#25 Highest Peak of All Time (McGrady '03 wins)

[fatal9]

So fatal, why Malone over McHale? Kevin is better defender and comparable offensive player.

They are pretty close but Malone is easily the better offensive player (offense not to be confused with only one on one scoring here). I’ve made a point of why I think his scoring is overrated in comparison to other guys because they can bring more than Malone can in the playoffs (or had similar flaws on offense but make up for it by being dominant defensively which Malone wasn’t). But Malone still provides better offensive value than McHale and a lot of other players who are better one on one scorers than him, because offense is more than that. If I need a basket? I’ll take McHale. If I want my team to reach the highest point total possible? I’ll take Malone.

If we take out isolation offense, Malone is maybe the best scorer ever. He is incredible at scoring in context of the team, kind of like “take nothing off the table” type of guy in the offense. He spaces out the floor. He gets your offense easy baskets. He RUNS offense for you out of the high post. He threads passes from the post to hit cutters. He is a legit offensive hub. He makes opponents think twice about fighting through his screens. He reads defenses well. He's elite in the pick and roll. He is a capable iso scorer (mediocre when compared to the best). He does an amazing job at putting himself in position to score without the ball (has a knack for where to be, and also has brute strength to get position where ever he wants). He can score an efficient 25 without ever stopping the ball or putting it on the floor. If he grabs a defensive rebound, he’s throwing an outlet pass in the receiver's lap. He is an incredibly effective team offensive player. You lose a lot with him off the floor.

I think it's absurd that people are questioning Malone's team impact when his strength as a scorer and offensive player is how well he does it WITH the team (and how well the team does with a player like him on the floor). No, I don't think old Stockton and old Hornacek playing 30 mpg are the co-anchors of an offense that was better than MJ's Bulls. I can’t throw out all I see based on a single piece of data that isn't even from the time period in question and is filled with confounding variables galore.

Malone’s regular season impact is and never was a question to me. I have problems with his isolation scoring in the playoffs and to me that was a big flaw when we were discussing him with players in the 15-20 range (who were 5+ type offensive players). Now we are at 25, the flaw isn’t quite as glaring because everyone now has one thing or another, we’ve moved into lower end of the tier. I mean Moses just got voted in. And he's not any better than Karl at iso scoring, has a similar track record of up and down playoff performances, isn't even close to being an offensive hub, and isn't as good of a defender at his position. It doesn't matter as much anymore, he doesn't look as flawed comparatively to other players.

[Lightning25]

I just wanted to drop something off because I do feel like it's relevant to our discussion so far.

I apologize for my biased views against Tracy McGrady and I apologize that my biased views against him got in my way of analyzing McGrady objectively. However, I do feel like the players that have been ranked above McGrady so far in this peak discussion should be ranked above him. I just feel like looking back in retrospect that my reasons were agenda-based and irrational and I apologize for that.

The truth is I'm just really ticked off at the guy for how he played in Houston because I felt like one of my favorite players,Yao Ming, deserved better than McGrady and how McGrady played like in Houston (06-09 specifically). I didn't like the way McGrady played, he played soft, lacked hustle, poor leadership, no work-ethic, didn't play defense or rebound, etc. But the truth is that McGrady in Houston and McGrady in Orlando were two completely different players, so I apologize for having recency bias when it came to McGrady.

If you are wondering why I had this epiphany about McGrady, it's because recently I feel like I've been in McGrady's shoes in Orlando. I mean, McGrady was pretty much screwed over in Orlando with the horrible management by giving him terrible players to play with. I can relate because recently in one of my classes I'm taking, I have to work in a group where everyone is lazy, stupid, and complete a-holes that alienate me. And honestly, all it does to someone is take away your spirit and motivation to perform.

I feel like the same thing happened with McGrady in Orlando. I feel like after the 2003 post-season and during the 2004 season, McGrady's spirit/motivation/passion for the game was taken away. He was disgruntled with the Orlando Magic with how horrible his team was, he was tired of having to do everything, he was tired of having no help, etc.

