Retro POY '79-80 (Voting Complete)

[Doctor MJ]

Lakers win title: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/ ... /index.htm

Interesting quote from this:

The issue of (finals) MVP—decided by seven writers and broadcasters—was a touchy one among the Lakers. Virtually everyone agreed that the rightful recipient should have been Abdul-Jabbar, that the MVP was a bone thrown to Johnson because he will finish second to Boston's Larry Bird as Rookie of the Year—which, in the light of Magic's playoff performance, will forever seem ridiculous—while Abdul-Jabbar will win his sixth regular-season MVP award.

I think that's a clear overreaction on the writer's part, but to me it does hammer it what I think has to be the case: Perception of Magic's total season after the playoffs was far different than perception of his regular season before the playoffs, and had they held an all-season ROY vote, there would have been some serious debate on the matter.

[ElGee]

^^^Their stats are similar -- see my reply to semi about my thoughts on that.

You're certainly making a valid point about the perception and the different opportunities...but doesn't that sort of make my point as well? Magic joined sort of a "flat" Laker team (or so the story goes) and not only added a key player on the court -- he's Magic freaking Johnson -- but an energizing force made legendary after the opening night victory hug. He had his opportunity, in LA do less, and made a mark. It just wasn't as large as Bird's. (LA jumped 2.5 in SRS, it's not like they won 65 games and Magic made waves).

So this is getting toward the idea of - whatever players were capable of accomplishing, what did they ACTUALLY accomplish. A very valid point, but I've always tried to couple this with: If the two guys switched places, how would it look then? Now, when a guy gives up because his team is crap, I'm not sympathetic to arguments for what he could do in a better situation. However, when a guy is playing a crucial role on an NBA champion, I've got a tough time knocking him for not contributing more value if I actually think he could contribute more value if he were called upon to do so.

Yes, and I've been extremely strict in the interpretation of this project in ranking players based on what they did, not what they could do. I think doing it the other way creates problems.

Otherwise, why wouldn't you have Nash in the top 5 in 2004? (OK, maybe rule changes.) Why wouldn't you have Duncan No. 1 (or 2 or 3) in 2006? I just think it's a slippery slope to look 5 years into the future and take one game (Finals G6) and think "well, Magic probably could have just dominated the league if he were asked to because he did it in 1987").

Heck, watching him play then I don't get that feeling, and everything I've read/seen about Magic talks about how much he tried to add to his game in the offseason. He's still fumbling the ball off his foot and making poor entry passes. This is someone who didn't make an All-NBA first team until 1983. It's understandable -- he was only 20 years old.

But, if I'm understanding you correctly, you think based on G6 that if Magic were asked, he could be a high-efficiency scorer who drove an elite offense in 1980? Because I don't buy that. He was good then, but he wasn't 84 Magic and he certainly wasn't 87-90 Magic.

[ElGee]

Lakers win title: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/ ... /index.htm

Interesting quote from this:

The issue of (finals) MVP—decided by seven writers and broadcasters—was a touchy one among the Lakers. Virtually everyone agreed that the rightful recipient should have been Abdul-Jabbar, that the MVP was a bone thrown to Johnson because he will finish second to Boston's Larry Bird as Rookie of the Year—which, in the light of Magic's playoff performance, will forever seem ridiculous—while Abdul-Jabbar will win his sixth regular-season MVP award.

I think that's a clear overreaction on the writer's part, but to me it does hammer it what I think has to be the case: Perception of Magic's total season after the playoffs was far different than perception of his regular season before the playoffs, and had they held an all-season ROY vote, there would have been some serious debate on the matter.

That is an interesting quote, but c'mon. It's the greatest game by a rookie in NBA history, and it was shocking as well because Kareem wasn't there and the dude played out of position. Add to that how much the media loves winning narratives and how Magic beat Bird in 79 and the writer probably thought it would be Magic taking home 3 straight MVPs in the near future.

[ThaRegul8r]

Magic had the epic Game 6, but I'm not seeing how Kareem isn't the clear MVP overall. The cumulative numbers are deceptive because the one game boosted them up, but the final averages are not indicative of the way he played the whole series.

Hey, appreciated the longer post. I don't mean to cherry pick, but it seemed clunky to paste it all in here.

No, it's fine. I realize that oftentimes when I post it gets "TL; DR"ed anyway.

