RealGM 2023 Top 100 Project - #6 (Hakeem Olajuwon)

[lessthanjake]

I feel like some people here must already be aware of this, so it’s probably redundant information for some, but I did just stumble across RAPM data for 1993-1994, 1994-1995, and 1995-1996, using Pollack’s data. See the links in the below:

https://www.apbr.org/metrics/viewtopic.php?t=8671

1993-1994 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VSPxw_RVZ-WBOHM5J434efmLjMYGVYi8CrA59WS7GuA/edit#gid=2018314684

1994-1995 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hnhhuQhlY-hp0Qt6xT-cUe2tqBF3TxPjYW8g0mblnmQ/edit?pli=1#gid=1932503302

1995-1996 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nqWP4Lu7lBjAydga0vrN1Gv4L686iA1AktvFj4vgKSo/edit?pli=1#gid=1715147358

What I find particularly notable for these purposes is how well Shaq does. Shaq is ranked 8th in 1993-1994, 2nd in 1994-1995, and 7th in 1995-1996. This actually compares pretty favorably with Hakeem, who is 4th in 1993-1994, 6th in 1994-1995, and 11th in 1995-1996. And this is Hakeem’s peak, while it is just the very early years of Shaq’s prime. Hakeem is also behind David Robinson and Karl Malone each of these years (and of course MJ in 1995-1996). Pippen was above Hakeem in two out of the three years as well, though Hakeem was ahead of Pippen by a lot in the other year.

Of course, Hakeem’s playoff resume in these years was great, and I don’t think this data includes playoffs, but it still does seem worth noting that peak Hakeem was still being outdone in RAPM by a few players, including one current nominee who wasn’t even in his peak years at the time.

_______

EDIT: Having discussed this further below, I don’t think this is real RAPM, since it seems like it’s just based on Pollack’s plus-minus info, which isn’t enough to do real RAPM. Which mutes the force of the above points of course, though I do think one can look at the raw plus-minus data in the above links and draw some conclusions.

[Doctor MJ]

This is an interesting thought process. It seems like this method presupposes that Hakeem had to have been a better defender than everyone that was on a team with lesser defenses than his. It’s perhaps an appropriate assumption to make in response to my post that was about team defensive rating, but is it really right to use a cut off like that with this sort of analysis? For instance, maybe Ewing was a better defender? Michael Cooper? Both those guys were close in DPOY voting that year and FWIW were higher in DRAPM in the limited Squared data set.

Also, more generally, I’m not sure being one of the league’s top few defenders a bunch of years necessarily makes someone the 2nd best defender of all time. Not sure exactly how often people made your DPOY ballot, but surely guys like Mutombo, Ben Wallace, Tim Duncan, Garnett, Robinson, Eaton, etc. would have all made that sort of ballot a lot too and perhaps have been better in some years they made it? To me, I just don’t really see much of anything separating Hakeem from those guys defensively, and indeed, I think I’d probably put some of them above him (almost certainly Duncan and Mutombo, for instance).

I mean, I did just argue against guys on two superior DRtg teams compared to the Rockets, so clearly I'm not just taking one guy from the #1 team, #2, etc. There's absolutely no reason why we couldn't go through team-by-team and evaluate them for DPOY candidates, it would just take a long time, so it's probably better to just bring up guys you're considering (which to be fair, you did do that too).

I will acknowledge that I have a tendency when doing these analyses to start at the top, or rather tops because I don't just look at one thing. That absolutely is going to have an effect that can be called winning bias, but to be clear, it's not like I'm just following a set of algorithmic rules here. If my process leads me to not notice a guy, then that's a wrongful omission and I'd like to fix it.

I do want to be clear also that I take it as a given that everyone's aware of Olajuwon's a) well-known elite defensive stats, b) all-time defensive reputation, and c) freakish agility for his size when I'm talking about team DRtgs. It's a "and he led a very effective teammates" clause added to the standard sentence.

So might Ewing or other guys be more valuable at defense while leading an inferior DRtg? They might. Could be the case. Hope to get more data so we can know the truth more definitively. But the things Olajuwon was doing was blowing people's minds at the time in a way Ewing wasn't, and I think you can see why just by heading over to YouTube. Given this, the question I'd think people would be looking to ask is:

If Olajuwon was NOT more valuable on defense than Ewing despite being so much more agile, what would we be expecting to see that would tell us this discrepant event? And there the obvious one is about team effectiveness - which I believe was already being discussed to knock Olajuwon before I jumped in, which is totally fine.

But if the question is: But how did Olajuwon deserve Top 3 standing so many times? We figure it out one year at a time, and him playing on weaker defenses in later years of his career isn't necessarily that relevant...until it becomes relevant based on what we are analyzing.

Re: Michael Cooper. Love Coop! I think he's really a remarkable player. But he's a man defender rather than a help defender. That doesn't necessarily mean he's less valuable than top help defenders, but it does mean that we'd expect him to be so, because most of the time it's true.

I expect you're mentioning Coop partly because of his DPOY win. And there I'd say that this is an example of how they thought about the award - especially back then. Coop was a venerated defensive specialist on a dynasty and buzz started percolating from the Lakers outward about giving the man his due.

I don't actually think the scouting of Coop - his actual abilities on defense - was overrating him at all, it's just that holistically, I don't really think he ever had enough impact to justify a DPOY based on competitive impact.

I'll also say that I certainly considered Coop when I was going year by year so his omission for me isn't an oversight, but rather a disappointing truth. I'd love to show him that love, but I don't see a way to justify it.

