#39 - GOAT peaks project (2019)

[LA Bird]

1) Michael Jordan 1990-91
2) LeBron James 2012-13
3) Wilt Chamberlain 1966-67
4) Shaquille O'Neal 1999-00
5) Kareem Abdul-Jabbar 1976-77
6) Tim Duncan 2002-03
7) Larry Bird 1985-86
8) Bill Russell 1963-64
9) Hakeem Olajuwon 1993-94
10) Magic Johnson 1986-87
11) Kevin Garnett 2003-04
12) Julius Erving 1975-76
13) Bill Walton 1976-77
14) Oscar Robertson 1963-64
15) Stephen Curry 2015-16
16) Dwyane Wade 2008-09
17) Jerry West 1965-66
18) David Robinson 1994-95
19) Dirk Nowitzki 2010-11
20) Kobe Bryant 2007-08
21) Tracy McGrady 2002-03
22) Moses Malone 1982-83
23) Patrick Ewing 1989-90
24) Kevin Durant 2013-14
25) Russell Westbrook 2016-17
26) Charles Barkley 1992-93
27) Kawhi Leonard 2018-19
28) Chris Paul 2007-08
29) George Mikan 1948-49
30) Steve Nash 2004-05
31) Giannis Antetokounmpo 2018-19
32) Karl Malone 1996-97
33) Dwight Howard 2010-11
34) Artis Gilmore 1974-75
35) James Harden 2018-19
36) Willis Reed 1968-69
37) Rick Barry 1974-75
38) Bob McAdoo 1974-75

Please include at least 1 sentence of reasoning for each of your 3 picks. A simple list of names will not be counted.

Deadline: 5pm November 18 Eastern Time
As with past peaks project, this one seems to have run its course at around the same point. I'll stop at 40 so this will be the second to last round.

The Voting System:

Everyone gives their 1st choice (4.5 points), 2nd choice (3 points), and 3rd choice (2 points). Highest point-total wins the round.
You can use your 3 choices to vote for more than 1 season of the same player (if you think that the best 3 seasons among the players left belong all to the same player, nothing is stopping you from using all you 3 choices on that player), but you can't continue voting for other seasons of that player once he wins and gets his spot. The final list will be 1 season per player.

Thank you for your participation!

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[cecilthesheep]

1. 1959 Bob Pettit - Pettit was the first real offensive superstar of the shot clock era, and had impact in a few different ways: this is rather conjectural from the extremely limited film available, but he seemed to rely a lot on a combination of layups/putbacks with an outside jumper. Notably, he didn't take as many inefficient hooks as I'm used to seeing from that era. He was either spacing the floor or taking a high-efficiency shot. He had some impact as a passer as well, one of the first guys who really got good at drawing the defense to himself and finding a teammate. 1959 through 1961 was his best run of team + individual success; I've been convinced to go 1959 over '60, see below for good points made by LA Bird

2. 1960 Bob Pettit - same guy, same team, slightly worse individual and meaningfully less impressive team stats

3. 1961 Bob Pettit - got a lot of rebounds this year, but again, same guy, same team; slightly less impressive playoffs

[cecilthesheep]

I will probably vote for Baylor before this project ends, if Pettit gets in. I'd be interested to hear everyone's thoughts on Dave Cowens, Reggie Miller, Scottie Pippen, Allen Iverson, John Havlicek, George Gervin, and Cousy.

A lot of people thought Cousy was the GOAT before Russell; they may be wrong, but I think it's worth analyzing where that comes from. I think the Nash/Magic comps have some merit, although the offensive rating tanking with Russell's arrival is weird.

[trex_8063]

1st ballot - '18 Anthony Davis
Excellent and versatile two-way player, statistical giant in both rs and playoffs, solid(ish) impact metrics. Had initially voted for '15 version, but pursuant to discussion beginning in post #9 of the 37th peak thread, have switched to '18 version of AD.


2nd ballot - '61 Elgin Baylor
To some degree the volume vs. efficiency considerations of Baylor (among others from this era) should be viewed with a bit of leniency, imo, as efficiency and "finding a good shot" just wasn't on anyone's radar in the early 1960's. And at any rate '61 Baylor was significantly above league avg efficiency (especially in the playoffs, where he shot a TS% that would be decent even by today's standards, despite lack of 3pt line, decent spacing, or restrictions on hand-checking). Any way you slice it, Baylor was an excellent (if not quite elite) scorer, and underrated playmaker for the SF position, as well as a GOAT-level rebounder for his position, and likely a better defender than some of the perimeter players voted in recently (e.g. Nash or Harden).

Baylor '61 rs per 100 possession estimates: 31.1 pts, 17.75 reb, 4.55 ast @ +2.91% rTS. 28.2 PER, .227 WS/48 in 42.9 mpg
Baylor '61 playoff per 100 possession estimates: 32.5 pts, 13.1 reb, 3.9 ast @ +6.89% rTS (53.83% TS, which would be semi-respectable even by today's standards). 28.0 PER, .248 WS/48 in 45.0 mpg

Some additional stuff about prime Baylor in general (copied from another thread), as far as it can be applied specifically to '61:

Spoiler:

Here's some more info regarding Baylor's impact, draw your own conclusions.....

In '58 (before Baylor), the Lakers were 19-53 (.264) with an SRS of -5.78.

