Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation

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Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#1 » by sp6r=underrated » Fri Mar 14, 2025 9:21 pm

In NBA history, there are six players who are among the top 100 in both VORP and Win Shares, yet participated in fewer than 20 playoff series.

Image

Except for Aldridge, all are either already in the Hall of Fame or will be once they meet the eligibility requirements. Collectively, they spent 101 years in the league, and their records include:

1 Finals (1-4 Record)
5 Conference Finals (9-19 Record)
61 Playoff Appearances/40 Missed Playoffs

They made 30 All-NBA teams, won one MVP and received MVP votes in 34 seasons.

How much do you think their teams' playoff struggles were due to bad luck versus not being as individually great as expected?

Edit - 3/16: I realized I forgot to mention I had a 35k minutes played filter for their career. I put that in there to focus on players who had long careers.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#2 » by Special_Puppy » Fri Mar 14, 2025 9:59 pm

Here's these players Change in RAPTOR and BPM From the Regular Season to Playoffs. For RAPTOR I'm looking at their entire career. For BPM I'm only looking at "prime years"

Wilkins:
RAPTOR -1.6
BPM -1.9

Aldridge
RAPTOR -1.4
BPM -0.9

Iverson
RAPTOR 0
BPM +0.9

Carmelo
RAPTOR -0.7
BPM -0.5

English
RAPTOR +0.2
BPM -0.2

Carter
RAPTOR -0.4
BPM -0.1

Note that overall playoff performance is what matters. A player that goes from a 10 in the regular season to a 9 in the playoffs is more valuable than a player who goes from a 3 in the regular season to a 6 in the playoffs.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#3 » by penbeast0 » Fri Mar 14, 2025 10:13 pm

I have Iverson and Nique as low efficiency scorers, the others as average or higher, though both did a good job of not turning it over much considering their usage. The other factor is that of them all, only Aldridge has a rep for working on defense (though English seemed to put in the work when I saw him, just having the likes of Dan Issel protecting the rim didn't help).
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#4 » by lessthanjake » Fri Mar 14, 2025 10:13 pm

A lot of those guys are relatively one-dimensional scorers and/or second-tier stars that just happened to have good enough longevity to end up in the top 100 in VORP and Win Shares. I don’t think any of them were good enough to win a title as the team’s best player, though they were good enough to lead 50+ win teams. If people regard these guys negatively for their lack of success, I think that’s probably just borne out of expecting more out of them than one should. Second-tier stars like this just aren’t going to lead teams far in the playoffs! I’d say bad luck was at play for the simple reason that guys like that basically need to be the second-best player on the team for the team to be really good, and these guys never got on a team with a better player (aside from Aldridge briefly with Kawhi—and the team was definitely a title-contender, but Kawhi left soon thereafter), while other guys of this sort of level have. For instance, do we think these guys are worse than James Worthy, or do we just think that James Worthy happened to be on a team with Magic and Kareem and these guys didn’t?
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#5 » by Fadeaway_J » Fri Mar 14, 2025 10:38 pm

LMA seems out of place with the others, as I don't think he was ever seen as a #1 option anyway. Although strictly from a "bad luck" standpoint, coming in with the Roy-Oden Blazers and then joining the Spurs a couple of years before the Kawhi situation unexpectedly went awry wasn't great.

I'll pass on Nique and English as they're before my time, but AI, Vince, and Melo just weren't good enough as lead guys. I think you could give them someone like, say, Pau Gasol and they're winning another series or two, but that's about it.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#6 » by eminence » Fri Mar 14, 2025 11:15 pm

For folks who couldn't think of the 5 conference finalists:
'85 Nuggets
'01 Sixers (finalist)
'09 Nuggets
'10 Magic (I'd forgotten Vince was on this squad)
'17 Spurs

On the best teams any of these guys were ever on ('10 Magic/'16/'17 Spurs) they pretty clearly weren't the lead guys. The Nuggets guys were arguably their teams #1, but each had a teammate finish higher in MVP voting. AI the only one to seem like the clear lead on a team to make it past the 2nd round and it took an absolute garbage conference.

