RealGM Top 100 List #14

[Laimbeer]

Top 2008 rankings still needing nomination

14.John Havlicek
19.Walt Frazier
21.Elgin Baylor
24.Rick Barry
25.Isiah Thomas
26.Scottie Pippen
27.John Stockton
28.Patrick Ewing
29.Bob Cousy
30.Clyde Drexler

[andrewww]

Vote: Jerry West
Nominate: John Havlicek

I'm shocked that Karl Malone and Kevin Garnett went over Moses, and Moses wasn't even #13 on my list.

Particularly KG. And it's difficult to believe at least one of Moses, West or Oscar will not be top 15.

Is it me, or is there a herd instinct grabbing hold? Why all this Barry love at this level, above Hondo and Baylor? The list is taking some bizarre turns.

its called letting in people with questionable credentials and objectivity having voting power, while leaving out the actual knowledgable ones out.

i think KG is a great all around big with great defense, rebounding, playmaking, and fundamentals in general. he's been a bit underrated since his minny days, but i would certainly have west, oscar, and moses ahead of him not only because these 3 were superior offensively, and because ive never gotten the sense where KG can carry a team like the other 3 i mentioned. he's a great piece for a championship level contender if he's not forced to carry the scoring load and has other perimeter scorers like sam i am, spree, pierce, and ray ray when he's enjoyed the most success.

at this point id have west/oscar/moses as the next 3 and the order is interchangeable much like shaq/duncan/kobe/hakeem are in the same tier. Dr J is also ranked a bit higher than i thought he should, but in the 17-20 range i think you guys will need to take a serious look at guys like baylor, barkley, hondo, dirk, admiral, barry, isiah.

[SDChargers#1]

I am going to go with my same votes from last thread.

Vote: Moses Malone
Nomination: Scottie Pippen

[Rapcity_11]

its called letting in people with questionable credentials and objectivity having voting power, while leaving out the actual knowledgable ones out.

Have you read the threads??? Almost every poster who voted for KG or campaigned hard for him early in the rankings did an in-depth analysis. To say those posters lack knowledge or have questionable credentials and objectivity is just wrong.

[Fencer reregistered]

Top 2008 rankings still needing nomination

14.John Havlicek
19.Walt Frazier
21.Elgin Baylor
24.Rick Barry
25.Isiah Thomas
26.Scottie Pippen
27.John Stockton
28.Patrick Ewing
29.Bob Cousy
30.Clyde Drexler

Whoa!! Havlicek wasn't nominated last time? I continue to be confused. There was a lot of discussion of him last time; I can't detect who was nominated (him or somebody else); and now there are no nominations for him?

I nominate John Havlicek!

As for vote, you guys have convinced me for Oscar Robertson. I don't like the grouchy intangibles, but they weren't THAT bad -- more like early Jordan or early post-Shaq Kobe, and not so much like team-wreckers such as with-Shaq Kobe, with-Kobe Shaq, or Wilt.

He also has to get some kind of racial pass for them -- Russell had Auerbach and Cousy to help him get through the meanness, as well as college teammate KC Jones. Who did Oscar have?

I'm also seeing Oscar as being a leader in establishing the role of the half-court point guard -- Cousy came before him in showing what transition PGs could do, but Oscar probably took half-court PGing to another level past the Celtics, who ran the half-court offense through Russell as much as through Cousy.

[Dr Positivity]

There was a tie between Havlicek and Barry, with 4 votes each with 15 other votes for neither. Penbeast elicted to nominate neither both due to the tie and the lack of majority

I believe we'd be better off with 6 nominees than 10 by this stage, because it has a practical value of concentrating the vote. Moving it down to 9 at least is a good move IMO.

[andrewww]

its called letting in people with questionable credentials and objectivity having voting power, while leaving out the actual knowledgable ones out.

Have you read the threads??? Almost every poster who voted for KG or campaigned hard for him early in the rankings did an in-depth analysis. To say those posters lack knowledge or have questionable credentials and objectivity is just wrong.

im referecing more to the followers who clearly have hidden agendas or those who dont have enough perspective on the game if you take out the stats.

[mysticbb]

One of them was a total liability on an entire half of the court, and the other was slightly better. At no point in their careers were either of them better than Moses.

I'm not sure about that. Ben Wallace had an average APM from 2003 to 2006 of +8. I doubt that Moses Malone had a similar stretch better than that. For Mutombo we have +3 for the end of his career from 2002 on. That is still above average in overall impact at a time when his offensive impact was rather negative. I wouldn't be so sure that neither of those were better at any point than past peak/prime Moses Malone despite the difference in terms of boxscore numbers.

I think Love's a quality player whose reputation would vastly improve if he played on a better team.

