RealGM 2017 Top 100 List #52 (Alonzo Mourning)

[LA Bird]

Run off vote: Alonzo Mourning

One of two remaining players who IMO had been the best player in the league at one point (to be fair though, 1999 was a pretty weak MVP year). Mourning was not a great passer but he was a fairly efficient scorer as a #1 option and rated solid in ORAPM during his prime years. An all time great defensive player who was overshadowed by other defensive GOATs such as Mutombo and Robinson. Key contributor on the 06 championship team (3rd in PER, 2nd in WS/48 in both regular season and playoffs) and was the center on pretty much all of the top performing Heat lineups throughout the season and in the finals.

[pandrade83]

Darn I got busy last night and never got back on to post a vote. Oh well.

Of the 4 I honestly am not feeling any of them. I'll see if any of the votes here sway me, but Zo's peak being in that 99 00 timeline doesn't sit well with me. If I were looking at a defensive player I might look elsewhere. I also felt he was a bit under sized and sadly my biggest memory of him was hearing people point out that the 3 point line was clearly too close, even Zo is shooting 3's.

My gut feeling is Bob Lanier, but I have just not done enough homework on him to feel I can vote for him this high. But right now if I were going to vote I'd be going for him. Would love if anyone had some material, but I feel I'll be at work till late so not sure how much time I'll get today.

Hayes and English just seem like empty stats guys for me. English really falls off for me when I look at per 100 stats.

English has 0 top 10 WS seasons. 2 top 10 VORP seasons. 3 top 10 PER seasons, and 83 does jump out at me. But as I discussed earlier and i'll expand a bit. When I look at volume scorers there are two areas that I don't feel box score metrics are really able to capture and one will be missed in RAPM. The first being that offensive rebound rates are highest off of missed layups and 3's. The second is that drawing fouls, especially on bigs has a value add to the team that may or may not even been seen in RAPM as that value could be extended even when you're off the court as potentially a rim protector or two will be off as well due to foul trouble.

The one thing I will put in Hayes favor is that he was that he never missed games. 1303 games played and he never played less than 80 games in a season. That's pretty outstanding.

To rip Zo for offense & peaking in a weak era and then turn around & picking Hayes would be kind of ironic.

[penbeast0]

...

My gut feeling is Bob Lanier, but I have just not done enough homework on him to feel I can vote for him this high. But right now if I were going to vote I'd be going for him. Would love if anyone had some material, but I feel I'll be at work till late so not sure how much time I'll get today....

The issue with Lanier is his defense. I always thought of him as both soft and not very motivated. Looking at his prime in Detroit, they are close to the bottom of the league almost every year except 1974 which was a massive outlier (and where newspapers were commenting on how motivated he looked). Then, in Milwaukee (to be fair, he had major knee injuries and his mobility was shot), Don Nelson platooned him with defensive players in the 4th quarter which implies his defense was still an issue though those Moncrief led teams had excellent defenses.

[dhsilv2]

Darn I got busy last night and never got back on to post a vote. Oh well.

Of the 4 I honestly am not feeling any of them. I'll see if any of the votes here sway me, but Zo's peak being in that 99 00 timeline doesn't sit well with me. If I were looking at a defensive player I might look elsewhere. I also felt he was a bit under sized and sadly my biggest memory of him was hearing people point out that the 3 point line was clearly too close, even Zo is shooting 3's.

My gut feeling is Bob Lanier, but I have just not done enough homework on him to feel I can vote for him this high. But right now if I were going to vote I'd be going for him. Would love if anyone had some material, but I feel I'll be at work till late so not sure how much time I'll get today.

Hayes and English just seem like empty stats guys for me. English really falls off for me when I look at per 100 stats.

English has 0 top 10 WS seasons. 2 top 10 VORP seasons. 3 top 10 PER seasons, and 83 does jump out at me. But as I discussed earlier and i'll expand a bit. When I look at volume scorers there are two areas that I don't feel box score metrics are really able to capture and one will be missed in RAPM. The first being that offensive rebound rates are highest off of missed layups and 3's. The second is that drawing fouls, especially on bigs has a value add to the team that may or may not even been seen in RAPM as that value could be extended even when you're off the court as potentially a rim protector or two will be off as well due to foul trouble.

