2011-12 RealGM Player of the Year Discussion Thread

[AnaheimRoyale]

Lebron looked like a star in the Bulls series last year, when Wade was nowhere to be seen. I don't necessarily think Dirk winning it is totally unreasonable, but it's dubious to be sure. There are other examples I was thinking of that were bad though...

[mysticbb]

Yeah, Kobe's defense is such a mess. The Lakers are only 3 full points better defensively with him on the court.

That is not true at all. The Lakers with Bryant on the court this season had 104.9 DRtg (league average was so far 104.4!), without him 106.3. That is 1.4 points difference. Bryant improves the defense, but that is hardly due to him playing awesome defensively, rather than others cover his mistakes off the ball.

Not making big impact?

Maybe we just have a complete different understanding what the word "big" means, because with Bryant the Lakers played +1.7, without him -2.3, that makes a 4pt difference. And unless you want to tell me that Bryant's backup is some sort of All-NBA caliber player, I really have a hard time seeing that this is some sort of "big" impact.

[mysticbb]

Really? it was "obvious" who played better between Dirk and James last year in the Finals?

It wasn't to you? Nowitzki for example had 16.6 game score in 40 minutes, while James had 13.7 in 43 minutes. During the minutes with Nowitzki on the court the Mavericks were at +8.5, without him at -29.1 in the finals. The Heat with James were at -8.4, without James at +39.4. So, what exactly did James better than Nowitzki which would warrant that we call James the better performer during the finals?

[An Unbiased Fan]

Yeah, Kobe's defense is such a mess. The Lakers are only 3 full points better defensively with him on the court.

That is not true at all. The Lakers with Bryant on the court this season had 104.9 DRtg (league average was so far 104.4!), without him 106.3. That is 1.4 points difference. Bryant improves the defense, but that is hardly due to him playing awesome defensively, rather than others cover his mistakes off the ball.

This is ridiculous.

1) You're using on/off numbers which is faulty because they don't take into account rotations, or how much garbage time was included in the calculations, etc.. I mean Kobe played 38.5 MPG, so you're trying to extrapolate a relation with the other 9.5 MPG with his defensive impact. That's just silly, and ripe with error.

2) Not only do you use those numbers.....but then you dismiss the fact that LA's defense is 1.4 better with Kobe, by saying,"but that is hardly due to him playing awesome defensively, rather than others cover his mistakes off the ball".

So you chastise others for looking at the game, but disregard the faulty numbers you used, to say others were covering for Kobe.

Oh, and who was covering by the way? Fisher? Sessions?? Bynum who is slloowww on rotations??? Pau?!?? I mean really dude, just stop.

Maybe we just have a complete different understanding what the word "big" means, because with Bryant the Lakers played +1.7, without him -2.3, that makes a 4pt difference. And unless you want to tell me that Bryant's backup is some sort of All-NBA caliber player, I really have a hard time seeing that this is some sort of "big" impact.

When the game is in play, Kobe's impact was fairly huge. Again, you can't treat raw on/off numbers as equal because they're not. The 9.5 MPG Kobe wasn't in the game includes garbage time, and various rotations.

[mysticbb]

This is ridiculous.

No, not everything you don't understand and is against your opinion is ridiculous. ;)

Matter of fact is that the defense with Bryant was below league average, whether he improved that defense or not is really not the point. Matter of fact is that Bryant's off ball defense is rather bad. Yeah, he looks good against a ball handler, but in how many possessions did he actually defend the ball handler? The Lakers had to defend 8592 plays this season, 729 were defended by Bryant as the primary defender. Seriously, that is such a small amount of plays Bryant defended against the ball handler while in most plays he was actually defending off the ball. And please, watch Bryant act on defense when he is not matched up with the ball handler and away from the ball. There is a reason that Bryant is one of the worst players in the league defending the spot up shooter, because he is constantly too much away from his opponent player. And the opponents are actually using that weakness against the Lakers.

So you chastise others for looking at the game, but disregard the faulty numbers you used, to say others were covering for Kobe.

Nope, I say how it is. Did you even watch him play defense or are you constantly just focussed on how much points he scores?