I completely agree. Kevin Love will be considered a better player on a better team, some might even argue for him being a MVP caliber player, if he puts up the numbers from last season while his team is maybe playing like the Kobe-less Lakers for example. That is +3.5 during the time Love isn't playing and assuming he replaces an average player we are getting overall +5.5 for that team, a team capable of winning 56 games. What do you think would happen? We would here about Kevin Love and his 20/15 being so great that he should be the MVP. That his impact was still not close to typical MVP caliber players doesn't matter. And the same happened with Moses Malone. His numbers were impressive and the team played worse without him, but not that much worse. And Malone didn't push a team that far. He improved the 76ers less than those +3 while replacing Caldwell Jones and Darryl Dawkins minutes. And that as the MVP. I don't see him having a big impact at all. As I said pushing a +5.7 to +9 or more, maybe, but that didn't happen.

I also think there are differences outside of the statistical similarities, especially the fact that Moses got to the foul line a ton and, despite his rep as a mediocre defender/shot blocker, was better than Love on that end. Like, not even in the same league better.

Better at his peak, certainly, but how much better? We are using the 79, 82 and 83 to justify that opinion about Moses Malone, but how much of that is real impact? I seriously don't see it. Garnett made more with less in terms of team performance in 2005 than Moses Malone in 1979.

RE: Garnett. How do we chalk up ALL of Boston's significant improvement to him when the Celtics also added one of the great shooters in NBA history? Surely he played a big role, but he was not the only addition.

The Celtics were +6.3 in games without him and +9.8 with him. That is a bigger improvement than Moses Malone showed in 1983 at his peak level play. No, I don't say that all of the improvement was due to Kevin Garnett, but he improved the Celtics in less minutes more than Moses Malone the 76ers.

In contrast, the Sixers add only Malone, they improve by seven or eight wins and go from getting repeatedly beaten in the Finals to capping the best playoff run in league history (to that point) with a sweep of the Showtime Lakers.

Probably a little bit too much narrative there for your taste, but at some point the results have to matter, too, don't they?

You are right, too much narrative without looking into the situation at all. The numbers for Erving in that season are pretty telling, the team was +1.8 without Erving and clearly better with and that's while Moses Malone played. Again, we don't see such an improvement from Moses Malone and we have that for Erving also past his peak. Check out the constant improvements Nowitzki made to the Mavericks, that is on a higher level than Moses Malone in his peak seasons. The 76ers were already a really good team without Moses Malone, they became better, but the narrative about them being such a great team is also not backed up in terms of overall performance level. We saw teams playing above +10 for a season, that is better than the 83 76ers.

The run to 1981 finals was also a lot of luck involved. They took two closer games in the first round from the Lakers, then they ran into the Spurs, a team with fitting support around Gervin, but in no way great or even particular good, Kansas City was even weaker than the Rockets in the conference finals. Yes, they won two games against the Celtics, but that were again two close games and the Celtics destroyed the Rockets two times. Yes, that run had a lot of luck involved and not so much high team performance.

But otherwise, I'm just not seeing the picture of a guy, in Malone, who got worse in the playoffs. He didn't improve like Dirk, but neither did he dip like Karl or David Robinson. I guess I don't see how we can toss out the career numbers.

I understand why you are saying this. If we look at the career averages, it doesn't look that big of a drop for Malone, but from year to year he didn't keep that level. What I want to adjust for is Moses Malone playing more playoff games in years in which he was better than in years he was weaker.

I suppose it depends on your standards. I'm looking at a guy, in Moses, who managed to put up all those 20/10s, with 13 or so seasons with 20-plus PERs, and not understanding how those don't qualify.

Because I don't think that you can win a championship with Moses Malone being the best player in 6 of those 14 seasons you mentioned. I can see it in 8, but not in 14 (unless, obviously, we are talking about All-Time great team that is capable of playing +7 ball already without him and against weaker than average competition during the championship run). The difference might be not that big in your eyes, but at one point I make the cut. And Malone imho has not much contribution beyond the boxscore.

I think one aspect is the overrating of offensive rebounding. I showed that before in that forum, but a higher ORB% doesn't lead to a bigger scoring margin. And a lot of Malone's reputation as great rebounder comes from his offensive rebounds. In the playoffs Malone has a lower DRB% than Nowitzki. Thus, in a similar situation Malone was not rebounding better.
And when I look at all those things I'm rather sure I would vote David Robinson over Moses Malone as well. So far nobody presented a case for Moses Malone which should put him into a Top20 for sure. All I'm reading is his 20/15 seasons, his MVP trophys, but not so much about his incredible impact on the game.

[mysticbb]

This is true. Malone took a team from 5.74 SRS to 7.53 SRS (historically good). While KG's 2008 Celtics were still a 6.29 SRS when he didn't play. KG was a missing piece from a Finals caliber team. Malone was the missing piece to propel a Conference finals caliber team.