In '59 they obtain rookie Elgin Baylor (and he's the only relevant transaction that occurred), and improve to 33-39 (.458) and -1.42 SRS (improvement of 14 wins and +4.36 SRS). They would also make it to the finals by first defeating a -1.36 SRS Detroit team 2-1, and then defeating the +2.89 SRS defending champ St. Louis Hawks 4-2.
wrt to how that improvement was managed......
Yeah, we always tend to think of Baylor as primarily an offensive player; but there's some to suggest he had a significant impact defensively, too. His reputation is mostly as a "decent" (but not great) defender, though I wonder if perhaps his prowess on the glass reduced a lot of easy second-chance opportunities for opponents (he was 3rd in the league in rebounds right off the bat in his rookie season).
Because in terms of rORTG, the Lakers in '58 (before Baylor) were -0.8 (ranked 6th of 8), and in rDRTG were +4.5 (8th of 8, and +2.5 to the 7th place team!). In '59, their rORTG improves to +0.6 (a jump of 1.4, up to 4th of 8); but rDRTG improves to +1.7 (a big jump of 2.8, from a distant last place to 6th of 8).
The team is 33-37 (.471) with him, 0-2 without him.


In '60, an aging Vern Mikkelsen has retired, aging Larry Foust misses some games and is playing a reduced role, too. Meanwhile the offensive primacy of the wildly inefficient (even for the era) Hot Rod Hundley increases, as well as a marginally increase in role for the even worse Slick Leonard (ridiculously bad 37.3% TS.....that's even -9% relative to league avg; similar to someone shooting 44% TS or so today; you'd have to be an elite defender to get ANY playing time at all today, and no way would you be getting 28+ mpg and be 6th on the team in FGA/g.....goes to show how efficiency just wasn't on the radar yet). And they also obtained rookie Rudy LaRusso (who would eventually become a pretty good player, but is a fairly inefficient scorer in his rookie season). They also obtained the somewhat inefficient Frank Selvy as well as an aging 6'11" Ray Felix in mid-season trades.
Anyway, their rORTG falls to -3.4 (8th of 8), though their defense continues to improve to +0.1 rDRTG (4th of 8), as they finish 25-50 (-4.14 SRS).
The team is 23-47 (.329) with him, 2-3 (.400) without him.


In '61, we have the arrival of rookie Jerry West. He's not yet the player he would become, but nonetheless is the clear 2nd-best behind Baylor. This affords them to reduce the role of Hundley and Leonard in the backcourt. rORTG improves to -1.3 (7th of 8), rDRTG continues to improve to -1.2 (4th of 8).
The team is 34-39 (.466) with Baylor, 2-4 (.333) without him.


In '62, West is now a legit superstar, too. Slick Leonard is gone, and Hundley's role is further diminished; LaRusso continues to improve and get more efficient. Non-surprisingly, the team rORTG improves to +1.4 (3rd of 9). Critics might argue Baylor missing games contributed to this improvement in rORTG, but I'm more inclined to think it's the additive effects of a) the improvements in West and LaRusso, b) the loss of Leonard, and c) the reduced role of Hundley; especially in light of the following.......
Baylor misses 32 games, not due to injury, but rather to military service: he's only able to play if he can get a weekend pass to quickly travel to the game, play, and then come back. So he likely barely gets to practice, and yet still establishes himself among the league's elite---->Per 100 possession estimates: 33.6 pts, 16.3 reb, 4.1 ast @ +1.34% rTS in a whopping 44.4 mpg.
The team is 37-11 (.771) with him, 17-15 (.531) without him. Some of his missed games may have overlapped with West's missed games, but the thing is: West only missed 5 games total that year. And NO ONE else in their main rotation missed more than 2 games all year.
They make it to the finals and take the Russell Celtics to 7 games. Baylor averages 40.6 ppg, 17.9 rpg, and 3.7 apg in the series @ 51.0% TS (+3.1 rTS). In a close game 5 victory, Baylor logs [what I think is still an NBA finals record] 61 pts (and I believe 22 reb as well).


Going back to our agreement that impact = goodness + fit + utilization......I don't think Baylor was utilized ideally (something that I think is unfortunately true for MANY old era players). Yet there's still several indicators of substantial impact circa his peak, especially in '62.

EDIT: I'd also add this quote from The Rivalry: Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, and the Golden Age of Basketball by John Taylor....

.....Fans specifically came to see him [Baylor]. When he was on military duty and playing sporadically, they called the box office before games to ask if he would be appearing. The Lakers front office had run figures calculating Baylor’s ability to sell tickets, and they determined that in games when he did not play, the Lakers drew an average of 2,000 fewer fans. That amounted to approximately $6,000 per game, or $200,000 over the course of a season….

Correctly utilized, I think Baylor could be the best SF of the recent era not named Lebron or Kevin Durant:
1) a scorer capable of maybe 21-22 ppg at around 58% TS on a talent-laden team, or 27+ ppg on ~56% TS if shouldering bigger usage; basically a Carmelo level scorer....
2) but a better playmaker than Melo (very underrated aspect of Baylor's game)
3) a neutral [to maybe small positive??] level defender
4) and possibly the GOAT rebounding SF outside of Shawn Marion (roughly equal to peak Lebron in this regard).
To qualify this last, I'm going to bring up a [url=viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1412184#start_here]CavaliersFTW's thread[/url]:

Also note Baylor's reb/100 possession numbers in '61: 17.75.
Compare this to some other notables (mostly centers: including Wilt and Russell) in '61:
Wilt Chamberlain '61 - 20.7
Bill Russell '61 - 19.3
Walter Dukes '61 - 19.2
Bob Pettit '61 - 18.9
Wayne Embry '61 - 15.1
Bailey Howell '61 - 14.3
And here are a few other notables from shortly after '61:
Walt Bellamy '62 - 17.5
Jerry Lucas---renowned as one of the greatest rebounders or all-time---though not around in '61, in the mid-60's ('64-'67) averaged between 17.4 to 19.1 rebs/100 possessions
Gus Johnson only had one year with a reb/100 avg >17.75 (18.3 in '71; he otherwise ranged between 12.7 to 16.6)
Dave DeBusschere ranged between 11.8 to 14.3 rebs/100 possessions during his career.
BOTTOM LINE: Baylor's rebounding was no joke. He is elite in an all-time sense for his position.