I guess I must think their reputations are lower than others might, they look like a bunch of 2nd/3rd team quality guys who could lead you to 2nd round outs in a good year and mostly did.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#7 » by trex_8063 » Sat Mar 15, 2025 4:34 am

The wording of the question throws me a little, mostly by way of I'm not sure what is meant by "bad luck". I feel like your intent is that this represents a catch-all for ANYTHING other than their individual failings as players.
Though that feels like a big semantic stretch for me, that is the interpretation I am working under with what follows.....


The one other question I must ask is: were all of these guys seen, at any point in their careers, as the tier of star that could be the clear #1 on a true contender?

LMA, for one, seems a little out of place in this regard. He NEVER had that reputation that I recall, and he arguably wasn't the best player on most of his teams. And I say that as someone who is REALLY bullish on Aldridge (I think he's tragically underrated on this forum [and in the mainstream]).

English to some degree also.
It seems neither of these guys was ever considered above an All-NBA 2nd/3rd Team type of player (and rightly so).
And actually, Vince Carter too, for all the flash (never made a 1st Team, never finished higher than 10th in the MVP vote). Although the fanbase loved Carter's flash and style, I don't remember there being true hype about this being the kind of guy who could lead a contender (maybe a few whispers around '01, but any such talk quickly faded).

The only guys among the group who were truly touted as an MVP-tier player [ever] were Nique and AI, and Carmelo perhaps barely specifically in '13.

Anyway, I'm gonna talk mostly about one guy......


Nique
He was probably the one whose reputation was the most "wrong", because: a) it was the strongest of everyone listed except perhaps AI [even though he wasn't any better than Carter or Melo, or perhaps English too (perhaps not even LMA, once defence is factored in)]; and b) because he fell off harder than anyone in the playoffs.

That said, I think you could also argue he suffered as much as anyone in this group from "bad luck":
Exhibit A - The EC of Nique's prime was brutal: the Bird/McHale/Parish Celtics, the tail-end of the Moncrief ensemble Bucks (Sixers were still good in '86, too). And by the time those teams faded, the Bad Boy Pistons had ascended, and the Jordan Bulls were up and coming. By '92 (as the Bad Boy Pistons faded from relevance) you had the appearance of the Ewing/Riley Knicks and the Price/Daugherty/Nance Cavs.
Pretty much EVERY SINGLE YEAR of his prime, even getting to the ECF would mean beating at least one contender-level team......because there was ALWAYS more than one of them in the conference with the Hawks.

The competition faced within their own conferences for Iverson, Carter, and English was a joke by comparison. Only Melo and LMA can probably claim to have faced a similar(ish) gauntlet within their own conference.

Exhibit B - Did Nique ever have a truly strong cast? I personally don't think so. Not saying he had bad casts, but he just didn't have a cast I'd exactly be drooling over, either.
Compared to some of his competition:
Did he ever have anything as good as McHale/Parish/DJ/Ainge/(plus one good year of Walton)? Obviously no, nothing even close (never minding that he's also not individually as good as Bird).
Did he ever have anything as good as Laimbeer/Dumars/Rodman/Aguirre/(and that great bench and all-time tier coach)? No. Nothing even close that sort of support.

Now also compare it to the other guys in this group who also faced a tough conference:
Did he ever have a cast as good as Billups/Nene/K-Mart/JR Smith/(with decent bench and coach)? I would argue no.
Did he ever have a cast as good as Lillard/Batum et al or Brandon Roy et al? Maybe (though I'm a pinch skeptical)
Or a cast as good as Iverson/Camby/Nene (or Melo/Camby/Nene)? Maybe (barely, for at most 1-2 seasons).


