AEnigma wrote:Doctor MJ wrote:AEnigma wrote:That can be said to some degree of most players in tight series. What if Slater Martin were a bit worse defensively (btw overall minutes leader for the team). The contention is not that Hagan was bad, it was that Pettit was the player most responsible for securing the win. Looking at performance in losses is fine for a predictive hypothetical — e.g. in an average game, who would make for a more reliable scorer — but when looking at what happened, yes, Hagan’s averages in the losses comfortably outpaced what he produced in the wins (where Pettit was more consistently the star).
The reason Hagan is on this ballot at all is disproportionately because for three consecutive series he posted gaudier scoring averages than Pettit did. But two of those series were against quantifiably bad teams, and his production in the other was skewed toward games the team lost. I think that matters when assessing this narrative of him as the secret driving force of the team, yes.
So let me first say I absolutely agree that Pettit would have been the Finals MVP when they won the title, and I think that's pretty cut & dry.
Re: Hagan here because of 3 series he posted gaudier scoring averages against bad teams on average. I don't think that's a fair characterization of the trend of his career. Consider:
Hagan averaged more PPG in the 4 finals series he played in, 25 games total, than he did in any other round, despite the fact that that total is weighted down by the fact that that includes a series from his rookie season in which he was a 14.5 MPG player in the regular season.
In Hagan's other 3 finals appearances (always against the Celtics remember), he averaged 25.7 PPG on 54.2% TS.
For perspective, Hagan - who was one of the most efficient major scorers of the era in the regular season - peaked in the regular season with in '59-60 with a PPG of 24.8 PPG, when he did so on 52.2% TS% which was good for an elite +209.7 TS Add.
So Hagan in general, on the biggest stage, against the most dominant defensive dynasty of all time consistently outperformed his scoring performance of even his best regular season, and the idea that Hagan padded his numbers against soft competition just couldn't really be more wrong.
… But he did. He objectively did. That does not mean he was not a good scorer otherwise; that was never stated. That does not mean he did not score well against the Celtics; that was also never stated. That does not mean he did not elevate his scoring in the postseason as a general statement; that too was never stated. But Hagan has two postseasons, across three series, where he eclipsed 52% true shooting — and here as well, this is not me saying 52% is an easy bar for the era. One of those series was the 1958 Finals, where he averaged 56.4% true shooting — but specifically averaged 69.4% true shooting in the two double-digit losses and 49.5% true shooting in the four close wins. And of course Russell was absent for the second of those losses. In the other two series, both against 33-win teams, his true shooting was 58.9% and 58.3%.
Now, he did recreate that level in one later series: the 1961 Finals. 58.3% true shooting there too. It was also a series where the Hawks were outscored by twelve points a game. Hagan was outstanding in the team’s one win, but if we want to talk about effect on the team, I find it pretty interesting how — excluding his rookie season here — Hagan averaged 23.75 on 52.4% true shooting in wins against the Celtics and 27.3 on 54.7% true shooting in losses against the Celtics (all of which were by at least 8 points). Pettit shows the opposite signal, with 24.7 points per game in losses against the Celtics (now I am counting 1957 because that was his prime) and 33 points per game in wins against the Celtics. Not taking the time to calculate the respective true shooting because I think the point disparity speaks enough for itself, but what I am emphasising here is that Hagan was broadly thriving when games were less competitive while Pettit was the more reliable producer in wins.
It doesn't make any sense to try to impugn Hagan's performance as lesser based on weak defensive opponents, implying he couldn't do it against strong defensive opponents, when we his offensive performances in the Finals against the Celtics were extremely impressive.
AEnigma wrote:Hagan has forever had a reputation take as being able to take his game to another level in the playoffs, and close examination of it has never left me with any doubts about this. I have no specific explanation for the fact that the small sample of WOWY doesn't show Hagan in a heroic light, but I do think he was absolutely essential to the success those Hawks had reaching the finals in 4 out of 5 years.
But again the bar is not merely “was essential making the Finals”. The bar is not also just being an efficient scorer. Dantley was the most efficient scorer on the 1987/88 Pistons, and I do not think the team is as successful if he had been entirely absent, but I am not going to imply he deserved comparable billing to Isiah or was even de facto more valuable to the team than Bill Laimbeer was — and you very explicitly made a show of backing Hagan over Dantley. You constantly praise Hagan’s contribution to a title team, but I am looking and seeing an inverted one-way Worthy playing in a worse era for less meaningful time, and Worthy is barely going to get in as is.
I really don't see the rationale in me having to argue Hagan over Dantley long after Dantley got voted in. Yeah, I happen to think Hagan was better than Dantley, but you don't have to believe that to think that Hagan is a serious candidate.
Re: inverted one-way Worthy and Worthy barely going. I'll note first that I'm either the only one, or one of the few, who has been voting for Worthy in the Nominee vote. So I'm all for you arguing for Worthy in earnest rather than just using him to try to tear down Hagan.
I will say first that in practice Hagan was more of a self-creator than Worthy - who benefitted from arguably the GOAT facilitator of all-time, and despite this Hagan was considerably more efficiency relative to his era in the regular season.
Let's also just keep some perspective on the volume of these two guys.
Number of regular season 30 point games:
Worthy 52 (out of 926)
Hagan 93 (out of 839)
Number of playoff 30 point games:
Worthy 13 (out of 143)
Hagan 12 (out of 95)
Number of 40 point games total:
Worthy 0
Hagan 12
If you want to make an argument for Worthy as the better all-around player, cool.
If you want to point out that Worthy may well have done more big time scoring in another situation, cool.
But trying to equate the scoring they actually did just isn't right.