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Spoiler:
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Anyone may post on-topic thoughts in the thread, but only approved voters will have their ballots counted. Requests to join the project can be made on the general discussion thread; however, unless you were included on that initial notification list or otherwise have an established history voting in forum projects, you will need to wait until the next thread to be given consideration as an approved voter. Finally, meta commentary or questions should be restricted to the above-linked general thread to keep voting threads focused on discussing peaks.
lazily copy and pasted from a #3 thread peaks post lazily copied from the top 100. Don't feel like writing another one of these and I figure "peaked higher than the person just voted higher" is a good enough argument for his peak. (that said pretty much all of this can be applied vs those still on the board)
Bill Russell over Jordan (peak) case
I presented a case for Duncan in the last thread and somewhat alluded to one for Russell in my Kareem post. There, I focused on his average, peak, and prime "goodness" as that was a big-question mark. Here, for Russell, just like with Kareem, I will focus on what voters seem to be marking as an advantage for Jordan...
Spoiler:
RK wrote:Even with the high ends and what I feel to be a substantial argument for GOAT peak/prime in Jordan's favor, why I see him as career #3 all-time is due to the meaningful longevity/prime quality and overall longevity aspects. I haven't finalized intel for my pool aside from my Mt. Rushmore / GOAT candidates yet, but James & Jabbar (even Russell) both have more MVP+ level seasons - and better supporting years when factoring in the full body of work.
Ambrose wrote:#1 Michael Jordan
To put it simply, I personally think Jordan is flat out better than anyone else left. There may be a run or two from Russell or Duncan or Wilt that look comparable but nothing like Jordan's stretch of combined individual and team dominance. I also don't think he has the dips or red flags the others have. I love data as much as anyone, (not saying data isn't high on Jordan) but sometimes we do use that in place of simply "proving it" and I think putting anyone else other than Jordan here would be an example of that. However, I'm quite on Russell offensively, so I can see why those who view him higher may disagree.
To go back to my stated criteria from a prior thread, I believe the per season title equity Jordan gives you outweighs the longevity advantage of Duncan, and there is no longevity concern against guys like Russell or Wilt. Nominate: Magic Johnson
trelos6 wrote:Vote: Jordan
His peak is now too hard to pass up, despite limited seasons compared to a few others.
I have him at 8 seasons being the undisputed best player, 10 as an arguable top 3 player, 11 all-nba, 14 as an all star level, and 9 all defensive years.
He edges out Bill Russell and Tim Duncan.
For now I’d have Russell 4, Duncan 5.
Nomination: Shaq
Clyde Frazier wrote:Vote 1 - Michael Jordan Vote 2 - Bill Russell Nominate - Magic Johnson
As more and more seasons pass and the game evolves, it makes sense that Jordan’s assumed status as GOAT would be tested. I'm sticking with him here, but the decision between Kareem and LeBron for #2 has become tougher. While I'm generally a longevity guy, if I feel the body of work is impressive enough without elite longevity (jordan, magic, bird, now curry)
Dr Positivity wrote:Vote #3 - Michael Jordan
Probably a lopsided vote so I won't spend too much energy here. I like players who are by far the best of their generation like Lebron, Kareem and MJ. I don't think anyone has a big enough longevity advantage over him where it's not weighed out by being worse. I value Curry's era more but I rate him as less valuable than MJ for his time period and his star longevity is slightly worse, but I could be talked into nominating him relatively soon.
Nominate: Shaq
Looking through these I see three claims:
-> Jordan peaked higher/was better on average/had a better prime -> Jordan provided more "championship equity" -> Jordan was the "undisputed best player" of his era in a way Bill Russell was not
I will start with the first two, as I think they go hand-in-hand. Do keep in mind, that these are going to be era-relative arguments built on a player's likelihood to lift teams to championships. I do not have any way to convince anyone Russell would have likely been better in 1990 or 2023. Perhaps someone may be persuaded or Duncan(basketball did not peak in the 90's), but for Bill, I will try and justify the following claims: Bill Russell was probably better at his peak Bill Russell was probably better on average It is more likely Bill Russell was the best player of his era than Jordan was the best player of his
First, let's start with a simple assumption: -> All else being equal, a player who wins 11 rings in 13 years probably was better("more likely to win championships") than a player who won 6 in 13 -> All else being equal, a player who wins 8-rings in 8 years probably was better("more likely to win championships") than a player who won 6-rings in 8(or 7) years -> All else being equal, a player who goes 27-2(or 27-1) over a much longer period of time(an entire career) with dramatically different personnel in a league without lower-end expansion fodder... https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KfFmPYlS0Mx00w0hri6LoGASkES3DWfBY25Q8vhHWoA/edit#gid=0 ...is probably better than a player who posts a worse record of 27-3 (or 27-2) over a convenient 7 or 8-year frame while getting to dunk on weaker early round opposition -> All else being equal, a player whose teams are a bigger regular-season outlier(7.0 expected championships vs 2.9 per fp4's calc) and then who overperforms in the playoffs by a bigger margin(11 actual championships vs 6 by basketball reference), probably was better
About now you might be thinking, "shouldn't this line of reasoning Jordan a starting advantage over Duncan?"
All in all, I think then, it can be reasonably argued prime Duncan -> Won at least one(probably three) titles with less -> Led two dominant teams(statistically better with most of the Bulls if you go by standard deviation(more relevant to winning championships than "srs")), one was probably with less -> Led a third team not too far behind in 2005(not sure what "help" is there but there's still no Pippen equivalent) with less -> Beat two teams better or on par with anyone Jordan beat(05 and 07 suns, great in the rs too, great in the rs missing key pieces, greatest offense ever, led by an offensive goat candidate who also led a goat offense in Dallas pre-prime) -> Beat two tougher gauntlets better than any Jordan beat(05, 07) -> Beat, with less, a reigning champion that had posted a top 10 all-time full-strength srs after sweeping the Shaq-Kobe-Payton-Malone Lakers -> Won at least 50 games every season(Jordan managed that once pre-triangle) -> Won in multiple systems(Jordan managed that never) -> Won with completely different 2nd bananas(Jordan managed that never)
I point this out because, even if you just lift Duncan's best two years to be a match for Mike's(and keep the internal scaling), then by Ben Taylor(the guy who put not one, not two, not three, not four, but five MJ years above the season you have at #1), his srs-study-based "career over replacement player" formula outputs Duncan's career as more valuable.
Feel free to dispute any of the excerpts above or the justification offered in the post(As Doc MJ noted, I actually used the BPM wrong formula in my post), but I do think it's fair that when arguing for a player who won less is better than a player who won more, to expect that there is justification that logically arrives at the alleged conclusion.
Here is what I believe has most often been argued for Jordan: -> He is a great offensive player who also plays good defense -> He looks great via conventionally defined "production" -> When he loses his teammates don't look great via conventionally defined "production"(even if they are holding the opponent 5-points below their regular season offensive-rating)
But I have to ask, at least for those who are ascribing to era-relativity(that may not be true for all the posters voting for Jordan, but I believe it has been explicitly noted as part of their criteria for some) or something resembling Championships-over-replacement-player, where they see the logical connection between the above points and Jordan being better than BIll(or Duncan).
The Celtics did not win more 5 more rings than the Bulls on the strength of their offense. And the Bulls were a contention-level team(assuming health) when they lost the strength of Jordan's offense(and defense). By a metric called GOAT-POINTS, "production" sees Hakeem as the true greatest player ever. A couple of years ago, BPM saw Lebron as the undisputed GOAT. There was a measure of "production" which put Dennis Rodman on top at the 90's, and I'm sure some lunatic could just filter down scoring so that Pippen and Lebron came at #1 and #2.
Even if Jordan was the best offensive-player-ever(and I do not think his results or even historically mapping the ways he "produces" correlate with offense-quality supports that), it, alone, would not imply superiority to Bill as an individual force of winning.
Simply put, I think we ought to be careful conflating priors with evidence:
uberhikari wrote:
Heej wrote:
What phenomenon would "great offense and good defense in the 90's is more valuable than goat defense in the 60's" explain? Why couldn't Russell's defense be sufficient in a league without 3-pointers and a less horizontally spaced floor? And what about IQ, a trait that corresponds with suprising(relative to "production") results on both ends over a variety of contexts(Draymond, Magic, Lebron, Nash, Boston KG):
Spoiler:
Doctor MJ wrote:I'd note here in Russell you have an example of someone with an incredibly active basketball imagination once it got turned on - which of course didn't happen until he had time AWAY from coaches - but it's not that I'm saying that his talent on this front was one-of-a-kind and that that was his truly greatest strength. Russell was unusual in such talent surely, but really it was him getting into certain types strategic habits with the reinforcement of a similar mind that caused something of an exponential curve. And of course, the application of that curve was on Russell's body, which was a far greater body talent than what Jones possessed.
I also think Russell elaborate on the horizontal game tellingly in this quote but unfortunately I'm not sure which book it was from:
Beginning in my freshman year, I developed the concept of horizontal and vertical games. I made a distinction between the two that others had not done. The horizontal game meant how I played side to side. The vertical game was how I played up and down. I knew that if I could integrate the two games, our team could win. I would always be in a position to determine where the ball was and where it was going.
What I saw was how much more there was to the game than that. I would lie awake at night and play with numbers. How much time was there in an NBA game? Forty-eight minutes. How many shots were taken in a game? Maybe a hundred and sixty, eighty or so on each side. I calculated the number of seconds each shot took—a second, a second and a half—and then I multiplied by a hundred. Two hundred forty seconds at most—or four minutes. Then add a single extra second for a foul shot missed and then the ball put in play; add another minute at the most. So, five minutes out of forty-eight are actually taken up in the vertical game.
What I'm hoping you're getting a picture of is a young man who started thinking for himself about how he could best help his team win at basketball.
From an innovator's perspective, this is what would put Russell at the very top of my list of all basketball players in history. This archetype of the horizontal & vertical force who intimidated shots like nobody's business but who relied on non-vertical agility to do a whole bunch of other things that were valuable, Russell basically invented it. Not saying no one before had ever done anything like it, but it wasn't what was being taught by coaches.
In Russell's words:
On defense it was considered even worse to leave your feet…The idea was for the defensive player to keep himself between his man and the basket at all times. Prevent lay-ups, keep control, stay on your feet. By jumping you were simply telegraphing to your opponent that you could be faked into the air. Defenses had not begun to adjust to the jump shot.
Russell would be the one, then, who would make that adjustment and have the world take notice, and only after he did that did the coaches begin coaching players to do Russell-type things.
Bill Russell was the best help defender and the best man defender of his time while also possibly sporting the most "ahead of the curve" basketball intelligence of anyone ever to the tune of becoming the nba's only champion-winning player-coach. He also happened to win the most on teams that gained separation almost entirely on defense. Why would we assume the "two-way force" that won half as much was as or more valuable to winning?