Re: Squared data set. I love what Squared is doing but I'm still reluctant to make to much of the limited sample. If you'd like to make an argument about any particular of his data sets being large enough to give us confidence now, I'd love to hear it.

Re: most DPOY ballot finishes doesn't necessarily mean greatest defender. Absolutely true. It's just a starting place that pushes me to think about each and every season, and keeps me honest with regards to my perception of prime duration.

Re: other guys who probably made it a lot too. Sure they did, and I'm just saying that Hakeem made my Top 3 more times, as well as finished 1st more times, and earned more DPOY shares.

Re: other guys in other years could have been better. Certainly and to be honest I don't think I've ever done a Defensive Peak GOAT list. In general though I see the long & lithe frame of Russell/Olajuwon/Garnett as the model for achieving the most defensive effect, so I'm inclined to side with Hakeem ahead of most guys defensive peak vs defensive peak.

Re: Duncan/Mutombo. Well, Hakeem is quicker than the other guys, while they are stronger. There's a trade off in play there where I generally come down on the side of the quicker guys so long as they have the necessary length.

I will say: If the reality was that the best way to play offense was though posting a big to volume score, that would change my assessment of the ideal, because man defense against post scorers has a lot to do with strength. It just turns out, in my assessment, that this hasn't really been the case for the NBA since 1951, and for the WNBA it's literally never been true...though many around that league still believe otherwise.

In a nutshell: If humans were less capable of shooting from range, the ideal basketball defender would have a different build.

But what do you think? Why do you give the nod for Duncan/Mutombo over Olajuwon?

[Doctor MJ]

I feel like some people here must already be aware of this, so it’s probably redundant information for some, but I did just stumble across RAPM data for 1993-1994, 1994-1995, and 1995-1996, using Pollack’s data. See the links in the below:

https://www.apbr.org/metrics/viewtopic.php?t=8671

1993-1994 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VSPxw_RVZ-WBOHM5J434efmLjMYGVYi8CrA59WS7GuA/edit#gid=2018314684

1994-1995 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hnhhuQhlY-hp0Qt6xT-cUe2tqBF3TxPjYW8g0mblnmQ/edit?pli=1#gid=1932503302

1995-1996 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nqWP4Lu7lBjAydga0vrN1Gv4L686iA1AktvFj4vgKSo/edit?pli=1#gid=1715147358

What I find particularly notable for these purposes is how well Shaq does. Shaq is ranked 8th in 1993-1994, 2nd in 1994-1995, and 7th in 1995-1996. This actually compares pretty favorably with Hakeem, who is 4th in 1993-1994, 6th in 1994-1995, and 11th in 1995-1996. And this is Hakeem’s peak, while it is just the very early years of Shaq’s prime. Hakeem is also behind David Robinson and Karl Malone each of these years (and of course MJ in 1995-1996). Pippen was above Hakeem in two out of the three years as well, though Hakeem was ahead of Pippen by a lot in the other year.

Of course, Hakeem’s playoff resume in these years was great, and I don’t think this data includes playoffs, but it still does seem worth noting that peak Hakeem was still being outdone in RAPM by a few players, including one current nominee who wasn’t even in his peak years at the time.

So, unless I'm mistaken that's not actually RAPM, because to do RAPM you need access to lineup data from minute to minute.

Rather, what's being done is a regression based on the raw +/- totals for the entire season. It's worth doing, but it's not what "APM" means in basketball statistics.

And yeah, the thing with Hakeem is the playoffs. If there were no playoffs, Malone & Robinson would be ranked higher than him.

[lessthanjake]

Spoiler:

What is the quantitative evidence backing the idea that Hakeem was a top 2 defensive player of all time?

We do actually have at least a little data on this, and I don’t think it backs a strong conclusion in that regard.

- For instance, Hakeem’s Rockets made the playoffs 14 times. In those 14 years, their postseason defensive rating was only better than the league average postseason defensive rating 8 of the years. If you take a weighted average of how much the Rockets did better or worse than the league average PS defensive rating in the years Hakeem was there, it’s only 0.59 better than average. In the regular season, the Rockets did have some good defenses, but they averaged a rDRTG of just -1.33 in his career. It was -2.28 if you cut it off at 1996-1997. Even if we take that -2.28 number, it’s definitely good, but not exactly evidence of top-2-defensive-player-ever impact. It’s akin to the Pelicans this past season or the 2022 Mavericks.

- We have snippets of defensive RAPM numbers for Hakeem and they don’t look incredible. The GitHub RAPM only starts at 1996-1997 (so it doesn’t really have almost any prime Hakeem), but it never has Hakeem anywhere near the top of the league in DRAPM in any season or any playoff. Meanwhile, we have snippets of earlier seasons from Squared, and Hakeem’s defense isn’t graded out very highly in those data sets. His DRAPM in the 1984-1985 set is positive but there’s a whole ton of players above him in it. In the 1987-1988 set, Hakeem’s DRAPM was negative. Hakeem’s DRAPM in the 1990-1991 set looks good, but there’s still about 10 players ahead of him that I can see. And then the 1995-1996 numbers are positive but half the players in the top 40 have a better DRAPM in that set than Hakeem does. These are very small sample sizes, but Hakeem not coming out super high in any of them seems unlikely if he was really having top-2-all-time defensive impact.

The consensus on Hakeem seems to be built around film analysis, but I’m always pretty skeptical of film analysis when it comes to defense, since there’s so much that goes into defense that is really hard to notice or precisely value when watching the film. So I’m pretty skeptical of calling someone the best defender in history besides Russell when there’s not really any available data that supports him having that kind of impact.

