Retro Player of the Year 2006-07 UPDATE — Tim Duncan

[Lost92Bricks]

He won't get mentioned but Wade was the actual best player. He just missed too many games.

[lessthanjake]

And you're talking to a guy who thinks these two players are comparable playmakers:
jordan archangel, 13-11, +2 net, with a team that won 27 before he got there
lebron archangel, 11-0 +8 net with starters(- mo williams) that won at an 18-win pace without Lebron but with Mo-Williams

This is a silly spammed stat that occurred in two completely different contexts, and it’s never been clear why we should particularly care about a stretch of games without Mo Williams. It’s not as if LeBron’s role was materially different without Mo Williams.

Because both played taking over from their team's starting PG's and upped their assists to a similar amount? If arch-angel is not cherrypicking than neither is the Mo-Williams-less Cavs. Not that it particularly matters which you choose since Cleveland was way better.

LeBron always played like a helio at that point. He didn’t become a heliocentric player for some brief period of time with Mo Williams out. So you’re just cherry-picking games that went particularly well, with whatever attempt at a plausible rationale for it you can come up with.

1. The part where you talk about how Jordan was “with a team that won 27 before he got there” is just nonsensical. You are referring to the 1983-84 Bulls winning 27 games. How does that team bear any relationship to the 1988-89 Bulls that Jordan played PG with? The only player who was on both teams was Dave Corzine!

.
The relationship is they're a better team that lost a negative impact player named Woodrige whose next team and teams gained a bunch of postive impact defensive specialists. They were a 27-win team without MJ in 84, a 27-win team without MJ in 86, and then lost Orlando Woodridge and gained Oakley, Pippen, Grant, and Sam Vincient.

As explained to you, it's the same thing you have spammed thread after thread, except far more transparent:

Spoiler:

As is, you're not really applying this seriously. Taking 86 and then adjusting for Woodridge's negative signals is the same process as "WOWYR". Taking the 93 Rox and adjusting for Thorpe showing no impact is the same process. But those are apparently not valid, while WOWYR is.

If much simpler and more transparent adjustments aren't trustworthy, then there's no reason for you to be trusting these other metrics just because they specifically favor Jordan in 93.

.
If you want to argue losing a player whose next team got 4 points worse with him, was generally worse with him, and played on one winning team as a 12th man made the Bulls significantly worse, feel free to. If you want to argue Pippen and Grant becoming starters made the Bulls worse you can do that too. But when you repeatedly use a far more extreme version of this approach for no other reason than "I like the end result", the "it's just nonsensical" is clearly prompted with the output, not the process.

I see you’re doubling down on doing WOWY comparisons using two teams that have an overlap of only one player. Again, you might as well compare results of two entirely different teams. This is not what WOWY is supposed to be and is obviously meaningless.

Anytime I point this out, you assert that WOWYR does something theoretically similar. But the difference there is that WOWYR systematically adjusts for every single player based on all data about all players, while you’re purporting to wave your hand at the effect that you think one or two players might’ve had based on one or two data points. One is actually a rigorous approach (albeit not perfect), and the other is completely unserious.

And that’s of course leaving aside the tanking aspect of things.

Ah yes, the "tanking aspect of things", A.K.A you and Djoker making **** up. The 21-game sample are games Ben curated pre-trade all featuring Mo-Williams and "full-strength rotations. And as has been covered, those cavs went into the season declaring they'd try to win(having refused to trade JJ Hickson) and played the same starters with the same minute distributions from game 1 as they did in non-blowouts during the losing streak. They tried to win...they couldn't. Even in their "full-strength" games they played like a sub-20 win team...which is what they played like without Lebron the previous 3 years.

You know who was actually trying to tank? The 84 and 86 Jordan-less Bulls...
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=115384747#p115384747

Who your entire defense hinges on being better support than the 88/89 Bulls, even though they ditched impact negatives for impact positives who didn't conflict with Jordan's strengths.

We’ve been over this many times, so no need to rehash much. If you think the mentality of players is the same when their superstar player clearly leaves because he thinks they’re bad and the team fires their coach and makes very little actual effort to improve the roster, you’re free to do so. If you think a team giving lip service to the idea of trying to win negates all that, then fine. And if you think that that lip service speaks more loudly about where the organization expects/wants things to go than the team making virtually no effort to use their cap space after their two highest-paid players left in free agency and hiring a new coach who had been a tank commander in the past, then okay. But I think those of us with common sense can be pretty sure that the context became substantially different, and that that is significant in how players play.

You appear to have ignored the playoffs for Jordan that year, despite him being at PG in that timeframe too (as clearly evidenced by Hodges—squarely a PG—starting every game,

Ignore what? The Bulls reducing Jordan's point-responsibilities and Jordan averaging less assists overall and less assists progressively each series? If you had actually watched the games as opposed to just saying you do like you last thread, you would have noticed playoff MJ brough up the ball less, handled the ball less, made less passes, and was no-longer operating the same way he did arch-angel, probably because that ended with the Bulls being on a big strech of losing. Heck, even if you had just been consistent with how you were interpreting the box-score(highlighting the 11 assist stretch initally to backup the idea Jordan was helioing), the assists going down would have signalled to you Jordan's offensive involvement was going down. But instead you linked a game where Pippen, initially bringing the ball up, went down early, the commentators noted Jordan's offensive involvement was higher than before, and the Bulls with Jordan playing his most helio game of the playoffs suffered their biggest defeat.

This is the issue with declaring you watch the games as opposed to actually watching the games.

