Compilation of Michael Jordan’s on-off data with the Bulls

[lessthanjake]

I have just updated the OP to include Squared’s sample for the 1991-1992 regular season. This basically just adds an extra 17 games that Squared tracked for that season above and beyond the Dipper tracking that I’d previously been using in this thread. We now have data for 70 of Jordan’s games in that season, instead of 53 games. The overall numbers with this change remain very similar. The 1991-1992 regular season on-off is a bit lower, but the “on” value for that season is now higher, and the total numbers across all data now has a slightly higher “on,” slightly better “off,” and very slightly better on-off.

Great stuff!

I don't want to give you more work but I really think you should update the playoff numbers we got on the spreadsheet and update with the new regular season numbers from Squared too. For 1996, you can keep using the Pollack data I guess since both sets are complete.

Playoffs

All runs from 1988-1996 have slightly different tallies.



1986-1987 Regular Season (40 games)
ON: +71 1622 minutes
OFF: -80 318 minutes

1992-1993 Regular Season (79 games)
ON: +548 3003 minutes
OFF: -98 819 minutes

1995-1996 Regular Season (82 games)
ON: +988 3090 minutes
OFF: +16 856 minutes

Another thing that comes to mind that I think you mentioned...

Should we just add the two games MJ missed (one in 1992 and one in 1993) to the OFF samples for those seasons? I haven't done it yet but it makes sense. We know that 48 minutes for those games are part of the OFF sample so I see no reason not to.

I may be blanking on something I should know the answer to, but where do those slightly different playoff tallies come from? My OP has a lot of explanation of exactly where all the data comes from, so if I were to make changes, I’d want to be able to explain exactly where the new tallies came from. And is there anything I can link to for the Squared regular season data you list above? I could potentially just link your post, but am curious if there’s something directly from Squared that could be linked to for that.

As for the stray missed games, yeah they could easily be included. I’ve basically just included games if they’re directly in the data source I’m using. It’s a somewhat arbitrary decision, though, since I don’t need someone to have tracked a game Jordan missed to know the relevant data for purposes of this thread. That said, the treatment of missed games is a bit of a tricky issue, because I’m not including 1995 games before he came back (nor do I think I would include the games in 1986 that he didn’t play in, if we got his regular season plus-minus data for the games he did play that year). Those seem materially different than random missed games (1995 even moreso, because he wasn’t even in the NBA), but arguably if I’m not including those then I shouldn’t be including any missed games at all and the current inclusion of one missed game in the 1992 regular season is perhaps a bit sloppy if that should be the rule. I don’t really feel strongly about any of it. A significant issue with 1995 (and 1986 if we actually had regular season data for Jordan for that year too) is it’d just get way outsized weight in the off sample of the overall data, making the off sample not actually representative. Of course, I think some would like that and would see not including 1995 non-Jordan games in the off sample as being biased in favor of Jordan, so it’s definitely a loaded issue.

[Djoker]

I have just updated the OP to include Squared’s sample for the 1991-1992 regular season. This basically just adds an extra 17 games that Squared tracked for that season above and beyond the Dipper tracking that I’d previously been using in this thread. We now have data for 70 of Jordan’s games in that season, instead of 53 games. The overall numbers with this change remain very similar. The 1991-1992 regular season on-off is a bit lower, but the “on” value for that season is now higher, and the total numbers across all data now has a slightly higher “on,” slightly better “off,” and very slightly better on-off.

Great stuff!

I don't want to give you more work but I really think you should update the playoff numbers we got on the spreadsheet and update with the new regular season numbers from Squared too. For 1996, you can keep using the Pollack data I guess since both sets are complete.

Playoffs

All runs from 1988-1996 have slightly different tallies.



1986-1987 Regular Season (40 games)
ON: +71 1622 minutes
OFF: -80 318 minutes

1992-1993 Regular Season (79 games)
ON: +548 3003 minutes
OFF: -98 819 minutes

1995-1996 Regular Season (82 games)
ON: +988 3090 minutes
OFF: +16 856 minutes

Another thing that comes to mind that I think you mentioned...

Should we just add the two games MJ missed (one in 1992 and one in 1993) to the OFF samples for those seasons? I haven't done it yet but it makes sense. We know that 48 minutes for those games are part of the OFF sample so I see no reason not to.

I may be blanking on something I should know the answer to, but where do those slightly different playoff tallies come from? My OP has a lot of explanation of exactly where all the data comes from, so if I were to make changes, I’d want to be able to explain exactly where the new tallies came from. And is there anything I can link to for the Squared regular season data you list above? I could potentially just link your post, but am curious if there’s something directly from Squared that could be linked to for that.