One approach has been to say Jordan was the Ultimate Winner:
Spoiler:
iggymcfrack wrote:It's been mentioned a lot of times how the Bulls had the exact same record in playoff series from '91-'98 as the Celtics did from their first title of the Russell dynasty in 1957 to the last in 1969. Well, let's look at that a little more in-depth, but since Jordan wasn't playing in 1994, I'll use 1990 instead and just look at the years Jordan played with Phil Jackson. (Remember, Russell also had a legendary genius coach.)
The Celtics had an average SRS of +6.0 from '57-'69. The Bulls had an average SRS of +7.7 from 1990-1998 excluding 1994. During the Celtics' dynasty run, there were an average of 9.3 teams in the league and during the Bulls' run there were an average of 27.8 teams in the league. This means that during Boston's run, each team's SRS was artificially depressed by 0.7 points per game due to have to facing the Celtics (SRS/(# of teams-1)) while the Bulls opposition was only depressed by 0.3 points per game due to having to face the Bulls. So let's adjust every team the Celtics played in the playoffs up by 0.4 points during that run to give them a higher SRS. Here's how those series went:
Boston Celtics playoff series during Russell years 1957 Def. -0.6 adjusted SRS Syracuse 3-0 1957 Def. +0.1 ASRS St. Louis 4-3 1958 Def. +0.6 ASRS Philly 4-1 1958 Lose to +1.2 ASRS St. Louis 2-4 1959 Def. +4.1 ASRS Syracuse 4-3 1959 Def. -1.0 ASRS Minneapolis 4-0 1960 Def. +3.2 ASRS Philly 4-2 1960 Def. +2.2 ASRS St. Louis 4-3 1961 Def. +2.3 ASRS Syracuse 4-1 1961 Def. +3.4 ASRS St. Louis 4-1 1962 Def. +3.0 Philly 4-3 1962 Def. +2.3 LA Lakers 4-3 1963 Def. +1.6 Cincinnati 4-3 1963 Def. +3.1 LA Lakers 4-2 1964 Def. +4.8 Cincinnati 4-1 1964 Def. +4.8 San Francisco 4-1 1965 Def. +0.3 Philly 4-3 1965 Def. +2.1 LA Lakers 4-1 1966 Def. +1.4 Cincinnati 3-2 1966 Def. +4.5 Philly 4-1 1966 Def. +3.3 LA Lakers 4-3 1967 Def. -2.3 New York 3-1 1967 Lose to +8.9 Philly 1-4 1968 Def. -1.3 Detroit 4-2 1968 Def. +8.4 Philly 4-3 1968 Def. +5.4 LA Lakers 4-2 1969 Def. +5.2 Philly 4-1 1969 Def. +5.9 New York 4-2 1969 Def. +4.2 LA Lakers 4-3
Chicago Bulls playoff series during Jordan/Jackson years 1990 Def. -1.1 SRS Milwaukee 3-1 1990 Def. +4.2 SRS Philly 4-1 1990 Lose to +5.4 SRS Detroit 3-4 1991 Def. -0.4 SRS New York 3-0 1991 Def. -0.4 SRS Philly 4-1 1991 Def. +3.1 SRS Detroit 4-0 1991 Def. +6.7 SRS LA Lakers 4-1 1992 Def. -3.9 Miami 3-0 1992 Def. +3.7 New York 4-3 1992 Def. +5.3 Cleveland 4-2 1992 Def. +6.9 Portland 4-2 1993 Def. -0.7 Atlanta 3-0 1993 Def. +6.3 Cleveland 4-0 1993 Def. +5.9 New York 4-2 1993 Def. +6.3 Phoenix 4-2 1995 Def. +2.9 Charlotte 3-1 1995 Lose to +6.4 Orlando 2-4 1996 Def. +1.5 Miami 3-0 1996 Def. +2.2 New York 4-1 1996 Def. +5.4 Orlando 4-0 1996 Def. +7.4 Seattle 4-2 1997 Def. +1.8 Washington 3-0 1997 Def. +5.5 Atlanta 4-1 1997 Def. +5.6 Miami 4-1 1997 Def. +8.0 Utah 4-2 1998 Def. +1.9 New Jersey 3-0 1998 Def. +2.5 Charlotte 4-1 1998 Def. +6.3 Indiana 4-3 1998 Def. +5.7 Utah 4-2
Overall results
Russell vs. teams with 5+ ASRS: 4-1 series record (.800), 17-12 game record (.586) Jordan vs. teams with 5+ SRS: 13-2 series record (.867), 57-28 game record (.671)
Russell vs. teams with 2-5 ASRS: 14-0 series record (1.000), 56-28 game record (.667) Jordan vs. teams with 2-5 SRS: 6-0 series record (1.000), 23-7 game record (.767)
Russell vs. teams under 2 SRS: 9-1 series record (.900), 35-19 game record (.648) Jordan vs. teams under 2 SRS: 7-0 series record (1.000), 25-2 game record (.926)
Note that Jordan has a better record in individual games against playoff teams with a SRS under 2 than Russell has in series. Also, Jordan has a better game record against the teams with 5+ SRS than Russell does against the teams with SRS under 2. Even if you go back to Jordan's rookie season, he never lost to a team with an SRS under 5 whereas Russell lost to the pitiful 34-38 Hawks in 1957 in a year where no team had a winning record in the Western Division. Obviously, there are other factors at play. Russell dominated more consistently over a variety of ages, but also he did it against much weaker competition with regard to the league as a whole and where the talent level was at, and with Oscar stuck on extremely poor teams all through his prime, he pretty much just had to beat Wilt most years to win those rings. That's why I'm voting for the ultimate winner:
Vote: Michael Jordan
Nominate: Shaquille O' Neal
A few notes -> As noted earlier, the "identical record' bit is a bit disingenuous. Russell is 27-1 in series he was available for. If missed games are a detriment, then Jordan is 27-3. Actually there are alot of issues with this framing(mostly noted at the top). Will add that because of the length(beyond natural aging) Russell had to play alot more regular season games to get to those 11 championships.
-> Raw SRS comparisons are not always relevant to era/league-relative comparisons. At some points srs tresholds are similar. In the 60's they are much lower. I think standard deviation might represent things better, but they're still extrapolated from SRS so it probably only mitigates that discrepancy. (Have also been using psrs to rate playoff opposition but FP4 has reservations about the calculation process)
-> SRS thresholds being lower also do not necessarily mean the league was weaker(see: post-merger 70's, early 2000's where Duncan led 3 Chicago-tier outliers)
-> SRS tresholds being higher also do not necessarily mean the league is stronger(90's)
-> The 1969 Celtics probably beat a better opponent than anyone Jordan has toppled with the Wilt-West Lakers, where what was, when healthy, one of the greatest era-relative teams ever had the best player from the team that pushed the Celtics to 7 in 1968(more on that later). You might note that Wilt is the only star who has ever properly beaten Russell and it required a Sixers team that was excellent without him and Russell to find himself the new coach of his team while carrying an injury. (And yes, I would say that is better evidence for Russell being the clear "best player of his era" than anything present for Jordan)
-> The Celtics also beat the 1969 Knicks who posted a +8 srs(virtually unheard of for any non-boston team up until that point) en route to a championship the following year
-> Subjectively speaking I think losing to a 4x mvp plus a really good cast on what was a big outlier for that era in his first year as a player-coach(injured by the way) is less of a wasted "chance" than Jordan losing to detroit in 90 or orlando in 1995.
A more...uh natural approach is to argue Jordan was disadvantaged in terms of support(which itself would not justify seeing Micheal as better), but even here, I do not think the arguments are strong:
Spoiler:
f4p wrote:
ShaqAttac wrote:Do you think Russell had waay more help than MJ then? Because MJ only won with a superteam and 11>6.
certainly on average he had more help. his first season in the league, he missed the first 24 games for the olympics. his team went 16-8. if they had kept up that pace, they would have finished 48-24, 10 wins more than the next best team. that was the team russell got added to. i said duncan had a good start, but it pales in comparison to a runaway best record team. he actually had a negative WOWY that first year because his team went 28-20 (42 win pace) with him, so -6. little wonder that the celtics posted easily the best record for the next 5 or 6 years. and the rest of the league was shockingly mediocre, so russell's megateams were facing <1 and <2 SRS teams constantly.
russell's average SRS differential to his opponent in his 2 losses is actually +1.47. meaning he was a favorite on average in his 2 losses. that's the highest "average loss" differential of anyone i tracked. yes, he was injured in the finals, but the team did go 1-3 in his games and 1-2 if you take out game 6 where he came back and only played 20 minutes. on the flip side, jordan's differential of -5.04 is easily the lowest of anyone i tracked, meaning he was a massive underdog when he lost. besting the 2nd lowest of -3.49 for garnett.
russell also started his career as generally a playoff faller. this partly explains why his teams got taken to 7 games so many times, despite huge win differentials. he also wasn't an underdog in a series until 1967, and he lost.
by mid career though, russell started becoming a playoff riser, his teams do not appear to have the lopsided talent advantage by that point, and he started playing higher SRS teams (though often still not great) and beating them, including a +8 wilt team and 4 teams around +5 to finish it out. so in a way, you could say he validated the early career concerns by showing he could win without a huge supporting cast advantage and could beat good teams and even 1 great one. the counterargument would be that he got lucky he was a playoff underperformer (modestly) on his most talented teams and then overperformed on his less talented teams. in fact, it's probably axiomatic that someone that wins 11 of 13 in a team setting got lucky/fortunate in a lot of ways. if the talent advantage on his teams was flipped from early career to late career, we might see the late 60's celtics go on a 5 or 6 year run of 65-70 win seasons with dominant 0 and 1 loss playoffs sprinkled in. but possibly 3 or 4 missed titles early in russell's career, which might remove some of the veneer of invincibility.
the biggest concern with jordan's case is that he kind of went from huge underdog to huge favorite very quickly. when he lost, it was unreasonable to think he wouldn't lose. when he won, it was often unreasonable to think he wouldn't win. so he didn't necessarily pile up the close series we might like to see. however, i do give big credit to 1993 and 1998. the 1993 bulls were a +6.2 teams that had to basically beat 3 other +6 teams, and went 12-4 against them. the 1998 bulls were a +7.2 team, but the pacers and jazz were +6.3 and +5.7, and with pippen's last 2 finals games being a 2-16 disaster class and a game 6 where he only played 26 minutes, that was the time to get jordan. instead, in game 7 against indiana, he guarded reggie in the 4th and held him to 0 points on 0-1 shooting (wouldn't even let him get the ball), and in game 6 against utah he score 45 points in a glacially slow 76 pace game to drag a tired bulls team to title number 6. basically his "bill russell 1969" moment as far as i'm concerned, to show he could also win when things were not at their best.
