RealGM Top 100 List #66

[therealbig3]

Making shots doesn't mean you're not taking bad shots. He hits those 3's a lot of the time, the ones he takes early in the shot clock. But there's a ton of times where he goes cold and he misses them, and he basically loses the team a possession, and he'll keep shooting it. I know you can't really complain when he makes it, and he can get hot and bring a team back in it, but he can also shoot you out of it. Isn't this a common criticism of a lot of volume scorers? Why should Billups be excused from it? Kobe is very efficient too, but his shot selection is rightfully criticized, since he hurts his team sometimes by forcing shot after shot. It's a similar criticism I have for Billups.

And Billups is a very good scorer, I already conceded that. But he's being given credit for two things mainly: being an incredibly smart player, and being a very good all-around player. But I actually think he's one-dimensional: he can score, but he provides little else. He doesn't turn the ball over much, but that's also because he's not passing/creating as much as other PGs. He's not a strong rebounder, and the evidence points to him being a below average defender. And I think his bball IQ is being overrated, I can't count the number of times I've heard the commentators criticize Billups for not passing in a certain situation and for taking a bad shot. And it's not like this was back in 03 or 04, when he was just entering his prime...I heard this when I was watching a Knicks game this past season.

And Billups actually gets bailed out a lot, because of the cheap fouls he draws. Even the Knicks commentators said that he shouldn't have gone to the line on a certain play when he blatantly flopped, but the refs gave him a foul anyway. I'm a Nets fan, and my team has plenty of history with the Pistons in 03 and 04, and we played them 4 times a year in the regular season too. I also watch a bunch of Knicks games, and I always watched the Pistons come playoff time. I couldn't stand Billups or Hamilton because of their flopping. This won't show up in the stats, and it shouldn't, because as far as anybody's concerned, Billups was fouled and went to the line. But it just shows that Billups is pretty reliant on the refs being lenient, and if you notice, Billups's efficiency shot up both in the regular season and the playoffs starting in 05, when no handchecking was enforced. I have doubts that Billups could have thrived or been as successful in a more physical era, or if the refs simply didn't give him some of the cheap calls that he routinely gets.

[ThaRegul8r]

If not for Russell, Thurmond would probably have been the best defender of the 60's.

Everyone in that era to a man said that Thurmond was second only to Russell as a defender.

[penbeast0]

Generally, we criticize the really efficient players less for taking bad shots and the inefficient players more because an efficient shooter is helping his team more than an inefficient one. You seem to be saying that Billups is efficient but could be much more so or else that Billups is efficient but if he passed the ball early in the shot clock instead of taking an open 3 that it would lead to more points for his team on a consistent basis. Either may be true but his level of efficiency is so good that seems unlikely.

For the record, Kobe's ts% is .556 for his career (.548 last year); Michael Jordan is at .569; Chaucey Billups is at .581 . . . I don't criticize MJ (or even Kobe) for taking bad shots although they certainly do sometimes; I'm not going to criticize Billups for it either.

Now John Wall or Jordan Crawford last year, them I'll criticize.

[therealbig3]

Fair enough.

I'm getting more at your second suggestion, that overall, it would be better for the team if he didn't take those quick shots.

[lorak]

vote: Thurmond
nominate: Worthy

[therealbig3]

Just to add to Thurmond's case:

Starting in 71, we have data for TRB%, which is the best way to determine how good of a rebounder somebody was imo. Thurmond's prime lasted until 73. In that time:

71: 14.8%
72: 16.6%
73: 18.0%

And in terms of raw stats, these are the 3 lowest rpg years of his prime, while playing similar minutes. So, he most likely had higher TRB%'s in previous years. As a point of reference, Tim Duncan peaked at 19.6%, Kevin Garnett peaked at 20.3%, Hakeem Olajuwon peaked at 19.8%, and Charles Barkley peaked at 20.9%,. These are four of the best rebounding big men of all time, and Nate Thurmond was most likely clearly a bit better than them in his rebounding prime.

We know he was a monster defender. He was also a very good passing big man, registering the first quadruple-double, since they started recording blocks. He regularly averaged around 3 apg, peaking at 4.2 apg.