As for the stray missed games, yeah they could easily be included. I’ve basically just included games if they’re directly in the data source I’m using. It’s a somewhat arbitrary decision, though, since I don’t need someone to have tracked a game Jordan missed to know the relevant data for purposes of this thread. That said, the treatment of missed games is a bit of a tricky issue, because I’m not including 1995 games before he came back (nor do I think I would include the games in 1986 that he didn’t play in, if we got his regular season plus-minus data for the games he did play that year). Those seem materially different than random missed games (1995 even moreso, because he wasn’t even in the NBA), but arguably if I’m not including those then I shouldn’t be including any missed games at all and the current inclusion of one missed game in the 1992 regular season is perhaps a bit sloppy if that should be the rule. I don’t really feel strongly about any of it. A significant issue with 1995 (and 1986 if we actually had regular season data for Jordan for that year too) is it’d just get way outsized weight in the off sample of the overall data, making the off sample not actually representative. Of course, I think some would like that and would see not including 1995 non-Jordan games in the off sample as being biased in favor of Jordan, so it’s definitely a loaded issue.

The playoff revision comes from my own tracking. I basically tracked all Jordan playoff games from 1986-1996 at some point. That's how the spreadsheet got completed.

Here is the 1993 regular season updated from Squared2020's tweet - 79 games:

Read on Twitter

The 3 games that aren't logged are:

Read on Twitter

Here is the 1987 regular season updated from another tweet - 40 games:

Read on Twitter

And the 42 games that aren't logged are:



Those are the sources..

As for 1986 and 1995, it makes sense to do it either way. As long as people understand the issue of uneven samples and don't just combine the off sample from 1995 for instance (which is huge!) to other off samples in neighbouring seasons. That would be problematic but otherwise it's ok.

[lessthanjake]

Great stuff!

I don't want to give you more work but I really think you should update the playoff numbers we got on the spreadsheet and update with the new regular season numbers from Squared too. For 1996, you can keep using the Pollack data I guess since both sets are complete.

Playoffs

All runs from 1988-1996 have slightly different tallies.



1986-1987 Regular Season (40 games)
ON: +71 1622 minutes
OFF: -80 318 minutes

1992-1993 Regular Season (79 games)
ON: +548 3003 minutes
OFF: -98 819 minutes

1995-1996 Regular Season (82 games)
ON: +988 3090 minutes
OFF: +16 856 minutes

Another thing that comes to mind that I think you mentioned...

Should we just add the two games MJ missed (one in 1992 and one in 1993) to the OFF samples for those seasons? I haven't done it yet but it makes sense. We know that 48 minutes for those games are part of the OFF sample so I see no reason not to.

I may be blanking on something I should know the answer to, but where do those slightly different playoff tallies come from? My OP has a lot of explanation of exactly where all the data comes from, so if I were to make changes, I’d want to be able to explain exactly where the new tallies came from. And is there anything I can link to for the Squared regular season data you list above? I could potentially just link your post, but am curious if there’s something directly from Squared that could be linked to for that.

As for the stray missed games, yeah they could easily be included. I’ve basically just included games if they’re directly in the data source I’m using. It’s a somewhat arbitrary decision, though, since I don’t need someone to have tracked a game Jordan missed to know the relevant data for purposes of this thread. That said, the treatment of missed games is a bit of a tricky issue, because I’m not including 1995 games before he came back (nor do I think I would include the games in 1986 that he didn’t play in, if we got his regular season plus-minus data for the games he did play that year). Those seem materially different than random missed games (1995 even moreso, because he wasn’t even in the NBA), but arguably if I’m not including those then I shouldn’t be including any missed games at all and the current inclusion of one missed game in the 1992 regular season is perhaps a bit sloppy if that should be the rule. I don’t really feel strongly about any of it. A significant issue with 1995 (and 1986 if we actually had regular season data for Jordan for that year too) is it’d just get way outsized weight in the off sample of the overall data, making the off sample not actually representative. Of course, I think some would like that and would see not including 1995 non-Jordan games in the off sample as being biased in favor of Jordan, so it’s definitely a loaded issue.

The playoff revision comes from my own tracking. I basically tracked all Jordan playoff games from 1986-1996 at some point. That's how the spreadsheet got completed.