A few more: -> Expected SRS only works if you assume Jordan was as or more valuable in the regular-season(what we have mostly suggests the opposite) -> Curiously a 28 game-sample without from Russell's rookie-year is included, but an 82-game sample after he leaves with a similar roster is not. Nor is the career-wide "off"
Another angle is to insist the Bulls were actually not that good with a selective consideration of health:
Spoiler:
lessthanjake wrote:The arguments against him in the prior threads focus a lot on the Bulls doing pretty well without him in 1994, but even there we’re still ultimately talking about a 2.87 SRS team that beat a completely injury-ravaged team in the first round of the playoffs and then lost a close series against a very good team. Even if we ignore the lingering value of that team having learned how to win from their prior years with Jordan, and leave aside the fact that missing a star player for a whole season is entirely different from missing a player for random periods due to injury (the latter will be a situation where the team is not as able to adapt to the player’s absence), the reality is that the 1993-1994 season in no way backs the idea that the Bulls were a contender without Jordan. They were 11th in SRS (maybe a bit higher just while healthy, but we’re comparing to the rest of the league’s numbers and other teams weren’t always healthy either). And the only playoff series they won was against a team that was completely ravaged by injury (the Cavs missing Brad Daugherty, Larry Nance, and Hot Rod Williams). They also managed to play the Knicks very close—which was pretty good, because the Knicks were a genuinely good team—but being 11th in SRS, winning a gimme-putt playoff series, and then losing a 7-game series is not the picture of a real contender
More than a few notes: -> As has been pointed out(and ignored), the Cavs playoff-rotation posted a net-rating of +5.8 without the mentioned pieces. A caveat is that they played below average competition, and to my knowledge no one's calced the SRS. They do about as expected vs playoff-teams going by record(3-5). -> Pippen and Grant, after barely missing any games in 1993 missed a bunch in 1994. Even if the other teams are not always healthy, the Bulls themselves were healthy in 93 when Jordan played with them making the non-health adjusted numbers misleading -> If we account for health and are "consistent" with our approach we find there's plenty that backs up the Jordan-less Bulls as a proper contender, even outside of 1994...
The Bulls Supporting Cast: 94, 95, Jordan's Individual "Production", and the Triangle
Spoiler:
AEnigma wrote:This is an extremely common refrain and the type of thinking that is inevitable when we spend more times looking at name than at real production.
The 1994 Bulls played at a 4.7 SRS pace when healthy, but because we need to portray the Bulls as untalented, we instead need to ignore Pippen and Grant separately missing ten games for the first time in their career. There we need to look past the “55-wins”. And then the following year, when Grant is replaced with Ron Harper and they play at a 3.8 SRS pace before Jordan’s return, well, we look at the win totals painting them as a barely over .500 team. They play like more of 6.5 team with Jordan (3.8 —> 6.5 quite the feat of ceiling raising!), and when Rodman is added to that 6.5 core, Jordan is the one who receives all the credit for that lift.
That last point is a very common trend for Jordan’s teams. 2.74 SRS in 1990, then a massive spike up to 8.57 in 1991. What changed? Jordan played 160 fewer minutes. His TS ADD went down from 315 to 301. His VORP went up 0.2, his win shares went up 1.3, and his PIPM wins went up 1.4… Then the following year the Bulls are even better: 10.07 SRS, rarefied air. But Jordan? TS ADD down to 196. VORP down 1.6, win shares down 2.6, and PIPM wins up 0.5. But of course it is not a super team. 1993, they take a step back to 6.19 SRS. A 4 SRS fall out of nowhere! And contributing to that fall, Jordan’s TS ADD is now down to 124. His win shares are down 0.5, his PIPM wins are down 0.9, and his VORP… is up 1.
So if Jordan is not the one driving these massive swings, I wonder who else possibly could be.
We see elements of this in effect more clearly in 1998, where Pippen misses a large chunk of the season. With Pippen out, the Bulls play at a +6 pace. With Pippen returns, the Bulls play at a +9.5 pace, and this is where I urge readers to remember 1995.
This entire line of thought is another instance of classic Jordan double-speak where we praise Jordan because he lifts teams people claim are less talented teams… but we also call him a “ceiling raiser” because he supposedly fits so much better with the same talent!
The other issue with "Jordan bullied his teammates to greatness" is they did exceptionally well with him entirely absent(55-win full-strength srs, 58-win when when you add the playoffs, 53-win srs without Jordan and Grant in 95) despite a metric-ton of ongoing off-court drama. Why were the Bulls able to fully contend without Jordan with Pippen beefing with management, and Grant and Scottie at each other's throats? Why were they able to fully contend without Jordan with Pippen actively beefing with the guy who management repeatedly tried to replace him with? Why were they still good when Grant left and their best player went and filed a trade-request?
Doc has argued that "leadership is not always linear", but that only leaves "Jordan the great galvanizer" as plausible, not probable. As it happens, the Pre-Jackson Bulls never had a team comparable to Jordan-less Chicago.
And even if you want to put their great success(which was mysteriously absent before jackson entered the fray and limited Jordan's influence)as a byproduct of Jordan, that doesn't really change that Jordan was given far less leeway to "lead" in Chicago than he was in Washington. If "power reveals", does it really make sense to pretend Jordan at his most powerful isn't indicative, but the results when Jordan was at his least powerful were?
Never said anything about "confident", but I don't really have an issue making probabilistic judgments(uncertainity is fine). Main thing about 1971 vs 1991 is -> there is no triangle equivalent(Bulls offense goes from +2.3 to +6.5 between the first and 2nd half of 1990), -> there's no equivalent to the defensive jump(Bulls go from below average at the start of the season to a -3 defense by the 90 playoffs(-5 in the last 2 rounds)).
The Bucks are closer by 1970 with rookie Dandridge than the Bulls get pre-triangle despite Kareem joining a similar team. The Bucks are also still great In 72 in the games Oscar completely misses and unlike 91 where there's no real discernible improvement(Mj's on/off, rapm, defensive tape all looks worse actually)despite facing significantly weaker competition(pistons are way worse defensively and overall in the first two rounds of 1991 compared to 1990).
Kareem's production jumps between 70, 71, and 72 despite worse help(oscar hobbled) and much tougher comp(west+wilt) in 72 vs 71(west hurt). Their full-strength srs also improves iirc. It's also obvious the Bulls were historically loaded when we look at the full-lineup performances in 94 and 95(58-win without Jordan, 52-win without Jordan and Grant), and there's nothing that indicates the same for the Bucks
See the thing about the triangle was it wasn't about getting Jordan to do more. If 90/91 MJ was a better player than 88 or 89 MJ, it wasn't because he was out there impacting the game in more ways. It's because he was more effective in a scaled-down, specialized role. The box-score only tracks the ends of possessions. It does not track Jordan facing way less doubles. It does not track Jordan making less plays at the perimeter than Scottie, nor does it track him being less involved in the full-court presses.
Usage rate measures assists(the pass before a shot) and shots, it does not track who is handling the ball and who is floating off-ball where it's very hard to double because of illegal-d. Jordan was, in a raw sense, doing less. There was a trade-off between effeciency and volume even if you don't put it down to help and competition.
Falcolombardi wrote:So some thinghs here about that +7 number
First that is really weird to use the 93 bulls playoffs improvement as their "real level" cause they improved in the playoffs after coasting. Then not use the 94 bulls playoffs (where they also improved a lot) as their "real level" too
The 94 bulls actually had a +8.9 postseason srs which is almost the same as their 93 seasom +10 post season srs ( +1 difference)
The 94 bulls also missed 20 combined games from their two stars and played a +4.7 srs when healthy in the regular season (+1.5 difference with the 93 bulls with jordan) and in a very generous best case scenario a (+5.3 difference with even the 92 bulls regular season )
If i average the 94 bulls (+4.7 at full strenght in regular season and +8.9 in playoffs) vs the 92 reg season + 93 playoffs combination draymomd used (and please notice i am already picking and choosing the parts that help jordan more) the gap is only 5 points
That is not goat level.
Even by you guys own approach[Draygold and DJoker are the "guys" for context] as it is below other all time greats lift in either absolute terms or in "ceiling raising" situations
I also dont get the "improving a good team is harder" part in relation to kareem, who led a goat level team in the 71 bucks so he was not exactly lacking in "ceiling raising" either compared to jordan while also having better "floor raising" lift as evidenced by their 60~ win pace without oscar in 1972
Or 08/09 garnett who had a similar lift from +3.4 to +9 and he is not even among the goat candidatws short list yet matches jordan here
i could also bring up other cases of lift like 2015 lebron cavs +10 postseason srs with a lot less talent and that the 91 bulls (kirye and love hurt) which strikes me as a even more extreme example of "ceiling raising" considering the floor it came off. Iirc it's +5 if you combine the rs and playoff sample but feel free to take the +4.7
To summarize...
-> with their starting lineup, the 94 Bulls played like a 55-win team in the regular-season, dominated a decent opponent and outscored a New York side, without home-court, that came within a couple of possessions of winning the championship in 6.
-> In 95, health or no health-adjusted they played like a 50+ win team(52-win health adjusted) despite the loss of Grant(who helped the Magic to their first finals).
-> And from the onset of the triangle through to the 1992 regular season, the Bulls defense and offense skyrocketed(with a huge jump within 1990 itself) despite Jordan's own individual numbers, box or non-box, not seeing a similar jump as Jordan scaled down his role on the team.
I could of course say that the "without" from Russell's rookie year is a noisy 28-game sample and thus there is "nothing backing up" Russell's Celtics having excellent help.
But I believe good arguments are internally consistent so I will acknowledge that just like the Jordan-less Bulls, the Celtics were capable of contention without their best player. Here's the difference...
-> Won at least one(probably three) titles with less -> Led two dominant teams(statistically better with most of the Bulls if you go by standard deviation(more relevant to winning championships than "srs")), one was probably with less -> Led a third team not too far behind in 2005(not sure what "help" is there but there's still no Pippen equivalent) with less -> Beat two teams better or on par with anyone Jordan beat(05 and 07 suns, great in the rs too, great in the rs missing key pieces, greatest offense ever, led by an offensive goat candidate who also led a goat offense in Dallas pre-prime) -> Beat two tougher gauntlets better than any Jordan beat(05, 07) -> Beat, with less, a reigning champion that had posted a top 10 all-time full-strength srs after sweeping the Shaq-Kobe-Payton-Malone Lakers -> Won at least 50 games every season(Jordan managed that once pre-triangle) -> Won in multiple systems(Jordan managed that never) -> Won with completely different 2nd bananas(Jordan managed that never)
You see all these points I brought up about Duncan? I can also make similar ones about Russell. After it was
Russell who kept winning that initial "superteam" was depleted, not Jordan Russell who kept winning with different co-stars, not Jordan Russell who won when the league got tougher(Jordan only won after the competition broke down) and Russell who, by the data, won with less
Speaking of. Remember that 82-game sample I mentioned earlier?
What happened to the Celtics with a bad positional replacement(like Chicago had in 84 and 94(Pippen controversially ended up played minutes as a shooting guard)) as they lost a 28mpg role-player and Russell's best teammate "having learned how to win under Bill" significantly improving?
Well let's do a comparison. And while we're at it, why don't we do the Bulls *before Jordan taught them how to win. In fact let's give Jordan, at his statistical apex in 1988, all the credit for the Bulls getting better from when they drafted him. He should beat out the retiree player-coach who doesn't score enough points or isn't "the most productive player in every series he plays in", right?
