#23 Highest Peak of All Time (Barkley '93 wins)

[tsherkin]

Wait a second... You'll rather have David West and Tyson Chandler than John "f**king" Stockton and Jeff "the-first-Manu" Hornacek? His supporting cast was better by some distance.

And why are you equating the taller, more athletic and more dynamic off-the-dribble Manu to Jeff Hornacek, exactly?

[Dr Positivity]

Vote 93 Barkley

I definitely like Barkley over Moses. Barkley seems like clearly the better offensive player to me as a scorer, passer, etc., one of the true offensive giants. Moses has great offense for a C but he's no Barkley IMO. Defensively Moses looks a little better, but when positional weighting is put in (Barkley can be put beside a defensive center, harder to find a defensive PF) the gap doesn't seem massive to me. Enough that I'll side with the scarier offensive force

Barkley over Karl because I don't trust playoffs Karl

Barkley v Tmac is then my choice. Tmac is hard for me, I'm not sure about his attitude and I'm not sure about his short playoff run when compared to an extended PS with huge moments like Barkley's. I think I'll side with the older, playoff proven Barkley here

[C-izMe]

Wait a second... You'll rather have David West and Tyson Chandler than John "f**king" Stockton and Jeff "the-first-Manu" Hornacek? His supporting cast was better by some distance.

And why are you equating the taller, more athletic and more dynamic off-the-dribble Manu to Jeff Hornacek, exactly?

I was saying he's the same type of player. He's not as good but he's a slightly worse at everything version of Manu.

[tsherkin]

I was saying he's the same type of player. He's not as good but he's a slightly worse at everything version of Manu.

I don't see that at all. Bum knee dude who was never terrifically athletic in the first place, shorter, way less dynamic at dribble penetration. That was half of the problem the Jazz had with Chicago, they didn't enjoy any kind of serious on-ball attack threat or perimeter athleticism. They didn't play with anything like the same kind of frenetic energy.

[C-izMe]

I was saying he's the same type of player. He's not as good but he's a slightly worse at everything version of Manu.

I don't see that at all. Bum knee dude who was never terrifically athletic in the first place, shorter, way less dynamic at dribble penetration. That was half of the problem the Jazz had with Chicago, they didn't enjoy any kind of serious on-ball attack threat or perimeter athleticism. They didn't play with anything like the same kind of frenetic energy.

Hornacek could get to the rim pretty well. Again not as good as Manu but still good he's good enough.

[colts18]

Don't forget that David West was an all-star player.

[tsherkin]

Hornacek could get to the rim pretty well. Again not as good as Manu but still good he's good enough.

He was a very good player, but he didn't look anything at all like Manu on the court.

[C-izMe]

Don't forget that David West was an all-star player.

It's a meaningless accolade IMO.

Hornacek could get to the rim pretty well. Again not as good as Manu but still good he's good enough.

He was a very good player, but he didn't look anything at all like Manu on the court.

A great passer with crafty handles and a tendency for making crafty moves at any chance he got. Very Manu like IMO.

[tsherkin]

A great passer with crafty handles and a tendency for making crafty moves at any chance he got. Very Manu like IMO.

Not stylistically. He was an impact player, no question, but he's only superficially similar to Ginobili. Again, lacks the size, lacks the athleticism, lacked the kind of frenetic energy, not as dynamic off of the dribble (in part because of the difference in size and athleticism)... Hornacek was a very good player. He was more measured in his approach, though, and a more dangerous scoring threat while he was on the floor, and is a better defensive presence as well. There's more total impact from Ginobili and significant differences in their approach to the game, it's a weak comparison.

[bastillon]

A great passer with crafty handles and a tendency for making crafty moves at any chance he got. Very Manu like IMO.

Not stylistically. He was an impact player, no question, but he's only superficially similar to Ginobili. Again, lacks the size, lacks the athleticism, lacked the kind of frenetic energy, not as dynamic off of the dribble (in part because of the difference in size and athleticism)... Hornacek was a very good player. He was more measured in his approach, though, and a more dangerous scoring threat while he was on the floor, and is a better defensive presence as well. There's more total impact from Ginobili and significant differences in their approach to the game, it's a weak comparison.

you're saying Hornacek was a better DEFENSIVE presence ? I hope that's just some typo. anyway this comparison is flawed on every level. Hornacek didn't have borderline superstar impact like Ginobili had. Hornacek was an off ball perimeter shooter/passer, Ginobili is a huge threat off the dribble. different impact, different style. Hornacek is more like homeless version of Larry Bird playing combo guard. Ginobili is just a different type of player.

