Retro Player of the Year 2010-11 — Dirk Nowitzki

[AEnigma]

General Project Discussion Thread

Ballots, Discussion, and Results from the Official Player of the Year voting in 2011.

In this thread we'll discuss and vote on the top 5 players and the top 3 offensive and defensive players of 2010-11.

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 20:00PM EST on Friday, January 31st. 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.

Contrarian votes can be and have been sincere, but they look a lot more sincere when you take the time to fully present your reasoning rather than transparently pretend nothing is amiss.

Vote sincerely. Do not move a player down in your voting to give another player an advantage. I would encourage every voter to give some explanations while they do their voting - but particularly if you have a top 5 that deviates strongly with the norm and you haven't expressed your thoughts on it earlier in the thread. If I'm not satisfied, I may ask you for more of an explanation - and it may come to actually booting people out of the project.

The rules here are that you've got to use the same type of thinking for all 5 votes. I understand putting more thought into #1 than #5, but I don't want PJ Brown votes. Voters do Brown type votes to give a guy an honorable mention. Makes sense if people only care about who finishes 1st, but I've been clear that I want to measure more than that. I've been trying to encourage literal "honorable mentions" to serve that purpose, and I'd ask that people use that as the way they honor guys who did something special but who aren't actually a top 5 guy that year.

There is a significant difference between a properly justified and internally consistent contrarian vote, and a vote whose purpose is to undermine the project itself. Ballots which threaten to do the latter and derail project discussion via blatant vote manipulation are liable to be tossed. If it happens twice, the offending poster will be removed from the project.

Current Voter List

Spoiler:

[One_and_Done]

1) Lebron
2) Dirk
3) Dwight
4) KD
5) Wade

It’s time to revisit the overreaction people had to Lebron’s subpar 2011 finals performance. It’s now forgotten, but the Heat were not the favourites according to most pundits heading into the season; the Lakers were. The Heat only became favourites once LA was eliminated, because nobody gave the Mavs any credibility. Dirk was seen as a choke artist because of the events in the 06 and 07 playoffs. In reality, Dallas was a very underrated team whose domination of the West should have led to them being re-evaluated by the finals.

The 2011 Heat were a very flawed team. Part of this was by necessity, as they had limited cap to find the right role players around their stars until the following offseason, but part of it was poor design. Historically, the recipe for winning titles with Lebron was to surround him with shooters. The Heat did not do that. Their 2011 finals starters included Joel Anthony, who couldn’t shoot at all, and the corpse of Mike Bibby, who was just bad (and not able to shoot any more either; 29% from 3 in the finals). In addition they had Wade, a poor 3pt shooter, and Bosh who was not used as a 3pt shooter. That’s terrible spacing for a Lebron team. Because they had so much talent, they made the finals anyway, but they were not built to optimise the talent on the team.

Part of the reason for the 2011 Heat being less than the sum of their parts was that Wade and Lebron were never a great fit. Some combinations like Curry & Draymond, Lebron and AD, or KG, Pierce & Ray Allen, have great synergy. The players complement each other. Wade and Lebron were both ball dominant guys who operated best with the ball in their hands. That is not complementary, so you’re not getting optimal results from their pairing.

In 2012 the Heat had learned their lesson, and had some financial tools to add the right players. Their new playoff starting line-up of Lebron, Wade, Bosh at the 5, Chalmers and Battier, was much more suitable. Wade and Lebron still weren’t an ideal fit, but with Bosh now at the 5 to space the floor a little (and with orders to shoot 3s), and Battier to provide 3&D, the team won the title easily. The defensive scheme also took advantage of the strengths of the big 3, by letting them become a switch heavy perimeter oriented defence.

People criticise Lebron for his 18-7-7, 540 TS% stat line. But it’s a very Magic Johnson type line, which is fitting because he (mistakenly) tried to address the overlap between Wade and himself by playing a more Magic type role; and to start the series it worked ok. Adjust Magic’s 1980 “finals MVP!” series for pace, and his stats are not much better than Lebron’s in the 2011 finals. Ditto his 1982 title run stats. The Heat also led the series 2-1 with that strategy, and were almost up 3-1, but over the whole series the Mavs had adjustments that exploited the flaws in that team. The much more synergistic Lakers team, with title experience, got spanked 4-0 in contrast.

