Retro Player of the Year 1957-58 UPDATE — Bob Pettit

[AEnigma]

General Project Discussion Thread

Discussion and Results from the 2010 Project

In this thread we'll discuss and vote on the top 5 players and the top 3 offensive and defensive players of 1957-58.

Player of the Year (POY)(5) — most accomplished overall player of that season
Offensive Player of the Year (OPOY)(3) — most accomplished offensive player of that season
Defensive Player of the Year (DPOY)(3) — most accomplished defensive player of that season

Voting will close sometime after 10:30 AM PST on Wednesday, August 7th. I have no issue keeping it open so long as discussion is strong, but please try to vote within the first three days.

Valid ballots must provide an explanation for your choices that gives us a window into how you thought and why you came to the decisions you did. You can vote for any of the three awards — although they must be complete votes — but I will only tally votes for an award when there are at least five valid ballots submitted for it.

Remember, your votes must be based on THIS season. This is intended to give wide wiggle room for personal philosophies while still providing a boundary to make sure the award can be said to mean something. You can factor things like degree of difficulty as defined by you, but what you can't do is ignore how the player actually played on the floor this season in favor of what he might have done if only...

You may change your vote, but if you do, edit your original post rather than writing, "hey, ignore my last post, this is my real post until I change my mind again.” I similarly ask that ballots be kept in one post rather than making one post for Player of the Year, one post for Offensive Player of the Year, and/or one post for Defensive Player of the Year. If you want to provide your reasoning that way for the sake of discussion, fine, but please keep the official votes themselves in one aggregated post. Finally, for ease of tallying, I prefer for you to place your votes at the beginning of your balloting post, with some formatting that makes them stand out. I will not discount votes which fail to follow these requests, but I am certainly more likely to overlook them.

Current Voter List

Spoiler:

________________________________________
Layaway Voters
* B-Mitch 30
* Bad Gatorade
* McBubbles
* MyUnibroDavis
* penbeast0

[Dr Positivity]

Didn't expect Schayes to have higher PPG than Pettit this late, and frankly has a good case to have a better season overall, even if you hypothesize that Schayes offensive stats could have have gone up by his defensive workload having gone down and becoming more of a Dirk. I will not be one of the people voting for Hagan over Pettit, although the former deserves top 5.

[penbeast0]

It is easier to shine as a #2 when the #1 is drawing the doubles and being gamed for so I am hesitant to favor someone like Hagan over his teammate Pettit even if his playoff numbers are better.

[trex_8063]

As before I'm going to list the rs TS Add leaders (everyone > +50, which comes to a nice round number of 20 players), along with ppg info....

TS Add Leaders (ppg, league rank)
1. George Yardley, DET: +222.6 (27.8 ppg, 1st)
2. Kenny Sears, NYK: +213.6 (18.6 ppg, 9th)
3. Dolph Schayes, SYR: +206.0 (24.9 ppg, 2nd)
4. Neil Johnston, PHW: +184.5 (19.5 ppg, 8th)
5. Cliff Hagan, STL: +173.3 (19.9 ppg, 7th)
6. Jack Twyman, CIN: +156.9 (17.2 ppg, 14th)
7. Bob Pettit, STL: +151.0 (24.6 ppg, 3rd)
8. Frank Ramsey, BOS: +141.9 (16.5 ppg, tied 18th)
9. Larry Costello, SYR: +128.8 (14.9 ppg, tied 25th)
10. Clyde Lovellette, MNL: +115.4 (23.4 ppg, 4th)
11. Carl Braun, NYK: +109.0 (16.5 ppg, tied 18th)
12. Ray Felix, NYK: +107.1 (12.2 ppg, 31st)
13. Larry Foust, MNL: +104.0 (16.8 ppg, 16th)
14. Bill Sharman, BOS: +103.2 (22.3 ppg, 5th)
15. Vern Mikkelsen, MNL: +100.5 (17.3 ppg, 13th)
16. Paul Arizin, PHW: +86.8 (20.7 ppg, 6th)
17. Ed Macauley, STL: +83.4 (14.2 ppg, 27th)
18. Harry Gallatin, DET: +68.4 (14.9 ppg, tied 25th)
19. Tom Gola, PHW: +56.0 (13.8 ppg, 28th)
20. Ron Sobie, NYK: +51.3 (11.5 ppg, 33rd)

[Owly]

It is easier to shine as a #2 when the #1 is drawing the doubles and being gamed for so I am hesitant to favor someone like Hagan over his teammate Pettit even if his playoff numbers are better.