I argue all the time that if Kobe, KG, Pierce, Lebron, etc. could continue performing well and motivated despite playing in garbage teams for all those years that McGrady should as well and that McGrady is just mentally weak because he can't. However, at this point I've realized that it is not necessarily that McGrady is mentally weak, but rather the players I had just listed are just mentally tough.

So again, I apologize for my agenda-based/hateful posts on him and I'll be sure from this point forward to analyze McGrady more objectively.

[MisterWestside]

If we take out isolation offense, Malone is maybe the best scorer ever. He is incredible at scoring in context of the team, kind of like “take nothing off the table” type of guy in the offense. He spaces out the floor. He gets your offense easy baskets. He RUNS offense for you out of the high post. He threads passes from the post to hit cutters. He is a legit offensive hub. He makes opponents think twice about fighting through his screens. He reads defenses well. He's elite in the pick and roll. He is a capable iso scorer (mediocre when compared to the best). He does an amazing job at putting himself in position to score without the ball (has a knack for where to be, and also has brute strength to get position where ever he wants). He can score an efficient 25 without ever stopping the ball or putting it on the floor. If he grabs a defensive rebound, he’s throwing an outlet pass in the receiver's lap. He is an incredibly effective team offensive player. You lose a lot with him off the floor.

I think it's absurd that people are questioning Malone's team impact when his strength as a scorer and offensive player is how well he does it WITH the team (and how well the team does with a player like him on the floor). No, I don't think old Stockton and old Hornacek playing 30 mpg are the co-anchors of an offense that was better than MJ's Bulls. I can’t throw out all I see based on a single piece of data that isn't even from the time period in question and is filled with confounding variables galore.

Or we could just watch this video instead of reading your lengthy (and accurate) post about Malone

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgjJJrB1oDQ[/youtube]

Oh and by the way, this clip contains an example of everything that you mentioned. And this game was in 2001.

Old-man Malone in '01: 112 ortg/30 usg/100 drtg, 4th in PER, 5th in ws & ws/48, 3rd all-NBA. So we got all this other stuff that says he was a damn good player at 37, including gametape, and one (one!) RAPM stat that disagrees. An RAPM stat, mind you, that doesn't even outpredict some box metrics. We're going to take that stat as infallible now, right?

[C-izMe]

I just wanted to drop something off because I do feel like it's relevant to our discussion so far.

I apologize for my biased views against Tracy McGrady and I apologize that my biased views against him got in my way of analyzing McGrady objectively. However, I do feel like the players that have been ranked above McGrady so far in this peak discussion should be ranked above him. I just feel like looking back in retrospect that my reasons were agenda-based and irrational and I apologize for that.

The truth is I'm just really ticked off at the guy for how he played in Houston because I felt like one of my favorite players,Yao Ming, deserved better than McGrady and how McGrady played like in Houston (06-09 specifically). I didn't like the way McGrady played, he played soft, lacked hustle, poor leadership, no work-ethic, didn't play defense or rebound, etc. But the truth is that McGrady in Houston and McGrady in Orlando were two completely different players, so I apologize for having recency bias when it came to McGrady.

If you are wondering why I had this epiphany about McGrady, it's because recently I feel like I've been in McGrady's shoes in Orlando. I mean, McGrady was pretty much screwed over in Orlando with the horrible management by giving him terrible players to play with. I can relate because recently in one of my classes I'm taking, I have to work in a group where everyone is lazy, stupid, and complete a-holes that alienate me. And honestly, all it does to someone is take away your spirit and motivation to perform.

I feel like the same thing happened with McGrady in Orlando. I feel like after the 2003 post-season and during the 2004 season, McGrady's spirit/motivation/passion for the game was taken away. He was disgruntled with the Orlando Magic with how horrible his team was, he was tired of having to do everything, he was tired of having no help, etc.

I argue all the time that if Kobe, KG, Pierce, Lebron, etc. could continue performing well and motivated despite playing in garbage teams for all those years that McGrady should as well and that McGrady is just mentally weak because he can't. However, at this point I've realized that it is not necessarily that McGrady is mentally weak, but rather the players I had just listed are just mentally tough.

So again, I apologize for my agenda-based/hateful posts on him and I'll be sure from this point forward to analyze McGrady more objectively.