Not that scraping past a banged up Lowry Raptors analog with its best player injured and missing the swing game is impressive.

Lol, I see you’re making this argument again. I’ll just link to where I’ve addressed this before (in a post that you did not respond to): https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=108093882#p108093882

Spoiler:

There’s no basis whatsoever for this claim that the Bulls “redistributed point responsibilities” or your claim that “Jordan went back to the 2” for the playoffs. You just want it to be true, because the Bulls did pretty well in those playoffs and you want to claim the Bulls were worse with Jordan at PG.

Your only basis is to point to the fact that a 17-game sample in the playoffs has lower assists than a prior 24-game sample, which is just obviously basing an argument on statistical randomness. And it’s especially odd when even the 17-game sample had abnormally high assist numbers for Jordan anyways. It’s then even more odd that you come to a baseless conclusion that they put Jordan back at the 2 for the playoffs because they lost almost all their games to end the season, when actually Jordan averaged lower assists in that bad timeframe (8.8 a game) than he had in the more successful games before that at PG (12.1 a game). So your logic is simultaneously that lower assist totals in small samples shows that Jordan’s playmaking duties were lower, while also saying that they decided to lower his playmaking duties because they didn’t do well in a set of games where he…had lowered assist totals (and therefore, by your logic, that bad stretch would’ve been a set of games his playmaking duties were lowered, which then logically would give no reason for the Bulls to do what you’re claiming they did). It’s all just obviously complete nonsense. You’re just looking at a set of numbers and squinting at it for a while until you can come up with a way to weave a completely misleading and materially false narrative that is convenient for your agenda (not to mention that even the regular season data by itself plainly disproves your original “regression” claim).

This really isn’t that difficult to be honest. We know full well Jordan was still at PG in the playoffs. You could even just take a quick glance at the lineups and see that he was very obviously still at PG. You see, the Bulls had two PGs on their team: Sam Vincent and John Paxson. They also had Craig Hodges, who was a backup SG. Before Jordan moved to PG, the Bulls consistently started Sam Vincent (and if Vincent was out, they started Paxson). When Jordan moved to PG, they quickly moved Sam Vincent out of the starting lineup in favor of Craig Hodges (in the only RS starts Hodges ever got during his time on the Bulls). Hodges ended up being out for a bunch of games towards the end of the season (meaning Vincent/Paxson had to be put back in the starting lineup during that time), but Hodges was back for the playoffs. And, lo and behold, Craig Hodges started every single game for the Bulls in those playoffs. And not as a nominal starter—Hodges had substantially more minutes in the playoffs than Vincent and Paxson combined (who both had reduced minutes compared to the RS). In other words, in those playoffs, the Bulls started and gave large minutes to a SG that they never otherwise started during other time periods, while simultaneously substantially reducing the minutes of their PGs. Your claim that Jordan “went back to the 2” in the playoffs is just blatantly false. Just because you want something to be true doesn’t mean it is. You are wrong, I think you should know you’re wrong unless you’re really drinking your own kool-aid, and I fully expect to never again see this claim about the Bulls “regressing” with Jordan at PG.

Some other prior posts from that same thread, with relevant points clipped below:

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=108085872#p108085872

Spoiler:

Jordan’s scoring did go up in those playoffs, but that was virtually always true for him in the playoffs and so that’s not a meaningful data point regarding his role changing between RS and playoffs. Notably, he had fewer playoff points per game than he had had since his rookie season and a noticeably higher number of assists per game than in any surrounding playoffs. So the playoff stats bear out the shift in role to PG too. More importantly, you can also just watch the full match that you linked to (and which I linked to myself in my post) and see that Jordan very clearly played the PG position. Like, did you actually even watch the entire video you linked to before suggesting that “Jordan went back to the 2” in the playoffs? I can only conclude that you didn’t, because that game clearly demonstrates Jordan playing as a heliocentric PG.

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=108088233#p108088233

Spoiler:

And, specifically as to the playoffs, you refer to Pippen getting injured early in that particular game where there’s clear video evidence that Jordan played PG. But at that point Pippen was not the playmaker he later became. He was 5th on the team in assists per 36 minutes that year, in both RS and playoffs. Pippen getting injured didn’t somehow magically foist playmaking duties onto Michael that game, because Pippen didn’t really have those duties back then.

I think you just watched the video, saw Pippen bring the ball up once before he got injured and erroneously thought that 1989 Pippen was a major playmaker (like he later became) when he really wasn’t. You can get a good sense below how Pippen was playing in that series, and it was not as a playmaker. Jordan played as a PG in that game because he was playing that role in the playoffs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?si=v2tFUY9yNKrzUul2&v=yv28250bFo8

https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=108088581#p108088581

Spoiler:

No, your claim was that we shouldn’t believe the clear video evidence showing Jordan played as a PG in the playoffs, because Pippen went down early in that game. Your claim appeared to be that Jordan happened to just play like a PG that game because of Pippen’s injury. But that doesn’t make virtually any sense when we recognize that Pippen was not really played as a playmaker back then, and therefore that Pippen getting injured would not have foisted significant playmaking duties on Jordan that Pippen would normally have. At which point we’re just left with clear full-match video evidence that you are wrong and that Jordan did play as a PG in those playoffs (which also means that Jordan-as-PG produced a localized *peak* in the Bulls’ SRS in that era—very far from the “regression” you erroneously claimed, though that was plainly false even without the playoffs).