3rd ballot - '59 Bob Pettit
I could see going a lot of ways with my 3rd ballot.......could swing back to Anthony Davis with his '15 campaign (which I'd initially favoured), but everyone else seems to be leaning toward '18 on him anyway. Also considering Walt Frazier [probably '72] or '68 Connie Hawkins, as well as maybe '06 Elton Brand, '87 Kevin McHale, or Alonzo Mourning ('99 or '00). But sometimes I think I'm sleeping on Bob Pettit because of era. The guy was a cagey athlete from what I've seen, is legit PF-sized even by modern(ish) standards, was the original "stretch-4" who had range out to around 20 ft (at least by late in his career), and a modern-looking jump-shot; also was pretty consistently behind only Russell and Wilt [+/- the low-minute, foul-accumulating Walter Dukes] in his rebounding rates (see above in the Elgin post).

Not only did he crush his own era, there's every reason to believe this is an elite player in ANY era.
The other hard part with him is: which year to go with?
Pretty much any of the years in the immediate vicinity of 1960 have a decent case, and '63 looks really good as well. I'm going with '59, a year in which he was the league's leading scorer while spear-heading the league's best offense, was 2nd [distantly, to Russell] in rpg, with the league-best PER and league-best total rs WS.
In the playoffs he perhaps could have been better, and it's a bit disappointing that they lost to an apparently worse Laker team in the first round. However, I've always weighted the rs more than most, and I also note that per my own Scaled PER and WS/48 studies, the rs PER of his '59 campaign is tied for 13th all-time [with '90 Michael Jordan], and his rs WS/48 barely made the cut (tied for 107th all-time, with '84 Larry Bird), too.
Could certainly see going with some of the others I've mentioned, but for now I'll go with the oldest-school candidate.

[trex_8063]

I will probably vote for Baylor before this project ends, if Pettit gets in. I'd be interested to hear everyone's thoughts on Dave Cowens, Reggie Miller, Scottie Pippen, Allen Iverson, John Havlicek, George Gervin, and Cousy.

A lot of people thought Cousy was the GOAT before Russell; they may be wrong, but I think it's worth analyzing where that comes from. I think the Nash/Magic comps have some merit, although the offensive rating tanking with Russell's arrival is weird.

I think the offense getting sharply worse was partly by design [although probably not with that exact intent]. But Auerbach somewhat spear-headed the frantic increase in league-wide pace (with his Celtics usually right out in front), and there was [of necessity to maintain that pace] the commonality of terrible shots going up early in the shot clock. I'd read he felt they could "run teams ragged", and perhaps he vaguely had a notion that the point-exchange (how many they scored per possession vs how many they allowed) would always be a + [because Russell was now anchoring that defensive end], so the more possessions they got in per game (even at bad offense) the better.

I'd also done some studies looking into the correlation of pace [at the extremes] and team rORTG, and found that past a certain point pace seems to be detrimental to rORTG. I found a small-moderate correlation [of increasing pace to decreasing rORTG] in years where the league average pace was >107; I found a more moderate correlation in years where it exceeded 115. Without going into too much detail, just consider the following:
In years with avg pace >115, there are 19 total teams with a rORTG of +3.0 or greater; only ONE of the 19 had an above average pace (at a somewhat modest +1.3 rPace). There are four teams with rORTG -5.0 or worse in these years......three of the four are rPace of greater than +2.0 (the other is -0.1). Of the thirteen highest rPaces in these years, ALL THIRTEEN had a below average rORTG. Of the seven lowest rPaces in these years, ALL SEVEN had a rORTG that was above average.

.....so that should give you an idea of how the extreme pace Red insisted they play during the Russell years was detrimental to their offense.

To some degree, though, criticisms that Cousy's game did not evolve at the same rate as the rest of the league was doing could also be at least a little bit valid. That's a bit more difficult say with any certainty, though. But anyway.....
Not that we need to take the numbers completely at face value, but they do make clear that Cousy really had relatively little claim on being the GOAT prior to Russell/Wilt. Guys like Schayes, Pettit, Arizin, Mikan (up to '54) and imo probably Neil Johnston were all probably better overall players than Cousy in most overlapping years. And I say this as someone who has more than once leapt to Cousy's defense from criticism on this forum.

What Cousy has going for him in terms of legacy are that he was one of the most popular (with fans and media) players of his era and was [imo] hugely beneficial to the national/global popularity of the game (which fuels player pool, which in turn fuels quality/competitiveness of the league), that he was sort of the proto-typical PG, that he was a key [if often overrated] piece of multiple contender-level teams, and that he had a fairly long and consistent prime (and thus left a not at all irrelevant statistical footprint on the game). Those are all factors which work in his favour [for me] in terms of his place in an all-time list.