Let us assume for the sake of argument Pettit is drawing doubles ...

Hagan out assists Pettit every which way: per game RS, more so per 36, more so per game in playoffs (doubling Pettit 3.6 to 1.8), most so in playoff per 36.

However deep you might want to plausibly define their rotation Pettit is lowest in RS and playoff assists per 36.

If he is getting doubles he's not directly channeling them into frequent teammate baskets.

Given the trend toward liking guys that can do both creating for self and others more and only one (perhaps especially only self ... perhaps because it fails to open [and perhaps fails to legitimate the threat of opening] four other routes) if you are taken by this way of thinking Pettit might be someone that's harmed by it.

[AEnigma]

Might be the most competitive OPoY race thus far. Considering Cousy, Braun, Schayes, Pettit, Hagan, and/or Yardley. Third place for DPoY again up in the air. Schayes performs superbly against the Warriors, but both teams overall struggle to generate good offence, so fully possible I go with Graboski yet again.

[Djoker]

I have a feeling the Celtics probably win the Finals if Russell doesn't get hurt but he does get hurt and misses two Finals games than comes back hobbled for the last one where Pettit has perhaps his most famous game; a monster 50/19.

Game 1 - Hawks win by 2

Pettit: 30/19/? on 57.8 %TS
Russell: 14/29/? on 33.8 %TS

Game 2 - Celtics win by 24

Pettit: 19/7/3 on 42.8 %TS
Russell: 22/27/? on 56.7 %TS

Game 3 - Hawks win by 3

Pettit: 32/19/? on 54.1 %TS
Russell: 14/13/? on 42.7 %TS (30 mins played; left game with injury)

Game 4 - Celtics win by 11

Pettit: 12/17/? on 27.5 %TS
Russell: DNP

Game 5 - Hawks win by 2

Pettit: 33/21/? on 52.3 %TS
Russell: DNP

Game 6 - Hawks win by 1

Pettit: 50/19/? on 61.6 %TS
Russell: 8/8/? on 43.5 %TS (20 mins played)

Series Averages

Pettit: 29.3/17.0/2.2 on 51.2 %TS (+6.3 rTS over league average)
Russell: 14.5/19.3/2.3 on 44.1 %TS (-0.8 %TS over league average)

Compared to the 1957 Finals, Pettit put up even better numbers. That rTS is pretty impressive considering it's relative to league and the Celtics were a really good defense.

And the Hawks as a team again seem to have done much better offensively in the Finals against the Celtics with 47.6 %TS than they did in the regular season with 45.5 %TS. That's kind of a worrying trend that two years in a row they allowed the underdog Hawks to do so well against them. Russell did miss time in the series but the Hawks' TS% didn't seem affected much by Russell's absence which also surprised me.

Game 1 (40 mins of Russell) - 50.7 %TS
Game 2 (43 mins of Russell) - 44.2 %TS
Game 3 (30 mins of Russell) - 50.1 %TS
Game 4 (0 mins of Russell) - 44.2 %TS
Game 5 (0 mins of Russell) - 47.2 %TS
Game 6 (20 mins of Russell) - 49.8 %TS

It seems the Celtics more or less struggled on D with and without Russ. There was something about these Hawks that made them a difficult matchup...

As for Cliff Hagan, he was terrific through the first four games of the series and almost certainly the Finals MVP if they awarded one but he really faded in the last two games (both Hawks wins) putting up a combined 36 points on 41.9 %TS (-3.0 rTS) across those two games. He did carry Pettit through the Pistons series but the Hawks won it in 5 games by an average of 10.8 points a game so that shouldn't carry too much weight. With that in mind and a clearly weaker RS, I don't think Hagan is a serious threat to overtake Pettit on my ballot.

And Russell was the most impactful player in the league all year long... until the Finals. He got hurt, got completely outplayed by Pettit and lost the championship. He will get my #2 and Pettit #1 just like 1957 in all likelihood. Schayes, Hagan and Arizin probably the rest of the top 5 although I'll think more about that.

[Dr Positivity]

Vote

1. Bill Russell - He is like the 3rd best offensive center in the league so when you add it to the defense/rebounding the overall impact is too much to compete with here. Seems like he was alien playing against centers like Johnston.