The one thing I will put in Hayes favor is that he was that he never missed games. 1303 games played and he never played less than 80 games in a season. That's pretty outstanding.

To rip Zo for offense & peaking in a weak era and then turn around & picking Hayes would be kind of ironic.

I kinda just completely dismissed hayes But gotta give him credit for the 1300 games and never missing more than 2 games in a season, that's some Stockton and Malone stuff right there!

[Owly]

My gut feeling is Bob Lanier, but I have just not done enough homework on him to feel I can vote for him this high. But right now if I were going to vote I'd be going for him. Would love if anyone had some material, but I feel I'll be at work till late so not sure how much time I'll get today.

From the last project from the thread that he got in on (some aspects may be either non-pertinent or make less sense out of context - feel free to either visit the old threads or enquire and if I'm around and can help clarify I will).

I'm voting Bob Lanier. Acomposite post of my previous stuff why below. No new angles on it again. Time limited so won't modify the comps to Hayes. Carter (runoff last time) doesn't have Hayes' low (boxscore) peak problem, but didn't maintain it.

I'm voting Bob Lanier
Reasoning: looks like the best career added value by crude faux-EWA/WS combination. He's also high on a similar peak based ranking which I ended up posting a few threads back (43rd, and all those above him still available didn't maintain their peak anything close to how he did, and/or have era concerns).

Spoiler:

PPR Score PPR Rank name
29.69848481 17 Amare Stoudemire
32.80243893 18 Neil Johnston
43.56604182 25 Paul Arizin
47.38143096 26 Bob McAdoo
54.3783045 30 Walt Bellamy
55.90169944 31 Terrell Brandon
63.07138812 33 Elton Brand
65.30696747 35 Ed Macauley
67.53517602 36 Emanuel Ginobili
68.01470429 37 Arvydas Sabonis
76.53103945 42 Larry Foust
77.46612163 43 Bob Lanier

All with era concerns; longevity/peak maintainance issues and/or problems defense/intangiables (Manu probably the least but minutes is an issue; for a comp see http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... 01&y2=2015).

Team level D might be held against him but his Drtg (hardly perfect, but I think sufficient for the point/claim being made) in '74 when he played 81 games led the league.

A concern might be that he missed quite a few games, including playing (just) less than 65 games and 2500 minutes for three of his five short prime/extended peak years ('76, '77 and '78 of '74-'78). Still for that 5 year span he looks like the 2nd or 3rd best player in the league (even after minutes are factored in) and he lasted much better than McAdoo.
cf:
The five year span in question http://bkref.com/tiny/64BQL" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The 70s: http://bkref.com/tiny/0DbJe" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Reviews on D

Lanier is the big difference. He played only when in the mood before last season. He concentrated more on stopping other teams from penetrating and fourth in blocked shots with 247.

[individual bio]
Called "Moses" by his teammates ... For leading them out of the wilderness ...... trimmer last season ...... Defense was his biggest improvement

Depending on who's in there, the Pistons can make you work. When one of the "whos" is either Trapp or Howard Porter, the opponents can relax a bit. But Rowe, Ford, Mengelt, Kevin Porter, Money and Lanier will get down and play some defense. Lanier, in fact often surprises people by jumping out to pick up guards or forwards. He also clogs the middle nicely.
[individual bio]
Has become a very intimidating defensive player who, like Dave Cowens, is not afraid to switch out on unsuspecting forwards and guards.

Somewhat confusing. Lanier is a mammoth figure to try and get around [and some other decent players but the Porters are bad and the bench "woefully weak" ... comunication and fouling called a problem, perhaps coaching semi-implied as a problem based on that?]
[individual bio]
Can rebound, block shots, play defense, do everything but clean the kitchen floor ...... [unrelated but I've touched on this] Injuries have been a problem, though, but he has always played hurt

[Vitale will be looking to emphasize D] Lanier gives him a head start. That is the advantage of having a big center. Lanier seals off the middle and is tough and aggressive.