First off, I don't understand the whole "inflated by game 6" thinking. Whatever the total contribution he made is, having a disproportionate amount of it come at the most opportune time is a good thing, isn't it? I mean it would be one thing if you could legitimately claim that Magic didn't play well at all before game 6, but 17/10/9 with great efficiency is not anything to dismiss lightly - Finals MVPs have been won with LESS than that.

I'm in no way trying to diminish what Magic did, but my point was that Kareem was the driving force behind the Lakers taking a 3-2 lead. While Finals MVPs have been won with less than Magic did in the first five games, those finals also didn't have a performance like the one Kareem had either.

In general I feel like we're talking past each other. Kareem was clearly the MVP through 5 games, but I feel like you're looking at this by counting player of the game awards.

Not my intent, I was just trying to show the overall impact breaking down each game.

If player B is a valuable sidekick for X games, he doesn't necessarily need to be the man for X more games to become the MVP of the series. How much does he need? Well there's no one answer, tons of variable, tons of perspectives. I guess I would ask you for your thoughts just in general of what it would take the sidekick to get the nod since I've already said my piece.

I guess I'll just put this here. Kareem is my #1 for 1979-80 Player of the Year. He was regular season MVP, 6th in scoring, 2nd in FG%, 8th in rebounding, 1st in blocks, fifth in minutes, passed for 4.5 assists, was First Team All-NBA and First Team All-Defense. When you look at advanced statistics, he was 2nd in PER, 3rd in TS%, 1st in OWS, 4th in DWS, 1st in WS. Then in the postseason he averaged 31.9 on 57.2 percent shooting and 61.1 percent true shooting, 12.1 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 3.87 blocks in 41.2 minutes with a PER of 27.9. Then in the Finals he averaged 33.4/13.6/3.2/4.6/.549 FG%, .578 TS%. Kareem was the MVP of the regular season, the MVP throughout the playoffs, and the MVP of the Finals. He dominated all season long. Now, what he did in the regular season and playoffs up to that point is irrelevant when it comes to Finals MVP, but he dominated in the Finals as well.

I hear people say that Magic carried Kareem to his five titles in the '80s and they don't recognize Kareem's contributions. In 1980, Kareem was dominant. But his dominance was unfairly overlooked because Magic had one of the greatest games of all time in Game 6, but the Lakers are not up 3-2 without Kareem. It seems to me like what the league MVP did is completely overlooked, which is aided by the fact that Magic had an ebullient, effervescent personality, while Kareem was withdrawn. As TrueLAfan said, how many people today talk about Kareem's Game 5 where he played through injury to lead LA to victory? How many people today talk about Kareem in the 1980 Finals at all—other than to say he was injured for Game 6 and Magic took over? Couldn't have been too valuable if they won the big one without him, right? Some people today use that Game 6 to say that Magic won without Kareem, completely ignoring the first five games that put them in position to only need one more win in the next two games. Kareem gets lost in the shuffle while everyone remembers Magic's Game 6. I reiterate that I take nothing away from it, but I want to make sure that Kareem gets his deserved recognition that was lost.

[Doctor MJ]

Yes, and I've been extremely strict in the interpretation of this project in ranking players based on what they did, not what they could do. I think doing it the other way creates problems.

Otherwise, why wouldn't you have Nash in the top 5 in 2004? (OK, maybe rule changes.) Why wouldn't you have Duncan No. 1 (or 2 or 3) in 2006? I just think it's a slippery slope to look 5 years into the future and take one game (Finals G6) and think "well, Magic probably could have just dominated the league if he were asked to because he did it in 1987").

Heck, watching him play then I don't get that feeling, and everything I've read/seen about Magic talks about how much he tried to add to his game in the offseason. He's still fumbling the ball off his foot and making poor entry passes. This is someone who didn't make an All-NBA first team until 1983. It's understandable -- he was only 20 years old.

But, if I'm understanding you correctly, you think based on G6 that if Magic were asked, he could be a high-efficiency scorer who drove an elite offense in 1980? Because I don't buy that. He was good then, but he wasn't 84 Magic and he certainly wasn't 87-90 Magic.

You are totally right that making it more complicated that gives rise to a variety of issues. Getting to the core of my thinking, the issue comes down to whether you can judge a player's true accomplishment based on just linear improvement to the scoreboard. You take two identical twins (totally identical, not the Brooke-star, Robin-sideshow, kind from real life), but them on identically constructed teams but with talent level X and Y respectively. All things being equal, you expect the brother on weaker team to provide greater unweighted lift - does that mean he's truly accomplished more than his other brother? I have a problem with that thinking, and so no, I don't look at true accomplishment in such a linear fashion.