When the game is in play, Kobe's impact was fairly huge. Again, you can't treat raw on/off numbers as equal because they're not. The 9.5 MPG Kobe wasn't in the game includes garbage time, and various rotations.

With Bryant the Lakers were +1.7 this season, the Suns with Nash were at +4.1. Do you really want to argue that the Suns had actually a better support around Nash than the Lakers around Bryant? See, statements like "Kobe's impact was fairly huge" are ridiculous, because that is not seen in the results, it is not seen in the reality. I'm sorry, but I really don't see how a reasonable person can try to argue that Bryant had a "fairly huge" impact.

[therealbig3]

Because imo, ranking Dirk over LeBron is based on a 6-game stretch, because I thought LeBron was clearly better than Dirk during the regular season, and was comparable to Dirk in the first 3 rounds of the playoffs.

I personally think it was a bit prisoner of the moment, because LeBron's regular season was completely forgotten, as were his great performances against Boston and Chicago.

And Dirk's claim to POY isn't even based on his Finals, it's based on his series against LA and OKC, because he wasn't all that great in the Finals, at least compared to his earlier series.

[Doctor MJ]

Because imo, ranking Dirk over LeBron is based on a 6-game stretch, because I thought LeBron was clearly better than Dirk during the regular season, and was comparable to Dirk in the first 3 rounds of the playoffs.

I personally think it was a bit prisoner of the moment, because LeBron's regular season was completely forgotten, as were his great performances against Boston and Chicago.

And Dirk's claim to POY isn't even based on his Finals, it's based on his series against LA and OKC, because he wasn't all that great in the Finals, at least compared to his earlier series.

Along the lines of what I was saying, all year long the Mavs were hurting more when Dirk went out than the Heat when LeBron went out. I had Dirk as my MVP in the regular season until injuries took their toll, and at regular season's end iirc I had Dirk again ahead of LeBron (though he wasn't my regular season MVP, Dwight was).

[therealbig3]

Because imo, ranking Dirk over LeBron is based on a 6-game stretch, because I thought LeBron was clearly better than Dirk during the regular season, and was comparable to Dirk in the first 3 rounds of the playoffs.

I personally think it was a bit prisoner of the moment, because LeBron's regular season was completely forgotten, as were his great performances against Boston and Chicago.

And Dirk's claim to POY isn't even based on his Finals, it's based on his series against LA and OKC, because he wasn't all that great in the Finals, at least compared to his earlier series.

Along the lines of what I was saying, all year long the Mavs were hurting more when Dirk went out than the Heat when LeBron went out. I had Dirk as my MVP in the regular season until injuries took their toll, and at regular season's end iirc I had Dirk again ahead of LeBron (though he wasn't my regular season MVP, Dwight was).

Ah, well in that case, then I can understand Dirk's case over LeBron. If you ranked him over LeBron during the regular season, then yeah, he should go ahead of LeBron overall.

I disagree with that strongly though, which is why I was a little surprised at Dirk over LeBron.

BTW, Dallas doing worse without Dirk than Miami without LeBron doesn't necessarily mean Dirk>LeBron. It just means that Dallas was more dependent on Dirk than Miami was on LeBron (which makes sense, because they still had a healthy Wade and Bosh). This year, we saw how valuable LeBron can be, because Wade was injured for much of the season, and was ineffective for even more games, but I don't think he's necessarily a "better" player than last year, just has to shoulder more responsibilities.

[ElGee]

Really? it was "obvious" who played better between Dirk and James last year in the Finals?

Based on what? Can you elaborate?

Hmm, sounds you've got some pent up thought on this for us. I can't imagine you are in doubt why most people were underwhelmed by LeBron during that series. He took a back seat to Wade, and then seemed quite passive later on when the team really needed him to alpha. I understand the reasons for the former - but it's not exactly something that's going to earn him "MVP points", and when you connect that to an actual failure on his part, it is a real issue.

I understand that Dirk wasn't as impressive in the finals as he had been at some earlier times, but he still looked like a star out there.