Vote 93 Barkley

I definitely like Barkley over Moses. Barkley seems like clearly the better offensive player to me as a scorer, passer, etc., one of the true offensive giants. Moses has great offense for a C but he's no Barkley IMO. Defensively Moses looks a little better, but when positional weighting is put in (Barkley can be put beside a defensive center, harder to find a defensive PF) the gap doesn't seem massive to me. Enough that I'll side with the scarier offensive force

Barkley over Karl because I don't trust playoffs Karl

not sure if you read the comments about Barkley I re-posted. to me there's a pretty huge gap between Moses and Barkley on defense. Moses can actually be a good HCO defender/part of a good defensive team. Barkley just suck defensively, period. check out some of the averages of opposing PFs against Barkley. look at the 93 postseason of Kemp for a good measure:

14.8 ppg 52% FG vs Karl Malone in the 1st round
13.6 ppg 42% FG vs Hakeem in the 2nd round
20.6 ppg 59% FG vs Barkley in the WCFs

and it's not just Kemp either. everyone defended by Barkley posted monster stats, far better than vs anyone else in that postseason. Divac posted 18 ppg 5.6 apg in the 1st rd, Carr/Cummings combined together for 19.2 ppg at 54% FG in 36 mpg, Grant didn't have a great offensive series but he wasn't involved in the offense since MJ was rocking 40 ppg. Barkley is a huge liability on defense to me. especially in the playoffs when the game moves closer to the basket and protecting the paint becomes more important.

I'd like to see Philly's ORTG/DRTG for 83 RS + PS excluding the games when they were coasting late in the season. their SRS was about 9 so I expect them to be about top3 offense and top3 defense at the same time. I think Moses also improved his game in the playoffs (mystic said he was a +5 boxscore player in the RS but +7 in the PS). I see Moses 83 as clearly more impactful than Barkley's 93. that 1-6 record without Barkley means nothing to me. we've seen Suns playing years at about 6 SRS before Barkley joined that team. they were absolutely stacked.

I know Barkley was an offensive savant but was his offensive impact as good as his boxscore stats suggested ? it wasn't until he was paired with KJ that his offenses started to look like juggernauts...except that KJ was already leading elite offenses in the late 80s/early 90s without Barkley to begin with. Barkley's boxscore stats is really the only thing going for him. we've seen him miss extended period of time in 87 and 91 and it wasn't anything close to what you'd expect.

to me this is more about Moses vs Karl Malone than it is about Barkley vs either of them. I see Malones being a notch above Barkley. Karl Malone is indeed somewhat suspect playoff performer. ElGee defended him well but I can't get myself wrapped around one thing, his ORTG in 96-98 playoffs was 105. it only went down after that. I just don't see Malone as an efficient playoff performer in that timespan. I said this already to fatal, I think mid 90s Karl Malone was more aggressive, more likely to go to the basket instead of settling for jumpshots, he posted far more efficient postseasons in 92-95 and he was also at the age when most superstars have their best seasons. I don't see how he's more "polished" in the late 90s unless you're talking about shooting more jumpshots.

defensively Karl Malone is a huge upgrade over both Moses and Barkley. Moses is not that bad as a defender per se, he won't let his opponent score a bunch of pts against him and was even a good post defender against Kareem (imagine Barkley in that role, trying to contain a Dirk, doesn't pass the laugh test). but Moses style of play on offense was very bad for defense. as fatal pointed out - consistently the most turnover prone NBA C in the history, relentless on the ORB which took away his transition D. his impact on defensive rebounding is suspect to me as well but there's no question he was a very impactful rebounder in 83 as UAF was arguing in his defense. but Karl Malone has all of this and then some. his offense is more conductive to playing good defense. his defense itself is better than Moses as well. he's not just a good post defender, he's a borderline alltimer. what he did to D-Rob in 94/96/98, to Duncan in 04, to Shaq in the late 90s, he was a guy who could defend any elite post player in history. even though Malone lacks some impact in help-D to be a truly great all around defender, he's being compared to two guys whose help-D was poor at best.