He does get criticized as a scorer, but looking at his TS% relative to league average:

65: -2.3%
66: -3.3%
67: -1.3%
68: -3.2%
69: -3.4%
70: -2.8%
71: +0.1%
72: -1.2%
73: +0.1%

So yeah, he's below league average. But he's not horribly inefficient, is he? 1-3% points under league average for the most part, with a couple of years right at average. What's important to me is that a) Thurmond played in a time when efficiency wasn't preached and people just took bad shot after bad shot. So players were generally less efficient. And b) As you can see, when the league slowly started focusing on maximizing each possession, rather than trying to get as many possessions as possible, you can see that Thurmond also started getting more efficient, and the gap between league average efficiency and his own stayed about the same (and was pretty negligible from 71-73). I definitely think that if Thurmond played later, when coaches emphasized being efficient, he would have shot less or he would have taken better shots. I think you'd be talking about a post player with average efficiency giving you about 15 ppg, 12+ rpg, 2+ apg, 3+ bpg, and a guy who would be challenging and beating Dwight Howard for DPOY. He'd have an overall pretty huge impact. He'd probably be considered for MVP if his team won enough.

[ThaRegul8r]

He'd probably be considered for MVP if his team won enough.

Thurmond was MVP runner-up to Wilt in Wilt's finest season. Everyone was talking about him being the heir-apparent. It was his Warriors who took the most games in a series in the playoffs against arguably the GOAT single-season team.

[therealbig3]

He'd probably be considered for MVP if his team won enough.

Thurmond was MVP runner-up to Wilt in Wilt's finest season. Everyone was talking about him being the heir-apparent. It was his Warriors who took the most games in a series in the playoffs against arguably the GOAT single-season team.

Yeah, the more I reflect on Thurmond, the more I think he got underrated in this project. His inefficient scoring was really the only knock on him. But if we used that argument as consistently as we did against Thurmond, Russell wouldn't be #2. I'm not questioning that pick at all, I agree with it, but Russell was just as inefficient as Thurmond, sometimes drastically moreso, but everyone pretty much understood that wasn't what he was about, and he simply impacted the game in a different way than others, through rebounding, defense, and passing. It was the same thing we saw with KG. It seems to me that Thurmond was the same way, a poor man's Russell really, yet he got kind of ignored for a while there.

[lorak]

1. I remember analysing 60s and Thurmond anchored top2 defenses at the time. statistically teams he anchored had a lot better defense than Wilt. it needs to be said that I'm not sure of it and somebody would have to double check me on this one.

I think he only two times anchored top2 defense (in 1967 and 1975), anyway, here's Thurmond's teams ortg and drtg relatively to LA:

Code: Select all

estimations pre 1974
year      ortg   drtg   diff   
1963   SFW   -0,6   +1,1   -1,7   
1964   SFW   -1,5   -5,9   +4,4   rookie 26 MPG
1965   SFW   -6,6   -1,5   -5,1   41MPG, Wilt trade
1966   SFW   -2,8   -0,6   -2,2   
1967   SFW   -0,9   -3,2   +2,3   65G
1968   SFW   -3,3   -2,8   -0,5   51G
1969   SFW   -4,0   -2,7   -1,3   
1970   SFW   -5,1   -1,8   -3,3   43G
1971   SFW   -0,4   +0,9   -1,3   
1972   GSW   -1,6   -2,3   +0,7   
1973   GSW   +1,1   -1,7   +2,8   
1974   GSW   +3,1   +0,7   +2,4   62G

1975   GSW   +2,7   -0,4   +3,1   in CHI
1974   CHI   -1,0   -4,1   +3,1   in GSW
1975   CHI   -0,3   -3,3   +3,0   34MPG
1976   CHI   -3,1   -0,3   -2,8   13G, 20 MPG


So it looks rather bad. Only one all time great defensive team (1964), and he wasn't even the most important defender on that team. And of course Thurmond's teams were horrible on offense and that's why overall (efficiency differential) they often were below league average.