(And my apologies, I know I'm totally using subtly contradictory meanings of the word "accomplish" now over the course of the thread)

Now you bring up examples that beg the question, well why not just look at everyone in terms of their absolute potential then? For me the big things here:

1) Magic's team was the best in the league. I don't like feeling like I'm penalizing a guy because he's on a better team. Doesn't seem right.

2) His stats in general are pretty star-like. We're really not talking about a guy being able to put up good numbers if he's in the right situation here - Bird got the MVP buzz because he was the most MVP-ish on a team with great improvement not because he had vastly better stats. So we're really talking intangibles here, and Magic's were strong from the get go.

3) He actually got an opportunity this year to show something incredible. When he faced the same team that handled Bird's Celtics, and Kareem went down, Magic responded with a game significantly more impressive than Bird had against them, or anything Bird ever did in the finals.

I will fully grant though, that doesn't fully address your points, and I will be thinking more about them.

As far as what Magic could do without Kareem, I'm really undecided and welcome input. He's ceratainly not going to go for 40/15 every night. Do I think that he could from scoring 18 on 60% to 21 on 54% though? Yeah, I kinda do. As to whether he can match Bird's total impact, that's I suppose the big question.

[Doctor MJ]

I guess I'll just put this here. Kareem is my #1 for 1979-80 Player of the Year. He was regular season MVP, 6th in scoring, 2nd in FG%, 8th in rebounding, 1st in blocks, fifth in minutes, passed for 4.5 assists, was First Team All-NBA and First Team All-Defense. When you look at advanced statistics, he was 2nd in PER, 3rd in TS%, 1st in OWS, 4th in DWS, 1st in WS. Then in the postseason he averaged 31.9 on 57.2 percent shooting and 61.1 percent true shooting, 12.1 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 3.87 blocks in 41.2 minutes with a PER of 27.9. Then in the Finals he averaged 33.4/13.6/3.2/4.6/.549 FG%, .578 TS%. Kareem was the MVP of the regular season, the MVP throughout the playoffs, and the MVP of the Finals. He dominated all season long. Now, what he did in the regular season and playoffs up to that point is irrelevant when it comes to Finals MVP, but he dominated in the Finals as well.

I hear people say that Magic carried Kareem to his five titles in the '80s and they don't recognize Kareem's contributions. In 1980, Kareem was dominant. But his dominance was unfairly overlooked because Magic had one of the greatest games of all time in Game 6, but the Lakers are not up 3-2 without Kareem. It seems to me like what the league MVP did is completely overlooked, which is aided by the fact that Magic had an ebullient, effervescent personality, while Kareem was withdrawn. As TrueLAfan said, how many people today talk about Kareem's Game 5 where he played through injury to lead LA to victory? How many people today talk about Kareem in the 1980 Finals at all—other than to say he was injured for Game 6 and Magic took over? Couldn't have been too valuable if they won the big one without him, right? Some people today use that Game 6 to say that Magic won without Kareem, completely ignoring the first five games that put them in position to only need one more win in the next two games. Kareem gets lost in the shuffle while everyone remembers Magic's Game 6. I reiterate that I take nothing away from it, but I want to make sure that Kareem gets his deserved recognition that was lost.

I don't think I disagree with anything you said. I think I need to make clear - when I say I don't think Kareem got robbed, it's not that I believe that Kareem was definitely the #2 overall most valuable guy in the '80 finals, it's that Magic did enough that I really couldn't complain with either choice.

And I am with you and TrueLA about Kareem not getting enough recognition. People talk about him like he's only a GOAT candidate due to longevity, like Wilt was the clearly superior player at peak. Meanwhile, when Kareem volume scored, he did it with an efficiency that dwarfed Wilt's volume efficiency and did so in a way where there isn't reason to believe that he was hurting his team. Wilt's '67 peak may indeed be better than Kareem's best but if so it's only because of the rest of his game because Kareem was simply a superior scorer, to say nothing of the fact that he was the best defensive player of the 70s. When I have my internal GOAT debate, he's the last center standing.