Taking a step backwards I observe the following:

1) Lebron clearly should have won the RS MVP in 2011, and only missed out because voters were annoyed about the decision and had voter fatigue. The Rose MVP is one of the worst of all-time.

2) Lebron’s overall playoff stats are still very good; 30-11-7 per 100 on 594 TS%, while providing elite D.

3) Lebron should be docked for a sub-par finals, but as I noted it’s not as sub-par as people think. The question is how much I should dock Lebron for being subpar in the finals with a flawed team, when most players in his position wouldn’t have made the finals to begin with. If you swapped out Lebron for Kobe or Dirk, that Heat team does not make the finals. The reason is ultimately because Lebron is a more impactful player than them. So can I really put him below guys because he performed sub-par at a stage of the playoffs those guys wouldn’t have made in his place?

I ultimately have to keep Lebron at #1. He was still the best player, and a subpar finals performance can’t change that given his team shouldn’t have been there is the first place, never mind won it. The other 95% of the season matters much, much more than a few finals games.

Despite Dirk’s sub-par D, I think you can make an argument for him as the best playoff player. He certainly wasn’t the best RS performer though, or even that close to be honest. His team certainly fit together better than Lebron’s team did. Full points for how he stomped on the West though, his playoffs were incredible this year. He’s my #2 for now, but honestly I am tempted to go with Dwight or KD. For the season as a whole they may have been better, factoring in the RS. Dwightmare or not, him carrying such a depleted team to 52 wins was impressive. KD leading the young Thunder to 55 wins and the WCFs ahead of schedule was also impressive. Dirk outplayed him in the WCFs, which helps keep him ahead for now, but I’ll need to have a closer look as the thread progresses. Number 5 is tough. I’ve gone with Wade, despite his lack of synergy with Lebron. You certainly can’t criticise his playoffs. I also pondered Kobe and Nash, but I think Nash had maybe dropped off a little, and Kobe’s horrific Mavs series drags him down (especially when he wasn’t better than a bunch of these guys in the RS already).

[trelos6]

OPOY

1.Lebron James. 27.3 pp75, +5.3 rTS%. Team rOrtg +4.5. Top 6 playmaker, great passer. Playoffs 22.5 pp75 on +2.3 rTS%.

2.Dirk Nowitzki. 26.5 pp75 on +7.1 rTS%. Team rOrtg of +2.5. Playoffs; 29.3 pp75, +7 rTS%. Great playoffs.

3.Derrick Rose. 26.7 pp75 on +0.9 rTS%. Team rOrtg of +1.1. Top 3 playmaker. Great passer. Playoffs; 27.6 pp75, -4 rTS%. Had a great playoffs up until the Miami series.

DPOY

1.Kevin Garnett. Anchors the leagues best defense.

2.Dwight Howard. Anchors a top 3 defense.

3.Andrew Bogut. Anchors a top 4 defense.

POY

1.Dirk Nowitzki. +4.12 OPIPM, +1.78 DPIPM, +5.9 PIPM. 17.85 Wins Added. Typical Dirk regular season, in the playoffs he dismantled the Lakers double bigs, then blitzed the up and coming Thunder. Now the finals, well, if Lebron didn’t go 18/7/7 on league average shooting, he’d be #1. But that series was damning. Wade’s playoffs and finals were great, and scoring wise, Wade was great, but lacks on the playmaking vs Lebron, and efficiency vs Dirk.

2.Lebron James. Great regular season. In the finals, he was good, but he’s Lebron. He’s supposed to be better. All playoffs, Wade was the #1 option. Wade was awesome v Celtics, but Lebron was great vs Philly and Chicago. Anyways, this is still a great year for anyone else not named Lebron, and a good year albeit weaker than a few surrounding seasons for the man himself. +3.65 OPIPM, +0.96 DPIPM. +4.6 PIPM. 18.41 Wins added.

3.Dwayne Wade. 27.2 pp75 on +4 rTS%. Team rOrtg of +4.5. Playoffs dropped to 26 pp75 on +3 rTS%. Had a great series vs Celtics, and was actually great in the finals 26/7/5 .614 TS%. +3.4 OPIPM, +0.8 DPIPM, +4.23 PIPM. 16 Wins Added.