Spoiler:
OhayoKD wrote:Correct, though to be specific it is a 22-23 win improvement on a bad team(taking a 40 win team to 65-wins for example would be harder). Furthermore, with an eye to future threads, this is especially disappointing in comparison with Kareem and Russell once you account for srs tresholds(assuming you are still worried about championships, how you compare to the best opposition matters alot more than how you compare by raw-score): ((1988), Bulls were +3.8 at full strength) ((1977), Lakers were +4.9 at full strength) (1969, no clue what the Celtics were at full-strength)
In terms of positional replacements Jordan replaced a bad shooting guard in 84. Russell was replaced by a bad center in 1969. For the purposes of what we're using for Kareem(pretending the Lakers didn't lose anything in the trade including their starting center), Kareem's signal should actually be suppressed if we looked at "positional replacement".
retiree-player-coach russell, on a team that would run a tougher gauntlet than any of Jordan's Bulls, saw the celtics drop by 7 points with an otherwise near identical roster(sam jones was a 28 mpg chucker on an average offense) despite hondo improving and a 2-point offensive improvement. (key to note is that this 7-point drop was from a much better league-best lvl team even if u just go by the regular-season)
Kareem, assuming the Lakers lost nothing when they traded for him in 1975(actually lost 2nd and 5th mpg guys) saw the Lakers jump from -3.95 to .500 to +4.9 with the addition of 29 mpgDon Chaney and one-off head-coach Jerry West. That is a bigger jump in a league on a team that posted a higher srs in a league where the best teams were +4 to +6.
Simply put, having inflated Jordan's mark beyond reason, retiree-player coach russell looks like an outright peer, and Kareem having given him a lower mark than is reasonable, looks outright better. And with Kareem it is hardly a one-off(will get into that on the next thread). And for Russell while we have much, what we do have all corroborates beyond a 20-game stretch on a much better team as a rookie. Also beyond the numbers Russell won 5 rings with a completely different core than he won his first 6. Jordan only ever won with a specific infrastructure and co-star, Bill only ever lost when hurt.
And yet, no. Russell is still a match for (emperically)apex Jordan on a much, much[b] better team.
Some other signals
[b]-> WOWYR, which was used to argue for Jordan against Lebron puts Russell's help for his career at 40-wins -> WOWY, which does not make weird corrections such as applying 2nd-year Pippen to 91 MJ's "without", views the Bill-less Celtics as a 35-win cast throughout his career. -> In 1969 Russell missed 5 games and the Celtics were bad -> If we do health-adjustment for 69 and 70, Russell does not merely match Jordan's drop-off, he outright looks more valuable:
Elgee wrote:Tom Sanders, KC Jones and John Havlicek made up an excellent supporting cast of defenders, although Boston lacked a second big man to play next to Russell. When he retired in 1969, along with Sam Jones — who was down to 26 minutes per game by then — the Celtics dropped a whopping 8 points in SRS (from a 59-win full-strength pace to a 36-win one) despite returning the rest of their eight-man rotation.10 So while Boston fielded a strong team around Big Bill, there’s nothing indicating that they could sniff the same heights without him.
-> For those tempted to put it all to "the Celtics didn't have centers", the Celtics were [b]largely unaffected when Russell's teammates missed time throughout his career:
Elgee wrote:For instance, when his teammates missed time, Boston rarely missed a beat. In 1958, Bob Cousy sat for seven games and the Celtics played far better without him. In ’59 and ’60, Sharman, Cousy and Tom Heinsohn missed a few games each, and the machine kept on ticking. In ’61, Sharman missed 18 games and the Celtics were (again) better without him. In ’62, Cousy missed five and, yes, the Celtics were better without him (portending his retirement years).6
But Russell missed four games in 1962 and Boston’s differential fell by 22 points. Four games is infinitesimally small, but all of these stories point in the same direction. It was only when Russell was hampered by injury (in the 1958 Finals) that the Celtics fell short of a title — the single time a Russell team failed to win in a 12-year span dating back to college.7
This trend would hold throughout most of Russell’s career. In ’66, Sam Jones missed eight games and Boston’s performance didn’t budge. Jones missed 11 more contests in ’69 and the team was about 2 points worse without him. All told, as the roster cycled around Russell, his impact seemed to remain.
Does this all make Russell being more valuable certain?, no. But when you are ranking one player over another, appealing to uncertainty is not justification.
Is Russell absolutely for sure better? No. But, if you value winning championships, I believe it is more likely that Russell is better(era-relative) than Jordan is, and I do not think there's much of a counter-case.
I also said I would justify Russell peaking higher, but honestly at this point, I think I can just offer these earlier assumptions:
(For the purposes of this post, "goat-level" can just be "peak/prime Micheal Jordan")
-> All else being equal, a player with more high-level years has a greater chance of having a higher peak than a player with less high-level years. If a player is "at" the top more often, then they have more chances to fluctuate up and "peak" -> All else being equal, a player who starts off as better has a greater chance of having a higher peak than a player who starts off worse -> All else being equal, a player who ages better has a greater chance of having a higher peak than a player who does not' -> All else being equal, a player with better longevity is also more likely to be better at their best. After all, higher peaks have more room to fall, and the ability to maintain excellence over time is usually indicative of a both versatility and a special sort of mental resilience(Kareem does not win 6-rings if he copies MJ's antics in Washington). -> All else being equal, a player who is generally better, is more likely to be better at their best
In fairness Russell's rookie year looks worse per "without", but pre-nba he was winning ncaa championships with a program that had never made the final in a league where more proffessional players played.
Additionally(and I only realized this mostly done with this post), using full-health with and without, 1969 Russell already looks more valuable than an inflated signal for Micheal(assuming the Bulls improved or maintained as a cast between 84 and 88) when we account for srs-suppression.
If you are looking to be convinced that Bill was clearly the best player of his era. I would ask you to consider how you would feel about Jordan if he retired beating the Reggie-Stockton-Malone Jazz. The data is rather conflicted about Jordan being the best in his perceived prime with certain players(Magic, Drob) consistently advantaged while his draftmate switches between being favored or disfavored depending on the signal before elevating better than Jordan does in the playoffs.
Regardless, I think I've said about all I can think to say so I'll end with this:
If the forest is "winning", then arguing for Jordan over Bill on the basis of "individual production" is missing the forest for the leaves.
A good theory has explanatory power. What phenomenon does "Jordan was more valuable" explain? If you can't think of a satisfactory answer to the question, then perhaps Bill Russell is just better, and we don't need a theory saying otherwise.
its my last message in this thread, but I just admit, that all the people, casual and analytical minds, more or less have consencus who has the weight of a rubberized duck. And its not JaivLLLL
-> Leads massive rs outlier with no evidence of impressive help playing way more minutes than everyone -> RS outlier is dominant in the postseason -> potential peak of a player who effectively lead two different dynasties with two completely different supporting casts and won back to back against historically strong competition as a player-coach on a roster that seems to have been incapable of making the playoffs without.
I am keeping things mostly era-relative this time around so Russell is a simple 1 to argue for. A full Russell vs Jordan case is made in page 2.
2. 03 Tim Duncan
Will just copy and paste what I wrote for him in the 2003 RPOY
Spoiler:
OhayoKD wrote:Voting Post
1. Tim Duncan
60-wins and a +5.6 SRS with Duncan averaging 6 more minutes than 2nd-in-minutes sophomore Tony Parker and 13 more minutes than #2 David Robinson. Duncan sees substantial time without #2s past and present with San Antonio going 15-3 without Robinson (68-win pace) and 10-3 without Manu (63-win pace, statmuse isn't showing net). From 01-07, the Spurs played at a 41-win pace without Duncan posting a net-rating of +0.4. A sample largely informed by 2004/2005 and a Spurs team with significantly improved iterations of Manu and Parker. With RAPM, Duncan, despite his best years coming with a #2 who plays his natural position, and an unusually large amount of minutes spent with said #2's poor backups, scores 2nd best behind KG of all players relevant to this ballot. In playoff-rapm he looks like the outright best.
With that we have a strong POY case, but what cements it is the postseason:
Sansterre wrote:Playoff Offensive Rating: +1.80 (83rd), Playoff Defensive Rating: -8.65 (14th) Playoff SRS: +10.66 (47th), Total SRS Increase through Playoffs: +3.36 (34th) Average Playoff Opponent Offense: +2.75 (34th), Average Playoff Opponent Defense: -1.70 (59th)
Round 1: Phoenix Suns (+1.6), won 4-2, by +5.3 points a game (+6.9 SRS eq) Round 2: Los Angeles Lakers (+4.8), won 4-2, by +5.8 points a game (+10.6 SRS eq) Round 3: Dallas Mavericks (+7.5), won 4-2, by +5.0 points a game (+12.5 SRS eq) Round 4: New Jersey Nets (+6.9), won 4-2, by +5.8 points a game (+12.7 SRS eq)
The spurs jump from the 76th highest SRS to the 46th PSRS going from +5.6 to +10 as Duncan goes from averaging 6 more minutes than anybody else to 8 more minutes and ups his points, assists, assist% rebounds, rebound %, blocks, and block percentage (.1 tov increase, .1 steal decrease, .1% steal percentage drop). He also sees across-the-board improvement in ben's advanced box, and, by a box-score interpretation that really doesn't capture what he offers as the primary focus of the opposing offense on >50% of his team's defensive possessions, the Spurs run more through him than all but 2 other bigs:
The problem was that all of his teammates were the wrong ages. David Robinson was 37, the future Hall of Famer going into his final year, protecting his body by playing only 25 minutes a game. In contrast Tony Parker was only 20 and Manu Ginobili was 25 (but he was a late bloomer, at this point mostly notable for being an insane ball-hawk on defense). Pretty much all of his great teammates were either too old or too young. I don’t want to sell that it was a bad supporting cast . . . It’s just that there was no way they were going to be winning anything without ‘03 Duncan. Do you know how many bigs on this list broke 45% Heliocentrism for the regular season? ‘80 Kareem, ‘74 Kareem and ‘01 Shaq (I’m choosing not to consider Bird and LeBron bigs for the purposes of this list). How about 50% Heliocentrism in the playoffs? ‘74 Kareem is it. As all-time seasons with a big man carrying a team to greatness go, ‘03 Duncan has got to be on the short list for that discussion.
.
For comparison the 2000 Lakers, led by a far more lauded pinnacle, post a psrs of +7, a substantially worse postseason performance even with 8 additional minutes of Kobe Bryant.
