All-time great players PO opponents avg SRS

[carlquincy]

Awesome work! Thanks!

Bare in mind that these superstars contribute greatly to their team SRS. So we should not assume that they successful because they are surrounded by great teammates.

[capfan33]

While the cutoffs are arbitrary to an extent, it really is striking how many insane and how many bad teams Lebron has faced in the playoffs. It appears no superstar has had the amount of variance Lebron has had in terms of teams faced.

[ty 4191]

While the cutoffs are arbitrary to an extent, it really is striking how many insane and how many bad teams Lebron has faced in the playoffs. It appears no superstar has had the amount of variance Lebron has had in terms of teams faced.

Lebron faced great teams a ton in the playoffs, also. Especially in the Finals, where he faced better teams than Jordan.

viewtopic.php?f=64&t=2185164&p=98293842#p98293842

I wanted to find out which ATG Players faced the best teams in the Playoffs, so I looked at the Net Rating of opposing teams (for every series) for each player, and ran the numbers using this criteria, which 70s Fan used, but for overall opponent production, (not just defense, this time):

Lower -2.0 Net Rating: Bad Team
From -2.0 to +1.9 Net Rating: Average Team
From +2.0 to +3.9 Net Rating: Good Team
From +4.0 to +6.0 Net Rating: Elite Team
Above +7.0 Net Rating: All-Time Great Team

Performance Against The Very Best: Versus Elite + All Time Great Teams

Kobe: (71.8% of total games): 38 MPG, 24.4 PPG, 4.9 RBS, 4.5 AST, (+2.4 rTS%)

Malone: (68.9% of playoff games): 40.7 MPG, 24.3 PPG, 10.6 RBS, 3.5 AST, (-1.1 rTS%)

Hakeem: (66.3% of total games): 41.7 MPG, 28.0 PPG, 11.5 RBS, 3.6 AST, (+3.1 rTS%)

Jordan: (60.9% of total games): 41.9 MPG, 34.1 PPG, 6.6 RBS, 5.8 AST, (+3.6% rTS%)

Curry: (53% of total games): 38.7 MPG, 26.4 PPG, 5.2 RBS, 7 AST, (+9.0 rTS%)

Duncan: (50.2% of total games): 38.0 MPG, 20.9 PPG, 12.2 RBS, 3.0 AST, (+0.6 rTS%)

Wilt: (46.2% of total games): 47.2 MPG, 26.8 PPG, 24.3 RBS, 3.4 AST, (+2.8 rTS%)

LeBron: (43.6% of total games): 41.8 MPG, 28.3 PPG, 8.9 RBS, 7.2 AST, (+2.6 tTS%)

Magic: (39.2% of total games): 39.9 MPG, 19.3 PPG, 7.8 RBS, 12.3 AST, (+3.9 tTS%)

Bird: (37.2% of total games): 43.0 MPG, 24.8 PPG, 10.8 RBS, 6.6 AST, (+4.3 rTS%)

West: (35.9% of total games): 39.7 MPG, 27.3 PPG, 4.8 RBS, 5.5 AST, (+0.8 rTS%)

Kareem: (27.1% of total games): 39.4 MPG, 27.1 PPG, 12.4 RBS, 3.3 AST, (+4.6% rTS%)

Russell: (26% of total games): 47.6 MPG, 14.5 PPG, 24.4 RBS, 4.8 AST, (-1.6 rTS%)

[capfan33]

While the cutoffs are arbitrary to an extent, it really is striking how many insane and how many bad teams Lebron has faced in the playoffs. It appears no superstar has had the amount of variance Lebron has had in terms of teams faced.

Lebron faced great teams a ton in the playoffs, also. Especially in the Finals, where he faced better teams than Jordan.

viewtopic.php?f=64&t=2185164&p=98293842#p98293842

I wanted to find out which ATG Players faced the best teams in the Playoffs, so I looked at the Net Rating of opposing teams (for every series) for each player, and ran the numbers using this criteria, which 70s Fan used, but for overall opponent production, (not just defense, this time):

Lower -2.0 Net Rating: Bad Team
From -2.0 to +1.9 Net Rating: Average Team
From +2.0 to +3.9 Net Rating: Good Team
From +4.0 to +6.0 Net Rating: Elite Team
Above +7.0 Net Rating: All-Time Great Team

Performance Against The Very Best: Versus Elite + All Time Great Teams

Kobe: (71.8% of total games): 38 MPG, 24.4 PPG, 4.9 RBS, 4.5 AST, (+2.4 rTS%)

Malone: (68.9% of playoff games): 40.7 MPG, 24.3 PPG, 10.6 RBS, 3.5 AST, (-1.1 rTS%)

Hakeem: (66.3% of total games): 41.7 MPG, 28.0 PPG, 11.5 RBS, 3.6 AST, (+3.1 rTS%)