2. Dolph Schayes - Outstanding season with efficient 25ppg and usually has all around game beyond his scoring, and great numbers in playoffs.

3. Bob Pettit - Similar season to Schayes though a little worse passer and outplayed by Hagan in playoffs, but still his team's superstar and has the close out game, and I believe bigger impact on D than Hagan.

4. Cliff Hagan - The playoff run can put him over the rest.

5. Bill Sharman - Yardley has the big stats but I prefer Sharman's defense and passing, and I'll give him the edge over Cousy who's TS falls this year. Johnston is washed by the playoffs. Lovellette is starting to become more of a winning player but still think he's one way guy on ok team. Willing to be talked into someone else here.

Offensive player of the year

1. Dolph Schayes
2. Cliff Hagan
3. George Yardley

Defensive player of the year

1. Bill Russell
2. Maurice Stokes
3. Tom Gola

[eminence]

Worst to First (we'll see how long I can keep this up, probably will cut down to teams of interest at some point during the ABA years)

Lakers (19-53): Mikkelsen/Foust don't exactly power the Lakers to greatness, Mikan - not quite the coach he was player. Garmaker getting an Allstar nod over Mikkelsen is odd to me, but yeah, nobody even close.

Royals (33-39): Add Lovellette, doesn't seem to move the needle much. The very unfortunate end of season where Stokes gets paralyzed overshadows anything else they did.

Pistons (33-39): Yardley/Shue and some old Knicks. Yardley clearly at the head now (1st Team). Uninspired by them in general, better than the Lakers sure, but may have been the 7th best team in the league. Yardley a strong scorer (maybe some PO struggles), but not someone I know for doing a ton else. I'll think about him for top 5.

Knicks (35-37): Another season where the bottom of the East was competitive with the top of the West. #1 ranked offense, Sears doing a bunch of the scoring, but my first instinct would be towards Braun as their top guy. Only real holdover from Lapchick's coaching days. No top 5 contenders.

Warriors (37-35): Gola is back, but the Warriors aren't really any better. Johnston seems to be on his last legs by PO time after a decent RS (even worse against the Nats than against the Celtics before we credit it to Russell). Retires early next season. Arizin has lost a step as well, not sure he's much of a top 5 contender anymore. Team not quite as deep as they were when they won the title either. Upset the Nats before meeting the Celtics.

Nationals (41-31): Costello arrives and gets Dolph some more help, clearly still a Schayes team (I like Kerr decently as well). Lose to the Warriors in the POs, but Schayes in particular seems to play well, seems like more of Costello not being ready for the lights. Schayes will be top 5 for me again, he's likely going to wind up solidly high on my personal shares list. Schayes a reasonably close 2nd in MVP voting.

Hawks (41-31): The Champs. Respect to Slater, but I'm not in love with that 2nd team All-NBA selection. Mostly Pettit/Hagan in my estimation. I didn't wind up supporting him for top 100, but I do think Hagan for a ~5 year run was one of the best PO performers ever. Pettit clearly my pick for top RS Hawk, more equal in the playoffs (Hagan having a larger lead in the less important series but a reasonably equal Finals). Overall Pettit is probably my POY, and Hagan will likely take a spot on my ballot (would lean Hagan over Yardley, but below Schayes of guys mentioned so far).

Celtics (49-23): One of the strongest RS teams to date. Pushed in the POs again by the Hawks even prior to the Russell injury (down 1-2 after 3, were down in game 3 when he got injured). Some matchup issue I haven't quite figured out. Bills injury the final nail. Cousy has his first truly inefficient scoring season aging/pairing with Russell full-time and dropping from my top 5 radar (I think he'll be on it one last time next year). Heinsohn I think of as a strong defender and overall 3rd/4th guy, but doesn't seem to have that same rep elsewhere. Ramsey another strong depth piece. First season I think I'd go with Sharman over Cousy as the overall #2 Celtic, but a minorish gap. Russell with a very deserving MVP and likely my #2 guy, losing out to the guy who won while he was out injured. Them's the breaks.

Pettit, Russell, Schayes, Hagan/Yardley is my first thought of an order, deciding on 4th/5th order and if anyone else should challenge them. Pretty set on top 3 and order. Schayes still might be *better* than Pettit, but once again the team aspect offers a clear gap - Russell now seems a step above both when healthy, but didn't finish healthy.