[semi-sentient]

I seriously doubt Kareem will be getting short-changed here. After he wins this year unanimously, he'll be at #13 on the all-time shares list with his best years ahead of him. He's going to get his recognition and I'd be shocked if he didn't end up #1 on the list.

[JordansBulls]

I seriously doubt Kareem will be getting short-changed here. After he wins this year unanimously, he'll be at #13 on the all-time shares list with his best years ahead of him. He's going to get his recognition and I'd be shocked if he didn't end up #1 on the list.

Agreed. I think what will hurt though is 1975 and 1976 when he didnt make the playoffs.

[ElGee]

Yes, and I've been extremely strict in the interpretation of this project in ranking players based on what they did, not what they could do. I think doing it the other way creates problems.

Otherwise, why wouldn't you have Nash in the top 5 in 2004? (OK, maybe rule changes.) Why wouldn't you have Duncan No. 1 (or 2 or 3) in 2006? I just think it's a slippery slope to look 5 years into the future and take one game (Finals G6) and think "well, Magic probably could have just dominated the league if he were asked to because he did it in 1987").

Heck, watching him play then I don't get that feeling, and everything I've read/seen about Magic talks about how much he tried to add to his game in the offseason. He's still fumbling the ball off his foot and making poor entry passes. This is someone who didn't make an All-NBA first team until 1983. It's understandable -- he was only 20 years old.

But, if I'm understanding you correctly, you think based on G6 that if Magic were asked, he could be a high-efficiency scorer who drove an elite offense in 1980? Because I don't buy that. He was good then, but he wasn't 84 Magic and he certainly wasn't 87-90 Magic.

You are totally right that making it more complicated that gives rise to a variety of issues. Getting to the core of my thinking, the issue comes down to whether you can judge a player's true accomplishment based on just linear improvement to the scoreboard. You take two identical twins (totally identical, not the Brooke-star, Robin-sideshow, kind from real life), but them on identically constructed teams but with talent level X and Y respectively. All things being equal, you expect the brother on weaker team to provide greater unweighted lift - does that mean he's truly accomplished more than his other brother? I have a problem with that thinking, and so no, I don't look at true accomplishment in such a linear fashion.

(And my apologies, I know I'm totally using subtly contradictory meanings of the word "accomplish" now over the course of the thread)

I see what you're saying and, intuitively, I agree (I'm not big on overly analyzing team swings anyway). With that said, I think there's not too much of a ceiling effect to worry about with a 3 SRS 47-win team. And one other thing I'll get to in a second...

Now you bring up examples that beg the question, well why not just look at everyone in terms of their absolute potential then? For me the big things here:

1) Magic's team was the best in the league. I don't like feeling like I'm penalizing a guy because he's on a better team. Doesn't seem right.

2) His stats in general are pretty star-like. We're really not talking about a guy being able to put up good numbers if he's in the right situation here - Bird got the MVP buzz because he was the most MVP-ish on a team with great improvement not because he had vastly better stats. So we're really talking intangibles here, and Magic's were strong from the get go.

But again, the stats are coming from a different place. Magic's basically the 4th offensive weapon on that team. He rebounds well, when he does he pushes the break (extremely well). He passes well, and runs a little point. But there's a huge difference between a 16 ppg guy and 21 ppg when 75% of the 16 points are from fastbreak layups, putbacks, Kareem double teams, etc. and 75% of the 21 ppg are from, essentially, creating his own offense (or at least coming off screens and scoring as a primary team option). I don't want to minimize Magic's scoring too much, but we're talking a similar rate and efficiency to 1988 Dennis Rodman. It's what happens when you're active and a secondary offensive player with good offensive players around you.

And that's my biggest issue with issue 80-83 Magic, especially 1980 Magic who didn't have the defense and all-around tornado-like impact of 82 Magic...(almost there)

3) He actually got an opportunity this year to show something incredible. When he faced the same team that handled Bird's Celtics, and Kareem went down, Magic responded with a game significantly more impressive than Bird had against them, or anything Bird ever did in the finals.

I will fully grant though, that doesn't fully address your points, and I will be thinking more about them.

As far as what Magic could do without Kareem, I'm really undecided and welcome input. He's ceratainly not going to go for 40/15 every night. Do I think that he could from scoring 18 on 60% to 21 on 54% though? Yeah, I kinda do. As to whether he can match Bird's total impact, that's I suppose the big question.

Game 6 was amazing, no doubt. I'm not sure Magic could jump his scoring considerably if Kareem were permanently removed from the team. Then again, and this is the big issue, it depends on what position he plays.