Jordan: (60.9% of total games): 41.9 MPG, 34.1 PPG, 6.6 RBS, 5.8 AST, (+3.6% rTS%)

Curry: (53% of total games): 38.7 MPG, 26.4 PPG, 5.2 RBS, 7 AST, (+9.0 rTS%)

Duncan: (50.2% of total games): 38.0 MPG, 20.9 PPG, 12.2 RBS, 3.0 AST, (+0.6 rTS%)

Wilt: (46.2% of total games): 47.2 MPG, 26.8 PPG, 24.3 RBS, 3.4 AST, (+2.8 rTS%)

LeBron: (43.6% of total games): 41.8 MPG, 28.3 PPG, 8.9 RBS, 7.2 AST, (+2.6 tTS%)

Magic: (39.2% of total games): 39.9 MPG, 19.3 PPG, 7.8 RBS, 12.3 AST, (+3.9 tTS%)

Bird: (37.2% of total games): 43.0 MPG, 24.8 PPG, 10.8 RBS, 6.6 AST, (+4.3 rTS%)

West: (35.9% of total games): 39.7 MPG, 27.3 PPG, 4.8 RBS, 5.5 AST, (+0.8 rTS%)

Kareem: (27.1% of total games): 39.4 MPG, 27.1 PPG, 12.4 RBS, 3.3 AST, (+4.6% rTS%)

Russell: (26% of total games): 47.6 MPG, 14.5 PPG, 24.4 RBS, 4.8 AST, (-1.6 rTS%)

100% agree, I've always thought that Lebron wouldn't have made 10 straight finals in the west, but he also never would've lost a finals if he did manage to get through the west.

[G35]

This this this.

Lebron's teams got to play a lot of weak teams in the East from 2011-18:
- 12-2 vs the Raptors
- 4-1 vs the Sixers
- 12-3 vs the Bulls
- 8-0 vs the Hawks

That is four different teams where it was basically, stack stats time for Lebron...his teams were 36-6 vs those four teams. That's ridiculous.

Lebron's eastern opponents have certainly been weak as overall teams, but stacking stats is best done against weak defensive teams, and Lebron has faced among the best (the best?) defensive group of teams of anyone ever. The eastern teams could never keep up with Lebron because they usually had weak offenses, but teams like the 2011 bulls and 2014 pacers and those celtics teams were very good and often elite at defense.

That is true. Very true.

But there are dynamics within a series. I watched those series.

There is another saying..."The best defense is a great offense". So what does that mean?

If you have a great defense but crappy offense, how does that play out in the playoffs? Do the games end up being 60-50? No.

This is why offensive players that can consistently score in the playoffs are the most valuable. Good offense, beats good defense.

The Celtics had the DPOY in Marcus Smart and the #2 defense in the league. Why couldn't they stop the Warriors? There are a few reasons:
- Steph is an ATG shooter and he showed it
- The Warriors offense is multi-varied attack and the Celtics could not shut it down like they could with the Nets or the Bucks
- The Celtics offense hurt their defense

There is a dynamic between a teams offense and defense. Some teams will use their defense to create offense and some teams use their offense to help their defense. What I mean by that is a great defensive team can create TOV's, fast break opp's, to create transition offense and get easy buckets. You can't always count on that if you play against a disciplined offense that does not give up TOV's. The Celtics gave the Warriors offense easy opportunities because of their sloppy offense and their over reliance on one on one basketball. Essentially their poor offense hurt their defense.

In the playoffs, if you have a bad offense but a great defense, you are in trouble because this is not the RS anymore. You play against the same team in a 7-game series and they can exploit your weaknesses. Those Pacers, Raptors, and Hawks teams had poor offenses and that can exploited.

If I had to choose between a team to go with in the playoffs with poor offense/great defense and great offense/poor defense I will roll the dice with the great offense teams.

Dirk/Nash Mavericks
Nash/Amare/Marion Suns
Harden Rockets

Compare that to:
Rose/Deng Bulls
George/Hibbert Pacers
Horford/Milsap Hawks
Lowry/Derozan Raptors

These teams may have good defenses, but their lack of reliable offense causes them to be exploited. Why is that in the East Lebron's teams would set records but then go to the finals and their offense becomes pedestrian again?

https://nba.nbcsports.com/2017/06/01/cavaliers-hiding-unimpressive-defense-behind-record-setting-playoff-offense/

Yet, the Cavs are here, four wins from their second straight NBA title.

Maybe we should give their offense a little more credit. Its carrying a historic load.

The Cavaliers are scoring 123.2 points per 100 possessions in the playoffs – on pace to smash the record in the 16-team postseason format (enacted in 1984). The difference between Cleveland’s offensive rating and No. 2 (1987 Lakers, 120.3) is greater than the difference between No. 2 and No. 11.

