NBA Superstars Playoffs Production Based On Quality Of Opposition

[70sFan]

It makes your accomplishments less impressive because you did it against inferior competition in the playoffs. Wilt faced MUCH better teams, overall, than Kareem, (or anyone else from that entire era), and, Wilt needs to be given full credit for that.

Some of that is caused by RS performance though. If your team is higher on the standings, it means that you'll face weaker competition and there is nothing wrong with that. It's much more sophisticated than you imply.

As I said, you want to give Kareem full credit for all the Finals and winning all the Championships with Dynastic teammates and at ATG coach around him in the 80's, but, at the same time, you say "It doesn't matter who he faced in the playoffs those years."

You can't have it both ways, brother....

Find me one quote in which I pick Kareem over Wilt because of rings or team accomplishements. I don't evaluate players this way.

Shorten Kareem's career to 1970-83 and I might still pick him, although it's closer. Additional 3 years gives him longevity advantage, but it doesn't tell us much about prime Kareem. I don't use 1987-89 seasons at all in my evaluation, even though he won two rings in that period.

[ty 4191]

I completed Bird and Magic!!

(See results in the first post of this Thread).

[ty 4191]

Find me one quote in which I pick Kareem over Wilt because of rings or team accomplishements. I don't evaluate players this way.

That's refreshing.

Most people on this Forum use Finals reached and Championships won by a player (first and foremost) when evaluating players.

There are so many inherent flaws and problems with that reasoning. It's totally specious and facile reasoning.

[70sFan]

I completed Bird and Magic!!

(See results in the first post of this Thread).

I don't see Magic stats in the first post.

Edit: now I see it. Thank you for your work again.

Although the narrative is quite different, Bird and Magic looks nearly identical in terms of elite teams faced.

[Texas Chuck]

Find me one quote in which I pick Kareem over Wilt because of rings or team accomplishements. I don't evaluate players this way.

That's refreshing.

Most people on this Forum use Finals reached and Championships won by a player (first and foremost) when evaluating players.

There are so many inherent flaws and problems with that reasoning. It's totally specious and facile reasoning.

This is a false narrative. Almost no posters on the PC board use Finals and Championships first and foremost when evaluating players. In fact, you have many who refuse to consider team results at all. In fact, I am one of very few posters who is open that I place a great deal of importance on team success--after all the goal of the endeavor is team success not individual statistical glory.

The valuing of individual stats over team play leads one for instance to think Wilt was better than Russ.

[ty 4191]

I completed Bird and Magic!!

(See results in the first post of this Thread).

I don't see Magic stats in the first post.

Edit: now I see it. Thank you for your work again.

Although the narrative is quite different, Bird and Magic looks nearly identical in terms of elite teams faced.

You're welcome!!

I have wonder about conference strength, however.

Consider:

--Including the Finals, the Western Conference had a .423 winning percentage against the Eastern Conference from 1980-1992. That is an incredible disparity.

--Only 4 of of 18 teams that played in the West had a winning record against the East.

This is one thing that isn't captured by Net Rating.

But it IS captured, again, fully...here:

What If the Celtics and Lakers had switched conferences in the 1980’s?

https://www.celticsblog.com/2020/5/17/21258281/what-if-the-celtics-and-lakers-had-switched-conferences-in-the-1980s

[ty 4191]

This is a false narrative. Almost no posters on the PC board use Finals and Championships first and foremost when evaluating players. In fact, you have many who refuse to consider team results at all. In fact, I am one of very few posters who is open that I place a great deal of importance on team success--after all the goal of the endeavor is team success not individual statistical glory.

I said this Forum, not this Board, necessarily. Go to The General Board for a day, where 80% of the posts and attention are on this Site, and see how many people use team wins, "deep playoff runs" and finals glory....

The valuing of individual stats over team play leads one for instance to think Wilt was better than Russ.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/blog/index4f3e.html?p=4229

Look at the MP with Russell vs. MP with Wilt for HOFers.

Russell's teammates were light years better than Wilt's. When Wilt got great teammates and coaches who weren't fired or allowed to resign after 1 or 2 years, here's what he did:

Wilt gets great coaching that uses him properly, great teammates, and then (in his old age, for that era), suddenly wins .718 of his games during the entire second half of his career. His teams set the record for wins twice (two *different* teams, no less).