The Celtics in 2008 were historically BETTER than the 76ers. That team was at +9.77 with Garnett, much better than the +6.29 without him. And I'm more impressed by pushing a better team to an even higher degree. While we have strong evidence that the highest impact player on the 76ers wasn't Moses Malone, but Julius Erving.

[Doormatt]

its called letting in people with questionable credentials and objectivity having voting power, while leaving out the actual knowledgable ones out.

Have you read the threads??? Almost every poster who voted for KG or campaigned hard for him early in the rankings did an in-depth analysis. To say those posters lack knowledge or have questionable credentials and objectivity is just wrong.

im referecing more to the followers who clearly have hidden agendas or those who dont have enough perspective on the game if you take out the stats.

who exactly do you believe has a hidden agenda that has been arguing (very well i might add) and voting for guys like KG and Malone? ElGee? Dr. Mufasa? Mystic?

L...O...L

And who has been left out of this process that is actually knowledgeable? the only one i can think of is TLAF, but he chose to stay out on his own. it seems like anybody who wants to participate and actually has credibility has been allowed to do so.



sorry, i dont mean to derail or anything but that is ridiculous.

as you were.

[andrewww]

@Doormat

I can easily name names, but id get banned for derailing the thread if i havent done so already. but fyi, none of the posters you mentioned are the ones im referring to.

[mysticbb]

I can easily name names, but id get banned for derailing the thread if i havent done so already. but fyi, none of the posters you mentioned are the ones im referring to.

Well, you wouldn't derail the thread, if you would make a compelling argument for either of those players you mentioned as "being better than Garnett". You can still do it and for the next vote it can be taken into account, if some voters have missed out on details you can provide. The arguments doesn't need to include data per se, it can be very well just about the way those players impacted the game. What did they do on the court in order to make a great impact. Some specific non-boxscore related contributions by those players the people around here may have overlooked. You are very welcome to do it.

[Fencer reregistered]

There was a tie between Havlicek and Barry, with 4 votes each with 15 other votes for neither. Penbeast elicted to nominate neither both due to the tie and the lack of majority

I believe we'd be better off with 6 nominees than 10 by this stage, because it has a practical value of concentrating the vote. Moving it down to 9 at least is a good move IMO.

Got it. Thanks.

[fatal9]

Vote: Charles Barkley
Nomination: Steve Nash

Was down to Barkley and LeBron for me. You could say LeBron's already accomplished everything Barkley did team-wise/individually, but I've really soured on LeBron's playoff performances, especially the way he has gone out. Playing poorly is one thing, but not caring/quitting is unacceptable. Just can't trust him anymore because of his bizarre play in the last two years.

[Gongxi]

ElGee has warmed me to LeBron, and I'm prepared to include him in the triad of West/Oscar/Moses, but after reading through the thread, I'm definitely leaning away from West and towards Oscar and Moses.

Still nominating Baylor, though.

[ElGee]

Vote: Charles Barkley
Nomination: Steve Nash

Was down to Barkley and LeBron for me. You could say LeBron's already accomplished everything Barkley did team-wise/individually, but I've really soured on LeBron's playoff performances, especially the way he has gone out. Playing poorly is one thing, but not caring/quitting is unacceptable. Just can't trust him anymore because of his bizarre play in the last two years.

There's the potential that this will look absolutely ridiculous in the near future (Tragic Johnson style). Obviously, I treat these big narrative-driven arcs a little differently than most...but it's the obvious concern for LeBron. So much so that if he were continue to have it happen I would re-evaluate his entire career...although Im not there yet (Boston was almost nothing to me -- maybe 1 "weird" game -- and the Finals looked like fatigue/mental overthinking/lack of trust in shot). Those are issues, but everyone gets to have issues at some point in their career. If they are never addressed, then I think we say they are symptomatic of something bigger.

The tricky part, as I've said, is that he's smack in the middle of his career. It almost doesn't matter where we place him, but for me, based on career (maybe another super elite year from someone like Kobe if Bryant retired), peak (definitely in the sacred peaks) and where I'd draft him (pretty darn high - he's kind of like a scoring version of Scottie Pippen or an all-around better Dr. J) there really aren't any players left ahead of him. For me, I think Oscar would be the only one.

Think about Dwyane Wade, who we all seem comfortable with from somewhere between late teens and early 20s. Now remember he lost 2 years to injuries while LBJ was one of the best players in the world. And assuming those two years count, well, that's how you he ends up a few slots ahead, behind maybe only 13 or 14 other guys.

One more thing to remember about LBJ for me: His with/without numbers were +12.5 for the 13 games he missed in 08 and 10. His on/off, RAPM (http://stats-for-the-nba.appspot.com/ranking10, http://stats-for-the-nba.appspot.com/ranking09, http://stats-for-the-nba.appspot.com/ranking_rec) WS, EV, whatever we look at, basically tell the story of the best player in the league for a number of years. That's *already* historically excellent. For the people who want to ignore era and flaunt George MIkan's run of dominance, this isn't much different. Most guys just don't have 3 or 4 year stretches as the best player on earth. Russell. Kareem. Bird. Jordan. Shaq. That's basically the list.

