NBA MVP Discussion Thread 2023-24 (Part 4: MVP Thread's Revenge)

[Exp0sed]

So, your question is a compelling one. I'd say in general I just refrain from making conclusions so quickly. The odds of X after 3 games might be low, but it's non-zero, and we're about to get games 4, 5, 6, 7, etc, so best to be patient. If it's real, the trend will continue.

As I say that, I think I'd be remiss if I didn't point some things out about the last 3 games:

First, Washington & San Antonio are bad teams, that Luka already had double digit positive +/- games against earlier this season.

So then it's really that OKC game that stands out because that was Dallas beating down an actually good team.

In that game, the Mavs had a +18 in the 31 minutes Luka played, which is very good...
but they also had a +17 in the 17 minutes Luka didn't play, which means they were actually outscoring the Thunder at a more dramatic rate without than with.

Again, not trying to say, "That means it was a fluke!", only that these 3 games weren't really that much out of norms for Luka's +/- type indicators when you factor in some context, and so all the more reason to be patient and see what the new information teaches us.

for some reason you keep arguing that Luka has been consistent in being pedestrian (in terms of +-) throughout 6 seasons and thus the data is robust but that's not factually true

u mentioned Luka in his second season (2019-2020) posted an elite mark of +243 playing next to KP
can u find other sophomores who were first options as 19 year olds or as sophomores and posted a mark that good?

the fact is Luka was was elite in that regard as well in 2020 when he was playing with KP, THJ (whose been coming off the bench these past few seasons despite being better than guys who are starting) was a starter that season and Dallas had a reasonable starting five.

what changed in 2021, was he elite in 2020 and declined at 20 years old in 2021 and thereafter?

your argument doesn't really hold water imo

I understand your'e saying: hey, if he gets there that i'll give him props for it but that's not the issue, i'm completely indifferent to whether you specifically (or anyone for that matter) thinks this way or that way

i'm just trying to get u to realize that when that happens (and imo it's likely to happen in the latter part of this season and that trend has already started) - Luka will still be the same player he was before.
he's not gonna add talent, burst or abilities. he'll be the same player that posted an elite mark as a sophomore, a season in which he finished 4th(!) in MVP voting as a 20 year old and led the Mavs to a great record and the league's best offense (their defense was 16th btw. it's 19th this season and one of the best in the last few games in the entire NBA, Gafford and PJ do make a difference on that end and that should "normalize" Luka's +-, at least for the latter part of the season, obviously most of the season has already been played).

he will also be the same player that has failed to post such marks since that season. the difference will be the roster, the schemes, the rotations etc - not Luka
Luka has been consistently elite all this time.

Okay, so there's some thing to clarify here:

First, I don't think I talked about Luka's +/- in '19-20 as "elite". I think maybe you're referring to someone else?

Second, a number like Luka's that year (which I think is +253 for the regular season) isn't actually elite if "elite" means "What we expect from MVP candidates?". I was super impressed by sophomore Luka by the standards of evaluating sophomores of course, but there was an expectation that Luka would take a step forward after that which would lead to him being an MVP-type player, and we're still waiting on that.

Now, in terms of "Was Luka elite and then fell back?", I'll say that the absolute answer is "No", but when we look just at ORtg as the league has evolved, it does tell a story.

Here's Luka's ORtg over the years in question, with the league average ORtg next to it in parentheses:

'19-20: 118.7 (110.6)
'20-21: 118.5 (112.3)
'21-22: 115.5 (112.0)
'22-23: 119.8 (114.8)
'23-24: 121.1 (115.9)

Luka's on-court offenses have been well ahead of league average in general, but the competitive advantage there really did peak in '19-20.

This is part of the more general arms race going on all throughout the league all the time, and it is worth considering whether a more meaningful assessment of the players is done based on absolute scales rather the relative scales we focus on within any given season. If it's possible a player is actually improving at a great rate but we're confusing that for stagnation due to the rest of the league improving at a similar rate, we should perhaps be more positive in our sentiment than we are.

Re: if results change but Luka is the same guy he was before. So to be clear, when new information makes me reconsider a player, I do going into the past as well. I even periodically go through an re-think my evaluations of top players in a given season trying to start fresh and not be chained to how I or others were thinking at the time. And so I'll certainly be doing this with Luka in the future regardless of how things play out.

I agree with you, obviously 3 games is nothing and it's def true that two of those came against very weak teams. I just observed the oddity because if we assume there is no casual connection than randomly hitting that mark 3/3 when before he was 5/44 is pretty meaningful in binomial disturbution terms even on such a tiny sample

as for the +253, I wasn't quoting anyone - I was arguing that +253 for a 19 year old sophomore being the first option has to be elite (I'm not as familiar as u are in historical +- numbers) but I find it hard to believe there are many sophomores who led their teams to a good record, the best offense and a +253 (even if we include sophomores who were older at the time, as not many sophomores are leading teams at 19 period, that's a small pool of players)

isn't +253 elite for a sophomore?

as for the offensive trends around the league, i'd say the numbers you presented don't really support that narrative
let's say the league average ORTG rose by X in that time span and Luka's ORTG rose by less - we're only talking about a couple of points and there's alot of noice and variance involved.

so say we disregard that variance and statisical margin of error, to match the league trend Luka's Ortg should have risen from 118.7 to around 124? and instead it's at 121? that's hardly compelling imo and it's not the reason his +- haven't been great

20-21 team just wasn't as good (esepcially offensively)
this current team has Grant Williams, DDJ and Lively all starting in more games than Kyrie, 121 ORTG with the guys he's been playing with is phenomenal, it's better than what we've seen in the past

what's his ORTG when playing alongside Kyrie for a full season? i'm sure it'd be in line with the bump we've seen in league trends
Luka and Kyrie have only played 28 games together this season

there's too much noise and two many different variables to really compare the league trend to Luka's ORTG imo
it's not a useful analysis

my point was that Luka managed +253 for a season as a soph, even it's not "elite" it's close to it. so the story that you're telling about Luka consisently being ok, pedestrian or just above average and thus the 6 year model is very robust is simply false imo

that second season was a great +- season. has he regressed as a player since then? ofc not, thus there must be some other explanation for the anomaly that's been his +- for most of his career

that's my logic anyway, going back to the analogy about the continental drift and the discovery of tectonic plates.
just because we can't pinpoint the exact reason\s or circumstances that are causing this phenonemon does not mean there isn't an explanation, one that doesn't include assuming Luka is more pedestrian that he appears to be by any other metric or eye test

just because we don't know what that mechanism is, does not mean all the continents didn't use to be one landmass nor does it mean that Luka isn't as great as 99.9% of basketball fans, players etc. are clearly seeing he is i.e - a perennial MVP candidates and one of the best players in the world. because well..he is

[Doctor MJ]

So, your question is a compelling one. I'd say in general I just refrain from making conclusions so quickly. The odds of X after 3 games might be low, but it's non-zero, and we're about to get games 4, 5, 6, 7, etc, so best to be patient. If it's real, the trend will continue.