Coaches and GMs who either overtly disliked/hated and/or totally mismanaged Wilt.

Neil Johnston
Ed Gottlieb
Frank McGuire
Bob Feerick
Dolph Schayes
Butch Van Breda Kolff
Fred Schaus

Coaches who understood him well, treated him well, and used him properly/to his full potential:

Alex Hannum
Bill Sharman

In 14 years he only had two coaches that ever understood him, and that he could count on. That's only 6 of his 14 seasons.

Here are his team’s records those years:

68-13 (all time record for wins)
62-20
69-13 (all time record for wins, different team)
60-22

That's a .793 winning percentage for 4 years. On two different teams.

Also....it's not that hard to dominate when you have an absolute monopoly on the league for 13 years, have almost literally all the best defensive players, have Hall of Famers coming off the bench, and have the greatest coach (arguably, all time) and, have the greatest management/ownership in NBA History to that point.

Both players have a case for GOAT, but probably not because of the inane, facile "Chips" Argument.

[70sFan]

Also....it's not that hard to dominate when you have an absolute monopoly on the league for 13 years, have almost literally all the best defensive players, have Hall of Famers coming off the bench, and have the greatest coach (arguably, all time) and, have the greatest management/ownership in NBA History to that point.

I am confused, who created this monopoly in the 1960s league? Boston was nothing special before Russell came in.

They didn't have the best defensive players in the league either. If you take a look at 1964 team (the best defense ever), it's arguable if they had better defensive team than Wilt. Wilt played with Nate Thurmond who was arguably better than anyone not named Russell defensively. He played with Al Attles who was comparable to KC Jones. Meschery and Heinsohn were comparable as well. Wayne Hightower sucked on offense, but he was long and mobile defender as well.

There is no reason to believe Russell played on some kind of superteams year after year. It reminds me Tim Duncan situation a lot when people try ot exaggarate how good some Spurs roleplayers were just to downgrade Duncan's impact on winning.

[70sFan]

I completed Bird and Magic!!

(See results in the first post of this Thread).

I don't see Magic stats in the first post.

Edit: now I see it. Thank you for your work again.

Although the narrative is quite different, Bird and Magic looks nearly identical in terms of elite teams faced.

You're welcome!!

I have wonder about conference strength, however.

Consider:

--Including the Finals, the Western Conference had a .423 winning percentage against the Eastern Conference from 1980-1992. That is an incredible disparity.

--Only 4 of of 18 teams that played in the West had a winning record against the East.

This is one thing that isn't captured by Net Rating.

But it IS captured, again, fully...here:

What If the Celtics and Lakers had switched conferences in the 1980’s?

https://www.celticsblog.com/2020/5/17/21258281/what-if-the-celtics-and-lakers-had-switched-conferences-in-the-1980s

That's interesting point to consider. I still don't think the difference is nearly as massive as some people would like to believe. In some years, Magic had an easy path to the finals (like in 1987) but in others (like 1980) he actually faced better competition.

All in all, focusing only on competition faced in postseason won't give you enough context. It's a very interesting and useful data (especially for some stars that are seen as "chokers"), but it shouldn't end the discussion.

[ty 4191]

They didn't have the best defensive players in the league either.

Yes, they did, overall.

Looking at the big picture:

--4 of the top 5 players in defensive win shares during the 60's were only one team. The Celtics. Wilt is the only non Celtic in the top 5.

--7 of the top 10 players were on the Celtics. Only Rogers, Baylor, and Thurmond crack the top 10 in overall defensive value during the decade.

[70sFan]

They didn't have the best defensive players in the league either.

Yes, they did, overall.

Looking at the big picture:

--4 of the top 5 players in defensive win shares during the 60's were only one team. The Celtics. Wilt is the only non Celtic in the top 5.

--7 of the top 10 players were on the Celtics. Only Rogers, Baylor, and Thurmond crack the top 10 in overall defensive value during the decade.

DWS reward players for their team success, so given that Celtics were by far the best team in NBA history it's quite clear why Celtics players have high numbers. DWS don't tell us anything about defensive impact though.

We actually have seen how good Celtics defense was without Russell:

1956 Celtics: +1.4 rDRtg
1957 Celtics: -4.9 rDRtg

1969 Celtics:-6.4 rDRtg
1970 Celtics: -0.1 rDRtg

Where were all of these amazing defenders before or after Russell's retirement?

