David Robinson: Defensive GOAT

[tsherkin]

bast I think is more interested in a defensive RPOY project, though I could be wrong.

Yeah, but there'd be significant overlap between those two projects anyhow.

As far as how far we'd go with a Top X defensive GOAT project, I was think 50, but if people only wanted 25 that'd be just fine by me. I would not consider going to 100.

I won't get involved past 25.

[Doctor MJ]

What specific concerns do you have? To me the key thing is the idea that a player's defensive focus may wax and wane over his career for totally valid reasons, and so one might prefer to talk about peak defensive GOAT as opposed to career defensive GOAT.

Well, what's more important? Impact relative to era? Because the rules and quality/style of the game are very different.

How important is innovation? Russell would lose a lot of overall efficacy and importance in the modern era because of the 3pt line and because he kind of set the mold for the idea of the shot-blocking defensive center. Scouting techniques, video access, etc, etc. Lots of stuff has changed. His teams rate out as really great defensively, but how do rank that kind of player against someone like Olajuwon, or Robinson, etc, etc?

Then what about teammates and coaching and separate that out? Is that even possible?

It's all those little details. When you include players from different eras, all the minutiae can be pivot points around which the entire argument swings.

Ah, those indeed are questions one needs to have set opinions for a good GOAT list generally. I personally don't like including innovation generally on to such lists, but that including a player's specific ability to solve problems is relevant.

I also have Russell as my overall GOAT despite acknowledging that under current rules & strategies he'd be less valuable because I don't consider that a negative reflection on what Russell accomplished. This isn't to say I consider the quality of all leagues equal though (I penalize Mikan quite hard).

[ThaRegul8r]

Isn't that Doctor MJ's blog?

*inserts requisite sass*

Robinson was a really great player. I think we really need to define the full meaning of "defensive GOAT" though, before any productive discussion develops.

We should have a RealGM top 100 list for defensive players, but only like the top 20-25 so people won't get uninterested.

I would be interested in this, but I'm not sure how many others would be, as defense is less interesting/important to people than offense.

[Dr Pepper]

When it comes to players of significantly older eras, its best to gauge them in relation to the league of the time. And with Russell's accomplishments, accolades, reputation, analysis, etc. its expected and deserved that he would rank at the top of the GOAT defensive rankings

[tsherkin]

Like I said, all such details need to be considered and the angle of approach spelled out in advance for any such project to be productive.

[magicman1978]

I'd definitely love to see an analysis of Russell vs Olajuwon defensively. I think Olajuwon is the best defender I have ever seen and it's really difficult for me to imagine someone being better than that because it just doesn't seem possible.

[G35]

Well here is game 2 I put up
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZN9OaDRFf8&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/youtube]

Just from this game you can see that the Rockets had a different gameplan for Robinson (and all the Spurs post up players) than the Spurs had for Hakeem. The Rockets were doubling pretty hard whenever Robinson posted up. Not every time, granted but they were coming at him on the catch forcing him to pass it out to the perimeter.

With Hakeem the Spurs were half-heartedly doubling and leaving Robinson mostly alone while staying out on the perimeter. I think during the telecast I heard that the Rockets had just set the record for 19 three point shots made in the playoff's. The Rockets players, Horry, Elie, Cassell were hitting their outside shots so far in the first half.

Even with all that Hakeem didn't do much of anything in the first half. Robinson played good defense on him. I think you could see it was personal with Hakeem because he wanted to go right back at DRob whenever he scored a bucket.....

[SideshowBob]

We should have a RealGM top 100 list for defensive players, but only like the top 20-25 so people won't get uninterested.

I would be interested in this, but I'm not sure how many others would be, as defense is less interesting/important to people than offense.

I'd love to participate as well, though personally I feel that I wouldn't be able to contribute to the discussions all that much and would typically end up voting along with the general sentiment.

[colts18]

More data:

Robinson had 13 healthy seasons and here is what he did in them:

D rating:
1st- 5 times (NBA record)
Top 3- 11 times (NBA record)
Top 5- 11 times (NBA record)
Top 10- 13 times (NBA record (every season of his career)

DWS:
1st- 3 times (8th)
Top 3- 9 times (3rd)
Top 5- 11 times (3rd)
Top 10- 12 times (4th)

BLKS:
1st- 2 times (6th)
Top 3- 6 times (5th)
Top 5- 8 times (4th)
Top 10- 11 times (4th)

[Doctor MJ]

I'd love to participate as well, though personally I feel that I wouldn't be able to contribute to the discussions all that much and would typically end up voting along with the general sentiment.

Don't worry. Just do the best you can, don't be a cocky jerk, and seek to learn. And if we have heavy hitters in the project, they'll give you an opportunity to learn not simply from them, but by providing data and contemporary references.

[Doctor MJ]

Just from this game you can see that the Rockets had a different gameplan for Robinson (and all the Spurs post up players) than the Spurs had for Hakeem. The Rockets were doubling pretty hard whenever Robinson posted up. Not every time, granted but they were coming at him on the catch forcing him to pass it out to the perimeter.

