RealGM

Compare --
Tim Hardaway, Terry Porter, Gus Williams, and Penny Hardaway at PG,
Bailey Howell, Marques Johnson, Bob Dandridge, and Jeff Hornacek as the top wings,
Jerry Lucas, Walt Bellamy, Amare, and Yao Ming are the three top bigs left.

Point Guards

Timbug is the best playmaker, Terry the most efficient, Penny (like Gus) the playoff star (and the most star power generally). All had some defensive rep, Porter the best, Timmy's size limits him the most (and Penny's makes him the most variable). Porter had the longest run, Penny the shortest. Depends on what you are looking for.

Wings

For the wings, Marques is the highest peak but much the shortest career, Dandridge the best defender, Howell was more of a postup scorer especially in Boston, Hornacek adds outstanding 3 point shooting which neither of the others provided though both Marques and Bobby D were superior volume scorers. Marques is generally just a bit superior to Dandridge at everything other than defense but when the playoffs came, the difference mainly disappeared. Howell falls short of either in the playoffs, Hornacek keeps his efficiency but also his more secondary status. Howell joined the Russell Celtics as an important scoring cog in the last two runs, but didn't add much to the 1970 and 1971 awful teams before retiring. Dandridge was a key cog both offensively and defensively in the only titles ever for both Milwaukee and Washington.

Bigs

First thing that leaps out is Bellamy's much longer and Yao's much shorter career. Era differences give Amare and Yao an efficiency advantage and Lucas and Bellamy a rebounding edge but those numbers all regress to a more similar norm when compared to era averages. Amare (and Yao) come off as clearly higher volume options however, Lucas in particular tends to slip a bit as he has an extraordinarily low foul draw. These differences become even stronger come playoff time. Given Yao's limited career (and turnovers), and despite his weak defense (none of these players except maybe Yao had a good defensive rep), I would have to go for Amare as the best big left.

wigglestrue wrote:Just out of curiosity, how many additional full seasons' worth of totally-average/downright-mediocre/replacement-level play would Walton need to pad his peak play with for his durability score to reach acceptable levels for this Top 100?

Mediocre years? I suspect they wouldn't help at all.

Of the top 50 minutes played guys those that made it on to our list are
a) Players that are in the Hall of Fame
b) Players that are going to be in the Hall of Fame
c) Horace Grant and Shawn Marion (i.e. defender, rebounder types who played well for a number of years without taking much/anything off the table, if the bar for good is 17.9 PER Marion has 9 such seasons, if .144 WS/48 he has 8; Horace has 3 and 7 and that's just by the older boxscore metrics, BPM looks more favourably on them and certainly PER can be somewhat harsh on those that aren't volume scorers). Grant got in at #85, and as has been frequently acknowledged at this stage, we're playing with narrow margins. Done on a different day the ordering for the top 80-120 range could be quite different.

All time NBA-ABA combined minutes leaderboard - That haven't made our list wrote:22. Clifford Robinson 42561
23. Buck Williams 42464
30. Charles Oakley 40280
33. Otis Thorpe 39822
35. Andre Miller 39688
37. Mark Jackson 39121
38. Walt Bellamy* 38940
40. Jason Terry 38476
41. Kevin Willis 38362
42. Joe Johnson 38306
46. Lenny Wilkens* 38064
48. Michael Finley 37996
49. Derek Harper 37786
50. Antawn Jamison 37638

Over a quarter of the top 50 minute getters didn't make our top 100, despite the self-selecting nature of that group (i.e. only good players get to play big career minutes, so the chances were that a lot of the top minutes guys would be guys who had elite careers).

Moncrief (#66) got in very comfortably with a little over half Clifford Robinson's minutes. Robinson hasn't had any peripheral mentions as a candidate. Kevin Johnson (#55) was a little closer, trailing Robinson's minutes total by just 17500.

I don't think there's any reason to think adding mediocre years has significantly bolstered players up the rankings. People aren't ranking on longevity of minutes, they are (generally) looking at longevity of quality (i.e. productivity).


