Retro POY '06-07 (Voting Complete)

[Doctor MJ]

In this thread we'll discuss and vote on the top 5 best player seasons of '06-07. Some pointers:

-I will tally up the votes 3 days from now. I encourage people to wait to actually cast their votes until there's been some discussion - Ideally waiting until the 3rd day. However, I know everyone's schedule is busy - I'm not going NOT count votes just because they come in relatively early.

-The voting panel is not officially closed. However, if you'd like to be a part of it, contact me - more dedicated, knowledgeable voters will always be wanted.

-This includes both regular and post-season. You should be weighing both in to some degree, and should not be ranking one star over another just because of how far each got in the playoffs.

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

Some things to start us off:

Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _2007.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _2007.html
Award Voting http://www.basketball-reference.com/awa ... _2007.html

Regular Season Raw +/- http://82games.com/teams06.htm
Post-Season Raw +/- http://www.82games.com/0607/playoffs/playoffs.htm
Wages of Wins http://dberri.wordpress.com/nba-team-reviews-2006-07/
Regular Season Adjusted +/- http://www.82games.com/ilardi1.htm

Questions for '06-07:

-What do you make of Dirk & the Warriors in the context of POY?
-Thoughts on Parker & Ginobili, now with 3 rings each, can one of them squeak into the top 5?

[sp6r=underrated]

Other points to consider
1. What do people think of Kobe's season this year?
2. How does Duncan factor in this year?
3. What about Lebron who had a down RS, by his lofty standards?
4. The Nash debate can begin.

[CellarDoor]

Duncan's especially interesting given that they won the Finals, but he wasn't the Finals MVP. I personally don't put stock in that, but some might. It's undeniable that this was his easiest run in terms of teammates though.

[JordansBulls]

One of the toughest years to decide. Dirk had a great season, but going down with the best record here really hurts him.

2007 -
Best Stats - Dirk
Winning - Duncan

Nash wasn't able to overcome the Spurs again despite having the better record (although the suspension was B******)

Top 5 in MVP voting were Dirk, Nash, Kobe, Duncan and Lebron and they were the top 5 guys that season as well. I would put Wade 6th this season as he got hurt.

While Dirk had better overall numbers than Duncan, Duncan was right their with him and not too far behind as was Lebron.

My intial voting would be:

1. Duncan
2. Dirk
3. Lebron
4. Kobe
5. Nash

[DumbyTheWizard]

I'd swap Nash and Kobe, but otherwise, your rankings look good...

[Optimism Prime]

Some things to start us off:

Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _2009.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _2009.html
Award Voting http://www.basketball-reference.com/awa ... _2009.html

Links don't work--the ... in the middle screws them up. Mind editing and including the actual links?

[Doctor MJ]

Links don't work--the ... in the middle screws them up. Mind editing and including the actual links?

Should work now.

[Dr Positivity]

I like Lebron here. Put up 27/7/6 and guarantees you a ton of points at the rim and from 3, and the degree of difficulty of winning 50 games and making the Finals with Eric Snow, Boobie Gibson, Larry Hughes, Sasha Pavlovic, Damon Jones, Donyell Marshall, Anderson Varejao, Big Z and Mike Brown is much higher than what Duncan did. That team had ZERO business beating those stacked Pistons...

[semi-sentient]

Below are the numbers for the players I believe were top 5 in the league, so I'm going to focus solely on them.

Tim Duncan

Code: Select all

RS: 80G, 20.0 PTS (.579 TS), 11.2 RB, 3.6 AS, 0.9 ST, 2.5 BK, 3.0 TV, 26.1 PER
PO: 20G, 22.2 PTS (.556 TS), 11.5 RB, 3.3 AS, 0.7 ST, 3.1 BK, 3.0 TV, 27.4 PER

Kobe Bryant

Code: Select all

RS: 77G, 31.6 PTS (.580 TS), 5.7 RB,  5.4 AS, 1.4 ST, 0.5 BK, 3.3 TV, 26.1 PER
PO:  5G, 32.8 PTS (.561 TS), 5.2 RB,  4.4 AS, 1.0 ST, 0.4 BK, 4.4 TV, 24.1 PER

LeBron James

Code: Select all

RS: 78G, 27.3 PTS (.552 TS), 6.7 RB, 6.0 AS, 1.6 ST, 0.7 BK, 3.2 TV, 24.5 PER
PO: 20G, 25.1 PTS (.516 TS), 8.1 RB, 8.1 AS, 1.7 ST, 0.5 BK, 3.0 TV, 23.9 PER

Dirk Nowitzki

Code: Select all

RS: 78G, 24.6 PTS (.605 TS),  8.9 RB, 3.4 AS, 0.7 ST, 0.8 BK, 2.1 TV, 27.6 PER
PO:  6G, 19.7 PTS (.509 TS), 11.3 RB, 2.3 AS, 1.8 ST, 1.3 BK, 2.3 TV, 20.9 PER