In simplest terms, the Cavs offense is built around LeBron James. If single-covered, he scores. If double-teamed, he passes to usually-open, usually-good 3-point-shooting team. Mix in Kyrie Irving‘s isolations, Kevin Love‘s outside-inside game and Tristan Thompson‘s offensive rebounding, and it’s just too much for opponents to handle.

The Cavaliers have made 43% of their 3-pointers and 56% of their 2-pointers and generated 27 free-throw attempts per game this postseason.

Their playoff offensive rating is 14.4 points better than the regular-season league average. That scoring has propped up a playoff defense at the regular-season league average.

[Colbinii]

Chris Paul?

[f4p]

Chris Paul with one of the weirder profiles (also can't believe I forgot him). Not much of a favorite when a favorite (+2.3), not much of an underdog when an underdog (-2.0). Average win looks pretty good at only +2.2, but average loss is really bad at +0.2.
Perhaps this next stat makes him a victim of his own regular season ability to make a team overperform, but he lost an astounding 9 series as a favorite and was only 9-9 as a favorite. Lost an even crazier 5 series as a +2 favorite and was only 5-5 in such series. Oscar Roberston does pretty poorly in these SRS comparisons and he was 7-4 and 1-2 pre-Kareem. The only other people with 4 losses are Duncan and Kareem, but they were 26-4 and 23-4. Only Dirk (3-3) and pre-Kareem Oscar (1-2) compare in not winning more than they lost in +2 series.

Also, even his 2 upsets were by less than 0.4 and one was the 2019 1st round against Utah, which I don't think many considered an upset, and the other was the 2021 WCF with Kawhi out, which also would not be considered an upset.

Paul's -7 differential between losses as a favorite and wins as an underdog blows Larry Bird's -5 out of the water for 1st place.

[Bad Gatorade]

Chris Paul with one of the weirder profiles (also can't believe I forgot him). Not much of a favorite when a favorite (+2.3), not much of an underdog when an underdog (-2.0). Average win looks pretty good at only +2.2, but average loss is really bad at +0.2.
Perhaps this next stat makes him a victim of his own regular season ability to make a team overperform, but he lost an astounding 9 series as a favorite and was only 9-9 as a favorite. Lost an even crazier 5 series as a +2 favorite and was only 5-5 in such series. Oscar Roberston does pretty poorly in these SRS comparisons and he was 7-4 and 1-2 pre-Kareem. The only other people with 4 losses are Duncan and Kareem, but they were 26-4 and 23-4. Only Dirk (3-3) and pre-Kareem Oscar (1-2) compare in not winning more than they lost in +2 series.

Also, even his 2 upsets were by less than 0.4 and one was the 2019 1st round against Utah, which I don't think many considered an upset, and the other was the 2021 WCF with Kawhi out, which also would not be considered an upset.

Paul's -7 differential between losses as a favorite and wins as an underdog blows Larry Bird's -5 out of the water for 1st place.

It could also stem from injuries not being apples-to-apples for each player.

So whilst CP3's team SRS would be impacted by his own health, there are numerous circumstances in which the health of others has also probably caused notable swings in team SRS.

For example, his second leading scorer (West in 2011, Blake in 2013, 2016, 2017, oh, and Booker this year!) has been injured quite a few times during the playoffs.

Another factor is that teams that weren't healthy in the regular season could be healthy by the time they face CP3 in the playoffs (Westbrook 2014, Gobert 2018, Butler 2018, the entire Warriors team in 2018, Ginobili 2012, Giannis/Jrue in 2021, Doncic 2022 etc). I don't know the proportion as to which teams are handicapped by this generally, but it's something worth looking at on a wider scale, IMO.

I wonder how this would look if we changed the measure to something like, Regular Season BPM * Playoff Minutes, Regular Season RAPM/Lineup Differential * Playoff Minutes etc. This would also be interesting with regard to guys traded mid season like Rasheed in 2004 and Drexler in 1995, and also probably make teams with elite 5 man lineups look more menacing once they're playing more minutes.

Also, looking at the rest of the table, although expansion would play a part, it's interesting to note just how many guys at the top were 2000s Western conference mainstays that either never won a title, or went through large periods of seeming like they "couldn't win the big one." Kobe kind of stands out to me atop the table as the most "successful" player that faced consistently tough opposition.

[f4p]

It could also stem from injuries not being apples-to-apples for each player.

good point, few people have been more affected by injuries that happened during the actual playoffs.

[Bad Gatorade]

It could also stem from injuries not being apples-to-apples for each player.

good point, few people have been more affected by injuries that happened during the actual playoffs.

Yeah, for example, I took the 2017-18 Warriors/Rockets series and applied LEBRON to the minutes played in the playoffs, and the Rockets had a weighted LeBron of 10.3, and the Warriors 10.0. This doesn't change the end result of losing as a favourite (technically), but that's a humongous increase in terms of opponent SRS. I'd argue theoretically that the Warriors were still the favourite, but your exercise is numeric, so that's kind of a moot point in that sense.