As I say that, I think I'd be remiss if I didn't point some things out about the last 3 games:

First, Washington & San Antonio are bad teams, that Luka already had double digit positive +/- games against earlier this season.

So then it's really that OKC game that stands out because that was Dallas beating down an actually good team.

In that game, the Mavs had a +18 in the 31 minutes Luka played, which is very good...
but they also had a +17 in the 17 minutes Luka didn't play, which means they were actually outscoring the Thunder at a more dramatic rate without than with.

Again, not trying to say, "That means it was a fluke!", only that these 3 games weren't really that much out of norms for Luka's +/- type indicators when you factor in some context, and so all the more reason to be patient and see what the new information teaches us.

for some reason you keep arguing that Luka has been consistent in being pedestrian (in terms of +-) throughout 6 seasons and thus the data is robust but that's not factually true

u mentioned Luka in his second season (2019-2020) posted an elite mark of +243 playing next to KP
can u find other sophomores who were first options as 19 year olds or as sophomores and posted a mark that good?

the fact is Luka was was elite in that regard as well in 2020 when he was playing with KP, THJ (whose been coming off the bench these past few seasons despite being better than guys who are starting) was a starter that season and Dallas had a reasonable starting five.

what changed in 2021, was he elite in 2020 and declined at 20 years old in 2021 and thereafter?

your argument doesn't really hold water imo

I understand your'e saying: hey, if he gets there that i'll give him props for it but that's not the issue, i'm completely indifferent to whether you specifically (or anyone for that matter) thinks this way or that way

i'm just trying to get u to realize that when that happens (and imo it's likely to happen in the latter part of this season and that trend has already started) - Luka will still be the same player he was before.
he's not gonna add talent, burst or abilities. he'll be the same player that posted an elite mark as a sophomore, a season in which he finished 4th(!) in MVP voting as a 20 year old and led the Mavs to a great record and the league's best offense (their defense was 16th btw. it's 19th this season and one of the best in the last few games in the entire NBA, Gafford and PJ do make a difference on that end and that should "normalize" Luka's +-, at least for the latter part of the season, obviously most of the season has already been played).

he will also be the same player that has failed to post such marks since that season. the difference will be the roster, the schemes, the rotations etc - not Luka
Luka has been consistently elite all this time.

Okay, so there's some thing to clarify here:

First, I don't think I talked about Luka's +/- in '19-20 as "elite". I think maybe you're referring to someone else?

Second, a number like Luka's that year (which I think is +253 for the regular season) isn't actually elite if "elite" means "What we expect from MVP candidates?". I was super impressed by sophomore Luka by the standards of evaluating sophomores of course, but there was an expectation that Luka would take a step forward after that which would lead to him being an MVP-type player, and we're still waiting on that.

Now, in terms of "Was Luka elite and then fell back?", I'll say that the absolute answer is "No", but when we look just at ORtg as the league has evolved, it does tell a story.

Here's Luka's ORtg over the years in question, with the league average ORtg next to it in parentheses:

'19-20: 118.7 (110.6)
'20-21: 118.5 (112.3)
'21-22: 115.5 (112.0)
'22-23: 119.8 (114.8)
'23-24: 121.1 (115.9)

Luka's on-court offenses have been well ahead of league average in general, but the competitive advantage there really did peak in '19-20.

This is part of the more general arms race going on all throughout the league all the time, and it is worth considering whether a more meaningful assessment of the players is done based on absolute scales rather the relative scales we focus on within any given season. If it's possible a player is actually improving at a great rate but we're confusing that for stagnation due to the rest of the league improving at a similar rate, we should perhaps be more positive in our sentiment than we are.

Re: if results change but Luka is the same guy he was before. So to be clear, when new information makes me reconsider a player, I do going into the past as well. I even periodically go through an re-think my evaluations of top players in a given season trying to start fresh and not be chained to how I or others were thinking at the time. And so I'll certainly be doing this with Luka in the future regardless of how things play out.

I agree with you, obviously 3 games is nothing and it's def true that two of those came against very weak teams. I just observed the oddity because if we assume there is no casual connection than randomly hitting that mark 3/3 when before he was 5/44 is pretty meaningful in binomial disturbution terms even on such a tiny sample

as for the +253, I wasn't quoting anyone - I was arguing that +253 for a 19 year old sophomore being the first option has to be elite (I'm not as familiar as u are in historical +- numbers) but I find it hard to believe there are many sophomores who led their teams to a good record, the best offense and a +253 (even if we include sophomores who were older at the time, as not many sophomores are leading teams at 19 period, that's a small pool of players)

isn't +253 elite for a sophomore?

as for the offensive trends around the league, i'd say the numbers you presented don't really support that narrative
let's say the league average ORTG rose by X in that time span and Luka's ORTG rose by less - we're only talking about a couple of points and there's alot of noice and variance involved.

so say we disregard that variance and statisical margin of error, to match the league trend Luka's Ortg should have risen from 118.7 to around 124? and instead it's at 121? that's hardly compelling imo and it's not the reason his +- haven't been great

20-21 team just wasn't as good (esepcially offensively)
this current team has Grant Williams, DDJ and Lively all starting in more games than Kyrie, 121 ORTG with the guys he's been playing with is phenomenal, it's better than what we've seen in the past

what's his ORTG when playing alongside Kyrie for a full season? i'm sure it'd be in line with the bump we've seen in league trends
Luka and Kyrie have only played 28 games together this season

there's too much noise and two many different variables to really compare the league trend to Luka's ORTG imo
it's not a useful analysis

my point was that Luka managed +253 for a season as a soph, even it's not "elite" it's close to it. so the story that you're telling about Luka consisently being ok, pedestrian or just above average and thus the 6 year model is very robust is simply false imo

that second season was a great +- season. has he regressed as a player since then? ofc not, thus there must be some other explanation for the anomaly that's been his +- for most of his career

that's my logic anyway, going back to the analogy about the continental drift and the discovery of tectonic plates.
just because we can't pinpoint the exact reason\s or circumstances that are causing this phenonemon does not mean there isn't an explanation, one that doesn't include assuming Luka is more pedestrian that he appears to be by any other metric or eye test

just because we don't know what that mechanism is, does not mean all the continents didn't use to be one landmass nor does it mean that Luka isn't as great as 99.9% of basketball fans, players etc. are clearly seeing he is i.e - a perennial MVP candidates and one of the best players in the world. because well..he is

Again, it makes no sense to talk of someone being elite for a sophomore as if it's the same thing as being MVP-candidate level.

But yes, Luka was certainly elite relative to the norms of sophomores.

Re: does not mean there isn't an explanation. I've been asking for explanations the entire thread, but really all I ever get are excuse-based explanations. Fine to bring up these things, but it's a lot of time we're talking about now, and this time has been made up of a number of different team contexts that all need to be blamed separately if they are to be things that excuse the man who has been the throughline the entire time.