Steve Nash

Code: Select all

RS: 76G, 18.6 PTS (.654 TS), 3.5 RB, 11.6 AS, 0.8 ST, 0.1 BK, 3.8 TV, 23.8 PER
PO: 11G, 18.9 PTS (.577 TS), 3.2 RB, 13.3 AS, 0.4 ST, 0.1 BK, 4.4 TV, 21.9 PER

Offensive Rankings:

1. Steve Nash - Not only was he crazy efficient, but he ran the best offense in the league which was good enough to get him the 2nd best record overall. He had both Amare and Marion playing out of thier minds.
2. Kobe Bryant - No one had to carry anywhere near the load offensively, and no one was more potent or feared on offense. Even though scoring was his main contribution, he was very effective as a play-maker as well, which is why guys like Smush Parker and Luke Walton flourished. His offensive output towards the end of the season (4 straight 50+ point games, 2 of which were 60+ point games) kept the Lakers in the playoff hunt after injuries starting taking their toll (Odom, Walton, Kwame were all banged up).
3. LeBron James - Probably up there with Kobe in terms of carrying the load, but having better overall teammates to work with. His game was still largely about getting to the basket and while not much of an outside threat, he was still a very effective scorer and play-maker.
4. Dirk Nowitzki - Great outside game, but I'm not really a fan of jump-shooting bigs, no matter how efficient they are. He was a very effective scorer, but not much of a play-maker and that's precisely why he never takes his teams anywhere as opposed to other great "wings".
5. Tim Duncan - While he led his team in scoring, he probably had the most help with both Parker and Ginobili both chipping in.

Defensive Rankings:

1. Tim Duncan - Simply the best defensive player of the bunch. He's the only one capable of anchoring a top notch defense, and he just has the biggest impact on the floor.
2. Kobe Bryant - Still playing at a very high level defensively, although no longer an elite defender on a consistent basis.
3. LeBron James - Although he improved in this department, I don't think he was better than Kobe as a defender, and frankly, I wasn't sure if I could rate him above Dirk. Due to a lack of arguments for Dirk, he gets the nod.
4. Dirk Nowitzki - Never known for his defensive impact, I think this is about right.
5. Steve Nash - Without question the poorest defender of the bunch.

Regular Season Rankings:

1. Kobe Bryant - He gets the nod for having to carry the largest load. The Lakers were decimated with injuries and damn near lost all hope of making the playoffs until Kobe went into video game mode. Outside of his scoring outburst, he was still the best two-way player in the game.
2. Dirk Nowitzki - Gets a ton of credit for leading the Mavs to such a phenomenal record. He played great in the regular season and was deserving of his MVP award. If he were a bigger contributor defensively, he'd be the #1 guy.
3. Tim Duncan - Solid on both ends as usual. Opposite of Dirk, had he been a bigger contributor offensively, I think he'd be #1.
4. LeBron James - Not as potent as Kobe or Nowitzki on offense, and not nearly as impactful as Duncan defensively, so this seems about right.
5. Steve Nash - Great offense, but poor defense. I can't give him the nod over any of those since he's the worst two-way player, which is going to come up with him time and time again.

Playoff Rankings:

1. Tim Duncan - Was consistently great from start to finish and posted the best overall post-season numbers.
2. Steve Nash - While his efficiency came down to Earth, he played well enough to deserve his #2 ranking. If not for Amare and Diaw being completely brainless, they would have likely knocked off the Spurs. Hard to fault Nash for what happened in this series.
3. LeBron James - Big props for getting past the Pistons, but other than that, he went through some very weak competition and had a horrendous Finals.
4. Kobe Bryant - His play fell slightly and he didn't get a chance to really do much due to having a straight up sorry supporting cast outside of Odom. How sorry? Smush was benched in favor of Ears in their 1st round series against the Suns, and Kwame only showed up for one game.
5. Dirk Nowitzki - Inexcusable performance for an MVP candidate, and by far the worst playoff performer.

As before, if I hear more convincing arguments for certain players, then I'll be open to revising my rankings as the evidence comes in.

Overall Rankings:

1. Tim Duncan
2. Kobe Bryant
3. LeBron James
4. Dirk Nowitzki
5. Steve Nash

[Silver Bullet]

I think you guys are giving too much importance to winning the title. Duncan that year wasn't even in the discussion as far as being an MVP candidate goes (He didn't have a single first place vote that year).
And then, anybody who saw the Phoenix-San Antonio series, knows that Phoenix would've won the title that year had it not been for one Bruce Bowen - and they might've won it anyway, had David Stern not decided to screw everything up.

I mean, yes, take the legit MVP candidates, Nowitzki, Nash, Kobe - and you can shift them around, because of performances in the playoffs, but don't put a guy that wasn't even in the discussion at no. 1 just because he won the title (and didn't even win the Finals MVP).