Duncan also does this with Popavich, not "standard-deviation above any coach ever statistically" Phil Jackson. And he does it forced out of his natural position with a co-star who shares massive overlap in terms of skllset. Points ignored when certain, let's say, "context" is provided to diminish him
Elgee wrote: I’d be remiss not to acknowledge Popovich more, who, for my money, is the greatest coach in NBA history. He transitioned the Spurs from a defensively-oriented team that orbited around its twin-towers, to a perpetual motion, Euro-style offense built around perimeter players who could pass and shoot. This morphed into a brief offensive dynasty, peaking in 2014 with one of the greatest teams of all-time, unheard of for an ensemble production that lacked a troupe of stars. Popovich’s success on both sides of the ball does take some of the shine off of Duncan for me. ... Duncan’s portability isn’t top-notch either; he’s savvy enough to scale down his offense (as he did in later years), although his limited passing prevents him from matching Garnett’s impact in a secondary role. His longevity was fantastic, tallying 17 All-Star seasons by my valuations, tied for tops in this series. He, KG and Wilt all have similar peaks and era-adjusted career value, and thus feel nearly interchangeable in these slots. So, while Garnett and him are neck and neck, if I were forced to choose, I’d oh-so-barely side with Duncan. (Are ties allowed?)
Duncan is the most portable, scalable, proven, winningest, and, most importantly, valuable player in the league. Simply, put he's the best player of the early 2000s; peak, prime and career. Maybe the best since Jabbar, maybe even Russell (era-relative). He was not merely consistent, but consistently spectacular. And at his best, he got better in the biggest games, the ones titles are won or lost with.
For the true "most dominant", I think a unanimous vote would be appropriate.
[3. 93 Hakeem
Looks generally comparable to the two more prominent and successful contemporaries via rs signals despite not being used properly schematically until he was 30 (and turned into a contender for the era's premier creator) and is a massive playoff-riser both by team elevation and translation of individual numbers. Looked very impressive defensively in supposed non-peak years compared to everyone but peak Duncan (granting that he may have gotten "hot" in 86 in terms of defensive efficacy given the absurd results), and multi-year playoff samples see him as a strong creator even pre-rudy.
Walton and Jordan will likely be my the next two in some order (and I don't feel great about not including Walton now).
Will emphasize for people that RAPM really tells us nothing about him thus far beyond him being good to a vague degree. He's tied with Drob over a sample though I imagine Drob will end up gaining separation simply based of his arguably era-best RS signals
Edit
Meh. Can't really form a solid positive 1-year case for Hakeem over Walton. Will keep Hakeem because he is actually getting more than 1 other vote but Lebronny's argument really isn't one I can seriously counter beyond pointing out a lack of replication for someone who never had any opportunity to.
The aforementioned argument by the way:
Spoiler:
Lebronny wrote:Walton- 77. ATG D. Good PM. Skillset not great but I’m taking over any Jordan.
Many times Walton draws a triple or double to contest their shot, but it technically leads a 4 on 3 advantage to get the rebound and put it back easily. And is this a form of playmaking.
-3.4 without +7.9 with
76 Portland also was a -3.3 team which is consistent without him79 blazers only won 45 games +1.1 team Ron Brewer was added, Thompson was added and Owen’s took a huge step up from 10 pts to 18 pts Looking at the 77 Blazers SRS compared to their top 5 and top 10 teams in their league along with the 91 Bulls. And it looks identical for 5 best teams, and similar for 10 best teams
But now with Walton’s 65 games, if we do SRS when Walton played vs the top 5 and top 10 teams in the league, Walton’s team will have a better SRS than even the 91 Bulls
77 they added talent. In 90s expansion dilutes.
Bulls have better PSRS but let’s be for real, it’s easy to build a strong SRS vs weak teams, Walton faced an above average team every series or even a team better than his, whereas Jordan had the huge gap of a team and played 2 below average teams in a row (Knicks and Sixers).
I think the Pistons in 1991 were just an above average team atp Still a good team but they were not their RS selves 1991 Lakers ran off Magic and Divac.
So 77 Blazers with Walton better team than 91 Bulls.
Walton is definitely over MJ one year
its my last message in this thread, but I just admit, that all the people, casual and analytical minds, more or less have consencus who has the weight of a rubberized duck. And its not JaivLLLL
1. Tim Duncan (02, then 03) 2. Shaq (00) 3. Bird (84, 86, 85)
Duncan is an easy choice for me. As I elaborated on at length in the RPOY and top 100 project, Duncan’s impact is slept on by people who only remember late career Duncan. In truth, Duncan was never at his absolute peak again after his 04 injury. He was still amazing over the rest of his prime from 04-07, maybe 95% as good as 02 and 03, but the drop was noticeable. That 2002 Spurs team wouldn’t have won 20 games without Duncan, let alone 58. Everyone on his support cast was old and washed, young and inexperienced, or highly limited. That he managed to carry a slightly better Spurs support cast to the title the next year remains one of the GOAT carry jobs of all-time. Defensively, Duncan is IMHO the GOAT, over Russell, Hakeem, etc.
Duncan 02 had nothing around him. He anchored the Spurs entire defence, and almost every offensive possession was run through him. In the playoffs, he matched up with Shaq and guarded him 1 on 1 for much/most of the series, and the stats speak for themselves. Duncan clearly outplayed Shaq.
Shaq 00 isn’t controversial. He has one of the most dominant peaks of all-time. His defence holds him back, but what he’s giving you on offense is so impactful that his foibles there don’t matter (except in comparison to someone like peak Duncan).
Not sure about vote #3 yet. We'll see who gets traction.
EDIT: I have tentatively gone with Bird at #3, who needs a shout out. I barely rank him top 10, but hos absolute peak was incredible. His lift is particularly evident when looking at the 32 game improvement of the 1980 Celtics, which was overwhelmingly driven by Bird.
I think it's notable that during the 80s, when both Bird and Hakeem were in their prime, there was no question as to who the better player was.
If I was choosing between Hakeem and Russell/Wilt, obviously I'm taking Hakeem, but that seems unlikely to be in play.
Warspite wrote:Billups was a horrible scorer who could only score with an open corner 3 or a FT.
Who was on this team creating this type of team? Duncan’s plus offense and GOAT level defense lifted a team to immense heights. I cannot think of very many scenarios in which this player wouldn't have the same results—1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s (proven), 2010s (proven), space and pace era, etc. Immense lift on both sides of the ball especially the playoffs. great regular and post season in which he shouldered a heavy load and didn’t falter. Impact metrics look great, especially in the playoffs. Defense is replicable in many different eras while his offense was continuously resilient throughout the playoffs. If we’re doing a “Veil of Ignorance” type simulation, I feel very comfortable with this version of Duncan being capable of providing championship impact.
Playoffs:
+3.8 rORtg on, -14.2 rORtg off (offense strong enough with him on, absolutely nothing with him off) -9.7 rDRtg on, +8.9 rDRtg off (defense incredibly strong with him on, garbage with him off)
2. Shaq, 2000
The gravity at the rim, plus defense, high minutes played, only short coming is FT shooting. The Lakers’ shortcomings were really obvious whenever he wasn’t on the court and that was pretty much the case every season except 2001 playoffs.
Playoffs:
+8.8 rORtg on, -5.1 rORtg off (very strong offense on, very weak offense with him off) -1.2 rDRtg on, +9 rDRtg off (solid even defense with him on, terrible with him off)
3. 1994 Hakeem
Debated 1994 Hakeem, 1967 Wilt, KG here. Arguments about Hakeem’s two way impact and playoffs rising have persuaded me about him. I feel that Russell has to go in here somewhere soon as a solid GOAT candidate.
lessthanjake wrote:Kyrie was extremely impactful without LeBron, and basically had zero impact whatsoever if LeBron was on the court.
lessthanjake wrote: By playing in a way that prevents Kyrie from getting much impact, LeBron ensures that controlling for Kyrie has limited effect…
One_and_Done wrote:, Duncan 02 had nothing around him. He anchored the Spurs entire defence, and almost every offensive possession was run through him. In the playoffs, he matched up with Shaq and guarded him 1 on 1 for much/most of the series, and the stats speak for themselves. Duncan clearly outplayed Shaq.
Hmm, Duncan 02 seems like a weird choice over Duncan 03. While Duncan had nice totals in the Lakers series, in the 4th quarters (basically 1.25 games), he was something like 11 for 29 with 9 turnovers while the spurs blew 3 4th quarter leads. Partly because he couldn't ever score on shaq.
And as for guarding Shaq, this video I counted Duncan as primary defender on Shaq (so weak side blocks don't count as defending) on 6 of 51 possessions (the video skips a few possessions). And it was 4 of 11 at one point so 2 of the last 40. And it was game 4, so I'm guessing the spurs had settled on a strategy at that point.
While I don't recall 03 duncan having nearly as much trouble scoring on Shaq or having the 4th quarter struggles. And having better overall playoff numbers while winning the championship.
These are Shaq numbers against Duncan coverage:
Game 1: 4/11 FG, 3/4 FT, 1 ast, 1 tov Game 2: 5/9 FG, 3/6 FT, 3 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 5/8 FG, 2/2 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 2/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 5: 3/8 FG, 4/6 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov
Overall: 10 ppg on 48.7 FG%, 66.7 FT% and 53.3 TS%, 1.2 apg and 0.6 tov
Note that game 4 is the one when Duncan defended Shaq the least, at least based on DFG (and my memory).
I also have Duncan stats vs Shaq and 2003 stats as well, but they are on my harddrive and I am out of home for the rest of July outside of weekends. If anyone is interested in such numbers, I could try to share them this weekend.
Apologies for the late response, I took my hard drive with me during the weekend, so now I can provide the numbers for the 2002 and 2003 WCSF series.
2002 WCSF Duncan against Shaq
Game 1: 3/6 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 0 tov Game 2: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 0/0 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 0/2 FG, 5/6 FT, 2 ast, 1 tov Game 5: 3/12 FG, 4/4 FT, 4 ast, 3 tov
Overall: 4.6 ppg on 30.4 FG%, 90.0 FT% and 42.0 TS%, 1.2 apg and 1.0 tov
2002 WCSF Shaq against Duncan
Game 1: 4/11 FG, 3/4 FT, 1 ast, 1 tov Game 2: 5/9 FG, 3/6 FT, 3 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 5/8 FG, 2/2 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 2/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 5: 3/8 FG, 4/6 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov
Overall: 10.0 ppg on 48.7 FG%, 66.7 FT% and 53.3 TS%, 1.2 apg and 0.6 tov
Unfortunately, I don't have the data for G2 of 2003 WCSF, I just didn't have the copy when I did my tracking work. I also didn't count assists and turnovers, I could do that because I have my notes but I just don't have enough time for that.
2003 WCSF Duncan against Shaq
Game 1: 0/4 FG, 2/2 FT Game 3: 0/2 FG, 0/0 FT Game 4: 0/1 FG, 3/4 FT Game 5: 4/8 FG, 3/4 FT Game 6: 0/5 FG, 0/0 FT
Overall: 3.2 ppg on 20.0 FG%, 70.0 FT% and 32.8 TS%
2003 WCSF Shaq against Duncan
Game 1: 5/6 FG, 0/1 FT Game 3: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT Game 4: 1/3 FG, 2/3 FT Game 5: 0/0 FG, 0/0 FT Game 6: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT
Overall: 3.6 ppg on 53.3 FG%, 50.0 FT% and 53.7 TS%
As you can see, Duncan defended Shaq significantly less in 2003. Shaq also guarded Duncan less than the year before. The data shows that Duncan struggled a lot against Shaq, but it wasn't common for the Lakers to put O'Neal on Timmy. Shaq also didn't have his best time against Duncan.