I don't think Bellamy is getting in, so I'm thinking maybe Marques (though I've been reticent to vote for my guys *Kemp* from in another project; as I think I was with Gus in the runoff, good to see him in though), Hagan or perhaps Howell.

Alright, how many full seasons' worth of decent-ish and pretty good play? If you took the career of Kevin Willis and subbed out a few years for 3 years' worth of Walton peak play, where would Willis probably have been ranked here?

wigglestrue wrote:Alright, how many full seasons' worth of decent-ish and pretty good play? If you took the career of Kevin Willis and subbed out a few years for 3 years' worth of Walton peak play, where would Willis probably have been ranked here?

Speaking for myself, that would definitely make the cut. I want to make clear what you're proposing, and how it contrasts with what the world actually got to see of Bill Walton (because you've scoffed at the forum at large recently, and I worry you might still be doing so).

So.....
You're proposing that perhaps we sub out Willis' best three years ('92-'94) and replace them with 3 years of peak-level Walton play. For the purpose of this exercise, I'm assuming Willis' durability stays the same (that is: he misses only 5 games TOTAL in that 3-year span). Now I want this made absolutely clear: this is TWICE the amount of "peak Walton"-level that the world actually got to see. Walton played just 123 rs games between '77 and '78, and missed the majority of the playoffs in '78. So we really only saw peak Walton for about a season and a half. You're saying 3 seasons worth, though==>this is not an insignificant improvement upon reality, and I'm harping on the point because I want to make it painstakingly clear that this is NOT an insignificant adjustment on what the world actually saw. Moving on.....

Walton was quite good in '75 and '76, too; basically an all-star or borderline all-star level player in both those years. However, he only played 86 rs games in those two years combined. So in addition to his 1.5 seasons of peak, we have basically 1 season (or 1 "and a bit") of good/very good level of play.
Kevin Willis was pretty good in both '87 and '98 (borderline all-star in '87). He wasn't quite as good as Walton was in '75 and '76, but given he doesn't miss games, I would certainly say his '87 and '98 easily match the value of '75 and '76 Walton.

Beyond that, Walton had what amounted to 3 or so decent role player years (spread out over 5 seasons, because he again misses significant chunks of the season in multiple years). Willis, in addition to '87, '92-'94, and '98, had probably 4 decent role player seasons.

Then, whereas Walton has basically no other career to speak of, Willis has 10+ "less relevant" years. Now given these are "less relevant" years, I don't want to give the impression that they add a lot of career value to Willis.......but nor are they completely without worth (imo). idk, if you wanted me to roughly quantify them, I'd say all of them put together are worth roughly the same as 1 borderline all-star season, or 2 "decent role player" years.


So given you're proposing twice the length of peak-level play, similar amount of merely "good/very good" value years, and significantly more role player years.......I hope you can appreciate that what you're suggesting is significantly more than what Walton actually gave in his career. And for me, it would definitely be worth a top 100 spot (easily).

Majority of my post from last thread below:



The quick recap of why I'm still going to vote Walt Bellamy....

Pros
Excellent scorer. The scoring numbers (both volume and efficiency) during his peak years are on par with those of peak Dwight Howard (as noted in post above in the spoiler), which is no small potatoes. His overall prime scoring numbers are barely behind prime Dwight Howard, too.
Solid rebounder. His peak/prime/career rebounding numbers (adjusted for pace and for era standards) are still better than those of Chris Bosh or Marc Gasol, and roughly similar to (or marginally better than) those of Pau Gasol.
Dat longevity. Particularly in relation to era standards, his durability and longevity are very good (excellent, even).

Cons
Defense???? Not sure if it's appropriate to call this a "con", as I'm not sure if his defense is necessarily "bad". He certainly doesn't appear to be as soft/porous as Stoudemire, Lee, or Boozer. But he doesn't have a "good" reputation, either.
Intangibles. I'll admit the narrative implies they might be in short supply for Bells.
Impact. There is some room to question if his impact was less than what the boxscore would suggest. These are difficult things to evaluate, especially in the era prior to impact data. At any rate, the same concerns were true of Elton Brand, Carmelo Anthony, among others.