So let me chime in on this here because I have Hakeem tied with Wilt at 9 times being a DPOY ballot guy 2nd only to Russell, and I have Olajuwon being the #1 4t times to Wilt's 3 (though I have Mikan at #1 6 times).

I want to be clear here that while I admire Hakeem a great deal, I was under no assumption that he'd keep making my ballot for some of the reasons you went into about the team's defense, never the less, he kept making it.

As I've said before, I didn't take notes when I did this - unwise - so I can't just give you all the reasons for why I came to the conclusions I did, but I can list out the years, and to the extent they lineup with times where you're skeptical, that yields a point for discussion.

'84-85: 3rd (behind Eaton & Moncrief)
'85-86: 1st
'86-87: 2nd (behind Eaton)
'87-88: 2nd (behind Eaton)
'88-89: 1st
'89-90: 1st
'90-91: ---
'91-92: ---
'92-93: 1st
'93-94: 2nd (behind Mutombo)
'94-95: 3rd (behind Robinson & Ewing)

And that's it.

You mention '87-88 specifically for weak DRAPM data and he's 2nd on my ballot that year, so let me look into that one.

Looking at the top RS DRtg's that year, we get:

1. Utah
2. Detroit
3. Chicago
4. Houston

So, that's quality defense that year from the Rockets and not an obvious reason to be skeptical of Hakeem.

Eaton's Jazz are at #1, no issues there.

Pistons are at #2 and had a hell of a defense, but of course, it's hard to really justify singling out one guy for DPOY. Rodman would eventually be the guy getting the DPOY love, but at this point it's hard to even see him as a candidate for making the ballot.

Jordan of course actually won the DPOY that year. He places 3rd on my ballot, and I'd honestly find it a bit amusing having to justify Olajuwon over him in this thread given that I'm justifying having Jordan on my DPOY ballots at all in a previous project thread.

Zooming in on the Rockets, in the regular season the team had 2 big minute players: Olajuwon & Rodney McCray, and McCray would also make All-D 1st team. But the team would trade McCray to the Kings the next year, and the Kings wouldn't be great on defense, and meanwhile the Rockets improve on defense.

In the playoffs, the Rockets would lose in the first round to a higher seeded team in Dallas that would get to the Conference Finals. Of the Mavs 3 playoff opponents, the Rockets would hold them to the weakest ORtg. (Olajuwon would also look amazing on offense and I don't think anyone thought there was a debate as to who the best player in the series.)

All of this going along with what we know already about Olajuwon - great shotblocker, extremely agile for a big, had the DPOY named after him - makes me pretty confident in saying that with what I see to this point, Olajuwon should at least be a candidate for DPOY this year.

And my real question would be: Should I have someone (other than Eaton) above him?

This is an interesting thought process. It seems like this method presupposes that Hakeem had to have been a better defender than everyone that was on a team with lesser defenses than his. It’s perhaps an appropriate assumption to make in response to my post that was about team defensive rating, but is it really right to use a cut off like that with this sort of analysis? For instance, maybe Ewing was a better defender? Michael Cooper? Both those guys were close in DPOY voting that year and FWIW were higher in DRAPM in the limited Squared data set.

Also, more generally, I’m not sure being one of the league’s top few defenders a bunch of years necessarily makes someone the 2nd best defender of all time. Not sure exactly how often people made your DPOY ballot, but surely guys like Mutombo, Ben Wallace, Tim Duncan, Garnett, Robinson, Eaton, etc. would have all made that sort of ballot a lot too and perhaps have been better in some years they made it? To me, I just don’t really see much of anything separating Hakeem from those guys defensively, and indeed, I think I’d probably put some of them above him (almost certainly Duncan and Mutombo, for instance).

To add some color to this, I’ll take Mutombo for instance. Here’s some info on how he improved his team’s defense:

Improvement in DRTG with Mutombo on vs. off (positive number being good)

1996-1997 Regular Season: +10.3
1997-1998 Regular Season: +14.3
1998-1999 Regular Season: +6.7
1999-2000 Regular Season: +6.7
2000-2001 Regular Season: +5.2
2001-2002 Regular Season: +9.5

Individual-year playoff numbers are super noisy here since his teams often didn’t go far, but if you do a weighted average of his playoff teams’ defensive ratings with him on and off the court, you get the following:

1997-2002 Playoffs: +8.6

And here’s his team’s DRTG+ compared to the rest of the league in minutes he played (normalized so that 100 equals league average):

Mutombo’s Teams’ DRTG+ with Mutombo on (lower number being good)

1996-1997: 91.38
1997-1998: 92.95
1998-1999: 91.29
1999-2000: 100.67
2000-2001: 94.77
2001-2002: 93.01

These are *remarkable* numbers, and they only encompass Mutombo in his thirties, so there’s half a decade of great defense before that too, where he was actually even more athletic. I find it hard to look at the available data for Hakeem—which is limited but much more lukewarm—and conclude that he was a better defender than Mutombo, especially when I know that at the time I regarded Mutombo as having been a better defender (of course their defensive peaks didn’t overlap much, but I am referring to what my retrospective feeling was in the early 2000s). And that’s just one example.