2021 finals, the Bucks had a weighted LEBRON of 8.0 and the Suns had 5.9 (ergo, by LEBRON, the Bucks were actually the clear favourites).

2014-15 against the Spurs, the Clippers had 8.9 and the Spurs had 9.3. Against the Rockets, the Clippers had 6.2 (and if we replace 70 of Rivers' minutes with Paul to accommodate for missing 2 games, we get 7.9 and the Rockets jump to 4.6. 6.2 to 4.6 remains an upset, and it's worth noting that in the regular season, the Rockets' weighted LEBRON is 1.7! Ergo, the Rockets clearly got a lot stronger with their postseason health, probably thanks to Dwight. I maintain that the series was an upset, but it's probably not to the degree that regular season SRS claims.

Interestingly, OKC remained an upset in 2013-14 (9.9 to 8.3), which was a shock to me, but hey (I was honestly expecting ~10 SRS for OKC, given that the 2013 and 2016 teams are basically some of the best teams ever by SRS, but it could just be a statistical quirk via LEBRON). In general, these Clipper squads look great by LEBRON, so it might actually be that LEBRON uses a box score prior, which might underrate some of the better defensive teams out there (which the Clippers generally weren't).

So yeah, there are probably other statistics (RAPM?) that we could use to showcase this due to the limitations of LEBRON (and to be fair, almost every stat out there), but it's something to consider. I do feel like if we undertook a methodology akin to this, CP3 might look a bit better relative to what the numbers showcase thus far. I might look into this in more detail using RAPM?

In fact, I just ran 2013-14 Thunder by BPM and their BPM goes from 8.0 in the regular season to 11.9 in the Clippers series (using regular season BPM, but postseason minutes). Their BPM overstates their SRS of 6.66, but perhaps their "true" strength really was closer to ~10? The Clippers go from 8.6 to 11.9 if we do the same (ergo, the Clippers have a smaller increase and it probably levels their SRS out to being roughly the same in the postseason. This probably puts both teams in the ~10 SRS camp for the playoffs, although they wouldn't be ~10 SRS teams in the regular season, even with good health, due to the difference in minutes that basically every team has between the regular and postseasons. I'd postulate closer to ~8 SRS, but it's also something else to look at with relation to other players.

Edit

I spent some time looking at CP3's series from 2008-2018 (didn't want to go beyond then - it's very time consuming). Looking at prime CP3 (which I consider to be 2008-2018) feels complete enough, anyway.

In 16 series from 2008-2018, CP3's team had an average SRS of 5.44 in playoff series, with an average opponent SRS of 4.53. CP3's team had the better SRS in 13/16 series (often not by a huge amount, but it's there).

What I then did, however, was make an adjustment (SRS / Regular season minutes BPM * Playoff minutes BPM), i.e. with the BPM remaining constant, but the minute distribution changing. CP3 still had a better average SRS (7.19 to 6.56), but that's partially because there were two series in which CP3's opponents actually got worse, both of them occurring in 2018. This was a very big shock to me, since both Jimmy Butler and Rudy Gobert were injured in those years. Those were also the two best postseason teams that CP3 had (estimated SRS of 11.51 and 12.32). They were really the only "easy" series CP3 had in his entire prime. Additionally, we should note that playoff teams are expected to get a bit better, which is why the values look high. They'd look higher for basically any player if we run this exercise, since the end-of-rotation scrubs are no longer getting playing time, and starters are playing more.

There were 4 series out of the 16 that were complete and utter blowouts in terms of quality - 2011 Lakers (7.22 differential), 2012 Spurs (7.62), and the two 2018 series (both of them being between 9 and 10). Basically every other series has been fairly competitive in terms of SRS, even if SRS doesn't fully capture the circumstances (e.g. the Clippers are still a slight "favourite" in 2016, but they lost both CP3 and Blake at the same time and the series is lost at that point). These 4 series are split 2-2, so I don't think they really need too much delving into.

Of these 12 remaining competitive series (which includes the Portland and 2013 Memphis ones, FWIW), CP3's record is 4-8. So, there's still a disparity, but weighting for postseason minutes does change things a bit in his favour. Funnily enough, of these 12 competitive series, there were also 8 series in which the opponent's minute weighted "postseason" SRS actually increased more than CP3's team. Some of these are incredibly close, with 2014 Thunder, 2017 Jazz and 2018 Warriors all being within 0.3 points. All of those series were actually very competitive too, interestingly enough. A plausibly changed result here or there and it's really not as damning as one might think.

It's pretty crazy that in these 16 series, CP3 missed considerable time in many of these regular seasons, and yet the opposing team still increased more often!