As for the assist stats, again, Jordan averaged more assists per game in those playoffs than he averaged in any surrounding year, and more than he averaged in any regular season in his career except for that one. The idea that Jordan getting almost 8 assists a game in the playoffs somehow proves he wasn’t playing as a PG is just silly. The assist numbers in those playoffs are, in fact, actually indicative of the difference in role! They may be lower than they were in the RS with him at PG, but that’s talking about comparing assist numbers in two low sample sizes of games (i.e. statistical randomness renders the point you’re making about differences in assist numbers essentially meaningless). You’re basically saying that Jordan must not have been playing PG in a 17-game sample because his assist totals were a bit lower than they were in a 24-game sample where he played PG, even though his assist numbers in the 17-game sample were higher than virtually any other non-PG time in his career. It doesn’t make sense, and is contrary to all actual evidence. This is all just simply an argument you want to be true because it’s convenient to some broad-strokes arguments you try to make, but that is not actually consistent with the factual reality of what happened.

I encourage others to go to that linked thread and read the exchange and see what you think. As is clear from the above and those links, I’ve spent a lot of time explaining this. I have no interest in spending more time going down this merry-go-round again and am quite comfortable resting on the results of the prior discussion on this precise topic.

____________

EDIT: Anyways, this is really sidetracked from the actual topic of the thread—which it has virtually no relation to. I shouldn’t have engaged with your off-topic spam—Michael Jordan is irrelevant to this thread, as is what happened in any period of time in the 2009-10 Cavaliers season. Ironically, the linked thread was similarly derailed by me addressing the silliness of this spam. I shouldn’t really bother since it’s going to be spammed in thread after thread regardless of whether discussion demonstrates it to be silly.

[trelos6]

He won't get mentioned but Wade was the actual best player. He just missed too many games.

He was up there. But I can’t do anything with his 50 games, Unless he had a dominant playoffs. Similarly for KG in 2009.

[IlikeSHAIguys]

I'm buzzin ha

1 - Tim Duncan
2 - Lebron James
3 - Steve Nash
4 - Kobe Bryant
5 - Dirk Nowitzki

It's weird because Duncan's regular season stats are better and his playoff stats are worse but they win less games and then win get further and won. But if he's the best defender and he has 20/3/11 on good true-shooting I guess he can be 1?

I'm pretty confused with the Lebron stuff. If you think his defense is that great and he makes all that much then why take Kobe? Kobe 1 just seems random.

Could totally see Nash being 1 or 2 but idk. Are his assists worth that much more? If he's a way worse defender and scorer and Lebron's an all-time playmaker too then idk even though he is leading the best offenses and all.

Kobe scores 30+ on good true-shooting in the RS and playoffs with 4 and 5 assists. Seems like leaving him off completely is just reacting to him losing so far? Like different people are just leaving him off without explaining why and I'm confused. Is he a terrible defender?

21/2 when you're whole thing is offense seems pretty bad but he was an MVP winning lots of games so I don't think I can just leave him off.

Offensive Player of the Year
1 - Steve Nash
2 - Lebron James
3 - Kobe Bryant

Defensive Player of the Year
1 - Tim Duncan
2 - Ben Wallace
3 - Kevin Garnett

[Djoker]

Djoker, I am not calling you inconsistent with your votes, nor did I ever expect you to vote for Lebron prior to 2009, but my original point was that this comment:

With all due respect, how is Lebron getting #2 in OPOY this year? The Cavs had a -0.9 rORtg in the RS then -2.8 rORtg in the PS. The Cavs got to the Finals more thanks to their defense (and some soft East competition) not Lebron's offensive mastery.

… does not work as an an expression of incredulity from you any more than it would work for me to ask why people are not voting for the players who had the most regular season success / highest BPM.

Lebron had terrible offensive support, which is the type of extenuating circumstance you have used to argue for other players. Lebron led that terrible offensive support to the Finals, which is the type of “postseason success” you have used to argue for other players. The Cavaliers were 8 points better offensively with Lebron in the regular season, and nearly 12 points better offensively with Lebron in the postseason, which is the type of statistical lift you have used to argue for other players. Despite all that, you do not understand why he might be second on some ballots? (Hell, based on last thread, may as well put him #1 because it is not like you have any love for Nash here either.) That is the inconsistency I am highlighting.

I didn't think I needed to mention his efficiency since it's common knowledge but now since you're accusing me of caring only for team offense, I am clarifying that I don't believe Lebron is the #2 OPOY because he neither performed well individually nor did his team. A double whammy so to speak. The emphasis on team numbers in this case is because Lebron is getting a lot of credit for getting his team to the Finals so it seems even more appropriate to mention that they didn't get there on the back of their offense. Again, his poor offensive production doesn't really need to be brought up as it's common knowledge (or so I thought).

[AEnigma]

They got there on the back of Lebron carrying an offensive support cast that made the 2001 Iverson-less 76ers look potent, but you know what, sure, maybe the team would have been better off with a legendary playoff performance like Dirk’s or Wade’s or McGrady’s or Arenas’s or Iverson’s or Pierce’s or Ray’s or Carter’s. Maybe Deron Williams and Baron Davis could have not only successfully increased their share of the team’s scoring responsibilities in his place, but also the extent of their creation share, all without even a Lamar Odom-level teammate capable of seriously drawing attention away.

Or maybe all that was really needed to be assessed equitably was for his name to not be “Lebron James”.

[OhayoKD]

Anytime I point this out, you assert that WOWYR does something theoretically similar. But the difference there is that WOWYR systematically adjusts for every single player based on all data about all players, while you’re purporting to wave your hand at the effect that you think one or two players might’ve had based on one or two data points. One is actually a rigorous approach (albeit not perfect), and the other is completely unserious.