An unbiased attempt to explain can mention this, but should also be asking:

What are the concerns and tricky parts about Luka's game that may be contributing here?

And to be clear, this isn't just a Luka +/- thing. Me doing analysis like this is precisely why I have concerns about Shai in the playoffs, and why I had specific concerns about Jokic on defense for the playoffs (that admittedly have now been mostly assuaged).

[iggymcfrack]

So again nothing about why I believe Luka had average career's +/-? It's not about luck but about team construction. Curry had all his career great +/- mostly because his team was built properly and had fantastic defensive rtg, although we all know that he's not good defender. His +/- was product of great team construction and his production. There's no luck factor here. Warriors deliberately built team around Curry, which hidden his most important weakness on the other hand Mavs couldn't until recently. Is it really Luka's fault for having to play with Powell as starting C for many years? Is it really his fault for having undersized bigs that can't rebound? Is it really his fault not having enough athletic wings?

When you look at first 7 teams in Nba, they're first 7 teams in D too, like were Warriors until recently. Are Pgs of those teams the main reason for having the best team D? Was Curry his entire career, while having fantastic defensive rtg, generational defender or maybe it was about his team's D? Don't you think that Luka's +/- can dramatically change, if Mavs build better defensive team?

I showed you direct comparison between Curry and Luka, in offensive and defensive side and you didn't even write a single sentence about it. My point is really simple, the main reason for his average career +/- is not having good enough team D. If you have the most efficient 70+ game in the history, 91 TS%, 73/10/7, and your team barely wins, it should be evident that something is wrong with team D and not with impact of your star player. Letting your opponent score 143 is not exactly receipt for winning. Now you can say, that if he was really impactful, he should score 73/10/7 with fantastic efficiency and be the best team defender too.

That's it from me. I believe it's clear positive correlation between quality of the starting lineup and +/-. Difficult to find any kind of other correlation that can be proven. You have good players in good teams with good +/-. You have bad players in good teams with good +/-. And you have good players in bad teams with bad +/-.

There's a big difference between noise in small samples and between data that is wrong, because it doesn't measure what we believe it does. +/- is not measuring impact of single player, it''s measuring impact of lineups, and there we can talk about noise in small sample size.

Is it Luka's fault that X? No, not his fault per se.

But the whole thing about "The Mavs built poorly around him" is that a) the supporting cast when Luka's off the floor has been pretty reasonable his whole career, and b) the Mavs have tried very hard to surround Luka with the right talent bringing in various players, and it hardly makes sense to boil that down to a guy in Powell who has played less than he's sat in every single year of his career.

As I've tried to indicate, if the Mavs make some move that makes everything fall into place that makes the world go "D'oh! They should have done that years ago." I'll certainly be reconsidering how I see the situation, but as is, the entire basketball world expected more of the Mavs given Luka and the rosters they had. That's why Luka was the pre-season favorite for MVP 3 straight years and never ended up being a serious candidate.

Re: blaming PGs for defense not right. So, some things here:

a) There's really no reason to consider Luka a defensive point guard. He's power forward-sized, and the Mavs have generally not used that to "play big", rather they put guard-sized guys on the floor to deal with the size norms of other teams. We generally expect power forward-sized guys to be positives on defense, and when this isn't the case, it should go against them.

b) While I can certainly agree that Luka's a positive on offense and that positive makes up for the defense and then some, it's important not to let the conversation imply that if we simply looked at offense Luka's numbers - On, On/Off, ORAPM, etc - would be a serious candidate for best in the world.

The general truth is that Luka's look less impressive on offense as well as overall when looking at these sort of metrics than those who focus on the box score expect.

Let me put up numbers just for this year with Luka and other top performers with On & On/Off ORtg because they represent Luka's best performance of his career.

Luka, On: 121.1 On/Off: +7.2
Jokic, On: 122.9 On/Off: +14.3
Shai, On: 123.4 On/Off: +9.5
Giannis, On: 122.8 On/Off: +8.4
Hali, On: 126.1 On/Off: +8.7

Now to be clear: Luka's doing great by all reasonable standards here - as I said, best of his career - and I wouldn't look to say he couldn't possibly be the MVP because of these numbers, but we're still not talking about a situation where Luka really has a case for looking like the most impactful offensive player around with these metrics.

(ftr, I do think Luka's pretty clear cut ahead of Giannis as an offensive player, and I will be cautious about Shai in particular until I see it in the playoffs. Hali too to some degree, though I have specific Shai concerns.)

I believe it's pretty clear that main reason for Luka having average career +/- is on defensive side not offensive side. And it's pretty clear that Curry having incredible career +/- is because he had phenomenal, totally unexpectedly, defensive rtg. Both players being great offensive talents and not exceptional defensive players, but having totally opposite defensive rtg.

It should be obvious what Mavs have to do, and they done it at this trade deadline, they gave up all remaining picks to get 2 players, that should help in D. If we add Lively to that roster, it's obvious that Mavs' FO agree where the problem is. I believe we will see the big improvement next year.

Sga is great example, how futile is looking at +/- numbers, before player has the right team built around him. Catastrophic first 4 years, improvement in year 5 and great in 6, when he got the final piece.

Luka offensive on/off by year (2019-2024): -1.0, +3.3, +6.8, +3.3, +7.7, +6.0

Steph offensive on/off by year (2013-2019): +10.4, +15.2, +12.7, +14.0, +18.4, +15.1, +10.9

Even if you remove defense from the discussion, Luka doesn’t come remotely close to matching peak Steph’s offensive impact.

[Bob8]

So, your question is a compelling one. I'd say in general I just refrain from making conclusions so quickly. The odds of X after 3 games might be low, but it's non-zero, and we're about to get games 4, 5, 6, 7, etc, so best to be patient. If it's real, the trend will continue.

As I say that, I think I'd be remiss if I didn't point some things out about the last 3 games:

First, Washington & San Antonio are bad teams, that Luka already had double digit positive +/- games against earlier this season.

So then it's really that OKC game that stands out because that was Dallas beating down an actually good team.

In that game, the Mavs had a +18 in the 31 minutes Luka played, which is very good...
but they also had a +17 in the 17 minutes Luka didn't play, which means they were actually outscoring the Thunder at a more dramatic rate without than with.

Again, not trying to say, "That means it was a fluke!", only that these 3 games weren't really that much out of norms for Luka's +/- type indicators when you factor in some context, and so all the more reason to be patient and see what the new information teaches us.



Okay, so there's some thing to clarify here:

First, I don't think I talked about Luka's +/- in '19-20 as "elite". I think maybe you're referring to someone else?

Second, a number like Luka's that year (which I think is +253 for the regular season) isn't actually elite if "elite" means "What we expect from MVP candidates?". I was super impressed by sophomore Luka by the standards of evaluating sophomores of course, but there was an expectation that Luka would take a step forward after that which would lead to him being an MVP-type player, and we're still waiting on that.