[AEnigma]

Offensive Player of the Year

1. Carl Braun
2. Dolph Schayes
3. Bob Cousy

Will see how conversation develops on this. I listed six names earlier, and I think Yardley may be the first cut despite his excellent regular season. Cannot be outplayed that badly in the playoffs by a direct positional matchup. I also do not think he has much argument over Schayes or Pettit, and I intend to include at least one legitimate playmaker, so that leaves him no path to top three.

Knicks are interesting. Guerin is the guy I will be picking next year and will become a regular, but I am skeptical he had more playmaking responsibility than Braun did this year. I think playmaking is the most important offensive attribute, and this year Cousy and Braun were the top two playmakers in the league. Cousy’s efficiency struggles are enough to drag him below Schayes (arguably at his offensive apex), but I am happy to reward the best offensive players on the three best offensive teams.

Defensive Player of the Year

1. Bill Russell
2. Maurice Stokes
3. Joe Graboski

Similar reasoning to last time, although willing to edit that third spot if I see a compelling argument for someone else. Stokes manages a postseason game this time but still is not proving more than Russell has, and then tragically will never again have the opportunity to do so. Unlike last time, Schayes performs excellently against the Nationals, but the rest of the team struggles to such a significant degree that I am willing to continue rewarding Graboski by proxy.

Player of the Year

1. Bob Pettit
2. Bill Russell
3. Dolph Schayes
4. Maurice Stokes
5. Cliff Hagan

Starting bottom down. Hagan merits inclusion for the postseason performance, but I am generally not assessing him as a player good enough to be the foundation of a team. Stokes on the other hand is a clear foundation, with the team collapsing when he missed time this year and then when his career ends next year. In the only year of his tragically short career where he makes the playoffs, I would like to reward that level of impact.

Moving on to the clear top three. Schayes is brilliant but does not achieve anything, so much like last year, his claim to a higher listing remains hypothetical. And Pettit again looks like the top player in the Finals, even if I suspect Russell would have characteristically secured the comeback had he been healthy.

1957 Celtics: down 1-2 against the Hawks (+16 point differential) but win the series anyway

1962 Celtics: down 1-2 and eventually 2-3 against the Lakers (+5 point differential through three games) but win the series anyway

1963 Celtics: down 1-2 against the Royals (+15 point differential) but win the series anyway

1966 Celtics: down 1-2 against the Royals again (-3 point differential!) but win the series anyway

1968 Celtics: down 1-2 against the Pistons (-14 point differential!!) but win the series anyway, then are down 1-2 and eventually 1-3 against the 76ers (-8 point differential through three games) but win the series anyway

1969 Celtics: down 1-2 and eventually 2-3 against the Lakers (-2 point differential through three games) but win the series anyway

Russell literally never lost a 1-2 series where he played five games.

[trelos6]

Once again, I'll start on the defensive side of the ball, because it's a little easier.

DPOY

1. Bill Russell
2. Maurice Stokes
3. Dolph Schayes

HM: Red Kerr

Russell anchors the Celtics defense for the next 10 seasons, so expect to see him at the top of the list pretty much every season going forward. In '58, they were #1 by a wide margin. This continued in the playoffs. Syracuse were also a great D, once again, I was close to giving Red Kerr some love last season, and he and Schayes definitely did a great job in '58. Stokes was great again also, as the Royals hung onto their #2 overall defense.

OPOY

1. Dolph Schayes
2. Bob Pettit
3. George Yardley

HM: Cliff Hagan

I think it's only going to get harder for OPY going forward. A number of strong candidates this season, with Cousy, Pettit, Schayes, Sharman, Yardley, Hagan, Sears, Johnston shining.

Knicks were #1 offense in the RS, with Kenny Sears leading the way. .534 TS%, 18.6 ppg.
Nationals were #2 offense, with Schayes leading the way, 24.9 ppg, .508 TS%.
Hawks were #3 in offense, and Pettit was his usual brilliant self, with 24.6 ppg, .492 TS%. However, Cliff Hagan makes an appearance, with his amazing playoffs. 19.9 ppg elevated to 27.7 ppg in the post season, TS% going from .513 to .576.
Arizin and Johnston were both still good, with Arizin showing again his game was more robust in the playoffs.
Yardley was 27.8 ppg, on .505 TS%, Cousy 18 ppg, 7.1 assists, but his efficiency started to plummet. I can't get there with Sharman, and anyone on the Royals.