It "systematically" takes dozens of players from completely different rosters at completely different points of their careers based on the average deltas from what ever smattering of games they missed and throws them together completely excluding the largest possible samples (arrivals/depatures).

Your defense hinges on the Bulls getting worse, and they will have had to have gotten worse losing

(in order of minutes averaged)

-> Orlando Woodridge, whose next team gets 4 points worse
-> David Greenwood, whose next team got 3 points worse
-> Quintin Dailey, whose next team got 5 points worse
-> Ennis Whatley, whose next team stayed the same
-> Mitchell Wiggins, whose next team got 5 points better
-> Rod Higgins, whose next team got 5 points better
-> Reggie Theus, whose next team gets 2 points worse
-> Steve Johnson, whose next team got 2 points worse
-> Ronnie Lester, whsoe next team got 3 points better
-> Syndney Green, whose next team got 2 points better
-> Jawhan Oldham, whose next team got 1 point worse
-> Wallace Bryant whose next team got 1 point better

Good luck.

Ah yes, the "tanking aspect of things", A.K.A you and Djoker making **** up. The 21-game sample are games Ben curated pre-trade all featuring Mo-Williams and "full-strength rotations. And as has been covered, those cavs went into the season declaring they'd try to win(having refused to trade JJ Hickson) and played the same starters with the same minute distributions from game 1 as they did in non-blowouts during the losing streak. They tried to win...they couldn't. Even in their "full-strength" games they played like a sub-20 win team...which is what they played like without Lebron the previous 3 years and shockingly the results vary greatly depending on who's doing it and how they're doing it.



You know who was actually trying to tank? The 84 and 86 Jordan-less Bulls...
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=115384747#p115384747

Who your entire defense hinges on being better support than the 88/89 Bulls, even though they ditched impact negatives for impact positives who didn't conflict with Jordan's strengths.

If you think a team giving lip service to the idea of trying to win negates all that, then fine.

Lip Service? They literally nixed a potentially-championshp winning trade because they thought JJ Hickson, heroically started the year 7-9 and -4 (a stretch ending with a win) and then those same lineups got blown out three games in a row including two embarrasing losses to the guy who left them and the team that knocked them out the previous year. Shockingly in the next non-blowout L of that win-streak the minutes and players from game 1 was the same.

It's almost like in the actual nba, where players are playing for their jobs and careers, you don't "tank" by hoping people sabatoge themselves, you do it by making better players play less minutes and worse players play more minutes...like the 84 Bulls did.

Also lmao at that "letter" being "lip service"

Ignore what? The Bulls reducing Jordan's point-responsibilities and Jordan averaging less assists overall and less assists progressively each series? If you had actually watched the games as opposed to just saying you do like you last thread, you would have noticed playoff MJ brough up the ball less, handled the ball less, made less passes, and was no-longer operating the same way he did arch-angel, probably because that ended with the Bulls being on a big strech of losing. Heck, even if you had just been consistent with how you were interpreting the box-score(highlighting the 11 assist stretch initally to backup the idea Jordan was helioing), the assists going down would have signalled to you Jordan's offensive involvement was going down. But instead you linked a game where Pippen, initially bringing the ball up, went down early, the commentators noted Jordan's offensive involvement was higher than before, and the Bulls with Jordan playing his most helio game of the playoffs suffered their biggest defeat.

This is the issue with declaring you watch the games as opposed to actually watching the games.


Because both played taking over from their team's starting PG's and upped their assists to a similar amount? If arch-angel is not cherrypicking than neither is the Mo-Williams-less Cavs. Not that it particularly matters which you choose since Cleveland was way better.

LeBron always played like a helio at that point. He didn’t become a heliocentric player for some brief period of time with Mo Williams out..[/quote][/quote]
And Lebron "helioing" was because they just had him bring up the ball and pound the air out of it every possession right?

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Oh wait, no. Lebron doesn't even play "point" for most of the possessions. He gets the ball at the elbow or the top of the key where he is instantly met with traffic and extra attention.

Since apparently an 11-game sample that's analgolos to Arch-angel Jordan isn't enough for you, how about we just look at what happened in all 32 games he played PG:
[quote="SideshowBob"]
2010 Cleveland Cavaliers

Spoiler:

Full Season

Code: Select all

Pace     ORTG     DRTG     MOV     SOS     SRS     Off     Def     Net
90.6     112.1    105.0    6.52   -0.35    6.17   +4.6    -2.2    +6.8

Pre-PG Stretch 44 Games

Code: Select all

Pace     ORTG     DRTG     MOV     SOS     SRS     Off     Def     Net
90.2     111.4    104.3    6.43   -0.20    6.64   +3.8    -3.1    +6.9

Lebron PG Stretch January 23rd - April 6th, 2010, 32 Games

Code: Select all

Pace     ORTG     DRTG     MOV     SOS     SRS     Off     Def     Net
90.7     114.8    105.1    8.84   -1.04    7.24   +7.0    -1.6    +8.6

Four Factors

Spoiler:

Full Season

Code: Select all

              eFG%       ORB/DRB%    TOV%       FT/FGA

Offense       53.2%      25.1%       12.7%      .246
Defense       48.2%      77.2%       11.7%      .218

Pre-PG Stretch 44 Games

Code: Select all

              eFG%       ORB/DRB%    TOV%       FT/FGA

Offense       53.1%      25.3%       13.5%      .247
Defense       47.5%      77.7%       12.0%      .241