Now, in terms of "Was Luka elite and then fell back?", I'll say that the absolute answer is "No", but when we look just at ORtg as the league has evolved, it does tell a story.

Here's Luka's ORtg over the years in question, with the league average ORtg next to it in parentheses:

'19-20: 118.7 (110.6)
'20-21: 118.5 (112.3)
'21-22: 115.5 (112.0)
'22-23: 119.8 (114.8)
'23-24: 121.1 (115.9)

Luka's on-court offenses have been well ahead of league average in general, but the competitive advantage there really did peak in '19-20.

This is part of the more general arms race going on all throughout the league all the time, and it is worth considering whether a more meaningful assessment of the players is done based on absolute scales rather the relative scales we focus on within any given season. If it's possible a player is actually improving at a great rate but we're confusing that for stagnation due to the rest of the league improving at a similar rate, we should perhaps be more positive in our sentiment than we are.

Re: if results change but Luka is the same guy he was before. So to be clear, when new information makes me reconsider a player, I do going into the past as well. I even periodically go through an re-think my evaluations of top players in a given season trying to start fresh and not be chained to how I or others were thinking at the time. And so I'll certainly be doing this with Luka in the future regardless of how things play out.

I agree with you, obviously 3 games is nothing and it's def true that two of those came against very weak teams. I just observed the oddity because if we assume there is no casual connection than randomly hitting that mark 3/3 when before he was 5/44 is pretty meaningful in binomial disturbution terms even on such a tiny sample

as for the +253, I wasn't quoting anyone - I was arguing that +253 for a 19 year old sophomore being the first option has to be elite (I'm not as familiar as u are in historical +- numbers) but I find it hard to believe there are many sophomores who led their teams to a good record, the best offense and a +253 (even if we include sophomores who were older at the time, as not many sophomores are leading teams at 19 period, that's a small pool of players)

isn't +253 elite for a sophomore?

as for the offensive trends around the league, i'd say the numbers you presented don't really support that narrative
let's say the league average ORTG rose by X in that time span and Luka's ORTG rose by less - we're only talking about a couple of points and there's alot of noice and variance involved.

so say we disregard that variance and statisical margin of error, to match the league trend Luka's Ortg should have risen from 118.7 to around 124? and instead it's at 121? that's hardly compelling imo and it's not the reason his +- haven't been great

20-21 team just wasn't as good (esepcially offensively)
this current team has Grant Williams, DDJ and Lively all starting in more games than Kyrie, 121 ORTG with the guys he's been playing with is phenomenal, it's better than what we've seen in the past

what's his ORTG when playing alongside Kyrie for a full season? i'm sure it'd be in line with the bump we've seen in league trends
Luka and Kyrie have only played 28 games together this season

there's too much noise and two many different variables to really compare the league trend to Luka's ORTG imo
it's not a useful analysis

my point was that Luka managed +253 for a season as a soph, even it's not "elite" it's close to it. so the story that you're telling about Luka consisently being ok, pedestrian or just above average and thus the 6 year model is very robust is simply false imo

that second season was a great +- season. has he regressed as a player since then? ofc not, thus there must be some other explanation for the anomaly that's been his +- for most of his career

that's my logic anyway, going back to the analogy about the continental drift and the discovery of tectonic plates.
just because we can't pinpoint the exact reason\s or circumstances that are causing this phenonemon does not mean there isn't an explanation, one that doesn't include assuming Luka is more pedestrian that he appears to be by any other metric or eye test

just because we don't know what that mechanism is, does not mean all the continents didn't use to be one landmass nor does it mean that Luka isn't as great as 99.9% of basketball fans, players etc. are clearly seeing he is i.e - a perennial MVP candidates and one of the best players in the world. because well..he is

Again, it makes no sense to talk of someone being elite for a sophomore as if it's the same thing as being MVP-candidate level.

But yes, Luka was certainly elite relative to the norms of sophomores.

Re: does not mean there isn't an explanation. I've been asking for explanations the entire thread, but really all I ever get are excuse-based explanations. Fine to bring up these things, but it's a lot of time we're talking about now, and this time has been made up of a number of different team contexts that all need to be blamed separately if they are to be things that excuse the man who has been the throughline the entire time.

An unbiased attempt to explain can mention this, but should also be asking:

What are the concerns and tricky parts about Luka's game that may be contributing here?

And to be clear, this isn't just a Luka +/- thing. Me doing analysis like this is precisely why I have concerns about Shai in the playoffs, and why I had specific concerns about Jokic on defense for the playoffs (that admittedly have now been mostly assuaged).

How can be playing with 30 different starting lineups just an excuse? When others has played with less than 10 different lineups, SGA with only 6? 30/54 different lineups might be some kind of a Nba record. I know that Mavs have never finished a season with so many different starting lineups, and it's only 2/3 of the season played. How can be playing with theoretically the best lineup for only 26 minutes an excuse? Other teams having best lineup playing 600+ minutes together. How can be saying that the best 3 Mavs players outside Luka missing 60+ games is just an excuse?

All those things are facts and all those things had a big impact on Mavs' season and Luka's offensive rtg and +/-. I would expect from someone, who want to look at games through numbers, to at least consider those pretty important circumstances. But you're just dismissing them as an excuse, and don't want even consider importance of them, while talking about how Luka's offensive rtg is not elite?

What is more baffling to me that your MVP candidate is having a fantastic season, while having incredible luck with injuries. The difference between Mavs and OKC considering injuries is just unbelievable. Mavs playing with 30 different lineups and OKC playing 47 times with the best lineup. What would have happened, if situation was vice versa? And don't forget, SGA has even worse career +/- than Luka, if you will again brought up Luka's career +/-.

Yes, it is what it is, but I believe circumstance should be taken into consideration, if they're so specific.

[Bob8]

Is it Luka's fault that X? No, not his fault per se.

But the whole thing about "The Mavs built poorly around him" is that a) the supporting cast when Luka's off the floor has been pretty reasonable his whole career, and b) the Mavs have tried very hard to surround Luka with the right talent bringing in various players, and it hardly makes sense to boil that down to a guy in Powell who has played less than he's sat in every single year of his career.

As I've tried to indicate, if the Mavs make some move that makes everything fall into place that makes the world go "D'oh! They should have done that years ago." I'll certainly be reconsidering how I see the situation, but as is, the entire basketball world expected more of the Mavs given Luka and the rosters they had. That's why Luka was the pre-season favorite for MVP 3 straight years and never ended up being a serious candidate.

Re: blaming PGs for defense not right. So, some things here:

a) There's really no reason to consider Luka a defensive point guard. He's power forward-sized, and the Mavs have generally not used that to "play big", rather they put guard-sized guys on the floor to deal with the size norms of other teams. We generally expect power forward-sized guys to be positives on defense, and when this isn't the case, it should go against them.

b) While I can certainly agree that Luka's a positive on offense and that positive makes up for the defense and then some, it's important not to let the conversation imply that if we simply looked at offense Luka's numbers - On, On/Off, ORAPM, etc - would be a serious candidate for best in the world.