If Miami wins the series, you don't say "it's obvious." No one does. This, despite Dirk playing exactly the same. This is nothing I haven't said before. It's Winning Bias.

I don't object to concluding Dirk was better. I object to the "obvious" part that everyone assumes. If we put up a poll between two fairly close performances that were both wins, the results on who played better would be close to split. If we put up a poll on who was better in last year's Finals, the numbers would approach 100% for Dirk. That's whacky. It's the result of Winning Bias.

GmSc 16.3 to 13.3
EV 0.5 to -0.6
Offensive EV 0.5 to 1.5

James played 43 minutes to Dirks' 40 so Dirk needed to be 8% better on impact per minute to equal LeBron. Dirk's role in the Mavs offensive was to run as a primary scoring hub/threat, not turn it over much and shoot the hell out of the ball. He averaged 23 pts/100 on 53.7% TS. Averages only tell so much in a 7-gamer though:

G1 27 pts 58% TS 7.9% TOV 5 OC 6 FD
G2 24 pts 51.5% TS 17.7% TOV 7 OC 5 FD
G3 34 pts 68.1% TS 13.4% TOV 3 OC 5 FD
G4 21 pts 44.9% TS 11.4% TOV 4 OC 4 FD
G5 29 pts 64.7% TS 8.2% TOV 4 OC 6 FD
G6 21 pts 37.7% TS 6.7% TOV 1 OC 0 FD

Dirk's last game was especially horrible, and it's something he himself seemed to be the only one to comment on. The series was really an offensive lowpoint for him in many regards since 2007 vs. GS after about 6 or 7 great shooting series. Compare to LeBron, who was an all-around defensive dynamo and an all-around offensive catalyst heading into the Finals:

G1 24-9-5 71% TS 5.6% TOV 8 OC 3 FD
G2 20-8-4 59.7% TS 23.0% TOV 3 OC 5 FD
G3 17-3-9 53.9% TS 20.2% TOV 7 OC 2 FD
G4 8-9-7 31.3% TS 23.9% TOV 13 OC 5 FD
G5 17-10-10 42.8% TS 16.8% TOV 14 OC 6 FD
G6 21-4-6 62.6% TS 26.4% TS 6 OC 2 FD

By Offensive EV
G1 James 10.1 Dirk 5.4
G2 Dirk 2.0, James 1.5
G3 Dirk 9.4 James 1.9
G4 James 2.3 Dirk -1.3
G5 Dirk 7.7 James 4.0
G6 James 3.2 Dirk -6.2

Throughout the series, James created more offense than any player on either team (11 OC/100). Dirk had his teammates set up slightly more of his offense (11% 2's, 43% 3's to James 9% 2's, 33% 3's).

James had 3 better games by this metric, Dirk had 3. James crushed Dirk in G6 and was solidly better in G1. Dirk crushed James in G3 and was comfortably better in G5. LeBron's failures in this series extended to the defensive end, where his ridiculous impact wasn't felt. People made way more shots against him than normal. Of course, he failed to pressure the defense quite as much as he normally does (drew fewer fouls) but you can see in a number of games he does some significant damage (14 opportunities created and 6 fouls drawn is monstrous - he had 34 OC's and 33 FD's in 5 games v Chi for comparison.)

All told, it's close. My point is, what on earth makes it obvious? If we watched all 466 James possessions and all 431 Dirk possessions, and just watched those two guys -- we didn't have a scoreboard, or even cared when a teammates shot went in, or about foul shots, etc. -- I don't think there would be anything "obvious" about who was better.

[Doctor MJ]

Ah, well in that case, then I can understand Dirk's case over LeBron. If you ranked him over LeBron during the regular season, then yeah, he should go ahead of LeBron overall.

I disagree with that strongly though, which is why I was a little surprised at Dirk over LeBron.

Perfectly reasonable thoughts.

BTW, Dallas doing worse without Dirk than Miami without LeBron doesn't necessarily mean Dirk>LeBron. It just means that Dallas was more dependent on Dirk than Miami was on LeBron (which makes sense, because they still had a healthy Wade and Bosh). This year, we saw how valuable LeBron can be, because Wade was injured for much of the season, and was ineffective for even more games, but I don't think he's necessarily a "better" player than last year, just has to shoulder more responsibilities.