[penbeast0]

If Thurmond isn't a terribly bad offensive player but his teams were so horrible on offense and they were built around the offense of two people -- Rick Barry and Nate Thurmond -- then Rick Barry doesn't belong ahead of the much more efficient (and less of a jerk) Adrian Dantley. Or Thurmond really is a bad offensive player but a great defender and rebounder which is where I am coming from -- and that still may be enough to get him in here.

[Doctor MJ]

He'd probably be considered for MVP if his team won enough.

Thurmond was MVP runner-up to Wilt in Wilt's finest season. Everyone was talking about him being the heir-apparent. It was his Warriors who took the most games in a series in the playoffs against arguably the GOAT single-season team.

Not to be a wet blanket, if Thurmond and Rick Barry's team who played Wilt in the championship.

[lorak]

If Thurmond isn't a terribly bad offensive player but his teams were so horrible on offense and they were built around the offense of two people -- Rick Barry and Nate Thurmond -- then Rick Barry doesn't belong ahead of the much more efficient (and less of a jerk) Adrian Dantley. Or Thurmond really is a bad offensive player but a great defender and rebounder which is where I am coming from -- and that still may be enough to get him in here.

Warriors with Thurmond AND Barry ('66, '67, '73, '74) are the best offensive teams during Thurmond's career. And we see clear improvement in both cases when Barry joined the team (and when he left in 1967 they became much worse on offense). So I think Thurmond was really bad offensive player, maybe not as bad as Ben Wallace, but not much better than him also.

[ElGee]

vote: Grant Hill
nominate: David Thompson

Has everyone forgotten about Grant HIll? He hasn't been voted in yet...

[ElGee]

Just way too much love in this project for role players like Jones and Rodman. Makes no sense to me. And I'm using the term love literally. I think thoughtful posters who like them as players -- I sure as hell do -- for what they add to the team are valuing those contributions ahead of overall value and Grade B superstars. At least there is some consistency about though...but c'mon, Bobby Jones over some of the guys left on the board? Why did he rarely start and play ~28 mpg? His peak couldn't touch David Thompson's IMO.

To be honest, I was hoping to push for an all-Nuggets conversation before nominating anyone from the group. Nom'ed Bobby because I needed to pick someone, and he has been on my mind.

Nuggets have Jones, Thompson, and Issel as a trio, and I think it really warrants conversation.

I think it makes sense to go chronologically.

'73-74. None of the players are on the team. The team is weak, SRS of -0.49.

'74-75. The great leap forward. The team's SRS jumps to +6.62, and now the team's record is +6.62. So what happened?

Well, major changes:

1. Mack Calvin joins the team appears to be the anointed star. Makes 1st team All-ABA.

2. Rookie Bobby Jones. He plays 2700+ minutes, which is 2nd on the team and more than any other new player. He also leads the team in Win Shares.

3. Larry Brown becomes the coach. This was certainly a factor in the success, but how big of a factor, and how much should that count against the players?

'75-76: Another great year, but the SRS and team record dip a bit. Noteworthy changes:

1. Mack Calvin's gone. btw, Calvin changed teams 9 times in his 12 year career. Pretty hard to fathom that a player a guy capable of spearheading a 6+ SRS improvement wouldn't also be worth keeping on your team.

2. Dan Issel joins and leads the team in PER and WS.

3. Rookie David Thompson joins and leads the team in scoring.

Incidentally, Thompson plays about 3100 minutes, while Issel and Jones play about 2800.

Denver joins the NBA and remains elite before descending toward mediocrity. When did that descent begin in earnest? Debatable. The first big SRS drop came in '77-78 (-4.15), but the team record didn't see a serious decline until ('79-80) when we see a second big SRS drop.

If you don't care about SRS, the narrative is straight forward:

1. Thompson missing time and regressing.

2. Also, Larry Brown quit late in '78-79 and his brain was missed. Incidentally, Brown quit and went back to college to coach UCLA because of George McGinnis. McGinnis was just such an awful follower of instruction that Brown demanded he be traded, but management refused. McGinnis was acquired by trading Bobby Jones away.

If you don't want to ignore the first SRS drop it becomes tougher though.