He wasn't playing point guard or running the team in 1980. I'm giving him credit for just all-around impact -- perhaps in a Scottie Pippen mold, sans the defense -- rebounding, solid extra passing, ability to run the break from time to time, running the point well when Nixon is out, and scoring efficiently in small, organized ways instead of taking a bunch of bad shots/turning it over a lot.

But the man is worse in 1980 than in 82 or 83. He isn't running the offense in 1980, he's just a cog in it. And a good one at that.

[penbeast0]

Again, let's look at the top teams and see how key the top players were to their performances.

1. The NBA Champion and best team was clearly the Lakers. Kareem is their best player with a terrific efficiency rating and defensive impact but he wasn't carrying the load alone. People talk about Magic but what about Jamaal Wilkes who averaged 20ppg to Kareem's 25 and also was an All-Def candidate; plus Norm Nixon who averaged more assists (and less turnovers) than Magic while scoring roughly the same plus Michael Cooper and several PF types. This was a loaded team, Kareem was it's main man, Magic was not that key until the finals except that his personality turned this underperforming collection of great talent (wait for the next few previous years) into a team (true of Bird as well).

2. Julius Erving, on the other hand, had very little help carrying the Sixers scoring load. He averaged 27ppg, the next leading scorer averaged 14 (Darryl Dawkins -- and DD was more interested in playing to the media than rebounding or defense). He did have solid defensive stars Bobby Jones and Maurice Cheeks as support but the Sixers were right up there with Boston (who they beat badly in teh ECF) and LA and Julius carried the biggest offensive load of all the candidates.

3. Boston was the third of the big three and Bird was clearly their best player; Maxwell had some big playoff games but Bird was the undisputed star of that team; again, bringing them up over .700 without the great talent Kareem had around him in LA.

So, I don’t think it’s Kareem easily, it’s at least a close 3 way race and if it goes to Kareem, it will be for his defense as well as his offense which I think was far more important than the defensive impact of either Erving or Bird.

4-5. The other key factor is that there wasn’t a huge separation between the top 3 and the next few. Seattle and Phoenix were within 5 games of the Lakers and Seattle was the other semifinalist. The trouble is that they were a very balanced team with Gus Williams, Dennis Johnson, and Jack Sikma all having roughly equal impact on their play. Hard to vote a top 5 MVP candidate because of that. Same goes for Phoenix with a 4 headed monster of a team (Paul Westphal, Walter Davis, Truck Robinson, and Alvin Adams)

6-8. Three other teams finished around .600, strong but well back of the leaders. Atlanta also has a 3 headed team with John “Cementhead” Drew, “Fast Eddie” Johnson, and Dan Roundfield. Milwaukee is led by Marques Johnson but he has a lot of support including again Bob Lanier, a young Sidney Moncrief, and a wealth of others. Kansas City also has 3 outside scorer, with Otis Birdsong scoring the most, though Sam Lacey might have been their MVP despite underwhelming stats (he played less than 30 mpg though).

Finally, people have been mentioning Moses Malone and George Gervin who led their respective teams to .500 records. Moses had big rebounding numbers to go with 25 ppg but Houston was one of the worst defensive teams in the league and while Rudy Tomjanovich, Rick Barry, and Calvin Murphy were all poor defenders, having weak interior shotblocking didn’t help. Gervin, of course, did nothing but score as has been brought up. But, 33 ppg on an outstanding .528fg% is great scoring – even if the numbers are quite pace inflated.

So, that all off my chest . . . my final 5 end up pretty conventional:

1. Kareem – 25ppg with great efficiency and defense plus a title is too much to ignore
2. Erving – carried his team more and went further than Bird
3. Bird – great turnaround and great all-around play; he even worked at defense
4. (big gap)
5. Moses – numbers too big to ignore
6. Magic – his numbers don’t stand up on that fast paced Laker team but he was the reason it became a team and not just a collection of talent

HM. Gervin, Marques Johnson

[shawngoat23]

If I don't come up with anything between now and the end of the voting period, I'm going with:

1. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
2. Julius Erving
3. Larry Bird
4. Magic Johnson
5. Moses Malone

[TrueLAfan]

The comments about Magic have pushed him into my consideration for the 4 and 5 spot. He really was great in the postseason...although, yeah, Kareem should have been the Finals MVP.