Here is the 1993 regular season updated from Squared2020's tweet - 79 games:

Read on Twitter

The 3 games that aren't logged are:

Read on Twitter

Here is the 1987 regular season updated from another tweet - 40 games:

Read on Twitter

And the 42 games that aren't logged are:



Those are the sources..

As for 1986 and 1995, it makes sense to do it either way. As long as people understand the issue of uneven samples and don't just combine the off sample from 1995 for instance (which is huge!) to other off samples in neighbouring seasons. That would be problematic but otherwise it's ok.

Okay, thanks! That all makes sense. Do you have any link to where Squared has all 82 games for 1996 (the above stuff you linked from Squared does include some 1996 stuff, but it looks like he only had 78 games at the time he posted those)? I’d probably prefer to use Squared’s version for that than the Pollack data that’s there now, because I believe the Pollack data is just contained in a random spreadsheet someone made at some point, rather than actually being pulled from the original data source. The numbers are very similar so it doesn’t really matter much, but they’re not exactly the same and if I can avoid using that spreadsheet for something, I’d prefer that.

[Djoker]

I may be blanking on something I should know the answer to, but where do those slightly different playoff tallies come from? My OP has a lot of explanation of exactly where all the data comes from, so if I were to make changes, I’d want to be able to explain exactly where the new tallies came from. And is there anything I can link to for the Squared regular season data you list above? I could potentially just link your post, but am curious if there’s something directly from Squared that could be linked to for that.

As for the stray missed games, yeah they could easily be included. I’ve basically just included games if they’re directly in the data source I’m using. It’s a somewhat arbitrary decision, though, since I don’t need someone to have tracked a game Jordan missed to know the relevant data for purposes of this thread. That said, the treatment of missed games is a bit of a tricky issue, because I’m not including 1995 games before he came back (nor do I think I would include the games in 1986 that he didn’t play in, if we got his regular season plus-minus data for the games he did play that year). Those seem materially different than random missed games (1995 even moreso, because he wasn’t even in the NBA), but arguably if I’m not including those then I shouldn’t be including any missed games at all and the current inclusion of one missed game in the 1992 regular season is perhaps a bit sloppy if that should be the rule. I don’t really feel strongly about any of it. A significant issue with 1995 (and 1986 if we actually had regular season data for Jordan for that year too) is it’d just get way outsized weight in the off sample of the overall data, making the off sample not actually representative. Of course, I think some would like that and would see not including 1995 non-Jordan games in the off sample as being biased in favor of Jordan, so it’s definitely a loaded issue.

The playoff revision comes from my own tracking. I basically tracked all Jordan playoff games from 1986-1996 at some point. That's how the spreadsheet got completed.

Here is the 1993 regular season updated from Squared2020's tweet - 79 games:

Read on Twitter

The 3 games that aren't logged are:

Read on Twitter

Here is the 1987 regular season updated from another tweet - 40 games:

Read on Twitter

And the 42 games that aren't logged are:



Those are the sources..

As for 1986 and 1995, it makes sense to do it either way. As long as people understand the issue of uneven samples and don't just combine the off sample from 1995 for instance (which is huge!) to other off samples in neighbouring seasons. That would be problematic but otherwise it's ok.

Okay, thanks! That all makes sense. Do you have any link to where Squared has all 82 games for 1996 (the above stuff you linked from Squared does include some 1996 stuff, but it looks like he only had 78 games at the time he posted those)? I’d probably prefer to use Squared’s version for that than the Pollack data that’s there now, because I believe the Pollack data is just contained in a random spreadsheet someone made at some point, rather than actually being pulled from the original data source. The numbers are very similar so it doesn’t really matter much, but they’re not exactly the same and if I can avoid using that spreadsheet for something, I’d prefer that.

As far as I know, Squared never publicly released the 1996 update. So if you want, just stick with the Pollack data for now. You are using it for 1995 after all. By the way the source for the raw plus minus numbers for 1996 is on this thread. Unfortunately the links to the images are dead.

viewtopic.php?t=1343246

[lessthanjake]

The playoff revision comes from my own tracking. I basically tracked all Jordan playoff games from 1986-1996 at some point. That's how the spreadsheet got completed.

Here is the 1993 regular season updated from Squared2020's tweet - 79 games:

Read on Twitter

The 3 games that aren't logged are:

Read on Twitter

Here is the 1987 regular season updated from another tweet - 40 games:

Read on Twitter

And the 42 games that aren't logged are:



Those are the sources..

