Retro Player of the Year 2000-01 UPDATE — Shaq/Duncan

[homecourtloss]

Tie is good. I didn’t get a chance to vote not it would go

1. Kobe: not the best player in a vacuum, but his player was probably the reason why the Lakers were so dominant in the playoffs along with having the greatest coach ever doing his usual things with the roster of role players and superstars.

2. Shaq: he could put him number one as in a vacuum. I think he was the Lakers best player and also had a very good postseason, even though if the regular season wasn’t that great relative to Shaq’s peak moments.

3. Duncan: you could actually argue that he might’ve been the best player in the NBA with that brutal sweep. It’s hard to ignore though that’s not completely his fault.

4. KG: you can’t see him getting strong stronger in each face of the game, heading to his peak seasons that are coming up.

5. Iverson: not really sure about this pic but had to do a lot of heavy lifting on offense, even though it’s their defense that made them the team that they were.

[LA Bird]

If my tally is right,

4 voted Shaq > Duncan > Kobe
3 voted Duncan > Shaq > Kobe
3 voted Shaq > Kobe > Duncan
3 voted Kobe > Duncan > Shaq
2 voted Duncan > Kobe > Shaq
1 voted Kobe > Shaq > Duncan

Shaq vs Duncan is tied 8-8 but Shaq beats Kobe by a wider margin (10-6 vs 9-7) so I would lean towards Shaq here.

Edit: If homecourtloss's vote is counted, that would be 9-8 for Shaq and an even bigger win over Kobe (10-7 vs 9-8)

[One_and_Done]

The fact that 8 voters preferred Duncan and 8 preferred Shaq makes me think a tie is even more appropriate tbh. I don't see 'who preferred them over Kobe' as particularly relevant.

I don't think just taking the next person to vote is appropriate, so I've ignored homecourtloss' vote, especially as he said a tie sounded good.

[OhayoKD]

I think just let them share it.

I'm totally against letting old projects change this one.

[IlikeSHAIguys]

Tie I mean its Christmas or like it was lol

[penbeast0]

I support co-RPOY. Either of the other options are fine if you and others support them though.

[ceoofkobefans]

co poy seems nice or we could do a runoff vote where we just choose between shaq and duncan

[Djoker]

I say give the tiebreaker to Shaq because he had more first place votes. Or just count homecourtloss's vote and the tie is broken. Easier than organizing a run-off...

[Narigo]

I also say to count homecourt vote

[Hook_Em]

This is a top-3 Shaq season so he’s obviously #1 this year. 30 PER in the regular season and only missed 8 games. Oddly his worst series was in the first rd vs Portland in a non competitive series.

[ShaqAttac]

co poy. if same amount of ppl voted one over the other than idt it matter who gotmore 1st place. hcl tiebreak but hcl also said tie so

[AEnigma]

Looks like the count is 7 votes for a tie, 4 votes to give tiebreakers to Shaq, and then 1 vote (CEOofKobefans) expressing a preference for either a tie or a runoff.

Worth noting that no one who voted Duncan above Shaq on their ballots voted against a tie, and that everyone who voted for Shaq to be awarded the tiebreaker also voted for Shaq above Duncan on their ballots. However, seeing as Penbeast, CEOofKobefans, and Homecourtloss all voted (or intended to vote) for Shaq but said they were fine with a tie, declaring a tie seems to have broader appeal.

I do feel odd because in normal circumstances I would have just incorporated Homecourtloss’s late ballot… but in normal circumstances, a single additional ballot has not been in a position to swing a result (I think only around five times in the entire project, and only ~three where such a ballot could have been reasonably legitimate). And I hope Shaq voters recognise that a) another Duncan voter could have been the one to break the tie instead, and b) everyone will be able to see this discussion with Homecourtloss’s late ballot unofficially breaking the tie:

Spoiler:

Code: Select all

Player      1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th Pts
1. Shaquille O’Neal  7  5  3  2  0   126
2. Tim Duncan  5  7  5  0  0    124
3. Kobe Bryant  5  5  4  0  1   106
4. Kevin Garnett   0  0  2  8  1   35
5. Allen Iverson   0  0  2  1  8   21