[ty 4191]

DWS reward players for their team success.

No, this is an individual statistic. What metrics do you use to directly measure defense pre 1976-1977?

Where were all of these amazing defenders before or after Russell's retirement?

He had a huge impact on his team's defense, no doubt, probably bigger than everyone else, ever.

As I said, he has a strong case as GOAT in my book. And, that's despite being a very poor offensive player (for a very high scoring/possessoins per game era).

[70sFan]

DWS reward players for their team success.

No, this is an individual statistic. What metrics do you use to directly measure defense pre 1976-1977?.

You can check out how this stat is calculated here:

https://www.basketball-reference.com/about/ws.html

It's very crude attempt to capture individual player defensive impact on team results. DWS don't have good correlaction with actual impact metrics. For the 1960s players, it's basically a compilation of team defense, rebounds and assists (!) into something that doesn't capture anything really. Wilt and Russell don't have high DWS because they are good defenders, but because they rebounded a lot of boards on good defensive teams.

What I use instead? It's very tricky, I always try to look at different WOWY data and even cruder correlation between team results and player's game played/missed.

Nothing is better than watching games for evaluating defense though. I think we have enough Celtics footage to conclude that Russell was amazing defender. KC Jones looks also extremely impressive on that end. I like what Satch Sanders could bring to the table as well. Havlicek was very solid, though he improved as he got older, more experienced. Heinsohn was smart without the ball, but he wasn't strong man defender. Ramsay was pesky and could guard bigger men. The rest wasn't anything special though - Howell wasn't good defensively, Sam Jones was above average, Cousy was mediocre, Siegfried was pesky but extremely limited.

Celtics were definitely very talented on defense, but I don't think they were more talented than 1970 Knicks or 1994 Knicks for example. Russell was the key difference between these teams.

[Texas Chuck]

Both players have a case for GOAT, but probably not because of the inane, facile "Chips" Argument.

We can agree to disagree on Wilt.

But Russ isn't a GOAT candidate because he has 11 rings. He has 11 rings because he was one of the greatest players of all-time. You have the causation backwards.

I note you ignored my request to check to see the actual level of play of the hall of famers that Russ played with and just continue to cite them as "evidence" he played on stacked teams. I suggest you take the time to look into just how few of those players actually belong in the Hall and just as importantly how little some of them actually even played with Russ. You continue to imply every Russell team was loaded with 7 or 8 HoF players and that's just not an accurate representation.

And of course he never played with the top end talent that Wilt did.

Sorry, but Russell was the reason for the dynasty.

[Owly]

They didn't have the best defensive players in the league either.

Yes, they did, overall.

Looking at the big picture:

--4 of the top 5 players in defensive win shares during the 60's were only one team. The Celtics. Wilt is the only non Celtic in the top 5.

--7 of the top 10 players were on the Celtics. Only Rogers, Baylor, and Thurmond crack the top 10 in overall defensive value during the decade.

I'm inclined to think that the Celtics did - depending somewhat on definitions and acknowledging limitations and a reliance on second hand sources - have the best defensive players.

Sanders, K.C. and Havlicek as a defensive cast (either as 2nd to 4th defensive players or as non-centers or even just in general) seem pretty good. My best guess - and it is a guess both in terms of the reality and my aggregation of opinions - is that Heinsohn is underrated on that end (Kalich rated him a 6 on that end - even with Hagan, Yardley, Mikkelsen and above Barry and Arizin among then inactive [non-NBA] forwards for what that's worth, John Taylor emphasizes his hustle/effort in The Rivalry and as a coach and author he seemed emphasize hustle too).

But if your basis for thinking the players are good based off defensive win shares ... I'd ask if you understand where they come from. In general ... and especially before the defensive boxscore DWS basically just answers whether you were on a good defensive team: if you did and you played you get DWS, it's not like it has a great means of parsing out defensive credit ... something that's kind of hard even now.

As I say, I think that was a very good defensive cast but I could be wrong and have DWS still look like they do.

[70sFan]

And of course he never played with the top end talent that Wilt did.

I would say a team like 1960 Celtics was quite comparable in terms of level of talent relative to league average to Wilt's best teams.

[Texas Chuck]

And of course he never played with the top end talent that Wilt did.

I would say a team like 1960 Celtics was quite comparable in terms of level of talent relative to league average to Wilt's best teams.

