RealGM 2023 Top 100 Project - #9 (Kevin Garnett)

[iggymcfrack]

I’m curious if anyone can articulate to me an argument in favor of nominating someone else over Moses Malone. Only one other guy on the table was the best player in the league over significant timespan (Mikan), and Moses Malone had way better longevity than Mikan and faced much stiffer competition for being best in the world (i.e. prime Kareem). And no one else being considered on the table at this point actually won more than Moses. He led one of the greatest teams of all time and also took a team to the finals (past the 1980s Lakers) that would proceed to win 14 games on -11.12 SRS when he left a couple years later.

The advanced numbers we have look pretty terrible for him:


He ranks 44th all-time in career VORP between Anthony Davis despite playing at the best possible time to get a high VORP since it was he came into the league right after it became calculable meaning that he got to play against easy competition without having any seasons not counted. From the Backpicks article, he apparently ranked in the 3rd percentile in Box Creation among 24 point per 75 scorers due to his lack of court vision and passing ability. Also, here's the relevant section on the plus/minus (again secondhand, not the actual raw data):

Fortunately, we have Harvey Pollack’s plus-minus data for Moses’ four seasons in Philadelphia to help evaluate his impact. His AuPM oscillates between strong (but not transcendent) and pedestrian in those four seasons, with ’83 and ’85 looking like typical top-20 seasons and ’84 and ’86 lacking impact. Similarly, Moses’ regressed game-level data tells us that he made a difference, but that his impact was far short of a Grade-A superstar’s.

So, given bottom tier passing, average to above average defense, and good but not great scoring, I don't see a case for him over someone like David Robinson who was an elite all-time defender while also being a much more complete player offensively. The only area where Malone was really elite was offensive rebounding where he does rank #1 all-time ahead of Dennis Rodman, Tristan Thompson, Kevon Looney, and Roy Hibbert. I mean, its a nice skill to have, but does it make someone a top 20 player? Not in my book.

[rk2023]

I’m curious if anyone can articulate to me an argument in favor of nominating someone else over Moses Malone. Only one other guy on the table was the best player in the league over significant timespan (Mikan), and Moses Malone had way better longevity than Mikan and faced much stiffer competition for being best in the world (i.e. prime Kareem). And no one else being considered on the table at this point actually won more than Moses. He led one of the greatest teams of all time and also took a team to the finals (past the 1980s Lakers) that would proceed to win 14 games on -11.12 SRS when he left a couple years later.

I understand that he has a solid case for best in the world over the span of 1979-83 as you cited in a prior exchange (would take Kareem myself, as I feel Moses doesn't reach his higher points within this time frame) - so if you value that, a nomination here could certainly make sense. As it pertains to the three most worthy candidates I personally see garnering the coming nomination(s), I'm going to compare 5 year prime slates here, for a set standard. Am happy to elaborate with more evidence on each if/when prompted. For transparency, I see each of these spans as more impressive than Moses' 1979-83 magnum opus (along with better surrounding years) - but to each their own.

West:
I think he has a very formidable case for being the best player in the league through the 1966-70 time frame if you aren't one who places a significant weight on RS games missed / the fact that he missed a playoff run. On a per play and game-over-game basis, his impact and offensive lift (WOWY / win share heliocentrism) were astounding, his playoff production (particularly scoring) translates to the highest degree seen amongst superstars or near it at the least, and I view West as a tremendous all around player with his improved playmaking and consistently good, not quite all-time though, guard defense. With Russell's retirement, Wilt missing a year / having an odd 1969 campaign, and a slight dip in Oscar's production - I would take West across this time frame over the pack.

Oscar:
Going to focus on 1962-66 here. Of course, I wouldn't view Oscar as high as '66-70 West in a relative-to-the-pack sense, as (1) Bill and (2) Wilt were both better - but Oscar stepped in and instantly became the best offensive player and guard in NBA History at that point in time with his combination of scoring and facilitating. He didn't miss too much time in this span, but the general prime WOWY sample [Thinking Basketball has a great write-up on this] Oscar accrued from Cincinnati paints him as the indispensable driving force of the Royals' spree of best in the league offenses. He also won an MVP in 1964 competing against (arguably) peak Wilt and very close to peak Russell - granted I would take one of the bigs for this award. Regardless, it goes to show he did his part in making it a debate from a players' / media view.

Dirk:
I wouldn't call him the "best in the world" across this time span, but keying in on the 2007-11 time frame.. he certainly holds his own in having a great argument amidst (imo) a more talented player pool than 1979-83 [eg. LBJ, Kobe, Wade, Paul, Dwight, Duncan, Garnett]. I prefer Dirk as an offensive centerpiece where I don't think Moses' advantage on the defensive end outweighs what all Dirk brought the table - with his scoring/spacing efficacy leading the way to provide the impact of a floor raiser while bringing traits that lend themselves well for a scalable game and ample roster flexibility in terms of building around him. I don't want to lean too much into impact stats and team data in this context when comparing Dirk to the other 3 here, as it's cross-era and such information isn't available for them to the extent it is Dirk. FWIW however, Dirk had an 11.7 on/off across this time span in the RS (10.6 of it coming from ORTG) and 11.2 in the PS. Without a formidable offensive cast per-se, the Mavs had 113.3 and 112.0 ORTGs with Dirk on the floor in this time span.