4.Chris Paul. Outside of West, he didn’t have much help. 17.9 pp75 on +3.7 rTS%. Team rOrtg was -1. Playoffs; 22.3 pp75 on +12.9 rTS%. Yeah, it was only 6 games, but he was great. Paul was great defensively, even getting some votes in DPOY. Top 5 playmaker and passer this year. Got better once the knee brace came off. +4.62 OPIPM, +2.15 DPIPM, +6.77 PIPM. 18.54 Wins added.

5.Dwight Howard. 24 pp75 on +7.5 rTS%. Great defensively. Playoffs; 26.1 pp75 on +13.6 rTS%. Again, 6 games, but he was the best player on the floor vs Atlanta. +2.32 OPIPM, +4.1 DPIPM, +6.42 PIPM. 18.37 Wins Added. Gets the nod over Manu, and Rose. Bulls were a great defensive team, led by Deng and Noah, I gave Rose his flowers in the OPOY conversation. Manu was top 10 OPOY, and good defensively.

[One_and_Done]

2.Lebron James. Great regular season. In the finals, he was good, but he’s Lebron. He’s supposed to be better. All playoffs, Wade was the #1 option. Wade was awesome v Celtics, but Lebron was great vs Philly and Chicago. Anyways, this is still a great year for anyone else not named Lebron, and a good year albeit weaker than a few surrounding seasons for the man himself. +3.65 OPIPM, +0.96 DPIPM. +4.6 PIPM. 18.41 Wins added.
.

Lebron isn't competing with 09 Lebron, he's competing with everyone else in 2011.

[OhayoKD]

2.Lebron James. Great regular season. In the finals, he was good, but he’s Lebron. He’s supposed to be better. All playoffs, Wade was the #1 option. Wade was awesome v Celtics, but Lebron was great vs Philly and Chicago. Anyways, this is still a great year for anyone else not named Lebron, and a good year albeit weaker than a few surrounding seasons for the man himself. +3.65 OPIPM, +0.96 DPIPM. +4.6 PIPM. 18.41 Wins added.
.

Lebron isn't competing with 09 Lebron, he's competing with everyone else in 2011.

Wierd point to make when he was outplayed by 2 people he shared the court with that series lol

[One_and_Done]

2.Lebron James. Great regular season. In the finals, he was good, but he’s Lebron. He’s supposed to be better. All playoffs, Wade was the #1 option. Wade was awesome v Celtics, but Lebron was great vs Philly and Chicago. Anyways, this is still a great year for anyone else not named Lebron, and a good year albeit weaker than a few surrounding seasons for the man himself. +3.65 OPIPM, +0.96 DPIPM. +4.6 PIPM. 18.41 Wins added.
.

Lebron isn't competing with 09 Lebron, he's competing with everyone else in 2011.

Wierd point to make when he was outplayed by 2 people he shared the court with that series lol

I didn't realise we were supposed to judge everything off 1 series.

[AEnigma]

Defensive Player of the Year

1. Dwight Howard
2. Kevin Garnett
3. Tyson Chandler
HM: Andrew Bogut

Again Howard establishes a significant advantage in minutes played. Garnett arguably has a better season than last year, but missed games plus an earlier and less competitive elimination prevents him from gaining any real ground on Howard. Finally, although Chandler did not have the minute load I typically like to see, I do think he was a strong defender, was the most outstanding defender for a title team that largely suppressed every elite offence it encountered, and was evidently so essential to the Mavericks that his offseason departure immediately shut their title window.

Honourable mention to Bogut, who had a year similar to last but this time could not lead his team to the postseason.

Offensive Player of the Year

1. Dirk Nowitzki
2. Dwyane Wade
3. Chris Paul
HM: Steve Nash

Outstanding offensive lift from Dirk on a team bereft of other reliable sources of offence, which carried over to a historic conference postseason run and a more limited but still ultimately “clutch” Finals MVP performance.

Wade maintains the postseason offence edge over Lebron which we saw last year (and in 2006), and he may have been the most impressive offensive presence in the Finals. Dirk had such a substantial advantage the rest of the season that I am not going to move Wade any higher, but that is notable enough for me to keep Wade in second place in a year where Nash, Deron, Lebron, and Kobe all had down seasons.