[individual bio]Devensively he can be as imposing as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar or Bill Walton or Artis Gilmore

Depending on how much you allow hypotheticals, you might also consider that Detroit rushed him back in his rookie year which may have been detrimental to his long term health.

One quick and dirty study of his impact.

'76 Pistons
team points differential over the year -86 over 82 games, -1.048780488 per game
team points differential over 18 games without Lanier -92 over 18 games, -5.111111111 per game
team points differential over 64 games with Lanier +6 over 64 games, 0.09375 per game


'77 Pistons
team points differential over the year -85 over 82 games, -1.036585366 per game
team points differential over 18 games without Lanier -107 over 18 games, -5.944444444 per game
team points differential over 64 games with Lanier 22 over 64 games, 0.34375 per game

Lanier('s impact) looks a little worse in '78
'78 Pistons
team points differential over the year -102 over 82 games, -1.243902439 per game
team points differential over 19 games without Lanier -100 over 19 games, -4.347826087 per game
team points differential over 63 games with Lanier -2 over 63 games, -0.031746032 per game

Players with as many or more top 2000(ish) player seasons (as before not absolutely up to date- LeBron should now be on there) by PER (17.9+)

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 18
Karl Malone 17
Shaquille O'Neal 17
Kevin Garnett 17
John Stockton 17
Tim Duncan 16
Hakeem Olajuwon 16
Kobe Bryant 16
Moses Malone 16
Charles Barkley 15
Paul Pierce 14
Clyde Drexler 14
Michael Jordan 13
Wilt Chamberlain 13
Dirk Nowitzki 13
Robert Parish 13
David Robinson 12
Oscar Robertson 12
Earvin "Magic" Johnson 12
Larry Bird 12
Jerry West 12
Patrick Ewing 12
Dominique Wilkins 12
Steve Nash 12
Allen Iverson 12
Bob Pettit 11
Bob Lanier 11
Adrian Dantley 11
Elgin Baylor 11
Vince Carter 11
Larry Nance 11
Pau Gasol 11
Alex English 11
Chris Webber 11

Players with as many top 2000ish player seasons as Lanier by WS/48 (.144+)

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 18
John Stockton 18
Karl Malone 17
Tim Duncan 16
Reggie Miller 16
Shaquille O'Neal 15
Hakeem Olajuwon 15
Charles Barkley 15
Kevin Garnett 14
Kobe Bryant 14
Moses Malone 13
Paul Pierce 13
Wilt Chamberlain 13
Dirk Nowitzki 13
Robert Parish 13
David Robinson 13
Oscar Robertson 13
Earvin "Magic" Johnson 12
Jerry West 12
Adrian Dantley 12
Bill Russell 12
Ray Allen 12
Michael Jordan 11
Larry Bird 11
Steve Nash 11
Bob Pettit 11
Bob Lanier 11
Larry Nance 11
Bailey Howell 11
Detlef Schrempf 11

New angle. Wins above very good. Lanier versus last times runoff loser Elvin Hayes.

Seasons in top 2046 player seasons (i.e. WS/48 .144 or above)
Number of seasons in top 2026 player seasons (i.e. PER 17.9 or above)

Obviously this is similar to the stuff above but I figured it might be interesting to see how big the gap is by this measure.

Hayes has 3 seasons above the WS/48 bar. Two clearly so, one only marginally.

'75: 2.0934375 WS Wins Above Very Good
'77: 2.032416667 WS-WAVG
'79: 0.129375 WS-WAVG

Hayes Total: 4.255229167 WS-WAVG


Lanier WS Wins Above Very Good
'74: 5.268770833 WS-WAVG
'79: 3.129479167 WS-WAVG
'76: 3.002979167 WS-WAVG
'77: 3.006541667 WS-WAVG
'75: 3.422604167 WS-WAVG
'81: 1.497354167 WS-WAVG
'82: 1.0655 WS-WAVG
'73: 1.115625 WS-WAVG
'82: 0.662 WS-WAVG
'84: 0.669 WS-WAVG
'79: 0.420520833 WS-WAVG