Doctor MJ wrote:Responding to 70s post here, and before I do I wanted to acknowledge the context 70s is alluding to from my perspective, which frankly is one where I've been owing 70s more dialogue for a while. He raises good points that I haven't rebutted, and yet I apparently haven't changed my holistic evaluation.
Now, to be clear this isn't stubbornness in opinion on my part. What it is, is an insistence of me forming my evaluations on first principles of my own understanding. I don't do this because I believe I'm somehow the only one who can do this right, but rather because that's my approach generally to developing expertise in a given domain. I absolutely seek mentors who know more than I do, but I don't claim their evaluation on my own simply because I have more confidence in their evaluation than I do in my own.
I don't do this in all walks of my life - there are plenty of things I just pay for, or rely on others to do for me - but if I decide I'd like to understand something better, I have to build that ontology/schema one epistemological step at a time.
As I say all of that, there's a more flexible dimension of my ontology that I do want to make clear exists, and that's about level of uncertainty (which is really a collection of micro-uncertainties, but easier to think about them all effectively integrated together. What 70s done in the past hasn't flipped my Wilt ranking over other players, but it has increased my level of uncertainty. That uncertainty was never zero - it never is - but when I don't rebut a rebuttal to my satisfaction (which to be clear, can involve "agree to disagree") - my uncertainty goes up.
Alright, here's 70s post, and my thoughts - which I'm looking going to be thinking through between typing what I type up here, and I type what I type below:
So just to be clear - I don't think there is anything wrong with you keeping your opinion after new data or evidences comes out. I am well aware that you have spent a lot of time analyzing this situation and I wouldn't expect from someone like that just rejecting well established opinion just after one tiny break in the overall picture.
I am not that fluent in English, so I wish I could deep dive more into the thinking principles with you, but life already gives me very little time on basketball, so I have to move on
I'm just going to emphasize again that this is GREAT data sleuthing that I was not aware of when I first developed my model for Wilt's pivot passer offenses trying to explain the one-season-wonder 76er rORtg of '66-67 which stands out so distinctly not just from '67-68, but really Wilt's entire career as the engine of his team's offenses on the Warriors & 76ers.
Of course, what's always tricky - and adds to the uncertainty of the situation - is the fact that we didn't get more years after '67-68 in Philly because Wilt left. More sample in subsequent years would have been really useful in determining what correlations were truly causal, and which were not.
It is true, such a small sample makes it incredibly hard to get any trustworthy conclusions, especially without the tape to analyze. We do have the last 2 months of the 1965/66 season with Wilt posting over 6 apg, but it was before Hannum, so I am not sure if it's worth taking time to calculate ORtg estimations for that period.
First thing I need to point out is the slipperiness of using different splits in the same interval to make reinforcing arguments. It makes sense why 70s did it because he's actually rebutting two distinct arguments that I and others have made int he past, but I want to be careful how I consider my splits as I get a handle on things.
1. Wilt does both more scoring and more assisting Post All-Star. 2. Wilt does both more scoring and more assisting in Wins. 3. There is a HUGE spike in PPG between Oct-Nov (14.8 & 17.3 PPG) & December (30.5 PPG), which is then followed by 26.1, 24.8 & 268.8 in the last 3 months. 4. There's also a clear trend toward Wilt getting more and more efficient as the year goes on (starting at 47.2% in Oct and ending at 63.9% in March.) 5. When we look at Opponent based splits, there are 2 teams that are drastically different from the rest:
Against Boston, Wilt scores 17.1 PPG on 44.9% TS. Against San Francisco, Wilt scores 17.3 PPG on 45.5% (Remember that his season averages were 24.3 PPG on 55.7%.)
Okay then, the 3 inquiries that brings up to me are:
a) How does that Calendar split between Oct-Nov & the rest of the year look by team success measures?
b) How does that Opponent split between Bos/SF & the rest of the league look by team success measures?
c) How do these various factors differ between '66-67 & '67-68?
I'm going to look at all of this, though I'm going to stop short of doing intense calculations due to time constraints - I welcome 70s or others to do them.
Calendar split: Oct-Nov: 15-7, and looks like the average team PPG in that time was maybe 117. Dec-Mar: 47-13, and looks like their average team PPG in that time was maybe 124.
Definitely significantly stronger after the split, which again, came with Wilt's major increase in scoring.
I should also note, that record & PPG increase further in the Feb-Mar range, which was one of the splits 70s looked at.
Opponent split: Against Boston: 4-4, and scores 112.8 PPG. Against San Francisco: 4-3, and scores 116.6 PPG. Against Others: 54-13 (keep in mind season average was 122.6 PPG, so against Others must have been much higher).
Okay so, this stark difference between Wilt's scoring against Bos/SF compared to all other teams I think has to be taken as very noteworthy given that we know that these teams were anchored by Bill Russell & Nate Thurmond respectively who were universally acknowledged to give Wilt problems, and in fact it's often put forth that as Wilt became obsessed with his FG%, he specifically avoided taking shots against tougher defenders (Thurmond being the most notable one as Russell retired).
There's no obvious skewing of the calendar with Bos/SF during the early part of the year, so these two phenomenon seem distinct.
However, it would be nice to see specifically how Wilt did against Russell & Thurmond in Feb & March where he seems to have been in peak form I think.
The most problematic think I note, which I didn't recall, was that Thurmond was injured in January of that season, and so didn't play in the 3 February games the 76ers faced the Warriors. This also means, that 3 of the 4 wins against SF this season didn't involve Thurmond, so I believe Thurmond's Warriors were 3-1 against Wilt's 76ers for the season.
Against the Celtics in March (they didn't play in Feb):
So, we're back to Wilt scoring a really low amount (15 PPG - and on <50%) like at the start of the year, but now the Warriors are winning. I'm not going to deep dive it, but I note that Hal Greer scored 70 points over the two games racking up 36 free throws, and that's really something and not normal for any player, but I'd want to emphasize that it's definitely not what Greer did in an average game against an average opponent, and certainly not what Greer did on average against the Celtics, but it does seem that Greer specifically got to the free throw line more against the Celtics than other opponents, which warrants further conversation.
So, this is how Wilt stats look against the Celtics in these two periods I picked back when I did the estimation:
First 30 games:
16/27/9 on 7/14 FG, 2/16 FT 8/33/6 on 3/11 FG, 2/7 FT 10/23/5 on 4/14 FG, 2/8 FT
Total: 11.3/27.7/6.7 on 36 FG%, 19 FT% and 32 TS%, 0-3 record, 102.3 Team Ppg
Last 52 games:
31/27/6 on 13/23 FG, 5/15 FT 19/24/11 on 9/17 FG, 1/8 FT 23/29/13 on 8/14 FG, 7/13 FT 17/22/8 on 6/13 FG, 5/10 FT 13/24/10 on 5/10 FG, 7/13 FT
Total: 20.6/25.2/9.6 on 53 FG%, 42 FT% and 50 TS%, 4-1 record, 119.0 Team Ppg
So even though it is true that the Celtics limited Wilt to a significant degree, the numbers from the rest of the season look basically identical to the ones from 1966/67 season:
Against Boston, Wilt scores 20.1 PPG on 53.2% TS.
So I am not really sure that we can conclude the Celtics "figured out Wilt", it looks like he did his usual 1966/67 work on them outside of this bad beginning.
Well, so first and foremost, when I knock his passing, I'm doing so based a standard of ideal decision making, not comparing him to other giants who are primarily not in the league for their decision making ability. I'd note that most of the guys you mentioned were never used as pivot passers the way Wilt was (Jokic & Walton being the obvious exceptions), and so the arguments for their success aren't typically focused on their passing.
While the oldest Wilt arguments weren't about passing either - 50 PPG!!! - to me the last two years of Wilt's Philly career are, because he's being used as a pivot passer, which begets a naive explanation of "He was the GOAT scorer and even better as a passer".
To which I'd generally respond a) you get easier passing options when the defense expects you to shoot, b) but eventually they should find the new equilibrium, and c) while this may not drag down the effectiveness back initial levels, we should expect there is some regression to the mean as opponents adjust.
This of course leads me - perhaps prematurely to think that we were seeing signs of this in '67-68.
Yeah, I don't think anyone would argue for Wilt being a top tier passer here. I would be interested in your thought on Wilt's passing ability in comparison to the other non-pass-first bigs though.
There's also an eye test component of this for me that came in conjunction with the conclusions I previously drew, and here I'll readily admit to small sample size theater.
I remember watching that 1970 Game 7 against the Knicks just be astounded at how flawed Wilt's game seemed to be for reasons completely separate from physical injury. And while I was struck by this on a number of levels, the most mundane one was just his tendency to simply give up trying to score late in the shot clock, and pass the ball back out to the guards to make something happen. To me, scorers who are great passers should be making attacking passes as a matter of course when the defense puts too much pressure on them, and this has been a thing known for over a century, so it's not a "they didn't know better back then thing".
I wonder if you have found the same tendencies in different games. Please do not take that as an attack, but I often see you pointing out 1970 G7 game when we analyze Wilt's game and it is fair, as it was the critical moment and Wilt disappointed. At the same time though, this might be by far his worst performance available on the tape, so we should be fair and do not judge Wilt's whole game with the worst scenario possible.
I'd also note that a good chunk of the guys you listed above are guys who I wouldn't be looking to volume score with in the absence of illegal defense rules. I know it's super unpopular among the PC board to say, but I wouldn't generally recommend built your offense around Tim Duncan at all, so it's less a question of whether we'd use his scoring more or his passing more, but how he can help as a role player. (To be clear, not saying Duncan was the worst of the bunch, but I just know that it's a place where I've had a lot of dialogue with people seeing me as anti-Duncan, when what I really am in general is against low post volume scoring once you've got players who can be proficient running the offense further from the basket. It's not that it's never worked in the past, but I think that it's something that wouldn't have worked well enough if either a) the NBA had recognized the need for a pace & space paradigm shift as soon as rules allowed for it in 1980 or b) the Illegal Defense rules implement from the '80s to early '00s never saw the light of day.
I know you are clearly against post offense, but the reality is that teams played that way for the loooong period of the NBA history, so we should not be too critical for Wilt who did what people expected from him - or from Duncan to the same degree.
00 is the one year shaq combines his sub goat clear all time O with elite defense which is enough for him to be my 3rd highest peak
2. 2003 Tim Duncan
All time two way impact floor raising a very mid team to best in the league level, rising in the playoffs, and capping it off with arguably the best finals by a non bron mj shaq player ever.