With Hakeem the Spurs were half-heartedly doubling and leaving Robinson mostly alone while staying out on the perimeter. I think during the telecast I heard that the Rockets had just set the record for 19 three point shots made in the playoff's. The Rockets players, Horry, Elie, Cassell were hitting their outside shots so far in the first half.

Even with all that Hakeem didn't do much of anything in the first half. Robinson played good defense on him. I think you could see it was personal with Hakeem because he wanted to go right back at DRob whenever he scored a bucket.....

Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt that the gameplans involved were like a mastermind-ed plan to make Hakeem look as good as possible while making Robinson look as bad as possible. I'm still more impressed with Hakeem, but Robinson gets a bum rap to some degree.

[Doctor MJ]

I'd definitely love to see an analysis of Russell vs Olajuwon defensively. I think Olajuwon is the best defender I have ever seen and it's really difficult for me to imagine someone being better than that because it just doesn't seem possible.

Imagine someone with essentially the same build and ability to learn as Hakeem (which allowed for maximized vertical and horizontal court coverage), but focused more of his energies on defense.

Now consider a few other attributes:

-Russell was a bit of a psychological mastermind. We see this most clearly in basketball with the way he recognized that actually blocking the shots wasn't as important as creating uncertainty in the mind of the opponent so that they start missing even the easy shots. However, he was also skilled at such manipulation as a coach, and as a high jumper where he'd use the time before the competition to get in his opponent's head.

-Russell had an incredible knack for basketball strategy that really many intelligent people don't. There's a natural tendency to feel like a player who scores a lot of points is having a huge impact, and that if you're guarding that man, you're failing. In reality though, the gap between success and failure over the course of a large sample size is about one basket per 20 possessions. As in, even the worst offense is successful almost as much as the best. In modern basketball analysis this has resulted in the en vogue fetish for efficiency. For Russell, he saw that all he needed to do as a defender was knock the offense down a few more times than normal and he would greatly tilt the chances of winning to his team's favor.

-Russell also had a Roger Federer-ish obsession with matchups and tactics, and so with every player he went up against he sought to analyze their game and come up with defensive countermeasures.

-Finally, in part because of all of these traits, this wasn't a guy who got down on himself, or went to emotionally unproductive places like frankly most people do, including young Hakeem.

[magicman1978]

Can't remember if it was the game in the posted video, but Rodman really showed what kind of a headcase he was at that time. I remember two instance of him shooting pull-up 3's on a fast break when he had other players open. Hakeem had Horry to help stretch the defense and Robinson had Rodman. It was clear Olajuwon was the superior player, but I don't think the gap is as big as it seems with what happened in that series.

[lorak]

bast I think is more interested in a defensive RPOY project, though I could be wrong.

Yeah, but there'd be significant overlap between those two projects anyhow.

Yes, but it would be better to do defensive RPOY first and then top 25 defensive GOAT.

[colts18]

bast I think is more interested in a defensive RPOY project, though I could be wrong.

Yeah, but there'd be significant overlap between those two projects anyhow.

Yes, but it would be better to do defensive RPOY first and then top 25 defensive GOAT.

I'm not sure about the Retro DPOY. How exactly are we going to argue who is the 3rd best defender in 1997? Or #5 in 1984?

[Doctor MJ]

I'm not sure about the Retro DPOY. How exactly are we going to argue who is the 3rd best defender in 1997? Or #5 in 1984?

It can be done, but I really question how well. I'd expect peak reputation to have huge carry over, and that the issues we had with waning interest deep in the original RPOY to be much worse. For example, once we get to the '60s, how much year-to-year analysis really happens? '50s? Yikes.

I'm open to arguments though. Certainly I'd love to have access to large amounts of quality though from each year of the shot clock era, I just question whether that would really happen even with the great posters we have on this board.

[colts18]

I'm not sure about the Retro DPOY. How exactly are we going to argue who is the 3rd best defender in 1997? Or #5 in 1984?

It can be done, but I really question how well. I'd expect peak reputation to have huge carry over, and that the issues we had with waning interest deep in the original RPOY to be much worse. For example, once we get to the '60s, how much year-to-year analysis really happens? '50s? Yikes.

I'm open to arguments though. Certainly I'd love to have access to large amounts of quality though from each year of the shot clock era, I just question whether that would really happen even with the great posters we have on this board.

That's why I think a career project is better. We all watched these players throughout their careers and we have full career stats to analyze them. I'm confident that a lot of posters can make good arguments on why Hakeem was a better defender than Robinson, but they probably can't articulate why Hakeem was a better defender in 1993.

[drza]

I'd actually argue for the RPoY approach first as well, just because the vs. peer arguments of the RPoY were IMO so incredibly valuable when it came time for us to do a top-100. Whereas I think the tendency to generalize when it comes to broad swatches of time would be more felt if we did the top-25 defenders project first.