A certain lack of playoff success almost had to be expected for those Hawks teams, imo. Honestly, I feel like they outperformed their talent during the rs some years.


Anyway, all of that said, I agree with the consensus that NONE of these guys was ever good enough to truly be the #1 on a true contender, unless it was a really uniquely constructed ensemble where it's difficult to truly say who is the best player......more like a 1a/1b/1c/(1d??) situation (perhaps not unlike the current Cavs team).
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#8 » by MiamiBulls » Sat Mar 15, 2025 1:07 pm

Career Playoff Defense-Adjusted True Shooting

Dominique Wilkins: -2% rTS
A high volume jump shooter who wasn't actually good at converting them.

Lamarcus Aldridge: -2% rTS
High Usage midrange shooter who consistently shot sub 40% from the midrange

Allen Iverson: -2.5% rTS
Poor 3pt shooter, inherently poor rim finisher, poor midrange shooter

Carmelo Anthony: -2% rTS
Poor Rim finisher. From 2006 to 2013 Playoffs shot a third of his shots at the rim yet only finished at a 51% clip similar to the 5'11" Allen Iverson

Vince Carter: +0% rTS
Egregiously Poor rim finisher despite taking 1/3 of their shots at the rim and being an exceptional vertical leaper.

Simply put 5 out of 6 of these players are some of the inefficient/low efficiency high volume scorers in NBA Playoffs History. These players just weren't consistently proficient enough scorers to justify their Usage or being a leading scorer on a championship contender.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#9 » by SHAQ32 » Sat Mar 15, 2025 1:57 pm

Melo played on some pretty good teams yet still finds himself on this list.

Aldridge was a good scorer but not a great scorer, and he wasn't an impact defender at his position.

Vince only had a few good seasons, and AI played on some pretty bad teams.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#10 » by tsherkin » Sun Mar 16, 2025 2:31 pm

So the bulk of this list is made up of inefficient volume scorers who didn't play good defense. And then there's LaMarcus Aldridge, who was mostly an inefficient mid-volume scorer (who basically never turned it over) and did play good defense.

If you can't hit shots, you have problems, and a bunch of these guys were not particularly good even when they did get to the playoffs.

85-93, Nique was a roughly 28/7/3 guy on 46.6% FG, 54.2% TS, and didn't start cracking league-average (or better) efficiency until 1990, when he started to use a mediocre 3ball more. He was a 51% TS guy in the playoffs over a decade of appearances... and 50.7% with Atlanta. Weak defender. Not a dynamic playmaker. Bump-and-fade post guy with good transition value. He had his moments, but he wasn't a good example of a contention-level focal star.

Iverson was an inefficient super-volume gunner for a good chunk of his career. He looked better when his volume wasn't insane, which helps remind that some of this was related to team context. There's the old chicken-v-egg question about whether he had to do this because Philly had such bad offensive personnel or that Philly's roster was so rough because he struggled to play with anyone else who needed the ball... but he also only really had Stackhouse, Derrick Coleman and like Keith Van Horn as running mates at any point in Philly. So it's hard to tell. He seemed to be able to get off-ball, cut to a spot and then make an explosive drive well enough. Bleh shooter. Bleh defender, despite his steal totals (not that it got in the way of a good team defense with appropriate peripheral personnel). Looked better in Denver. Faster pace, better running mate.

23.3 PPG PER36 in his career, 24.0. Heavily relied on raw MPG to bolster his volume, which also influenced his reputation as a chucker, when other guys were playing less. He was a 19.1 FGA36 guy, 19.9 in Philly, which is actually fairly normal for a star player. Inefficient the bulk of his career. 2008 was his best year in that regard, the only time he got north of 101 TS+ apart from 1998, and one of 5 seasons of his career with a positive TSAdd. He didn't get to the rim well, didn't finish well when he got there, wasn't an elite 3pt shooter, was okay at the line, and a Kobe-like volume of long twos, which did him no favors. Quite inconsistent on that shot in the playoffs after 2000, as well. He was a 49.1% TS guy for Philly in the playoffs, and 47.1% for Denver, which tells you all you need to know about his average value as a playoff scorer. Obviously, the Sixers' offensive environment sucked, but he's far from the only star who operated in such an environment, and it wasn't a good offensive strategy to have him shooting that much.