[lessthanjake]

1. Wes Unseld and Cowens beat out Kareem for MVP too. MVPs were awarded even more poorly in the 70s than today. I don't put too much stock in that. How many of those MVPs would you say Moses actually deserved in hindsight? Moses game just doesn't translate to MVP play today either. As I alluded to, his skill set is overrated in most eras, but especially today. A big without any real offensive depth, who doesn't protect the rim, and makes his living grabbing offensive rebounds in the paint. He'd probably be torched in pick and roll too. Sounds like a tough fit.

2. Karl Malone wasn't even the best player, but I'm not sure Moses was; he was just wrongly perceived to be. He was also perceived to be in worse leagues. I'm not going to base a vote on anything as arbitrary as "won a title", and Moses won his ring by joining an existing contender anyway.

1. Wes Unseld did not ever get the MVP over Kareem. He got it the year before Kareem entered the league. And Cowens won the MVP over Kareem once, not three times. Cowens also only won it because his team won a massive 68 games. That’s very much not what happened with Moses Malone. Moses won his first two MVPs without his team even winning more games than Kareem’s! Indeed, in 1981-1982, Moses got the MVP in a year that Kareem’s team won 10 more games than Moses’s. Indeed, Moses’s team won the least games of any top-10 MVP finisher that year. For his first MVP, no one in the top 5 in MVP voting was on a team that won fewer games than Moses’s team. Moses was just regarded as the best player and therefore got the award.

I genuinely don’t see the point about skill set. Physically dominant big men have been good in every era. And he had a good mid-range jump shot too—which in this era probably would end up being a three-point shot (note: his FT% was good enough that I don’t think it is all that speculative that he could’ve shot the three). He’d be like Joel Embiid with much more dominance on the boards and a bit less rim protection. In any event, I think most people are voting based on how a player played within their era, not based on some speculative notion of how well they’d do in the current era.

2. Who was better than Moses from 1978-1979 to 1982-1983? Kareem? Moses had a higher PER and more win shares than Kareem in that timeframe. He won three MVPs to Kareem’s one MVP. He was superior in all-NBA selections in that timeframe. When their teams met in the playoffs twice in those years, Moses’s team won both times, with Moses being better than Kareem in both series. The only other guy to win an MVP in that timeframe was Dr. J, and it was pretty obvious Moses was better than Dr. J, given that they were on the same team for a year and Moses was the team’s clear best player. Bird was really good in that timeframe too (he was there for four years of it), but was pretty clearly statistically inferior to Moses. The Celtics did beat Moses’s Rockets twice in the playoffs, but Bird didn’t actually outplay Moses—Moses just had a clearly weaker team. Magic was around too, but wasn’t quite at that level yet, and was definitely outplayed by Moses in the series’s that they played against each other. I’m not really sure who would really have a particularly good case over Moses in that timespan.

[homecourtloss]

Are you able to point me to where plus-minus data for Moses Malone is? I know Pollack did it for the 76ers back way further than we otherwise have, but I can’t actually find it online.

What I can find on this is second-hand—for instance here: viewtopic.php?p=99258529#p99258529

That suggests Moses Malone had a +15.6 On/Off in 1982-1983. Which doing some quick basic math suggests to me that the 1982-1983 76ers—one of the best teams of all time—actually probably had a net rating of about -4 in minutes Moses was off the floor!

Yep, that's about accurate: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ZxRM9p2dFil5w6s21VEB4HnQZJymEY8_2vej-jREuUo/edit#gid=631667261

He had spectacular numbers in '83/'85, okay in '86, and pretty poor in '84. I guess overall a bit better than I remembered.

Way back when these numbers were first posted, my immediate reaction was that it’s highly unusual to have someone have such a monster year, 1983, and then another monster impact year, 1985, and then 1984 sandwiched in between with something underwhelming.

Also, Mo cheeks has always been highly underrated, and even with the accolades and praise Bobby Jones gets for his defense, it might not truly do him Justice as he was a defensive monster in his later years when wing defense turns to deteriorate.

There’s the scrutiny that Dr. J comes under for some underwhelming numbers aside from a few years.

[One_and_Done]

My bad on Unseld. I stand by the general point though. MVPs from the 70s and earlier are pretty bad. I think they do a better job of reflecting the perception of the public from the 80s onwards, mainly because that's when the media took the voting over, though even then one can always just say 'well the public/media perception was wrong'. It's still a useful guide as to what those voters thought at the time, but current player voting and opinion leaves me (and I suspect most of us) with a grim view of player voting for awards.