offensively Malone does look worse in the playoffs but in his defense you have to consider Jazz team structure (ElGee's post I re-posted) which led to Malone taking on a very big offensive load, as well as his playoff opposition. in his prime in 92-98 Malone was consistently playing against top post defenders in history. he faced Hakeem 4 times, Shaq 2 times, Duncan once, D-Rob 3 times, Kemp 3 times, PTB frontlines with Buck Williams/Cliff Robinson like 2-3 times as well... that's some hard opposition to play against. I'm not that surprised his offensive numbers dropped in the PS.

his team offenses were elite in the playoffs though I'm reluctant to give Malone credit over Stock/Hornacek because it wasn't after Hornacek's addition that they started playing elite offense (they were kind of putrid before that) and Stockton's floor generalship was still a very valuable asset, even if his shot creation abilities were much-diminished come playoff time, let's not forget Utah struggled without Stockton on offense early in 98. but still, if Malone + some fitting pieces + role players gave you such great effects offensively, he deserves some credit as the #1 guy on the team.

I disagree with colts assessment of Malone's cast in his finals runs as bunch of scrubs. you need to understand the value of defensive role players and spot up shooters. this is the issue I've been discussing with mystic in this particular thread. Malone's teammates weren't big scorers but they had great off ball impact with spacing effect. they were also relentless on defense. some of his centers might seem like scrubs if you look at their raw numbers but they were also some of the best role players in the league. Ostertag in particular was a great post defender (check out him and Malone playing vs late 90s Shaq) and he was also putting up insane blk% numbers. you also have to consider how much those non-scorers benefited from Jazz offensive system. you didn't have to be a great isolation player because it was all about their off ball movement and screens.

[tsherkin]

you're saying Hornacek was a better DEFENSIVE presence ? I hope that's just some typo.

Hmmm, upon edit, it appears some sloppy grammar set that up.

No bast, I was not saying Hornacek > Manu on D.

I think Hornacek was inferior at almost everything but set shooting, personally. PG duties, too, he had some fine seasons there to open his career. But in general, Manu was more dynamic on either end, we agree.

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[ardee]

Vote: 1993 Charles Barkley

It was between '93 Barkley and '81/'82/'83 Moses here.

Personally, I choose '93 Barkley as his peak because that was the one year he wasn't terrible on defense. In fact, he had a pretty impressive 4.8 DWS. I'm the last person to use a stat like win shares, but I think it's a decent indication that he was contributing at least somewhat on that end. He had the highest DRB% of his prime as well.

More importantly, the Suns were a pretty amazing 61-15 when he was playing, and just 1-5 without him. 6 games is a small sample size, but it's definitely an indicator of the value he was adding. To anyone who laughs off this argument, do you really think that if he missed, say, 25 games, the Suns would do exponentially better without him then they did, given more games to adjust?

His supporting cast gets a bit overrated. No one averaged more then 6 rpg, and besides KJ, who missed 33 games, no one averaged over 4 apg. The next best three players, Marjele, Ainge and Chambers, were esentially scorers. Yes, Marjele and Ainge were great three-point shooters, but he didn't have any great all-around team-mates, like Moses' Doc or Malone's Stockton.

The clincher is obviously the Playoffs. It was arguably a top 8 Playoff performance without winning the chip. He was at his best when it mattered most: from game 5 of the Sonics series to game 4 of the Chicago series, he averaged 31-15-5 on 60% TS.... Those are peak Shaq numbers!

In game 7 of the Sonics series, he sprung for 44/24 on 12/20 shooting (19/22 from the line!!), and the rest of the Suns went 18-52 from the field! That's a certified legendary performance, and I don't think he gets half the credit he deserves. The modern equivalent would be the Spurs-Thunder series going 7, Harden and Westbrook disappearing in the final game (say a signature 8/23 game from WB with a bunch of turnovers, and a 2/10 game from Harden), and Durant erupting for 50 on 18/27 shooting.

Pretty confident about this vote, Barkley was a monster that year, and the only reason he didn't win was because he ran into the biggest monster of them all.