I've gotta say that this year, as I noted in my original post, I have a really hard time putting Moses in the top 5. He was a below average defender that turned the ball over all the time. He was average, at best, at FG%—even though he had little range. (Malone shot about as well as Dan Issel...except Dan Isssel was putting up a bunch of 18-22 footers). The Rockets team was pretty good other than Malone, and they were a .500 team.

I understand the allure of statistics, but Moses Malone didn't help his team to win a large number of games. For me, that's a major factor in deciding the value of a player. You can have all sorts of great number of obvious skills...but if your team doesn't put Ws on the board, then something is wrong. This is not a case like the Lakers in 1975, who had no balance or defense or bench other than Kareem. This is a team that pretty good frontcourt support for Moses in Rudy T, Major Jones, and The Whopper. (I'm sorry, but Billy Paultz will always be The Whopper to me.) Calvin Murphy was still an above average player. Rick Barry was reduced to role player status, but accepted it well and was fairly effective. Robert Reid was good (and was very good in the postseason). Allen Leavell had a very good rookie season. Mike Dunleavy and Tom Henderson were good end of rotation players. Del Harris is a capable coach. That's a lot of average to above average players to have, at all positions and on the bench, to end up with 41 wins if you've got a MVP caliber player in the starting lineup.

So what did Moses do to get extra push here? His numbers didn't seem to help his team much. Was it beating the Spurs in the playoffs? But the Spurs were, also, a .500 team...and Gervin outplayed Moses in that series. There are times when a player carries a bad or even mediocre team, and even though they don't have a large number of wins, you can see that person's impact. But Moses's pre-Philadelphia teams often underperformed. In 1980, it was really serious. And, I've got to say, it was kind of recognized. 1979 was/is a somewhat different story for Moses. 1980 is kind of an off year for him. I don't see him as a top 5 player, and neither did people at the time.

[ItsMillerTime]

Probably my final rankings

1. Kareem
2. Dr. J
3. Bird
4. Gervin
5. Moses Malone

HM: Magic, Dennis Johnson, Dan Roundfield

[drza]

Early rankings. The Bird/Magic debate thus far in the thread has been pretty rich on both sides.

1. Kareem
2. Dr. J
3. Magic/Bird
4. Bird/Magic
5. Moses Malone

When taking regular and postseason together, I really don't see much to separate Magic and Bird. Their situations are different, but I don't realistically see a way that either cold have done more in their given roles. Right now Magic is at 3 because he gets the tiebreaker for his finishing performance, but I will continue to follow along with the discussions to see if something changes my mind.

[Doctor MJ]

Long feature on Kareem coming out of his shell: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/ ... /index.htm

Great article.

One thing I can shed some light on is his headaches. They weren't migranes, they were cluster headaches. I have them myself, and aside from the clear indications from how his headaches come on, my neurologist has told me that he is known cluster headache sufferer.

Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_headache

The key thing to understand in terms of effect on basketball, other than the fact they are typical more painful than migranes, is that they tend to come in tight periods of time where they occur at a much higher frequency than a migrane would. I've had a few terrible days where I've had as many as 6 of these headaches, and even though I have access to very helpful medications that didn't exist in the 70s, I was completely useless. You can't think, you're totally exhausted - heck it even effects your vision and coordination. The excuse of "I have a headache" is a cliche that people don't really buy, but truly him having these headaches is a legit excuse for him to miss a basketball game - no matter how important that game was.

[Jimmy76]

Long feature on Kareem coming out of his shell: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/ ... /index.htm

Great article.

One thing I can shed some light on is his headaches. They weren't migranes, they were cluster headaches. I have them myself, and aside from the clear indications from how his headaches come on, my neurologist has told me that he is known cluster headache sufferer.

Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_headache

The key thing to understand in terms of effect on basketball, other than the fact they are typical more painful than migranes, is that they tend to come in tight periods of time where they occur at a much higher frequency than a migrane would. I've had a few terrible days where I've had as many as 6 of these headaches, and even though I have access to very helpful medications that didn't exist in the 70s, I was completely useless. You can't think, you're totally exhausted - heck it even effects your vision and coordination. The excuse of "I have a headache" is a cliche that people don't really buy, but truly him having these headaches is a legit excuse for him to miss a basketball game - no matter how important that game was.

cluster headaches are an absolute nightmare from what I gather

I heard of a kid in portland who would use nitrous whenever he felt one coming on but he got arrested for it since portland outlawed it

totally unrelated to the discussion but what are the medications and how effective are they? I've heard of a couple people turning to illegal drugs to help deal with them

[Optimism Prime]

One thing I can shed some light on is his headaches. They weren't migranes, they were cluster headaches. I have them myself,

Are you referring to the GB?