But where his peak, specifically, is concerned.....tbh, I don't think we're even close to him yet. I think some of the aforementioned contemporaries (Schayes, Arizin, Johnston) would have to get in before him in a peaks project.

I could see campaigning for some of the other guys you mentioned soon [speaking for myself, Pippen and Gervin would likely come up slightly ahead of Iverson or Miller]; but for me probably not before AD, Baylor, Pettit, Hawkins, Frazier, Mourning, Brand, or Kevin McHale.
In that same neighborhood (as Pippen/Gervin) would be someone like Clyde Drexler [for me], EDIT (after reading LA Bird's post): also '96 Penny Hardaway, '74 Bob Lanier, +/- peak Kidd (he might be more of a bridger between Pippen/Gervin/Drexler/Penny/Lanier and the Miller/Iverson group).

[LA Bird]

1. 1960 Bob Pettit - Pettit was the first real offensive superstar of the shot clock era, and had impact in a few different ways: this is rather conjectural from the extremely limited film available, but he seemed to rely a lot on a combination of layups/putbacks with an outside jumper. Notably, he didn't take as many inefficient hooks as I'm used to seeing from that era. He was either spacing the floor or taking a high-efficiency shot. He had some impact as a passer as well, one of the first guys who really got good at drawing the defense to himself and finding a teammate. 1959 through 1961 was his best run of team + individual success; 1960 had the best playoff run, which I'll use as a tiebreaker.

1960 was the Hawks best playoffs run as a team but individually, Pettit was more or less the same player throughout those three postseasons. His only notable playoff run statisticially was 63, which is outside of the 59~61 range you are looking at here. Pettit's 60 regular season lags so far behind 59 statistically that I have a hard time seeing the PO difference as more significant than the RS difference (PER, WS48 at below career average vs career best).

I will probably vote for Baylor before this project ends, if Pettit gets in. I'd be interested to hear everyone's thoughts on Dave Cowens, Reggie Miller, Scottie Pippen, Allen Iverson, John Havlicek, George Gervin, and Cousy.

I would also add Lanier, Mourning, Penny and Kidd to your list of top candidates. Too bad this project will end before we get around to discussing these guys though.

A lot of people thought Cousy was the GOAT before Russell; they may be wrong, but I think it's worth analyzing where that comes from.

Correct me if I am wrong but I thought Mikan was still the consensus GOAT before Russell. Cousy and Pettit both won MVPs and were regarded as the best at their position but received little GOAT talks because basketball was still seen as a giant's game dominated by centers.

[cecilthesheep]

1. 1960 Bob Pettit - Pettit was the first real offensive superstar of the shot clock era, and had impact in a few different ways: this is rather conjectural from the extremely limited film available, but he seemed to rely a lot on a combination of layups/putbacks with an outside jumper. Notably, he didn't take as many inefficient hooks as I'm used to seeing from that era. He was either spacing the floor or taking a high-efficiency shot. He had some impact as a passer as well, one of the first guys who really got good at drawing the defense to himself and finding a teammate. 1959 through 1961 was his best run of team + individual success; 1960 had the best playoff run, which I'll use as a tiebreaker.

1960 was the Hawks best playoffs run as a team but individually, Pettit was more or less the same player throughout those three postseasons. His only notable playoff run statisticially was 63, which is outside of the 59~61 range you are looking at here. Pettit's 60 regular season lags so far behind 59 statistically that I have a hard time seeing the PO difference as more significant than the RS difference (PER, WS48 at below career average vs career best).

This is all true. After some thought, I'm gonna put '59 first and '60 second.

I will probably vote for Baylor before this project ends, if Pettit gets in. I'd be interested to hear everyone's thoughts on Dave Cowens, Reggie Miller, Scottie Pippen, Allen Iverson, John Havlicek, George Gervin, and Cousy.

I would also add Lanier, Mourning, Penny and Kidd to your list of top candidates. Too bad this project will end before we get around to discussing these guys though.

A lot of people thought Cousy was the GOAT before Russell; they may be wrong, but I think it's worth analyzing where that comes from.

Correct me if I am wrong but I thought Mikan was still the consensus GOAT before Russell. Cousy and Pettit both won MVPs and were regarded as the best at their position but received little GOAT talks because basketball was still seen as a giant's game dominated by centers.

Also true, I should probably say GOAT under 6'9". I don't really know where I've heard "GOAT before russell" but it's made it into my brain somehow. Shouldn't give that too much credence though.

I do like Lanier. Kidd I think didn't have the highest peak, I'd have him much higher on a career list. Mourning and Penny are solid choices but not who I see myself voting for before the 40th spot.

[penbeast0]

Going to continue to go with some of the less popular (and older) stars:

1. Walt Frazier 73 Led one of the most cohesive teams to a title despite losing Willis Reed for most of the year

2. Bob Pettit 58 The greatest 4th quarter in the history of the NBA to defeat Bill Russell's Boston Celtics (though Russell was injured). HAwks only ring. Although the rest of this season doesn't stand out from Pettit's consistent outstanding career, this one stretch seems to put it over the top for me. Great scorer and rebounder throughout his career.

3. Frazier 72 Not a championship but another great season followed by another great playoff run. Statistically a bit better than 73 though I think the championship puts 73 over it

[trex_8063]

This is all true. After some thought, I'm gonna put '59 first and '60 second.

.

Better change it in your original vote post if you're decided, or it may get miscounted.