Yeah I think at some point EVERYONE is irrationally critical of some great player. For years I extremely disliked Nash (thought he was an all star painted out as MVP) and Russell (thought he was well under Wilt). Took me a long time to back off my stance too.

[lorak]

So fatal, why Malone over McHale? Kevin is better defender and comparable offensive player.

They are pretty close but Malone is easily the better offensive player (offense not to be confused with only one on one scoring here). I’ve made a point of why I think his scoring is overrated in comparison to other guys because they can bring more than Malone can in the playoffs (or had similar flaws on offense but make up for it by being dominant defensively which Malone wasn’t). But Malone still provides better offensive value than McHale and a lot of other players who are better one on one scorers than him, because offense is more than that. If I need a basket? I’ll take McHale. If I want my team to reach the highest point total possible? I’ll take Malone.

If we take out isolation offense, Malone is maybe the best scorer ever. He is incredible at scoring in context of the team, kind of like “take nothing off the table” type of guy in the offense. He spaces out the floor. He gets your offense easy baskets. He RUNS offense for you out of the high post. He threads passes from the post to hit cutters. He is a legit offensive hub. He makes opponents think twice about fighting through his screens. He reads defenses well. He's elite in the pick and roll. He is a capable iso scorer (mediocre when compared to the best). He does an amazing job at putting himself in position to score without the ball (has a knack for where to be, and also has brute strength to get position where ever he wants). He can score an efficient 25 without ever stopping the ball or putting it on the floor. If he grabs a defensive rebound, he’s throwing an outlet pass in the receiver's lap. He is an incredibly effective team offensive player. You lose a lot with him off the floor.

I think it's absurd that people are questioning Malone's team impact when his strength as a scorer and offensive player is how well he does it WITH the team (and how well the team does with a player like him on the floor). No, I don't think old Stockton and old Hornacek playing 30 mpg are the co-anchors of an offense that was better than MJ's Bulls. I can’t throw out all I see based on a single piece of data that isn't even from the time period in question and is filled with confounding variables galore.

Malone’s regular season impact is and never was a question to me. I have problems with his isolation scoring in the playoffs and to me that was a big flaw when we were discussing him with players in the 15-20 range (who were 5+ type offensive players). Now we are at 25, the flaw isn’t quite as glaring because everyone now has one thing or another, we’ve moved into lower end of the tier. I mean Moses just got voted in. And he's not any better than Karl at iso scoring, has a similar track record of up and down playoff performances, isn't even close to being an offensive hub, and isn't as good of a defender at his position. It doesn't matter as much anymore, he doesn't look as flawed comparatively to other players.

1. What about defense? Wasn't McHale better defender by bigger margin than Malone's advantage on offense?
1b Defense is more important for big men than offense.

2. If your main strength is scoring then iso scoring in the playoffs is the most important thing. Malone failed on that area badly.

3. In 1998 Jazz offense was nothing special without Stockton. But completely different story when he came back from injury, His impact was that BIG even when he played 30 MPG. Similar with Hornacek who offensively was on the level of Reggie Miller.

[lorak]

If we take out isolation offense, Malone is maybe the best scorer ever. He is incredible at scoring in context of the team, kind of like “take nothing off the table” type of guy in the offense. He spaces out the floor. He gets your offense easy baskets. He RUNS offense for you out of the high post. He threads passes from the post to hit cutters. He is a legit offensive hub. He makes opponents think twice about fighting through his screens. He reads defenses well. He's elite in the pick and roll. He is a capable iso scorer (mediocre when compared to the best). He does an amazing job at putting himself in position to score without the ball (has a knack for where to be, and also has brute strength to get position where ever he wants). He can score an efficient 25 without ever stopping the ball or putting it on the floor. If he grabs a defensive rebound, he’s throwing an outlet pass in the receiver's lap. He is an incredibly effective team offensive player. You lose a lot with him off the floor.

I think it's absurd that people are questioning Malone's team impact when his strength as a scorer and offensive player is how well he does it WITH the team (and how well the team does with a player like him on the floor). No, I don't think old Stockton and old Hornacek playing 30 mpg are the co-anchors of an offense that was better than MJ's Bulls. I can’t throw out all I see based on a single piece of data that isn't even from the time period in question and is filled with confounding variables galore.