Total: 23.260375

In PER, Hayes has 9 seasons over the 17.9 "very good" bar. Here his extra minutes should tell more, as much as they ever will (note also that two of his top three seasons now come on the Rockets)

'77: 3.179900498 PER/EWA Wins Above Very Good
'71: 2.71119403 PER/EWA-WAVG
'72: 2.582835821 PER/EWA-WAVG
'79: 1.853731343 PER/EWA-WAVG
'75: 1.896268657 PER/EWA-WAVG
'69: '1.838308458 PER/EWA-WAVG
'76: 0.740049751 PER/EWA-WAVG
'70: 0.729353234 PER/EWA-WAVG
'74: 0.53761194 PER/EWA-WAVG

Total: 16.06925373 PER/EWA-WAVG


PER/EWA Wins Above Very Good for Lanier
'78: 7.933283582
'75: 9.659452736
'74: 9.095522388
'72: 7.99920398
'77: 6.206268657
'76: 5.642985075
'73: 6.582089552
'79: 3.469154229
'80: 2.650497512
'71: 2.107313433
'81 1.569850746

Lanier Career WAVG 62.91562189

Okay by valuing high (metrics) peaks, that favours Lanier. Still if you believe greatness is near essential for titles then it's at least worth looking at.

Other discussion from earlier threads

I'm not as familiar with Lanier, but those WOWY numbers Owly is posting make him certainly worth a big look. Still, I wonder whether he is a superior candidate to someone like Elvin Hayes.

Look at any boxscore metric and it will say Lanier peaked (much) higher, I suspect they'd all say he added more career value and tbh how "valuable" at this point in the list are, for instance, Hayes' Win Shares garnered from sub .100 WS/48 seasons - he gets 19 Win Shares from such seasons - set greatness impact replacement level at something like .120 WS/48 and you'd take a huge chunk out of his apparent contribution, ditto with PER - where he never hit 20, which Eric Murdock and Matt Geiger did, okay that's OTT, and as I've said before the range/SD seems like it might be less in the 70s but in any case that affects Lanier just as much anyway.

Lanier doesn't have Hayes' baggage as a teammate (not sure he was entirely happy/positive by the end in Detroit but nothing like Hayes) and he rates as better by the metrics in the playoffs despite playing a large chunk of his playoff career past his prime in a tough conference (80s East). Lanier being a more willing passer might make him easier to build around too.

What does Hayes have an edge in? D, probably (though positional competition isn't equal on the accolade front), and minutes. To me, it's not nearly enough.

and some more earlier opinion based stuff on portability

I can't think really of another angle to analyse this from. I'd guess he's portable as he can score from the post, he space the floor and shoot the J, and it seems like at his best (anecdotally) he could defend guys out on the floor as well as play a more conventional anchor, and his assist % is pretty strong for a big man (double Hayes' 14.4 to 7.0).

From a random fantasy historical draft game ... discussing primarily '74-76, but touching on his "impact" on the '80 Bucks.

One thing I think should be pointed out. 1974 for Lanier was a massive outlier defensively. His defensive win shares were 7.1 and Drtg was 4.1 . . . he barely reached half that figure again with a career second best of 3.8 and 1.8 respectively. Other than 74, that's Amare Stoudemire territory. Similarly, while the Pistons were 3rd in the league in defensive rating in 74, they were never even in the top half of the league defensively and the next year (75), they were 17th out of 18, and in 76 were 16th out of 18. IN fact, the next time they reached the top half of the league defensively was the year they traded away Lanier and replaced him with career mediocrity Kent Benson.

This says to me that what I remember from my eye test was true; Lanier was a lazy defender and 1974 was a fluke outlier. So, if Owly is counting on Lanier's defense as a key part of his writeup, I think that presents a huge question mark. Now, admittedly covering Ben Wallace is about as easy an assignment as Lanier could hope for but he wasn't much of a help defender either.

Needless to say I disagree with this characterisation of Lanier.

