RealGM

I wasn't going to do another thread so soon, but I'm In a good mood, will take a break from this for a week or so - unless you guys want more haha.

This time around not saying much other then stats (not that I really do) - not even giving a way who I'm picking.

Plain and Simple In today's game who you pick? Latrell Sprewell OR Penny Hardaway.

Points Per Game
Penny Hardaway 15.2
Latrell Sprewell 18.3

Rebounds Per Game
Penny Hardaway 4.5
Latrell Sprewell 4.1

Assists Per Game
Penny Hardaway 5.0
Latrell Sprewell 4.0

https://www.landofbasketball.com/player_comparison/penny_hardaway_vs_latrell_sprewell.htm

Latrell Sprewell top 10 dunks - not many videos of him


Penny Hardaway

Granting Sprewell has better longevity and going mostly otoh, without systematic analysis

...

Penny. Penny peaks way higher ...
24.6 PER versus 19.7 (both are outliers)
.229 WS/48 versus .117 (.115 if you want to stick to one year for all stats)
7.2 BPM to 2.7.
Penny also has a big impact signal that year (1st in on-off at +17.1 - and fwiw in the faux RAPM from it ... fwiw Sprewell has good on-off [+10.7] in '97 on a very poor team ... AScreaming's '97 NPI RAPM put's him 90th of 438 players with 1.22)

Sprewell could play big minutes, which fooled some who look at per game totals, but barring '97 his composites never suggest he was significantly above average. Nor is there a big impact signal over his career.


Without specifics on the question I would trend towards career value though "todays game" might make me think more peak-y and also maybe locks in Penny's injuries less.

Regardless Sprewell doesn't get the boost others might because I think he wants paying like a star and choked out a coach which is bad from any number of dimensions (asset value to franchise; general intangibles, trust etc; ethical/moral) and broadly isn't a great intangibles guy. As such it's hard to say he accumulates value/"CORP" in the way a good 3rd or 4th best player on a good team might.

Penny was considerably better than Sprewell on offense. If we assume health, and of course that's a big if, then this is easily Penny.

Completely different tier of players. Pretty easily Penny here.

Penny. Dude had generational talent; he could score, shoot, shoot the 3, handle the ball, play in the post and was a phenomenal passer. Wasn’t the most mentally tough guy ever but was he wasn’t chocking out his coach either. He’d be even better in the wide open - modern league.

Soon after posting this one, actually remembered someone who would of been a better fit to go against Penny. I won't mention who It is, but will include them In another 1 later on.

Sprewell in today's game would just be another guy putting up 25ppg on mediocre efficiency that gets a max contract and leads a team nowhere. Penny both then and now is a legitimate piece you can build a contender around.

Cavsfansince84 wrote:Sprewell in today's game would just be another guy putting up 25ppg on mediocre efficiency that gets a max contract and leads a team nowhere. Penny both then and now is a legitimate piece you can build a contender around.

Sprewell only had 4 20+ ppg seasons and never reached 25 ppg. It's possible that the volume would change, but he was significantly inefficient for the bulk of his career. Really apart from 3 seasons, as it happens. I agree with you; he'd be nothing special today (on offense), volume alone.

His defense would still be valuable, but then, I think he'd probably end up a second or third option and a wing stopper more than anything else, though. I think teams are a little clearer on who is and isn't worth it as a scoring weapon unless they have no other choices. So outside of an 01 Stackhouse type situation, I don't see him being given the scoring possessions to float the volume.

tsherkin wrote:

Cavsfansince84 wrote:Sprewell in today's game would just be another guy putting up 25ppg on mediocre efficiency that gets a max contract and leads a team nowhere. Penny both then and now is a legitimate piece you can build a contender around.

Sprewell only had 4 20+ ppg seasons and never reached 25 ppg. It's possible that the volume would change, but he was significantly inefficient for the bulk of his career. Really apart from 3 seasons, as it happens. I agree with you; he'd be nothing special today (on offense), volume alone.

His defense would still be valuable, but then, I think he'd probably end up a second or third option and a wing stopper more than anything else, though. I think teams are a little clearer on who is and isn't worth it as a scoring weapon unless they have no other choices. So outside of an 01 Stackhouse type situation, I don't see him being given the scoring possessions to float the volume.

He might not be allowed to shoot that much today to reach 25ppg but on a bad team where he's the #1 or #2 I think he might. Regardless, whether he's at 25ppg or not its not a major part of my post. Projecting players 20-30 years into the future is never an exact science.

Cavsfansince84 wrote: He might not be allowed to shoot that much today to reach 25ppg but on a bad team where he's the #1 or #2 I think he might.

I agree, wherefore the Stackhouse mention. I wasn't disagreeing with you so much as musing after I'd made my primary point.

tsherkin wrote:

Cavsfansince84 wrote: He might not be allowed to shoot that much today to reach 25ppg but on a bad team where he's the #1 or #2 I think he might.

I agree, wherefore the Stackhouse mention. I wasn't disagreeing with you so much as musing after I'd made my primary point.

Factoring in pace, how today's league tends to favor wings maybe quite a bit more than it did in the 90's and his overall game/athleticism(decent 3 pt shooter even back then). That's why its easy for me to see him putting up 25+ on a bad/mediocre team.

Cavsfansince84 wrote: Factoring in pace, how today's league tends to favor wings maybe quite a bit more than it did in the 90's and his overall game/athleticism(decent 3 pt shooter even back then). That's why its easy for me to see him putting up 25+ on a bad/mediocre team.