Paul is returned to being a top offensive player candidate after last year’s injury. Does not really achieve much of note, but he outperforms Kobe in their postseason matchup and plays several hundred more minutes than Nash and Deron do, so he earns a ballot spot.

Player of the Year

1. Dirk Nowitzki
2. Lebron James
3. Dwight Howard
4. Dwyane Wade
5. Derrick Rose
HM: Kevin Durant

This has been, as it was in 2011, a topic of conversation, so I will make it clear that I had Dirk as a top three player in the regular season. A lot of that is circumstantial — Nash started declining, Kobe continued declining, Wade was more limited by role than he was the prior two years, Chris Paul had not recaptured his 2008/09 form, Durant was still early prime, etc. — but it is how I felt and how I still feel all the same. His competition was Lebron and Dwight. Dwight would have been my pick for MVP after Dirk functionally took himself out of contention by missing nine games while the other top candidates only missed three or fewer. However, he was completely irrelevant in the postseason: the Magic were the ultimate bracket loser, losing in the first round to a mediocre Hawks team, who lost to the Bulls, who lost to the Heat, who lost to the Mavericks. Again, highest I have ever voted a first round exit (in any modern sense of the term) is third. No different this year, but in that sense a nice testament to Dwight’s season.

That leaves Lebron as Dirk’s possible contender… and look, there is a reason this is the series that permanently prevented large swaths of the population from ever supporting Lebron as the GOAT regardless of the rest of his career: he cost his team the title. No real way around it. The Mavericks played great defence on him, absolutely. The roster only had three players who were actually good enough to be on a Finals team, yes. Lebron did not perform as badly as the stats can imply, sure. But this was not 2007, or 2010, or 2014, or 2017, or 2018, because all Lebron needed to do was play mediocre, and the Heat win the title regardless. He did not, and that has to matter… even if “in a vacuum” he was still the best player and achieved more this year than anyone other than Dirk did.

Dirk by contrast may have struggled himself in the Finals, but he was stupendous against the Lakers and transcendent against the Thunder, to the point that I still have a hard time ever picking Durant’s peak over his. And even in the Finals, Dirk still was able to close out those games. Trailing by two points with a minute left in Game 2, and Dirk scores eight to win the game. Trailing by seven points with nine minutes left in Game 4, and Dirk scores ten to win the game. And while the Mavericks generally controlled Game 6, Dirk was still there in the fourth, scoring ten of his team’s final sixteen points and securing the title as the Heat were unable to ever dwindle down the Mavericks’ lead. An immortalising and redeeming run to erase the ignominy of 2006 and 2007.

Wade had his last year as a top five talent, and while he was miserable against the Bulls, he was arguably the best player in the Finals. Safe choice for fourth. Durant has a fine claim for fifth, but nothing about his conference run was impressive enough to erase Rose leading the league in regular season wins, taking home the MVP award, and also leading his team to the conference finals. No, Rose was not a top five player in a vacuum, and yes, the Bulls were a strong cast around him… yet they also fell from a 64.2-win pace with him across 2011/12 to a 52.7-win pace without him, and then proceeded to lose four of five games to an 8-seed (so if including playoffs, 62.2-win pace down to 47.2). That degree of lift can compete with anyone save the top three.

[lessthanjake]

This seems like it’s pretty straightforwardly Dirk at #1. He was one of the best players in the NBA, and won the title while playing great in the playoffs. We had a similar scenario the last couple years, but Dirk arguably was more impressive in both RS and playoffs than Kobe was the prior two years, and no one else was as good as 2009 & 2010 LeBron. So this is pretty easy.

The rest of the top 5 is probably LeBron, Wade, Howard, and Rose in some order (with Durant probably being an honorable mention). I don’t feel strongly about the order of those guys. I think LeBron was a little better than Wade overall until the Finals, but the Finals matter a lot and there was a big difference between them, so I could definitely see putting Wade ahead of LeBron. And ultimately Rose is probably below the other guys. So maybe it’s more like a three-way tie for 2nd between LeBron/Wade/Howard, with Rose being 5th. Which would then mark the rare occurrence where I am in complete agreement with AEnigma.