[trex_8063]

Sadly I think this [3-4 voters; you should put your picks in, btw LABird, as we could use all the volume we could get] is all we'll see from here on. This is why we stopped at 40 last time [and even getting there was laborious], despite some initial enthusiasm to go to top 50......once everyone's past the handful they're either fans of or otherwise think really highly of----or perhaps when they realize their fav has no traction----they just seem to lose interest.

It's sort of a shame, because I think we could have some spirited debate determining the hierarchy of the peaks of guys like Pippen, Penny, Hill, Drexler, Gervin, Iverson, Lanier, Yao, Archibald, Stockton, etc etc; as well as where Hawkins, Haywood, McHale, Brand, and whoever else will end up being left off this top 40 (Mourning? Davis? Baylor?) work into this.

[LA Bird]

Sadly I think this [3-4 voters; you should put your picks in, btw LABird, as we could use all the volume we could get] is all we'll see from here on. This is why we stopped at 40 last time [and even getting there was laborious], despite some initial enthusiasm to go to top 50......once everyone's past the handful they're either fans of or otherwise think really highly of----or perhaps when they realize their fav has no traction----they just seem to lose interest.

This is why I think these kind of long projects should start bottom up instead of top down. There are two overriding factors in determining how many votes we get in these projects - time and player popularity. More people will vote in a Jordan vs LeBron thread than a Gilmore vs Lanier thread and people naturally lose interest in these projects over time after a few months time. With a bottom up approach where we first decide on the player pool and then countdown from #50, we can ensure a more balanced participation throughout the project because we get the less popular players out of the way when everybody is still interested in the project. There could even be incentives for participation by weighing votes depending on voting frequency in previous rounds. With the current top down approach, we get a huge rush of votes at the beginning when everybody joins to vote for their favorite GOATs but participation quickly declines once we go down the list. There was quite a sharp drop in participation by as early as round 15 (West won round 17 with only 2 votes).

Anyway, my votes with credit to E-Balla and you for the writeups:

1. 1999 Alonzo Mourning

Spoiler:

I've been alluding to how great and underrated Zo is but I haven't made a full post on it yet. It's pretty odd that looking around you can find write ups either here or from blogs about other players. There's nothing on Zo. I mean articles from professionals from back in the day exist but for some reason I can't find any breakdowns on Zo which is a shame because his impact was tremendous and at his peak he was on the same level as young Duncan, arguably better than Malone who barely won MVP over him, and was comparable to Shaq at the time (who played no defense).

Offensively Zo had a basic post game, and a pretty reliable jumper out to 15 feet (it was shaky outside of that). That's basically all (of course he had the signature Georgetown running hook like Ewing did but it was meh). Most of his points were gained due to his immense physical advantages. His turnaround was money because of the speed of his spin, he got deep position easily with his strength and finished strong, and his faceup drives worked because he had a jumper you had to play while having one of the best first steps for any C ever (Dwight comes to mind as faster). Zo also wanted it, and he played like it. Got him to the line often and got him a decent amount of putbacks. He was undersized but I think that played to his advantage more especially in the post Shaq era. He was in a league environment where teams kept a big plodder on the floor or on the roster and when matched up with one he was unstoppable. He didn't even need his jumper against some of the bigger guys in league history.

Watch on YouTube

His handles weren't great, he wasn't a great mover laterally, he didn't have spin moves or a strong drop step, but he still managed to be a 19-23 ppg scorer on between +5-7 rTS% each of the first 8 years of his career and a 20 ppg on 55 TS% guy in the playoffs.

He didn't pass well at all but Miami in both 98 and 99 had a +2.5ish offense. They had a +2.4 offense in 98 against NY and a +0.9 in 99 against them (that's slight underrated because NY's defense came alive in the playoffs). All in all Zo wasn't great but he was definitely a good enough first option to give you a top 10 offense that would hold in the playoffs against some tough ass squads in tough ass series (arguably the toughest series' ever) if he was the centerpiece with a very good PG and decent third scorer (Tim and Mash).

Overall he averaged 20.1/11.0/1.6 with 3.9 bpg on +5.3 rTS% with a 107 ORTG in the regular season and 21.6/8.2/0.8 with 2.8 blocks and 1.6 steals per game on 57.1 TS% (+8.3 rTS%) with a 106 ORTG (+8 rORTG).

Defensively he's on the shortlist of the GOATs. He was DPOY back to back in 99 and 2000 and watching him it's obvious why. He was someone that chased shots but didn't seem to foul because his jump speed was so fast. Next to Bill Russell he's the most effective shot blocker ever. One thing I always noticed watching Zo is he kept the ball inbounds. If his back was to the basket he went straight up and only flicked his wrist. If he was behind the play he pinned it on the backboard. Either way he always found a way to keep it in play and I'm taking him as the best rim protector ever next to Deke. In this clip you can see exactly how fast he gets off the floor and how effortless it is for him.

Watch on YouTube

His only weakness was his lack of height. Unlike Ben Wallace who seemed to be able to overcome his height issues Zo was not a great man defender at all. Usually this isn't an issue but Zo played at the same time as numbers 4, 9, 18, and 23 on this list. The 4 guys with the highest single season PPG totals for any true C outside of Wilt and Kareem. In these clips you can see how Shaq dominates him at both player's arguable peaks.

Watch on YouTube

Hakeem (who was also undersized - he was listed at 7 feet but is barely taller than Dwight Howard who is 6-9 barefoot and 6-10 in sneakers) is the only one of those centers Zo played well and that's because with his speed and power he was the perfect counter to him. I'd argue no one ever played Hakeem as well as Zo did in the few times I've seen a game featuring the two. Overall he's a 10/10 rim defender, 10/10 help defender, and maybe a 7/10 man defender that still led -4 to -6 defenses at his best.