Do the pros outweigh the cons. You know where I stand.

If it isn't Bellamy here, I hope it can be Jerry Lucas, or maybe Tim Hardaway or perhaps even George McGinnis (though he's clearly a long-shot).

EDIT: Vote changed to Jerry Lucas, reasons noted in post #25.

I didn't realize Walton is only getting credited with one and a half seasons' worth of a peak. That's some stingy accounting. They were, in fact, separate seasons, however shortened. Also, his 1986 wasn't just "decent", it was one of the best seasons a role player has ever had in the NBA. Or has your inner HAL determined that to be nothing but "copious narrative"? I'll make it simpler: If Kevin Willis in his best season won both league MVP and Finals MVP, and in his third-best all-around season he had one of the greatest seasons a role player has ever had, playing for one of the greatest teams ever, then he's already long been voted in, right?

wigglestrue wrote:I didn't realize Walton is only getting credited with one and a half seasons' worth of a peak. That's some stingy accounting. They were, in fact, separate seasons, however shortened. Also, his 1986 wasn't just "decent", it was one of the best seasons a role player has ever had in the NBA. Or has your inner HAL determined that to be nothing but "copious narrative"? I'll make it simpler: If Kevin Willis in his best season won both league MVP and Finals MVP, and in his third-best all-around season he had one of the greatest seasons a role player has ever had, playing for one of the greatest teams ever, then he's already long been voted in, right?

1.5 seasons of peak is not "stingy accounting"; it in fact appears highly accurate (to say otherwise is questionable accounting). A season is 82 rs games, he played 123 rs games......technically, that's precisely 1.5 seasons. Sure, players whom we give "full credit" to typically miss a game here or there, so realistically we can perhaps give him credit for a little more than 1.5........although then he missed ALMOST ALL of the playoffs during that 2nd season (so he played less than 1.5 seasons of playoffs in that span). Overall, I think 1.5 seasons is very very fair. If you still disagree, then I don't know what to say; it'd be like me saying "2+2=4" and you replying "no it doesn't".


As for contention that '86 is a GOAT-level role player year......idk. It was an awfully relevant role player year, I'll grant yout, but I think that's highly debatable, pending criteria for what exactly qualifies for a "role player year". I don't think role players are limited to guys coming off the bench, and as such, the fact that he played just 19.3 mpg that year isn't really in his favor. Unless he's among the greatest players in the world for those 19.3 minutes, it's hard to believe he's exerting the same impact per game as a role player who, for instance, plays very well and does so for 30+ mpg.

So is he among the greatest in the world in those 19.3 minutes? Well.....
He is indeed an excellent (perhaps near-elite) rebounder, an elite defender, good locker-room and "glue guy", and scoring on very very good shooting efficiency (though I seem to recall you implying scoring efficiency is of very limited importance to you anyway)......but anyway he's managing that efficiency as a 4th or 5th option with at least one great play-maker, scoring pretty limited volume (BELOW league avg pts per 100 possessions). And fwiw, his shooting efficiency pales in comparison to what guys like DeAndre Jordan, Chris Andersen, and Tyson Chandler have done in similar low-volume scoring roles. And although he had a considerable assist rate for a big, he was also averaging 4.6 turnovers per 100 possessions (which is slightly worse than Dwight Howard's career avg, and significantly worse than passing/facilitating centers like Dave Cowens and Joakim Noah).

And again, this is what he was for just 19.3 mpg (slightly less at 18.2 mpg in the playoffs, where he also missed 2 games, btw). That leaves ~29 mpg wherein he exerts no effect whatsoever.

Wiggles check your PM. ~Doc

though I seem to recall you implying scoring efficiency is of very limited importance to you anyway

There's a huge difference between saying you mathheads have overdosed on shooting efficiency and that "very limited" implication. You inferred incorrectly.