[Djoker]

Dirk #1 Wade #2. Lebron despite a shockingly poor Finals probably still gets #3 for me. I'm not sold on Durant, Howard, Rose etc. to be over Lebron.

[jjgp111292]

Yeah, this is Dirk's year...in a vacuum, Bron had the best regular season and a good EC playoff showing where he put past demons to bed but the Finals was unconscionable. Luckily 2012 is next, and should be unanimous!

I could see a 2a 2b argument for Wade and Bron but I'd lean to Bron getting #2

[Lebronnygoat]

LeBron
Howard
Dirk
Wade
Durant
LeBron being able to scale it down a bit in terms of floor raising, but reaching heights as a wing defender we may have never seen before (Pippen in question/Goat lvl), still being an elite playmaker, and being, like he always is, an elite scorer. Early on in the season, LeBron complained about taking too many minutes, which is true. He had been playing bad rotation minutes due to the structure of the team, and lack of depth. No point guard stability, at all, Carlos Arroyo was the guard for majority of the season before Bibby came over, and even then Carlos only really played 40 out of 60 possible games, (counting games he played near his normal minute rotation and not games when he was on the trade block barely playing). Carlos might be the worst starting PG in the league, anyway. Haslem only played 13 games!!!
The most used 2011 Miami lineups
Carlos Arroyo, D-Wade, LeBron, Bosh and Big Z
Chalmers, D-Wade, LeBron, Bosh and Dampier
Carlos Arroyo, D-Wade, LeBron, Bosh and Joel Anthony
Yea… you can choose between Big Z, Dampier and Anthony, and make an argument for them as the worst starting or backup center in the league, and argue Carlos is the worst starting point guard in the league. Chalmers was an inefficient 6ppg scorer who got hurt in March and was complete TRASH until the conference finals. Bosh is also a high usage face up player, which is how he scored his famous 24 points per game in Toronto. But as a power forward, I feel like Bosh wasn’t defending how we saw him later in Miami. Bosh wasn’t spreading the floor like he did later in Miami. Bosh was more stagnant and not a good decision maker this year. Essentially, this team was ran on star power and no chemistry, continuity, system proficiency, or clear game plan that has worked in the history of the game, at least consistently. It was just duck tape stars on a team and go. LeBron anchoring this defense with really just Wade, a perimeter defender, in still a defensive era, to a top 5 level is just adding more merit to his goat lvl wing season. Then to lead the playmaking responsibilities, scoring responsibilities, defensive responsibilities, and scale it back to the point where his other players are still eating on the team is probably one of the most impressive portable/scalable years from a super star in NBA history. Leading a top 3 offense, and best team in the league (#1 SRS). Come playoff time, the most used lineups were
Big 3, then Joel and Bibby
Big 3, then Chalmers and Joel
Big 3, then Bibby and Big Z
Again, just the Big 3… where against Philly, Wade seriously drops off as a scorer, being 22.2 on inefficient shooting, and arguably even Bosh seriously dropping off, being just a +1.1rTS with 19.8ppg. Meanwhile, LeBron is the only player keeping the team afloat (their regular season standards) averaging 24.2-10.6-6.2 on +5.5rTS (1.4 TO’s) and leading a +4.6rORTG offense (+4.4 in the RS) and anchoring a -6.9rDRTG defense (-4.2 in the RS) though, I will give credit to Wade leading the team in blocked shots and steals.
Against Boston, short story short, Miami indeed translated this round, arguably rose, but Bosh was the inconsistent factor at play here. Sub 50% TS and 12.8ppg. Clearly a plummet. Wade was able to rise and seemingly from a series average perspective lead the team. But if we do go game by game, it seems LeBron’s had the better game 2, 4 and 5. Not to mention he closed out the last two games in the 4th quarter, putting all the strain on himself. Just go look at the 4th quarter stat logs in the games LeBron was better in. I think LeBron being the best defender, having more games as the better scorer (no big lows vs highs gap) and being the better playmaker is still an easy explanation for why he’s leading this team yet. Enter the Bulls series, and Miami’s offense dropped (+1.1), though, their defense improved to a -9.5rDRTG, overall translating or arguably rising. The inconsistent factor for Miami here, was Wade. Sub 50%TS, 18.8ppg. 4 turnovers to 2.2 assists per game. Next leading scorers are Chalmers at 5.6, Haslem at 4.6, Bibby at 4.0. Chris Bosh rising in this series was very important, or they would have not been the same offense. This series was a defensive montage for LeBron, and is how they won this series and why again, their team stayed afloat. LeBron himself was still 25.8-7.8-6.6 on +6.0rTS and had the great defensive playmaking stats at 4.2 stocks per game. Games 2-5 all were close games, being closed out and undeniably LeBron being the best player in the end of games (Bosh could take game 3).
One problem here so far is the minutes he’s been put under, and how much he has to play in the 4th, and how good he has to play in order to get by. According to research that’s been done, LeBron stands alone at playing the most non stop 2nd halves of all time during this playoff run since it’s been trackable. Which is 14. He’s averaging 45 minutes a night with this unstable lineup, causing horrible rotations, and increasing inconsistent play. Boston and Chicago are also all time great defenses, which puts even more load on a player. LeBron is so far 3/3, meanwhile Wade and Bosh are ⅓.
The finals hit, and LeBron plays elite in game 1, good in game 2, mediocre in game 3, and bad in games 4 and 5. Game 6 was decent. LeBron played bad for his standards, but he didn’t play awful in a vacuum. He didn’t play bad in a vacuum. He didn’t play mediocre in a vacuum either. You must watch the finals in order to see how LeBron is still able to make the defense rotate, at level consistently more than any series he had in 2011. The openings and advantages he was creating were there, I personally tracked about 14-15 times per game (including game 4) where teammates had way more likelihood in getting a bucket whether it be connecting it to another player to take the open shot or shooting it themselves. Thing is, other than Wade, they didn’t… Bosh went back to his former self we saw in Philly and Boston, and couldn’t even be a serviceable playmaker. Making bad decisions out the short roll, Mike Bibby not making anything, Miller not getting any volume in this series, and Dallas frying Miami’s defense (partly LeBron’s fault too). I still feel like Dirk and LeBron matched up pretty evenly in this series especially looking at it game by game.