But he was also a dynamic ball handler and while he was no Stockton, he was a better playmaker than either Melo or Nique as a result of simple penetrate-and-pitch play. He ostensibly hit the league as a scoring PG as opposed to a SG and he could get to basically wherever he wanted to go with the ball and was STUPID fast, both in straight-line speed and change of direction. His hesitation game was legendary. Unfortunately, with his shotmaking issues, the overall value was only so much.

Melo was another guy who shot a lot at middling to weak efficiency most years, didn't defend well and wasn't a great playmaker. Not a good playoff performer, though it bears mention that of his 7 postseason appearances with the Nuggets, he faced the 04 T-Wolves (6th-best D in the league), the 05 title Spurs, the 06 Clippers (8th-best D and pretty decent rim protection from Brand and Kaman), the 07 title Spurs and the 08 Lakers (5th-best D, Pau Gasol was awesome). That 08 series wasn't a great showing for AI, but especially not for Melo. The year after, they got Billups, won 54 games, toasted the Hornets and Mavs over the first two rounds, then ran into the title Lakers in the WCFs, and Melo was pretty mid. Definitely not a dominant or electric series from him. He was a shade above playoff league-average efficiency, a bit weaker on the glass than his usual, and his customarily-uninspiring level of playmaking. Scored nearly 28 ppg, but also absolutely crapped himself in the close-out Game 6. 35.3% from the field despite getting to the line a ton. It was very much a Karl Malone/David Robinson-type performance. A year later, they got taken out by the Deron/Boozer Jazz in the first round, though in that one, Melo actually played pretty well. 30.7 ppg on 56.4% TS (+2.1% rTS for the playoffs), rebounded well... but again, he crapped himself furiously in the finale, shooting 6/22 from the field in an 8-point loss.

He had a habit of holding the ball too long, taking 600,000 jab steps, and basically letting the defense settle in before making his move. Kind of like a higher-volume Chris Bosh. Loads of talent, but he took too much time, shot too many jumpers and struggled when the pace slowed down.

Vince was another one... bleh defense, bleh efficiency, weak playoff performer most years. He was pretty brutal against New York as a Raptor, but he was brilliant against Philly for us in 2001. Trash in the 05 and 07 playoffs for New Jersey. Shot crazy well from 2 against Toronto in the 2006 playoffs while crapping himself at the foul line, then crapped himself against the Cavs (generally his custom against stronger defenses, particularly when his 3 wasn't falling).

I remember Alex English more aesthetically than I do in detail. Statistically, he held up well in the playoffs. 25.9 ppg on 50.9% FG for Denver on 55.4% TS (103 TS+, but he had a much higher peak from 82-86) in the RS. 26.1 ppg on 49.6% FG, 55.6% TS in the playoffs. 86 and 87 weren't great. 85 was phenomenal, and was his short series in 84. Ran into the title Lakers in the 85 WCFs and the Finalist Houston Rockets in the 86 semis, putting 29.2 ppg on 54.9% against Olajuwon and Sampson, which was impressive.

Denver got blown out 153 to 109 in Game 5 of the 85 WCFs... the one game that series he didn't play. They never really had a chance in that series, though. Scott and Worthy both scored 22+ ppg at over 70% TS. They couldn't slow the Lakers down, and LA was way better in transition. The Nuggets were a fast team, but LA was just savage. That series was played at almost 113 possessions per game and you just couldn't compete in transition with a team Magic was running.