[lessthanjake]

I personally would’ve supported giving it to Shaq because of (1) the late ballot with Shaq above Duncan; and (2) the fact that Shaq was an overwhelming winner (I think unanimous) in the prior project for this year. I do also echo that the vote on what to do with the tiebreak was mostly just a straight line vote by who people supported in their POY vote, which limits its usefulness. But it is true that a few Shaq voters indicated a preference for a tie, so the tiebreak-vote itself does go in favor of a having co-winners. So I think that’s a perfectly reasonable decision. I’d also note that one problem with just making Shaq the winner based on the late vote is that it’s a little odd to let one late vote break a tie instead of opening the whole thing up to a whole runoff process allowing others to do late votes too. And runoffs are a hassle.

In any event, it looks like another pretty surprising result, given Duncan being a co-winner after having gotten zero first place votes in the prior project.

[Top10alltime]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1G6waCYa67Q8Fblli8aUJmCptnaoIfJMY3PIIzoMS_6E/edit?usp=drivesdk

This is my tracking for kobe perimeter defence in 01 finals g1. (friend told me this is one of Kobe's best defensive games)

So can anyone tell me other of Kobe's best defensive PO games to track?

[f4p]

Wow, how many other POYs lost a playoff series by over 20 ppg. Congrats to Timmy.

[70sFan]

Wow, how many other POYs lost a playoff series by over 20 ppg. Congrats to Timmy.

I hope you don't have LeBron anywhere close to POY in 2018.

[f4p]

Wow, how many other POYs lost a playoff series by over 20 ppg. Congrats to Timmy.

I hope you don't have LeBron anywhere close to POY in 2018.

well there's beatdowns, and then there's beatdowns. lebron did take a pretty good whoopin' in the finals, but it was "only" by a net rating of 16 and he was carrying a +1.0 team to the finals.

the 2018 warriors had the following series net ratings (opponent regular season net rating + series net rating)
Round 1: +12.4
Round 2: +9.4
Round 3: +18.2
Round 4: +17.0

So lebron was quite the highest and was only a little above the other series average of +13.3

now the 2001 lakers:
Round 1: +20.8
Round 2: +14.6
Round 3: +33.2 (!!)
Round 4: +12.1

that +33 is double the other series average of +15.8. is there another +33 by any team in history? probably, but it must be a short list. it's almost certainly the worst net ratings (-24.6) by a +8 team in history. it really might be the greatest beatdown in playoff history. directly by the guy challenging for the POY. who also basically swept all the box score stats (#1 PER/#2 WS48/#1 BPM in regular season, #1 PER/#1 WS48 in playoffs). sweeping the box score stats while your team basically sweeps the playoffs should be an ironclad POY season by any standard. unless the other challenger just massively outplays you in a series losing effort. or keeps what should be a lopsided series real close. neither of which happened.

and making it a little even more out of line, it's not even like this is 2002/3 duncan being compared to arguably peak shaq. it's not even 2004/5 duncan. it's a DOWN YEAR from duncan. all his numbers are worse than 2000 and much worse than they would be in his amazing 2002-2005 peak. considering the previous project apparently didn't have a single vote for duncan (i just started reading this project's thread and someone said that), this is a massive shift in favor of a down year from someone who lost by maybe the wildest margin of all time. 2018 lebron has a good argument for best regular season player and no one would call his playoffs a "down year".

[lessthanjake]

Wow, how many other POYs lost a playoff series by over 20 ppg. Congrats to Timmy.

I hope you don't have LeBron anywhere close to POY in 2018.

I get the point you’re making here, but to some degree it actually proves the point f4p was making. The crazy thing here is that even the 2018 Finals weren’t particularly close to a series lost by over 20 points per game. The 2018 Cavs were outscored by 15 points per game in the Finals. Meanwhile, the 2001 Spurs were outscored by 22.2 points per game against the Lakers. It was basically a 50% bigger beatdown than what the 2018 Cavs got. Which I think should put into perspective exactly how lopsided it was.