[lessthanjake]

I feel like some people here must already be aware of this, so it’s probably redundant information for some, but I did just stumble across RAPM data for 1993-1994, 1994-1995, and 1995-1996, using Pollack’s data. See the links in the below:

https://www.apbr.org/metrics/viewtopic.php?t=8671

1993-1994 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VSPxw_RVZ-WBOHM5J434efmLjMYGVYi8CrA59WS7GuA/edit#gid=2018314684

1994-1995 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hnhhuQhlY-hp0Qt6xT-cUe2tqBF3TxPjYW8g0mblnmQ/edit?pli=1#gid=1932503302

1995-1996 RAPM: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nqWP4Lu7lBjAydga0vrN1Gv4L686iA1AktvFj4vgKSo/edit?pli=1#gid=1715147358

What I find particularly notable for these purposes is how well Shaq does. Shaq is ranked 8th in 1993-1994, 2nd in 1994-1995, and 7th in 1995-1996. This actually compares pretty favorably with Hakeem, who is 4th in 1993-1994, 6th in 1994-1995, and 11th in 1995-1996. And this is Hakeem’s peak, while it is just the very early years of Shaq’s prime. Hakeem is also behind David Robinson and Karl Malone each of these years (and of course MJ in 1995-1996). Pippen was above Hakeem in two out of the three years as well, though Hakeem was ahead of Pippen by a lot in the other year.

Of course, Hakeem’s playoff resume in these years was great, and I don’t think this data includes playoffs, but it still does seem worth noting that peak Hakeem was still being outdone in RAPM by a few players, including one current nominee who wasn’t even in his peak years at the time.

So, unless I'm mistaken that's not actually RAPM, because to do RAPM you need access to lineup data from minute to minute.

Rather, what's being done is a regression based on the raw +/- totals for the entire season. It's worth doing, but it's not what "APM" means in basketball statistics.

And yeah, the thing with Hakeem is the playoffs. If there were no playoffs, Malone & Robinson would be ranked higher than him.

Ugh, yeah I knew there was something I wasn’t thinking about on this (otherwise people would be using that data more), and of course now that you mention it obviously you can’t get real RAPM just from the plus-minus and the Pollack stuff isn’t actually anything beyond plus-minus. So the data is more just interesting from the perspective of the plus-minus info, which has already been talked about in the thread. I’ll keep the post up, since if anything I want to be able to refer back to the links myself, but will edit it to point this out.

[ijspeelman]

Vote: Kevin Garnett



I feel like I have to explain a lot to have KG this high. I'll just start by saying I am not super confident about this pick. Wilt and Hakeem are right there. There's something in KG that is harder for me to see in those two and I think pushes him over.

I think Hakeem and Garnett are insanely good two way guys who combined generational defense with near-generational offense. Hakeem worked best as the “number one guy” and Garnett probably always needed to be a “number two guy”, but never got that opportunity with TWolves. Both of them are impeccable defenders. I think I like Garnett’s help defense a lot more.

Earlier, I said that I though Hakeem was a great "number one guy" and KG was a great "number two guy". I think this was disingenuous to say about KG, but I also think it is a positive that is hard to also give to Hakeem. Being a "number two" on offense is a frowned upon statement, but in reality its an incredibly hard thing to be on a championship roster. KG, I believe, had the opportunity to be a "number one" guy and win a title with the skills he had when he was on the Timberwolves, but the Timberwolves roster made it nearly impossible.

Code: Select all

Rk        Player Name             Exp Titles   Actual   Delta   Delta %
6     Wilt Chamberlain        3.04         2        -1.04   -34.3%
9     Hakeem Olajuwon         0.1          2        1.9     1868% 
11    Kevin Garnett           0.76         1        0.24    30.8%

I think there is a lot of nice data in f4p's post: Top 100 - Expected Titles (by SRS) vs Actual Titles (viewtopic.php?f=64&t=2305821). I think a lot of it is very contextual so I want to do my best not to take everything at face value. I just stole the data for the three guys I feel like I have to compare KG with (sorry Shaq).

Between the three, KG lands in the middle in winning more than he should have with the teams he had. While, I still rate Celtics KG fairly highly (especially in the first two years), I do think this data makes his tenure on the Timberwolves not look as bad as it was.

In KG's 12 year tenure with Minnesota, his team only managed an SRS over 3 twice. Once he moved to Boston, his team did it four years straight and much above 3 twice. The question here is do you blame KG for these poor team results. In my mind, no.

Code: Select all

3 Year Period    Garnett RAPM        Duncan RAPM        Shaq RAPM
1996-99        3.219614579        3.504251073*        2.58431274
1999-02        2.93686363        3.450089552        2.774477798
2002-05        5.073348473        4.046588984        1.444972421


* Duncan was not in the league in 1996-97

If we are looking by RAPM in three year increments, Garnett is closer to Duncan than Shaq. He looks incredibly elite especially in the 2002-05 stretch. I don't think blaming Garnett for team failures is especially fair.

I spoke of Garnett's ability to be a "number two" guy and I believe he got to show it on the Celtics. While being the best player on the Celtics due to his dominant defense, he was able to play off Pierce due to his connective tissue passing and ability to space the floor with his jumper.

I like that as Garnett's offensive ability and explosiveness waivered with injury and age that his defense mostly stuck and became a high level all-star to sub all-star defensive big man later in his career.

RAPM Source:https://basketball-analytics.gitlab.io/rapm-data/

I admittedly know very little about RAPM, but what I have learned about in these forum posts. I somewhat hate one number metrics in general, especially when compared directly to others because they do not paint the picture, but instead inform it.

I like clips and didn't incorporate them so here you go:

Spoiler:

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Edited out this because I feel like I should vote:

Spoiler:

I think I’m bowing out of my vote for this period.