LMA, LMA. Decent player. Bleh scorer, but a decent possession-control guy, I guess. 2011 to like 2015, he was a low-20s scorer, otherwise mostly in the teens aside from a pair of years with the Spurs. Had a good year in the lockout season of 2012 and had some decent but non-elite seasons with the Spurs. Not a good playoff scorer with the Blazers, scoring 22.1 ppg on 49.4% TS. 19.5 ppg on 53.9% for the Spurs was a little better, and playoff league average was usually 55-56%. Once again, a guy HEAVILY reliant upon long jumpers. 33.6% of his RS FGA in Portland (31.8% in the playoffs). Switched that up for shorter middies with the Spurs, but it didn't matter much (he shot just under 39% FG on those for SAS). Same deal, though: lots of jumpers, decent shot generation around the basket, decent draw rate... difficulty making shots (especially with Portland). Just not really a stunning offensive player. Probably the worst of this whole group, really, especially because he was also the least-useful playmaker (bit better with the Spurs, but still).


So yeah, we're banging the same gong here: low-efficiency scorers without high-end playmaking, often with weak D (not all, of course).

So yeah. That isn't just luck, it's to do with their ability as well.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#11 » by AEnigma » Sun Mar 16, 2025 3:23 pm

tsherkin wrote:23.3 PPG PER36 in his career, 24.0. Heavily relied on raw MPG to bolster his volume, which also influenced his reputation as a chucker, when other guys were playing less. He was a 19.1 FGA36 guy, 19.9 in Philly, which is actually fairly normal for a star player.

Not sure why you would use per 36 minutes when the bulk of these years were on a relatively slow team during the slowest paced era in league history. Also not sure why you would ignore free throw attempts here when attempting to measure a player’s scoring load.

Iverson’s per possession shot attempt rate in this era basically only trails Jordan historically in terms of sustained volume shooting (although in the modern league that volume is more common, so it is conceivable that a few others start to regularly join them). From 1999 to when he was traded to the Nuggets, he averaged 23 field goal attempts and 9 free throw attempts per 75 possessions, which as a near decade average is roughly even to 2013 Carmelo (his scoring volume peak) and would be the second-highest volume season of Kobe’s career (2006), McGrady’s career (2003), Harden’s career (2019), Wilkins’ career (1988), Gervin’s career (1982)… It was under no circumstances “normal”.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#12 » by tsherkin » Sun Mar 16, 2025 3:34 pm

AEnigma wrote:Not sure why you would use per 36 minutes when the bulk of these years were on a relatively slow team during the slowest paced era in league history. Also not sure why you would ignore free throw attempts here when attempting to measure a player’s scoring load.


In the main because I was discussing his shooting volume. His raw FGA/g looks nutters, but his per-minute shot rate actually isn't a lot different from his contemporaries, so some of his reputation as shooting too much was a little overstated. His draw rate was good (elite, given shooting volume, even), but there is a small degree to which his propensity for overshooting was overstated relative to his peers (especially on those trash Philly squads). Like, look at 01. McKie, Snow, Tyrone Hill, Ratliff/Mutombo, etc. It's not like he was stealing shots from better players.

TL;DR, I was trying to be kinder than I usually am to AI.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#13 » by EmpireFalls » Sun Mar 16, 2025 3:35 pm

Stay away from mid range jump shots kids.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#14 » by tsherkin » Sun Mar 16, 2025 3:42 pm

EmpireFalls wrote:Stay away from mid range jump shots kids.


... if you don't do anything else at an elite level.

English was fine. He wasn't a tier-1 superstar, but he was a pretty good scorer with playoff resilience. He just also wasn't an elite defender or playmaker, and relied heavily on transition. And didn't play on a team which was a dominant defense, and did play in an era with a much more dominant team in his conference (and another waiting in the EC).

Building around a mid All-Star instead of a superstar doesn't lead to titles. Inefficient volume gunners aren't real superstars.