The general truth is that Luka's look less impressive on offense as well as overall when looking at these sort of metrics than those who focus on the box score expect.

Let me put up numbers just for this year with Luka and other top performers with On & On/Off ORtg because they represent Luka's best performance of his career.

Luka, On: 121.1 On/Off: +7.2
Jokic, On: 122.9 On/Off: +14.3
Shai, On: 123.4 On/Off: +9.5
Giannis, On: 122.8 On/Off: +8.4
Hali, On: 126.1 On/Off: +8.7

Now to be clear: Luka's doing great by all reasonable standards here - as I said, best of his career - and I wouldn't look to say he couldn't possibly be the MVP because of these numbers, but we're still not talking about a situation where Luka really has a case for looking like the most impactful offensive player around with these metrics.

(ftr, I do think Luka's pretty clear cut ahead of Giannis as an offensive player, and I will be cautious about Shai in particular until I see it in the playoffs. Hali too to some degree, though I have specific Shai concerns.)

I believe it's pretty clear that main reason for Luka having average career +/- is on defensive side not offensive side. And it's pretty clear that Curry having incredible career +/- is because he had phenomenal, totally unexpectedly, defensive rtg. Both players being great offensive talents and not exceptional defensive players, but having totally opposite defensive rtg.

It should be obvious what Mavs have to do, and they done it at this trade deadline, they gave up all remaining picks to get 2 players, that should help in D. If we add Lively to that roster, it's obvious that Mavs' FO agree where the problem is. I believe we will see the big improvement next year.

Sga is great example, how futile is looking at +/- numbers, before player has the right team built around him. Catastrophic first 4 years, improvement in year 5 and great in 6, when he got the final piece.

Luka offensive on/off by year (2019-2024): -1.0, +3.3, +6.8, +3.3, +7.7, +6.0

Steph offensive on/off by year (2013-2019): +10.4, +15.2, +12.7, +14.0, +18.4, +15.1, +10.9

Even if you remove defense from the discussion, Luka doesn’t come remotely close to matching peak Steph’s offensive impact.

Luka's replacement was Brunson and now is Kyrie, who was Steph's replacement? (On/off is laughable to me, you're judged by what your replacement and opponents are doing, when you're on the bench.) if second best player is your replacement, your on/off won't be ever elite. Worse is your replacement, better is your on/off. Like I said, Warriors built fantastic team around Steph, shooting and D. Mavs went in other direction, instead of shooting and D, they always had multiple guards in the lineup and even today, both best players are guards. When did a team won something in Nba with 2 Pgs as best players?

Instead of Kyrie Mavs should have added elite wing, but it's extremely difficult to find that kind of player, especially if your assets are very limited and you're not prepared to pay such money as Warriors did every year. They could get Kyrie only because his trade value was pretty low because of all of his "moments".

[Doctor MJ]

I agree with you, obviously 3 games is nothing and it's def true that two of those came against very weak teams. I just observed the oddity because if we assume there is no casual connection than randomly hitting that mark 3/3 when before he was 5/44 is pretty meaningful in binomial disturbution terms even on such a tiny sample

as for the +253, I wasn't quoting anyone - I was arguing that +253 for a 19 year old sophomore being the first option has to be elite (I'm not as familiar as u are in historical +- numbers) but I find it hard to believe there are many sophomores who led their teams to a good record, the best offense and a +253 (even if we include sophomores who were older at the time, as not many sophomores are leading teams at 19 period, that's a small pool of players)

isn't +253 elite for a sophomore?

as for the offensive trends around the league, i'd say the numbers you presented don't really support that narrative
let's say the league average ORTG rose by X in that time span and Luka's ORTG rose by less - we're only talking about a couple of points and there's alot of noice and variance involved.

so say we disregard that variance and statisical margin of error, to match the league trend Luka's Ortg should have risen from 118.7 to around 124? and instead it's at 121? that's hardly compelling imo and it's not the reason his +- haven't been great

20-21 team just wasn't as good (esepcially offensively)
this current team has Grant Williams, DDJ and Lively all starting in more games than Kyrie, 121 ORTG with the guys he's been playing with is phenomenal, it's better than what we've seen in the past

what's his ORTG when playing alongside Kyrie for a full season? i'm sure it'd be in line with the bump we've seen in league trends
Luka and Kyrie have only played 28 games together this season

there's too much noise and two many different variables to really compare the league trend to Luka's ORTG imo
it's not a useful analysis

my point was that Luka managed +253 for a season as a soph, even it's not "elite" it's close to it. so the story that you're telling about Luka consisently being ok, pedestrian or just above average and thus the 6 year model is very robust is simply false imo

that second season was a great +- season. has he regressed as a player since then? ofc not, thus there must be some other explanation for the anomaly that's been his +- for most of his career

that's my logic anyway, going back to the analogy about the continental drift and the discovery of tectonic plates.
just because we can't pinpoint the exact reason\s or circumstances that are causing this phenonemon does not mean there isn't an explanation, one that doesn't include assuming Luka is more pedestrian that he appears to be by any other metric or eye test

just because we don't know what that mechanism is, does not mean all the continents didn't use to be one landmass nor does it mean that Luka isn't as great as 99.9% of basketball fans, players etc. are clearly seeing he is i.e - a perennial MVP candidates and one of the best players in the world. because well..he is

Again, it makes no sense to talk of someone being elite for a sophomore as if it's the same thing as being MVP-candidate level.

But yes, Luka was certainly elite relative to the norms of sophomores.

Re: does not mean there isn't an explanation. I've been asking for explanations the entire thread, but really all I ever get are excuse-based explanations. Fine to bring up these things, but it's a lot of time we're talking about now, and this time has been made up of a number of different team contexts that all need to be blamed separately if they are to be things that excuse the man who has been the throughline the entire time.

An unbiased attempt to explain can mention this, but should also be asking:

What are the concerns and tricky parts about Luka's game that may be contributing here?

And to be clear, this isn't just a Luka +/- thing. Me doing analysis like this is precisely why I have concerns about Shai in the playoffs, and why I had specific concerns about Jokic on defense for the playoffs (that admittedly have now been mostly assuaged).

How can be playing with 30 different starting lineups just an excuse? When others has played with less than 10 different lineups, SGA with only 6? 30/54 different lineups might be some kind of a Nba record. I know that Mavs have never finished a season with so many different starting lineups, and it's only 2/3 of the season played. How can be playing with theoretically the best lineup for only 26 minutes an excuse? Other teams having best lineup playing 600+ minutes together. How can be saying that the best 3 Mavs players outside Luka missing 60+ games is just an excuse?

All those things are facts and all those things had a big impact on Mavs' season and Luka's offensive rtg and +/-. I would expect from someone, who want to look at games through numbers, to at least consider those pretty important circumstances. But you're just dismissing them as an excuse, and don't want even consider importance of them, while talking about how Luka's offensive rtg is not elite?

