Retro POY '84-85 (Voting Complete)

[kaima]

1985 articles

viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1023664#p23988271

[kaima]

1. Bird. This year is close between Bird and Magic. Bird had the better regular season. Magic had the better playoff run. But...actually, Bird was tearing things up in the playoffs until the Finals. And, even then, his 24-9-5 isn't exactly chopped liver. He had too much oomph from the RS to drop him to #2. Which means...
2. Magic. Magic averaged 18.3-6.2-13.6 during the season. On less than 12 shots a game. And he was just as great in the playoffs and finals. But the guy who stepped on the Celtics' throats in the Finals was the Cap. So Magic stays at #2 while I elevate the other guy, who happens to be...
3. Kareem. Do I honestly think Kareem was the third best player in the league? During the regular season—no. He was, probably, around the 4th or 5th best. But that's one of the reasons why we're doing this. Going into the finals against Boston, Kareem was only playing 30 minutes a game in the playoffs—but they were a damn impressive 30 minutes!

30.5 mpg, 20.2 ppg, 7.7 rpg, 3.5 apg, 2.3 bpg

Then there was the Memorial Day Massacre...and in the last five games of the finals, Kareem at 37, in his 16th year, was the Kareem of the late 70s and very early 80s. He put up 28.4 ppg, 10.2 rpg, 6.0 apg, and shut down Robert Parish. Way to go, Big Fella.
4. MJ. So close between MJ and Moncrief. It sounds funny to say this now, but people weren't as impressed with MJ's rookie year as you might think. In later years, the story has grown about how awful the surrounding team was...except Lumber Corzine, David Greenwood, and Steve Johsnon were an effective, if foul-happy, frontcourt. Woolridge and Dailey could play a little too. Jordan was still great, but—no. He wasn't really clsoe to the top 2...and Kareem had a better playoff run. MJ had a rare mediocre postseason series against the Bucks; Moncrief was just everywhere in that series. So I have to say, for #5, I've got...

So, are you generally ranking players based on perceptions during that time period, rather than broader analysis in hindsight?

Perceptually, it seems that Moses Malone was considered the better C for the 1985 season, during that same period of time. Should that play a role in the vote? (as an aside, I find the analysis of Moses compelling and agreeable...that is, outside the talk of officiating bias. I don't know how someone analyzes bias in officiating for a presence like Moses, but sees nothing off-kilter or unkosher in the calls provided a franchise like LA year after year; again, the problem comes in the contrast. If officiating bias is on the table, then discussion as far as success by year or all-time becomes quite loaded, and perhaps far more interesting)

Just as a base, I find the contrast fascinating in the analysis of Jordan's supposedly ample support (or, at least, passable based on the argument passed off, and the standard stated) coming on the heels of Magic/Kareem at 2/3 respectively, with little to no mention of how LA was the most talented team in the league. As usual.

Seems Jordan is punished for, putatively if we follow the stated meme above, playing with better than advertised talent, while Magic and Kareem are celebrated individually with nary a mention of how great their supporting cast was.

I think Kareem's season is being, pretty close to, highly overrated here, based on LA winning the championship -- which ironically enough, is centered (har) around the overwhelming talent of that selfsame squad.

Even the point about minutes per vis a vis Kareem is an argument against when conflated with or taken into consideration parallel to the argument against Jordan on teammate support -- Kareem, as he himself pointed out, could cruise and rest himself because of the talent those Lakers around him, who also made it easier to compile big stats on a big stage. The Celtics, certainly, couldn't focus on him the way the Bucks could focus on Jordan.

Further, the MPG argument is an inherent handicap; it's an argument based around the assumption that we should reward Kareem for his ability relative to age. I don't think that argument has been made for anyone else in this project, and I don't think it should be.

Under what other standard would 20.2 and 7.7 be considered better than 28.2, 6.5 and 5.9? Jordan, a guard, was almost rebounding as much as Kareem, a Center. If you want to use the MPG argument, then I guess many should have been ranking Duncan as the best PF through the present and John Stockton was the best PG in the league until the day he retired.