As far as the season goes it was a lockout but Miami won 33 of the 50 games, going 1-3 without Zo, and lost in a major first round upset to the eventual NBA Finalists while they still had their best player (because Ewing got hurt and they still made the Finals without him). I think that result is why this year is overlooked because Zo played amazing in that series while his team collapsed.

Zo averaged 21.6 ppg on 57.1 TS% like mentioned before but his team? Outside of him they scored 57.4 ppg on 47 TS%. Tim Hardaway went from averaging 17.4 ppg and 7.2 apg on 51.1 TS% with a 13.8 TOV% and 105 ORTG to 9.0 ppg and 6.4 apg on 35.7 TS% with a 22.2 TOV% and 74 ORTG in the series against NY. Without Zo dominating NY sweeps them instead of needing a lucky bounce on an H20 floater to win.

As far as his impact goes I'm not going to dig for the raw +/- numbers (screw NBA.com for ever taking them down) but Zo led the league in RAPM and his yearly finishes from 97 to 99 are:

97 - 7 (this is NPI)
98 - 2 (3rd in NPI)
99 - 1 (2nd in NPI)

TL;DR: Impact stats paint him as the impactful player of that 3 year stretch.

Basically we have it all here, just not the reputation, and that's something recent because in 99 he was runner up to MVP and in 2000 he was 3rd in MVP voting to Shaq and KG. The numbers hold up, the playoff performance holds up, the team strength success holds up (not in 99 specifically but form 97-00), the impact holds up. If it wasn't for his game being limited compared to the other star Cs of his time and him losing head to head matchups against all of them constantly (besides Hakeem) he'd be seen as on their level pretty clearly. As it is he's a half step behind them as the next best great true C if you ask me.

EDIT: And I forgot to mention Zo's impact as a leader. I'm not the biggest intangibles guy unless it bleeds on the floor and boy did it when Zo was out there. He's one of the toughest players ever (he would fight you if he needed to as JVG found out in 98), one of the most well respected players ever (so respected people forget what he did to the Raps to get back to Miami and just like him going back to Miami), and one of the players that played hardest in league history. If I made a short list of players with the most contagious energy in the floor Zo would probably be right under Magic, KG, and Westbrook as far as guys worthy of this list go. He always seemed to lead through big plays, big celebrations, and a crowd/team that exploded when he was ready for them to. I think it's a big part of why that Heat team was so successful and of course we all know while Wade was the best player on the 06 Heat and Zo didn't even start he was the soul of the team turning around each game when he hit the floor.

2. 2016 Draymond Green

Spoiler:

Draymond's versatility, defense and passing is among the best the league and despite being a horrible shooter over his career, he shot an outlier 38% from 3 in the 2016 season. His impact numbers consistently rate among the top in the league, and in 2016 specifically, he put up probably the best +/- numbers of all time - a +18.5 on court net and +26.3 on/off net. Critics often rush to discredit Draymond as a role player leeching off Curry's impact but his -12.7 defensive on/off is the best of any starter over the last 25+ years I believe and Curry has little to do with those numbers. His 5 year playoffs DRAPM is #1 in the league by a large margin and he has led Golden State to one of the best 5 year postseason defenses of all time. Offensively, Draymond still averaged 15.7 points, 8.8 assists, 56.1% TS on only 2.7 turnovers per 36 without Curry. He is not a scorer but individual volume scoring from bigs like a Jermaine O'Neal has rarely yielded much offensive impact for a team anyway. The Warriors were an elite +10 net in the regular season and +14 in the postseason with Draymond and no Curry and he was the best Warriors in the Finals which they came close to winning.

And in case this term comes up later, I don't think Draymond is a "system player" at all. If Draymond is so easily replaceable within this Warriors' system, why does the team suffer a massive dropoff without him? How many PF/C has a comparable skillset and can space the floor with 38% 3pt shooting, push the ball in transition, run the offense in the half court and also defend at even half the level he does? Draymond is not a system player because without him, there is no Warriors small ball lineup. Any team can put a undersized guy at center but it is Draymond's unique versatility on defense that allows the Warriors' defense to not get burned when they do go small. His playmaking ability would get marginalized on a team with a more ball dominant point guard but there are not many who are better playmakers than Draymond and portability is also an issue for most high volume superstars. Draymond is not a #1 or #2 scoring option but he has proved to be an essential piece on both ends of the floor to an all time team over a multi-year period. And FWIW, despite his box score numbers paling in comparison to his +/- numbers, 2016 Draymond's WS/48 (0.190) was still comparable to superstars like 60 Pettit (0.191) and 75 Barry (0.188).

3. 1961 Elgin Baylor

Spoiler:

To some degree the volume vs. efficiency considerations of Baylor (among others from this era) should be viewed with a bit of leniency, imo, as efficiency and "finding a good shot" just wasn't on anyone's radar in the early 1960's. And at any rate '61 Baylor was significantly above league avg efficiency (especially in the playoffs, where he shot a TS% that would be decent even by today's standards, despite lack of 3pt line, decent spacing, or restrictions on hand-checking). Any way you slice it, Baylor was an excellent (if not quite elite) scorer, and underrated playmaker for the SF position, as well as a GOAT-level rebounder for his position, and likely a better defender than some of the perimeter players voted in recently (e.g. Nash or Harden).