[lessthanjake]

My bad on Unseld. I stand by the general point though. MVPs from the 70s and earlier are pretty bad. I think they do a better job of reflecting the perception of the public from the 80s onwards, mainly because that's when the media took the voting over, though even then one can always just say 'well the public/media perception was wrong'. It's still a useful guide as to what those voters thought at the time, but current player voting and opinion leaves me (and I suspect most of us) with a grim view of player voting for awards.

Two of Moses Malone’s MVP awards were won when the award was voted on by the media.

[One_and_Done]

My bad on Unseld. I stand by the general point though. MVPs from the 70s and earlier are pretty bad. I think they do a better job of reflecting the perception of the public from the 80s onwards, mainly because that's when the media took the voting over, though even then one can always just say 'well the public/media perception was wrong'. It's still a useful guide as to what those voters thought at the time, but current player voting and opinion leaves me (and I suspect most of us) with a grim view of player voting for awards.

Two of Moses Malone’s MVP awards were won when the award was voted on by the media.

And how do you feel about those MVPs? Do you think Moses was the best player in the NBA those 2 years? How about Dr J the year before? I think over time the voters got better, but those first few years where they took over voting look a bit rough.

I should clarify I'd have Moses in my top 25. I just feel this is a little soon for him.

[lessthanjake]

I’m curious if anyone can articulate to me an argument in favor of nominating someone else over Moses Malone. Only one other guy on the table was the best player in the league over significant timespan (Mikan), and Moses Malone had way better longevity than Mikan and faced much stiffer competition for being best in the world (i.e. prime Kareem). And no one else being considered on the table at this point actually won more than Moses. He led one of the greatest teams of all time and also took a team to the finals (past the 1980s Lakers) that would proceed to win 14 games on -11.12 SRS when he left a couple years later.

The advanced numbers we have look pretty terrible for him:

But what is that all based on for him? In his prime years, he barely missed any games. For instance, in those 5 years where he was the best player in the world, Moses Malone missed a grand total of…7 games (in which his teams went 2-5). And then he missed a grand total of 36 games for the rest of his career until his age-37 season. WOWY stuff for someone who missed so few games is basically just completely meaningless. Is this largely just based on what happened in the 23 games he missed in 1977-78, when he wasn’t even an all-NBA player yet (he took a big leap the next year)? Maybe, but then again the team went 23-36 with Moses and 5-18 without him that season, so it’s not exactly some indictment on his impact, particularly when it’s merely in his age-22 season where he was an all-star but not yet all-NBA, so obviously wouldn’t be the peak level of his impact.

For reference, while I take this sort of stuff with a grain of salt, when prime Moses left the Rockets, they went from a 46-win team to a 14-win -11.12 SRS team. So that is suggestive of Moses having a lot of impact. And when he joined the 76ers, they went from a 58-win team (hard to improve much on that) to a dominant 65-win team that won the title with just one playoff loss.

And we actually have plus-minus data for Moses Malone in his 4 years with the 76ers, which a link was just posted to in the last page. If you look across those 4 years and do a weighted average of his plus-minus for those years, you’ll find that Moses Malone had a +12.3 on-off in his years with the 76ers. That’s really high! And that’s his late prime, and doesn’t encompass most of his peak.

He ranks 44th all-time in career VORP between Anthony Davis despite playing at the best possible time to get a high VORP since it was he came into the league right after it became calculable meaning that he got to play against easy competition without having any seasons not counted. From the Backpicks article, he apparently ranked in the 3rd percentile in Box Creation among 24 point per 75 scorers due to his lack of court vision and passing ability. Also, here's the relevant section on the plus/minus (again secondhand, not the actual raw data):

Fortunately, we have Harvey Pollack’s plus-minus data for Moses’ four seasons in Philadelphia to help evaluate his impact. His AuPM oscillates between strong (but not transcendent) and pedestrian in those four seasons, with ’83 and ’85 looking like typical top-20 seasons and ’84 and ’86 lacking impact. Similarly, Moses’ regressed game-level data tells us that he made a difference, but that his impact was far short of a Grade-A superstar’s.

So, given bottom tier passing, average to above average defense, and good but not great scoring, I don't see a case for him over someone like David Robinson who was an elite all-time defender while also being a much more complete player offensively. The only area where Malone was really elite was offensive rebounding where he does rank #1 all-time ahead of Dennis Rodman, Tristan Thompson, Kevon Looney, and Roy Hibbert. I mean, it’s a nice skill to have, but does it make someone a top 20 player? Not in my book.

This really just all flows from the specifics of one particular stat: Box Plus Minus. VORP is just a non-rate-stat version of BPM, so Moses Malone not doing well in VORP is really just not doing well in BPM. Meanwhile, this AuPM for Moses Malone takes Pollack’s on-off data and regresses it with BPM. Crucially, we know that Moses Malone’s actual plus-minus data was really good. Moses Malone had a +15.6 on-off in 1982-1983 and a +21.7 on-off on 1984-1985! His average over his four years with the 76ers that we have data for was +12.3. These are really high numbers! So how does Backpick’s AuPM get an AuPM result out of this that merely “oscillates between strong (but not transcendent) and pedestrian”? Well, it’s obviously a result of the BPM piece of it.

