RealGM

We're in round 2!

This is a voting based tournament to determine who was the GOAT team to not win a title. The original thread for this is

here

Each matchup will utilize the rules, refs, & equipment of the older team in this tournament. This hopefully will eliminate a bit of the recency bias. Health is as it was at the close of the Regular Season; perhaps a team didn't win because of injury.

One last thing. Voting without any reason listed at all will not be counted. Each thread will be open until it slips to page 2 of the board.

'91 Blazers 63-19, lost in WCF in 6 to the Lakers, SRS +8.5, Offense +4.9, Defense -3.6
Duckworth
Williams
Kersey
Drexler
Porter

Robinson
Ainge
M. Bryant



'17 Spurs 61-21, SRS +7.1, Offense +2.3, Defense -5.3
Pau
Aldridge
Kawhi
Green
Parker

Manu
Lee
SImmons
Dedmon
Mills

I think these are two of the best teams in this tournament. I'm curious to see how much of Kawhi's recent success in Toronto will sway the vote. To be clear - I don't think it's unreasonable to pick the Spurs here - these are two excellent squads each of whom could win this thing. I've seen some very bullish Kawhi opinions recently though. . . .

Why 91 Blazers and not 90 or 92 when they actually got to the Finals? And why the 17 Spurs, who were not as good as the 16 Spurs? Really got to question the year choices here.

Anyway, going by those years Spurs would win (at full strength). The Blazers had a lot of talent, but they were a one dimensional team who thrived on playing fast and overwhelming the opponent. Detroit in the 1990 Finals and especially the Lakers in 1991 beat them by slowing the game down, turning it into a half court grind. Blazers were actually clearly more talented than the ageing Lakers in 1991, but Magic just totally controlled the pace of the series and Drexler and co. struggled to get anything going consistently in the halfcourt.

The Spurs under Popovich are masters at setting the pace and while Kawhi isn't Magic he has the ability to dominate offensively in a half court grind. That Portland team is simply to one dimension to beat Popovich and Kawhi over 7 games.

Joey Wheeler wrote:Why 91 Blazers and not 90 or 92 when they actually got to the Finals? And why the 17 Spurs, who were not as good as the 16 Spurs? Really got to question the year choices here.

Anyway, going by those years Spurs would win (at full strength). The Blazers had a lot of talent, but they were a one dimensional team who thrived on playing fast and overwhelming the opponent. Detroit in the 1990 Finals and especially the Lakers in 1991 beat them by slowing the game down, turning it into a half court grind. Blazers were actually clearly more talented than the ageing Lakers in 1991, but Magic just totally controlled the pace of the series and Drexler and co. struggled to get anything going consistently in the halfcourt.

The Spurs under Popovich are masters at setting the pace and while Kawhi isn't Magic he has the ability to dominate offensively in a half court grind. That Portland team is simply to one dimension to beat Popovich and Kawhi over 7 games.

In situations like the '90-'92 Blazers - where multiple teams qualified - I went with the one that had the highest SRS to be consistent/objective.

This tournament was about looking for cores that never won a ring. I was looking for teams that were 3 years off from winning a chip and/or teams where the top end players were different.

'14 Spurs - players with > 300 playoff minutes
Duncan
Kawhi
Parker
Diaw
Manu
Green
Splitter
Bellinelli
Mills

'17 Spurs - players with > 200 playoff minutes - differences are in bold

Aldridge
Green
Kawhi
Mills
Pau
Simmons
Manu
Lee
Parker

So, roughly 1/2 the core had turned over, & the people who played the most minutes in '14 had largely changed. Hope that makes sense.

I'm going to go with the team that I think is probably the best candidate tow in this type of tournament if it were possible to play out in real life.

The 1990-1992 Blazers were awesome!

The amount of talent on those teams is really special and they fit together nicely. I like Rick Adelman as a coach a lot, but I can't help but think he and Blazers management missed a few chances to make this team even better, maybe even a dynasty to rival the Bulls.

First, he never used Drazen Petrovic correctly and as a result, he bailed for New Jersey. Ainge was a great fit, but imagine a three guard line-up with Drexler, Drazen and Porter. That's a lineup that succeeds in any era, especially post-three point line.

Second, they never really pushed to bring Arvydas Sabonis over. It may not have been possible until the 1991-92 season depending on who and what you believe, but considering how quickly Bob Whitsitt was able to pin him down and get him to join the team in 1994, it seems like it was worth exploring. Imagine replacing that teams one weakness, Duckworth at center, with one of the top three centers of his generation and probably the best all-around player when you consider ability to fit in with the team concept.

Third, they never developed a trapping defense the way the Bad Boy Pistons, Bulls and Lakers on the mid-late 80's had. They had the length and athleticism to do it, but they just weren't creative enough.

Still, that was a great team for three seasons. I think they just have too much scoring for the Spurs to contend with. We saw the 2015-2017 Spurs struggle in the playoffs at times despite being a dominant regular season team. They were too predictable and too much of what they did was based around exploiting inefficiencies in opponents, which are typically minimized during the postseason, especially as you get into the later rounds.