Ah, but this isn't really a "who is the best player" debate. I actually refused to accept one poster's '69 vote because he picked Wilt, and when I asked him his reason, he said "I pick Wilt every year because I think in any given year he could have played better than everyone else and I don't care if he didn't help the Lakers at all this year". This is about what one player actually accomplished in the given year.

Now, that in and of itself has a ton of wiggle room, but arguments need to go beyond "Well if LeBron had stayed in Cleveland I think he'd have been the MVP this year, so he's my POY".

(btw, that '69 poster I didn't ban him from the project. I told him that all he had to do was supply a new list based on the clarified project standards and give his reasoning which I fully expected him to make only slight tweaks and then give a reasoning just enough to placate me. Instead though he quite the project.)

[therealbig3]

@Doctor MJ

Fair enough.

@ElGee

I think the main argument against LeBron in that series was his ineffective 4th quarters, while Dirk seemed to play quite well in the 4th quarter.

I know there's a "late game bias" (or whatever biases you keep going on about, lol ), but I think there's something to that in the 2011 Finals. LeBron seemed to play well through the first 3 quarters, and then when the 4th quarter rolled around, LeBron seemed to flip a switch and not do anything, almost intentionally. It was weird to watch.

[ElGee]

I'm aware of that, and it's nonsensical. There isn't a person alive who has been able to explain how points in the 4th quarter count more. I think LeBron was gassed. Others think he caught some sort of temporary mental disability. It doesn't matter why, does it?

I tend to agree with Simmons, Gladwell and Van Gundy's commentary in the last 24 hours - James is the most unfairly scrutinized athlete in sports history, and I can't think of a close second.

[mysticbb]

Dirk's role in the Mavs offensive was to run as a primary scoring hub/threat, not turn it over much and shoot the hell out of the ball.

That is WRONG. How many plays did they really run for Nowitzki? In most plays Nowitzki was used as a decoy, in order to draw the attention of the defense out of the zone to give the perimeter players opportunities to attack the basket. Or, they used Nowitzki in order to create opportunities for spot up shooters on the weakside. Nearly 1/4th of his scoring attempts were late in the shot clock, because the plays didn't work (most times, because the Heat defense was pretty good). Only in the 4th quarters of the games Nowitzki was actually really used as the primary scoring threat were they run iso plays for Nowitzki.

Dirk's last game was especially horrible

Nowitzki's first half was horrible, in the 2nd half he played really good. For sure, in average the game is well below his performance level, but that first half was the ONLY bad half he had.

The series was really an offensive lowpoint for him in many regards since 2007 vs. GS after about 6 or 7 great shooting series.

No, it wasn't. The 2007 series against the Warriors was completely different. Nowitzki waws used in a different role, at that he should get position in the post in order to score. And while Nowitzki had that position in that series, neither Harris nor Terry were able to throw the entry pass. That series was one of the main reasons Avery Johnson cried for a better point guard, someone who is able to make that entry pass. That's why the Mavericks went after Jason Kidd.
You also should keep in mind that Nowitzki suffered the finger injury and played with a fever during the series against the Heat. And still, his impact was HUGE. A complete different thing we see for James, who was forced to show his game off the ball and failed. And you can even see that in this season that the Heat/James realised it, and they worked on that. You see James moving better without the ball, making the offense more fluid.

Throughout the series, James created more offense than any player on either team (11 OC/100). Dirk had his teammates set up slightly more of his offense (11% 2's, 43% 3's to James 9% 2's, 33% 3's).

I think a major aspect you are completely missing with your method is the fact that the Mavericks players had a completely different setting to work against with and without Nowitzki. Take Barea for example, who was able to attack the basket much easier with Nowitzki on the court while being stuck with bad outside shots without Nowitzki. Honestly, the spacing created by Nowitzki's presence was a major driving factor during that playoff run. Your EV is not accounting for that at all. And when you look at your numbers, you are not really able to explain the difference in performance level of the team with and without a player.