POY

1. Bob Pettit
2. Dolph Schayes
3. Bill Russell
4. Cliff Hagan
5. George Yardley

I'm going with Pettit 1st overall. He was a factor defensively, as well as a huge contributor offensively. I've gone with Schayes at 2 for the same reason, despite his limited playoff sample size. Russell at 3 because his defense was that game breaking. Hagan at 4 for his wonderful playoffs and really good regular season. Finally Yardley at 5 because he was pretty good offensively, and I didn't want to reward another Celtic this season.

[ZeppelinPage]

Lengthy breakdown on the Celtics' season (specifically the Finals) using newspapers.

Regular Season
The Celtics now have Russell for the entire season and their pace explodes further. Even with Cousy recovering from surgery over a blood clot, the Celtics actually finish 3rd in rORTG according to Ben Taylor:

1958 Celtics rORTG: +1.4 (3rd of 8)

Heinsohn notes fewer plays are ran for him in order to accommodate having Russell on the floor more--and he changes his style from driving to playing more in the corner:

Spoiler:

Having Russell in the paint makes defending on the perimeter easier, and allows the Celtics' skilled defenders to take more risks. Players like Cousy, Sharman, Ramsey, and even Sam Jones, are allowed to play for steals more without being punished. Cousy in particular has yet another fantastic year stealing the ball and can lockdown on defense when needed:

Spoiler:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eastern Division Finals
Celtics play the Warriors in the EDF and make quick work of a team that has Neil Johnston and Tom Gola ailing from injuries. Russell, Cousy, and Ramsey were all standouts on defense in this series:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

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NBA Finals
In the Finals the Celtics match-up against the #1 seed Hawks, who disposed of the Pistons quite easily despite Pettit's underperfomance against Walter Dukes (Pettit did have the flu in the first two games). The Pistons did attempt a full-court press at times, which the Hawks seemed to struggle with, but this did prepare them for the impending Celtics press, which was far more difficult to beat. Coach Alex Hannum of the Hawks saw how important Russell was, with his ability to defend, rebound, and push the ball ahead to Cousy:

Spoiler:

Game 1
The Hawks manage to defeat the Celtics at Boston Garden in Game 1 behind a dominant performance from Hagan and Pettit. Strong performances from Russell, Sharman, and Cousy. More mentions of the Celtics' daunted full-court press as the Celtics managed to force 27 turnovers:

Spoiler:

Game 2
Game 2 is a decisive victory for the Celtics, with Sharman with 22 points (10-20 shooting), Russell 22/27 (7-15 shooting), and Cousy with 25/10 (8-17 shooting). The Celtics utilize a soft 'zone' defense against the Hawks to allow Ramsey to break off early in transition:

Spoiler:

Game 3
In Game 3, Hannum made sure to have his team contain the free man in the Celtics' fast break:

Spoiler:

Bill Russell leaves in the 3rd quarter after badly spraining his ankle and doesn't return, causing the Celtics to practically fall apart:

Spoiler:

Pettit finishes with 32/19 (10-23 shooting) while Hagan fouls out in 30 minutes. Heinsohn in particular has been having a difficult series, with his shot off and traveling violations being called on him. He admits he has been having the worst couple games of his career and strives to improve. Ramsey and Sharman perform admirably, while Slater Martin has "the greatest game of his career" as Cousy struggles:

Spoiler:

Game 4
Before Game 4, the Celtics confirm that Russell is unlikely to play, and to make matters worse, Cousy badly injured his toe during Game 3--putting his likelihood to play up in the air. Andy Phillip describes how the injuries will impact the team and their strategy in Game 4 by having to play through the pivot in a more half-court oriented game:

Spoiler:

The Celtics end up winning easily at St. Louis--and Cousy has a legendary performance. He plays all but 27 seconds of the game with padding placed in his right shoe for his toe, and suffers a bruised nose after being hit in the face during the 1st half. Despite this, he still has a triple double with 23 points/13 rebounds/10 assists (8-14 shooting).