I am not confident in any of my picks between KG, Hakeem, and Wilt. I’ve read posts here and talked to friends about it outside of the forum and I’m still stuck.

I’ll get more thoughts in for the next period and get a vote in. I assume one of those guys will win this round so I can at least narrow my search.

Nomination: Steph Curry



I think it’s time for that conversation. Off rip, I think he may be higher than Magic for me. His ability to switch between being off-ball and on-ball is insane. He is the best off-ball player ever which puts him in the list of most portable players ever. His passing is incredible and he’s a legitimately great playmaker with the ball. He’s been at a near MVP level or higher for eight years now and otherwise has been a solid all-star to sub all star guy in his younger years.

Just based on size, his defense is not good, but neither is Magic’s and he’s more than a half foot taller. He's also worked incredibly hard over the years to become an average to above average PG defender. The effort has made him a great team defender.

I really like Curry in this conversation of guys.

[lessthanjake]

Spoiler:

This is an interesting thought process. It seems like this method presupposes that Hakeem had to have been a better defender than everyone that was on a team with lesser defenses than his. It’s perhaps an appropriate assumption to make in response to my post that was about team defensive rating, but is it really right to use a cut off like that with this sort of analysis? For instance, maybe Ewing was a better defender? Michael Cooper? Both those guys were close in DPOY voting that year and FWIW were higher in DRAPM in the limited Squared data set.

Also, more generally, I’m not sure being one of the league’s top few defenders a bunch of years necessarily makes someone the 2nd best defender of all time. Not sure exactly how often people made your DPOY ballot, but surely guys like Mutombo, Ben Wallace, Tim Duncan, Garnett, Robinson, Eaton, etc. would have all made that sort of ballot a lot too and perhaps have been better in some years they made it? To me, I just don’t really see much of anything separating Hakeem from those guys defensively, and indeed, I think I’d probably put some of them above him (almost certainly Duncan and Mutombo, for instance).

I mean, I did just argue against guys on two superior DRtg teams compared to the Rockets, so clearly I'm not just taking one guy from the #1 team, #2, etc. There's absolutely no reason why we couldn't go through team-by-team and evaluate them for DPOY candidates, it would just take a long time, so it's probably better to just bring up guys you're considering (which to be fair, you did do that too).

I will acknowledge that I have a tendency when doing these analyses to start at the top, or rather tops because I don't just look at one thing. That absolutely is going to have an effect that can be called winning bias, but to be clear, it's not like I'm just following a set of algorithmic rules here. If my process leads me to not notice a guy, then that's a wrongful omission and I'd like to fix it.

I do want to be clear also that I take it as a given that everyone's aware of Olajuwon's a) well-known elite defensive stats, b) all-time defensive reputation, and c) freakish agility for his size when I'm talking about team DRtgs. It's a "and he led a very effective teammates" clause added to the standard sentence.

So might Ewing or other guys be more valuable at defense while leading an inferior DRtg? They might. Could be the case. Hope to get more data so we can know the truth more definitively. But the things Olajuwon was doing was blowing people's minds at the time in a way Ewing wasn't, and I think you can see why just by heading over to YouTube. Given this, the question I'd think people would be looking to ask is:

If Olajuwon was NOT more valuable on defense than Ewing despite being so much more agile, what would we be expecting to see that would tell us this discrepant event? And there the obvious one is about team effectiveness - which I believe was already being discussed to knock Olajuwon before I jumped in, which is totally fine.

But if the question is: But how did Olajuwon deserve Top 3 standing so many times? We figure it out one year at a time, and him playing on weaker defenses in later years of his career isn't necessarily that relevant...until it becomes relevant based on what we are analyzing.

Re: Michael Cooper. Love Coop! I think he's really a remarkable player. But he's a man defender rather than a help defender. That doesn't necessarily mean he's less valuable than top help defenders, but it does mean that we'd expect him to be so, because most of the time it's true.

I expect you're mentioning Coop partly because of his DPOY win. And there I'd say that this is an example of how they thought about the award - especially back then. Coop was a venerated defensive specialist on a dynasty and buzz started percolating from the Lakers outward about giving the man his due.

I don't actually think the scouting of Coop - his actual abilities on defense - was overrating him at all, it's just that holistically, I don't really think he ever had enough impact to justify a DPOY based on competitive impact.

I'll also say that I certainly considered Coop when I was going year by year so his omission for me isn't an oversight, but rather a disappointing truth. I'd love to show him that love, but I don't see a way to justify it.

Re: Squared data set. I love what Squared is doing but I'm still reluctant to make to much of the limited sample. If you'd like to make an argument about any particular of his data sets being large enough to give us confidence now, I'd love to hear it.

Re: most DPOY ballot finishes doesn't necessarily mean greatest defender. Absolutely true. It's just a starting place that pushes me to think about each and every season, and keeps me honest with regards to my perception of prime duration.

Re: other guys who probably made it a lot too. Sure they did, and I'm just saying that Hakeem made my Top 3 more times, as well as finished 1st more times, and earned more DPOY shares.

Re: other guys in other years could have been better. Certainly and to be honest I don't think I've ever done a Defensive Peak GOAT list. In general though I see the long & lithe frame of Russell/Olajuwon/Garnett as the model for achieving the most defensive effect, so I'm inclined to side with Hakeem ahead of most guys defensive peak vs defensive peak.

Re: Duncan/Mutombo. Well, Hakeem is quicker than the other guys, while they are stronger. There's a trade off in play there where I generally come down on the side of the quicker guys so long as they have the necessary length.

