2021-22 RealGM All-Season Awards - Discussion Thread

[eminence]

if it wasn't for me giving Joel Embiid a #1 vote (which was an outlier to say the least) Curry would have gotten 3rd place in POY and that's without making the playoffs. That is really high for someone with no post season considering the post season absolutely crashes most players POY campaigns.

Curry really does get a pass. He has it much easier and is given way more benefit of the doubt than most of the other star players. Even Lebron has never made a POY top 5 w/o playoffs and I think outside of me giving him a vote in 2019 I dont think he even got a single POY vote in any of the years he missed the post season or got bumped in r1.

Curry had a stronger + more durable regular season un 2021 than lebron in 19, 21 or 22 tho. Not exactly apples to apples

Lebron won 2010 poy with a underwhelming playoffs jokic prolly will win this with a single round loss

Is not too out there for the guy with the best regular season (most likely) to get 3rd

Although i can agree that he got given a "pass" in 2021 less liked players may not get (the use of oubre as a singular scapegoat as if he was some high school level player on thr court is particularly odd)

i feel like jokic certainly had the best regular season if we're talking about 2021

Rudy Rudy Rudy

[Doctor MJ]

I continue to be baffled that any other player whose team didn't meet "expectations" is being used to diminish that player. To point out fatal flaws in them. To show that even when they were really good, well we have to re-think if they ever were because they didn't win it all this year.

Yet last year Stephen Curry played better individually than he did this year. His gravity didn't disappear. Teams still focused their defenses on stopping him. But he had no Klay. His role playing teammates mostly weren't very good. And so that great off-ball impact, that great gravity, well it has limits too. His team even with he and Draymond both having better years than this year wasn't even in the playoffs.

But I'm supposed to dismiss Gobert and too bad if his teammates were terrible. That's a sign that his impact isn't real? Or Giannis?

Sorry this inconsistency sucks. The guy we love gets a pass, the guys we don't, well don't.

Chuck, you get that many of us are skeptical about Gobert in the playoffs, right?

Completely fine if you disagree with the assessment, but I don't see how it's hard to understand why someone would who is high on the Warrior duo in the playoffs, but low on Gobert, would have a tendency to vote similarly.

[Doctor MJ]

Curry had a stronger + more durable regular season un 2021 than lebron in 19, 21 or 22 tho. Not exactly apples to apples

Lebron won 2010 poy with a underwhelming playoffs jokic prolly will win this with a single round loss

Is not too out there for the guy with the best regular season (most likely) to get 3rd

Although i can agree that he got given a "pass" in 2021 less liked players may not get (the use of oubre as a singular scapegoat as if he was some high school level player on thr court is particularly odd)

i feel like jokic certainly had the best regular season if we're talking about 2021

Rudy Rudy Rudy

And that's absolutely true.

Last year I had Jokic & Gobert as 1 & 2 in the regular season. I ended up moving Giannis past both, but otherwise they kept their spots...though I felt quite conflicted about it after the Clipper series.

[jalengreen]

Curry had a stronger + more durable regular season un 2021 than lebron in 19, 21 or 22 tho. Not exactly apples to apples

Lebron won 2010 poy with a underwhelming playoffs jokic prolly will win this with a single round loss

Is not too out there for the guy with the best regular season (most likely) to get 3rd

Although i can agree that he got given a "pass" in 2021 less liked players may not get (the use of oubre as a singular scapegoat as if he was some high school level player on thr court is particularly odd)

i feel like jokic certainly had the best regular season if we're talking about 2021

Rudy Rudy Rudy

true, although jokic still my #1 i'd actually put gobert over steph. which would make steph not being in my top 3 POY for that year a rather easy decision

[eminence]

i feel like jokic certainly had the best regular season if we're talking about 2021

Rudy Rudy Rudy

true, although jokic still my #1 i'd actually put gobert over steph. which would make steph not being in my top 3 POY for that year a rather easy decision

I kinda just wanted to do the Rudy chant.

I wound up with

Giannis

Jokic

Gobert
Embiid
Curry

For my top 5 POY vote last season.

Curry
Jokic

Tatum
Giannis

Butler
Luka
Embiid

For this season.