Was '74 an outlier? Yes it's clearly his best year. It's one third of the Lanier I have, and in him I get a guy with 3 blocks and 1.4 steals a game a guy in the top 2 in Drtg (1st) and DBPM (2nd). Does he match that again? No, but I suspect (sadly) no one is envisioning that Lanier for my team. Does that mean he was Amar’e/Benson for the rest of the span selected? Far from it. As I'll show he was having a large impact on the team, that he was for instance was still a pretty good shot blocker in '75 (less so when he wasn't 100%, but given he meet the injury thresholds I'm assuming as with all players I've got a healthy Lanier, at worst he's playing the average of the 3 year span, which is pretty good), that the above comparisons are (badly) flawed and Lanier got a bum rap based on misfortune (and being too heavy) earlier in his career.

As I have said in the past (indeed in the context of discussing Lanier both in my generic pitch in the spoiler and in the top 100 project) Drtg is noisy and far from perfect. Still I think using team ratings as a measure of individuals is more problematic there’s large issues primarily teammates, then also noise. Teammates here in the sense they weren't very good. Noise in the sense of measuring an individual by team defensive performance which is so influenced by the four other players, 5 when said player is off court and coaching etc...

On teammates.
1) Look at them. Don't recall them? Through his prime http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... der_by=dws
From what I've read Mengelt was pretty good because he was so all out, beyond that some were probably fine/adequate and some weren't. There’s a lack of continuity and in particular a lack of continuity in good players and organisation/coaching/chemistry (Bing was irate by the time he left, they pick Marvin Barnes from the ABA, a player as poor as Curtis Rowe somehow had the leverage to holdout and demand a trade. It was a mess).

2) With without. In large samples Lanier was having a substantial impact in '76-'78
The difference with him to without him (per game in points diff) was ...

'76: 5.204861111
'77: 6.288194444
'78: 4.316080055

This is from a guy hitting his apex in '74. In '75 still more or less as healthy as he ever was (he was injured late in his NCAA career and the Pistons hurried him back in his rookie year, which may have altered his career trajectory, but I digress), he's still blocking more than two shots a game, and I think for those first two years of my span ('74, '75) he's having a larger impact overall and a larger impact on D (than for ’76-’78). But even if it were just at these levels, I just don't buy that his impact was exclusively offensive.

Then too, I don’t your analogy/comparison/whatever with Amar’e stacks up in terms of contemporary reputations (or indeed how much they were missed when absent). As cited here and in the top 100 project the Hollander handbooks consistently noted throughout his prime his defensive prowess and in particular his coming out and guarding guards on the perimeter on switches, which just isn’t what lazy defenders do cf: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1359554#p41917844 (Also STAT was playing with Marion, Bell and Diaw, which made their overall team D respectable/okay).

I could plausibly buy your version of Lanier as accurate through ’73. Maybe, maybe, to a lesser extent at the end of the 70s. I can buy that this early picture of Lanier (overweight, less focused on D, less consistent on D and perceived as a somewhat of a disappointment particularly through a disappointing rookie year in a strong draft class, all to some degree interconnected with that early injury) colouring popular perceptions of Lanier but my most reliable source of the time (Hollander handbooks) has Lanier as someone who “clogs the middle nicely” “very intimidating defensive player who, like Dave Cowens, is not afraid to switch out on unsuspecting forwards and guards” during his prime. Unless you’ve got more contemporary sources for prime Lanier as a lazy, non-helping defender, I’d take what I have (the stats plus Hollander) as the more persuasive view.

For whatever it’s worth his college coach Larry Weise, upon Lanier leaving college “I’ve never known a more unselfish player. It may sound trite, but I would call him the complete basketball player.” And he embraced a non-scoring role in Milwaukee and fought on in the hopes of winning a title despite a crumbling body, so I don’t recognise the “lazy” vision of Lanier. As before maybe a little early on (though injuries, franchise culture maybe didn’t help) and perhaps frustrated by the end in Detroit, but I can’t help but feel you’ve been coloured (perhaps indirectly by others perceptions; Lanier's "conventional" historical standing is nowhere near I believe the evidence suggests it should be) by early perceptions that he was a “big bum” or whatever and the fact Detroit weren’t good, because when talking about his play, it his prime, the numbers and comments of the time (of the limited few I have access to) seem persuaded he was trying, he was very good, and he was a good and agile defender.