I will say: If the reality was that the best way to play offense was though posting a big to volume score, that would change my assessment of the ideal, because man defense against post scorers has a lot to do with strength. It just turns out, in my assessment, that this hasn't really been the case for the NBA since 1951, and for the WNBA it's literally never been true...though many around that league still believe otherwise.

In a nutshell: If humans were less capable of shooting from range, the ideal basketball defender would have a different build.

But what do you think? Why do you give the nod for Duncan/Mutombo over Olajuwon?

So I generally agree with what you’re saying here. But I think this actually gets to my concern pretty well—which is that there’s a lot of assumptions about Hakeem’s defensive impact, and they’re not assumptions I’m certain are correct.

You mention Hakeem’s freakish agility for someone his size and that he was doing things that blew peoples’ minds. And of course that’s right. I’d even add that his quick hands were also shocking for someone his size. But one thing I’ve learned a bit since the advent of more advanced stats and play-by-play data is that highly athletic defenders aren’t always the most effective ones. For instance, Dwight Howard was also doing things from an athletic standpoint that blew peoples’ minds. And he was a great defender, who also got three DPOY awards. But I don’t think the data really bears out that that he was a top-tier all-time defender—despite the singular athleticism and the reputation at the time. And I think someone like Tim Duncan—who did not jump off the page the same way athletically—was a better defender. Now, I’m not saying Dwight Howard and Hakeem are the same, but it’s just an example where I think assumptions based on jump-off-the-page moments aren’t always completely right. A good bit of the time, the less-athletic, more-strength-based guys have more defensive impact, whether that’s because of more strength, or better positioning, or maybe even better communication with their teammates. There’s just so much that goes into defense that the raw jump-off-the-page stuff can definitely be swamped by subtle advantages elsewhere.

There’s also the assumption that a great perimeter defender is less impactful than a great big defender. I’d agree of course that that’s generally true. But it isn’t always true. And I think we shouldn’t go so far as to assume that great big-man defenders in a given year must’ve been more impactful defensively than all great perimeter defenders. You aren’t actually doing that of course, since, for instance, you put Jordan in your top three in the year you used as an example. But I do think that an assumption like that would tend to end up overvaluing a big-man defender in analysis about number of hypothetical DPOY podiums/wins, because the big man will get the benefit of the doubt over perimeter defenders every time, and sometimes that won’t actually be correct. Maybe that sort of thing cancels out when comparing between different big-man defenders, but it still seems worth noting.

So I guess the bottom line is that you’ve certainly identified correct things about Hakeem, but I wouldn’t personally draw more than a fairly weak assumption based on that, and then when I look at the data we do have (which includes team data, as well as some limited individual impact data), he doesn’t jump out to me like some other people do (I made a post about Mutombo, for instance), so it feels a bit like the data doesn’t totally validate the more eye-test-based stuff—or at least doesn’t validate it to the point of placing him as the 2nd greatest defender of all time (I’m not suggesting he wasn’t a great defender, of course, but rather am arguing with a sentiment I’ve seen here and elsewhere that Hakeem is the best ever defender besides Russell).

[LukaTheGOAT]

Hakeem's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

6.85
6.74
6.44
5.82
5.32

Duncan's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

5.24
4.46
4.45
4.41
4.41

Mutombo's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

4.37
4.35
4.34
4.21
3.78

Hakeem's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

5.40
5
4.73
4.31
4.08

Duncan's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

4.78
4.54
4.20
4.06
3.74

Mutombo's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

5.35
4.85
4.77
4.51
4.31

Hakeem's Best 5-years In Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

5.4
5.4
4.7
4.7
4.3

Duncan's Best 5-Years in Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

4.2
4.1
3.7
3.3
3.2

Mutombo's Best 5-years in Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

3.7
3.2
3.1
3
3

It certainly looks like Hakeem belongs.

[lessthanjake]

Hakeem's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

6.85
6.74
6.44
5.82
5.32

Duncan's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

5.24
4.46
4.45
4.41
4.41

Mutombo's Best 5-Years in D-RAPTOR

4.37
4.35
4.34
4.21
3.78

Hakeem's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

5.40
5
4.73
4.31
4.08

Duncan's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

4.78
4.54
4.20
4.06
3.74

Mutombo's Best 5-Years in D-PIPM

5.35
4.85
4.77
4.51
4.31

Hakeem's Best 5-years In Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

5.4
5.4
4.7
4.7
4.3

Duncan's Best 5-Years in Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

4.2
4.1
3.7
3.3
3.2

Mutombo's Best 5-years in Crafted Defensive Plus-Minus

3.7
3.2
3.1
3
3

It certainly looks like Hakeem belongs.

What are those based on though? There’s not full play by play data for Hakeem’s best years, so isn’t that stuff basically just constructed from box score info for him?

[LA Bird]

Vote: Wilt Chamberlain
Alt: Hakeem Olajuwon
Nom: Stephen Curry

Running low on time so I will just list out some of my thoughts. Haven't read through the last few threads so I don't know if any of these points have been addressed by others already...