Or we could just watch this video instead of reading your lengthy (and accurate) post about Malone

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgjJJrB1oDQ[/youtube]

Oh and by the way, this clip contains an example of everything that you mentioned. And this game was in 2001.

Old-man Malone in '01: 112 ortg/30 usg/100 drtg, 4th in PER, 5th in ws & ws/48, 3rd all-NBA. So we got all this other stuff that says he was a damn good player at 37, including gametape, and one (one!) RAPM stat that disagrees. An RAPM stat, mind you, that doesn't even outpredict some box metrics. We're going to take that stat as infallible now, right?

Yeah, regular season game vs weak defensive team proves that Malone's scoring ability didn't have serious flaws which were regularly exposed in the playoffs...

Here's one of Malone's best playoffs games ever. Look at the way he scored. Mostly jumpers, which were in because he was hot that day, but usually he more often missed than made them. Tournaround jumpers just like Elvin Hayes - that was primary weapon of prime Karl Malone. That's not good.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68MjmF8PlCc[/youtube]


McHale, Dwight, Hayes - all of them were worse offensive players than Karl (but McHale not by much), but their advantage on defense was bigger than Malone's on offense. So I don't know why you guys pick Karl over them.

[ardee]

1992: 28-11 on 60% TS, probably the third best player in the league after MJ and Drexler that year. He was brilliant in the Playoffs, 29-11 on 62% TS, and led the Jazz to a WCF berth while losing finally to the loaded Blazers who then of course got roasted by MJ one round later.

I'm pretty certain 1992 is the Malone year I'm voting for. He was younger, more athletic, and his defensive rotations were just as good.

So, 1992 Malone vs. 2003 T-Mac. Any thoughts?

Wait... why not nominate '92 Drexler then?

Ok, you got me Was too caught up in my thoughts on Malone to consider that. Well yeah, going back, if I was voting in the '92 RPOY thread, I would probably vote Malone over Drexler. Drexler is coming up soon though, hope to get him in before 30. People just remember that one game (arguably it WAS the greatest game ever played by an individual, but still) where MJ hit those 6 threes, but forget how good Drex was the whole rest of the year.

I should probably retract my earlier statement about being pretty sure about 1992. I'd rather say I'm leaning toward 1992 for his peak, but I would like other thoughts on why people are choosing 1998 as his peak when he was still not even close to as efficient in the Playoffs as he was in his earlier days.

[PTB Fan]

Vote: '62 Elgin Baylor

Not a popular choice as of now, but I think he had an excellent season overall and was just amazing with what he had that season and what he did.

[JordansBulls]

By the way, does anyone think it's possible to argue that Tmac's peak was actually in 2002, not 2003? I thought Tmac was better in terms of all-around play that season. He did a great job rebounding, defending that season compared to 2003 and other year in Orlando really. His scoring and passing was there too, it always was although not as good as 2003. 2003 was his best scoring/offensive outburst season but 2002 was his best all-around season.

I think 2005 Tmac and 2007 Tmac was better than 2002 Tmac.

[ardee]

Vote: '62 Elgin Baylor

Not a popular choice as of now, but I think he had an excellent season overall and was just amazing with what he had that season and what he did.

If you want to vote Baylor, why not pick '61? More efficient, played the full season, and dragged a putrid team to within a few points of the Finals with a legendary PO performance of 39/15/5.

[Lightning25]

By the way, does anyone think it's possible to argue that Tmac's peak was actually in 2002, not 2003? I thought Tmac was better in terms of all-around play that season. He did a great job rebounding, defending that season compared to 2003 and other year in Orlando really. His scoring and passing was there too, it always was although not as good as 2003. 2003 was his best scoring/offensive outburst season but 2002 was his best all-around season.

I think 2005 Tmac and 2007 Tmac was better than 2002 Tmac.

No way. Any version of Tmac in Orlando was better than any version of Tmac in Houston.

Tmac was more of a slasher in his Orlando days and was more efficient because of that while Tmac in Houston was more of a jump shooter and was less efficient because of that. Also, T-Mac's all-around/two-way game came more so in Orlando than in Houston. Tmac was a one-sided player as soon as he got to Houston.