Returning to generalized finding, Jordan's teammates prove something, relatively, negative or lacking in him, while this is not argued coherently, that I can see, for the talent base of the stars ranked above him.

I find this problematic.

I'm even more troubled when I consider past votes wherein Magic was ranked over Jordan by some based on "lacking teammates" to Magic's side, while the counter to that argumentation or inverted base is never used in the now-present tense as far as peak-era Lakers and Magic -- it's not an issue when Magic plays on loaded teams, oh no, but when he plays on teams that are merely talented (far more than what Jordan had much of the time, natch), this somehow proves that he also belongs above Jordan...because Jordan played on teams with better talent during those aforementioned and explored years (91, 90).

Um...

On the Haves and Have Nots scale it's hard to argue that Jordan is being mistreated, but it's even harder to believe that Jordan should be punished in any way for having decent teammates relative to guys like Magic and Kareem who played for, oh, about a decade straight with the most talent in the league behind them.

I don't mean to be captious but...I'm bothered by this.

[kaima]

Gotta roll.

My vote:

1) Bird
2) Magic
3) Jordan
4) Isiah
5) Moncrief

HM: Kareem, Moses

Feel like the combination, Frankenstein-like, of Moses' regular season with Kareem's playoffs would be a really damned fine season. Easy top five.

Unfortunately, neither guy had this. No-go on ranking either on their own merits. Respectable? Yes. Top five? I don't believe so, no.

[semi-sentient]

Obviously I can. I've done it.

And so did the Lakers. Something they did more than once during this era or period, based on analysis.

I know you have, but explain to me how a team that won the championship despite not having homecourt advantage can be said to have underachieved. Would it have really mattered had they won 65 games instead?

Did I miss your original point or misunderstand what was said?

Maybe the regular season has more meaning for you, but to me it doesn't particularly matter as long as they are the last ones standing.

If the regular season means little to nothing to you, then why were you the one to bring up the issue of under or overachievement based on regular season record?

I brought it up because you made the statement "pushed the Lakers to 6 games", which implies that they were somehow the underdogs and had no business being competitive with the Lakers.

Perhaps my over/underachievment statements were inappropriate all things considered.

I don't think there is all that much difference in terms of talent either, unless we're focusing strictly on offense and completely ignoring defense where the Celtics excelled. These teams won about the same amount of games in the regular season and matched up well overall.

It's obvious when watching the games which team had more depth, from that talent. Base playoff stats support this.

Celtics were basically an 8-man rotation. Lakers were a full 10-man rotation. Considering how powerful LA was as a frontloaded proposition, the added depth made them frightening.

The Lakers only played 8 guys extensively.

Spriggs (27 min, 4 games), McGee (26 min, 4 games), Lester (6 min, 2 games), and Nevitt (2 min, 1 game) played sparingly. Spriggs and McGee got the bulk of their minutes in Game 1 which wasn't even close to being competitive.

Cooper was the main contributor off the bench, followed by McAdoo (19.5 min) and Kupchak (14.5 min).

Yes, they had more depth, but their reserves aren't the reason they beat the Celtics.

If you like Bird over Magic, that's fine, but to punish him for playing with Kareem is kind of crazy.

Really? That's an interesting statement, considering how you've voted players up or down in the past based on thinking very similar to what you're complaining about.

When have I ever punished a player (for playing great) when his teammates played great as well?

Hm. I wonder how that hashes with previous arguments from your side, as well as the specific argument of underachievement brought forth, again, by you in reply.

Refresh my memory... when have I made arguments against players that have had help, specifically when it comes down to a tie-breaker between two great players.