And for those wondering why there's a lot more to James than just the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately flameout:

*He's already authored a number of legendary games, series and clutch moments: http://www.backpicks.com/2011/05/25/cog ... narrative/
*James has the highest PS scoring rate of any player in NBA history (2009)
*In elimination games, James has averaged 31-10-8 (52% TS, 5 TOV)
*He played on a team in Cleveland that was 1-13 in the PS when he shot under 50% TS.

So the "coming up short" thing has been building as a bias for years, but mostly because he's literally never been able to make a mistake without it being magnified (see Boston 2010) Meanwhile, we've got a career body of clutch dominance (he's been a late-game freak in the RS and PS for years), big performances against the best defenses, and carrying a weaker team as well as anyone in history.

If we did this vote or June 1, or in a year from now, I'm sure the sourness wouldn't exist that is causing people shy away from this vote.

[An Unbiased Fan]

Vote: Jerry West

Best pre-merger guard in NBA history. Amazing combo guard with excellent 2-way ability. Great longevity, and playoff performances. This is an easy choice for me.

Nomination: John Stockton

Perhaps the greatest facilitator ever. All-time assist & steals leader. Underrated defender, and a PG who actually had an impact on defense. Perhaps the greatest PG ever at setting screens. Amazing bball IQ. Best PG longevity in history by a good margin.

[Baller 24]

Vote: Oscar Robertson

I was really leaning towards Moses Malone this time around, but I've learned some interesting things about Robertson coming into this thread. There is a small defensive gap between him and West, has more and better playoff performances at peak form. And once Robertson was surrounded by a more structured supporting cast, he facilitated and played a key role to one of the best teams ever (one of the best offensive teams of all-time). Not that Jerry West didn't play a big role one of the best teams ('72), his playoff numbers took a significant dip, you can argue that he wasn't even the 2nd best player on the team during that playoff run. Robertson's got a similar situation to Garnett in terms of how the Royals built around him, missed the playoffs just like Garnett on three consecutive occasions at prime form.

Nominate: Walt Frazier

[Gongxi]

I have to concur with the Oscar vote. I'm interested in a Moses/LeBron argument in the next thread. Obviously LeBron loses the ever-important 'narrative' aspect, but I'm interested in beyond that.

[An Unbiased Fan]

Vote: Charles Barkley
Nomination: Steve Nash

Was down to Barkley and LeBron for me. You could say LeBron's already accomplished everything Barkley did team-wise/individually, but I've really soured on LeBron's playoff performances, especially the way he has gone out. Playing poorly is one thing, but not caring/quitting is unacceptable. Just can't trust him anymore because of his bizarre play in the last two years.

There's the potential that this will look absolutely ridiculous in the near future (Tragic Johnson style). Obviously, I treat these big narrative-driven arcs a little differently than most...but it's the obvious concern for LeBron. So much so that if he were continue to have it happen I would re-evaluate his entire career...although Im not there yet (Boston was almost nothing to me -- maybe 1 "weird" game -- and the Finals looked like fatigue/mental overthinking/lack of trust in shot). Those are issues, but everyone gets to have issues at some point in their career. If they are never addressed, then I think we say they are symptomatic of something bigger.

For me, it's a bit too early for Lebron, considering the company he has among the current nominations. He didn't have just 1 bad game against Boston 2 years ago, his efficiency in the last 3 games were really bad(46.8% TS), and this was with Cleveland up 2-1 before that. He rolled through the playoff in 09' against two weak opponents, but I think many of us are still baffled why he didn't check Rashard Lewis when that could have won the Cavs that ECF series. His perfomance in the Finals was just...ugh. I mean it's not like Dallas was a great defensive team. And it's not like Wade was sucking and Bron had to do it himself like with SA in 07'. If Lebron plays even up to his normal level, the Heat win in 5 or 6 games.

I guess this goes back to my issues with "peaks". People reference regular season success & stats alot when discussing it, but I'm big on RS & playoff performances combined. I don't see Lebron's peak at a GOAt level one at all, because it mostly comess in the RS. Against 50-win teams(where the pressure is higher), his record and numbers take a big hit. I know you like to reference 104 DRtg teams, but my issue is with Lebron's mindset against quality opponents, not just his efficiency agaisnt good efensive teams(which takes a hit too).

That said, I do see him getting picked within the next 5 choices. Talent-wise he is defintely GOAt level, he just needs to put together some elite RS + PS runs. Would also be nice if we could see an expansion in his skillset. It's amazing that a big 6'9 dude with his talent, can't post up to save his life.