The bulk of your reply comes off like the data equivalent of "copious narrative". Copious math, not necessarily all that connected to reality. Just number-crunching for the sake of number-crunching in order to find some statistical hook on which to hang a bias. For ****'s sake...you had to resort to turnovers per 100 possessions compared to other all-time facilitators at center to find a supposed flaw. Guess how much of an impact that particular sub-stat had on Walton's overall effectiveness that season? About absolutely ******* zero impact, in reality. "Walton was sloppy with the ball in 1986." - Said by no one who played with or against him, coached him, or watched him that year. Guess how many hockey assists Walton had in 1986? A lot, I bet. Not measured, yet. But it's measurable, estimate-able. You're working without that information. Don't you think that information might be just as important if not moreso than TO per 100 possessions over the course of about 20 minutes per game? Ah, but the people who actually remember him in games from that season routinely testify to Walton's units featuring some of the best ball movement the sport has ever seen, and fortunately those recollections can be tested by deeper dives of measurement. The games are on tape. All of them, I presume, somewhere. How comfortable do you feel judging Walton's '86 impact using nothing but math even though the data is woefully incomplete compared to the kind of mapping and differentiating that basketball intelligentsia have only recently realized can add crucial depth and detail to box-score-derived math and can even contradict some "sophisticated" stat-centric conclusions?

Unless he's among the greatest players in the world for those 19.3 minutes, it's hard to believe he's exerting the same impact per game as a role player who, for instance, plays very well and does so for 30+ mpg.

Well, yeah, that's the whole point. For about 20 minutes a game, the 1986 Celtics were getting one of the greatest players in the world. "But by my calculations...[somethingsomethingsomething]."

Overall, I think 1.5 seasons is very very fair. If you still disagree, then I don't know what to say; it'd be like me saying "2+2=4" and you replying "no it doesn't".

Sorry, but who the **** are you or anyone here to withhold full-season credit from Walton's 1977 or 1978? When a player's season contains enough games to qualify for the stat crowns and when that player leads his team to the championship then who ******* cares about 17 regular season games being missed, it was as full a season as it needed to be. Same for 1978. You win regular season MVP, that's a full enough regular season, who cares about the 24 missed games. Defining either year as not-full-enough is NOT the objective fact you think it is, there is NOT a mathematical imperative to subtract credit.

I'm angry, sorry. I'm angry about the arrogance of the stat zeitgeist, here and in brainiac sports fan culture as a whole. You all act like I'm the arrogant one. Pfft. YOU are the ones arbitrarily playing SPORTS HISTORY GOD but pretending you aren't by hiding behind a fashionable veneer of pure scientific objectivity all while dispensing just-as-biased arguments from a bucket of not-complete-enough data.

Poster has been warned. Do not respond further folks.

wigglestrue wrote:

though I seem to recall you implying scoring efficiency is of very limited importance to you anyway

There's a huge difference between saying you mathheads have overdosed on shooting efficiency and that "very limited" implication. You inferred incorrectly.

The bulk of your reply comes off like the data equivalent of "copious narrative". Copious math, not necessarily all that connected to reality. Just number-crunching for the sake of number-crunching in order to find some statistical hook on which to hang a bias. For ****'s sake...you had to resort to turnovers per 100 possessions compared to other all-time facilitators at center to find a supposed flaw. Guess how much of an impact that particular sub-stat had on Walton's overall effectiveness that season? About absolutely ******* zero impact, in reality. "Walton was sloppy with the ball in 1986." - Said by no one who played with or against him, coached him, or watched him that year. Guess how many hockey assists Walton had in 1986? A lot, I bet. Not measured, yet. But it's measurable, estimate-able. You're working without that information. Don't you think that information might be just as important if not moreso than TO per 100 possessions over the course of about 20 minutes per game? Ah, but the people who actually remember him in games from that season routinely testify to Walton's units featuring some of the best ball movement the sport has ever seen, and fortunately those recollections can be tested by deeper dives of measurement. The games are on tape. All of them, I presume, somewhere. How comfortable do you feel judging Walton's '86 impact using nothing but math even though the data is woefully incomplete compared to the kind of mapping and differentiating that basketball intelligentsia have only recently realized can add crucial depth and detail to box-score-derived math and can even contradict some "sophisticated" stat-centric conclusions?