As for 1986 and 1995, it makes sense to do it either way. As long as people understand the issue of uneven samples and don't just combine the off sample from 1995 for instance (which is huge!) to other off samples in neighbouring seasons. That would be problematic but otherwise it's ok.

Okay, thanks! That all makes sense. Do you have any link to where Squared has all 82 games for 1996 (the above stuff you linked from Squared does include some 1996 stuff, but it looks like he only had 78 games at the time he posted those)? I’d probably prefer to use Squared’s version for that than the Pollack data that’s there now, because I believe the Pollack data is just contained in a random spreadsheet someone made at some point, rather than actually being pulled from the original data source. The numbers are very similar so it doesn’t really matter much, but they’re not exactly the same and if I can avoid using that spreadsheet for something, I’d prefer that.

As far as I know, Squared never publicly released the 1996 update. So if you want, just stick with the Pollack data for now. You are using it for 1995 after all. By the way the source for the raw plus minus numbers for 1996 is on this thread. Unfortunately the links to the images are dead.

viewtopic.php?t=1343246

FYI, I’ve updated the OP to include your updated playoff data, as well as the additional Squared regular season data from 1986-87 and 1992-93. I believe everything should be right, but of course if you (or anyone else) notice any mistakes, please let me know.

The numbers for specific years/playoffs have sometimes changed a decent bit with this update (even small plus-minus changes can change “off” values in the playoffs a fair bit), and obviously the 1986-87 data is completely new, but the bottom-line numbers didn’t change a whole lot. The updated playoff data results in a slightly higher playoff on-off (now at over +16 per 48 minutes in the total-playoff data). Combining the updated playoff data and additional regular season data results in a slightly lower overall “on” value, slightly worse “off” value, and very slightly lower on-off.

Regarding 1996, I’ve stuck with Pollack’s data for now. I am aware of that thread you mention (and had actually linked to it in the OP), but I still don’t *love* citing a random spreadsheet that is corroborated by a thread with dead links, rather than having direct access to the data source. It’s not *that* concerning really (the thread does corroborate the data, and I think we all uncontroversially understand that spreadsheet to be an accurate representation of Pollack’s data), but if I had full data for that season that I could cite directly then I’d opt to do that instead.

[Smoothbutta]

How come BBR for '97 regular season is net +8.0 and '98 is +6.7, while yours is '97: +8.75 and '98: +9.93?

Basically how is '98 appearing to be a better net rating in your analysis compared to '97 when it's the opposite on BBR and both seasons have approximately the same Bulls pace and Jordan minutes played?

[lessthanjake]

How come BBR for '97 regular season is net +8.0 and '98 is +6.7, while yours is '97: +8.75 and '98: +9.93?

Basically how is '98 appearing to be a better net rating in your analysis compared to '97 when it's the opposite on BBR and both seasons have approximately the same Bulls pace and Jordan minutes played?

BBREF’s per-100-possession numbers from first couple seasons of the play-by-play era in particular are just really weird and honestly probably not actually correct in a lot of cases. Others have talked about that in this thread and other threads and have lots of examples at their fingertips, but basically there’s lots of BBREF’s on-off numbers (as well as ORTG and DRTG) for those years that don’t actually make sense (like if you look at the net-rating/ORTG/DRTG with a player on the court and off the court it clearly wouldn’t match up overall to the team’s overall net-rating/ORTG/DRTG). For instance, Jordan’s on-off data for 1998 says the Bulls had a 107.1 ORTG with Jordan on the court, and a 97.0 ORTG with him off the court, but BBREF also lists the Bulls as having a 107.7 ORTG overall that season. Meanwhile, it lists them as having a DRTG of 98.7 with Jordan on and a 95.3 DRTG with Jordan off, but the Bulls as a whole are listed as having a 99.8 DRTG. Obviously, it’s not logically possible for all these number to be right. My guess is that there’s something funky going on with those years (maybe incomplete or inconsistent data) that is affecting their possession estimates (note: when calculating on-off per 100 possessions, BBREF does not actually take the real number of possessions—it instead makes an estimate using box data, so if there were some incomplete or inconsistent box data, then it would create issues with per-100-possession data).