Regarding the semi-implied Lanier for Benson as causation of defensive improvement, the trade happened mid-season (whilst Lanier was injured) and with, or without Benson, they were less competitive than they had been early in the season with (a hobbled) Lanier, not that they were good with him, and as ever there’s plenty of noise going on, you could argue the turning point was before Lanier’s absence, but after that point they more often than not lost by more than 10 points (they won 7; had 18 games, including those wins, in which they did not lose by 10 or more; and lost 27 by 10 or more – fwiw with Benson, over 17 games it’s 1 win; 8 games of not losing by 10 or more and 9 of losing by 10 or more). Such was the turnover in Detroit between seasons that any allusions that imply causation or indeed try to draw any meaningful comparison between Lanier and Benson are therefore massively fraught and I would suggest impossible; even within that season, as I said there’s a lot of noise around. But let’s look at Milwaukee for the final 26 games – those games with Lanier, and Lanier played in them all, they go +287, or +11.03846154 per game. Before that point, over 56 games they had been +36 or 0.642857143 per game. So if you’re going to take Lanier’s departure as anything I’d take it as an affirmation of his large impact, all the more so when he isn’t asked to singled-handedly carry the load.

Short-version:
- Mid-70s boxscore composite "advanced" metrics not too far off Kareem (on a per-minute basis).
- Despite missing time in his prime, above metrics were at a high level for a long time.
- With-without splits from when injured during prime indicates significant impact.
- Post-prime splits after trade for the more stable team (Milwaukee) suggest (on a small, but non-trivial sample) huge impact.
- From '74 on, a prominent yearly publication far more bullish on Lanier's D than penbeast.

Edited for typo - Also the following games are available though time constraints mean this probably isn't mega useful

Warriors Pistons 76 WCSF 3 highlights/incomplete
Warriors Pistons 76 WCSF 6 highlights/incomplete
Jazz Pistons 78
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 1
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 2
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 3
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 4
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 5
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 6
Sonics Bucks 80 WCSF 7
Bucks 76ers 81 ECSF 7
76ers Bucks 83 ECF 1
76ers Bucks 83 ECF 2
76ers Bucks 83 ECF 3
76ers Bucks 83 ECF 4

plus a whole bunch of All-Star games.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #45:

Alonzo Mourning - 4 (LABird, Doctor MJ, iggymcfrack, pandrade83)
Bob Lanier - 2 (Dr Positivity, trex_8063)
Elvin Hayes - 2 (scabbarista, Clyde Frazier)
Alex English - 1 (penbeast0)

Going to have to at least narrow this runoff down in about 6-7 more hours.

Spoiler:

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[THKNKG]

Vote: Zo

His longevity isn't great, but it isn't as bad as I once thought. He was a great defensive anchor and a really good offensive player. I personally have him over (or at least near) Dwight, so it's time for him (and Deke lol). Plus, I just feel he's a different level player than the other options.

[penbeast0]

...
I could plausibly buy your version of Lanier as accurate through ’73. Maybe, maybe, to a lesser extent at the end of the 70s. I can buy that this early picture of Lanier (overweight, less focused on D, less consistent on D and perceived as a somewhat of a disappointment particularly through a disappointing rookie year in a strong draft class, all to some degree interconnected with that early injury) colouring popular perceptions of Lanier but my most reliable source of the time (Hollander handbooks) has Lanier as someone who “clogs the middle nicely” “very intimidating defensive player who, like Dave Cowens, is not afraid to switch out on unsuspecting forwards and guards” during his prime. Unless you’ve got more contemporary sources for prime Lanier as a lazy, non-helping defender, I’d take what I have (the stats plus Hollander) as the more persuasive view.
...
But let’s look at Milwaukee for the final 26 games – those games with Lanier, and Lanier played in them all, they go +287, or +11.03846154 per game. Before that point, over 56 games they had been +36 or 0.642857143 per game. So if you’re going to take Lanier’s departure as anything I’d take it as an affirmation of his large impact, all the more so when he isn’t asked to singled-handedly carry the load.