Hannum expected the Celtics to continue successfully pressing his team and they did:

Spoiler:

The entire team chipped in and out-rebounded the Hawks--Ramsey, Heinsohn, and Cousy led the way. It's also likely the Celtics forced many turnovers, as they shot significantly more shots than the Hawks. Heinsohn was lauded for his defensive effort in this game, holding Pettit to 12 points on 3-17 shooting and hounding him so badly on defense that Hannum benched Pettit in the 3rd:

Spoiler:

Auerbach and Cousy came up with the idea to slow the game down further and utilize Cousy's size advantage in the post, which bothered Slater Martin. Cousy took Martin right into the post to start the 2nd and scored 7 straight early (finishing with 18 in the first half) while Martin struggled to score with Cousy defending him:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

Spoiler:

The entire team was playing in-sync and would exploit the Hawks when they attempted to double Cousy:

Spoiler:

Game 5
Russell's ankle is improved, but he is still unable to play. Sharman is suffering from a knee injury earlier in the series and finds it difficult to shoot. Arnie Risen is also playing sick. The Celtics continue to press in Game 5, forcing turnovers and keeping the rebounding battle close. The Hawks focus on packing the paint and forcing the team to shoot from outside with an injured Sharman and Cousy:

Spoiler:

The Hawks now have Slater Martin playing in front of Cousy in the pivot, instead of behind, to deny him the ball. If Cousy did manage to get the ball inside the pivot, the Hawks would double Cousy when he received the ball and force his teammates to create:

Spoiler:

The Celtics managed to bring the game close and utilized their press defense towards the end of the game. Cousy forces Martin out of bounds and the Celtics get the ball. Ramsey scores on a jumper, but they couldn't quite bring the game back as the Hawks are fouled and make free throws with 1 second left:

Spoiler:

Cousy, Sharman, and much of the team shoot poorly and they lose by 2 points. Heinsohn manages to bounce back with 18 points and 20 rebounds. Pettit goes to the line 24 times and has 33 points, while Hagan and Martin combine for 46 points to aid him.

Game 6
Before the game, the Hawks prepare for the Celtics' full-court press and plan for it:

Spoiler:

Auerbach and Cousy plan the Celtics' strategy on the flight to St. Louis, thinking about utilizing Heinsohn in the pivot more or even starting Frank Ramsey:

Spoiler:

Boston Celtics trainer Jock Semple states that Cousy "must be in a terrific amount of pain every minute he plays" as a result of his toe injury:

Spoiler:

Pettit's legendary 50-point game to close out the series. Russell attempts to play, spelling Risen when he can, but Pettit puts 4 fouls on Russell in the 2nd quarter and makes the Celtics go without him for longer than expected. Ramsey fouls out in 27 minutes. Pettit scores 19 in the 4th quarter--his jumper and drives could simply not be stopped no matter who was defending him. Sharman's knee feels better and he shoots well. Cousy manages to hold Slater Martin to 4 points and only 3 shots, but Martin defends Cousy tight, and he scores 15 points to go with 9 assists. The Celtics manage to bring it to within 1 point in the final minute, but Pettit hits a jumper off a rebound that puts the game out of reach with the Hawks up 3.

[Djoker]

Terrific post Zep.

One thing I notice about the papers is the praise of Cousy's defense on the perimeter. I always thought of him as a poor or at least unremarkable defender but he seems to have had some impact on that end of the floor.

Also interesting to note multiple injuries for the Celtics apart from Russell's ankle sprain. They were really a weakened team in the Finals and still fought to the wire. The Hawks' four wins were by a combined 8 points.

[Owly]

As for Cliff Hagan ... He did carry Pettit through the Pistons series but the Hawks won it in 5 games by an average of 10.8 points a game so that shouldn't carry too much weight.

So personally I'm not so much a fan of "guess how much this performance happened to tilt the scales in this game" ... both because we can't do it with precision and I think how your goodness is distributed is mostly chance ...

But fwiw I'd argue you could be penalizing Hagan for being too good and that the impression they're safe without him doing what he did is wrong.

In this case, unless you're arguing for being allowed to choose where you get rid of Hagan's "excess" goodness ... you actually can't uniformly lower Hagan's performance without putting the Hawks in a hole. Dropping his performance in games one and two even a little likely puts the Hawks down 0-3 (each of the first two games won by 3 points). From that position or even guaranteeing the next two wins (as I said playing with this sort of thing is fuzzy, butterfly effect stuff could come into play so one could conceive of 0-2, 0-3 or 2-3) ... even though the Hawks are better (depending somewhat on how much Hagan is reduced) ... however one conceives of it ... they are in a hole.