But the more straightforward answer here is that the numbers in this thread are going to be different from BBREF’s numbers because my numbers are on-off per 48 minutes, rather than on-off per 100 possessions. I did this because for quite a lot of Jordan’s games that we have data for, we don’t have possession numbers, so we couldn’t put that data in per-100-possession form without making some assumptions about what the pace was with Jordan on and off the court. The initial version of this thread actually tried to do that for years where we did not have possessions (using BBREF pace numbers and assuming the pace was the same with Jordan on and off), but people correctly pointed out that it was flawed and could actually be biasing the data a significant amount. So I decided to eliminate that issue by moving everything to per-48-minutes terms. As a result, I couldn’t just take BBREF’s per-100-possession numbers for 1997 and 1998 anymore. What I had to do instead was use BBREF’s plus-minus data for Jordan in those years, the Bulls’ overall plus-minus, and the number of minutes Jordan was on and off the court. That allowed me to calculate the on-off per 48 minutes. To the extent that the resulting on-off-per-48-minutes numbers differed significantly from the on-off per 100 possessions that BBREF lists, I think that’s actually probably reflective of BBREF’s on-off per 100 possessions being weird/wrong in those years. But either way, the thread is all in per-48-minute terms, so I can’t use BBREF’s per-100-possessions numbers.

[Special_Puppy]

Squared2020 has updated his historical lineup data. Jordan now has a more comfortable lead on Magic Johnson. https://squared2020.com/2025/01/26/historical-rapm-1985-1996/

[Djoker]

Read on Twitter

[DraymondGold]

I don’t recall what the latest thread was for new Squared2020 data, but thought I’d share this

We now have enough data to see the 1989 RAPM: https://squared2020.com/2026/04/11/1988-1989-nba-rapm/
It’s partial data, but still interesting to see. Ewing’s first time on top in the historical data! Jordan and Magic round out the top 3.

We also now have an updated version of the 80s-90s RAPM, presumably with the 1989 data added:

Read on Twitter

[TheGOATRises007]

Horace Grant might be the most underrated player of all-time.

[Smoothbutta]

I'm also not sure where to find any other discussions about the Squared2020 RAPM data. How trustworthy is this? I know it's not even close to all the games yet but... some interesting observations from the total 1985-1996 data..

- Admiral much better def RAPM than Hakeem, MJ close to neutral def RAPM, Bird negative
- Karl Malone at #384 is crazy?? 112 games worth of data is not nothing
- As mentioned above, Horace grant sheeesh

[FrodoBaggins]

I don’t recall what the latest thread was for new Squared2020 data, but thought I’d share this

We now have enough data to see the 1989 RAPM: https://squared2020.com/2026/04/11/1988-1989-nba-rapm/
It’s partial data, but still interesting to see. Ewing’s first time on top in the historical data! Jordan and Magic round out the top 3.

We also now have an updated version of the 80s-90s RAPM, presumably with the 1989 data added:

Read on Twitter

Surprised to see McHale (+2.41 ORAPM, -2.77 DRAPM, -0.36 RAPM, 184th) over Parish (-0.17 ORAPM, -1.39 DRAPM, -1.55 RAPM, 275th). Reggie Lewis (+2.68 ORAPM, -0.28 DRAPM, +2.40 RAPM, 40th) and Dennis Johnson (+1.50 ORAPM, +0.91 DRAPM, +2.41 RAPM, 39th) looking fantastic.

Robert had a really good year, while Kevin was disappointing by most accounts. There were even McHale trade rumors during the season, but I don't know how legitimate they were. Ainge was the one who was traded, which I think was a mistake in retrospect. They wanted some front-court support for Robert and Kevin, but they also needed outside shooting with Larry's absence.

Kevin's defense appears to be really busted at this point. IIRC, Boston's biggest weakness was transition defense.

--

Malone slightly above Stockton. That must be a first per what Squared2020 has alluded to in the past.

--

Rodman and Aguirre way higher than Dantley. Mahorn looking elite, which is something Squared2020 has talked about prior.

[lessthanjake]

I don’t recall what the latest thread was for new Squared2020 data, but thought I’d share this

We now have enough data to see the 1989 RAPM: https://squared2020.com/2026/04/11/1988-1989-nba-rapm/
It’s partial data, but still interesting to see. Ewing’s first time on top in the historical data! Jordan and Magic round out the top 3.

We also now have an updated version of the 80s-90s RAPM, presumably with the 1989 data added:

Read on Twitter

Thanks for pointing this out! If someone can tell me what games are in that sample, then I can add the data for those games to this thread.

[Squared2020]

Surprised to see McHale (+2.41 ORAPM, -2.77 DRAPM, -0.36 RAPM, 184th) over Parish (-0.17 ORAPM, -1.39 DRAPM, -1.55 RAPM, 275th). Reggie Lewis (+2.68 ORAPM, -0.28 DRAPM, +2.40 RAPM, 40th) and Dennis Johnson (+1.50 ORAPM, +0.91 DRAPM, +2.41 RAPM, 39th) looking fantastic.