Unless he's among the greatest players in the world for those 19.3 minutes, it's hard to believe he's exerting the same impact per game as a role player who, for instance, plays very well and does so for 30+ mpg.

Well, yeah, that's the whole point. For about 20 minutes a game, the 1986 Celtics were getting one of the greatest players in the world. "But by my calculations...[somethingsomethingsomething]."

Overall, I think 1.5 seasons is very very fair. If you still disagree, then I don't know what to say; it'd be like me saying "2+2=4" and you replying "no it doesn't".

Sorry, but who the **** are you or anyone here to withhold full-season credit from Walton's 1977 or 1978? When a player's season contains enough games to qualify for the stat crowns and when that player leads his team to the championship then who ******* cares about 17 regular season games being missed, it was as full a season as it needed to be. Same for 1978. You win regular season MVP, that's a full enough regular season, who cares about the 24 missed games. Defining either year as not-full-enough is NOT the objective fact you think it is, there is NOT a mathematical imperative to subtract credit.

I'm angry, sorry. I'm angry about the arrogance of the stat zeitgeist, here and in brainiac sports fan culture as a whole. You all act like I'm the arrogant one. Pfft. YOU are the ones arbitrarily playing SPORTS HISTORY GOD but pretending you aren't by hiding behind a fashionable veneer of pure scientific objectivity all while dispensing just-as-biased arguments from a bucket of not-complete-enough data.

What a sad, sad way to end a great project. I'm on your side in the sense that I think Walton should be in by this point - I'd have put him in the 70-80 range somewhere. But the anger with which you have chosen to direct your post to someone who is posting legitimate counterpoints in a polite fashion and in a fashion consistent with the own criteria that he has mapped out in post after post after post in great detail is not cool. You can make your point about available stats missing the mark and warning against over-reliance on them without being so combative.

For what it's worth, trex is one of the more vocal posters about this project tending to focus too much on shooting efficiency. He championed Iverson very hard. Cousy, too. I'm probably one of the ones who needs to be the object of your rant more than trex. Hell, I even came up with new freaking metrics based on scoring volume and efficiency. I have Dantley in my top 50. West in my top 10 ahead of Kobe. Frazier over Baylor. I was big on Arizin and Neil Johnston in part because of their huge scoring efficiency advantage. Let me have it, not somebody who has been one of the very few posters to consistently contribute in great detail and studiously and courteously express his perspective.

Moonbeam wrote:What a sad, sad way to end a great project. I'm on your side in the sense that I think Walton should be in by this point - I'd have put him in the 70-80 range somewhere. But the anger with which you have chosen to direct your post to someone who is posting legitimate counterpoints in a polite fashion and in a fashion consistent with the own criteria that he has mapped out in post after post after post in great detail is not cool. You can make your point about available stats missing the mark and warning against over-reliance on them without being so combative.

For what it's worth, trex is one of the more vocal posters about this project tending to focus too much on shooting efficiency. He championed Iverson very hard. Cousy, too. I'm probably one of the ones who needs to be the object of your rant more than trex. Hell, I even came up with new freaking metrics based on scoring volume and efficiency. I have Dantley in my top 50. West in my top 10 ahead of Kobe. Frazier over Baylor. I was big on Arizin and Neil Johnston in part because of their huge scoring efficiency advantage. Let me have it, not somebody who has been one of the very few posters to consistently contribute in great detail and studiously and courteously express his perspective.

I've told people not to respond further to Wiggles post, but Moonbeam had already responded. And I'm going to respond here because I think it's appropriate. Other people may respond to Moonbeam also, but not as a way to escalate anything.

So first off: Moonbeam, really glad to have you aboard. We're lucky to have you. It's not easy to get a guy who can actually work with the stat and also has a separate bit of basketball intuition, and is also a nice guy. So yeah, you're right it would make sense for an anti-stats person to tee off on you in particular, and they'd be wrong to do so.

I'll also jump in with regards to Walton and note: Everyone knows I'm a "stat guy" and I'm also someone who questions whether Walton should drop this far. So it's not really about about stat guys taking over here. It's simply a matter of how you view peak vs longevity, and everyone should question whether Walton's total career is worth being Top 100 in this project. As an example: Is Walton really one of the top 100 best prospects in an All-Time Draft if he's only going to play as much as he did? Is he really going to win you more total games than the other guys being considered?