Lebron PG Stretch January 23rd - April 6th, 2010, 32 Games

Code: Select all

              eFG%       ORB/DRB%    TOV%       FT/FGA

Offense       54.3%      25.3%       11.7%      .248
Defense       48.2%      76.5%       11.1%      .193

Lebron James

Spoiler:

Average and Per 75 possessions

Full Season

Code: Select all

MPG   PPG   TRB   AST   AST%    TOV   TOV%    TS%   RelTS%  USG%   ORTG

39.0  29.7  7.3   8.6   41.8%   3.4   12.3%   60.4% +6.1%   33.5%  121
N/A   30.3  7.4   8.7   N/A     3.5   N/A     N/A    N/A    N/A    N/A

Pre-PG Stretch 44 Games

Code: Select all

MPG   PPG   TRB   AST   AST%    TOV   TOV%    TS%   RelTS%  USG%   ORTG

38.7  29.7  7.1   7.8   40.4%   3.6   12.9%   61.1% +6.8%   34.2%  121
N/A   30.6  7.3   8.0   N/A     3.7   N/A     N/A    N/A    N/A    N/A

Lebron PG Stretch January 23rd - April 6th, 2010, 32 Games

Code: Select all

MPG   PPG   TRB   AST   AST%    TOV   TOV%    TS%   RelTS%  USG%   ORTG

39.5  29.7  7.5   9.6   43.8%   3.2   11.4%   59.6% +5.4%   33.4%  122
N/A   29.9  7.5   9.7   N/A     3.2   N/A     N/A    N/A    N/A    N/A

Oh would you look at that. Lebron averages a 30-point triple double, lowers his turnover percentage and the team goes from +7 to approaching +9.

Contrary to the narrative you like pushing, you don't maximise Lebron's "individual impact" by having kyrie or mo-williams. You don't do it by surrounding him with a bunch of shooters either:
https://synergysports.com/how-to-build-a-lineup-around-lebron/amp/

Lebron's impact doesn't come from teams uniquely trying to max his individual lift in a way Jordan's team's didn't (In actuality, Jordan's team's catered to Jordan more), he's doing it because he draws more defenders, creates and finds better openings, and can capitalize on those openings far more effectively.. You can keep praying all the creaton tracking being done various people suddenly stops painting him extremely favorably as the sample keeps growing, but if you've actually watched him play you would know "neck and neck with MJ" playmaking isn't going to manifest itself because this:
https://youtu.be/HGWFsYD7YNI?t=101
is just not the same as this:
https://youtu.be/uNi_3ex83ts?t=215

even if box-creation wants it to be.

On that note, your insistince that the Bulls were running an arch-angel offense, even though the evidence you used for Jordan being a heliocentric playmaker disagrees, can simply be checked on film.

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Other people than Jordan bring up the ball more in 5 possessions (3) in Game 1 than the 16 minutes between when Pippen goes out and Jordan first goes to the bench in game 6.

In the first 40 possessions following Pippen's ejection (not counting resets or when Jordan is out) of game 6 Jordan brings up the ball 34 times while the rest of the Bulls bring it up 6.

In the first 40 possessions of Game 1 (same rules), Jordan brings it up 25 times, the other Bulls bring it up 15 times, and 8 of those 15 other instances come from...

Scottie Pippen, the player who just so happens to become the Bulls primary-ball-handler when they take off. It's not all these other PGs you're talking about.

[Narigo]

1. Tim Duncan
2. Steve Nash
3. Kobe Bryant
4. Dirk Nowitzki
5. LeBron James

Tim Duncan and Nowitzki were top 2 this year in the regular season. Nowitzki was awful during the playoffs and lost in the first round despite being the number 1 seed in the playoffs.

Kobe and Nash weren't too far behind Dirk in regular season and they both had better postseason runs. Nash had better season than he had in 2006 while Kobe was a little worse than he was in 06. So that's why I put Nash over Kobe for this year. Nash was a bit more impactful Kobe on the offensive side of the ball

2007 LeBron was worse than he was in 2006 in the regular season. But he was really good in playoffs carrying his team to the finals.

2007 Timberwolves declined on the defensive end this season where last season they were 10th. Garnett offensive numbers werent as good as last year also where his efficiency dropped. Despite that he will probably be my honorable mention

[Djoker]

VOTING POST

POY

1. Tim Duncan - 1st Team All-NBA. 1st Team All-Defense. Last all-time year by Duncan and he's an easy POY here leading the Spurs to another title while anchoring them on both ends of the floor. Parker won Finals MVP and Manu was very impactful but it was Timmy who led the Spurs from start to finish. Not an amazing RS with a couple of guys arguably ahead of him there. Averaged 20.0/10.6/3.4 on +3.8 rTS in the RS then 22.5//1.5/3.3 on +1.9 rTS in the PS.

2. Kobe Bryant - 1st Team All-NBA. 1st Team All-Defense. Like last season, Lakers are again posting a very solid +2.2 rORtg despite another awful supporting cast around Kobe. He once again carries an enormous load to carry the Lakers trading some scoring volume for more playmaking. The main difference is the team regresses defensively and falls to 42-win pace. In the PS, they once again run into the Suns in the 1st round, this time an even stronger adversary with Amare, and are predictably defeated but Kobe has a strong series. Averaged 31.6/5.7/5.4 on +2.4 rTS in the RS then 32.8/5.4/4.4 on +6.0 rTS in the PS.