It's up to people how they conceive of player of the year (e.g. the player or the year they happened to have, playoff weighting etc) and the larger (RS) sample probably favors Pettit (depending somewhat on metric of choice ... Pettit plays more minutes, has a higher PER; whereas Hagan has a slightly higher WS/48 and given the assists gap might be helped in measures that weight that) . I think unless you're allowed to gerrymander his performances down in specific ways Hagan needs to play as well as he did for the Hawks to be likely to advance. And fwiw - and I don't think it's a good reason to ignore valid info - if he doesn't, Pettit's playoffs probably look a lot uglier (depending on performances in "new" game/games).

[Owly]

Terrific post Zep.

One thing I notice about the papers is the praise of Cousy's defense on the perimeter. I always thought of him as a poor or at least unremarkable defender but he seems to have had some impact on that end of the floor.

One )obvious) general caveat and two specific ones

general: qualitative stuff like this is fuzzy

specific:
1) books (at least one, maybe more) have noted Boston papers didn't always send out reporters for road games. If they didn't they'd rely on Johnny Most's commentary. Most was ... not unbiased.
2) Papers might not have been even-handed in attributing credit to Boston. In the big picture it is now widely perceived that they were wrong (over-crediting the local boy, under-crediting the ... I think we know).

Granting I tend to be relatively Cousy skeptic and pro-Sharman ... big picture I think it's plausible some were too low on Cousy's D if they thought he was genuinely awful. That said I'm less persuaded that selected clippings are something revealing him to be actively good.

[AEnigma]

Will echo the sentiment that newspaper praise only goes so far — saw guys like Iverson praised for their steals too many times to count — but agree it reflects reasonably well on Cousy.

[eminence]

Generally I find injuries more heavily emphasized by reporting in this era.

I think Arizin is the guy I'll need to think about a bit more directly vs Yardley (and Hagan to some degree). Can see a case for Gola as well, but I think I've made up my mind on that hierarchy.

[Dutchball97]

Player of the Year
1. Bob Pettit - Once again one of the top performers in the regular season, although I don't think anyone is touching Russell on that front this year. The 1958 Hawks are known for Hagan's play-off outburst but I do think it's important to contextualize that Hagan went Nuclear against the Pistons but Pettit was the better player in the finals. Overall Pettit seems to have solid defensive impact, while arguably being the best offensive player in the league. His finals performance combined with Russell's injury secures the top spot for Pettit in my eyes.

2. Bill Russell - Even though he's not quite yet at his peak, we're already seeing massive defensive impact that translates to consisent post-season success. Russell was definitely heading for that top spot that he'll undoubtedly capture many times in the seasons to come but the amount of help he had on the Celtics along with his injury costing them the title makes me hesitant to put him over Pettit at this point.

3. Cliff Hagan - Not sure if this is on the high side for Hagan but his post-season was really strong and played a major factor into the Hawks winning the championship. While Yardley and Schayes had stronger regular seasons than Hagan, the latter was still 5th in PER, 7th in WS, All-NBA 2nd team and got some MVP consideration (which was obviously tempered by playing on the same team as Pettit). I don't think Schayes did enough in only 3 games to defend his regular season lead over Hagan. It's also pointed out earlier in the thread how it's hard to justify putting Yardley over Hagan when looking at the head to head match up in the play-offs.

4. Dolph Schayes - Really strong regular season that saw Schayes finish 2nd in MVP voting as he led the Nationals to the 2nd best record in the league behind only the stacked Celtics. I'm not surprised others are higher on Schayes this season than me as he did keep going in the play-offs where he left off in the regular season and impacted the game on both sides but his short run in an upset defeat to the Warriors doesn't really convince me he should be ahead of the 3 finalists above who all had very strong regular seasons and post-seasons. I considered other Celtics as well but while all the starters contributed at a very high level I don't think any of them quite had a top 5 performance with Cousy's decline setting in.

5. George Yardley - Pretty comparable individual regular season to Schayes but the relative lackluster team performance of the Pistons (7th in both SRS and Net rating) makes me doubt just how close he was. His performance in the play-offs was arguably a step down but still more impressive overall than someone like Arizin or Sharman imo.

Offensive Player of the Year
1. Bob Pettit
2. Dolph Schayes
3. George Yardley

Arizin and Sharman just miss out as well here just like with the POY. Hagan was tough to leave off as I'm really impressed with his season overall but he wasn't the main offensive guy like the players who did make it on my ballot. This does play a factor in how much freedom someone has to get good shots off. Pettit wins it because he kept it up throughout the finals, while Yardley had a pretty big drop-off in the play-offs compared to his incredible regular season and Schayes only played 3 games in the post-season and remained pretty steady as well.