• Playoff rise and fall in general is overrated. You shouldn't get bonus points for improving in the postseason if the end performance is the same. If anything, with an equal playoffs, you would be ranked lower because of a worse regular season. Hakeem is one of the biggest playoff risers but I am not aware of any metrics that actually have playoff Hakeem as clearly better than other candidates here. In particular, literally half of Wilt's playoff games in the 60s came against the defensive GOAT which should theoretically see his postseason numbers being severely depressed but despite that he still looks solid compared to Hakeem.
60-68 Wilt (3818 min): 27.0 PER, 0.244 WS/48
86-95 Hakeem (4205 min): 26.9 PER, 0.204 WS/48
• Wilt anchored stronger team defenses than Hakeem's best on every three franchise he played at in both the regular season and playoffs. That doesn't necessarily mean he is better but I feel like he is often overlooked in the conversation for being the best non-Russell defender in history. Statistically, box scores never do a good job of accurately capturing defensive impact but Hakeem was lucky enough to play in an era where steals and blocks league wide were at an all time high (compare top 10 between late 80s and now to see the difference). In contrast, Wilt played in a time where he was credited with literally 0 steals and 0 blocks. If we are looking at non box defensive impact, I am fairly confident Wilt would come out on top here simply because how little of his defense is actually in the box scores.
• 1962 Wilt as a scoring peak is underrated. We can criticize Wilt's lack of passing in his early years but looking at scoring alone, I don't see the issue. It's not a GOAT offensive season but it's easily among the best scoring season by a big man. The Warriors lost in G7 by a single possession to the Celtics and let's be real - if Wilt had won a ring that year, nobody would be saying anything negative about his scoring. ElGee made a Wilt video a couple days ago but the team offense argument always seemed a bit lazy to me. Jordan, Curry, Wade are some of the best offensive players ever and they had career high scoring numbers on teams with mediocre offenses too. Even among guys from the same era, Barry and Baylor both put up some of their best scoring numbers on teams with an even worse offense than 62/63 Wilt did and that never gets held against them to the same degree.
• This is not really central to the discussion but I just want to say Hal Greer is probably one of the most overrated players in my updated top 100 list. Wilt gets roasted for his postseason dropoff but his playoff numbers are still all time level great despite the decline. Whereas Greer in postseasons without Wilt falls all the way to below average role player territory (16.1 PER, 0.127 WS/48 -> 13.2 PER, 0.063 WS/48). Sam Jones is a tier if not two above him when it comes to the playoffs. People sometimes talk about the Sixers' strong SRS after Wilt was traded to the Lakers but few mention how they were regular season paper tigers that never got past the first round after he left (+3.3 -> -3.8 during 69-71).

[OldSchoolNoBull]

Looking through this thread now that the deadline has passed...this is as close as can be.

I count

8 votes for Hakeem(AEnigma, falcolombardi, OhayoKD, trelos, rk2023, f4p, Shaqattac, iggymcfrack)
7 votes for Wilt(trex, ZeppelinPage, penbeast0, Samurai, ty4191, Draymond, LA Bird)

I count 2 secondary votes for Wilt(lessthanJake, DoctorMJ) and 4 secondary votes for Hakeem(One_and_Done, ty4191, ceoofkobefans, LA Bird), except two of those secondary Hakeem voters voted Wilt #1, so they probably shouldn't count.

But even if you add two secondary votes for each, bringing it to 10-9, neither has a majority of all voters because there were like four Shaq voters and 2 KG voters, I think.

[Doctor MJ]

What are those based on though? There’s not full play by play data for Hakeem’s best years, so isn’t that stuff basically just constructed from box score info for him?

Yup, that's true.

I don't think there's any getting around the issue that we have limited +/- data for prime Hakeem and that reduces our certainty over just how good he was.

[Doctor MJ]

Looking through this thread now that the deadline has passed...this is as close as can be.

I count

8 votes for Hakeem(AEnigma, falcolombardi, OhayoKD, trelos, rk2023, f4p, Shaqattac, iggymcfrack)
7 votes for Wilt(trex, ZeppelinPage, penbeast0, Samurai, ty4191, Draymond, LA Bird)

I count 2 secondary votes for Wilt(lessthanJake, DoctorMJ) and 4 secondary votes for Hakeem(One_and_Done, ty4191, ceoofkobefans, LA Bird), except two of those secondary Hakeem voters voted Wilt #1, so they probably shouldn't count.

But even if you add two secondary votes for each, bringing it to 10-9, neither has a majority of all voters because there were like four Shaq voters and 2 KG voters, I think.

So, based on the policy I set forth, after secondary votes are counted (where appropriate), plurality wins, so if your count is correct and nothing changes, Hakeem will take it by a single vote. We'll see what happens in the morning.

I want to be clear to everybody:

I really don't care if you change your vote so long as you Edit your post instead of making a second voting post.

I also really don't care if you get your vote in by the deadline. If the vote is there when I go to tally it up, it counts, and the deadline is my promise that I won't tally before then.

Will be interesting to see how this turns out.

[SpreeS]

Hakeem at 6th. It would be the most surprising thing to happen in this project for me (at the moment of course).

[One_and_Done]

Hakeem at 6th. It would be the most surprising thing to happen in this project for me (at the moment of course).

I mean he's 7th on my list, so this is functionally only 1 spot higher. I'd have had Shaq and Magic above him probably.

Glad to see Curry is going to be added to the list. Now I can focus on Bird and Durant.

[Dr Positivity]

I edited my post to have a vote for Hakeem 2nd, despite making a lot of anti Hakeem posts in the last few threads, I really don't want to vote for Wilt.

[iggymcfrack]

I edited my post to have a vote for Hakeem 2nd, despite making a lot of anti Hakeem posts in the last few threads, I really don't want to vote for Wilt.

Wilt's #1 overrated. If we had impact stats since the '60s I bet he'd be behind everyone else in the top 20.