3. 1964 Wilt Chamberlain
One of the goat floor raising seasons. led a young and below average warriors team to a 48-34 record with a 54 win pace by SRS (+4.41) where he averaged 36.9 PPG (1st in the league by 5.5 points a game) 22.3 RPG (2nd only to bill russell) 5 apg (6th in the league) with a 53.7 TS% (+4.8 rTS% which was good for 7th in the league) and took said warriors to the finals where they lost in 5 to the boston celtics who had 3 all stars and 3 of the other 9 all nba members that season other than Wilt; Bill Russell, John Havlicek (All NBA but not all star), Sam Jones (All star and 9th in MVP voting but not all nba), and Tom Heinsohn. While they lost in 5 it wasn't some lost cause of a series despite the talent disparity (Only lost by an average of 4 points per game, won their only game by 24, and the last two games of the series were lost by 3 and 6 points). Wilt averaged 29/2/28 on 50.9 TS% (+4.7 rTS% based on the celtics estimated TS% allowed in the RS) and the warriors had a 40.3 TS% (-5.9 rTS%) outside of wilt (not to mention would be finals mvp sam jones averaged 21.2 ppg and 2.8 apg on 60 TS% which is absurd efficiency for 1964). The warriors had a below average offense which will be used against wilt but I think that says more about his help than the offensive ability of the leagues best scorer and offensive rebounder who averaged 5 assists on top of that, but I also don't think Wilt's offense is quite the level of the Offensive GOATs or the guys a tier or 2 below (we've seen guys like MJ LeBron Kobe etc lead above average and even high level offenses without help offensively) but he's still an elite Offensive player (somewhere in the top 50 all time) and a top 5 or so defender ever which is enough to be the 6th highest peak ever for me. Could see the argument for him over Duncan or Kareem (mayve shaq but it takes some convincing), but also could see the argument for hakeem over him (maybe steph jokic or kobe with some convincing)
Who was on this team creating this type of team? Duncan’s plus offense and GOAT level defense lifted a team to immense heights. I cannot think of very many scenarios in which this player wouldn't have the same results—1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s (proven), 2010s (proven), space and pace era, etc. Immense lift on both sides of the ball especially the playoffs. great regular and post season in which he shouldered a heavy load and didn’t falter. Impact metrics look great, especially in the playoffs. Defense is replicable in many different eras while his offense was continuously resilient throughout the playoffs. If we’re doing a “Veil of Ignorance” type simulation, I feel very comfortable with this version of Duncan being capable of providing championship impact.
Playoffs:
+3.8 rORtg on, -14.2 rORtg off (offense strong enough with him on, absolutely nothing with him off) -9.7 rDRtg on, +8.9 rDRtg off (defense incredibly strong with him on, garbage with him off)
2. Shaq, 2000
The gravity at the rim, plus defense, high minutes played, only short coming is FT shooting. The Lakers’ shortcomings were really obvious whenever he wasn’t on the court and that was pretty much the case every season except 2001 playoffs.
Playoffs:
+8.8 rORtg on, -5.1 rORtg off (very strong offense on, very weak offense with him off) -1.2 rDRtg on, +9 rDRtg off (solid even defense with him on, terrible with him off)
3. 1994 Hakeem
Debated 1994 Hakeem, 1967 Wilt, KG here. Arguments about Hakeem’s two way impact and playoffs rising have persuaded me about him. I feel that Russell has to go in here somewhere soon as a solid GOAT candidate.
What about Hakeem put him over Wilt or KG for you??
-> Leads massive rs outlier with no evidence of impressive help playing way more minutes than everyone -> RS outlier is dominant in the postseason -> potential peak of a player who effectively lead two different dynasties with two completely different supporting casts and won back to back against historically strong competition as a player-coach on a roster that seems to have been incapable of making the playoffs without.
I am keeping things mostly era-relative this time around so Russell is a simple 1 to argue for. A full Russell vs Jordan case is made in page 2.
2. 03 Tim Duncan
Will just copy and paste what I wrote for him in the 2003 RPOY
Spoiler:
OhayoKD wrote:Voting Post
1. Tim Duncan
60-wins and a +5.6 SRS with Duncan averaging 6 more minutes than 2nd-in-minutes sophomore Tony Parker and 13 more minutes than #2 David Robinson. Duncan sees substantial time without #2s past and present with San Antonio going 15-3 without Robinson (68-win pace) and 10-3 without Manu (63-win pace, statmuse isn't showing net). From 01-07, the Spurs played at a 41-win pace without Duncan posting a net-rating of +0.4. A sample largely informed by 2004/2005 and a Spurs team with significantly improved iterations of Manu and Parker. With RAPM, Duncan, despite his best years coming with a #2 who plays his natural position, and an unusually large amount of minutes spent with said #2's poor backups, scores 2nd best behind KG of all players relevant to this ballot. In playoff-rapm he looks like the outright best.
With that we have a strong POY case, but what cements it is the postseason:
Sansterre wrote:Playoff Offensive Rating: +1.80 (83rd), Playoff Defensive Rating: -8.65 (14th) Playoff SRS: +10.66 (47th), Total SRS Increase through Playoffs: +3.36 (34th) Average Playoff Opponent Offense: +2.75 (34th), Average Playoff Opponent Defense: -1.70 (59th)
Round 1: Phoenix Suns (+1.6), won 4-2, by +5.3 points a game (+6.9 SRS eq) Round 2: Los Angeles Lakers (+4.8), won 4-2, by +5.8 points a game (+10.6 SRS eq) Round 3: Dallas Mavericks (+7.5), won 4-2, by +5.0 points a game (+12.5 SRS eq) Round 4: New Jersey Nets (+6.9), won 4-2, by +5.8 points a game (+12.7 SRS eq)
The spurs jump from the 76th highest SRS to the 46th PSRS going from +5.6 to +10 as Duncan goes from averaging 6 more minutes than anybody else to 8 more minutes and ups his points, assists, assist% rebounds, rebound %, blocks, and block percentage (.1 tov increase, .1 steal decrease, .1% steal percentage drop). He also sees across-the-board improvement in ben's advanced box, and, by a box-score interpretation that really doesn't capture what he offers as the primary focus of the opposing offense on >50% of his team's defensive possessions, the Spurs run more through him than all but 2 other bigs:
The problem was that all of his teammates were the wrong ages. David Robinson was 37, the future Hall of Famer going into his final year, protecting his body by playing only 25 minutes a game. In contrast Tony Parker was only 20 and Manu Ginobili was 25 (but he was a late bloomer, at this point mostly notable for being an insane ball-hawk on defense). Pretty much all of his great teammates were either too old or too young. I don’t want to sell that it was a bad supporting cast . . . It’s just that there was no way they were going to be winning anything without ‘03 Duncan. Do you know how many bigs on this list broke 45% Heliocentrism for the regular season? ‘80 Kareem, ‘74 Kareem and ‘01 Shaq (I’m choosing not to consider Bird and LeBron bigs for the purposes of this list). How about 50% Heliocentrism in the playoffs? ‘74 Kareem is it. As all-time seasons with a big man carrying a team to greatness go, ‘03 Duncan has got to be on the short list for that discussion.
.
For comparison the 2000 Lakers, led by a far more lauded pinnacle, post a psrs of +7, a substantially worse postseason performance even with 8 additional minutes of Kobe Bryant.
Duncan also does this with Popavich, not "standard-deviation above any coach ever statistically" Phil Jackson. And he does it forced out of his natural position with a co-star who shares massive overlap in terms of skllset. Points ignored when certain, let's say, "context" is provided to diminish him
Elgee wrote: I’d be remiss not to acknowledge Popovich more, who, for my money, is the greatest coach in NBA history. He transitioned the Spurs from a defensively-oriented team that orbited around its twin-towers, to a perpetual motion, Euro-style offense built around perimeter players who could pass and shoot. This morphed into a brief offensive dynasty, peaking in 2014 with one of the greatest teams of all-time, unheard of for an ensemble production that lacked a troupe of stars. Popovich’s success on both sides of the ball does take some of the shine off of Duncan for me. ... Duncan’s portability isn’t top-notch either; he’s savvy enough to scale down his offense (as he did in later years), although his limited passing prevents him from matching Garnett’s impact in a secondary role. His longevity was fantastic, tallying 17 All-Star seasons by my valuations, tied for tops in this series. He, KG and Wilt all have similar peaks and era-adjusted career value, and thus feel nearly interchangeable in these slots. So, while Garnett and him are neck and neck, if I were forced to choose, I’d oh-so-barely side with Duncan. (Are ties allowed?)
Duncan is the most portable, scalable, proven, winningest, and, most importantly, valuable player in the league. Simply, put he's the best player of the early 2000s; peak, prime and career. Maybe the best since Jabbar, maybe even Russell (era-relative). He was not merely consistent, but consistently spectacular. And at his best, he got better in the biggest games, the ones titles are won or lost with.
For the true "most dominant", I think a unanimous vote would be appropriate.
[3. 93 Hakeem
Looks generally comparable to the two more prominent and successful contemporaries via rs signals despite not being used properly schematically until he was 30 (and turned into a contender for the era's premier creator) and is a massive playoff-riser both by team elevation and translation of individual numbers. Looked very impressive defensively in supposed non-peak years compared to everyone but peak Duncan (granting that he may have gotten "hot" in 86 in terms of defensive efficacy given the absurd results), and multi-year playoff samples see him as a strong creator even pre-rudy.
Walton and Jordan will likely be my the next two in some order (and I don't feel great about not including Walton now).
Will emphasize for people that RAPM really tells us nothing about him thus far beyond him being good to a vague degree. He's tied with Drob over a sample though I imagine Drob will end up gaining separation simply based of his arguably era-best RS signals
Edit
Meh. Can't really form a solid positive 1-year case for Hakeem over Walton. Will keep Hakeem because he is actually getting more than 1 other vote but Lebronny's argument really isn't one I can seriously counter beyond pointing out a lack of replication for someone who never had any opportunity to.
The aforementioned argument by the way:
Spoiler:
Lebronny wrote:Walton- 77. ATG D. Good PM. Skillset not great but I’m taking over any Jordan.
Many times Walton draws a triple or double to contest their shot, but it technically leads a 4 on 3 advantage to get the rebound and put it back easily. And is this a form of playmaking.
-3.4 without +7.9 with
76 Portland also was a -3.3 team which is consistent without him79 blazers only won 45 games +1.1 team Ron Brewer was added, Thompson was added and Owen’s took a huge step up from 10 pts to 18 pts Looking at the 77 Blazers SRS compared to their top 5 and top 10 teams in their league along with the 91 Bulls. And it looks identical for 5 best teams, and similar for 10 best teams
But now with Walton’s 65 games, if we do SRS when Walton played vs the top 5 and top 10 teams in the league, Walton’s team will have a better SRS than even the 91 Bulls
77 they added talent. In 90s expansion dilutes.
Bulls have better PSRS but let’s be for real, it’s easy to build a strong SRS vs weak teams, Walton faced an above average team every series or even a team better than his, whereas Jordan had the huge gap of a team and played 2 below average teams in a row (Knicks and Sixers).