Moses Malone does not do well in BPM. This is why his VORP isn’t very high and this is clearly why his AuPM is not great despite his on-off numbers being great. Why does BPM not like Moses? Well, it probably has a huge amount to do with the fact that the stat artificially decreases the value of offensive rebounds when they come from centers, which would disproportionately depress a huge part of Moses Malone’s statistical profile.

In other words, all of this basically stems from the fact that a particular stat greatly decreases the value of Moses Malone’s outlier statistical contribution based on what his position is. Is that fair? Do we really think that the rather huge on-off data we have from Moses Malone actually isn’t all that good because his huge numbers of offensive rebounds weren’t very important?

[lessthanjake]

My bad on Unseld. I stand by the general point though. MVPs from the 70s and earlier are pretty bad. I think they do a better job of reflecting the perception of the public from the 80s onwards, mainly because that's when the media took the voting over, though even then one can always just say 'well the public/media perception was wrong'. It's still a useful guide as to what those voters thought at the time, but current player voting and opinion leaves me (and I suspect most of us) with a grim view of player voting for awards.

Two of Moses Malone’s MVP awards were won when the award was voted on by the media.

And how do you feel about those MVPs? Do you think Moses was the best player in the NBA those 2 years? How about Dr J the year before? I think over time the voters got better, but those first few years where they took over voting look a bit rough.

I should clarify I'd have Moses in my top 25. I just feel this is a little soon for him.

I feel pretty good about them. In 1982-1983, Moses led the league in PER and win shares, and his team won a huge 65 games, and we know he had a really high +15.6 on-off, with that 65-win team having a -4.1 net rating with him off the court. It is pretty straightforwardly obvious that he was the MVP, IMO. In 1981-1982, Moses also led the league in PER and win shares. His team only won 46 games, but this is a team that would proceed to win 14 games with a -11.12 SRS the next year when Moses left (without them having major injury issues), so we have pretty good reason to think getting them to 46 games was a huge lift by Moses. Bird or Dr. J probably could’ve gotten it that year too, since their teams won more games and they were really good too, but overall I feel good about a guy getting MVP when he leads the league in PER and win shares and we have reason to believe he was lifting an awful team to relevance. I suspect he was able to get award recognition despite his team only winning 46 games in part because he’d taken that same mediocre team to the finals the year before—which, while not part of that season, is I think a fair reason to not care as much about a lower sheer win total, since you know the guy can potentially make that team dangerous in the playoffs.

Meanwhile, while you asked about the latter two MVP’s I’ll just throw in some analysis of the first one as well: In 1978-1979, Moses was actually only 3rd in PER and 2nd in win shares, though he was close in both. The guy who finished slightly ahead of him in both those statistical categories was, unsurprisingly, Kareem. Moses’s and Kareem’s teams won the same amount of games and I wouldn’t say Moses’s team had more talent. Moses also outplayed Kareem a bit in their games against each other. This is a close one and Kareem could’ve gotten it too, but I don’t feel like Moses Malone was undeserving.

[lessthanjake]

Moses Malone had tremendous offensive impact

On this question of Moses Malone’s passing/creation, I think it’s certainly true he was not a great playmaker. But that only really matters to the extent it prevents him from lifting his offenses. And I don’t think we have much indication he had an issue with that. Rather, we actually have some very strong indications that prime Moses Malone had an extremely high impact offensively.

Some info on this:

- We have on-off data for Moses Malone’s four years with the 76ers. In those years, we find that the 76ers had a +11.68 better offensive rating with Moses Malone on the court. This is really high offensive impact! For reference, it’s slightly higher than the amount by which the Nuggets’ offensive rating has increased with Jokic on the floor the last four years. And it is far higher than any other player on the Sixers during that same timeframe. So Moses Malone was making a huge impact on the 76ers’ offense!

- At their peak offense with Moses Malone on the floor (1984-1985), the 76ers produced an offensive rating of 116.1 with Malone on the floor, in a year where the league average offensive rating was 107.9. This was well above the total offensive rating that year of the league-leading 1985 Lakers (114.1)—one of the greatest offensive teams ever. Obviously, the Lakers got that offensive rating including minutes that didn’t have Magic on the floor so this isn’t an apples to apples comparison, but it’s still certainly very impressive offense with Moses Malone. And that’s on a team that had an offensive rating of 97.3 with Moses Malone off the floor. So this was a lift from terrible offense to really elite offense!

- Despite having a weak team, in Moses’s four prime years with the Rockets, the Rockets’ offense ranked 1st, 4th, 9th, and 8th in the NBA. In Moses Malone’s last year there, the Rockets had a 108.3 offensive rating. He left, and despite not having really significant injury issues, the Rockets’ offensive rating plummeted to 97.0, which was by far the worst in the NBA.