ZING!

[Doctor MJ]

cluster headaches are an absolute nightmare from what I gather

I heard of a kid in portland who would use nitrous whenever he felt one coming on but he got arrested for it since portland outlawed it

totally unrelated to the discussion but what are the medications and how effective are they? I've heard of a couple people turning to illegal drugs to help deal with them

Among the legal methods of dealing with them, pure oxygen is the gold standard. Works well at stopping a particular headache, no real side effects, but it's not practical lugging an oxygen tank around with you wherever you go, or even storing them at your house if you only get them once every couple years.

Triptans are the best classic medication (classic in the usage and side effects), they arrived on the scene in the '90s). They tend to be what I rely on to abort a headache. The problem is they're really hard on your body. Cluster headaches can drive you insane, but triptans can kill you, particularly if you've got other medical conditions. I'm young, and otherwise healthy, so I tend to use them.

My secret weapon is actual melatonin. Generally used for insomnia, but I discovered in my last cluster that they while they didn't stop the headaches, they knocked the pain down to manageable levels - and the stuff is utterly benign. I can take as much as I want.

The illegal drugs are the psychedelics. Kareem actually used marijuana to help with his headaches, but the general consensus of the clusterhead community is that marijuana isn't very effective. I don't actually recall anyone using nitrous, but who knows? Psychedelic mushrooms are the preferred drugs because they are so much less powerful than LSD - people appear to be able to get results while taking such a small dose than don't even feel the intoxicating effects. The big thing about the psychedelics is that the claim isn't that they stop one headache, but that they will abort an entire cluster.

The fact that these drugs are in a class that not even doctors can prescribe them is just ridiculous, and makes me quite mad. There are people have these headaches far worse than I do, they literally can do nothing but endure pain all their life - the idea that any substance on earth should be prevented from medical use when it seems like it might help people like that is a crime of irrationality.

[Jimmy76]

cluster headaches are an absolute nightmare from what I gather

I heard of a kid in portland who would use nitrous whenever he felt one coming on but he got arrested for it since portland outlawed it

totally unrelated to the discussion but what are the medications and how effective are they? I've heard of a couple people turning to illegal drugs to help deal with them

Among the legal methods of dealing with them, pure oxygen is the gold standard. Works well at stopping a particular headache, no real side effects, but it's not practical lugging an oxygen tank around with you wherever you go, or even storing them at your house if you only get them once every couple years.

Triptans are the best classic medication (classic in the usage and side effects), they arrived on the scene in the '90s). They tend to be what I rely on to abort a headache. The problem is they're really hard on your body. Cluster headaches can drive you insane, but triptans can kill you, particularly if you've got other medical conditions. I'm young, and otherwise healthy, so I tend to use them.

My secret weapon is actual melatonin. Generally used for insomnia, but I discovered in my last cluster that they while they didn't stop the headaches, they knocked the pain down to manageable levels - and the stuff is utterly benign. I can take as much as I want.

The illegal drugs are the psychedelics. Kareem actually used marijuana to help with his headaches, but the general consensus of the clusterhead community is that marijuana isn't very effective. I don't actually recall anyone using nitrous, but who knows? Psychedelic mushrooms are the preferred drugs because they are so much less powerful than LSD - people appear to be able to get results while taking such a small dose than don't even feel the intoxicating effects. The big thing about the psychedelics is that the claim isn't that they stop one headache, but that they will abort an entire cluster.

The fact that these drugs are in a class that not even doctors can prescribe them is just ridiculous, and makes me quite mad. There are people have these headaches far worse than I do, they literally can do nothing but endure pain all their life - the idea that any substance on earth should be prevented from medical use when it seems like it might help people like that is a crime of irrationality.

unfortunately rationality and drug use dont tend to go hand in hand on either side of the law

ill hafta remember this for my pro pyschedelic and dissociative drug legalization (thought no complete de-regulation obviously) viewpoint

[TMACFORMVP]

1. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
2. Julius Erving
3. Larry Bird
4. Magic Johnson
5. Moses Malone