To illustrate this further, I just looked at every single 4-0 sweep in the entire history of the NBA. There were only *three* series in NBA history where a team either had as bad of a PPG margin as the 2001 Spurs did against the Lakers (-22.2) *or* had as bad of a net rating per 100 possessions as the 2001 Spurs did (-24.6). Those were (1) the 2019 Bucks vs. Pistons series, where the Bucks had a +23.8 PPG margin and a +23.5 net rating; (2) the 2016 Spurs vs. Grizzlies series, where the Spurs had a +22.0 PPG margin and a +24.7 net rating; and (3) the 2010 Magic v. Hawks series, where the Magic had a +25.3 PPG margin and a +29.4 net rating. Only that last one is actually worse on both fronts.

So this was objectively at least a top 4 biggest beatdown in the history of best-of-7 NBA series! And there has only been one best-of-7 series that was clearly worse (since only the 2010 Magic vs. Hawks series was worse in both PPG and net rating). And I will note that the 2019 Pistons were a -0.56 SRS team whose best player barely played in the series, and the 2016 Grizzlies were a -2.14 SRS team, whose best two players were out in the series. The 2010 Hawks were at least a +4.43 SRS team without any star player out. So that 2010 Hawks series was honestly the only real competitor in history in terms of crazy beatdowns. But even that team was led by…Joe Johnson.

There’s really no parallel in history for a genuinely great player having his team get beaten down in the playoffs *this* badly. And it’s not somehow just the result of crazy margins with Duncan off the court—the Spurs had a -22.66 net rating in Duncan’s minutes.

[Special_Puppy]

Wow, how many other POYs lost a playoff series by over 20 ppg. Congrats to Timmy.

I hope you don't have LeBron anywhere close to POY in 2018.

well there's beatdowns, and then there's beatdowns. lebron did take a pretty good whoopin' in the finals, but it was "only" by a net rating of 16 and he was carrying a +1.0 team to the finals.

the 2018 warriors had the following series net ratings (opponent regular season net rating + series net rating)
Round 1: +12.4
Round 2: +9.4
Round 3: +18.2
Round 4: +17.0

So lebron was quite the highest and was only a little above the other series average of +13.3

now the 2001 lakers:
Round 1: +20.8
Round 2: +14.6
Round 3: +33.2 (!!)
Round 4: +12.1

that +33 is double the other series average of +15.8. is there another +33 by any team in history? probably, but it must be a short list. it's almost certainly the worst net ratings (-24.6) by a +8 team in history. it really might be the greatest beatdown in playoff history. directly by the guy challenging for the POY. who also basically swept all the box score stats (#1 PER/#2 WS48/#1 BPM in regular season, #1 PER/#1 WS48 in playoffs). sweeping the box score stats while your team basically sweeps the playoffs should be an ironclad POY season by any standard. unless the other challenger just massively outplays you in a series losing effort. or keeps what should be a lopsided series real close. neither of which happened.

and making it a little even more out of line, it's not even like this is 2002/3 duncan being compared to arguably peak shaq. it's not even 2004/5 duncan. it's a DOWN YEAR from duncan. all his numbers are worse than 2000 and much worse than they would be in his amazing 2002-2005 peak. considering the previous project apparently didn't have a single vote for duncan (i just started reading this project's thread and someone said that), this is a massive shift in favor of a down year from someone who lost by maybe the wildest margin of all time. 2018 lebron has a good argument for best regular season player and no one would call his playoffs a "down year".

Has there been an explanation for why the 2001 Lakers did dramatically better in the post-season than the 2000+2002 Lakers? Like 9+ SRS better?

[70sFan]

I mean, Duncan got this mostly because he was the best RS player and he certainly had a better argument than LeBron in 2018 for RS MVP.

I didn't vote for Duncan and wouldn't do that, but I disagree that he can't compete because of 4 games in which his team was dominated. It's another matter had he played horribly in that series, but it's not the case - Duncan didn't play that badly to explain the massive letdown the Spurs had.