Better lessons to take away than "stay away from mid range jump shots."
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#15 » by AEnigma » Sun Mar 16, 2025 3:53 pm

tsherkin wrote:
AEnigma wrote:Not sure why you would use per 36 minutes when the bulk of these years were on a relatively slow team during the slowest paced era in league history. Also not sure why you would ignore free throw attempts here when attempting to measure a player’s scoring load.

In the main because I was discussing his shooting volume. His raw FGA/g looks nutters, but his per-minute shot rate actually isn't a lot different from his contemporaries, so some of his reputation as shooting too much was a little overstated. His draw rate was good (elite, given shooting volume, even), but there is a small degree to which his propensity for overshooting was overstated relative to his peers

He led the league in shot rate from 1999-2002, then again in 2004/05, and would probably have again in 2007 had he not been traded. The years where he did not, he trailed two historically high volume seasons from McGrady and Kobe. That is not “overstated”.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#16 » by tsherkin » Sun Mar 16, 2025 4:00 pm

AEnigma wrote:
tsherkin wrote:
AEnigma wrote:Not sure why you would use per 36 minutes when the bulk of these years were on a relatively slow team during the slowest paced era in league history. Also not sure why you would ignore free throw attempts here when attempting to measure a player’s scoring load.

In the main because I was discussing his shooting volume. His raw FGA/g looks nutters, but his per-minute shot rate actually isn't a lot different from his contemporaries, so some of his reputation as shooting too much was a little overstated. His draw rate was good (elite, given shooting volume, even), but there is a small degree to which his propensity for overshooting was overstated relative to his peers

He led the league in shot rate from 1999-2002, then again in 2004/05, and would probably have again in 2007 had he not been traded. The years where he did not, he trailed two historically high volume seasons from McGrady and Kobe. That is not “overstated”.


He was a high volume guy. But at 20 FGA36 in Philly is within 1 FGA36 of many Shaq seasons, exceeded a bunch by ORL McGrady, and similar to a large chunk of Kobe's career.

It's pretty normal shooting volume for a focal volume scorer. He was just playing 41.8 mpg for his first dozen seasons, so his per-game numbers get blown out like a player from the 60s.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#17 » by AEnigma » Sun Mar 16, 2025 4:44 pm

tsherkin wrote:
AEnigma wrote:
tsherkin wrote:In the main because I was discussing his shooting volume. His raw FGA/g looks nutters, but his per-minute shot rate actually isn't a lot different from his contemporaries, so some of his reputation as shooting too much was a little overstated. His draw rate was good (elite, given shooting volume, even), but there is a small degree to which his propensity for overshooting was overstated relative to his peers

He led the league in shot rate from 1999-2002, then again in 2004/05, and would probably have again in 2007 had he not been traded. The years where he did not, he trailed two historically high volume seasons from McGrady and Kobe. That is not “overstated”.


He was a high volume guy. But at 20 FGA36 in Philly is within 1 FGA36 of many Shaq seasons, exceeded a bunch by ORL McGrady, and similar to a large chunk of Kobe's career.

It's pretty normal shooting volume for a focal volume scorer. He was just playing 41.8 mpg for his first dozen seasons, so his per-game numbers get blown out like a player from the 60s.

I repeat: there is no sensible reason to use minutes rather than possessions when trying to assess shot rate. I just went over the numbers for you that there is literally only one player with a higher shot rate over a sustained period like that. It was “normal” by Jordan standards, and no one else.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#18 » by tsherkin » Sun Mar 16, 2025 5:02 pm

AEnigma wrote:I repeat: there is no sensible reason to use minutes rather than possessions when trying to assess shot rate. I just went over the numbers for you that there is literally only one player with a higher shot rate over a sustained period like that. It was “normal” by Jordan standards, and no one else.


Fine, look at his PER100 FGA. Again, fairly similar to McGrady, and post-Shaq Kobe. Exceeded by peak Harden. Very similar to Luka.