The answer to these questions is important for someone in this project, but to an outsider coming in evaluating it, the actual answer is not nearly as important as acknowledging that the answer is debatable. These things aren't easy. People do their best. For the most part this deep in the project it's silly to even suggest homeristic bias. People are dying just to be done with this now.

And so now is not the time to be critical. Now is the time to just pat on the back and be done. Later we can look at what mistakes we think may have been made.

Vote: Chet Walker

Okay, so I'll change my vote from Bellamy to another player, once again.

Walker didn't peak nearly as high as Bellamy, boxscore-wise, but he was very consistent throughout his entire career, very good scorer (very efficient for his era), solid rebounder, good defensive reputation, as well. Very good longevity, especially for his era. Retired at age 35 in 1975, but averaged about 19/6/2 with 19.5 and almost 57% TS, so indications are that he could've played a few more seasons on a high level. Meaningful contributor in every season of his career. Decent enough playoff performer. Could be a great role/complementary player, as well as one of the main stars of his team. His career was fairly similar to John Havlicek's - began his career as a role player and emerged as a real star around the age of 30. In his 13-year career, he played on losing teams just twice (and even those losing teams weren't really horrible - '64 Sixers finished 34-46, '70 Bulls finished 39-43). He was an ironman, never played less than 76 games in a season (averaged 30+ minutes in all but two of his seasons, so he played a major role on his teams). Walker reminds me of Paul Pierce, who is my favorite player, so you guys can see why I like Chet here.

Penbeast is voting for Bob Dandridge, who is pretty deserving at this point, too, but I prefer Walker due to better longevity and slightly more efficient scoring (as far as longevity, Walker's total career WS is 127.7, Dandridge's is 91.3 - pretty big gap in Walker's favor).

Why Walker over Bellamy? Well, Chet seems to be a bit more than his numbers, Walt seems to be (at least) a bit less.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnMbsY3xXaI[/youtube]

^^^^

It's a good point about Walker. I have him in my top 100 (just barely, presently at #99), though at times I look him over and wonder if he should be higher (perhaps as high as the 85-90 range); and your post has me considering. Seems kinda like Paul Pierce lite: SF who does A LOT of things well to very well (though perhaps not elite), with very few weak spots in his game. Similar to PP, he wasn't crazily athletic, more of a skill-based game (which is why it ages so well). No where near the playmaker Pierce is, though.

Not changing my vote yet, though I reserve the right to do so (in favor of maybe Lucas, Walker, or Timmy Hardaway) pending how things play out.

Vote for #100: Terry Porter

Could have easily voted for Marques Johnson, but I decided to go with Terry Porter for his very good longevity, portable skill-set and impressive prime playoff resume. Although his prime (88-93) wasn't lengthy, Porter added enough high quality role player seasons to have very good career longevity.

Porter was a very efficient scorer and excellent 3 PT shooter (prime: 39.3%, career: 38.6%), solid defender (could guard 2s when needed), effective penetrator with deceptive quickness and good playmaker/decision maker. Porter was also an impressive prime playoff performer, especially from 90-92, and knew how to use his size and strength against smaller/ weaker PGs. Based on their skill-sets and ability to step up during the PS, I think the closest recent comp to prime Porter is Chauncey Billups.

Prime Porter RS (88-93):
487 GP, 35.3 MPG | Per 100: 23.1 PTS, 10.6 AST, 5.1 REB, 2.3 STL, 3.6 TOV, 120 ORtg, 107 DRtg

18.2 PER, .587 TS%, .393 3 PT%, .358 FTr, 30.8 AST%, 15.5 TOV%, .176 WS/48

Prime Porter PS (88-93):
69 GP, 39.2 MPG | Per 100: 25.4 PTS, 8.5 AST, 4.7 REB, 1.6 STL, 3.1 TOV, 125 ORtg, 112 DRtg

18.4 PER, .612 TS%, .392 3 PT%, .452 FTr, 26.4 AST%, 12.9 TOV%, .171 WS/48

Porter was pretty impressive during the PS from 90-92 when the Blazers were legit title contenders. Managed to outperform Drexler in a few series and destroyed Stockton in the 92 WCF.