The big symptom of '77-78 is that the defense fell off dramatically. They were #1 in the league on defense in their first year in the NBA, but fell to 15th of 22 the next year. Looking at the 4 factors, the big thing that stands out is that their ability to force turnovers went from elite to mediocre. Worth noting that in '76-77 led the league in steals by a wide margin. They had 941 steals, the league average was 768, and only one other team was within a 100 steals from them.

By contrast, in '77-78, they only had 824 steals. Big dropoff, and there were a variety of factors there but has to be noted:

1. Jones leads the team in steals both times. First time with 186, second time with 137. So big dropoff from Jones again correlates clearly with team success.

2. Thompson & Issel combine for 205 steals the first year, and 192 the next. Not a big difference there.

Okay so dropoff in steals - maybe the team had to do that because they couldn't gamble as much? Makes me want to look at blocks. Incidentally, team blocks. What happened there? Well, they also went down, from 471 to 422, which took the team down from very strong to mediocre. Perhaps that relates to something that forced a change in strategy.

Incidentally, who led the team in blocks in '76-77? Jones with 162.
Okay, and who led the team in blocks in '77-78? Jones with 126.

So the team blocks 49 less shots than the previous year, and 36 of those less blocks are caused by Jones blocking less.

Every where we look it seems, we see Jones correlated with team success in Denver.

And then he gets traded to Philly for a much bigger name, and Philly ends up very happy they made the trade, just as Larry Brown bangs his head against the wall in Denver.

I just have a very hard time looking at Jones as a mere role player. His low minutes is a problem, but I do think it's appropriate to look at him as someone who at his best was having pretty huge impact on a per minute basis.

Hold on a second - there's more to the Nuggets transformation.

In 1974, they were +0.1 on offense. In 1975, Jones' rookie year (and Larry Brown's) they were +4.7. The majority of their improvement was on offense. Mack Calvin, for what it's worth, made his 5th consecutive all-star team that year and second consecutive all-nba 1st team...and his stats certainly make it look like it was impossible for him to NOT be having some kind of positive impact. Mike Green also made really nice offensive strides from his 1st to second year (again, you hear me talk about that transition a lot - we see it over and over in players). EDIT They even added Fatty Taylor and Van Breda Kolff to the rotation (not that important, but it wasn't exactly the same team).

In 1976, they lose Mack Calvin and Mike Green (17-9 54% shooting in 75). The rotation again changes slightly and Issell joins while Thompson come in as a rookie. What happens? Denver is again +4.6 on offense and -0.7 on defense (slightly worse on defense than in 75).

What happens in the postseason in 75 and 76 (numbers relative to environment)?

75 PS: +5.7 Ortg +7.1 Drtg!
76 PS: +5.3 Ortg +4.7 Drtg!

So again, we see a team that is succeeding with good offense and not showing much signs of dominant defense. In 77 they join the NBA...

+1.2 Ortg and -3.4 Drtg... No. 1 defense in the league by a good amount. (2000 MP by Paul Silas probably didn't hurt after his history of good defenses and awesome defensive rebounding in Boston.) Also Bobby Jones' minutes go down that year (29.5 mpg) so I find it somewhat difficult to give him a lot of credit for "anchoring" that kind of defense. And for the record, I happen to agree that Jones is one of the better perimeter defensive players ever, we're just trying to gauge his impact here...

They lose to the eventual champion Blazers in 6 games. This time the offense performs right around average versus Portland and the defense holds them down about -4 (consistent with the RS team strengths).

So who was doing what? Well, in 1976 Thompson AND Bobby Jones each received a single MVP vote (5 media members from each market voted, so it's possible that was home bias). He went for 40-10-5 in a critical game against Kentucky. In the FInals, he went for 30 in G1 and 24 in G2...and averaged 26.4 ppg on 61% TS without using the 3-ball!

So when we look at Bobby Jones, how can we attribute a lot of their success in this period to him (and specifically his defensive presence)? You point out what are small correlations between a defensive factor and Jones' role in that factor, and that makes perfect sense to me, because Bobby Jones was good in those areas and those areas count, it's just not the same load as playing 36-40 mpg and being a dominant paint defender (see: Thurmond, Nate).