[TrueLAfan]

Kaima -- right off the bat, I think there as many (to be honest, a lot more) issues with “hindsight” than contemporary viewpoints. As Bill James noted in the original Historical Baseball Abstract

I believe that, in evaluating players, much respect should be given to the opinions of the player's contemporaries, both afield and in the press box (and, for that matter, in the seats). It's not that they're always right; they're not. But they knew so much more about those players than we do today, or than we ever can....We are not bound to agree with them, but we must respect the fact that they possessed far more knowledge than we can ever hope to obtain about players, about their contemporaries, and about the game they played.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but I find that, more often than not, “broader analysis in hindsight” equates to “axe-grinding” or “promoting an agenda”...and both usually after the fact. And Bill James knows a lot more about statistical analysis than anyone here, and he knows more about statistical analysis in a sport where it is more easily quantifiable and, frankly, better than it is for basketball. And Bill James really pumps up contemporary views of players. I agree with him.

When it comes to voting on something like this, where my opinion differs from that of contemporaries, I note it...but, for instance, the idea that “Perceptually, it seems that Moses Malone was considered the better C for the 1985 season, during that same period of time” is not accurate. Moses and Kareem were virtually tied in MVP voting (218 to 206. in a year where the the #2 player—Magic--got 264 points). And then Moses had a poor playoff year, while Kareem stepped up and won a unanimous Finals MVP. I'm having a pretty hard time thinking that Kareem's excellence in the playoffs, both overall and comparatively, wouldn't have put him over Moses if the vote had been held after the season was over. And that's exactly what I did.

Re: team talent. I personally of the opinion that the mid-1980s had the best basketball teams of all time. The Celtics, Lakers (and in the early to mid-1980s, the Sixers) were among the greatest teams of all time. I personally don't think there's been a period where more than two historically great teams atu their peak go against each other for a period of years. So I'm a lot less inclined to look at team strength and say, “They're loaded.” The Lakers were loaded. The Celtics were loaded. The Sixers were loaded. The Bucks were incredibly strong; so were the Spurs. It's my personal opinion that if the early 1980s Bucks played the Jazz teams that made the Finals in the 90s, the Bucks would win fairly convincingly.

And part of greatness is harnessing talent and getting the talent to play together. It's a problem that Team USA faced for a long time (and still faces). Great talent doesn't always win out. A non-statistical ability to lead and/or get players to work together is something that will always have enormous practical, real world value—and usually isn't reflected, or reflected accurately in terms of value, through numbers. It's one (of many, many) reasons why statistical analysis in basketball is scattershot and, more often than not, flawed—often laughably flawed. Dave DeBusschere is a statistically unimpressive player. Nobody who saw him and followed the NBA thought he was anything other than great. The statistics ask us the question, “Look...are you gonna believe what I'm telling you, or your own eyes?”

[ronnymac2]

I don't know why people are up in arms about me only giving Jordan an HM. I think this is a fairly strong year, especially after the GOAT players. You have latter-prime top 15 centers ever (one a GOAT C), super-scoring sf's in the golden age of the sf, a top 5 pg in his prime, and one of the best two-way perimeter players ever. I'm grouping ROOKIE Michael Jordan with these guys. That is no small feat.

He could have went in my top 5 this year. But I'm not changing the vote. His peak games stack up nicely against these second-tier 1985 players. But he isn't as consistent. He isn't as experienced. He is turnover-prone, somewhat foul-prone, and is merely a good defensive player- not an all-time great perimeter defender. His range is just good- not at a best ever level. He's a freakishly athletic slasher/finisher with amazing creativity and a good touch in the mid-post area.

He evens shoots his free throws differently this year than in any year after. He clearly improved all aspects of his game in later years. I said this in a previous thread: I'm not docking this MJ for being lesser than a prime MJ. I just don't want people to think that this younger version is the same as prime MJ.

I was actually pretty impressed by Jordan's playoff series. He played very well when you see he was going up against not only Squid, but also Paul Pressey, possibly the most underrated player on RealGM. He had one great game. I believe he shot something like a combined 38% in the other three games. Playoff virgin. Kevin Durant this year. Jordan learned his lesson well. He's not quite MJ yet though.


Russell and Bird and Magic will be borderline. They did some crazy things that differentiate them....but they are still borderline. Just Like Jordan was. Jordan just happened to not make the cut this year.