_________________

Prime Moses dominated prime Kareem

Another piece of info regarding Moses Malone:

In those 5 years where he was the best player in the world (1978-1979 to 1982-1983), he faced Kareem on 23 occasions. Despite having a far weaker team most of the years, Moses’s team won 12 of those 23 games—crucially including winning both playoff series between the two.

Moses Malone dominated the individual matchup too. Here’s some stats from those 23 games:

Moses Malone stats vs. Kareem: 1978-1979 to 1982-1983

PPG: 29.9
RPG: 17.5
APG: 1.8
TS%: 59.4%

Kareem stats vs. Moses Malone: 1978-1979 to 1982-1983

PPG: 23.5
RPG: 9.4
APG: 3.8
TS%: 57.6%

[70sFan]

I’m curious if anyone can articulate to me an argument in favor of nominating someone else over Moses Malone. Only one other guy on the table was the best player in the league over significant timespan (Mikan), and Moses Malone had way better longevity than Mikan and faced much stiffer competition for being best in the world (i.e. prime Kareem). And no one else being considered on the table at this point actually won more than Moses. He led one of the greatest teams of all time and also took a team to the finals (past the 1980s Lakers) that would proceed to win 14 games on -11.12 SRS when he left a couple years later.

I think the problem I have with Moses is that his career after 1985 took a strange path. He got traded twice and even though he was still a strong contributor to these teams, he didn't really turn them into contenders on a fly.

I think Moses prime was relatively short despite a long career (only really 1979-85), which hurts his case against the other top 15 players ever. With that being said, I am glad to see someone who finally gives Moses recognition.

[70sFan]

Alright, keep in mind that I wouldn't have Moses nearly as high (closer to #20 spot), but:

4) His game is very era specific

Moses game just doesn't translate to MVP play today either. As I alluded to, his skill set is overrated in most eras, but especially today. A big without any real offensive depth, who doesn't protect the rim, and makes his living grabbing offensive rebounds in the paint. He'd probably be torched in pick and roll too. Sounds like a tough fit

I don't see a case for him over someone like David Robinson who was an elite all-time defender while also being a much more complete player offensively.

These takes are just wrong.

1. Moses would be an MVP candidate in any era at very least before three point revolution (I think he'd be today as well, but let's leave that for a moment). If you mean that Moses impact is era-specific, you basically mean he'd be MVP candidate in 90% of the league history. There is nothing suggesting that he'd not have similar impact in the 1960s, 1990s or 2000s.

2. Describing Moses as a brute force who does all of his offensive work on offensive glass is painfully wrong. Are you aware that Moses scored less than 25% of his points from putbacks (data comes from 38 1979-83 Moses games tracked)? People should stop thinking about Moses in that way - Malone was a very diverse scorer. He had a reliable midrange game that wasn't limited to catch and shoot attempts. He could put the ball on the floor and beat his man off the dribble. He moved without the balk exceptionally well. He scored many points in transition. He was GOAT tier at drawing fouls. His only weakness on offensive end is that he didn't pass well, but considering that the majority of his impact came from off-ball play I don't consider it a massive problem. It's not like we haven't voted in another scorer with subpar passing skills and worse off-ball game.

3. Can I ask for the explanation what makes David Robinson a "much more complete player offensively"? I guess he was a better passer, but that alone doesn't make you more complete.

[70sFan]

Are you able to point me to where plus-minus data for Moses Malone is? I know Pollack did it for the 76ers back way further than we otherwise have, but I can’t actually find it online.

What I can find on this is second-hand—for instance here: viewtopic.php?p=99258529#p99258529

That suggests Moses Malone had a +15.6 On/Off in 1982-1983. Which doing some quick basic math suggests to me that the 1982-1983 76ers—one of the best teams of all time—actually probably had a net rating of about -4 in minutes Moses was off the floor!

Yep, that's about accurate: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ZxRM9p2dFil5w6s21VEB4HnQZJymEY8_2vej-jREuUo/edit#gid=631667261

He had spectacular numbers in '83/'85, okay in '86, and pretty poor in '84. I guess overall a bit better than I remembered.

Worth mentioning that he was dealing with some injuries in 1983/84 season. It's the weakest season of his whole prime.

[lessthanjake]

I’m curious if anyone can articulate to me an argument in favor of nominating someone else over Moses Malone. Only one other guy on the table was the best player in the league over significant timespan (Mikan), and Moses Malone had way better longevity than Mikan and faced much stiffer competition for being best in the world (i.e. prime Kareem). And no one else being considered on the table at this point actually won more than Moses. He led one of the greatest teams of all time and also took a team to the finals (past the 1980s Lakers) that would proceed to win 14 games on -11.12 SRS when he left a couple years later.

I think the problem I have with Moses is that his career after 1985 took a strange path. He got traded twice and even though he was still a strong contributor to these teams, he didn't really turn them into contenders on a fly.

I think Moses prime was relatively short despite a long career (only really 1979-85), which hurts his case against the other top 15 players ever. With that being said, I am glad to see someone who finally gives Moses recognition.