I think the Pistons in 1991 were just an above average team atp Still a good team but they were not their RS selves 1991 Lakers ran off Magic and Divac.
So 77 Blazers with Walton better team than 91 Bulls.
Walton is definitely over MJ one year
I don't see how Bill Walton is better than Wilt, KG, or Steph peak for peak.
Offensively a glance, we can see Curry drove the best offense, and it got even better in the playoffs, Shaq was a big playoff riser, Wilt, KG, Duncan and Russell all dropped around the same. Of course, KG, Duncan, Hakeem all had to do some heavy lifting with their squads. Sam Cassell was probably the best #2 across all 3 squads.
Defensively, Russell anchored the GOAT D, and it remained the GOAT D in the PS. Shaq’s offensive input greatly diminished the team’s defense, cratering substantially, as did KG. Duncan, Wilt and Hakeem all improved defensively to various extents, Duncan the with the most improvement, while Curry is not a driver of the amazing Warriors defense, was certainly a net neutral defensively.
Trying to quantify defense into a single number can be quite tricky. If we call Bill Russell a 99 overall, as our benchmark. RS —> PS
Of course, opponent quality counts. KG. Went up against 3 top 8 offenses, Russell took down the #1 Royals and Wilt, Hakeem took the top 4 offense Sonics to 7. Duncan beat the #1 and #4 offense, Wilt took down Oscar and the #2 offense, and Shaq overcame the #1 and #3 offenses. All of the big defenders have quality defensive series vs top offenses. Yes these are quite arbitrary, but I’m trying to convey how much better Russell is than the next best defender.
In terms of playmaking, I’d rate them as Curry >KG > Wilt > Shaq > Hakeem ‘94 > Duncan ‘03 > Hakeem ‘93 > Russell
So, with all this information, breaking down offense and defense, Russell had to be pretty good on D to compensate for his poor scoring and creation relative to the rest.
Curry on the other hand, being the best playmaker and blends some great scoring volumes with ELITE efficiency, but also, as a guard, his defensive impact is quite lacking vs the rest.
Hakeem ‘93 and Duncan are just about even on D, playmaking and scoring, and I have ‘94 Hakeem just behind them.
KG and Wilt are both high level playmakers as bigs, Wilt’s scoring went down but efficiency was amazing. In the PS, he sacrificed his scoring for better defense.
Shaq was still quite good defensively, and had some great scoring volume. His efficiency would be amazing if he could hit free throws, with the best FTA of the bunch, no one was better at putting teams into foul trouble (until Giannis), but only hitting them at 52% really hurts his efficiency. His ability to decimate opposing frontcourts due to foul troubles provides a huge offensive impact.
Overall, I think my final rankings will be:
#4: Shaquille O’Neal (2000 > 2001 > 2002) . Best mix of scoring, playmaking, good defense, x-factor of rim pressure and FTA.
#5: Steph Curry (2017 > 2016 > 2015) . Elite efficiency, great volume and playmaking. X-factor of his gravity while spacing the floor to a GOAT level.
1. Hakeem 1993 (1994) Generally prefer bigger players philosophically and think Hakeem would dominate any era, fitting very well in this pace and space era as an undersized bigman. Would be the best (non-actualized Wemby) defender in the league while being a very good offensive engine, playoff monster. Prefer him slightly over Duncan in a modern context due to mobility and motor.
2. Duncan 2003 (2002) One of the most impressive carry jobs ever even though the Nets were a terrible team by finals standards. Hakeem-esque carrying a very limited squad on his back, I ultimately like Duncan's two-way play more than someone like Jokic or Shaq and moreover contextually think what Duncan did this season is far more impressive than anything Jokic has done. Think KG deserves serious consideration as well but ultimately going with the more conventional pick.
3. Shaq 2001 (2000) This is the point where it starts to get a lot hazier for me. Seriously considered KG, Magic and Jokic here. Ultimately, I'm going with what is likely the most conventional pick as I do think Shaq would in some ways be even more unstoppable today and was also definitely a good enough passer to punish defenses for doubling. I have serious questions about his defense, but not to the point where I would pick Jokic over him.
f4p wrote: Hmm, Duncan 02 seems like a weird choice over Duncan 03. While Duncan had nice totals in the Lakers series, in the 4th quarters (basically 1.25 games), he was something like 11 for 29 with 9 turnovers while the spurs blew 3 4th quarter leads. Partly because he couldn't ever score on shaq.
And as for guarding Shaq, this video I counted Duncan as primary defender on Shaq (so weak side blocks don't count as defending) on 6 of 51 possessions (the video skips a few possessions). And it was 4 of 11 at one point so 2 of the last 40. And it was game 4, so I'm guessing the spurs had settled on a strategy at that point.
While I don't recall 03 duncan having nearly as much trouble scoring on Shaq or having the 4th quarter struggles. And having better overall playoff numbers while winning the championship.
These are Shaq numbers against Duncan coverage:
Game 1: 4/11 FG, 3/4 FT, 1 ast, 1 tov Game 2: 5/9 FG, 3/6 FT, 3 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 5/8 FG, 2/2 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 2/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 5: 3/8 FG, 4/6 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov
Overall: 10 ppg on 48.7 FG%, 66.7 FT% and 53.3 TS%, 1.2 apg and 0.6 tov
Note that game 4 is the one when Duncan defended Shaq the least, at least based on DFG (and my memory).
I also have Duncan stats vs Shaq and 2003 stats as well, but they are on my harddrive and I am out of home for the rest of July outside of weekends. If anyone is interested in such numbers, I could try to share them this weekend.
Apologies for the late response, I took my hard drive with me during the weekend, so now I can provide the numbers for the 2002 and 2003 WCSF series.
2002 WCSF Duncan against Shaq
Game 1: 3/6 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 0 tov Game 2: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 0/0 FG, 0/0 FT, 0 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 0/2 FG, 5/6 FT, 2 ast, 1 tov Game 5: 3/12 FG, 4/4 FT, 4 ast, 3 tov
Overall: 4.6 ppg on 30.4 FG%, 90.0 FT% and 42.0 TS%, 1.2 apg and 1.0 tov
2002 WCSF Shaq against Duncan
Game 1: 4/11 FG, 3/4 FT, 1 ast, 1 tov Game 2: 5/9 FG, 3/6 FT, 3 ast, 1 tov Game 3: 5/8 FG, 2/2 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 4: 2/3 FG, 0/0 FT, 1 ast, 0 tov Game 5: 3/8 FG, 4/6 FT, 0 ast, 1 tov
Overall: 10.0 ppg on 48.7 FG%, 66.7 FT% and 53.3 TS%, 1.2 apg and 0.6 tov
Unfortunately, I don't have the data for G2 of 2003 WCSF, I just didn't have the copy when I did my tracking work. I also didn't count assists and turnovers, I could do that because I have my notes but I just don't have enough time for that.
2003 WCSF Duncan against Shaq
Game 1: 0/4 FG, 2/2 FT Game 3: 0/2 FG, 0/0 FT Game 4: 0/1 FG, 3/4 FT Game 5: 4/8 FG, 3/4 FT Game 6: 0/5 FG, 0/0 FT
Overall: 3.2 ppg on 20.0 FG%, 70.0 FT% and 32.8 TS%
2003 WCSF Shaq against Duncan
Game 1: 5/6 FG, 0/1 FT Game 3: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT Game 4: 1/3 FG, 2/3 FT Game 5: 0/0 FG, 0/0 FT Game 6: 1/3 FG, 0/0 FT
Overall: 3.6 ppg on 53.3 FG%, 50.0 FT% and 53.7 TS%
As you can see, Duncan defended Shaq significantly less in 2003. Shaq also guarded Duncan less than the year before. The data shows that Duncan struggled a lot against Shaq, but it wasn't common for the Lakers to put O'Neal on Timmy. Shaq also didn't have his best time against Duncan.
damn, i didn't realize shaq wrecked duncan on defense so hard in both 2002 and 2003. i mean i knew 2002. maybe my memory from 2003 is of game 5 when duncan was 4/8 or something because 20% is ugly. and i realize foul trouble is a concern but it's kind of weird that they both guarded each other so little, especially with how effective shaq was and the fact the lakers lost the 2003 series so it's not like it was just strategically holding back (i.e. break glass in case of emergency) like you could argue in 2002.
any chance you have 2001 numbers?
i think someone has posted 1995 finals numbers before but i don't know who. i know there were lots of doubles but it feels like hakeem and shaq were guarding each other for a lot more than like 4 shots per game like shaq and duncan.
The stats above, assuming they are right, are potentially misleading because: 1) They don't factor in all the possessions where Shaq is supposed to be guarding Duncan, but he has gotten out of position or lost him, and been burnt, and 2) They might not sufficiently factor in help defence supporting Shaq guard Duncan.
If Shaq was a Duncan stopper, Duncan wouldn't have been going off so much in say 99 or 03. But when you limit the sample to the times Shaq was in position under the post to contest, possibly with help, then it looks alot better. In reality Shaq would have fouled out in 2 quarters trying to guard Duncan every play.
Warspite wrote:Billups was a horrible scorer who could only score with an open corner 3 or a FT.
OhayoKD wrote:Meh. Can't really form a solid positive 1-year case for Hakeem over Walton. Will keep Hakeem because he is actually getting more than 1 other vote but Lebronny's argument really isn't one I can seriously counter beyond pointing out a lack of replication for someone who never had any opportunity to.
What would be the case to push Bill Walton above Hakeem in term of player? Facilitate + Playmaking might be the most notable ability which Bill Walton is comfortably better than Hakeem ( bill Walton is one of the best Center in these Skillsets not named Jokic after all ). Hakeem still have better Defensive Motor/traits there ( have Goat D case without Bill Russell )and being an all time resilience Scorer which can scale to personnel/playoff setting.
One_and_Done wrote:If Shaq was a Duncan stopper, Duncan wouldn't have been going off so much in say 99 or 03. But when you limit the sample to the times Shaq was in position under the post to contest, possibly with help, then it looks alot better. In reality Shaq would have fouled out in 2 quarters trying to guard Duncan every play.
"70sfan" literally state that in 2003 playoff series when both of them Face against each other. Shaq didn't have much possession being primary assignment on Duncan ( the vice versa apply to Duncan guarding Shaq too )which is why the Sample size on shot disturbing is much smaller than in 2002 ( which Shaq was more on Duncan due to D.rob missing game ). So Duncan going crazy doesn't disprove anything.
Even by my tracking of 2002 series - the Spurs were sending more help when Duncan was Guarding Shaq compare to Lakers help on duncan. * The Spurs help often happened when Duncan was getting push to disadvantageous position or to mess with Shaq dribble before he get inside the paint. While Lakers help were when Shaq deny Duncan positioning control and Lakers send help to stole the ball before Duncan pass ball out.
Just By the Stat he provides to us it shown that Shaq is slowing Duncan down these 2 playoff sample when he was the primary defender on Duncan. No one saying Shaq Spank Duncan on defense and put him in jail.
