Retro POY '73-74 (Voting Complete)

Post #1 » by **Doctor MJ** » Mon Aug 9, 2010 10:20 pm

In this thread we'll discuss and vote on the top 5 best player seasons of '73-74.

Trying something new now. Schedule will be Mon-Fri, and Thu-Mon. Typically this will be morning to morning.

Some things to start us off:

NBA
Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _1974.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _1974.html
Award Voting http://www.basketball-reference.com/awa ... _1974.html
Final Box Score http://webuns.chez-alice.fr/finals/1974.htm

ABA
Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _1974.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _1974.html

Topics
Kareem dominates
Celtics win controversial title
Erving takes everything there is to take

Mean_Streets · Post #2 » by **Mean_Streets** » Mon Aug 9, 2010 10:38 pm

1. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar - NBA MVP. Led team to Finals . All-Defensive First Team. Just another typical dominant season for Kareem, unlike last year he was actually healthy and led his team to the Finals, & some think the Bucks were robbed in that Finals.

2. Julius Erving - ABA MVP. ABA Champion. 27/11/5 on 51FG%

3. Bob McAdoo - Another dominant season for McAdoo. led the NBA in scoring , averaged 15 boards a game, & 3.3 BPG. Finished 2nd in the NBA MVP voting.

4. Dave Cowens - 19/16/4. 3rd in NBA MVP voting. NBA Champion.

5. Rick Barry - 25/7/6. All-NBA First Team.

ThaRegul8r · Post #3 » by **ThaRegul8r** » Mon Aug 9, 2010 10:42 pm

I know #1 is Kareem. I'll fill in the rest later.

JordansBulls · Post #4 » by **JordansBulls** » Mon Aug 9, 2010 10:53 pm

1. Julius Erving - MVP, won Title, Led in WS and PER in the playoffs and season as well as scoring

2. Kareem - League MVP, statisically dominant, 1st team all NBA and 1st Team Defense

* Lost Game 7 of the NBA Finals at home.

3. John Havlicek - Finals MVP, 2nd in playoff Win Shares, 1st Team All NBA and 1st Team Defense

4. Dave Cowens - 4th in MVP Voting, 3rd in playoff Win Shares, 2nd Team All NBA and 2nd Team Defense

5. Walt Frazier - 6th in MVP voting, 1st team all NBA and 1st Team Defense

http://webuns.chez-alice.fr/finals/1974.htm#

fatal9 · Post #5 » by **fatal9** » Mon Aug 9, 2010 11:46 pm

Kareem's series averages:

vs. Lakers: 30/18/5/4 on 56.9%. This was against a frontline of Elmore Smith (leading shot blocker in the league at 4.9 bpg), Happy Hairston (at PF) and Connie Hawkins (at PF or SF).

vs. Bulls (conference finals): 35/20/4/2 on 60.2%.

vs. Celtics (NBA finals): 33/12/5/2 on 52.4% (hit the famous game winner in game 6 to save Bucks from elimination and a had a game saving block against Cowens in game 2)

One of the more amazing things about his playoff stats is that the Bucks played at a pace of 98.8 during the playoffs (guessing they slowed down the offense to get Kareem the ball more?). That's identical pace to the league average in the early 90s. Should also be noted Bucks lost Lucius Allen (their second or third best player) to injury right before the playoffs started, and that was probably part of the reason Kareem's scoring increased dramatically in the playoffs. Bucks also had no all-stars outside of Kareem.

Lanier may get overlooked but he had a great year too, led Detroit to 52 wins with Dave Bing, was third in MVP voting after Kareem and McAdoo, had 23/13/4/3 in regular season, 26/15/3 in the playoffs (lost in 7 games to the Bulls).

Hayes led the league in rebounding, averaged 26/16/3 on 53% in the playoffs, including a 31/23 game to save his team from elimination in game 6 against the Knicks. He did however get shut down to 12 pts in the game 7. Played 48 minutes in the first six games and only 37 minutes in the game 7 (was apparently exhausted to the point where he took himself out of the game at one point).

McAdoo put up a monster statistical season on a playoff team, was second in MVP voting as well, and he should definitely crack some lists. Really hard to separate the players after Kareem this year. Dr. J, Hondo, Cowens, Lanier, Hayes, McAdoo, Barry, Frazier all could be included.