3. Steve Nash - 1st Team All-NBA. Arguably Nash's peak season and he could have won a 3rd straight MVP. The Suns were tied with Dallas in SRS and narrowly behind the Spurs. Once again strong in the PS as well. As far as offensive engines go, this guy is as good as they come. The Suns are finally a more balanced team as well posting an rDRtg of exactly 0.0 which is 13th in the league. In the PS they played the Spurs in what felt like the real Finals (with Mavs already out) and it was close with the Suns' loss tainted by key suspensions to Amare and Diaw in a pivotal Game 5. Averaged 18.6/3.5/11.6 on +11.3 rTS in the RS then 18.9/3.2/13.3 on +5.0 rTS in the PS.

4. Lebron James - 2nd Team All-NBA. Weaker RS than in 2006. And yes it was the weak East that he got through to make the Finals but all things considered, his PS was still significantly better than Dirk's. At least Lebron had four consecutive games of superb play against Detroit. He isn't higher on the list because of poor efficiency and the general lack of offensive lift (-0.9 rORtg and -2.8 rORtg in the RS and PS respectively). Oh and because he threw up an absolute abomination of a performance in the Finals. Yes he was 22 and yes the Cavs weren't reasonably expected to win the series which is why this series isn't nearly the legacy hit that 2011 is but it's still just a horrible performance. Averaged 27.3/6.7/6.0 on +1.1 rTS in the RS then 25.1/8.1/8.0 on -1.7 rTS in the PS.

5. Dirk Nowitzki - 1st Team All-NBA. MVP. After the RS, Dirk was looking like a strong contender for POY leading the best team in the NBA with 67 wins (though SRS had them at 61-win pace narrowly behind the Spurs). Then in round 1 against a mediocre Warriors team, disaster struck. The Mavs did the unthinkable losing the series and Dirk himself shot horribly and looked bad on the defensive end. Just a disasterclass of a performance. A part of me wanted to leave him off the ballot entirely for that but his body of work in the RS still counts for something and does slightly rectify the situation. Averaged 24.6/8.9/3.4 on 6.4 rTS in the RS then 19.7/11.3/2.3 on -4.3 rTS in the PS.

HM: Kevin Garnett - 3rd Team All-NBA. 2nd Team All-Defense. Still an all-around superstar. Missed the PS.

OPOY

1. Kobe Bryant - Fantastic scoring force with volume playmaking. Led a strong offense with a very weak cast.

2. Steve Nash - Good scorer and fantastic playmaker. Suns were the #1 offense but more balanced.

3. Dirk Nowitzki - Fantastic scorer.

HM: Lebron James - Good playmaker but poor efficiency plus unimpressive team results.

DPOY

1. Tim Duncan - The best defender and anchor on the elite Spurs defense that also won the title.

2. Ben Wallace - Ben moved to Chicago and they became the #1 defense. Last star year by Big Ben before he became a low minutes rotation guy.

3. Kevin Garnett - Still a fantastic mix of horizontal and vertical game on D. Timberwolves were horrible but I can't think of other defenders who were on KG's level.

[lessthanjake]

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As I noted in my last post, this is completely off-topic and a long-form discussion about it will just continue to derail this thread, about topics that have already been discussed at length in the past. Particularly in light of the prior posts made in this thread and the posts I’ve linked to here, I’m quite comfortable with the fact that people can read our prior posts on this stuff and make up their own minds about: (1) whether it makes any sense to run WOWY numbers for two teams that only have one player in common; (2) whether WOWYR’s systematic adjustment for all players based on all information is a way more legitimate way of doing things than running WOWY on completely different teams and then hand-waving about some players; (3) whether the 2011 Cavaliers were a team that was genuinely fully motivated as an organization to win; (4) whether Jordan played PG in the 1989 playoffs; and (5) whether the Bulls improved when Jordan played PG (which is discussed at length in the thread I linked in my earlier post in this thread). I just have a lot of difficulty thinking that anyone would read our exchanges on these topics (and watch the various videos) and come to the conclusion that you’re right about any of them, unless they just really want to (in which case there’s no point in discussing further because they’d never be convinced anyways). And, probably more importantly, it is a real derailment of this thread, which is something I probably shouldn’t have participated in doing in the first place (especially since you’ll never stop spamming things, no matter how many times it’s explained to you that what you’re spamming is non-sensical or materially misleading, so those explanations are largely a waste of time).

[Djoker]

Still trying to wrap my mind around OhayoKD's WOWY arguments. He really believes those Cavs teams would win under 20 games without Lebron. Meanwhile Lebron has many objectively very poor playoff games from 2006-2008 and yet the Cavs win or stay close in a lot of them. Ok...

Anyways, in the actual WOWY sample, the Cavs don't look that bad at all.

2004-2010 Cavaliers WIthout Lebron

Full Sample: 26 games, 10-16 record, -0.84 MOV, 39 Pythagorean Wins
Excluding End of Season Meaningless Games: 8-10 record, +0.50 MOV, 42 Pythagorean Wins

Roughly a .500 team though on a small sample so I wouldn't have too much confidence in it but it doesn't paint the picture of a hopeless team.

Then we have the 2011 season to which OhayoKD naturally clings to where the Cavs had a -8.88 SRS and played like an 18-win team. But to see how intellectually dishonest using that data point at face value is, one must realize that key starters didn't play very many games and minutes. Jamison played 56 games, Mo Williams 36 games, and Varejao 31 games. Delonte, Shaq and Big Z left the team. The top 4 in minutes for the season were JJ Hickson, Ramon Sessions, Anthony Parker and Daniel Gibson. No wonder that team sucked ass! But of course it barely resembled the 2010 Cavs.

