would be able to estimate his value.

But we could look at other things. For example when Stockton finally became a starter the Jazz improved from +0.4 efficiency differential in 1987 to +3.7 differential in 1988.
In 1988 Stockton played 984 more minutes than in 1987 so it’s possible that 1k minutes from Stockton is worth about +3 efficiency differential. So in normal season, when player is playing about 3k minutes, Stockton value would be about +9, what’s amazing results.

For sure it’s too good to be true, but advanced non box score data we have from 2000-2003, so Winston’s +/- (Stockton had +8.2 so result as amazing as +9) or 82games.com +/- (+7 in his last season in the NBA. So imagine how good he have to be when he was younger), confirms that Stockton’s value was very high, much higher than box score numbers indicate. Well, even in 1998, his value for Jazz was really huge, because in games which he played (64) Utah had the best offensive team of all time (according to ORtg relatively to league average).

[Baller 24]

1) Michael Jordan
2) Karl Malone
3) Clyde Drexler
4) Patrick Ewing
5) Kevin Johnson

- Jordan's an easy one
- Malone I have over Drexler because he was just as solid if not better in the regular season, destroyed teams in the playoffs, and when faced head-to-head in a series, Malone was just so damn good. I personally think Drexler's team won the series because of certain players stepping up their game significantly (Terry Porter), compared to Malone's teammates stepping down their game significantly (John Stockton).
- Patrick Ewing is a given, solid season overall individually, but didn't really have the team success part, but I'm giving it to him over Robinson due to him missing a good amount of time. In terms of RS, I'd have Robinson ahead, but again Ewing played in the playoffs, Robinson didn't, despite how bad Ewing's performance was.
- As for KJ, I would again like to have Robinson here, but if I'm going to use my criteria and leave Tim Duncan out of the '00 list, than I'm going to do the same for Robinson. Johnson was absolutely solid, like TMACFORMVP pointed out, 53 win Suns team, lost in the 2nd round, performed terrific in the playoffs. His numbers and production increased to a dominant standpoint in the playoffs.

HM: Mullin could have had the 5th spot for me, but he absolutely disappeared come playoff time, same goes with Tim Hardaway, Brad Daugherty could have had it here too, but Mark Price was more of the guy from an impact standpoint, and he faded away in probably his biggest game (Game 5 ECF against Bulls 1-5 shooting). So yeah, KJ it is for me.

[Baller 24]

The John Stockton was a superstar theory is coming to an end throughout this project, which is good.

[lorak]

So according to this project non superstars are:

26. Ben Wallace 0.059
27. Amar'e Stoudemire 0.051
29. Vince Carter 0.042
30. Chris Webber 0.035
32. Ray Allen 0.02
33. Chauncey Billups 0.018
37. Paul Pierce 0.008
39. Carmelo Anthony 0.004
40. Reggie Miller 0.004
41. Tim Hardaway 0.004
42. Shawn Kemp 0.004

[Baller 24]

If we're factoring in everything including playoffs, I'd agree with that.

[semi-sentient]

The John Stockton was a superstar theory is coming to an end throughout this project, which is good.

You'd have to define what a superstar is before making that statement. John Stockton is accepted as one of the 50 greatest players ever, so while he was never a guy that never stood out over someone like Malone, he was still an incredible player and one of the best PG's ever.

No one mentions Malone by himself when thinking of the 80's/90's Jazz. They refer to the duo as Stockton and Malone, usually in that order.

[Baller 24]

The John Stockton was a superstar theory is coming to an end throughout this project, which is good.

You'd have to define what a superstar is before making that statement. John Stockton is accepted as one of the 50 greatest players ever, so while he was never a guy that never stood out over someone like Malone, he was still an incredible player and one of the best PG's ever.

No one mentions Malone by himself when thinking of the 80's/90's Jazz. They refer to the duo as Stockton and Malone, usually in that order.

Agreed, the definition of a superstar varies by opinion, but for me, I'd say someone that was at one point, consistently considered one of the top 5 players in the league, or someone in that tier/category (for example '03 is a tough one, Nowitizki was left out, but there's no doubt in my mind he belongs in the same tier as the five group of guys that were voted in '03). I just never thought of Stockton the same way.