[falcolombardi]

I continue to be baffled that any other player whose team didn't meet "expectations" is being used to diminish that player. To point out fatal flaws in them. To show that even when they were really good, well we have to re-think if they ever were because they didn't win it all this year.

Yet last year Stephen Curry played better individually than he did this year. His gravity didn't disappear. Teams still focused their defenses on stopping him. But he had no Klay. His role playing teammates mostly weren't very good. And so that great off-ball impact, that great gravity, well it has limits too. His team even with he and Draymond both having better years than this year wasn't even in the playoffs.

But I'm supposed to dismiss Gobert and too bad if his teammates were terrible. That's a sign that his impact isn't real? Or Giannis?

Sorry this inconsistency sucks. The guy we love gets a pass, the guys we don't, well don't.

Chuck, you get that many of us are skeptical about Gobert in the playoffs, right?

Completely fine if you disagree with the assessment, but I don't see how it's hard to understand why someone would who is high on the Warrior duo in the playoffs, but low on Gobert, would have a tendency to vote similarly.

Are not those the same reasons someone would be low on garnett defense in his minnesota days (great defender + bad defense teammates = mediocre defenses)

[Doctor MJ]

I know but imagine an argument that says 20-21 Curry is a candidate for a top 3 NBA season of all-time but Kelly Oubre was apparently so bad as to be able to derail that season for the Warriors.

Yet we can't even mention that Spida and Conley and Mitchell and Bojan were defensive sieves. Or at least its then told to us that despite the numbers telling us Gobert is great because he can't win with terrible teammates he's not that great.

But Curry had to play with Kelly Oubre so he gets a pass? It's like the old KG days where we were supposed to pretend every single year he played with Ricky Davis when that was but a blip on KG's radar.

Okay, let's put the whole awards conversation to the side for a second.

You understand the specific concern about the Kerr's read & react schemes requiring the right capacity for decision making, right? I mean, people running motion offenses - including Phil Jackson - have been criticized for effectively being finicky about their player ingredients for a long time, and even as I defend the vision for what they want to achieve, I've never denied how badly those things can go.

If all you have is one or two guys on your roster who you have faith in to make decisions on the court, you absolutely should not play this way, and in a league where player tenure is so short due to free agency, there's real concern about ever implementing something like this because you may lose the players as soon as (or before) they ever hit their stride together.

And hence why Kerr got criticized for sticking with this approach last year when he had players who really didn't seem up to the challenge, and why it was argued that the organization effectively got lucky that Wiseman & Oubre got hurt last year.

And so THAT is why it made sense to talk about Curry getting unusually hampered by problematic teammates beyond simply "a weak supporting cast". A weak cast is supposed to be weak on talent, not actually unable to do the supporting job.

I don't particularly mind if you acknowledge all that and still didn't see Curry as a Top 5 MVP/POY guy last year, but it's frustrating when you talk like there's some massive inconsistency here while insisting in treating a distinct situation as if it must be the same as everything else.

Bottom line is that the way the Warriors struggled to over a big chunk of the year last year was a real reason to argue for abandoning Kerr's whole philosophy, and even as we know exist at a time where Kerr's philosophy seems pretty dang validated, the low lows we witnessed last year are something all teams are going to be thinking about when they consider copycatting the champion read & react scheme.

[Doctor MJ]

I continue to be baffled that any other player whose team didn't meet "expectations" is being used to diminish that player. To point out fatal flaws in them. To show that even when they were really good, well we have to re-think if they ever were because they didn't win it all this year.

Yet last year Stephen Curry played better individually than he did this year. His gravity didn't disappear. Teams still focused their defenses on stopping him. But he had no Klay. His role playing teammates mostly weren't very good. And so that great off-ball impact, that great gravity, well it has limits too. His team even with he and Draymond both having better years than this year wasn't even in the playoffs.

But I'm supposed to dismiss Gobert and too bad if his teammates were terrible. That's a sign that his impact isn't real? Or Giannis?

Sorry this inconsistency sucks. The guy we love gets a pass, the guys we don't, well don't.

Chuck, you get that many of us are skeptical about Gobert in the playoffs, right?

Completely fine if you disagree with the assessment, but I don't see how it's hard to understand why someone would who is high on the Warrior duo in the playoffs, but low on Gobert, would have a tendency to vote similarly.