On the other hand, I think we could use the RPoY approach but over a few years at a time instead of single year. Just like we'd shorten the top 100 down to a defensive top-25, I'd argue that we do the Defensive-player-of-Three-Years to bring our voting time down to about 20 - 25 threads.

Plus, this would also address someone's (DocMJ's?) point about defensive responsibilities changing over the course of a player's career. In 3-year bursts we can compare folks at roughly the same level, that may change three years later.

[colts18]

I'd actually argue for the RPoY approach first as well, just because the vs. peer arguments of the RPoY were IMO so incredibly valuable when it came time for us to do a top-100. Whereas I think the tendency to generalize when it comes to broad swatches of time would be more felt if we did the top-25 defenders project first.

On the other hand, I think we could use the RPoY approach but over a few years at a time instead of single year. Just like we'd shorten the top 100 down to a defensive top-25, I'd argue that we do the Defensive-player-of-Three-Years to bring our voting time down to about 20 - 25 threads.

Plus, this would also address someone's (DocMJ's?) point about defensive responsibilities changing over the course of a player's career. In 3-year bursts we can compare folks at roughly the same level, that may change three years later.

Maybe half decade or best defenders of the decade would work.

[SinJackal]

Great original post. Very informative, and excellent job putting together all the stats. Big props for all the work you put in.

David Robinson is one of the most underrated players in the history of the NBA imo. It's a shame that so many people decide to troll any mention of him by bringing up a single playoff series he was in, as if the rest of his career didn't happen. He also didn't exactly play like **** in that playoff series anyway, playing well in 3 of the 6 games that series. He had two extremely good games too, but it always goes overlooked and people act like he got swept instead of losing 2-4 with one of those losses being a one point loss and another just a 5 point (and bonehead plays by Rodman screwing them out of that game). People act like he got owned, but the Spurs were very close to winning the series. Hakeem was great, yes, but DRob locked him down in game 4 (and won), and also kept Hakeem from getting entirely in the game in game 1 as well,the game they only lost by 1 point.

It could've very easily been a 3-1 series in the Spurs' favor going into game 5. Hakeem played well 4 of 6 games, Robinson 3 of 6. It was a great series for Hakeem, and he played better than DRob overall, but DRob does not get a fair shake when people talk about that series. Mostly by newbie NBA fans who enjoy playing revisionist historian.




To Bastillion: Not quoting the post since it's gigantic (I'm sure you understand), but I'd like to reply to a bit of it.

Looking at the defensive comparisons between the top centers of that time, I would argue that DRob defended Shaq and Ewing better despite them posting a higher PPG. T heir efficiency and turnovers were a lot worse against DRob, so despite the higher points, their impacts imo were inferior than against Hakeem. I'm the kind of guy who believes higher PPG but lower effiency is worse than slightly lower PPG and much higher efficiency, and turnovers are very hurtful to the team. If you don't agree, that's all right, but that's how I feel about it. It does look like Hakeem defended Mourning, Daurghety, Seikaly and Smits better though.



I also noticed you didn't post their stats against eachother either.

D. Rob is 30-12 against Hakeem and held him to rather poor scoring efficiency. Hakeem averaged 2.3 more PPG on DRob, but he needed 5.7 more FGAs per game to do it (which shows that DRob scored better on Hakeem overall than Hakeem did on him). Obviously Hakeem scored like a "dream" against DRob and the Spurs in that one playoff series, but outside of that he has been mediocre against Robinson.

That is another fact that seems to be hidden by Hakeem fans any time those two are brought up in conversation.

Aside from the scoring, their other stats are surprisingly similar against eachother. The rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, and turnovers are almost identical. But yeah, Hakeem's mediocre .444 FG% (6.8% worse than his career average) against DRob is a bit of a "chink in the armor" for the argument of him dominating DRob on offense. He clearly did not. In fact, there might not be anyone he struggled more against throughout his career.

Meanwhile, DRob nearly posted his career averages against Hakeem in all categories (greater rebounds, blocks, steals, and assists than his average), and only 3% worse FG% than his average (less than half the dropoff for Hakeem against DRob). Hakeem really didn't do much to stop him. This is lifetime matchups, not just a single playoff series which gets harped on to death.

in 1991 (15 games) Spurs defense was worse without him by 1.5 drtg.
in 1992 (12 games) Spurs defense was better without him by 4.4 drtg

So no, we can't say he was responsible for nearly half Spurs improvement on D (and this thread is about defense, not overall performance!).

Yeah, but those stats are pointless unless you also post the offensive ratings of those teams.

Example: Team A is a bad defensive team. Not dead last, but bottom 10. Team B is the best defensive team in the NBA.

If Team A plays 82 games against the Bobcats, and Team B plays 82 games against the top 5 offensive teams in the NBA. . .Team A is very likely going to have the better defensive rating, And that does not mean they're a better defensive team. So if the year where they had an improved defensive rating happened to be against bad offensive teams, then it means less. Likewise, if the ones where it dropped off were against juggernauts, it also means less.

So, can you post the offensive ratings of the teams they played?