The length of Porter and Drexler figures to makes things difficult on Parker and Manu and they have at least three different guys they could throw at Kawhi to make life more difficult for him. The the front court depth advantage that the Spurs had in the modern era is also marginalized by the number of physical bruising defenders the Blazers have.

I'll go Blazers in Five. Porter is the star of the series overall, but Cliff Robinson plays a huge role both guarding Kawhi down the stretch and anchoring the second unit defense which the Spurs often exploited otherwise.

JoeMalburg wrote:I'm going to go with the team that I think is probably the best candidate tow in this type of tournament if it were possible to play out in real life.

The 1990-1992 Blazers were awesome!

The amount of talent on those teams is really special and they fit together nicely. I like Rick Adelman as a coach a lot, but I can't help but think he and Blazers management missed a few chances to make this team even better, maybe even a dynasty to rival the Bulls.

First, he never used Drazen Petrovic correctly and as a result, he bailed for New Jersey. Ainge was a great fit, but imagine a three guard line-up with Drexler, Drazen and Porter. That's a lineup that succeeds in any era, especially post-three point line.

Second, they never really pushed to bring Arvydas Sabonis over. It may not have been possible until the 1991-92 season depending on who and what you believe, but considering how quickly Bob Whitsitt was able to pin him down and get him to join the team in 1994, it seems like it was worth exploring. Imagine replacing that teams one weakness, Duckworth at center, with one of the top three centers of his generation and probably the best all-around player when you consider ability to fit in with the team concept.

Third, they never developed a trapping defense the way the Bad Boy Pistons, Bulls and Lakers on the mid-late 80's had. They had the length and athleticism to do it, but they just weren't creative enough.

Still, that was a great team for three seasons. I think they just have too much scoring for the Spurs to contend with. We saw the 2015-2017 Spurs struggle in the playoffs at times despite being a dominant regular season team. They were too predictable and too much of what they did was based around exploiting inefficiencies in opponents, which are typically minimized during the postseason, especially as you get into the later rounds.

The length of Porter and Drexler figures to makes things difficult on Parker and Manu and they have at least three different guys they could throw at Kawhi to make life more difficult for him. The the front court depth advantage that the Spurs had in the modern era is also marginalized by the number of physical bruising defenders the Blazers have.

I'll go Blazers in Five. Porter is the star of the series overall, but Cliff Robinson plays a huge role both guarding Kawhi down the stretch and anchoring the second unit defense which the Spurs often exploited otherwise.

Personally I'm not a great believer in "clutch performance" considering such variations to be largely sample size, randomness, matchups, uneven competition etc.

But two players you highlight, one as important and one as a possible source of improvement (though perhaps not for this hypothetical tournament) Robinson and Petrovic, are among the worst in terms of career playoff production drop-off. Is that a concern?

In terms of living up to expectations in the playoffs, the Blazers were probably fortunate to advance through two series in which they were outscored in 1990 and lost with their best team to a slightly lesser Laker team in '91 (Duckworth, their Achilles heel, came up small).


Anyhow, two great teams. I don't think you can go wrong with either.

pandrade83 wrote:

Joey Wheeler wrote:Why 91 Blazers and not 90 or 92 when they actually got to the Finals? And why the 17 Spurs, who were not as good as the 16 Spurs? Really got to question the year choices here.

Anyway, going by those years Spurs would win (at full strength). The Blazers had a lot of talent, but they were a one dimensional team who thrived on playing fast and overwhelming the opponent. Detroit in the 1990 Finals and especially the Lakers in 1991 beat them by slowing the game down, turning it into a half court grind. Blazers were actually clearly more talented than the ageing Lakers in 1991, but Magic just totally controlled the pace of the series and Drexler and co. struggled to get anything going consistently in the halfcourt.

The Spurs under Popovich are masters at setting the pace and while Kawhi isn't Magic he has the ability to dominate offensively in a half court grind. That Portland team is simply to one dimension to beat Popovich and Kawhi over 7 games.

In situations like the '90-'92 Blazers - where multiple teams qualified - I went with the one that had the highest SRS to be consistent/objective.

This tournament was about looking for cores that never won a ring. I was looking for teams that were 3 years off from winning a chip and/or teams where the top end players were different.

'14 Spurs - players with > 300 playoff minutes
Duncan
Kawhi
Parker
Diaw
Manu
Green
Splitter
Bellinelli
Mills

'17 Spurs - players with > 200 playoff minutes - differences are in bold

Aldridge
Green
Kawhi
Mills
Pau
Simmons
Manu
Lee
Parker

So, roughly 1/2 the core had turned over, & the people who played the most minutes in '14 had largely changed. Hope that makes sense.

Fair enough. Think your methodology produced some wonky results here though: making the Finals twice seems a bit more relevant than winning by more points in RS games. Not to mention Portland got brutally exposed vs the Lakers that year in the playoffs and the Lakers weren't really all that special by that point.

And valuing SRS, the Spurs in 2016 are actually one of the best teams ever period, they actually had way higher SRS than the Cavs, who actually won the title that year.