Are not those the same reasons someone would be low on garnett defense in his minnesota days (great defender + bad defense teammates = mediocre defenses)

Indeed they are.

ftr, on my historical DPOY list, I don't have Garnett on any ballots in his Minnesota years, despite the fact that I think '07-08 Garnett is arguably the best defensive season of that decade and I think Garnett could have done more than that in his physical prime.

For me it's a case-in-point for why it's important to remember that adding up POY-style analysis is not a substitute for more holistic career-long analysis.

[falcolombardi]

Chuck, you get that many of us are skeptical about Gobert in the playoffs, right?

Completely fine if you disagree with the assessment, but I don't see how it's hard to understand why someone would who is high on the Warrior duo in the playoffs, but low on Gobert, would have a tendency to vote similarly.

Are not those the same reasons someone would be low on garnett defense in his minnesota days (great defender + bad defense teammates = mediocre defenses)

Indeed they are.

ftr, on my historical DPOY list, I don't have Garnett on any ballots in his Minnesota years, despite the fact that I think '07-08 Garnett is arguably the best defensive season of that decade and I think Garnett could have done more than that in his physical prime.

For me it's a case-in-point for why it's important to remember that adding up POY-style analysis is not a substitute for more holistic career-long analysis.

Following on this, imagine if garnett was forced to retire after 2007 or gobert retired right now

What would you think about them in each case?

[Dutchball97]

Chuck, you get that many of us are skeptical about Gobert in the playoffs, right?

Completely fine if you disagree with the assessment, but I don't see how it's hard to understand why someone would who is high on the Warrior duo in the playoffs, but low on Gobert, would have a tendency to vote similarly.

Are not those the same reasons someone would be low on garnett defense in his minnesota days (great defender + bad defense teammates = mediocre defenses)

Indeed they are.

ftr, on my historical DPOY list, I don't have Garnett on any ballots in his Minnesota years, despite the fact that I think '07-08 Garnett is arguably the best defensive season of that decade and I think Garnett could have done more than that in his physical prime.

For me it's a case-in-point for why it's important to remember that adding up POY-style analysis is not a substitute for more holistic career-long analysis.

POY style analysis isn't a substitute but imo a very valuable addition to the usual career analysis. For example Chris Paul and John Stockton have pretty similar careers on paper but then you look at CP3 being top 25 in POY shares, while Stockton only got some residual votes here and there.

It also shows the mount rushmore of Russell, Kareem, LeBron and MJ being a tier clear of everyone else in POY shares. I think this is a great way to show relative dominance over their era, which is arguably the most important criteria for me when ranking careers.

It's also a handy tool for active players. Many are reluctant to include guys who played about half a career so far but especially for the likes of Giannis and Jokic at the moment it goes to show they should probably be in the top 50 conversation at least at this point in their careers.

I'm sure you didn't mean to say POY isn't a useful tool of analysis but I do feel it is kind of underused.

[Doctor MJ]

Are not those the same reasons someone would be low on garnett defense in his minnesota days (great defender + bad defense teammates = mediocre defenses)

Indeed they are.

ftr, on my historical DPOY list, I don't have Garnett on any ballots in his Minnesota years, despite the fact that I think '07-08 Garnett is arguably the best defensive season of that decade and I think Garnett could have done more than that in his physical prime.

For me it's a case-in-point for why it's important to remember that adding up POY-style analysis is not a substitute for more holistic career-long analysis.

Following on this, imagine if garnett was forced to retire after 2007 or gobert retired right now

What would you think about them in each case?

Well, I can tell you that in 2006 we voted KG #25 in the Top 100 list. I don't recall what I voted at the time, but I think in general I was in line with most other folks there, so that's about the ballpark I'd expect to say.

If Gobert retired right now? I expect he'd make my Top 100. Hard to say more specifically than that.

What would I think about them? Not entirely sure what you're thinking of here, but I'll say that circa 2007 I was skeptical of KG but said that if by some miracle he went to a new team and immediately lifted them a great deal into contention, then I'd expect to look back at the late years in Minnesota more in terms of how bad a context that was rather than some reasonable limitation for Garnett.