Baylor '61 rs per 100 possession estimates: 31.1 pts, 17.75 reb, 4.55 ast @ +2.91% rTS. 28.2 PER, .227 WS/48 in 42.9 mpg
Baylor '61 playoff per 100 possession estimates: 32.5 pts, 13.1 reb, 3.9 ast @ +6.89% rTS (53.83% TS, which would be semi-respectable even by today's standards). 28.0 PER, .248 WS/48 in 45.0 mpg

Some additional stuff about prime Baylor in general (copied from another thread), as far as it can be applied specifically to '61:
Here's some more info regarding Baylor's impact, draw your own conclusions.....

In '58 (before Baylor), the Lakers were 19-53 (.264) with an SRS of -5.78.

In '59 they obtain rookie Elgin Baylor (and he's the only relevant transaction that occurred), and improve to 33-39 (.458) and -1.42 SRS (improvement of 14 wins and +4.36 SRS). They would also make it to the finals by first defeating a -1.36 SRS Detroit team 2-1, and then defeating the +2.89 SRS defending champ St. Louis Hawks 4-2.
wrt to how that improvement was managed......
Yeah, we always tend to think of Baylor as primarily an offensive player; but there's some to suggest he had a significant impact defensively, too. His reputation is mostly as a "decent" (but not great) defender, though I wonder if perhaps his prowess on the glass reduced a lot of easy second-chance opportunities for opponents (he was 3rd in the league in rebounds right off the bat in his rookie season).
Because in terms of rORTG, the Lakers in '58 (before Baylor) were -0.8 (ranked 6th of 8), and in rDRTG were +4.5 (8th of 8, and +2.5 to the 7th place team!). In '59, their rORTG improves to +0.6 (a jump of 1.4, up to 4th of 8); but rDRTG improves to +1.7 (a big jump of 2.8, from a distant last place to 6th of 8).
The team is 33-37 (.471) with him, 0-2 without him.


In '60, an aging Vern Mikkelsen has retired, aging Larry Foust misses some games and is playing a reduced role, too. Meanwhile the offensive primacy of the wildly inefficient (even for the era) Hot Rod Hundley increases, as well as a marginally increase in role for the even worse Slick Leonard (ridiculously bad 37.3% TS.....that's even -9% relative to league avg; similar to someone shooting 44% TS or so today; you'd have to be an elite defender to get ANY playing time at all today, and no way would you be getting 28+ mpg and be 6th on the team in FGA/g.....goes to show how efficiency just wasn't on the radar yet). And they also obtained rookie Rudy LaRusso (who would eventually become a pretty good player, but is a fairly inefficient scorer in his rookie season). They also obtained the somewhat inefficient Frank Selvy as well as an aging 6'11" Ray Felix in mid-season trades.
Anyway, their rORTG falls to -3.4 (8th of 8), though their defense continues to improve to +0.1 rDRTG (4th of 8), as they finish 25-50 (-4.14 SRS).
The team is 23-47 (.329) with him, 2-3 (.400) without him.


In '61, we have the arrival of rookie Jerry West. He's not yet the player he would become, but nonetheless is the clear 2nd-best behind Baylor. This affords them to reduce the role of Hundley and Leonard in the backcourt. rORTG improves to -1.3 (7th of 8), rDRTG continues to improve to -1.2 (4th of 8).
The team is 34-39 (.466) with Baylor, 2-4 (.333) without him.


In '62, West is now a legit superstar, too. Slick Leonard is gone, and Hundley's role is further diminished; LaRusso continues to improve and get more efficient. Non-surprisingly, the team rORTG improves to +1.4 (3rd of 9). Critics might argue Baylor missing games contributed to this improvement in rORTG, but I'm more inclined to think it's the additive effects of a) the improvements in West and LaRusso, b) the loss of Leonard, and c) the reduced role of Hundley; especially in light of the following.......
Baylor misses 32 games, not due to injury, but rather to military service: he's only able to play if he can get a weekend pass to quickly travel to the game, play, and then come back. So he likely barely gets to practice, and yet still establishes himself among the league's elite---->Per 100 possession estimates: 33.6 pts, 16.3 reb, 4.1 ast @ +1.34% rTS in a whopping 44.4 mpg.
The team is 37-11 (.771) with him, 17-15 (.531) without him. Some of his missed games may have overlapped with West's missed games, but the thing is: West only missed 5 games total that year. And NO ONE else in their main rotation missed more than 2 games all year.
They make it to the finals and take the Russell Celtics to 7 games. Baylor averages 40.6 ppg, 17.9 rpg, and 3.7 apg in the series @ 51.0% TS (+3.1 rTS). In a close game 5 victory, Baylor logs [what I think is still an NBA finals record] 61 pts (and I believe 22 reb as well).


Going back to our agreement that impact = goodness + fit + utilization......I don't think Baylor was utilized ideally (something that I think is unfortunately true for MANY old era players). Yet there's still several indicators of substantial impact circa his peak, especially in '62.

EDIT: I'd also add this quote from The Rivalry: Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, and the Golden Age of Basketball by John Taylor....

.....Fans specifically came to see him [Baylor]. When he was on military duty and playing sporadically, they called the box office before games to ask if he would be appearing. The Lakers front office had run figures calculating Baylor’s ability to sell tickets, and they determined that in games when he did not play, the Lakers drew an average of 2,000 fewer fans. That amounted to approximately $6,000 per game, or $200,000 over the course of a season….