Wilt and Jabbar most likely will. Haven't looked at these early years yet though.

[mysticbb]

Jordan just happened to not make the cut this year.

He didn't make the cut, because you picked Alex English over him. That is the problem here. Make a compelling argument for that and nobody will say anything, but you just picked the overall weaker player (heck, the guy was weaker in EVERY aspect of the game) over Jordan with the reasoning "well, Jordan was a rookie". Come on, you have to see the flaw of your argument here. If someone has Kareem over Jordan, that is ok, pick Moncrief over Jordan, it seems also fine. But Jordan completely dominated Isiah Thomas and Alex English, watch those games. And you picked those two players over him.

The statistics ask us the question, “Look...are you gonna believe what I'm telling you, or your own eyes?”

Neither of that works alone. Only using the "own eyes" argument includes a strong bias, and only using the "stats are telling the story" argument will give a great chance of misinterpretation.

I also don't agree with Bill James regarding the "contemporary viewpoints". People like to exaggerate about the past and also include bias. Just relying on those informations is not a good way either. And we also don't have any idea how good they were at evaluation talent. We can see that right now when people are claiming Bryant is better than James, because Bryant has more skills (I think that is actually true, btw). In terms of winning basketball games it doesn't really matter whether Bryant has more skills what matters is the impact. It seems like people tend to pick the more skilled player over the higher impact player. I doubt that this was any different back in the days.
Thus a lesser skilled Moses Malone could have been a more impactful player than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1985.

[ElGee]

(1) I'm not following the Alex English argument.

HIs numbers are slightly inflated by Denver's pace. He averaged 25.9 points and 3.9 assists per 75 possessions (ie 40 minutes played at a pace of 90). This is a scoring rate around Bird in 87 or Drexler in 88, only those players are significantly ahead in assists. Jordan in 85 is 26.7 points and 5.6 assists per 75.

Now, if you like English outside of that, I suppose that's ok. I just don't see what else he's bring to the game at an elite level.

(2) How big is the difference between McHale and Abdul-Jabbar in the regular season this year? The statistics and roles (and even elements of their effectiveness on offense and defense) are quite similar.

[ElGee]

re: Lakers v Celtics under/overachieving or HCA (ugh) aspects - I watch the games and see a great Lakers team. But clearly they weren't the same to start the year (why? anyone?).

They were 31-16 and after Feb 1 finished 31-4 (!) just destroying people. They averaged 134 points per game in March and April (+19.3 point differential). There's a reason they won the Finals, and it wasn't because Larry Bird wasn't good.

[semi-sentient]

^^^ I was wondering the same thing. Perhaps they were tinkering with the lineups early on or something. Scott, Cooper, Spriggs, and Rambis all played a considerable amount of games as starters.

Unfortunately we don't have the starting lineups to see what the win/loss was, but that would have been very interesting.

The Celtics seemed to have a little more stability with their starting 5.

[ElGee]

My 1985 POY Ballot:

1. Larry Bird
2. Magic Johnson
3. Michael Jordan
4. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
5. Isiah Thomas

I've already said a good amount about these players in other posts, so I'll basically summarize my conclusions. Bird is comfortably first. Magic is comfortably second. Then there's a dropoff.

Jordan is just so good and doing so much, even as a rookie. He was amazing in that playoff game they won and hit the key shot, so he's not getting docked for being green. Guy was a pretty good defender then what I've seen as well - he worked hard on the court and looked like a pitbull off the chain (post-Dean Smith).

Kareem was in the next group (Isiah, Moses, Moncrief) which is a little trickier for me to differentiate because the players are so different. Kareem's postseason and amazing FInals performance brings him to the top.

Without delving into more detail than previous posts, Isiah gets the final spot, boosted by his strong playoffs. Usually I'd be partial to a big (like Moses) or a wing (Moncrief) but I do think there's a little Allen Iverson to this Detroit offense (and I mean that as a compliment to Zeke), and Thomas is doing a lot with them and doing a lot well.