Yeah, I mean his raw efficiency would certainly rise. He was a 90ish TS+ guy for most of his career, though, pretty mediocre.

But yes, I think we both agree that if someone was foolish enough to run him the possessions, he could throw up 25 on like 55, 56% TS. Which wouldn't be good, but it would be something you could expect on a garbage offensive squad. But there are only a couple of teams where that would fly, so it's a bit specific, but now we're into semantics. It's possible in the right situation. He was athletic enough, but not a particularly good shooter, not a hyper-athletic guy, etc.

ANyway, yeah. We're on the same page here. He wasn't a good scorer, but that raw volume would have been attainable today in the right spot.

tsherkin wrote: So outside of an 01 Stackhouse type situation, I don't see him being given the scoring possessions to float the volume.

Are you giving me hints on what I should do for my next one? I do have another Idea for It It's actually quite perfect IMO for him.

SlimShady83 wrote:

tsherkin wrote: So outside of an 01 Stackhouse type situation, I don't see him being given the scoring possessions to float the volume.

Are you giving me hints on what I should do for my next one? I do have another Idea for It It's actually quite perfect IMO for him.

I mean, you do you, I guess. Stackhouse is definitely one of those lower-tier guys who was briefly a little overrated and then went to Washington and got that all sorted out xD

I don't want Latrell Sprewell on my team, generally speaking. Don't need that sort of behavioral issue unless he's the last piece for a championship. Despite his health issues, I'd rather have Penny in any era at least until we advance psychological treatment for issues to the point where I don't have to worry about Sprewell choking out another person.

SlimShady83 wrote:Soon after posting this one, actually remembered someone who would of been a better fit to go against Penny. I won't mention who It is, but will include them In another 1 later on.

Grant Hill.

penbeast0 wrote:

SlimShady83 wrote:Soon after posting this one, actually remembered someone who would of been a better fit to go against Penny. I won't mention who It is, but will include them In another 1 later on.

Grant Hill.

Haha well done

tsherkin wrote:Penny was considerably better than Sprewell on offense. If we assume health, and of course that's a big if, then this is easily Penny.

Owly wrote:Granting Sprewell has better longevity and going mostly otoh, without systematic analysis

...

Penny. Penny peaks way higher ...
24.6 PER versus 19.7 (both are outliers)
.229 WS/48 versus .117 (.115 if you want to stick to one year for all stats)
7.2 BPM to 2.7.
Penny also has a big impact signal that year (1st in on-off at +17.1 - and fwiw in the faux RAPM from it ... fwiw Sprewell has good on-off [+10.7] in '97 on a very poor team ... AScreaming's '97 NPI RAPM put's him 90th of 438 players with 1.22)

Sprewell could play big minutes, which fooled some who look at per game totals, but barring '97 his composites never suggest he was significantly above average. Nor is there a big impact signal over his career.


Without specifics on the question I would trend towards career value though "todays game" might make me think more peak-y and also maybe locks in Penny's injuries less.

Regardless Sprewell doesn't get the boost others might because I think he wants paying like a star and choked out a coach which is bad from any number of dimensions (asset value to franchise; general intangibles, trust etc; ethical/moral) and broadly isn't a great intangibles guy. As such it's hard to say he accumulates value/"CORP" in the way a good 3rd or 4th best player on a good team might.

Few semantic quibbles aside, I agree.

Outside of [maybe as many as] three seasons, Sprewell's on-court production/efficiency/impact is never above that of a league-average player. The ONE benefit he provides a team in those years is that his motor enabled him to give you that "league-average" production and impact for 40-ish minutes per game (i.e. you didn't have to go to the bench [and what is likely a below average player] often). But that's a slim bonus.

*Penny was pretty close to a peak-Sprewell level player right off the bat in his rookie season.
*By his 2nd year he clearly better than anything Sprewell ever was (with actually a decent amount of daylight between them).
*By his 3rd [peak] year, he was a SO MUCH better player than Sprewell ever achieved.........it would be like comparing peak Jordan to peak Mitch Richmond (or something like that). BIG big gap.
*His 4th season is a bit banged up [injury year], and his quality thus erodes somewhat. Still better than peak Sprewell in the 59 rs games he does play; and then actually kinda goes off in the 1st round [which they lost 2-3 to a contender level Heat team]: 31.0 ppg [+3.9% rTS] and 3.4 apg with just 1.8 topg against the best defense in the league (also 6.0 rpg).
*Misses most of his 5th year to further injury issues, and isn't the same player when he comes back.......and yet he's still pretty close to peak Sprewell level for that 6th and 7th season.

Then he suffers more injury woes and is barely even a league-average player ever again.


You both know that I'm about as "longevity-driven" in my criteria as anyone on this forum; but I'd take those first 7 seasons of Penny [injuries and all] over Sprewell's entire career. The value above replacement that he provides in that span exceeds the entire of Sprewell's career, imo, and perhaps fairly easily.
I'm almost wondering if even his first 4 years alone could match Sprewell's career from a CORP or other value above replacement principle (something similar to my criteria).
Perhaps not, but I'd bet it's close (fwiw, Sprewell's entire career is 56.3 WS and 21.0 VORP in the rs, and 4.1 WS and 2.3 VORP in the playoffs; '94-'97 Penny alone is at 40.2 WS and 19.1 VORP in the rs, and 5.4 WS and 3.6 VORP in the playoffs).