This isn't a "just Jordan" thing. This is a "high volume scorer" thing. And fairly similar to a couple of guys in his own era, not just before and after.
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#19 » by trex_8063 » Mon Mar 17, 2025 11:27 am

tsherkin wrote:So the bulk of this list is made up of inefficient volume scorers who didn't play good defense. And then there's LaMarcus Aldridge, who was mostly an inefficient mid-volume scorer (who basically never turned it over) and did play good defense.


I'm glad you at least mentioned the bolded. I think that so often gets ignored when comparing players from an efficiency standpoint; and it does matter....

Suppose Player A shoots 59% TS, and Player B shoots 54%.......
Player A is averaging 1.18 pts/poss, while Player B just 1.08; a +0.1 per scoring attempt edge for Player A........except that for every 20 TSA Player A also turns it over 2.5 times, while Player B turns it over only 1.5 times per 20 TSA.
That reduces Player A's pts/attempt to 1.049, and Player B's down to 1.005.

Player B is still behind, but the margin has been more than cut in half.

And that kind of margin in turnovers [on same number of shot attempts] is often what is seen when comparing LMA to other bigs (except for guys named Dirk Nowitzki, Al Horford, Horace Grant, or Anthony Davis). Against some more turnover-prone bigs (e.g. Kemp, Moses, Dwight, Mutombo), the turnover edge in Aldridge's favour might even be larger.


tsherkin wrote:If you can't hit shots, you have problems, and a bunch of these guys were not particularly good even when they did get to the playoffs.

85-93, Nique was a roughly 28/7/3 guy on 46.6% FG, 54.2% TS, and didn't start cracking league-average (or better) efficiency until 1990, when he started to use a mediocre 3ball more. He was a 51% TS guy in the playoffs over a decade of appearances... and 50.7% with Atlanta. Weak defender. Not a dynamic playmaker. Bump-and-fade post guy with good transition value. He had his moments, but he wasn't a good example of a contention-level focal star.


He was also a fantastic offensive rebounding SF, fwiw.



tsherkin wrote:Iverson was an inefficient super-volume gunner for a good chunk of his career. He looked better when his volume wasn't insane, which helps remind that some of this was related to team context. There's the old chicken-v-egg question about whether he had to do this because Philly had such bad offensive personnel or that Philly's roster was so rough because he struggled to play with anyone else who needed the ball... but he also only really had Stackhouse, Derrick Coleman and like Keith Van Horn as running mates at any point in Philly. So it's hard to tell. He seemed to be able to get off-ball, cut to a spot and then make an explosive drive well enough. Bleh shooter. Bleh defender, despite his steal totals (not that it got in the way of a good team defense with appropriate peripheral personnel). Looked better in Denver. Faster pace, better running mate.


Related to the last factor mentioned: I think the lower shot-load helped (it perhaps meant fewer "bad" shots). Though he was also trending upward slightly in efficiency beginning in '06 (with the changes to hand-check rules), though he would hit his highest FTAr in '08. He suddenly became a passably decent 3pt shooter in '08, too (almost the only full season this could be said for him); that helped as well.
Uncertain how much those things are related to the setting in Denver, and how much to him simply adapting [finally!] to a changing league.


Nothing much to say wrt your other comments, other than I'd suggest you may be undercrediting Vince Carter on defense (although maybe I remember later career Vince more than early prime Vince [which were his best all-around years]). At any rate, he definitely cannot be lumped in with Nique and Melo in terms of his defense.
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tsherkin
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Re: Bad Luck or Wrong Reputation 

Post#20 » by tsherkin » Mon Mar 17, 2025 12:16 pm

trex_8063 wrote:I'm glad you at least mentioned the bolded. I think that so often gets ignored when comparing players from an efficiency standpoint; and it does matter....


It's a contributing factor, for sure. Of course, when you shoot that many jumpers, there's far less risk of turnovers. For a guy in a different tier, but same concept, look at Jordan's TOV% in the second three-peat, right?