Finally, I'll just add that just watching the team play, it makes little sense to see Jones as the key guy. Thompson, at the least, can boast the argument that he was a world-class all-around (yes, all-around!) wing player in the Kobe-mold. No, he wasn't as good as peak Kobe or Dr. J or the elite, but that's what this guy did, and he took over key games on offense because of it.

As you said, in 1978 -- probably Thompson's peak -- he finishes 3rd in MVP and Denver has a +1.4 offense but regresses mightily to +0.6 on defense. And it seems pretty fair to say at that point they are a 3-man team, but I won't comment on their defensive structure/scheme out of ignorance. (Although rookie Anthony Roberts looks like he progresses decently on offense.) I just don't see how to value someone who probably is never a top-10 or top-15 player over a guy who has a few years near the top of the heap. (And post 78, we're talking about basically a 26-28 mpg guy.)

[penbeast0]

A quick look at that Nugget info:

74, they were poor, particularly at guard where Al Smith was never much good and supposed team star Warren Jabali succumbed to substance and anger/defiance issues. They added Calvin to Ralph Simpson who gave them 2 decent scorers, but Calvin went from team to team because he was a pure shooter who wasn't a natural point and at 5'11 or so, couldn't guard most guys he faced; Mike Green did transition into a guy with decent stats but he didnt turn into a legit center -- look at the rest of his career -- he was a journeyman with a good jump shot but again, not much defensively nor a great rebounder. Similar to their 74 center, Robish; Beck was the team thug and had been there forever. Maybe Green took a step up but Robisch and Beck didn't "join the rotation," they were given less time. So they added one no-D shooter to a team of them plus a couple of non-scoring defensive specialists in Jan Van Breda Koff and Fatty Taylor (Taylor actually played a much bigger role). So you have no-D shooters at PG (Calvin), SF (Simpson --the team's leading scorer), and C (Green/Robisch) and defensive role player who could also play PG at SG (Taylor) but the big change was Larry Brown and the Jump-and-switch defense which was a big shock to the rest of the league. It used the team's strength, quickness, and avoided the team's weakness, man coverage -- but it took quick bigs with good smarts and that's why Bobby Jones was pretty universally regarded as the team's best player even as a rookie. He was the defensive captain that made the thing work and it created a ton of turnovers (1st in Steals) leading to fast break points for Calvin and SImpson -- Jones had 2 st/g and close to 2bl/g as well. Denver had the best record in EITHER league despite none of the other players making anything of themselves after the merger.

Unfortunately, like many gimmick defenses, it worked less well when teams had time to plan for it and get used to the pressure and they lost to the McGinnis/Daniels Pacers size and strength. The next year they added established stars Issel and Thompson and made it to the finals again with the league's best record but again the switching defense fell pray, this time to Julius Erving's greatest series ever as he abused the switches and hit everything from 25 feet on in.

Last point -- There were already many rumors about Brown being on his way out before the McGinnis/Jones swap though it certainly didn't help. That's just Larry Brown.

[therealbig3]

I can't really see Hill over Carter, personally. Carter was a guy who took on a huge offensive burden in the playoffs...Hill never really did, or at least, wasn't really able to. And Carter's time in NJ gets underrated, while I feel that Hill's prime gets overrated.

And regarding Thurmond...even if he was a bad offensive player...what about the numbers that bastillon posted? Regardless of what he was good at, he had huge impact. Russell was a bad offensive player too (very unimpressive scoring numbers, poor team offenses), but he had such a monstrous impact on defense that it makes him a GOAT candidate. I think it's a similar case with Thurmond, though obviously not as extreme.

[ElGee]

I can't really see Hill over Carter, personally. Carter was a guy who took on a huge offensive burden in the playoffs...Hill never really did, or at least, wasn't really able to. And Carter's time in NJ gets underrated, while I feel that Hill's prime gets overrated.

And regarding Thurmond...even if he was a bad offensive player...what about the numbers that bastillon posted? Regardless of what he was good at, he had huge impact. Russell was a bad offensive player too (very unimpressive scoring numbers, poor team offenses), but he had such a monstrous impact on defense that it makes him a GOAT candidate. I think it's a similar case with Thurmond, though obviously not as extreme.