[ronnymac2]

Jordan just happened to not make the cut this year.

He didn't make the cut, because you picked Alex English over him. That is the problem here. Make a compelling argument for that and nobody will say anything, but you just picked the overall weaker player (heck, the guy was weaker in EVERY aspect of the game) over Jordan with the reasoning "well, Jordan was a rookie". Come on, you have to see the flaw of your argument here. If someone has Kareem over Jordan, that is ok, pick Moncrief over Jordan, it seems also fine. But Jordan completely dominated Isiah Thomas and Alex English, watch those games. And you picked those two players over him.

Jordan beating two players who play different positions in two regular season games is supposed to impress me enough to put Jordan over them? From that article, it presents the game as more of a matchup between Jordan and a guy who defended him well in a previous game. It also seems English played pretty well as an individual. Not like he played poorly. C'mon.

In that 49 point game, Jordan's scoring was almost exclusively on exactly what I said his game was- athletic ability and creativity when slashing, and a nice touch in the mid-post. He should be lauded for this, but rookie Jordan didn't have the post game he'd have, and he didn't have the range either. He didn't have the variety.

To Mysticbb and ElGee......Alex English had a great season. Why English, you ask? Jordan had better stats in the regular season, though English was no slouch. Come playoff time, the experienced English put up better stats in just about every area except steals/blocks/assists and PER. English played 14 games to Jordan's four. Jordan DID play against a great defense, but Alex played against Utah, statistically an even better defense than MIL. ALex also played against a crappy defense in SA and a very good defense in LA. The same LA defense that did a decent job of containing another great scoring small forward, Larry Bird, in the finals.

30/6/4/53%/8fta/solid defense/low turnovers is **** fantastic. Got his team to the WCF, where they lost to a GOAT team and eventual champion. This guy beasted individually in the playoffs. He was second in win shares/48 and third in PER over a large sample size. Obviously not the be all and end all, but it at least indicates the guy was playing at a very, very high level.

[sp6r=underrated]

Time to Vote. I'll be posting later to discuss the era question that popped up in this thread. Long story short. I don't think the mid-80s deserves to be placed on the pedestal the way it is on this website.

The top 2 came down fairly easy to between Magic and Larry, and mainly how you feel about their respective RS performances. I do think Magic didn't get quite the respect that he deserved during this period because he joined a team with an established superstar, and that KAJ was still getting a bit too much love from the voters at this point. I disagree with the view put out by some that KAJ numbers were significantly inflate by Magic at this point. Still, he got an awful lot of good looks because of Magic, moreso than the other way around. This is long way of saying I think the RS gap between Bird and Magic in recognition overstates how much Bird outplayed Magic in the RS. Magic outplayed Bird in the PS and finals so

1. Magic
2. Bird
3. Jordan: His rookie year impact is understated by some. The bulls made an eleven game improvement, their offense went from 22 (out of 23 teams) to 11, and they improved their point differential by over 4 points. Outside of Jordan their roster talent was barerly changed. This is a huge impact. Even as a rookie MJ wasn't just putting up box score numbers (read Doctor MJ post on rookie and +/-) he was significantly helping his team win.
4. KAJ: As I said I do have my doubts, but I just don't feel comfortable brushing aside contemporary observations.
5. Isiah: I think 84 was Isiah's best season. I think the other contenders for this spot didn't significantly outplay him in the RS and had worse PS, so Isiah gets the spot. This is sort of a down year for individual performances, names on paper makes this look like a great individual season, but I don't think it was from an individual level.

HM
M. Malone: I'll take true's analysis that his defense was pretty putrid. The rest of his game didn't hold up that well either.
Cummings: Great rookie year

[Gongxi]

Alex English over Jordan is obviously a sick joke, but Bernard King getting a nod at...well, at any ranking, is even worse. Dude played little more than half the season. He was great when he played, sure, but half a season of King better than five guys' full season? I don't think so- I'm not sure it's better than a full season of Darrell Walker.