I don't think there would be anything "obvious" about who was better.

Again, during the time Nowitzki was on the court the Mavericks were +8.5, during the time James was on the court the Heat were -8.4. When both were on the court the Mavericks were winning by +10.3. And a major part of that was Nowitzki's work off the ball in comparison to James' work off the ball. You are ignoring that part. Nowitzki even beats out James with the ball in that series, but he blows him away in the part without the ball (talking about offense, obviously).

[ElGee]

Dirk's role in the Mavs offensive was to run as a primary scoring hub/threat, not turn it over much and shoot the hell out of the ball.

That is WRONG. How many plays did they really run for Nowitzki? In most plays Nowitzki was used as a decoy, in order to draw the attention of the defense out of the zone to give the perimeter players opportunities to attack the basket. Or, they used Nowitzki in order to create opportunities for spot up shooters on the weakside. Nearly 1/4th of his scoring attempts were late in the shot clock, because the plays didn't work (most times, because the Heat defense was pretty good). Only in the 4th quarters of the games Nowitzki was actually really used as the primary scoring threat were they run iso plays for Nowitzki.

I'm puzzled by this response. Read what I wrote, then read what you wrote. I don't see any contradiction anywhere.

Dirk's last game was especially horrible

Nowitzki's first half was horrible, in the 2nd half he played really good. For sure, in average the game is well below his performance level, but that first half was the ONLY bad half he had.

And?

The series was really an offensive lowpoint for him in many regards since 2007 vs. GS after about 6 or 7 great shooting series.

No, it wasn't. The 2007 series against the Warriors was completely different. Nowitzki waws used in a different role, at that he should get position in the post in order to score. And while Nowitzki had that position in that series, neither Harris nor Terry were able to throw the entry pass. That series was one of the main reasons Avery Johnson cried for a better point guard, someone who is able to make that entry pass. That's why the Mavericks went after Jason Kidd.
You also should keep in mind that Nowitzki suffered the finger injury and played with a fever during the series against the Heat. And still, his impact was HUGE. A complete different thing we see for James, who was forced to show his game off the ball and failed. And you can even see that in this season that the Heat/James realised it, and they worked on that. You see James moving better without the ball, making the offense more fluid.

Again, I say it was his worst offensive series since 07, you write something about posting up smaller GS players. I'm not following any points or rebuttal you're trying to make.

Throughout the series, James created more offense than any player on either team (11 OC/100). Dirk had his teammates set up slightly more of his offense (11% 2's, 43% 3's to James 9% 2's, 33% 3's).

I think a major aspect you are completely missing with your method is the fact that the Mavericks players had a completely different setting to work against with and without Nowitzki. Take Barea for example, who was able to attack the basket much easier with Nowitzki on the court while being stuck with bad outside shots without Nowitzki. Honestly, the spacing created by Nowitzki's presence was a major driving factor during that playoff run. Your EV is not accounting for that at all. And when you look at your numbers, you are not really able to explain the difference in performance level of the team with and without a player.

No doubt I can't measure everything. And spacing (holding) a player is unaccounted for in EV. You are not necessarily correct in your last sentence though. Early results have been good on such predictions.

I don't think there would be anything "obvious" about who was better.

Again, during the time Nowitzki was on the court the Mavericks were +8.5, during the time James was on the court the Heat were -8.4. When both were on the court the Mavericks were winning by +10.3. And a major part of that was Nowitzki's work off the ball in comparison to James' work off the ball. You are ignoring that part. Nowitzki even beats out James with the ball in that series, but he blows him away in the part without the ball (talking about offense, obviously).

Why would I use a correlative measurement in a super-small, 6-game sample when I'm analyzing causally at the possession level? I'm trying to separate the team result and you are simply quoting it. Dirk will beat James with the ball every game by Spacing -- how much value do you think that adds per possession?

[mysticbb]

I'm puzzled by this response. Read what I wrote, then read what you wrote. I don't see any contradiction anywhere.

Sorry, but you said that Nowitzki was only used as a scoring threat, while they didn't run many plays for him, because his game off the ball was the more important factor here. I don't know how you can't see the difference here.