There’s some truth to that, but I’d push back a little bit:

Moses was all-NBA second team in the 1986-1987 season. And, based on all-NBA voting in those years, if all-NBA third team had existed back then, he would’ve gotten it in the 1985-1986 and 1987-1988 seasons. He then rightly was an all star selection in the 1988-1989 season (and was the 4th-voted center in all-NBA voting). I think he had another all-star level season in 1989-1990, though Parish was selected to the team over him (even though the fan vote had Moses voted above Parish). He then was a pretty good player in 1990-1991 and 1991-1992 (and I’d say a borderline all-star in the latter season, though I think he was rightly not chosen). So, overall, after that 1979-1985 time period, we’re looking at 1 all-NBA second-team season, 2 all-NBA third-team seasons, 2 all-star level seasons, 1 borderline all-star level season, and 1 solid-contributor season. If we don’t consider any of that his prime, then it’s at least a really great post-prime!

And of course there’s also the pre-prime stuff. Moses was an all-star in 1977-1978. He was an all-star level player the year before that (he didn’t make the all star game but actually was 6th in MVP voting by the end of the year!), and had also been at the very least a strong all star at age 19 as a rookie in the ABA (he was 4th and 6th in the ABA in win shares and PER) at a time when the ABA was similarly strong as the NBA.

So, ultimately, here’s how I see it: From 1978-1979 to 1984-1985, Moses was an MVP-level player. That’s 7 MVP-level seasons (maybe 6 if we demote 1983-1984 to all-NBA level). On top of that, he had 3 all-NBA second/third-team level seasons, 5 all-star level seasons, 1 borderline all-star level season, and 1 solid-contributor season (and then a few low-value bench/injury seasons beyond that).

That may be lacking in number of MVP-level seasons compared to some of the people nominated currently, but I’d say it’s a pretty good longevity profile as compared to most anyone not yet nominated (with certain exceptions, like Karl Malone). And it wouldn’t even really *have* to be as good, given that he’s fairly unique at this stage in having a 5-year peak where he was probably the best player in the world (which cannot be said by anyone else besides Mikan—who Moses definitely has longevity over).

[iggymcfrack]

I don't see a case for him over someone like David Robinson who was an elite all-time defender while also being a much more complete player offensively.

3. Can I ask for the explanation what makes David Robinson a "much more complete player offensively"? I guess he was a better passer, but that alone doesn't make you more complete.

Slightly higher volume scorer on slightly higher efficiency while getting 2.5x as many assists with nearly identical turnover rate. I think at the very least we can say that Robinson is a clearly better offensive player while being a much, much, much better defensive player.

Can we agree that Robinson is much closer to Russell defensively than Malone is to Robinson and also that Robinson is the best offensive player of the three? If so, I think we can agree that there’s a much better case for Robinson > Russell than there is that Malone > Robinson.

[OhayoKD]

You know what tests as the most "accurate" all-in-one?

DARKO!



Admittedly DARKO maintains that Duncan is the true king, but Garnett still fares a lot better than Steph ever has. You know who also fares better?



As the most accurate data has deemed it so, let me pronounce a bottom line: KG looks better than Steph by impact. As does CP3, the inarguable impact king(among guards) of the last 10-years. All hail Paul the point god?

im not gonna say much more since im on thin ice but i dont think why you should be saying bottom line for things that people put good args against. It also seems like your putting in a bunch of stuff with slashlines in it so idk how much it got to do with steph being the impact king or whatever.

Well, no, not necessarily. After, all accuracy writ large does not preclude bias distorting a specific comparison. That is why it's worthwhile to distinguish between box and non-box, even with more "accurate" metrics. When we do so with LEBRON and RAPTOR, we see that the box-prior boosts Steph relative to his impact. Shaq's point is fair.

That said, as we can see above, even the hybrids do not paint Steph as a clear-winner here though I think we really need to get something clear about this switcheroo from "look at the gaps and # of 1st place finishes" to "look at the average placement!"

It is not magically a "clean" comparison across time-frames in a way other approaches you've rejected are. Frankly this "average method" seems out of place. Ranking and standard deviations is fair game, and over long spans those variations tend to smooth out (although literally speaking a +7 from 2000-04 is not *necessarily* better than a +6.5 from 2014-18). And while it is not perfect, a player posting the highest marks in a set again and again is itself pretty decent indicator.

But with the average approach, a random bad outlier can sink your average without that actually translating to what your impact would be over that time. For example:

NBA Shot Charts:
2019-23 — Steph is fifth behind Gianni, the Clippers wings, and Embiid
2018-22 — Steph is first

Here's another:

Cheema:
2017-21: Lebron is ahead on more possessions played and higher minutes per game
2016-20: still Lebron (bigger gap now)
2015-19: this one is Steph (replacing 2015 with 2020 hurts Steph a lot more than it hurts Lebron)
2014-18: Steph
2013-17: Lebron

See how much swing one year can have in a larger sample?

With "just average yearly ranks" 2008 would drag Wade into the depths but actual RAPM does not care long term. This also holds true for Garnett...