As for Dirk, maybe the best back to back scoring series I ever seen. But he wasn’t any special outside that. Howard’s regular season is definitely better, and that Hawks series was special, as good as any Dirk series. Idk if I can put Dirk over Howard for having simply one more ATG scoring series when I look at the regular season gap. Wade was still better than Durant in the playoffs meanwhile the regular season is close enough. Wade’s definitely a better playmaker and defender during this time.

[Lebronnygoat]

Lebron isn't competing with 09 Lebron, he's competing with everyone else in 2011.

Wierd point to make when he was outplayed by 2 people he shared the court with that series lol

I didn't realise we were supposed to judge everything off 1 series.

I’d argue LeBron was just as better than Dirk in the same amount of games Dirk was better than him in (Game 1, 2 and 6)

[OldSchoolNoBull]

1. Dirk Nowitzki

Of all the players under consideration for the Top 5 - a list that includes LeBron, Rose, Dwight, Durant, Garnett, Wade, Kobe, CP3, Nash - Dirk ranks as follows:

#1 in single-season RS RAPM via thebasketballdatabase(5.69)
#1 in single-season PS RAPM via thebasketballdatabase(4.97)
#2 in JE's single-season PI RS+PS RAPM(6.86) behind LeBron
#2 in RS on/off(+16.0) behind Garnett
#3 in PO on/off(+16.8) behind CP3(who only played 6 playoff games) and Garnett

He was the #1 option on a championship team that dethroned the two-time defending champion Lakers, defeated a very good up-and-coming Thunder team that would make the Finals the following year, and then shocked the world defeating the Heat. It was a monumental playoff run.

And he did it without having someone on his roster that finished in the Top 5 of last season's RPOY.

2. LeBron James

He laid an egg in the Finals, and the way this Heat team formed still leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but I can't possibly put him lower than this in good conscience. He came to Miami, put up great numbers, and took a borderline playoff team and turned it into a finalist. Took a -1.0 rORtg and turned it into a +4.4 rORtg. I realize Bosh also joined, but I don't think I'd get too much disagreement in suggesting that the bulk of the impact was from LeBron.