Obviously Owly and I have gone around on the issue of Lanier's defense before and if I hadn't seen him, I'd believe Owly's sources over my support from team Drtg. I did see him and wasn't impressed defensively which to me is the ONLY knock on Lanier (ok, not a particularly strong passer but not a black hole either). I never thought he was a disappointment or a bum, he was a very very good offensive player consistently (including in Milwaukee if you look at his per minute numbers) and overall a valuable and dangerous center. It wasn't a strong era and I'd pick Dave Cowens first among remaining 70s NBA centers but Lanier isn't a bad choice at this point.

Lanier v. English. I prefer English because I think he gives you offense as good as Lanier in a stronger era and because I value defense more for bigs and versatility more for wings and that was Lanier's weakness and English's strength.

Lanier v. Hayes? I'd take Lanier as the offensive and intangibles edge is pretty strong even though Hayes was a more active and aggressive player both defensively and on the boards.

Lanier v. Zo? Zo's defensive edge trumps Lanier's lesser offensive edge and Zo's intangibles are stronger than either Lanier or Hayes (though arguably not as strong as English depending on how much you value aggression v. coachability).

[dhsilv2]

So more looking at this, all these guys seem like poor to bad intangible guys, not terrible or horrible, but I'm not like that either. I'm abstaining 100%. I just don't want to vote for anyone here in the top 60. I'd be torn between lanier and Zo and Zo's offense gives me more pause than I think it should, but I just recall him on the 90's in the playoffs and I can't do it. I also recall how awful a disappointment he was for the nets and then the 3 point jokes.

I'm siding a bit more with Penbeast0 on the defense for lanier, it looks like he had a season where he was a monster and just never did it again. That for some reason sits poorly with me, as in if he'd not done that I'd feel better.

As this is going to be zo vs someone, I'll keep thinking for the next voting round.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #49:

Alonzo Mourning - 5 (Doctor MJ, iggymcfrack, pandrade83, LABird, micahclay)
Bob Lanier - 2 (Dr Positivity, trex_8063)
Elvin Hayes - 2 (scabbarista, Clyde Frazier)
Alex English - 1 (penbeast0)

No majority for any one player. But if nothing changes in the next hour or so, and there are no objections, I'm going to call it for Zo. If I eliminate English from the running, that would leave us with Zo having 5 of 9 votes (a majority). And he can correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect the one voter for English (penbeast0) would pick Mourning if forced to decide between the three big men.

Spoiler:

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[Doctor MJ]

So more looking at this, all these guys seem like poor to bad intangible guys, not terrible or horrible, but I'm not like that either.

Wait, Zo is a poor intangible guy? Nah, I don't think so.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/239582-the-legacy-of-alonzo-mourning?m=0

[trex_8063]

As per the below post, I'm calling it for Zo. Once English is eliminated, Mourning does actually hold the majority. There were no objections, so I propose we move on. Will have the next thread up in a moment....

Thru post #49:

Alonzo Mourning - 5 (Doctor MJ, iggymcfrack, pandrade83, LABird, micahclay)
Bob Lanier - 2 (Dr Positivity, trex_8063)
Elvin Hayes - 2 (scabbarista, Clyde Frazier)
Alex English - 1 (penbeast0)

No majority for any one player. But if nothing changes in the next hour or so, and there are no objections, I'm going to call it for Zo. If I eliminate English from the running, that would leave us with Zo having 5 of 9 votes (a majority). And he can correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect the one voter for English (penbeast0) would pick Mourning if forced to decide between the three big men.

Spoiler:

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[dhsilv2]

So more looking at this, all these guys seem like poor to bad intangible guys, not terrible or horrible, but I'm not like that either.

Wait, Zo is a poor intangible guy? Nah, I don't think so.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/239582-the-legacy-of-alonzo-mourning?m=0

Neutral at best I guess.