Sure. But he never played with a guy as good as Jerry West. And its not like the Warriors or 76ers teams he played on were void of good players either.

To me its as tired as the KG vs Dirk debates where too many of the KG supporters want to only whine about the quality of teammates KG had, while ignoring Dirk never played with any elite players, well ever. KG had Cassell in Minny who was better than any Dallas version of Nash. And of course in Boston, he had Truth and Allen.

Yes, Dallas overall had better teams than Minnesota, and I don't have a major issue if one believes Russ's supporting casts overall were slightly better than Wilt's. But the reason the Celtics dominated the league was primarily about Bill Russell. Not those supporting casts.

It's oddly lazy analysis from a guy going to a lot of work in his posts itt.

[Owly]

They didn't have the best defensive players in the league either.

Yes, they did, overall.

Looking at the big picture:

--4 of the top 5 players in defensive win shares during the 60's were only one team. The Celtics. Wilt is the only non Celtic in the top 5.

--7 of the top 10 players were on the Celtics. Only Rogers, Baylor, and Thurmond crack the top 10 in overall defensive value during the decade.

DWS reward players for their team success, so given that Celtics were by far the best team in NBA history it's quite clear why Celtics players have high numbers. DWS don't tell us anything about defensive impact though.

We actually have seen how good Celtics defense was without Russell:

1956 Celtics: +1.4 rDRtg
1957 Celtics: -4.9 rDRtg

1969 Celtics:-6.4 rDRtg
1970 Celtics: -0.1 rDRtg

Where were all of these amazing defenders before or after Russell's retirement?

Whilst I imagine Russell to be the most impactful defender ever, I would take issue with the bolded as being evidenced in any strong way by the data following.

56 to 57 involves significant other turnover. Macauley was a productive scorer but seems to have been a poor defender and he's dealt out. Heinsohn comes in. Ramsey arrives (see more on this later). Philip arrives too whilst other Celtics are shunted down the depth chart.

56-57 campaign includes relatively large chunk of the season sans Russell in which the Celtics do about/almost as well without him net (RS wise their points diff improves post Russell but not massively and fwiw win% slips slightly). Russell is fifth in total minutes. Before that they're using either a reserve caliber player or someone out of position.
This relatively small improvement is despite adding Ramsey a little after adding Russell, I would think a clear upgrade to their rotation.
Fwiw, (and I'm low on Russell's O in general) in the 50s Russell was an efficient shooter from the field (though bad at the line), so my guess is his net impact is less totally predicated on D than later (or perhaps that should be that his offensive negative is smaller than it would later be) though he's less involved as a passer and some think that's an area he added value.

The retirement impact is clearer though again the replacement players value in their minutes at center (starter and reserves) isn't too high (backups mattering less on the '69 team when Russell played 3291 minutes), there is other turnover again (Sam Jones going) plus an injury to Sanders and generally I would suspect a team not so focused on short term performance.

We can get a flavor, and there is other evidence supporting a large defensive impact (WoWY, iirc). But I don't think it's fair to say how good they are in '56 with Ed is reflective of how good dynastic era Celtics defenses would be sans-Russell.

[tsherkin]

I completed Bird and Magic!!

(See results in the first post of this Thread).

Thank you for all of your hard work

[LAL1947]

And, that's despite being a very poor offensive player (for a very high scoring/possessoins per game era).

Nothing is better than watching games for evaluating defense though. I think we have enough Celtics footage to conclude that Russell was amazing defender. KC Jones looks also extremely impressive on that end. I like what Satch Sanders could bring to the table as well. Havlicek was very solid, though he improved as he got older, more experienced. Heinsohn was smart without the ball, but he wasn't strong man defender. Ramsay was pesky and could guard bigger men. The rest wasn't anything special though - Howell wasn't good defensively, Sam Jones was above average, Cousy was mediocre, Siegfried was pesky but extremely limited.

Celtics were definitely very talented on defense, but I don't think they were more talented than 1970 Knicks or 1994 Knicks for example. Russell was the key difference between these teams.

In your reply, you concede that the Celtics were definitely very talented on defense... but you don't address Ty4191's main gripe that I've quoted above, i.e., "Russell was a very poor offensive player (for a very high scoring/possessions per game era)".

Just pointing it out in case you wanted to add something related to that.