3. Derrick Rose

I get the feeling that this place is not terribly high on DRose, but I have a certain perspective here. I am a Bulls fan since 1992. I watched every game of the 2010-11 season. The 2011 Bulls were an elite defensive team, for which you can't give too much credit to Rose. But he was the heart and soul of their offense. Their offensive team numbers aren't special, but that's kind of the point.
I think they would've been pretty bad without Derrick, and he made them marginally above average. And for reference you can look at his rookie season when the Bull's offense jumped from -3.6 to +0.1.

They had no one else that could create - for themselves or anyone else. Luol Deng was a good defensive player, a pretty good catch-and-shoot guy, had a couple of moves down low, but he was not a ballhandler. Kyle Korver was a great shooter but not a ballhandler. Keith Bogans was strictly a 3&D guy. Boozer, Taj Gibson, and Omer Asik were all bigs. CJ Watson, Rose's backup, could handle the ball some. After that, no kidding, Joakim Noah was probably the next best ballhandler(Jo had a unique skillset for a guy his size, he would literally lead fastbreaks sometimes).

Derrick was the entire engine of the offense. It's why all the Heat had to do in the playoffs was stick LeBron on him with that height advantage and it was series over.

In the regular season, Derrick scored 35.6 points per 100(on +0.9 rTS, we could round that up to +1.0), and recorded 10.9 assists per 100. The only other player in consideration to score on that kind of volume while also being in that ballpark of assist volume was LeBron. The only other ones that come particularly close this season are Wade and Kobe. Guys like CP3 and Nash have more assists, but much lower scoring volume. Guys like Dirk and Dwight and Durant have similar scoring volume but way less assist volume. And Derrick's volume in both categories held up in the playoffs.

Derrick averaged 25ppg and 7apg in the RS. He generated 17.4ppg off his assists. So he participated directly in 42.4ppg, or 43% of his team's 98.6ppg in the RS.

Derrick averaged 27.1ppg and 7.7apg in the PS. He generated 17.2ppg off his assists. So he participated in 44.3ppg, or 47.8% of his team's 92.5ppg.

I am not so blinded by my Bulls fandom as to put Derrick above Dirk or LeBron, not when LeBron beat him pretty easily in the playoffs and then Dirk beat LeBron in the Finals. But in the backlash to his MVP, I feel that some of you are going too far in the other direction. He deserves a Top 5 spot. I am not too fussed if's at #4 or #5 instead, but he should get in.

4. Kevin Durant

The fourth #1 option conference finalist this season. Durant led the league in scoring at 27.7ppg on +4.8 rTS and kept it up in the playoffs, averaging 28.6ppg on +4.1 rTS, leading his team to the WCF. Of particular note imo is that in the decisive game 7 vs a tough grit-and-grind Grizzlies defense, Durant put up 39 points on 52% FG, including 4/9 from 3(44.4%) and 9/9 from the FT line, along with 9 boards. I do not remember who was guarding him in that game, but I'm guessing it was a combination of Tony Allen and Shane Battier, not to mention with Marc Gasol anchoring the whole thing down low, and that is not an easy defense to score that efficiently against. Not that single-game TS should mean anything, but it was 67.3% TS in this game for Durant. Against Allen, Battier and Gasol.

5. Dwight Howard

I never feel completely comfortable with Dwight. His on/off and RAPM in the playoffs almost never align with his huge box numbers and losing to that Hawks team doesn't look great. Further, the Magic made two - IMO - dumb trades(Rashard for Arenas, Carter+Gortat for Hedo+JRich) that may or may not have been pushed by Dwight behind the scenes, as he was already in his "do what I want or I'm leaving" mode. Still, he produced huge box numbers and probably made that roster better than they had any right to be post-trade. I've looked at a number of other guys and can't convince myself to put any of them above Dwight.

HMs:

6. Kevin Garnett

Amongst all the players in this post, Garnett ranked as follows in 2010-11:

#2 in single-season RS RAPM via thebasketballdatabase(4.74)
#4 in single-season PO RAPM vs thebasketballdatabase(1.24)
#5 in JE's single-season PI RS+PO RAPM(5.73)
#1 in RS on/off(+16.1)
#2 in PO on/off(+22.2)

Given how much the impact metrics like him this season, I really did seriously consider putting at him #5 instead of Dwight, but I couldn't get there. Garnett kind of stunk it up offensively in the playoffs(I can only assume his hugely positive on/off was earned on the defensive end), and the team didn't put up much of a fight against the Heat, plus Garnett had Pierce and Allen and Rondo next to him while Dwight had on-the-decline Hedo, Jason Richardson, and an ineffective Arenas.