[An Unbiased Fan]

Those are some great point ardee, but I would point out that the Suns were 53-29 (5.69 SRS), #5 ORtg, #8 DRtg before in 1992 before Barkley. That Suns team was already a contender in the West. In 1993 with Chuck, their SRS moved a little to 6.27, their offense jumped to #1, but their defense stay around the same at #9.

I think people are overlooking Mose's defense in 1983 which was All-D 1st team. He was a much better defender than Barkley ever was.

I would also point out that while Barkley had a great PS run, Moses had a GOAT caliber PS run. And in the Finals he was completely dominant against KAJ.

[MisterWestside]

Vote: 1993 Charles Barkley

It was between '93 Barkley and '81/'82/'83 Moses here.

Personally, I choose '93 Barkley as his peak because that was the one year he wasn't terrible on defense. In fact, he had a pretty impressive 4.8 DWS. I'm the last person to use a stat like win shares, but I think it's a decent indication that he was contributing at least somewhat on that end. He had the highest DRB% of his prime as well.

More importantly, the Suns were a pretty amazing 61-15 when he was playing, and just 1-5 without him. 6 games is a small sample size, but it's definitely an indicator of the value he was adding. To anyone who laughs off this argument, do you really think that if he missed, say, 25 games, the Suns would do exponentially better without him then they did, given more games to adjust?

His supporting cast gets a bit overrated. No one averaged more then 6 rpg, and besides KJ, who missed 33 games, no one averaged over 4 apg. The next best three players, Marjele, Ainge and Chambers, were esentially scorers. Yes, Marjele and Ainge were great three-point shooters, but he didn't have any great all-around team-mates, like Moses' Doc or Malone's Stockton.

The clincher is obviously the Playoffs. It was arguably a top 8 Playoff performance without winning the chip. He was at his best when it mattered most: from game 5 of the Sonics series to game 4 of the Chicago series, he averaged 31-15-5 on 60% TS.... Those are peak Shaq numbers!

In game 7 of the Sonics series, he sprung for 44/24 on 12/20 shooting (19/22 from the line!!), and the rest of the Suns went 18-52 from the field! That's a certified legendary performance, and I don't think he gets half the credit he deserves. The modern equivalent would be the Spurs-Thunder series going 7, Harden and Westbrook disappearing in the final game (say a signature 8/23 game from WB with a bunch of turnovers, and a 2/10 game from Harden), and Durant erupting for 50 on 18/27 shooting.

Pretty confident about this vote, Barkley was a monster that year, and the only reason he didn't win was because he ran into the biggest monster of them all.

But, but, it's "hard" to find players to play with Barkley's skillset! (Put him in today's game and let's see posters say that. He'd fit right in, with unconventional lineups and long, athletic bigs even if they're not necessarily "skilled".)

Nice post ardee. I think it's a toss-up between Moses/Barkley but then again one of them should've been voted in already.

[bastillon]

I'm suprised to see Barkley go this high. I think he's been shown by mystic as very high negative defensive player. he was getting bullied by his opp in the 93 playoff run. people need to stop looking at his impressive boxscore stats and focus on his impact. Suns were absolutely stacked, they regularly posted 5-7 SRS in 89-92 before Barkley joined them. his offensive production while might seem all-time impressive, didn't exactly produce that kind of results on a team level. still a very impactful offensive player, just not as good as his stats suggested (see quoted therealbigthree post on page 2). defensively though, I see him as a huge negative. big enough almost to make up for his great offense. as a result Barkley's impact seems weak. I'll be interested if someone does in/outs on Barkley with ORTG/DRTG splits (controlled for teammates ofc). I think they'll back up my words.