[falcolombardi]

Indeed they are.

ftr, on my historical DPOY list, I don't have Garnett on any ballots in his Minnesota years, despite the fact that I think '07-08 Garnett is arguably the best defensive season of that decade and I think Garnett could have done more than that in his physical prime.

For me it's a case-in-point for why it's important to remember that adding up POY-style analysis is not a substitute for more holistic career-long analysis.

Following on this, imagine if garnett was forced to retire after 2007 or gobert retired right now

What would you think about them in each case?

Well, I can tell you that in 2006 we voted KG #25 in the Top 100 list. I don't recall what I voted at the time, but I think in general I was in line with most other folks there, so that's about the ballpark I'd expect to say.

If Gobert retired right now? I expect he'd make my Top 100. Hard to say more specifically than that.

What would I think about them? Not entirely sure what you're thinking of here, but I'll say that circa 2007 I was skeptical of KG but said that if by some miracle he went to a new team and immediately lifted them a great deal into contention, then I'd expect to look back at the late years in Minnesota more in terms of how bad a context that was rather than some reasonable limitation for Garnett.

Doesnt thus give you pause at assigning limitations to gobert based on utah struggles defensively?

Back in 2007 peopke would have even blamed garnett weaker defensive teams on him supposedly not being enough of a classical rim protector just as in 2022 gobert weaker defense teams are blamed on his supossed perimeter strufgles

[Doctor MJ]

Following on this, imagine if garnett was forced to retire after 2007 or gobert retired right now

What would you think about them in each case?

Well, I can tell you that in 2006 we voted KG #25 in the Top 100 list. I don't recall what I voted at the time, but I think in general I was in line with most other folks there, so that's about the ballpark I'd expect to say.

If Gobert retired right now? I expect he'd make my Top 100. Hard to say more specifically than that.

What would I think about them? Not entirely sure what you're thinking of here, but I'll say that circa 2007 I was skeptical of KG but said that if by some miracle he went to a new team and immediately lifted them a great deal into contention, then I'd expect to look back at the late years in Minnesota more in terms of how bad a context that was rather than some reasonable limitation for Garnett.

Doesnt thus give you pause at assigning limitations to gobert based on utah struggles defensively?

Back in 2007 peopke would have even blamed garnett weaker defensive teams on him supposedly not being enough of a classical rim protector just as in 2022 gobert weaker defense teams are blamed on his supossed perimeter strufgles

Pause? Sure. It's a tricky thing to evaluate, but as I said, I literally right now don't give DPOY ballot spots to Minny KG despite the fact that I rank KG higher than almost anybody on my Top 100 list, so it's not exactly something that's holding KG back in any broader sense.

[falcolombardi]

Well, I can tell you that in 2006 we voted KG #25 in the Top 100 list. I don't recall what I voted at the time, but I think in general I was in line with most other folks there, so that's about the ballpark I'd expect to say.

If Gobert retired right now? I expect he'd make my Top 100. Hard to say more specifically than that.

What would I think about them? Not entirely sure what you're thinking of here, but I'll say that circa 2007 I was skeptical of KG but said that if by some miracle he went to a new team and immediately lifted them a great deal into contention, then I'd expect to look back at the late years in Minnesota more in terms of how bad a context that was rather than some reasonable limitation for Garnett.

Doesnt thus give you pause at assigning limitations to gobert based on utah struggles defensively?

Back in 2007 peopke would have even blamed garnett weaker defensive teams on him supposedly not being enough of a classical rim protector just as in 2022 gobert weaker defense teams are blamed on his supossed perimeter strufgles

Pause? Sure. It's a tricky thing to evaluate, but as I said, I literally right now don't give DPOY ballot spots to Minny KG despite the fact that I rank KG higher than almost anybody on my Top 100 list, so it's not exactly something that's holding KG back in any broader sense.

Not about poy voting, but about how high or low you are on gobert defense

[OhayoKD]

A good post in general with lots of food for thought. Feels like you zeroed in on the essence here at the end.

So here's the thing:

When we talk about a team switching to a more post-season oriented style of play, and it hurting their regular season performance, I think we really need to be serious about asking ourself how we think this superior post-season approach hurts the team in the regular season.