For Portland I don't think it makes a big difference which team you choose, they were roughly same level 90-92, for the Spurs however... their 2016 was historically great, 2017 really wasn't. This is kind of important in a tournament like this because I think Spurs 2016 would actually be a legit contender to win it, Spurs 2017 defo aren't. If I understood correctly you chose 2017 because you considered that their 2016 core had already won in 2014?

Joey Wheeler wrote:

pandrade83 wrote:

Joey Wheeler wrote:Why 91 Blazers and not 90 or 92 when they actually got to the Finals? And why the 17 Spurs, who were not as good as the 16 Spurs? Really got to question the year choices here.

Anyway, going by those years Spurs would win (at full strength). The Blazers had a lot of talent, but they were a one dimensional team who thrived on playing fast and overwhelming the opponent. Detroit in the 1990 Finals and especially the Lakers in 1991 beat them by slowing the game down, turning it into a half court grind. Blazers were actually clearly more talented than the ageing Lakers in 1991, but Magic just totally controlled the pace of the series and Drexler and co. struggled to get anything going consistently in the halfcourt.

The Spurs under Popovich are masters at setting the pace and while Kawhi isn't Magic he has the ability to dominate offensively in a half court grind. That Portland team is simply to one dimension to beat Popovich and Kawhi over 7 games.

In situations like the '90-'92 Blazers - where multiple teams qualified - I went with the one that had the highest SRS to be consistent/objective.

This tournament was about looking for cores that never won a ring. I was looking for teams that were 3 years off from winning a chip and/or teams where the top end players were different.

'14 Spurs - players with > 300 playoff minutes
Duncan
Kawhi
Parker
Diaw
Manu
Green
Splitter
Bellinelli
Mills

'17 Spurs - players with > 200 playoff minutes - differences are in bold

Aldridge
Green
Kawhi
Mills
Pau
Simmons
Manu
Lee
Parker

So, roughly 1/2 the core had turned over, & the people who played the most minutes in '14 had largely changed. Hope that makes sense.

Fair enough. Think your methodology produced some wonky results here though: making the Finals twice seems a bit more relevant than winning by more points in RS games. Not to mention Portland got brutally exposed vs the Lakers that year in the playoffs and the Lakers weren't really all that special by that point.

And valuing SRS, the Spurs in 2016 are actually one of the best teams ever period, they actually had way higher SRS than the Cavs, who actually won the title that year.

For Portland I don't think it makes a big difference which team you choose, they were roughly same level 90-92, for the Spurs however... their 2016 was historically great, 2017 really wasn't. This is kind of important in a tournament like this because I think Spurs 2016 would actually be a legit contender to win it, Spurs 2017 defo aren't. If I understood correctly you chose 2017 because you considered that their 2016 core had already won in 2014?

Yes, this is discussed in the thread linked to in the OP. Both the concept and the specific example of the '16 Spurs (sharing 7 of their top 8 with the champs of '14).

Owly wrote:

Joey Wheeler wrote:

pandrade83 wrote:
In situations like the '90-'92 Blazers - where multiple teams qualified - I went with the one that had the highest SRS to be consistent/objective.

This tournament was about looking for cores that never won a ring. I was looking for teams that were 3 years off from winning a chip and/or teams where the top end players were different.

'14 Spurs - players with > 300 playoff minutes
Duncan
Kawhi
Parker
Diaw
Manu
Green
Splitter
Bellinelli
Mills

'17 Spurs - players with > 200 playoff minutes - differences are in bold

Aldridge
Green
Kawhi
Mills
Pau
Simmons
Manu
Lee
Parker

So, roughly 1/2 the core had turned over, & the people who played the most minutes in '14 had largely changed. Hope that makes sense.

Fair enough. Think your methodology produced some wonky results here though: making the Finals twice seems a bit more relevant than winning by more points in RS games. Not to mention Portland got brutally exposed vs the Lakers that year in the playoffs and the Lakers weren't really all that special by that point.

And valuing SRS, the Spurs in 2016 are actually one of the best teams ever period, they actually had way higher SRS than the Cavs, who actually won the title that year.

For Portland I don't think it makes a big difference which team you choose, they were roughly same level 90-92, for the Spurs however... their 2016 was historically great, 2017 really wasn't. This is kind of important in a tournament like this because I think Spurs 2016 would actually be a legit contender to win it, Spurs 2017 defo aren't. If I understood correctly you chose 2017 because you considered that their 2016 core had already won in 2014?

Yes, this is discussed in the thread linked to in the OP. Both the concept and the specific example of the '16 Spurs (sharing 7 of their top 8 with the champs of '14).

You’re correct (as is Owly). The 17 spurs were chosen over the 16 spurs because the 16 core had already won the title.

This project is intentionally precluding cores that had already won and trying to identify the best core to never win a ring. Does that make sense?

These are two great teams & I'm sad to have to vote one off. With that said, I'll take the Spurs in 6. San Antonio's length, size & discipline would be a strong counter to Portland's relentless/frentic athleticism. Portland struggled against disciplined teams that could slow the game down (people forget that the '92 Bulls were amongst the slowest paced teams). Duckworth was a pretty poor starter & I could see him having a miserable series against the Spurs' deep & talented front line.

It's a shame because these are both teams that are on my contender list to win this tournament.