I like Moses more and more. I don't think he was ever that impactful as he was in 83 but he really did seem like a very valuable player that year. not sure how strong the Sixers really were without him, this was a team that had been a championship contender for 3 years before but they were never head and shoulders above the rest. if you look at the strength of that 83 Sixers team it's almost unparalleled. they dismantled their playoff opposition. their SRS must've been some crazy +11 in the postseason (+6.6 MOV vs +3, +4.5, +5). they continued their RS dominance which slowed down after securing comfortably a top seed in their conference. plus what works in Moses favor greatly is how he contained red-hot Kareem in the finals (his scoring pre finals was some crazy 30 ppg average, dropped off to 23 ppg).

where do people see Kevin McHale ? I feel like he's in this ballpark at his peak. this was a guy who upped his volume and efficiency in the playoffs to some crazy levels. his ORTG is absolutely amazing. he wasn't a passer but at least didn't turn the ball over. more of a finisher than a guy who you can run offense through but still amazing offensive player all things considered. very hard to gameplan for because of his versatility as a scorer. his scoring skills were better than Barkley, Moses, Mailman, Ewing, Duncan... 1 vs 1 probably one of the 4 toughest players to stop on the block (Shaq, Dream, Kareem, McHale). his defense is very good and very versatile which makes it silly-easy to find fitting pieces around him. he can defend pretty much anyone from 3 to 5 except for couple outliers like LeBron or Shaq. defensive versatility, scoring versatility, insane playoff efficiency (check out those ORTGs, he AVERAGED a 122 ORTG for his playoff career), shotblocking guy. rebounding is an issue for him definitely though.

some peak stats:
86 PS - 25/9/3 @ 64% TS & 123 ORTG
88 PS - 25/8/2 @ 67% TS & 129 ORTG

some of his monster playoff series:
http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... inals.html
http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 7_ECS.html
http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 8_ECF.html

that last one was played with injured Bird struggling mightily and you can see how easily McHale picks up the slack offensively - he goes for 27 ppg @ 56% FG + 3.2 apg with less than 2 tov. this isn't a guy who was a challenged passer like Moses (nor was he a high tov player). his role was not to be much of a passer but he had some passing skills imo.

I'm hoping fatal9 can make some post about McHale (your 2nd most favorite player behind Bird?).

[colts18]

I like Moses more and more. I don't think he was ever that impactful as he was in 83 but he really did seem like a very valuable player that year. not sure how strong the Sixers really were without him, this was a team that had been a championship contender for 3 years before but they were never head and shoulders above the rest. if you look at the strength of that 83 Sixers team it's almost unparalleled. they dismantled their playoff opposition. their SRS must've been some crazy +11 in the postseason (+6.6 MOV vs +3, +4.5, +5).

10.23 SRS (6.46 MOV, 3.77 SOS), 16th best title team

http://www.basketball-reference.com/blog/?p=4787

#1 is 01 Lakers at almost 18 SRS.

[ardee]

I'm suprised to see Barkley go this high. I think he's been shown by mystic as very high negative defensive player. he was getting bullied by his opp in the 93 playoff run. people need to stop looking at his impressive boxscore stats and focus on his impact.

Did you even read the post? '93 Barkley's supporting cast is insanely overrated. He had some good scorers, but that's all. And in the Playoffs, most of them tended to disappear at times, leading to Charles' successfully shouldering a HUGE load.

This with-without thing is reaching breaking point with me, frankly. This may sound like a rant, but here's what I've observed:

When you're objectively judging a situation, you need to look at the facts you have, and then come to a hypothesis based on the facts. The wrong way to go about it is first develop your hypothesis, and then twist and misrepresent facts to suit your hypothesis.

That's exactly what with-without seems to be doing. Take '67 Chamberlain for example.

Best rebounder in the league, most efficient scorer in history, amazing passer, ridiculous shot-blocker: pretty much anyone unbiased would agree that all four of these things rolled into one player would give you a huge chance of winning basketball games.

That brings us to the people who find the SRS differential between '67 and '69. So, according to them, '67 Wilt couldn't have had a big impact, just because a non-mainstream and barely seen stat like SRS says so! Ignore all the things he was bringing to the table (heck, what was he taking OFF the table besides free-throw shooting? I STILL haven't heard someone pick a flaw in his skillset that year), just maintain that there's no way he gives you a huge chance of winning basketball games JUST BECAUSE SRS SAYS SO!

You know, SRS, the stat that has correctly predicted 3 out of the last 12 NBA champions? The stat that ranked a top 5 GOAT team, the 2001 Lakers, below the three teams they went 11-0 against in that very year's Playoffs?