While I think we can all get behind the idea that optimizing around one approach tends to make a team less able to adapt in the playoffs, do we really think that in order for the Bucks to be a dominant defense in the playoffs these past two post-seasons, they had to drop from a 5-8 points better than the average NBA regular season defense, to 0.2 points better?

Do we really have any more reason to think reaching perfect regular season defensive mediocrity is any more of a necessity than this?



(For those who don't recall, this was how Giannis showed up after a blow out loss mid-season this year to illustrate how unconcerned with losing like that.)

Call me cynical if you'd like, but I've seen many, many teams across a variety of sports who coast during the regular season once they have a veteran team with a playoff focus, so the idea of just ignoring the fact that the Bucks couldn't even get the #1 seed in a conference without anything even close to a typical #1 seed by record as if that was just something impossible to achieve doesn't seem likely.

I think that if it had been important to the Bucks to get the #1 seed this year, they would have. It wasn't, so they didn't.

re: The defense. I don't think the difference in defensive efficiency is because of any single thing. This is what I think accounts for the drop:

- shooting variance from three (and also at the rim) that affected them positively in 2020 and negatively in 2021
- occasional integration of switching schemes which probably has some minor costs (I probably gave too much time to this as a reason, but look, it's easier to play defense if you're doing the same thing all the time versus having to implement different rules in different contexts)
- by choice, and then necessity, playing more Giannis as center lineups
- playing more offensively slanted lineups (including three guard lineups)
- roster changes (primarily losing Robin for Bobby Portis from 2020 to 2021, and losing Brook for all but 298 minutes in 2022, but also other additions such as Allen, Nwora, replacing Divinzenzo minutes for more Connaughton)

And then I think even accepting a drop in their defense since 2020, they have shown the ability to tune-in their defense in the playoffs to basically as good as you can ask for. They almost out-defensed Boston with Connaughton, Allen, and Portis each playing 29, 26, and 25.5 minutes per game, respectively.

Re: not putting in the effort to get the 1 seed. It's easy to imagine why they didn't go after it as hard as they could have. They had had 60-win seasons without the playoff payoff and knew how much those wins are worth in the end. That's not that important to me personally, especially when I remember that their playoff defenses have been really good.

I also think you end up playing the best teams at some point, whether it's in the second round or the third, and without Middleton, I'm not sure I'd expect a different result.

More good thoughts. Bolded the part where it seems like we have a philosophical difference.

I don't blame players or teams for de-prioritizing the regular season in favor of the playoffs, but nor do I feel comfortable essentially carrying over regular season performances from previous seasons in the name of "they're still that good, they're just prioritizing things differently".

If you don't prioritize the regular season, it hurts you in my regular season awards (as it should in everyone's frankly).

From there, for me, it's a matter of whether you can do enough in the playoffs to surpass those who had the regular season lead over you. I've talked about why it ended up not being enough for me in this case, but others are free to consider things differently.

Re: does it matter if you play the best team in the second or third round? Great question. Really the key thing here for me is that the guy Giannis needed to pass up was on the "best team" in question. Whatever round the Bucks played the Celtics, it was going to be very tough for me to elevate Giannis ahead of Tatum based on a series that went like that one did, with Tatum playing as big as he did. (It would have been tough as well to elevate Tatum over Giannis based on that series, but that's moot for my purposes, because I had Tatum ahead of Giannis after the regular season.)

can i ask why you had tatum ahead of giannis in the regular season? Because it seems like him having a better record can easily put down to teammates. Regular season Impact stuff like LEBRON has giannis near or at the top of the league across the board and it doesn't have tatum in the top 5. I don't think the celtics being a higher seed is a good argument for tatum over giannis in the rs anymore than the suns being a 1 seed over the warriors and nuggets would be a good argument for taking cp3 over jokic or curry.r.

I thought Giannis was still better than tatum in the regular season, but not by enough of a margin to overcome weaker teammates.

Additionally, it seems like you are also rating tatum as having played really well vs the bucks, but considering that tatum had better teammates before middleton got hurt, and then middleton got hurt and the bucks still took the celtics to 7 despite their regular season shooting falling off a cliff like it always does, it feels like Giannis was way better in the postseason to me, even if he lost.

Do you think plus/minus stuff was inflating giannis's value and suppressing tatum's?