Sedale Threatt · Post #6 » by **Sedale Threatt** » Tue Aug 10, 2010 12:54 am

Another interesting stat from the Finals: Milwaukee went 0-4 in games officiated by Richie Powers, 3-0 otherwise.

Post #7 » by **semi-sentient** » Tue Aug 10, 2010 2:54 am

JB: Kareem also led the league in WS and WS/48 in both the regular season and playoffs, and he had the highest PER in the playoffs. Just wondering why those weren't mentioned.

I suppose it's also worth mentioning that Kareem played an additional 146 regular season minutes (about 3 games more) and an additional 179 playoff minutes (about 4 games more). All things considered I'm not sure if there is any reasonable argument to be made in favor of Dr J.

...

As for me, I think my top pick will be Kareem and it's not really close. Erving is pretty much a lock for the #2 spot. I'll have to give more thought to the others.

Post #8 » by **penbeast0** » Tue Aug 10, 2010 4:01 am

That said, let’s look at the best teams in basketball in 1974.

The Celtics had the 2nd best regular season record in the either league and won the NBA champion head to head over the only team better. Dave Cowens is again their best player (scored less than Hondo but his rebounding more than makes up for it). He is “only” 19/16/4 with weak efficiency though; which hurts him when compared to other top players.

Milwaukee led all basketball in win% and took Boston to 7. Kareem had a great year with 27/14/5 on good efficiency plus his first career all-defensive 1st team selection. He had good support with Dandridge, Oscar, and Lucius Allen but that is all they were; supporting players. Kareem should almost certainly be #1 this year.

The Nets are probably the 3rd best team in basketball. The ABA is within 10% of the NBA but they aren’t equal in depth of talent. Still, they were both the regular season and postseason champions and Erving was the undisputed king of the league with 27/11/5 to back up his rep (and 28/10/5 with even better fg% in the PO). If Kareem is #1, Doc is the odds on favorite for #2.

Kentucky has the 4th best record in basketball and their best player was Artis Gilmore. However, their offense featured Dan Issel (26ppg) and Louis Dampier (18ppg) shooting more than Artis. Artis also didn’t have the great efficiency that characterized his career, shooting only .493, way under his all-time NBA best career fg%. Still, 19/18/4 with 3.4 blocks is pretty impressive for the second best center of the 70s.

Chicago and Detroit were the next two best teams. Chicago featured great defense with Chet Walker, no slouch himself, the weakest link on a great 5 man defensive team, though not terribly efficient offense. Bob Love was probably their main MVP candidate at 22/6/3 and All-Def but .417fg%.

Detroit featured it’s normal two-star lineup of Bob Lanier and Dave Bing but, in a departure from normal, played excellent team defense too. Lanier is the key guy at 23/13/4 and 3 blocks (Chris Ford, Curtis Rowe and Don Adams were the defensive keys – read Tall Tales on the St. Louis team’s upset of NY in 75 for a mention of the seemingly mediocre Adams’s defensive impact on that screwy bunch).

Other top teams were the Knicks, Bullets, and Lakers in the NBA, and Utah in the ABA.

The Knicks were still good despite Willis Reed’s injury plagues season led by Walt Frazier and Dave DeBusschere. Frazier is the star with his trademark defense plus 21/7/7 on .472 from the field.

The Bullets’ Elvin Hayes exploded for 21/18/2 though shooting poorly (.423).

The Lakers were led by Gail Goodrich’s 25ppg though the real story was Elmore Smith breaking out with 5 blocks a game (and Jerry West going down with injury in his last season).

Utah made it to the ABA finals behind the ABA’s greatest defensive wing (Bobby Jones played PF then) in Willie Wise having a big offensive year at 22/8/4 .490fg% plus solid vets Ron Boone, Jimmy Jones, and Zelmo Beaty.

Other notable players included scoring leader Bob McAdoo at 31/15/2 .547 (37/13/1 in playoffs), George McGinnis finishing 2nd in both ABA scoring and rebounding at 26/15/3 but 5 turnovers, and Rick Barry at 25/7/6 .456 – All of whose teams finished over .500 though GS didn’t make the playoffs.