So just because the Suns had a good SRS before Barkley joined, and it didn't improve enough for his detractors, he 'wasn't having an impact'. Leave alone that the Suns lost in the first and second round the two years before Barkley's arrival, and pretty much all of his team-mates flopped in the Playoffs. KJ shot 42% in the Finals and averaged 4.5 TOV. Marjele shot 43% for the entire freaking Playoffs and got as badly destroyed by Jordan as Drexler did in '92, possibly even worse. No one averaged more then 6 rpg in the Playoffs, leaving the onus of controlling the boards completely on Chuck, which he did, to the tune of 13.6 a game.

You still think he had a 'loaded' supporting cast, bastillion?

Again, my apologies for the rant, I've just gotten really annoyed with people blindly making generalized statements and conveniently ignoring all other stats other then their one favorite.

I'm pretty disapointed Barkley fell this low, I really think he should have been voted for above Dirk (and I would have, if not for the fact I'd been waiting on West for 6-7 threads).

[therealbig3]

I have to ask why Barkley over T-Mac? As bastillon pointed out, Barkley wasn't having super high impact, and a large part of that was because of his defense being a negative. Furthermore, his offense is overrated by his box score numbers imo...he wasn't leading historic offenses until he was paired with KJ (who has like a top 5 PG peak). And as I pointed out, T-Mac with a weak supporting cast in Orlando was leading close to a +4 offense in the 75 games he played that year.

I think T-Mac is clearly better offensively than either Moses or Karl, and possibly a bit worse than Barkley, but certainly superior defensively. Karl is the best defensive player of the group, and I'm not sure if he was better than T-Mac on that front (and like I've said before, this is assuming T-Mac is with a championship-caliber supporting cast, so that he has energy for good defense...it's weird to me that as someone who entered the league known as a defensive stopper, someone who was used as a big part of some elite defenses in Houston, someone who was praised by JVG as a good defender, someone who we all saw play good, versatile defense against Boston as recently as this year's playoffs when he wasn't anywhere close to his athletic prime, and someone who is physically very similar to Pippen/LeBron, he isn't getting the respect he probably should get for his defense).

[bastillon]

Barkley 1987 (14g) 2.9 to 0.3
Barkley 1991 (15g) 1.2 to 0.0
Barkley 1994 (17g) 7.8 to 6.5
Barkley 1995 (14g) 0.1 to 3.9
Barkley 1996 (11g) 4.9 to 1.0
Barkley 1997 (29g) 3.4 to 5.7

KJ 1990 (8g) 5.5 to 7.6
KJ 1993 (33g) 3.7 to 8.2
KJ 1994 (15g) 7.5 to 6.2
KJ 1995 (35g) -1.5 to 3.3
KJ 1996 (26g) 4.0 to 1.6
KJ 1997 (12g) 12.3 to 2.5

ElGee can you cross-reference those numbers ? control for each other's absence ? possibly with SRS ? it doesn't seem like Barkley was that much better than KJ in terms of impact.

[bastillon]

I think T-Mac is clearly better offensively than either Moses or Karl, and possibly a bit worse than Barkley, but certainly superior defensively. Karl is the best defensive player of the group, and I'm not sure if he was better than T-Mac on that front (and like I've said before, this is assuming T-Mac is with a championship-caliber supporting cast, so that he has energy for good defense...it's weird to me that as someone who entered the league known as a defensive stopper, someone who was used as a big part of some elite defenses in Houston, someone who was praised by JVG as a good defender, someone who we all saw play good, versatile defense against Boston as recently as this year's playoffs when he wasn't anywhere close to his athletic prime, and someone who is physically very similar to Pippen/LeBron, he isn't getting the respect he probably should get for his defense).

I don't think any superstar guard can have a big impact on defense with how much energy they have to exert on defense. if TMac has to play on some ridiculously stacked team not to exert much effort offensively in order to make major defensive impact then it seems like a pretty astronomical requirement for the FO to make that happen.

also why is TMac's DRAPM so unimpressive in Rockets ? you're basing most of your praise of TMac on his (admittedly very impressive) skillset. but I just don't think TMac's imapct was as big as his talent. saying that TMac is a better defender than Karl Malone is a bit ridiculous imo, considering how often Karl Malone was a part of great defenses as a high minute big man (I generally assume credit goes to high min big men for team's defense).