Robert had a really good year, while Kevin was disappointing by most accounts. There were even McHale trade rumors during the season, but I don't know how legitimate they were. Ainge was the one who was traded, which I think was a mistake in retrospect. They wanted some front-court support for Robert and Kevin, but they also needed outside shooting with Larry's absence.

Kevin's defense appears to be really busted at this point. IIRC, Boston's biggest weakness was transition defense.

--

Malone slightly above Stockton. That must be a first per what Squared2020 has alluded to in the past.

--

Rodman and Aguirre way higher than Dantley. Mahorn looking elite, which is something Squared2020 has talked about prior.

Going through all the games in the sample so far, McHale was consistently viewed (by the announcers) as the only player making a positive contribution in games. He was definitely their top player throughout the season -- sample-wise. I don't recall off-hand any discussion from in-game commentary about McHale being traded, but Ainge was definitely discussed -- especially after his benching in favor of Brian Shaw in January. Most of the discussion revolving around McHale was keeping him as sixth man because of the severe drop-off in talent once Boston went to the bench. And even then, McHale got forced into the starting lineup at times. A lot of times the announcers complained about Parish not being as good as years past.

That said, I don't read the papers from back then, which could paint the same story you're mentioning. It's just not what I've seen in the roughly 25 Boston games. You are absolutely right, the transition defense was completely busted on that team.

---

This is the first season of data that I've worked on where Malone looked like the best player on the Jazz. I'm really hoping as I continue to add data, the extra Jazz games will have the mailman performing better. There's a lot of "25 points, 10 rebounds, -5 P/M" for Malone in the sample.

----

Pistons when Rodman gets on the court is wildly better in almost every game I've watched. He's basically the motor that keeps possessions alive, break down opponent's offenses, and speeds up the game.

I have a feeling Mahorn is winning a correlation battle here. From the video sample, he's a steady presence but the Pistons are not a super-team. Dantley is definitely a slog in the video sample -- even in the Dallas games.

[Squared2020]

I'm also not sure where to find any other discussions about the Squared2020 RAPM data. How trustworthy is this? I know it's not even close to all the games yet but... some interesting observations from the total 1985-1996 data..

- Admiral much better def RAPM than Hakeem, MJ close to neutral def RAPM, Bird negative
- Karl Malone at #384 is crazy?? 112 games worth of data is not nothing
- As mentioned above, Horace grant sheeesh

As far as trustworthy goes, I'd say don't use the rankings as pure rankings but as guide rails. Someone who is #10 could easily be #100. There needs to be a lot more data added -- and I'm working on it.

Bird being negative makes a lot of sense from the video -- the Celtics are a more fastbreak team and they simply outscore teams and give up more points with Bird on the floor. McHale and Parish really anchor that defense, particularly in the half-court grind.

MJ is close to neutral. This is expected from video. Tom Haberstroh and I discussed this on the Basketball Illuminati.

I'd wait to see how Admiral and Hakeem intermingle once I get more 1994 and 1995 data into the sample. This may change results.

Karl's up that high now? 1989 is doing him a solid. He's been hovering around 570 for a long time.

Horace Grant was an integral part of those Bulls teams -- and again with the Magic. Even during the 1990 season, the announcers were amazed by his development and how he helped carry games when Michael couldn't -- even calling him the second best player on those Bulls teams. 1991 -- and 1992 emphatically -- would change that with Scottie really coming onto the scene.

[Owly]

Surprised to see McHale (+2.41 ORAPM, -2.77 DRAPM, -0.36 RAPM, 184th) over Parish (-0.17 ORAPM, -1.39 DRAPM, -1.55 RAPM, 275th). Reggie Lewis (+2.68 ORAPM, -0.28 DRAPM, +2.40 RAPM, 40th) and Dennis Johnson (+1.50 ORAPM, +0.91 DRAPM, +2.41 RAPM, 39th) looking fantastic.

Robert had a really good year, while Kevin was disappointing by most accounts. There were even McHale trade rumors during the season, but I don't know how legitimate they were. Ainge was the one who was traded, which I think was a mistake in retrospect. They wanted some front-court support for Robert and Kevin, but they also needed outside shooting with Larry's absence.

Kevin's defense appears to be really busted at this point. IIRC, Boston's biggest weakness was transition defense.

--

Malone slightly above Stockton. That must be a first per what Squared2020 has alluded to in the past.