My top 5:

1. Kareem – pretty easily deserved it this year even over Julius
2. Erving – a clear and dominant #2
3. by the numbers it is McAdoo, then McGinnis and Barry . . . by team metrics (and defensive impact) it is Frazier, Wise, and Gilmore; but I will give the #3 spot to Bob Lanier who had the numbers, the wins, and whose team’s #3 in the league defense was a drastic change from their normal dismal defensive performance.
4. Bob McAdoo – huge numbers and a winning record in his breakout soph season
5. Walt Frazier – Knicks still winning with no Willis Reed

Hated to leave off Willie Wise who will be overlooked except by ABA fans; good numbers, great defense, and ABA finalist but Frazier overcame a lot more adversity to generate nearly as impressive a record

Post #9 » by **penbeast0** » Tue Aug 10, 2010 1:55 pm

Feel free to disagree with a person's reasoning but don't hijack the thread doing it or question his motive -- if you want to question motives, PM Doctor MJ to ask to remove him from the voting panel but don't drag it in here again.

Post #10 » by **Doctor MJ** » Tue Aug 10, 2010 5:45 pm

Thanks Beast. Yes people should follow that advice.

More generally, JB has been on this project from the beginning. There's really nothing new going on. So this is really more about whether you take issue with my management at this point.

Doc

Mean_Streets · Post #11 » by **Mean_Streets** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 5:42 am

Wow, no votes today?

Dr Positivity · Post #12 » by **Dr Positivity** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 7:25 am

Kareem Erving are definitely 1 and 2, I'm not sure Kareem's a shoo in at #1 though. The two advantages Kareem would appear to have on the surface is league best defense and superior rebounding. However I would say Erving being an 11rpg SF is as valuable as a 14.5rpg C, since it's all about value relative to replacement. Erving and average rebounding PFs/Cs should combine for about as much as Kareem and average rebounding SF/PFs. As shown by this year with Erving playing with two other 10-11rpg guys, and Kareem having a typical 9rpg PF in Perry and Dandrige at 7rpg. The Nets still were league average at rebounding despite having 3 10rpg guys, but I suspect with their high pace their gameplan had a lot of leak outs for fast break oppurtunities, which lowers DRB%. With that said, while having a slow pace made Kareem's DRBing more valuable for their d, I think Erving's defensive rebounding is thus better for a team's offense than Kareem's since every time he got the defensive board the other team was in instant trouble, similar to Magic and Barkley.

Then the defense. I think Kareem's better. But Erving should not be underestimated because he's a SF. 2.3spg and 2.4bpg at once is pretty crazy, that adds up to 4.7 "earned TOs", in comparison Kareem has 4.9 (1.4 spg, 3.5bpg). And the team results are pretty clear. Nets were the best defensive team in the league, and again this is with plausibly their drb% being worse than it could've been if they slowed it down. Then look at the change from the year before. 73 Nets have a 106.8 DRTG ranking them 7 of 10 in the league. 74 Nets have a 98.4 DRTG, 1st in the league. Also one of the reason the Nets d was so good was they ranked 2nd in forced TOs, which Erving was clearly the anchor of. So clearly Erving had a big defensive impact.

I'm probably taking Kareem, just that it's pretty close. There's not much more you can do in one season than what Erving did this year. On every stats board, crushed the advanced PER/WS/etc. stats, best record in the league RS, then a 12-2 ramshackling of the playoffs including a sweep of Artis' Colonels. The Nets playoff run was Milwaukee 71, Lakers 01-esque this year. Almost everything is checkmarked except big man defensive impact, but the Nets had the best defense in the league, so how much more impact could he have had?

Dr Positivity · Post #13 » by **Dr Positivity** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 7:47 am

Gotta love Wilt coaching an ABA team to a 109+ pace, with the next highest in the league being 105 (Nets). They were the prehistoric Nellieball 3pt chucker team.

Post #14 » by **penbeast0** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 1:24 pm

Good post DocMF

As for Wilt's "coaching," he really didn't do much. He sat around in a velour shirt and flip flops and let his top assistant do it all -- by the second half of the year he wasn't even showing up for all the games. (Source -- Terry Pluto's Loose Balls)

Post #15 » by **Optimism Prime** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 1:46 pm

penbeast0 wrote:Good post DocMF

As for Wilt's "coaching," he really didn't do much. He sat around in a velour shirt and flip flops and let his top assistant do it all -- by the second half of the year he wasn't even showing up for all the games. (Source -- Terry Pluto's Loose Balls)

This confused me at first--I thought you were starting a new derogatory nickname for our beloved leader!

Then I realized that there are TWO doctors on this project, and one of them is MuFasa. Got it now.