Correctly utilized, I think Baylor could be the best SF of the recent era not named Lebron or Kevin Durant:
1) a scorer capable of maybe 21-22 ppg at around 58% TS on a talent-laden team, or 27+ ppg on ~56% TS if shouldering bigger usage; basically a Carmelo level scorer....
2) but a better playmaker than Melo (very underrated aspect of Baylor's game)
3) a neutral [to maybe small positive??] level defender
4) and possibly the GOAT rebounding SF outside of Shawn Marion (roughly equal to peak Lebron in this regard).
To qualify this last, I'm going to bring up a [url=viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1412184#start_here]CavaliersFTW's thread[/url]:

Also note Baylor's reb/100 possession numbers in '61: 17.75.
Compare this to some other notables (mostly centers: including Wilt and Russell) in '61:
Wilt Chamberlain '61 - 20.7
Bill Russell '61 - 19.3
Walter Dukes '61 - 19.2
Bob Pettit '61 - 18.9
Wayne Embry '61 - 15.1
Bailey Howell '61 - 14.3
And here are a few other notables from shortly after '61:
Walt Bellamy '62 - 17.5
Jerry Lucas---renowned as one of the greatest rebounders or all-time---though not around in '61, in the mid-60's ('64-'67) averaged between 17.4 to 19.1 rebs/100 possessions
Gus Johnson only had one year with a reb/100 avg >17.75 (18.3 in '71; he otherwise ranged between 12.7 to 16.6)
Dave DeBusschere ranged between 11.8 to 14.3 rebs/100 possessions during his career.
BOTTOM LINE: Baylor's rebounding was no joke. He is elite in an all-time sense for his position.

[cecilthesheep]

Sadly I think this [3-4 voters; you should put your picks in, btw LABird, as we could use all the volume we could get] is all we'll see from here on. This is why we stopped at 40 last time [and even getting there was laborious], despite some initial enthusiasm to go to top 50......once everyone's past the handful they're either fans of or otherwise think really highly of----or perhaps when they realize their fav has no traction----they just seem to lose interest.

This is why I think these kind of long projects should start bottom up instead of top down. There are two overriding factors in determining how many votes we get in these projects - time and player popularity. More people will vote in a Jordan vs LeBron thread than a Gilmore vs Lanier thread and people naturally lose interest in these projects over time after a few months time. With a bottom up approach where we first decide on the player pool and then countdown from #50, we can ensure a more balanced participation throughout the project because we get the less popular players out of the way when everybody is still interested in the project. There could even be incentives for participation by weighing votes depending on voting frequency in previous rounds. With the current top down approach, we get a huge rush of votes at the beginning when everybody joins to vote for their favorite GOATs but participation quickly declines once we go down the list. There was quite a sharp drop in participation by as early as round 15 (West won round 17 with only 2 votes).

This is an interesting idea, but seems pretty difficult from a practical standpoint. How do you even have a top-down discussion? To decide who your 50th guy is, you essentially need to already know who guys 1-49 are, and without talking about that first it's a pretty daunting individual task.

[LA Bird]

Sadly I think this [3-4 voters; you should put your picks in, btw LABird, as we could use all the volume we could get] is all we'll see from here on. This is why we stopped at 40 last time [and even getting there was laborious], despite some initial enthusiasm to go to top 50......once everyone's past the handful they're either fans of or otherwise think really highly of----or perhaps when they realize their fav has no traction----they just seem to lose interest.

This is why I think these kind of long projects should start bottom up instead of top down. There are two overriding factors in determining how many votes we get in these projects - time and player popularity. More people will vote in a Jordan vs LeBron thread than a Gilmore vs Lanier thread and people naturally lose interest in these projects over time after a few months time. With a bottom up approach where we first decide on the player pool and then countdown from #50, we can ensure a more balanced participation throughout the project because we get the less popular players out of the way when everybody is still interested in the project. There could even be incentives for participation by weighing votes depending on voting frequency in previous rounds. With the current top down approach, we get a huge rush of votes at the beginning when everybody joins to vote for their favorite GOATs but participation quickly declines once we go down the list. There was quite a sharp drop in participation by as early as round 15 (West won round 17 with only 2 votes).

This is an interesting idea, but seems pretty difficult from a practical standpoint. How do you even have a top-down discussion? To decide who your 50th guy is, you essentially need to already know who guys 1-49 are, and without talking about that first it's a pretty daunting individual task.

The idea I had in mind would be to start with a list of the top 50 candidate peaks already and we vote for the least valuable season from that pool of seasons in each round from #50, #49, ..., until we eliminate our way down to just the #1 peak, similar to the election process for deciding the hosts of the Olympic games. Besides increased participation, this method also has the added benefit of focusing the discussion and reducing vote wastage because the players are already decided and it is only the order of their peaks that changes.

As for how we decide the top 50 peaks in no order in the first place, I would assume we can grandfather in the top 80% of the players from the previous peaks project and then do a nomination count system like trex_8063 did for the Honorable Mentions in the Top 100 project to decide who is selected with the remaining spots. Having people submit a 10 player peak list for #41~#50 shouldn't be too difficult when the project is just starting. I am just floating an idea though since we won't have another peaks project for 3+ years and who knows, maybe none of us will still be on this board at that point.

[LA Bird]

Final totals as at the deadline:

1) 59 Pettit = 6.5 points
2) 61 Baylor = 5.0 points
T3) 99 Mourning = 4.5 points
T3) 18 Davis = 4.5 points
T3) 73 Frazier = 4.5 points

59 Pettit wins.