--

Rodman and Aguirre way higher than Dantley. Mahorn looking elite, which is something Squared2020 has talked about prior.

Going through all the games in the sample so far, McHale was consistently viewed (by the announcers) as the only player making a positive contribution in games. He was definitely their top player throughout the season -- sample-wise. I don't recall off-hand any discussion from in-game commentary about McHale being traded, but Ainge was definitely discussed -- especially after his benching in favor of Brian Shaw in January. Most of the discussion revolving around McHale was keeping him as sixth man because of the severe drop-off in talent once Boston went to the bench. And even then, McHale got forced into the starting lineup at times. A lot of times the announcers complained about Parish not being as good as years past.

That said, I don't read the papers from back then, which could paint the same story you're mentioning. It's just not what I've seen in the roughly 25 Boston games. You are absolutely right, the transition defense was completely busted on that team.

---

This is the first season of data that I've worked on where Malone looked like the best player on the Jazz. I'm really hoping as I continue to add data, the extra Jazz games will have the mailman performing better. There's a lot of "25 points, 10 rebounds, -5 P/M" for Malone in the sample.

----

Pistons when Rodman gets on the court is wildly better in almost every game I've watched. He's basically the motor that keeps possessions alive, break down opponent's offenses, and speeds up the game.

I have a feeling Mahorn is winning a correlation battle here. From the video sample, he's a steady presence but the Pistons are not a super-team. Dantley is definitely a slog in the video sample -- even in the Dallas games.

Random thoughts in response to general conversation:

Parish's box aggregates held up a lot better than Kevin's that year. Barry and Cohn note sources talking about Kevin's defense being overrated - books not available right now so can't check the edition but a sense of accolades despite diminished performance (though reporting varied depending on the year).

K Malone up (though negligibly) on Stockton in earlier years is a pivot from previously seen data from this source and Pollack, though with noise and potential for closely aligned minutes perhaps shouldn't be too surprising.

Would imagine the Dantley-era Mavericks were a slog for non-Dantley reasons (though he seemingly didn't want to go there) that season. Moving Schrempf for Herb Williams was ... a mistake at the time, looks awful in retrospect and looks really bad in the short term too with Williams playing awful. Think that team felt ground down with Aguirre as a teammate, Aguirre played poorly that season (and Dantley kept that up), Tarpley gets injuries and suspensions, Donaldson gets hurt, Wennington is suddenly in the rotation and has a bad year (though most of his years don't look great productivity-wise).

On Mahorn - is he avoiding "with Edwards"? Don't know about rotations. But can see Edwards looks bad on that year''s data. And that chimes with my personal thoughts on Edwards and his standing among the Pistons bigs. Seemed to be his rep through most of his career was can score (but not efficiently) doesn't pass, doesn't really do big man stuff (defend and rebound) - Detroit helped general perceptions and he was more productive the next year iirc ... . Tend to wonder why Edwards wasn't exposed to expansion draft - maybe they thought they had enough D and not enough post attack and I think the Mahorn injury and wear and tear were a concern.

Young Rodman as highly impactful wouldn't surprise me.

McHale trade chatter ... doesn't sound entirely wild to me.

Robinson being high impact is what we should expect in the 94-96 window. Pollack's +/- and the stuff derived from it showed he was pretty close to +20 on/off for each of the three years of 94-96. On the average of the individual years I think Olajuwon was very narrowly third to Blaylock but Robinson was lapping the field.

[FrodoBaggins]

Surprised to see McHale (+2.41 ORAPM, -2.77 DRAPM, -0.36 RAPM, 184th) over Parish (-0.17 ORAPM, -1.39 DRAPM, -1.55 RAPM, 275th). Reggie Lewis (+2.68 ORAPM, -0.28 DRAPM, +2.40 RAPM, 40th) and Dennis Johnson (+1.50 ORAPM, +0.91 DRAPM, +2.41 RAPM, 39th) looking fantastic.

Robert had a really good year, while Kevin was disappointing by most accounts. There were even McHale trade rumors during the season, but I don't know how legitimate they were. Ainge was the one who was traded, which I think was a mistake in retrospect. They wanted some front-court support for Robert and Kevin, but they also needed outside shooting with Larry's absence.

Kevin's defense appears to be really busted at this point. IIRC, Boston's biggest weakness was transition defense.

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Malone slightly above Stockton. That must be a first per what Squared2020 has alluded to in the past.