[ronnymac2]

^^^Nah, it's a sick pick. As in, it's an awesome pick. It's the best pick I've made in this entire project.

[Gongxi]

Whatever you want to call it.

[Doctor MJ]

Finally getting to this. No time for the normal details:

1. Magic
2. Bird
3. Kareem
4. Jordan
5. Isiah

Honorable Mention:

Moses
McHale
Moncrief
Cummings
English

The one thing I will just briefly get into is Magic vs Bird since it's such a hot button issue. Basically I don't buy the "Magic had a much stronger team" argument. It's true Kareem played better than Magic in the finals, but McHale played better than Bird, and Bird also had 2 more all-star teammates in Parish and DJ. No problem with people who picked Bird, it's close, but in general, I'll take the distributor over the scorer unless the scorer is really on, which he wasn't when it was all on the line.

[Doctor MJ]

'84-85 Results

Code: Select all

Player                1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th Pts   POY Shares
1. Larry Bird          14   7   0   0   0 189   0.900
2. Magic Johnson        7  14   0   0   0 168   0.800
3. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar  0   0  12   3   3  72   0.343
4. Michael Jordan       0   0   8   6   3  61   0.290
5. Moses Malone         0   0   0   7   1  22   0.105
6. Sidney Moncrief      0   0   1   3   4  18   0.086
7. Isiah Thomas         0   0   0   2   8  14   0.067
8. Alex English         0   0   0   0   2   2   0.010


[mysticbb]

In that 49 point game, Jordan's scoring was almost exclusively on exactly what I said his game was- athletic ability and creativity when slashing, and a nice touch in the mid-post. He should be lauded for this, but rookie Jordan didn't have the post game he'd have, and he didn't have the range either. He didn't have the variety.

He didn't need to have that kind of stuff at this time. He done a great job just by using his body. And his reverse layup was unstoppable, why should he use something different?

He beat Isiah Thomas numerous times off the dribble as Thomas tried to stay in front of him. That was comical, especially because Thomas tried similar things on the other end against Jordan and failed.

To Mysticbb and ElGee......Alex English had a great season. Why English, you ask?

Nobody said he played a bad season, but his season wasn't better than Jordan's. Jordan was better in every aspect of the game, better scorer, better rebounder, better passer and better defender. I don't see any point in which English was better than Jordan.

Jordan had better stats in the regular season, though English was no slouch.

English played in a crazy face paced offense, the Bulls on the other side played way slower.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... i?id=lzzkr

Look at the advanced stats, Jordan beats him out easily across the board.

Come playoff time, the experienced English put up better stats in just about every area except steals/blocks/assists and PER.

Jordan had to play against the best perimeter defensive team in the league. For sure he had it tough to do everything. He needed to have a great game in game 3 to give the Bulls the win. Just imagine that he had a 30/4/12 game in game 2 and they lost. Jordan ended up with the higher PER, even in the playoffs. The reason is the high paced game of the Nuggets and the slower paced game of the Bulls.

Obviously not the be all and end all, but it at least indicates the guy was playing at a very, very high level.

Yes, he did, but for the whole year he didn't play better than Jordan. Combine the numbers for regular season and playoffs and Jordan is easily ahead of English.

[semi-sentient]

Site updated: http://www.dolem.com/poy

Bird is now in the top 10, passing up LeBron and Robinson, while Magic moves into the #4 spot ahead of Karl Malone. After the next round of voting, Bird will move to #7, passing up Kobe and Garnett. Magic will likely pass up Shaq for the #3 spot.

Code: Select all

1.  Michael Jordan     9.578
2.  Tim Duncan         6.153
3.  Shaquille O'Neal   5.910
4.  Magic Johnson      5.302
5.  Karl Malone        4.649
6.  Hakeem Olajuwon    4.380
7.  Kobe Bryant        3.658
8.  Kevin Garnett      3.388
9.  Larry Bird         3.104
10. David Robinson     2.431

Note also that I've made some changes to the site. I've added where each player ranked for the MVP, DPOY, All-NBA, and All-Defense awards.