What is more baffling to me that your MVP candidate is having a fantastic season, while having incredible luck with injuries. The difference between Mavs and OKC considering injuries is just unbelievable. Mavs playing with 30 different lineups and OKC playing 47 times with the best lineup. What would have happened, if situation was vice versa? And don't forget, SGA has even worse career +/- than Luka, if you will again brought up Luka's career +/-.

Yes, it is what it is, but I believe circumstance should be taken into consideration, if they're so specific.

It's an excuse because it excuses Luka. It's not looking to look at Luka, warts and all, and speak to what challenges relate to he and his game.

As I said, it's fine to bring up some things along these lines, but if all you're doing are finding reasons why the struggles of Luka's teams have nothing to do with Luka, you missing something essential.

Re: vice versa. If the facts were opposite, then the stuff I say about Shai, I'd say about Luka, and vice versa.

Is it possible Shai's situation is something that will turn out to be noise? Sure, not impossible.

Will this change anything about Luka situation? No. The only thing that will change the fact that Luka's never shown MVP levels of season impact is Luka showing just that.

[Bob8]

Again, it makes no sense to talk of someone being elite for a sophomore as if it's the same thing as being MVP-candidate level.

But yes, Luka was certainly elite relative to the norms of sophomores.

Re: does not mean there isn't an explanation. I've been asking for explanations the entire thread, but really all I ever get are excuse-based explanations. Fine to bring up these things, but it's a lot of time we're talking about now, and this time has been made up of a number of different team contexts that all need to be blamed separately if they are to be things that excuse the man who has been the throughline the entire time.

An unbiased attempt to explain can mention this, but should also be asking:

What are the concerns and tricky parts about Luka's game that may be contributing here?

And to be clear, this isn't just a Luka +/- thing. Me doing analysis like this is precisely why I have concerns about Shai in the playoffs, and why I had specific concerns about Jokic on defense for the playoffs (that admittedly have now been mostly assuaged).

How can be playing with 30 different starting lineups just an excuse? When others has played with less than 10 different lineups, SGA with only 6? 30/54 different lineups might be some kind of a Nba record. I know that Mavs have never finished a season with so many different starting lineups, and it's only 2/3 of the season played. How can be playing with theoretically the best lineup for only 26 minutes an excuse? Other teams having best lineup playing 600+ minutes together. How can be saying that the best 3 Mavs players outside Luka missing 60+ games is just an excuse?

All those things are facts and all those things had a big impact on Mavs' season and Luka's offensive rtg and +/-. I would expect from someone, who want to look at games through numbers, to at least consider those pretty important circumstances. But you're just dismissing them as an excuse, and don't want even consider importance of them, while talking about how Luka's offensive rtg is not elite?

What is more baffling to me that your MVP candidate is having a fantastic season, while having incredible luck with injuries. The difference between Mavs and OKC considering injuries is just unbelievable. Mavs playing with 30 different lineups and OKC playing 47 times with the best lineup. What would have happened, if situation was vice versa? And don't forget, SGA has even worse career +/- than Luka, if you will again brought up Luka's career +/-.

Yes, it is what it is, but I believe circumstance should be taken into consideration, if they're so specific.

It's an excuse because it excuses Luka. It's not looking to look at Luka, warts and all, and speak to what challenges relate to he and his game.

As I said, it's fine to bring up some things along these lines, but if all you're doing are finding reasons why the struggles of Luka's teams have nothing to do with Luka, you missing something essential.

Re: vice versa. If the facts were opposite, then the stuff I say about Shai, I'd say about Luka, and vice versa.

Is it possible Shai's situation is something that will turn out to be noise? Sure, not impossible.

Will this change anything about Luka situation? No. The only thing that will change the fact that Luka's never shown MVP levels of season impact is Luka showing just that.

1. I didn't hear any believable explanation, why SGA is in his 6 year suddenly become extremely impactful player either.

2. You're using stat that primarily reflects impact of lineups, but don't want to have conversation about those lineups?

3. I have to say I find it funny how you have extreme belief in very questionable stat, which at best seems having big problems in distinguishing between impact of the lineup and impact of a single player. And although you're saying that you're open for different evaluations of players, you in reality are not.

4. There's really nothing more to say, I will leave you alone with your strong beliefs.

[dygaction]

How can be playing with 30 different starting lineups just an excuse? When others has played with less than 10 different lineups, SGA with only 6? 30/54 different lineups might be some kind of a Nba record. I know that Mavs have never finished a season with so many different starting lineups, and it's only 2/3 of the season played. How can be playing with theoretically the best lineup for only 26 minutes an excuse? Other teams having best lineup playing 600+ minutes together. How can be saying that the best 3 Mavs players outside Luka missing 60+ games is just an excuse?

All those things are facts and all those things had a big impact on Mavs' season and Luka's offensive rtg and +/-. I would expect from someone, who want to look at games through numbers, to at least consider those pretty important circumstances. But you're just dismissing them as an excuse, and don't want even consider importance of them, while talking about how Luka's offensive rtg is not elite?

What is more baffling to me that your MVP candidate is having a fantastic season, while having incredible luck with injuries. The difference between Mavs and OKC considering injuries is just unbelievable. Mavs playing with 30 different lineups and OKC playing 47 times with the best lineup. What would have happened, if situation was vice versa? And don't forget, SGA has even worse career +/- than Luka, if you will again brought up Luka's career +/-.

Yes, it is what it is, but I believe circumstance should be taken into consideration, if they're so specific.

It's an excuse because it excuses Luka. It's not looking to look at Luka, warts and all, and speak to what challenges relate to he and his game.

As I said, it's fine to bring up some things along these lines, but if all you're doing are finding reasons why the struggles of Luka's teams have nothing to do with Luka, you missing something essential.

Re: vice versa. If the facts were opposite, then the stuff I say about Shai, I'd say about Luka, and vice versa.

Is it possible Shai's situation is something that will turn out to be noise? Sure, not impossible.

Will this change anything about Luka situation? No. The only thing that will change the fact that Luka's never shown MVP levels of season impact is Luka showing just that.

1. I didn't hear any believable explanation, why SGA is in his 6 year suddenly become extremely impactful player either.

2. You're using stat that primarily reflects impact of lineups, but don't want to have conversation about those lineups?

3. I have to say I find it funny how you have extreme belief in very questionable stat, which at best seems having big problems in distinguishing between impact of the lineup and impact of a single player. And although you're saying that you're open for different evaluations of players, you in reality are not.

4. There's really nothing more to say, I will leave you alone with your strong beliefs.

Just let time tell. Even MJ, LeBron, Curry, and Jokic were all considered not winning basketball before winning. It is always easier to justify an answer when something already happened.

[Bob8]

It's an excuse because it excuses Luka. It's not looking to look at Luka, warts and all, and speak to what challenges relate to he and his game.