Agree on Thurmond.

Obviously you are Carter's biggest supporter and have made sound points on him. It's weird, when he first was mentioned I thought "I'm going to have Vince Carter much higher than everyone else." Now I think "I might have Vince Carter lower than everyone else." And I really only disagree with your classifications of him slightly (in the negative direction) unless you are understating it. As it stands, I have Carter at around No. 75. To boot:

I don't happen to think much of his rookie season in the grand scheme of things. In 2000 I do have him as a top-10 player in the league, but it's really low all-nba quality stuff IMO. In 2001 he's slightly better, but it's in the same ballpark...and that's arguably his peak. He's 22nd overall in Ilardi's 03-09 study which really only captures the end of his dropoff and should treat him well. He's +2.4 on offense which is 36th -- 33rd if we remove small minute players. His on/off numbers in NJ reflect someone having positive impact, as his game would suggest.

But 02 and 03 are basically lost to me due to injury. (03 he's at least there at the end)

What's left is 04-07, and I'm not sure he does play his best basketball in New Jersey. You make a compelling case that he does, but (a) he's playing with Kidd and (b) the rules are different to make him look statistically more favorable. Not saying it's a bad stance, but how much better was he in NJ than in Toronto at his best? He looks excellent in the PS but I watched those series against Indy and the sometimes Shaq-less Heat and thought he played well, but nothing otherworldly. (eg Decent game 1 and they win with a 107 ORtg, he blows up in G3 and they post a 101 ORtg.)

I wonder how others compare 06 Carter to Allen and Iverson? I'm open to an argument there that would move him up for me...but at the end of the day I'm not wild about drafting Carter. Never liked his defense, he has some injury problems, and there are many all-around wings I would want on a team ahead of him, although at least he has a decent outside shot.

[Doctor MJ]

Hold on a second - there's more to the Nuggets transformation.

In 1974, they were +0.1 on offense. In 1975, Jones' rookie year (and Larry Brown's) they were +4.7. The majority of their improvement was on offense. Mack Calvin, for what it's worth, made his 5th consecutive all-star team that year and second consecutive all-nba 1st team...and his stats certainly make it look like it was impossible for him to NOT be having some kind of positive impact. Mike Green also made really nice offensive strides from his 1st to second year (again, you hear me talk about that transition a lot - we see it over and over in players). EDIT They even added Fatty Taylor and Van Breda Kolff to the rotation (not that important, but it wasn't exactly the same team).

In 1976, they lose Mack Calvin and Mike Green (17-9 54% shooting in 75). The rotation again changes slightly and Issell joins while Thompson come in as a rookie. What happens? Denver is again +4.6 on offense and -0.7 on defense (slightly worse on defense than in 75).

What happens in the postseason in 75 and 76 (numbers relative to environment)?

75 PS: +5.7 Ortg +7.1 Drtg!
76 PS: +5.3 Ortg +4.7 Drtg!

So again, we see a team that is succeeding with good offense and not showing much signs of dominant defense. In 77 they join the NBA...

+1.2 Ortg and -3.4 Drtg... No. 1 defense in the league by a good amount. (2000 MP by Paul Silas probably didn't hurt after his history of good defenses and awesome defensive rebounding in Boston.) Also Bobby Jones' minutes go down that year (29.5 mpg) so I find it somewhat difficult to give him a lot of credit for "anchoring" that kind of defense. And for the record, I happen to agree that Jones is one of the better perimeter defensive players ever, we're just trying to gauge his impact here...

They lose to the eventual champion Blazers in 6 games. This time the offense performs right around average versus Portland and the defense holds them down about -4 (consistent with the RS team strengths).

So who was doing what? Well, in 1976 Thompson AND Bobby Jones each received a single MVP vote (5 media members from each market voted, so it's possible that was home bias). He went for 40-10-5 in a critical game against Kentucky. In the FInals, he went for 30 in G1 and 24 in G2...and averaged 26.4 ppg on 61% TS without using the 3-ball!