LMA was a useful overall player. My criticism of him is more relative to the role of focal guy. You have to be able to make shots, or your opponent has to be struggling really badly to score as well, and he just had issues making shots. But the possession control of how he played did factor in, especially during the RS. Less so during the playoffs, IMHO, but still. He also didn't OVERshoot, which was a big deal. It was only in his last 2 seasons with Portland that he got north of 18 FGA/g, and he only shot over 16.3 FGA/g for the Spurs in one season. It just wasn't his role, nor his style, in most years. And then honestly he was actually not bad for San Antonio. 2016-19, he averaged 56.2% TS, and he was at 57.0 (+1.4% rTS) and 57.6 (+1.6% rTS) the last two years, then at 57.1% on 18.9 ppg in 2020 (+0.6% rTS). Right in that "acceptable second option" kind of territory, and then as discussed, outlier-level ball protection. And then, like I said, he was a pretty good defender. So as a value to team kind of guy, it was there. He wasn't a good choice as a #1, and he wasn't an ideal choice as a volume scorer overall, but much more tolerable as a #2 and with his D. His inconsistency at drawing fouls was another contributing factor.

The real problem was that he and Demar DeRozan were paired together, and neither of them were stunningly-efficient, and both of them had one degree or another of issue in the playoffs. Their whole offense was built around guys who struggled to make shots, and TOV% low or otherwise, that's a big-time challenge in a playoff series.

He was also a fantastic offensive rebounding SF, fwiw.


That is true, I overlooked that because I was just focused on scoring, but he was a good offensive rebounder. Ultimately, I don't think it matters compared to the other things, but it's worth mentioning. He was a somewhat prototypical 80s SF.


Related to the last factor mentioned: I think the lower shot-load helped (it perhaps meant fewer "bad" shots). Though he was also trending upward slightly in efficiency beginning in '06 (with the changes to hand-check rules), though he would hit his highest FTAr in '08. He suddenly became a passably decent 3pt shooter in '08, too (almost the only full season this could be said for him); that helped as well.
Uncertain how much those things are related to the setting in Denver, and how much to him simply adapting [finally!] to a changing league.


Shooting less and having better offensive help around him, I'm sure that helped a fair amount. He was never a tier-1 guy the way his popularity wanted to believe, but he was better than the inefficient crap he showed on those dreadful Philly teams. Even the Finals team, that offensive lineup was brutal apart from the rebounding. So it isn't a HUGE surprise that he looked better when his volume came down, at least during the RS.

Also, his time in Denver was the highest proportion of passing support on his 3pt shooting (apart from the 15 games with Philly before the trade in 07). Coincidence? Perhaps, we're talking a difference of 4 or 5%, but it couldn't have hurt.

Nothing much to say wrt your other comments, other than I'd suggest you may be undercrediting Vince Carter on defense (although maybe I remember later career Vince more than early prime Vince [which were his best all-around years]). At any rate, he definitely cannot be lumped in with Nique and Melo in terms of his defense.


There were points where he played decent defense. He wasn't a matador on D after Toronto, but the point with him is that if you're going to be a weak scorer, you need to be offering other things if you're in a central role, and Vince mostly didn't. He did a little bit of a lot of things, and sometimes did them well, sometimes not. But consistency was a HUGE issue for Carter.

But yes, I agree: not in the same territory as Melo or Nique. None of these guys are identical. They do all sit together in the same general territory of weak scorers in focal roles, though. There is variation in what they did well around those traits, though, and in someone like Aldridge's case, defense isn't a deficiency. For the others, it was either outright poor, or otherwise unremarkable, and none of these guys were high-end playmakers. Vince wasn't sticky with the ball like Melo, though, and he moved it all right, he just wasn't good enough to really push his offensive utility over top of his bleh scoring (and weak PS performances).

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