As I said, it's fine to bring up some things along these lines, but if all you're doing are finding reasons why the struggles of Luka's teams have nothing to do with Luka, you missing something essential.

Re: vice versa. If the facts were opposite, then the stuff I say about Shai, I'd say about Luka, and vice versa.

Is it possible Shai's situation is something that will turn out to be noise? Sure, not impossible.

Will this change anything about Luka situation? No. The only thing that will change the fact that Luka's never shown MVP levels of season impact is Luka showing just that.

1. I didn't hear any believable explanation, why SGA is in his 6 year suddenly become extremely impactful player either.

2. You're using stat that primarily reflects impact of lineups, but don't want to have conversation about those lineups?

3. I have to say I find it funny how you have extreme belief in very questionable stat, which at best seems having big problems in distinguishing between impact of the lineup and impact of a single player. And although you're saying that you're open for different evaluations of players, you in reality are not.

4. There's really nothing more to say, I will leave you alone with your strong beliefs.

Just let time tell. Even MJ, LeBron, Curry, and Jokic were all considered not winning basketball before winning. It is always easier to justify an answer when something already happened.

I'm first to admit that Luka doesn't deserve MVP votes yet. But based on +/- he doesn't deserve to be in any of All Nba teams either. Strangely enough he was in first All Nba team 4x in a row, which is a fantastic achievement for someone being under 25 years old, which just few others in Nba history achieved. How is this possible, if +/- clearly shows that he's not impactful player? Can non impactful player made 4x in a row first All Nba team?

If someone truly believes in +/-, conclusion should be simple, Luka is not even top 3 Mavs' player this season and not even top 100 Nba player. That's what +/- model is saying. Something works or something doesn't work.

[DrModesty]

1. I didn't hear any believable explanation, why SGA is in his 6 year suddenly become extremely impactful player either.

2. You're using stat that primarily reflects impact of lineups, but don't want to have conversation about those lineups?

3. I have to say I find it funny how you have extreme belief in very questionable stat, which at best seems having big problems in distinguishing between impact of the lineup and impact of a single player. And although you're saying that you're open for different evaluations of players, you in reality are not.

4. There's really nothing more to say, I will leave you alone with your strong beliefs.

Just let time tell. Even MJ, LeBron, Curry, and Jokic were all considered not winning basketball before winning. It is always easier to justify an answer when something already happened.

I'm first to admit that Luka doesn't deserve MVP votes yet. But based on +/- he doesn't deserve to be in any of All Nba teams either. Strangely enough he was in first All Nba team 4x in a row, which is a fantastic achievement for someone being under 25 years old, which just few others in Nba history achieved. How is this possible, if +/- clearly shows that he's not impactful player? Can non impactful player made 4x in a row first All Nba team?

If someone truly believes in +/-, conclusion should be simple, Luka is not even top 3 Mavs' player this season and not even top 100 Nba player. That's what +/- model is saying. Something works or something doesn't work.

Why are you so incredibly hung up on +/-?

It's been several pages that you can't stop talking about it.

[Bob8]

Just let time tell. Even MJ, LeBron, Curry, and Jokic were all considered not winning basketball before winning. It is always easier to justify an answer when something already happened.

I'm first to admit that Luka doesn't deserve MVP votes yet. But based on +/- he doesn't deserve to be in any of All Nba teams either. Strangely enough he was in first All Nba team 4x in a row, which is a fantastic achievement for someone being under 25 years old, which just few others in Nba history achieved. How is this possible, if +/- clearly shows that he's not impactful player? Can non impactful player made 4x in a row first All Nba team?

If someone truly believes in +/-, conclusion should be simple, Luka is not even top 3 Mavs' player this season and not even top 100 Nba player. That's what +/- model is saying. Something works or something doesn't work.

Why are you so incredibly hung up on +/-?

It's been several pages that you can't stop talking about it.

Because people are using it to declare their MVP.

[Mavrelous]

Because people are using it to declare their MVP.

He's not the MVP because he's 7th seed, if he pushes to 5th he's have legit chance, if he cracks top 4, he'll be favourite.

[Bob8]

Because people are using it to declare their MVP.

He's not the MVP because he's 7th seed, if he pushes to 5th he's have legit chance, if he cracks top 4, he'll be favourite.

Not if we believe in +/-.

[Exp0sed]

hard to believe we're still debating this

i'm still unclear what Doctor MJ is actually saying about Luka as a player
let's say by his +- he has never garnered even an All-NBA team let alone MVP votes, where do u rank him Doctor, is he even a top 20 player? top 30? top 50?

i really can't understand how you can build a case based on one specific anomaly when literally everything else is pointing in the opposite direction and that anomaly has to do with a very specific stat which is obviously very affected by context and isn't a reliable measure of individual production to begin with..

i mean, we're just fans on a msgboard but what about all the coaches in the league?
Luka is the most blitzed player in the league and is consistently getting the best defender and drawing a huge amount of doubles etc.
are they all idiots?

I thought I followed ur argument for a min there but I really can't say that i'm still following you - besides pointing out an anomaly, what are u actually arguing?

Luka has been winning since he was a teenager, in Europe, for his national team and later in the NBA
reminder, he and Brunson took a bunch of scrubs to the WCF. even if we just wanna focus on the rs - in 20/21, they were 4th or 5th (can't recall) with around 60%, with KP missing half the season - Luka was 21 at the time

how does all that happen if Luka so middling?

i'm really lost on what ur actually trying to argue, perhaps u could help me with that

p.s - Luka is a true ATG, his talent and production is off the charts and it's incredibly easy to see it, tbh you can't miss it
even if there's a specific anomaly that can't be explained or the exact nature of the cause for it is unknown, how does that balance out all the Luka magic?

[Archx]

i mean, we're just fans on a msgboard but what about all the coaches in the league?
Luka is the most blitzed player in the league and is consistently getting the best defender and drawing a huge amount of doubles etc.
are they all idiots??

Coaches know nothing, RealGM is where the real expertise is. Well, apart from Doc and Kidd, those two may really be clueless

[Bob8]

i mean, we're just fans on a msgboard but what about all the coaches in the league?
Luka is the most blitzed player in the league and is consistently getting the best defender and drawing a huge amount of doubles etc.
are they all idiots??

Coaches know nothing, RealGM is where the real expertise is. Well, apart from Doc and Kidd, those two may really be clueless

Luka is first in secondary assists.

[Exp0sed]

i mean, we're just fans on a msgboard but what about all the coaches in the league?
Luka is the most blitzed player in the league and is consistently getting the best defender and drawing a huge amount of doubles etc.
are they all idiots??

Coaches know nothing, RealGM is where the real expertise is. Well, apart from Doc and Kidd, those two may really be clueless

Luka is first in secondary assists.