So when we look at Bobby Jones, how can we attribute a lot of their success in this period to him (and specifically his defensive presence)? You point out what are small correlations between a defensive factor and Jones' role in that factor, and that makes perfect sense to me, because Bobby Jones was good in those areas and those areas count, it's just not the same load as playing 36-40 mpg and being a dominant paint defender (see: Thurmond, Nate).

Finally, I'll just add that just watching the team play, it makes little sense to see Jones as the key guy. Thompson, at the least, can boast the argument that he was a world-class all-around (yes, all-around!) wing player in the Kobe-mold. No, he wasn't as good as peak Kobe or Dr. J or the elite, but that's what this guy did, and he took over key games on offense because of it.

As you said, in 1978 -- probably Thompson's peak -- he finishes 3rd in MVP and Denver has a +1.4 offense but regresses mightily to +0.6 on defense. And it seems pretty fair to say at that point they are a 3-man team, but I won't comment on their defensive structure/scheme out of ignorance. (Although rookie Anthony Roberts looks like he progresses decently on offense.) I just don't see how to value someone who probably is never a top-10 or top-15 player over a guy who has a few years near the top of the heap. (And post 78, we're talking about basically a 26-28 mpg guy.)

Good points worth bringing up.

I think the thing I keep thinking about is you saying "How can a guy playing that little have such a big impact?", but me thinking about his major drop off in blocks & steals as those happen to be exactly the areas dropping off when the defense changes from all-world to mediocre. I mean, I get that Jones isn't doing everything himself out there, but I'm talking about a pretty huge team drop off in defense here and the most obvious change comes from a decrease in production from the player considered to be the team's defensive star and a lock for defensive accolades each year.

It really cries out for some other theory because as it stands it just makes you realize that regardless of the amount of minutes Jones was playing, he was getting quite a lot of amount of blocks and steals that the team clearly couldn't get without him, and that getting turnovers was the only of the 4 components of defense that Denver was really, really good at. That kind of correlation, even if you say that Jones could only have that impact with the help of his teammates, how can you not give a lot of credit to Jones?

So we have evidence of strong correlation to team success with Jones, we have him comparable peak WS number to Thompson, and much bigger career numbers, we've got the fact that the team's rise to elite status came without Thompson and left with Thompson still doing his thing.

None of this makes me say "Jones was the true star of the team. Thompson was a stat hog.", but nor do I think it makes sense to talk about Jones as if he's just a Battier/Collison-level role player. Jones was doing something truly unique here.

[penbeast0]

Yeah, that's what I felt like when ElGee started pushing Marques Johnson. I'm used to being the only one that brings him up and suddenly people are talking about him as one of the top 50 of all time and I'm the guy saying . . . Whoa! He was good but are we really talking about him this early?

[Doctor MJ]

Vote: Robert Parish

I'm more comfortable with his all around game than what I get from Thurmond.

Now obviously I've got Russell as my GOAT so I believe that a 60s era center can theoretically have jurassic-size impact on defense. However, I'm convinced of that because of what I see the Celtics have done. We simply don't see the same thing with Thurmond. I believe he was a superb defensive center, and probably the best man defender of the biggest bigs in history, but much of Russell's impact came from having swingman-levels of agility which I simply don't think Thurmond had.

I think good points have been made that Thurmond's shooting efficiency wasn't actually THAT terrible, but the fact remains that I simply don't want someone on my team scoring 20 points unless he's, y'know, quite good at it. Of course, it's hard to know the right way to judge a player based on what could simply considered a poor coaching strategy, and in general this doesn't bother me that terribly. I still don't see a clear edge of Thurmond over someone like Mutombo, and I prefer a strong offensive and defensive player who can play a variety of options with strong longevity like Parish.

Nominate: Tiny Archibald

This is real tough, but I feel like I have to at least say this at some point:

The year Tiny led the league in points and assists, the team led the league in offensive efficiency. You don't hear about this because the team overall was bad, and that overall factor makes you wonder if the offense was "legit", but it's a mind-blowing enough thing that it needs to be discussed. It's really without question the most "Whoa" peak thing around among players not yet nominated, and since Tiny is in the discussion right now, I'll get behind him at least for the moment.