[SpreeS]

86 SAC LaSalle Thompson
86 DEN Blair Rasmussen/Danny Schayes
86 LAL KAJ 38y
86 BOS Parish
87 POR Caldwell Jones
87 SEA Clemon Johnson/Alton Lister
88 DAL James Donaldson
89 SEA Olden Polynice/Alton Lister
90 LAL Divac 22y
91 LAL Divac 23y
93 LAC Stanley Roberts
93 SEA Sam Perkins/Michael Cage
94 POR Mark Bryant/Chris Dudley
94 PHO Joe Kleine/Oliver Miller/Mark West
94 UTA Felton Spencer
94 NY Ewing
95 UTA Antoine Carr/James Donaldson
95 PHO Joe Kleine/Danny Schayes
95 SAN Robinson
95 ORL O'Neal 22y
96 LAL Divac
96 SEA Ervin Johnson/Sam Perkins
97 MIN Dean Garrett
97 SEA Sam Perkins 35y
97 UTA Greg Ostertag/Greg Foster
98 UTA Greg Ostertag/Greg Foster


We would have only 8 winning PO series (10L) if to exclude two seasons (94/95) from Hakeem's PO career. We can see his direct opponents every year and the most of these teams were far from world beaters. The guy was reward for two seasons peak. So where is all time impact for most importat position (Center) of his era then he is playing against garbage opponents?

For example Wilt's opponents

Russell 8 times
Reed 4 times
KAJ 2 times
Thurmond 3 times

O'Neal

Ben Wallace 2 times
Duncan/Robinson 3 times
Duncan/C 2 times
Divac/Sabonis 8 times
Hakeem 1 time
Mutombo 1 time
Smits 3 time

Alone I see 11 DPOY nominations on O'Neal list w/o Duncan or Rodman who defended him in 96

[70sFan]

I edited my post to have a vote for Hakeem 2nd, despite making a lot of anti Hakeem posts in the last few threads, I really don't want to vote for Wilt.

Wilt's #1 overrated. If we had impact stats since the '60s I bet he'd be behind everyone else in the top 20.

Yeah, perfectly reasonable to believe that Wilt, who led two of the greatest teams ever, would fare worse in impact metrics than... Kawhi?

[ceoofkobefans]

[b]Total Career VORP (Basketball Reference's Box Plus Minus over total career):
[Wilt/West/Ocar unavailable]
-Garnett: 96.86 (31% ahead of Hakeem)
-Magic: 79.97 (1% ahead of Hakeem)
-Bird: 77.24 (equal to Hakeem)
-Shaq: 75.51 (equal to Hakeem)
-Hakeem: 74.22 (equal to Hakeem)
-Curry: 65.67

Total Career Win Shares:
-Wilt: 247.26 (52% ahead of Hakeem)
-Garnett: 191.42 (18% ahead of Hakeem)
-Oscar: 189.21 (16% ahead of Hakeem)
-Shaq: 181.71 (12% ahead of Hakeem)
-Hakeem: 162.77
-West: 162.58 (equal to Hakeem)
-Magic: 155.79
-Bird: 145.83
-Curry: 128.00

Good post but I think it would be better to use RS+PO for VORP and WS since BBR tracks that (i also decided to add Kobe in because he should be in these convos imo)

Career VORP (RS+PO)

Garnett: 106.3 (22.1% higher)
Magic: 98.31 (12.9% higher)
Kobe: 96.3 (10.6% higher)
Bird: 92.59 (6.3% higher)
Shaq: 90.83 (4.3% higher)
Hakeem: 87.09
Curry: 78.1 (11.5% lower)

Career Win Shares (RS+PO)

Wilt: 278.72 (50.4% higher)
Shaq: 212.8 (14.8% higher)
Garnett: 207.84 (12.1% higher)
Oscar: 202.85 (9.4% higher)
Kobe: 201 (8.4% higher)
West: 189.33 (2.1% higher)
Magic: 188.43 (1.6% higher)
Hakeem: 185.38
Bird: 170.66 (8.6% lower)
Curry: 149.69 (23.8% lower)

I would also like to add RAPTOR WAR here since we have data for that in the RS and PO and it’s one of the best impact metrics

Career RAPTOR WAR (RS+PO)

Garnett: 216.9 (13.7% higher)
Magic: 216.5 (13.5% higher)
Kobe: 210 (10.1% higher)
Bird: 192.1 (.7% higher)
Hakeem: 190.8
Curry: 187.7 (1.7% lower)
Shaq: 178.3 (7% lower)



KG is comfortably ahead of Hakeem in all 3 metrics (ahead by an average of 16%)

Magic is comfortably ahead of Hakeem in 2/3 metrics and edges Hakeem out in WS (9.3% ahead on average)

Kobe is comfortably(?) ahead of Hakeem in all 3. He stays around 10% for every stat (9.7% ahead on average)

Bird teeters from slightly ahead of Hakeem to roughly = to Hakeem to slightly below Hakeem in the 3 metrics (.5% behind on average)

Curry is consistently worse than Hakeem (he’s usually cleared by Hakeem at 12.3% behind Hakeem on average)

Shaq goes from clear of Hakeem to slightly ahead to comfortably (7%) behind Hakeem. He was ahead of Hakeem by an average of 4%.

wilt Oscar and west still only have WS sadly but they all come out ahead of Hakeem

Obviously not all that matters and this still isn’t fully adjusting for if a player rises or not in the playoffs since this is cumulative.

I’d say I would take Shaq and Kobe over Hakeem all time and I have him and wilt about equal. I’d have bird Magic and curry in the tier after Hakeem wilt and bill (Kobe tweeters between the TD Shaq tier and the Hakeem bill wilt tier).