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Rodman and Aguirre way higher than Dantley. Mahorn looking elite, which is something Squared2020 has talked about prior.

Going through all the games in the sample so far, McHale was consistently viewed (by the announcers) as the only player making a positive contribution in games. He was definitely their top player throughout the season -- sample-wise. I don't recall off-hand any discussion from in-game commentary about McHale being traded, but Ainge was definitely discussed -- especially after his benching in favor of Brian Shaw in January. Most of the discussion revolving around McHale was keeping him as sixth man because of the severe drop-off in talent once Boston went to the bench. And even then, McHale got forced into the starting lineup at times. A lot of times the announcers complained about Parish not being as good as years past.

That said, I don't read the papers from back then, which could paint the same story you're mentioning. It's just not what I've seen in the roughly 25 Boston games. You are absolutely right, the transition defense was completely busted on that team.

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This is the first season of data that I've worked on where Malone looked like the best player on the Jazz. I'm really hoping as I continue to add data, the extra Jazz games will have the mailman performing better. There's a lot of "25 points, 10 rebounds, -5 P/M" for Malone in the sample.

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Pistons when Rodman gets on the court is wildly better in almost every game I've watched. He's basically the motor that keeps possessions alive, break down opponent's offenses, and speeds up the game.

I have a feeling Mahorn is winning a correlation battle here. From the video sample, he's a steady presence but the Pistons are not a super-team. Dantley is definitely a slog in the video sample -- even in the Dallas games.

I've only watched what's available on YouTube. Maybe a half dozen games at most, probably. I found the game (DAL @ BOS, March 3, 1989) with the commentator quote talking about Parish playing well and McHale getting criticism (and a potential trade rumor):

7:20 -- commentator quote from Rick Barry:

Well, most people feel that Robert Parish is having his best season as a professional player this year. He's really taken up a lot of the burden with the loss of Larry Bird, and Kevin McHale's been getting a lot of criticism, unfortunately.

29:10 -- commentator quote from Rick Barry:

Well, he's (Parish) been playing outstanding basketball all season long. In fact, a lot of people felt that he deserved to be on the All-Star team this year, including me.

40:18 -- commentator quote from Rick Barry and the play-by-play commentator whose name escapes me:

Rick Barry: Well again, Kevin, receiving a lot of heat, he also was mentioned as a possible trade bait along with Danny Ainge, and they had discussed it quite a bit, and obviously they elected to go with Danny.

Play-by-play commentator: On the flight back from the coast, McHale and Ainge sat with each other, talking about which one of us will get traded.

Rick Barry: McHale is still averaging 22 points and 8 rebounds a game, not too shabby.

Play-by-play commentator: Well, they're criticizing him particularly for his defensive play.

Watch on YouTube

Also, what would you say 1988-89 Boston missed the most without Bird? IIRC, the defensive rating fell off more than the offensive rating did per Basketball Reference. The rebounding and general half-court defense seemed solid. There were no doubt confounding variables outside of Larry's absence: a new coach, an aging core, a thin bench with unproven youth. That's just my recollection, so it may be incorrect.

I felt that Bird's willingness to shoot in transition and early offense helped their transition defense because everybody was already back on defense. He was a good enough outside shooter to get away with gunning like that. Additionally, I think it helped having Larry make the entry passes because he was confident in making the pass, and he would punish the defense from three if they sagged off him. It seemed like Parish and McHale had less space to work with when worse shooters like Shaw and Lewis were making the entry pass.

Not to suggest that Robert and Kevin's games were reliant on Larry. More so, the synergistic value of having effective perimeter shooting for post players. I would've loved to have seen peak McHale with a four-out, one-in offense ala Hakeem 1992-93 onwards under Rudy Tomjanovich.

[Djoker]

I don’t recall what the latest thread was for new Squared2020 data, but thought I’d share this

We now have enough data to see the 1989 RAPM: https://squared2020.com/2026/04/11/1988-1989-nba-rapm/
It’s partial data, but still interesting to see. Ewing’s first time on top in the historical data! Jordan and Magic round out the top 3.

We also now have an updated version of the 80s-90s RAPM, presumably with the 1989 data added:

Read on Twitter

We don't have confidence intervals for this latest update but based on the last Christmas update (almost the same sample size), it's Jordan and Magic in their own tier still and then everyone else. Considering this is a RS-only dataset, I do expect Robinson to make a pretty big jump as 1994 and 1995 is added (those two are all-time level RS efforts) and to a lesser extent Hakeem as well but I doubt they reach the MJ-MJ tier.