90-92 Porter PS (58 GP):
Per 100: 25.7 PTS, 8.8 AST, 4.4 REB, 127 ORtg, 112 DRtg | 19.0 PER, .628 TS%, .414 3 PT%, .507 FTr, .185 WS/48

92 WCF v UTA:

Porter: 26 ppg, 8.3 apg, 4 rpg on .724 TS%, .529 3 PT%, 149 ORtg, 117 DRtg, 25.0 Game Score

Stockton: 14.3 ppg, 11.2 apg, 2.2 rpg on .535 TS%, .231 3 PT%, 114 ORtg, 121 DRtg, 14.0 Game Score

Highlights from Porter's 41 PTS on only 14 shots game 2 of 92 WCF v UTA:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAIouCRio6s&app=desktop[/youtube]

Highlights from Porter's 26 point game 2 of 91 WCF v LAL:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53IGG4ygn1E[/youtube]

Vote: Penny Hardaway

Penny was a PG/SG hybrid who could take on enormous ball-handling responsibility and balance finding his own shot with distributing on a historically dominant offense. He did this two years straight: 1995 and 1996.

In 1997, Shaq left and Penny and the rest of the team had season-long injury woes. In the playoffs, Orlando faced the best defense in the league, Alonzo Mourning's Miami Heat. Penny did a better job against them than prime Michael Jordan did two rounds later.

Penny was a generational offensive talent. Elite post game and mid-range game, could stroke the 3, and could slash from anywhere. He used his superstar gravity to help his teammates. He could play pick-n-roll, pick-n-roll pop, was an elite post-entry passer, could play the role of pure PG, or could attack the basket and be a featured scorer. He had a great NBA Finals in 1995 with 25.5 points and 8 assists per game (63.7% TS).

He might be the best peak player left (only Walton has a case, and Walton makes Penny look like Robert Parish ITO longevity).

Five votes for five different players so far - Bob Dandridge, Walt Bellamy, Chet Walker, Terry Porter and Penny Hardaway. What are we going to do? Considering this is the last thread, maybe we can give ourselves some more time and it'll allow someone to cast their vote?

I'd switch to Marques Johnson, Tim Hardaway or Detlef Schrempf if they started to receive votes and I was still the only one voting for Porter.

Before I place my vote, I'm going to take a moment to ackowledge penbeast for organizing this. It takes great dedication to oversee a project like this over the span of 9 months, and you've been terrific. I've greatly appreciated taking part when I have had the time, and I know that I will refer back to these polls over and over again for further information. It's been a great experience for me, and I feel my understanding of the game has deepened for having taken part.

I'd also like to take a moment to acknowledge a player who should have (would have?) been in these discussions had it not been for injuries, and that is Brandon Roy. If you allow me to don my homer goggles for a minute, Brandon Roy may be a crucial reason why the Blazers still play in Portland. The Jail Blazer era nearly killed the franchise. Fans tuned out in droves as player after player got caught up with the wrong side of the law or other stupidity. A string of 21 consecutive playoff berths was broken in 2003-04 as the team devolved into absolute chaos, with bad personnel moves and bad characters threatening to kill Blazermania. The team sank to the bottom of the standings AND the bottom of attendance in 2005-06 in a city with no other pro sports teams after being 6th in the league in attendance just 3 years prior. Paul Allen put the Blazers up for sale after that season, and who knows what may have happened?