And? :)

The game wasn't horrible, that is an hyperbole on your part in order to get your point across.

Again, I say it was his worst offensive series since 07, you write something about posting up smaller GS players. I'm not following any points or rebuttal you're trying to make.

Ok, I misread the part and somehow thought you said that this was like the 2007 series against the Warriors. While in terms of impact it was really, really different.

No doubt I can't measure everything. And spacing (holding) a player is unaccounted for in EV. You are not necessarily correct in your last sentence though. Early results have been good on such predictions.

For what kind of players? Can you explain why a player like Bonner has such big impact offensively with your numbers? Or do the numbers add up in terms of impact for a guy like Nowitzki? I think you are missing a big thing here, the reason why a lot of teams are looking to have a stretch 4 on their roster. Did you make an out-of-sample test? How much do you differ between prediction and real results?

Why would I use a correlative measurement in a super-small, 6-game sample when I'm analyzing causally at the possession level? I'm trying to separate the team result and you are simply quoting it. Dirk will beat James with the ball every game by Spacing -- how much value do you think that adds per possession?

Well, my measurement says that James was last season 1 pt per 100 possession better with the ball than Nowitzki, that leaves about 2.5 points Nowitzki added over James per 100 possessions. James used up more possessions with the ball, that means we are at about 3 points per 100 possessions Nowitzki adds over James due to his ability off-the-ball and created spacing. And for those 3pts you are giving a big part of the credit to Nowitzki's teammates.
Well, I also try to evaluate their impact on the team result, ignoring the team result is somewhat weird given the fact that we are talking about a 5on5 game. We have to look into the context and how the context changes with and without the players in order to understand the differences in game results.

[ronnymac2]

I'm not a Miami fan, but I'm really happy that LeBron James played so well last night. I hate stupid mother **** who don't appreciate his play on the court. He's not perfect, but nobody is.

My preliminary top 5, without thinking much:

LeBron James
Kevin Durant
Russell Westbrook
Dirk Nowitzki
Chris Paul

Howard, Rose, Paul, and Wade have been hurt by injuries (Wade and Paul to a lesser degree of course). I really didn't like Kobe this year. Garnett's offense is getting overrated.

LeBron James is the best player in the game. Anybody who doesn't believe that is a dumbass.

[AnaheimRoyale]

I'm not a Miami fan, but I'm really happy that LeBron James played so well last night. I hate stupid mother **** who don't appreciate his play on the court. He's not perfect, but nobody is.
...I really didn't like Kobe this year. Garnett's offense is getting overrated.

LeBron James is the best player in the game. Anybody who doesn't believe that is a dumbass.

+1

[GrangerDanger]

I'm aware of that, and it's nonsensical. There isn't a person alive who has been able to explain how points in the 4th quarter count more. I think LeBron was gassed. Others think he caught some sort of temporary mental disability. It doesn't matter why, does it?

I tend to agree with Simmons, Gladwell and Van Gundy's commentary in the last 24 hours - James is the most unfairly scrutinized athlete in sports history, and I can't think of a close second.

Kobe is, by far. Lebron's hate is very fair. When you tatoo "The Chosen One" on yourself, refer to yourself as "King James" through texts, promise your hometown a ring and then bolt, say "I can't clone myself" after a loss because of your own defensive failures, be notorious as one of the meanest players to stadium workers/towel boys, ballhog like no one in the history of the game, have the most athleticism of any player ever and play in the easiest era for perimeter players ever (both in rules and team strategies), and fail each and every year it's perfectly fine to scrutinize that.

Anyways my POY so far

1. Lebron
2. Durant
3. Paul
4. Kobe
5. Westbrook

[lorak]

1. LeBron
2. Durant
3. KG
4. Kobe
5. Nash (or Dirk, I'm not sure yet)

[colts18]

LeBron is averaging 31-10-5, .583 TS%, and 32 PER in this postseason. If he continues this and wins a title with Wade playing like a bum, it will go down as arguably the greatest postseason in NBA history to go along with his awesome regular season. That puts him as a top 10 player all-time.