[jalengreen]

Regular season Impact stuff like LEBRON has giannis near or at the top of the league across the board and it doesn't have tatum in the top 5.

when i check, LEBRON has tatum 5th in rate and 2nd in volume (wins added)

EPM has him 8th in rate and 3rd in volume

he's pretty up there. giannis is better but had 500 fewer minutes which affects things.

[OhayoKD]

Regular season Impact stuff like LEBRON has giannis near or at the top of the league across the board and it doesn't have tatum in the top 5.

when i check, LEBRON has tatum 5th in rate and 2nd in volume (wins added)

EPM has him 8th in rate and 3rd in volume

he's pretty up there. giannis is better but had 500 fewer minutes which affects things.

ohhh. then maybe i'm underrating tatum.

[Doctor MJ]

Hey y'all

I have a bit of a dilemma that I wanted to run by folks here.

The rules have always been that you need to give explanations for every award you vote for or it doesn't count.

We're now in a situation where someone who basically just a quick explanation for POY and none of the others (while saying he could add explanations later if needed...apparently not taking the specified rules or what everyone else did as a guide to what was expected).

Ordinarily I would just ignore the votes without explanations but I have a conflict of interest - if I don't count the votes without explanation, it changes an award winner in a direction closer to my ballot.

So I'm going to put this forward to the group and let it breathe for a bit, see what I get from people.

I'm not going to accept a vote without an explanation, but I see two reasonable choices:

1. Follow the rules, release the results now.

2. Give the voter an amount of time (how much time?) to get their explanations in, then follow the rules, and release the results then.

Incidentally, I've avoided giving any specifics because those specifics shouldn't matter, but obviously you can go figure out what's going on if you just look for the issue in the Voting thread.

Also, I'd like to avoid making a new thread with a formal poll about this. I'm wanting to make a decision quick about this and move on. So you have strong opinions, speak them now.

If the voting body here seems to want option (2), I'll plan to explicitly alert the poster in question along with a deadline for them to get their description in by, and I will not release results until after that deadline has passed.

Thanks,
Doc

[Texas Chuck]

Ordinarily I would just ignore the votes without explanations but I have a conflict of interest - if I don't count the votes without explanation, it changes an award winner in a direction closer to my ballot.

My view is that your integrity is above reproach. I really admire your concern for even the hint of impropriety, but I know that would have never even crossed my mind.

You were crystal clear about the requirements so if you choose to stick to that, I see no issue.

I also have no issues with extending a little grace period if you choose to do that.

So I guess I'm not much help in solving your quandary lol, but I also think whatever you decide to do will be completely fine.

[Dutchball97]

Hey y'all

I have a bit of a dilemma that I wanted to run by folks here.

The rules have always been that you need to give explanations for every award you vote for or it doesn't count.

We're now in a situation where someone who basically just a quick explanation for POY and none of the others (while saying he could add explanations later if needed...apparently not taking the specified rules or what everyone else did as a guide to what was expected).

Ordinarily I would just ignore the votes without explanations but I have a conflict of interest - if I don't count the votes without explanation, it changes an award winner in a direction closer to my ballot.

So I'm going to put this forward to the group and let it breathe for a bit, see what I get from people.

I'm not going to accept a vote without an explanation, but I see two reasonable choices:

1. Follow the rules, release the results now.

2. Give the voter an amount of time (how much time?) to get their explanations in, then follow the rules, and release the results then.

Incidentally, I've avoided giving any specifics because those specifics shouldn't matter, but obviously you can go figure out what's going on if you just look for the issue in the Voting thread.

Also, I'd like to avoid making a new thread with a formal poll about this. I'm wanting to make a decision quick about this and move on. So you have strong opinions, speak them now.

If the voting body here seems to want option (2), I'll plan to explicitly alert the poster in question along with a deadline for them to get their description in by, and I will not release results until after that deadline has passed.

Thanks,
Doc

The voter in question (I guess we're not naming him to not put him on blast?) did say in his voting post that he'd be willing to provide reasoning but wanted to make sure he at least got his votes in on time. I'm in favor of giving him a bit more time to give his reasoning tbh. Maybe some real life stuff got in the way or he simply forgot about it after posting his ballot. I would say give him an extra day but I'm not really familiar with what is usual amount of time for situations like this.