[mysticbb]

Just to make that voting right now, because I might not have the time to do it within 3 days.


1. Tim Duncan
2. Dirk Nowitzki
3. LeBron James
4. Kobe Bryant
5. Steve Nash

HM: Kevin Garnett


Duncan has the 2nd best boxscore metrics that season, best +/- values overall, best player on the title team. Nowitzki by far the best boxscore metrics in the RS, 3rd best +/- values, huge drop in the playoffs. James 3rd best boxscore metrics along with Bryant, better +/- values than Bryant, but that is a really close call here. Could also swap both. Nash is just behind those four. Garnett gets HM, because by numbers he is right up there with the best of them. Seeing how he performed one year later on a better team gives me the confidence that he wasn't really worse in 2007, but I feel the other had just a better overall season.

[sp6r=underrated]

In 2007 RS, Duncan was egregiously overlooked.

[Doctor MJ]

In 2007 RS, Duncan was egregiously overlooked.

Agree. During the regular season I had him right behind Dirk and Nash - then he stepped it up in the post-season.

[mysticbb]

In 2007 RS, Duncan was egregiously overlooked.

This!

The reason for that was the 67 wins for the Mavericks which completely overshadowed the 58 wins by the Spurs and Nash and Bryant were just flashier than Duncan. Duncan had a great season again, best DRtg in the league, best defender in the league, best +/- values. Duncan should have been in the MVP discussion that season.

[drza]

I know for sure Duncan and LeBron are in my top 5. My other four under consideration are Kobe, Dirk, Nash and KG.

I suspect that the Wolves' 32 wins will keep KG off most people's top five lists, and I can understand that. I do personally still feel that he was possibly the best individual player in the league that season with quite possibly the worst supporting cast for a star player in league history around him, but the other 5 candidates are pretty strong and at least so far it seems that those are the ones most posters are focused on. Nevertheless, KG is still among the top 6 for me right now and I'm hoping to have the chance to really take this season to the lab sometime before the voting closes.

[sp6r=underrated]

Thanks.

I am a admitted Duncan homer, so I was worried my biases were creeping up that year. During the RS I had it Dirk/TD as basically a tie, then Nash, then Kobe.

[Doctor MJ]

I know for sure Duncan and LeBron are in my top 5. My other four under consideration are Kobe, Dirk, Nash and KG.

I suspect that the Wolves' 32 wins will keep KG off most people's top five lists, and I can understand that. I do personally still feel that he was possibly the best individual player in the league that season with quite possibly the worst supporting cast for a star player in league history around him, but the other 5 candidates are pretty strong and at least so far it seems that those are the ones most posters are focused on. Nevertheless, KG is still among the top 6 for me right now and I'm hoping to have the chance to really take this season to the lab sometime before the voting closes.

Garnett's a candidate for the 5th slot for me, but there are other candidates as well. One of which is Dirk and his first round loss.

I am curious what those who put Garnett at #1 in '08 think about over the preceding years.

[Baller 24]

Tracy McGrady was very productive that season, led the Rockets to a 20-10 stretch without Yao, into the playoffs with a 50 win season. 6th in MVP voting, All-NBA second team, averaged 29/7/7/47% during a long stretch, and overall 25/6/7/43%, didn't have that good of a cast around him when Yao went out either. Just throwing a name out there besides the usual guys of Dirk, Duncan, LBJ, Kobe, and Nash. Dwight was still emerging, Yao was hurt despite having a very dominant season statistically, and Deron was solid, but still not good enough statistically.

[Gongxi]

I think you guys are giving too much importance to winning the title.

People are just going to ignore you. On the other hand, I expected to hear this from quite a few Kobe fans with regards to this year. Things you really didn't hear them say in the 08-09 thread.

I am curious what those who put Garnett at #1 in '08 think about over the preceding years.

Relatedly, this bears repeating, too. I think people are very quickly going to start realizing that while teams are experiencing drastic ups and downs, these players aren't to nearly such an extent, and they're going to start thinking "Hmmm...maybe it is a little crazy to have player X rated so high one year and off the list the next when it really came down to the players around him." One cane hope, anyway.

[JordansBulls]

Tracy McGrady was very productive that season, led the Rockets to a 20-10 stretch without Yao, into the playoffs with a 50 win season. 6th in MVP voting, All-NBA second team, averaged 29/7/7/47% during a long stretch, and overall 25/6/7/43%, didn't have that good of a cast around him when Yao went out either. Just throwing a name out there besides the usual guys of Dirk, Duncan, LBJ, Kobe, and Nash. Dwight was still emerging, Yao was hurt despite having a very dominant season statistically, and Deron was solid, but still not good enough statistically.

Where would you rank him? 5th, 6th or even higher?