I would love to see Dallas make a late push, if Kyrie and Luka both stay healthy I think that's a real possibility
if that happens the road would be paved for him to get his first MVP

I think the injuries for Denver and the piling losses are just gonna make the Nuggets take the last month off again, they're not gonna be able to catch the top seeds and they're not gonna overextend themselves trying imo, they'll just focus on getting as healthy and ready as they can for the playoffs and give it their best shot there

I also expect OKC to cool off a bit

if the Mavs end up something like 2nd-3rd with Kyrie missing as much as he has, I think it'll be his to lose
he'll have the raw stats, he'll have the records and iconic moments, he's def got the profile and exposure for it and voters might be hessitant to give SGA his props just yet

he's not there yet but I think it's actually fairly reasonable scenario, alot of moving parts but finishing the season hot is also better than starting hot then cooling off, as far as hype and buzz go

[Bob8]

Coaches know nothing, RealGM is where the real expertise is. Well, apart from Doc and Kidd, those two may really be clueless

Luka is first in secondary assists.

I would love to see Dallas make a late push, if Kyrie and Luka both stay healthy I think that's a real possibility
if that happens the road would be paved for him to get his first MVP

I think the injuries for Denver and the piling losses are just gonna make the Nuggets take the last month off again, they're not gonna be able to catch the top seeds and they're not gonna overextend themselves trying imo, they'll just focus on getting as healthy and ready as they can for the playoffs and give it their best shot there

I also expect OKC to cool off a bit

if the Mavs end up something like 2nd-3rd with Kyrie missing as much as he has, I think it'll be his to lose
he'll have the raw stats, he'll have the records and iconic moments, he's def got the profile and exposure for it and voters might be hessitant to give SGA his props just yet

he's not there yet but I think it's actually fairly reasonable scenario, alot of moving parts but finishing the season hot is also better than starting hot then cooling off, as far as hype and buzz go

I don't expect much from this season. Just impossible to incorporate new players and returning players that fast. I have 0 trust in Kidd. I have much bigger hope for next season, especially if they somehow get solid defensive wing.

[Exp0sed]

Luka is first in secondary assists.

I don't expect much from this season. Just impossible to incorporate new players and returning players that fast. I have 0 trust in Kidd. I have much bigger hope for next season, especially if they somehow get solid defensive wing.

fair enough, some fans are of the hopeless optimism and homerism type and some are the doom and gloom type
i'm not a Mavs fan and I actually think they have a good shot at such a run

Kidd is awful in some aspects but I actually get the feeling he has a good connection with Luka and his group, that's not nothing
I think their new look starting five fits well with each other and we know Kidd is gonna run them to the ground in RS mins, which should be good for their win column in the rs at least

is Exum coming back soon?
Luka has looked exaughsted lately, with Kyrie back and the new additions plus the ASB, I think he'll have a little extra in the tank
I also get the feeling he's very concious of accolades etc., I think he wants this as a competitor - an MVP, that is and I think he's gonna go for it or try his best at going for it anyway

just a hunch

[Doctor MJ]

How can be playing with 30 different starting lineups just an excuse? When others has played with less than 10 different lineups, SGA with only 6? 30/54 different lineups might be some kind of a Nba record. I know that Mavs have never finished a season with so many different starting lineups, and it's only 2/3 of the season played. How can be playing with theoretically the best lineup for only 26 minutes an excuse? Other teams having best lineup playing 600+ minutes together. How can be saying that the best 3 Mavs players outside Luka missing 60+ games is just an excuse?

All those things are facts and all those things had a big impact on Mavs' season and Luka's offensive rtg and +/-. I would expect from someone, who want to look at games through numbers, to at least consider those pretty important circumstances. But you're just dismissing them as an excuse, and don't want even consider importance of them, while talking about how Luka's offensive rtg is not elite?

What is more baffling to me that your MVP candidate is having a fantastic season, while having incredible luck with injuries. The difference between Mavs and OKC considering injuries is just unbelievable. Mavs playing with 30 different lineups and OKC playing 47 times with the best lineup. What would have happened, if situation was vice versa? And don't forget, SGA has even worse career +/- than Luka, if you will again brought up Luka's career +/-.

Yes, it is what it is, but I believe circumstance should be taken into consideration, if they're so specific.

It's an excuse because it excuses Luka. It's not looking to look at Luka, warts and all, and speak to what challenges relate to he and his game.

As I said, it's fine to bring up some things along these lines, but if all you're doing are finding reasons why the struggles of Luka's teams have nothing to do with Luka, you missing something essential.

Re: vice versa. If the facts were opposite, then the stuff I say about Shai, I'd say about Luka, and vice versa.

Is it possible Shai's situation is something that will turn out to be noise? Sure, not impossible.

Will this change anything about Luka situation? No. The only thing that will change the fact that Luka's never shown MVP levels of season impact is Luka showing just that.

1. I didn't hear any believable explanation, why SGA is in his 6 year suddenly become extremely impactful player either.

2. You're using stat that primarily reflects impact of lineups, but don't want to have conversation about those lineups?

3. I have to say I find it funny how you have extreme belief in very questionable stat, which at best seems having big problems in distinguishing between impact of the lineup and impact of a single player. And although you're saying that you're open for different evaluations of players, you in reality are not.

4. There's really nothing more to say, I will leave you alone with your strong beliefs.

1. I know I've already talked in this thread about a) Shai's shooting efficiency, b) Shai's turnover mitigation, and c) Shai's steals. These are all things that Shai is doing that have improved this year.

Beyond that, while we can have further discussion, I feel a need to emphasize again: You're trying to say that I cannot accept the data from this season unless I can explain it, while I'm trying to say you shouldn't reject data from this season unless you can explain why it should be rejected. It's not the same thing.

Perfectly fine for you to say that you're skeptical about Shai's growth in +/- this year until you've seen more sample, but you're looking to dismiss the stat entirely, which is just not a move that an analyst should ever look to be doing.

2. I'm all for talking about lineups, but from what I've seen you're mostly looking to use lineups from this year as a reason why Doncic doesn't look great with +/- stats while brushing aside the fact that this is just how things have always been with Luka for his entire NBA career.

Further, while I'm all for examining Shai's lineups in more detail, what I've already said is that the things I'd look for to indicate that his teammates are the impactful ones that supports such a conclusion. From what I see, you're trying to tear Shai's candidacy down on the basis of his teammates without lifting any of them up as actual rivals to Shai. Everything statistical about OKC this year that I see, whether box score or plus minus, is pointing to Shai being by far the most valuable player on that team.

3 & 4. So we keep talking past each other here. I'm keeping explaining to you how we make use of correlation and sample size to infer causal explanations in the the field of stats, and you keep coming back as if I haven't address the whole individual vs lineup thing when I very much have. You talk about me as having the closed mind, but conceptually you're just not understanding the basics of this stuff that has been part of the analytics discussion since long before you were on this site.

From what I can tell, you're just not really interested in the possibility that some of the things you think you know about statistical analysis aren't true, and so we're not going to get anywhere trying to discuss these finer points.