Then, Portland made a couple of thrifty draft-day moves and landed Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge, and turned the franchise around. LMA has been the staple, but Roy has the wunderkind. While some scoffed at the moves, it gave many fans hope. Allen pulled the team from sale in August, and Brandon immediately became the face of the Blazers, even though he had to endure another season of Zach Randolph as the big gun (back when he hadn't put it together maturity-wise). Roy's impact was immediate. Quickly dubbed "The Natural", he had the coolness of a 5-year vet out of the gate. Portland still struggled, but there was hope, and Roy's attitude quickly caught on. After beating the playoff-bound Jazz near the end of the season and therefore hurting their lottery position, Roy added: "As long as I'm on the court, I'm going to keep trying to hurt that lottery selection," he said. "I'm playing to win." Of course they did win in landing the number 1 pick in the most hyped draft in a long time, and the Oden vs. Durant decision became the talk of the league, not just Portland.

We all know how that panned out, but it didn't matter, Roy took Portland back into relevance again. "Rise With Us" was the motto, and the attendance quickly followed, back up to 7th in 2007-08, a season that started a hundreds-of-games sellout streak. He developed the reputation as a clutch monster (check out the stat), and this moment is one that I'll never forget, having listened to it on the radio as League Pass had not yet become a thing. You've probably seen it, but if you haven't, it's a lot of fun:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61dRAp0voaM[/youtube]

He made the All-Star team that year rather unexpectedly thanks to Portland's surprise start culminating in a 13-game winning streak, and though the team fizzled to a 41-41 finish, Roy was clearly a star.

In 2008-09, he broke out and became one of the top 10 players in the league. He had a knack for picking it up in nationally televised games, too:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO5erRRZ5tk[/youtube]

Oden played 61 games as a rookie, and with Batum and Aldridge, the team was building something special. When the game was in doubt, there was nobody I'd rather have shooting the ball than Brandon Roy. As a Blazer fan, I've been spoiled with Lillard, but Roy takes it for me:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4isKS1AeY2k[/youtube]

Portland finally returned to the playoffs, but they bowed out to a tougher Rocket team. Roy was BRILLIANT though, the lone bright spot in the first glimpse of the shortcomings of Nate McMillan as a coach (choosing to allow Joel Przybilla to front Yao Ming for an entire half while he sliced and diced the Blazers to the tune of a Game 1 blowout). Ron Artest even said that Roy was harder to guard than Kobe. Roy would go on to win All-NBA 2nd team honors.

In 2010, expectations were huge, as Portland had broken through the previous season and acquired Andre Miller in the offseason. Despite a 12-5 start, though, a lot of fans were concerned, as Roy was off to a rather pedestrian start. A 3-game losing streak didn't help, and then Oden went down for the last time. That took the sails out of everyone, but then Brandon Roy unleashed his true peak, going 27-5-5 over December and January on the slowest-paced team in the league. That was his peak, in my view. He'd go down at the end of the season with a knee injury from which he'd never fully recover, though he tried his hardest and rushed back in Game 4 of the playoff series against the Suns.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_syeaAB1LEY[/youtube]

Sadly, that was the end of superstar Roy. He became a shell of himself in 2011, though he had that one last moment of pure magic that still makes me teary-eyed:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB-FGLPT-fo[/youtube]

He had a top 1% heart and a bottom 1% set of luck with health, sadly. But Roy was so much more than just a great player - Portland is Rip City again in large part because of him, and for that, I can't thank him enough.

As for my vote, I'm going with Bill Walton. Clearly the best peak of anyone left, and I think I'd rather have one or two very good shots at a title with the best player in the league than 10 or so long shots with a fringe top-10 guy.

EDIT - vote for #100 - jerry lucas

on the go, so I could add the full write up later, but main reasons:

- elite rebounder during his era rivaling wilt and Russell
- great outside shooting big who could likely develop a 3 in today's game
- typically lost to eventual NBA champs when teamed with Oscar, so few upsets
- made seamless transition to fitting in with Knicks and helping them to their 73 title
- consistent production in RS and PS throughout his career

- - - - - - - - - - -

Leaving my Monroe write up here so I can come back and grab it later

Quotatious wrote:Five votes for five different players so far - Bob Dandridge, Walt Bellamy, Chet Walker, Terry Porter and Penny Hardaway. What are we going to do? Considering this is the last thread, maybe we can give ourselves some more time and it'll allow someone to cast their vote?

Make that 7!

Penny.

We require reasoning for our votes; it's about the discussion more than the result.