Defensive Player of the Year
1. Bill Russell
2. Maurice Stokes
3. Tom Gola

Russell and Stokes look like a pretty clear #1 and #2 again. I could be talked out of Gola at 3rd but it does seem like the Warriors get worse on defense when he leaves and instantly become better when he returns a year later. Schayes and Pettit were also serious options but I think owed more of their success to the offensive side of the game this season.

[70sFan]

So this is my first vote in this project, I hope I will keep up from now on.

POY

1. Bob Pettit

It is quite hard decision in this particular season. Bob didn't have the greatest of his seasons, despite achieving the ultimate goal in the end. His RS performance was fine, but I wouldn't have him at the top spot, or even particularly close (Russell is my clear 1st choice and I'd put Dolph ahead of him as well). His postseason run is also a bit spotty - Pistons series wasn't particularly close, but the overall margin of victory was massively influenced by the last 2 games. In the first 3 games, the Hawks went 2-1 with two very close wins in which Pettit averaged 15/16 on 36 TS%. It is fair to say that Hagan outplayed him significantly in that series.

The finals were also heavily influenced by Russell injury and even with that, you can argue that Hagan outplayed Pettit throughout the first 4 games. Pettit dominated the last two games though and without the strong candidate for the POY, I decided to put him ahead of injured Russell and Schayes.

2. Bill Russell

Easily the best player in the league already in his second season, unfortunately his postseason injury cost the Celtics a title. I still find him a good deal better than Dolph and I consider his series against Warriors to be better.

What's interesting is that in a very limited footage from that season I have gathered, Russell looked to be very engaged in the offensive sets (which isn't nearly as prominent in his rookie season). In this possession, we can see Russell making a quick spin move to the baseline to counter Neil's attempt to take away the hookshot to the middle:

What's more surprising is that early career Russell often attacked his man even from faceup position, like here against Nats:

Here you can see a more typical 1960s Celtics possession when Russell gets the ball in the high post and cutters start running around him:

As mentioned by others, the increase of Russell's offensive load also led to more turnovers and more clogged lane, so the offensive results were mixed, but it also shows his growth as a basketball player.

3. Dolph Schayes

I had a tough time putting him below Pettit, as I think he clearly had the better RS than Bob and I don't consider him to be clearly weaker player. With time going and footage available, I become more and more impressed by Dolph, he was just a remarkably savvy player. Had he advanced further in the playoffs, I could see him finishing higher, but losing to the Warriors was an underwhelming end of the season.

4. Cliff Hagan

Controversial decision, considering that he wasn't top 5 RS performer, but I can't ignore the fact that he was arguably the best, most consistent postseason performer of the year. Remarkable secondary scorer who didn't dominate the ball and could spread the floor for his era, as well as bang inside, reasonably good passer and I don't think he had any serious drawbacks on defense at this point of his career.

5. Paul Arizin

I know it was a rough RS for him, but he came back in the playoffs and played reasonably well against the clearly more talented Celtics team. I think Arizin was just overall a better player than Yardley and I don't think his relatively underwhelming RS numbers are enough to put him outside of top 5.

HM: George Yardley, Bob Cousy, Maurice Stokes

OPOY

1. Bob Pettit
2. Dolph Schayes
3. Cliff Hagan

HM: Arizin, Cousy

Nothing fancy there, Pettit gets the edge for his finals performance and RS advantage over Cliff.

DPOY

1. Bill Russell
2. Maurice Stokes
3. Joe Grabowski

I have to say that I am very undecided on my 3rd choice, but I can't see a better candidate here for now. I think Gola has a very reasonable case as well, but I don't fancy guard defense impact to be that high in this era. Walter Dukes might be an interesting candidate to look for, he was a solid defender from all accounts I have read but I don't like his ridiculously high foul rate.

Still open for changing my mind.

[Dr Positivity]

I have Dukes as like the Deandre/Drummond type C of this era where it's all about the physical tools but not high IQ or skill, although one should consider that in that era calling a black player a dumb player could be from racism. He probably was one of the most impactful C defenders after Russell based on just having an athletic 7 foot guy in the paint but I think I won't put him on a ballot, but I haven't been as big man only voting on DPOY as some others.