7. Chris Paul

Great box numbers, great impact numbers, took two games off the defending champs in his final games in New Orleans.

8. Dwyane Wade

His numbers are all good, but when he and LeBron are on the same team, I cannot convince myself to put him much higher than this.

9. Steve Nash

Great numbers, but his team missed the playoffs after having been in the WCF the previous season.

10. Kobe Bryant

Kobe's descent begins this season. Still a great player, but his impact numbers are down across the board and he didn't play particularly well against the Mavs.

11. Amare Stoudamire

Just wanted to give some love to Amare, who looked like a legitimate MVP candidate for the first half of the season before the (bad) Melo trade and the injuries. He was never really the same player after that.

OPOY
1. Dirk Nowitzki
2. LeBron James
3. Derrick Rose

All three for all the reasons given above.

DPOY
1. Kevin Garnett
2. Dwight Howard
3. Tyson Chandler

Going with Garnett over Dwight because thebasketballdatabase has his RS DRAPM at 3.61 vs Dwight's 3.22, JE has his RS+PO DRAPM at 5.79 vs Dwight's 4.43. And also because the Celtics' rDRtg was -7.0(second only to the Bulls) vs the Magic's -5.3(#3 in the league).

Giving Tyson some love for anchoring the champs' defense while posting a 1.75 DRAPM in the RS and a 1.59 DRAPM in the PO, and a 3.26 RS+PO DRAPM via JE.

(I thought about Marc Gasol, but Tyson's numbers are just better and he won the title too.)

[One_and_Done]

Wierd point to make when he was outplayed by 2 people he shared the court with that series lol

I didn't realise we were supposed to judge everything off 1 series.

I’d argue LeBron was just as better than Dirk in the same amount of games Dirk was better than him in (Game 1, 2 and 6)

The most stark part of this is that if you moved any of these guys to the Heat in Lebron's place, the Heat don't make the finals to begin with.

[AEnigma]

Yeah I am so sure the team that won three consecutive series 4-1 would have just been incapable of surviving with a different top five player who would also immediately be a more natural offensive fit with Wade.

[One_and_Done]

Yeah I am so sure the team that won three consecutive series 4-1 would have just been incapable of surviving with a different top five player who would also immediately be a more natural offensive fit with Wade.

They wouldn't. That's just how impactful Lebron was.

[70sFan]

I didn't realise we were supposed to judge everything off 1 series.

I’d argue LeBron was just as better than Dirk in the same amount of games Dirk was better than him in (Game 1, 2 and 6)

The most stark part of this is that if you moved any of these guys to the Heat in Lebron's place, the Heat don't make the finals to begin with.

The Heat with Howard would have won the title probably...

[One_and_Done]

I’d argue LeBron was just as better than Dirk in the same amount of games Dirk was better than him in (Game 1, 2 and 6)

The most stark part of this is that if you moved any of these guys to the Heat in Lebron's place, the Heat don't make the finals to begin with.

The Heat with Howard would have won the title probably...

I think in some ways there is a more logical argument for Dwight at #1 over others like Dirk. He's the one guy the Heat might actually have won with. I don't like how they match up with Boston though.

[70sFan]

The most stark part of this is that if you moved any of these guys to the Heat in Lebron's place, the Heat don't make the finals to begin with.

The Heat with Howard would have won the title probably...

I think in some ways there is a more logical argument for Dwight at #1 over others like Dirk. He's the one guy the Heat might actually have won with. I don't like how they match up with Boston though.

My point is that if you replace James with any all-star type player, the Heat would have easily reach the playoffs and in case of replacing him with top 5 player, you'd fight for the title. This Heat team is very shallow, but they have three legit stars (one all-star, the other superstar) and they wouldn't become below 50% without James if you replace them with a reliable star-level player.

[EmpireFalls]

I know he’s going to win and rightfully so, but I was not all that impressed with Dirk’s 2011 regular season. Very efficient shooting to be sure.