[One_and_Done]

Still trying to wrap my mind around OhayoKD's WOWY arguments. He really believes those Cavs teams would win under 20 games without Lebron. Meanwhile Lebron has many objectively very poor playoff games from 2006-2008 and yet the Cavs win or stay close in a lot of them. Ok...

Anyways, in the actual WOWY sample, the Cavs don't look that bad at all.

2004-2010 Cavaliers WIthout Lebron

Full Sample: 26 games, 10-16 record, -0.84 MOV, 39 Pythagorean Wins
Excluding End of Season Meaningless Games: 8-10 record, +0.50 MOV, 42 Pythagorean Wins

Roughly a .500 team though on a small sample so I wouldn't have too much confidence in it but it doesn't paint the picture of a hopeless team.

Then we have the 2011 season to which OhayoKD naturally clings to where the Cavs had a -8.88 SRS and played like an 18-win team. But to see how intellectually dishonest using that data point at face value is, one must realize that key starters didn't play very many games and minutes. Jamison played 56 games, Mo Williams 36 games, and Varejao 31 games. Delonte, Shaq and Big Z left the team. The top 4 in minutes for the season were JJ Hickson, Ramon Sessions, Anthony Parker and Daniel Gibson. No wonder that team sucked ass! But of course it barely resembled the 2010 Cavs.

Have you tried looking at the Cavs record without Lebron? Or when Lebron leaves? It's fairly clear they'd be terrible. I realise they were friskier this year, but from 07-10 the Cavs were an abysmal 3-15 without him. Then when he left in 2011 they were a low 20s win team.

[Djoker]

Still trying to wrap my mind around OhayoKD's WOWY arguments. He really believes those Cavs teams would win under 20 games without Lebron. Meanwhile Lebron has many objectively very poor playoff games from 2006-2008 and yet the Cavs win or stay close in a lot of them. Ok...

Anyways, in the actual WOWY sample, the Cavs don't look that bad at all.

2004-2010 Cavaliers WIthout Lebron

Full Sample: 26 games, 10-16 record, -0.84 MOV, 39 Pythagorean Wins
Excluding End of Season Meaningless Games: 8-10 record, +0.50 MOV, 42 Pythagorean Wins

Roughly a .500 team though on a small sample so I wouldn't have too much confidence in it but it doesn't paint the picture of a hopeless team.

Then we have the 2011 season to which OhayoKD naturally clings to where the Cavs had a -8.88 SRS and played like an 18-win team. But to see how intellectually dishonest using that data point at face value is, one must realize that key starters didn't play very many games and minutes. Jamison played 56 games, Mo Williams 36 games, and Varejao 31 games. Delonte, Shaq and Big Z left the team. The top 4 in minutes for the season were JJ Hickson, Ramon Sessions, Anthony Parker and Daniel Gibson. No wonder that team sucked ass! But of course it barely resembled the 2010 Cavs.

Have you tried looking at the Cavs record without Lebron? Or when Lebron leaves? It's fairly clear they'd be terrible.

I literally posted the record without Lebron in that post.

When he left for Miami, the team wasn't the same at all. All key players were missing a ton of games.

[One_and_Done]

Still trying to wrap my mind around OhayoKD's WOWY arguments. He really believes those Cavs teams would win under 20 games without Lebron. Meanwhile Lebron has many objectively very poor playoff games from 2006-2008 and yet the Cavs win or stay close in a lot of them. Ok...

Anyways, in the actual WOWY sample, the Cavs don't look that bad at all.

2004-2010 Cavaliers WIthout Lebron

Full Sample: 26 games, 10-16 record, -0.84 MOV, 39 Pythagorean Wins
Excluding End of Season Meaningless Games: 8-10 record, +0.50 MOV, 42 Pythagorean Wins

Roughly a .500 team though on a small sample so I wouldn't have too much confidence in it but it doesn't paint the picture of a hopeless team.

Then we have the 2011 season to which OhayoKD naturally clings to where the Cavs had a -8.88 SRS and played like an 18-win team. But to see how intellectually dishonest using that data point at face value is, one must realize that key starters didn't play very many games and minutes. Jamison played 56 games, Mo Williams 36 games, and Varejao 31 games. Delonte, Shaq and Big Z left the team. The top 4 in minutes for the season were JJ Hickson, Ramon Sessions, Anthony Parker and Daniel Gibson. No wonder that team sucked ass! But of course it barely resembled the 2010 Cavs.

Have you tried looking at the Cavs record without Lebron? Or when Lebron leaves? It's fairly clear they'd be terrible.

I literally posted the record without Lebron in that post.

When he left for Miami, the team wasn't the same at all. All key players were missing a ton of games.

1) try their record from 07-10. Bron clearly wasn't in his prime before 07, which is why nobody was voting for him before then. You talk about misrepresentative samples, then you cite 04-06 like it matters.
2) The Cavs were substantially the same in 2011 and were trying for the first 40 games of the season, then they realised they were horrible and pulled the plug.

[AEnigma]

Have you tried looking at the Cavs record without Lebron? Or when Lebron leaves? It's fairly clear they'd be terrible.

I literally posted the record without Lebron in that post.

When he left for Miami, the team wasn't the same at all. All key players were missing a ton of games.

It still had a lot more in common with those 2008-10 rosters that went 1-13 without him than your citation to the Cavaliers’ 9-3 record without him from 2004-07 (but ignoring 2003…) does.