Notice how Garnett's "average placement" here is at odds with "just average the single-year finishes!"

It's also worth noting Steph is playing less minutes and possessions from 15-18. Incidentally Steph looks worse in data with minute-weightings(some of je's stuff) or that show possession loads(cheema):

Spoiler:

Curry was the best player in the league in 2018 on a per possession basis but he played the equivalent of 19.9 minutes per game last regular season from his resting and injuries. And since he also missed the entire first round of the playoffs, one could make the argument that his injuries would have ended his team's postseason run if they weren't stacked enough to win a playoff series without him. Curry could be the best player in the league for the next few year but that is only if he stays healthy.

However, regardless of future projections, Curry has not already been the best player in the league for 4 straight seasons. Claiming Curry was better than LeBron in 2014 is absolutely crazy. You use NPI RAPM as your argument but then dismiss everybody ahead of Curry for some excuse or another, claiming that "Curry would get a boost with more data". Guess what - we do have more data from JE, who published full RAPM up until this past season. (For 2018, he only released Win Probabiliby)

2014 - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/teutg7zvxudqnlw/AABwLihdzQ1rRdBGU1Nee09ea/2014.txt?dl=0
2015 - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/teutg7zvxudqnlw/AAAG4Fs4qdK2DCya5d0JgdMda/2015.txt?dl=0
2016 - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_JkGXDXtu3cSLzplkQo4mDYOMLi-Sh2YfIb9nKeMNZI/edit#gid=0
2017 - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CiOqGlz6zjjmjUlJBNOXflG6wYAS1RLjZjtZSQHraF4/edit#gid=0

LeBron was ahead of Curry every season except 2017 (7.49 vs 7.57), but his higher minutes played would have made up for the negligible per possession difference that year anyway.

This all becomes especially dubious if in general, as opposed to a conveniently selected time-frame, player a is maintaining a better average than player b despite a longer career with more possessions and more "non-prime years".

All these filters really just work to obscure a very plain truth: Kevin Garnett is a bigger outlier in JE's data than Steph is

Some other issues:

-> Rank =/ dominance. In JE's, 2002-2011 KG is 2nd to Lebron who has a 40% lead on 3rd place. KG has a 30% one.
-> Averaging RAPM without counting possessions is a big no no. The "why" should be self-evident
-> Finally you are still listing unsourced data. You have now been made aware of this several times by various posters so I do not understand why you are still using it.

It's almost like you are just trying to find whatever approach works best for Curry, even when it's nothing real. "Average ranks" is not RAPM. And while you might like how github has big numbers for Curry, we should have higher standards for data here.

You've been repeating "all impact metrics are flawed" over and over, but it's starting to feel like an excuse to just pull up whatever might confirm your own biases.

Here's the thing. Blind stat-spamming goes both ways...









What happened to our "unarguable' impact king?

KG's probably better in terms of impact. Those who value that sort of thing should vote accordingly.

[trelos6]

Guy’s I’m considering for nomination:

Karl Malone
Julius Erving
David Robinson
Jerry West
Oscar Robertson
Dirk Nowitzki
Chris Paul
Kevin Durant

After those guys, I have a bit of a drop off to the Barkley’s, Mikan, Giannis, Moses group.

[eminence]

Way back when these numbers were first posted, my immediate reaction was that it’s highly unusual to have someone have such a monster year, 1983, and then another monster impact year, 1985, and then 1984 sandwiched in between with something underwhelming.

Also, Mo cheeks has always been highly underrated, and even with the accolades and praise Bobby Jones gets for his defense, it might not truly do him Justice as he was a defensive monster in his later years when wing defense turns to deteriorate.

There’s the scrutiny that Dr. J comes under for some underwhelming numbers aside from a few years.

Yeah, I think I let that negative first impression from the surprise of '84 influence me too much. A +6.5 on, +11.9 on/off over a 4 year period is quite solid, comparable to a Dirk run or some such.

On the others: Barkley looks decent (+3.2/+6.8), Cheeks (+5.0/+5.2) looks great with the early crew but kind of underwhelms with Barkley, Bobby (+8.2/+7.4) looks spectacular in limited minutes, DrJ (+4.8/+2.5)... ouch, a bit suppressed by staggering with Bobby, but still pretty underwhelming after accounting for that.

[LukaTheGOAT]

To me Moses Malone's peak prime impact can best be explained to me as being comparable to Dwyane Wade without the playmaking chops, however he is more portable. Considering Moses' prime didn't have an outlier length, I feel as if it is too early for him as well.

[SpreeS]

You know what tests as the most "accurate" all-in-one?

DARKO!



Admittedly DARKO maintains that Duncan is the true king, but Garnett still fares a lot better than Steph ever has. You know who also fares better?



As the most accurate data has deemed it so, let me pronounce a bottom line: KG looks better than Steph by impact. As does CP3, the inarguable impact king(among guards) of the last 10-years. All hail Paul the point god?