Post #16 » by **TrueLAfan** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 3:37 pm

1. Kareem. How good was Kareem? After winning Game 7 of the Finals, Tommy Heinsohn crowed about his”plan” of double teaming Kareem with Cowens and Silas. Cowens and Silas were very good defenders...probably not quite as good as their 8 All-D team selections imply, but still...very good on that end, more or less in the middle of their peak period in 1974. They “held” Kareem to 26 points, 13 rebounds, and 4 assists. (Oh, and Dave Cowens picked up his fifth foul in the first minute of the fourth quarter...and played the rest of the way without picking up number 6! Thank you, Richie Powers!) So, here's the deal. Have two of the league's best defenders at C and PF, and double team a guy with them, and “hold” him to 26-13-4 while Oscar Robertson, sadly, becomes the ancestor of John Starks. Add in a crooked ref. Title! Kareem is #1 for me in a walk this year.

2. Erving. The Nets were the #1 defensive team in the ABA this year (and the ABA had its share of great defenders and good defensive teams). The only player other than Julius Erving that played more than 1000 minutes on that team was Brian Taylor. The rest of the team was mediocre to rotten on that end. So Doc must have been doing something there. A 100 block-100 steal season is pretty rare...there are about 3 or 4 a year. Erving was thisclose[ to have a 200-200 year...he ended up with 190 steals and 204 blocks. Know how many other players have had over 150 steals and 150 blocks in a season? That would be...none. And, oh yeah...he put up 27-11-5 on 51% shooting (and nearly 40% from three!). And won a title. But, again, this is exactly how good Kareem is. Julius Erving is wonderful. He still wasn't as good as Kareem was in 1974.

3. Lanier. Imagine if Patrick Ewing was about an inch or two taller, and stronger, and had a little more range on his jumper. Take away a little of his defense—maybe 10%--but double his assist numbers. And make him the nicest, most respected guy in the league off the court, and one of the great fighters on it. I've always felt that, all in all, Peak Lanier was (at least) comparable to Peak Ewing. This is Peak Bob Lanier. Think of it like this; Clifford Ray got all the juice for being such a great defender in the 1975 playoffs. And Ray was a very good defender. Lanier averaged 26 and 15 with 3 assists and 2 blocks in the playoff series where they were matched up.

4. Frazier. The Knicks were on their last legs; DeBusschere was ailing, Monroe missed half the season, Jerry Lucas was less concerned with D than usual, Reed was totally on fumes and barely played at all...it was a recipe for a lousy team. And Clyde got them up to almost 50 wins. Was great in the postseasons too.

5. McAdoo. Close between him and Clyde. Huge numbers in the season, but Buffalo was a real run and gun team (pace isn't a great stat, but FWIW...Buffalo had a higher pace than all but one of the 80s Nuggets teams). Still, his Reb % was in the Drob/Ewing/Hakeem area, and he scored 31 a game. The Braves were flawed as a whole, but they were designed to one-dimensional. Doo was greta, and great in the PS.

Sedale Threatt · Post #17 » by **Sedale Threatt** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 10:53 pm

1. Abdul-Jabbar. I know, shocking I'd go with Kareem.

2. Erving. Good points about the Doctor's defense, but not enough to edge Kareem.

3. McAdoo. Comes down to either him or Lanier, and I can't get past the 31/15.

4. Lanier. Not sure if I can buy the comparison to peak Ewing, but no question Bob is one of the more underrated players in history.

5. Frazier. Either Clyde or Barry, and I'll buy the former's case for helping the Knicks overachieve.

I'm not sure what it is, but I'm finding this era to be pretty bland and uninspiring. I guess I'm already looking ahead to the Russell/Chamberlain debate.

ElGee · Post #18 » by **ElGee** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 11:32 pm

ABA MVP Voting (probably the last time I'll post it):

Erving 49
Gilmore 9

ElGee · Post #19 » by **ElGee** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 11:42 pm

Post #20 » by **penbeast0** » Wed Aug 11, 2010 11:44 pm

True, don't think your 150/150 club is going to hold up though it isn't common. Bobby Jones did the "never done" 150/150 in each of his first 3 seasons, plus Kirilenko did it once. For that matter, Hakeem Olajuwon got 200/200 in 1989 which I think may be the only time that's been done; and David Robinson got 150/300! in 1992.

They didn't keep numbers for the 60s or Russell would probably have a few; maybe even Wilt -- he as active defensively as Russell was but if you showed him a stat, he might focus on it like he did assists, lol.