This discussion is off the rails — partially my fault at the start — so if you want to talk about how WOWY measures weaken Lebron’s case as an overall candidate this year, go ahead, but they visibly do not in terms of his elevated playoff years (1-13 without him the next three years), and if you feel a desperate need to twist that sample into something more personally palatable, you all can do so in a different thread… or save it for 2010/11 I guess.

[lessthanjake]

Still trying to wrap my mind around OhayoKD's WOWY arguments. He really believes those Cavs teams would win under 20 games without Lebron. Meanwhile Lebron has many objectively very poor playoff games from 2006-2008 and yet the Cavs win or stay close in a lot of them. Ok...

Anyways, in the actual WOWY sample, the Cavs don't look that bad at all.

2004-2010 Cavaliers WIthout Lebron

Full Sample: 26 games, 10-16 record, -0.84 MOV, 39 Pythagorean Wins
Excluding End of Season Meaningless Games: 8-10 record, +0.50 MOV, 42 Pythagorean Wins

Roughly a .500 team though on a small sample so I wouldn't have too much confidence in it but it doesn't paint the picture of a hopeless team.

Then we have the 2011 season to which OhayoKD naturally clings to where the Cavs had a -8.88 SRS and played like an 18-win team. But to see how intellectually dishonest using that data point at face value is, one must realize that key starters didn't play very many games and minutes. Jamison played 56 games, Mo Williams 36 games, and Varejao 31 games. Delonte, Shaq and Big Z left the team. The top 4 in minutes for the season were JJ Hickson, Ramon Sessions, Anthony Parker and Daniel Gibson. No wonder that team sucked ass! But of course it barely resembled the 2010 Cavs.

Yup. For purposes of this thread, I do think the overall record from 2004-2010 is a wide range to assess the quality of the supporting cast in any individual year, since of course the roster changed almost entirely over that time period. However, the Cavs went 3-1 without LeBron in 2006-07, and if we included the two surrounding years, then it was 6-8. Of course, this is where WOWY shows some of its real limitations though, because that is now an *even smaller* sample, but expanding it requires us to look at the record of teams that were pretty different. I think the intuition OhayoKD would like people to have is that the 2011 Cavaliers were bad (and the Cavaliers also had a bad record in a small sample of games without LeBron from 2008-2010), and he’d want us to conclude that the Cavaliers’ roster in the earlier few years doesn’t necessarily look better on paper than later Cavaliers’ rosters, so we should assume that a team like the 2007 Cavaliers was an absolutely awful team. It’s an argument that requires a lot of assumptions and extrapolations, as well as ignoring the record without LeBron in the actual years in question. And that’s on top of relying heavily on what happened in a year where, as you note, the team had tons of injuries, and also was obviously not trying to win—actions speak louder than words, and the team willingly let their payroll fall by like 35% from 2010 to 2011 and hired a former tank commander to be the new coach, both of which made clear to everyone (including the players themselves, whose motivation matters a lot) what the intention was.

In general, I also just think that WOWY is very flawed by being a stat that is very dependent on team construction and what the team’s offensive system (and perhaps to a lesser extent the defensive system) is built to do. Teams aim to construct their rosters around the system they intend to run. And, in terms of system, some teams construct their system to maximize their superstar player, while others construct their system more to maximize the value of those around their superstar while assuming the superstar will still be able to eat regardless. LeBron’s Cavaliers were definitely the former, while other players have definitely had the latter (the triangle being a major example—with Phil Jackson having articulated pretty much exactly this about it). It’s not clear which one is actually superior from the perspective of team success. Both can be good, and I suspect which one is better depends some on the flexibility of the superstar himself, as well as what the team’s roster options actually are. Trying to optimize your best player is definitely a good thing, but so is optimizing the rest of the team if the superstar’s value isn’t too diminished by that. In any event, it is, however, clear which one will lead to better WOWY for the superstar.

[penbeast0]

...

2. Kobe Bryant - 1st Team All-NBA. 1st Team All-Defense. ...

Do you really buy Kobe being an All-Defensive caliber player this year? I am not up to watching enough tape to convince myself but at the time I thought he dropped off a lot defensively in this period.

[One_and_Done]

Kobe was absolutely a mediocre defensive player by this point.

[capfan33]

1. Duncan- pretty straightforward, while it’s not his best year there isn’t a compelling alternative and as one of his last all time years culminating in a finals sweep, easy choice.

2. Nash- pretty close between him and Bron. Him having to play the Spurs in the 2nd round is unfortunate as his suns likely readily could’ve beat any other team and he played very well against them, so I don’t think the lack of accomplishment compared to Bron is as big a factor considering he played better against the same team. And even in a vacuum he’s better offensively and overall probably a wash or slight adv to LeBron.

3. Lebron- the first of many LeBron votes despite funny enough possibly being his weakest year until this year. Dirk was much more impressive in the regular season but with his playoff catastrophe I can’t in good faith (even as a homer) put him higher than fourth. Yea a lot of lebrons narrative is carried by game 6, but like, game 6 is one of the greatest games ever played.

4. Dirk- extraordinary regular season when you consider his supporting cast, but one of the worst playoff series ever for an MVP. Very unfortunate as they well may have won it all otherwise.

5. Kobe- not super inspired by him this year, but not to the point where I’d vote for Baron Davis or someone like that lol. Wade would’ve been the choice but for his terrible playoff run, and KG missed the playoffs entirely while being stuck in purgatory.

[OldSchoolNoBull]

I guess my case for Baron earlier didn't persuade anyone.