Well, no, not necessarily. After, all accuracy writ large does not preclude bias distorting a specific comparison. That is why it's worthwhile to distinguish between box and non-box, even with more "accurate" metrics. When we do so with LEBRON and RAPTOR, we see that the box-prior boosts Steph relative to his impact. Shaq's point is fair.

That said, as we can see above, even the hybrids do not paint Steph as a clear-winner here though I think we really need to get something clear about this switcheroo from "look at the gaps and # of 1st place finishes" to "look at the average placement!"

It is not magically a "clean" comparison across time-frames in a way other approaches you've rejected are. Frankly this "average method" seems out of place. Ranking and standard deviations is fair game, and over long spans those variations tend to smooth out (although literally speaking a +7 from 2000-04 is not *necessarily* better than a +6.5 from 2014-18). And while it is not perfect, a player posting the highest marks in a set again and again is itself pretty decent indicator.

But with the average approach, a random bad outlier can sink your average without that actually translating to what your impact would be over that time. For example:

NBA Shot Charts:
2019-23 — Steph is fifth behind Gianni, the Clippers wings, and Embiid
2018-22 — Steph is first

Here's another:

Cheema:
2017-21: Lebron is ahead on more possessions played and higher minutes per game
2016-20: still Lebron (bigger gap now)
2015-19: this one is Steph (replacing 2015 with 2020 hurts Steph a lot more than it hurts Lebron)
2014-18: Steph
2013-17: Lebron

See how much swing one year can have in a larger sample?

With "just average yearly ranks" 2008 would drag Wade into the depths but actual RAPM does not care long term. This also holds true for Garnett...

Notice how Garnett's "average placement" here is at odds with "just average the single-year finishes!"

It's also worth noting Steph is playing less minutes and possessions from 15-18. Incidentally Steph looks worse in data with minute-weightings(some of je's stuff) or that show possession loads(cheema):

Spoiler:

Curry was the best player in the league in 2018 on a per possession basis but he played the equivalent of 19.9 minutes per game last regular season from his resting and injuries. And since he also missed the entire first round of the playoffs, one could make the argument that his injuries would have ended his team's postseason run if they weren't stacked enough to win a playoff series without him. Curry could be the best player in the league for the next few year but that is only if he stays healthy.

However, regardless of future projections, Curry has not already been the best player in the league for 4 straight seasons. Claiming Curry was better than LeBron in 2014 is absolutely crazy. You use NPI RAPM as your argument but then dismiss everybody ahead of Curry for some excuse or another, claiming that "Curry would get a boost with more data". Guess what - we do have more data from JE, who published full RAPM up until this past season. (For 2018, he only released Win Probabiliby)

2014 - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/teutg7zvxudqnlw/AABwLihdzQ1rRdBGU1Nee09ea/2014.txt?dl=0
2015 - https://www.dropbox.com/sh/teutg7zvxudqnlw/AAAG4Fs4qdK2DCya5d0JgdMda/2015.txt?dl=0
2016 - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_JkGXDXtu3cSLzplkQo4mDYOMLi-Sh2YfIb9nKeMNZI/edit#gid=0
2017 - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CiOqGlz6zjjmjUlJBNOXflG6wYAS1RLjZjtZSQHraF4/edit#gid=0

LeBron was ahead of Curry every season except 2017 (7.49 vs 7.57), but his higher minutes played would have made up for the negligible per possession difference that year anyway.

This all becomes especially dubious if in general, as opposed to a conveniently selected time-frame, player a is maintaining a better average than player b despite a longer career with more possessions and more "non-prime years".

All these filters really just work to obscure a very plain truth: Kevin Garnett is a bigger outlier in JE's data than Steph is

Some other issues:

-> Rank =/ dominance. In JE's, 2002-2011 KG is 2nd to Lebron who has a 40% lead on 3rd place. KG has a 30% one.
-> Averaging RAPM without counting possessions is a big no no. The "why" should be self-evident
-> Finally you are still listing unsourced data. You have now been made aware of this several times by various posters so I do not understand why you are still using it.

It's almost like you are just trying to find whatever data/approach works best for Curry, even when it's nothing real. "Average ranks" is not RAPM. And while you might like how github has big numbers for Curry, we should have higher standards for data here.

You've been repeating "all impact metrics are flawed" over and over, but it's starting to feel like an excuse to just pull up whatever might confirm your own biases.

There's just one problem. Blind stat-spamming goes both ways...









What happened to our "unarguable' impact king?

KG's probably better in terms of impact. Those who value that sort of thing should vote accordingly.

Darko!!!

I would want that you show us DPM progression's:

1. Kobe/Westbrook/Harden by age
2. Doncic/Irving by season
3. Davis/Griffin/Aldridge by games
4. Wesbrook vs Billups by games
5. Baron Davis vs Klay by age
6. Kobe vs Wade by age
7. Doncic vs Ginobili by games

I guarantee everyone would laugh from these graphs.

KG is the king of +/- on/off RAPM Darko and all others related stats bc MIN didn't have at least one big player above lg avg in 11y period.