[PTB Fan]

Vote: '62 Elgin Baylor

Not a popular choice as of now, but I think he had an excellent season overall and was just amazing with what he had that season and what he did.

If you want to vote Baylor, why not pick '61? More efficient, played the full season, and dragged a putrid team to within a few points of the Finals with a legendary PO performance of 39/15/5.

Debatable, but in '62 IMO Baylor made better effect on the Lakers, was on just as ridiculous level in the PS and in Finals from a sick RS where he had to full fill his duties to the armies and LA had a great record in those games he played. Plus, LA came within 2 points of upseting the Russell led Celtics in Game 7 on a Salvy missed wide open shot.

This was simply put a ridiculous season when all things are considered and I think it deserves credit.

[mysticbb]

Code: Select all

rank in RAPM

year   KM   JS
'01   38   3
'02   288   12
'03   52   19
'04   85


RAPM is NOT a player ranking tool, it is not the intention of that list. Using that in such a fashion just results in useless discussions like the one about Malone being "ranked 288th" in 2002. Given the fact that the replacment level is something like -2.5 to -3.0, Malone gives actually value over replacement in 2002 for more minutes than players listed ahead of him in the per 100 possession ranking, thus making him a "better" player than 288th even according to RAPM.

Look at Hollinger's flawed PER outclassing RAPM/box blends in prediction contests.

That is wrong. The prediction you are referring to is not based on PER. AND an important aspect of the prediction is the minute allocation. Not knowing that will screw the results. Someone who has more luck with that will have a possible better "prediction", but that doesn't tell us anything about the predictive ability of a specific metric. RAPM outperforms PER in out of sample and retrodiction tests by a good margin, it has a higher explanatory and predictive factor than PER.

He's basing that off of the retrodiction run-down from this site: http://sportskeptic.wordpress.com/2012/ ... the-goods/ Notice how RAPM is neck-and-neck with other metrics and even barely outperforms the hated Wins Produced (and btw, I also don't like WP).

RAPM actually outperforms all but ASPM during the timespan it is available. There exists no OLDRAPM, nobody actually knows what values Alex used here.

[
Mea culpa as I edited above. I don't understand what's up with that particular set of data.

That is based on the 2000-2001 dataset, the issue was that Engelmann hadn't fixed all the problems with the dataset yet and wanted to present preliminary data and more importantly the raw data to the stats community.

The analysis is based on this pbp set: http://stats-for-the-nba.appspot.com/PBP/PBP2001.rar

[MisterWestside]

That is wrong. The prediction you are referring to is not based on PER. AND an important aspect of the prediction is the minute allocation. Not knowing that will screw the results. Someone who has more luck with that will have a possible better "prediction", but that doesn't tell us anything about the predictive ability of a specific metric. RAPM outperforms PER in out of sample and retrodiction tests by a good margin, it has a higher explanatory and predictive factor than PER.

He definitely used it in some fashion; he didn't just pull those records out of thin air. He might have also used other sources but that is unknown. Others have also used their own metrics and managed to handle themselves well next to RAPM/box blends.

But I noticed how you skipped over this part in my post:

Of course I'm not going to use PER over everything else because of that, but it just shows that RAPM is one (albeit valuable) tool in the toolbox.

Of course I know that minute allocation is important here (which is why I stated "I don't use PER over RAPM because of the predictions"). But even still it's not irrelevant. RAPM is a great metric, even one of the better metrics, but it's also just one of them and other methods of analysis have their place. And that includes people who don't even use stats.

RAPM actually outperforms all but ASPM during the timespan it is available. There exists no OLDRAPM, nobody actually knows what values Alex used here.

Except that's wasn't my point.

Notice how RAPM is neck-and-neck with other metrics and even barely outperforms the hated Wins Produced (and btw, I also don't like WP).

What's the difference? Half a win's worth? Is RAPM blowing everything else away, and allowing stats guys to make perfect predictions just using RAPM so they can cash in on their early retirement?

I'll state this again:

...RAPM is one (albeit valuable) tool in the toolbox.

Alright.

[An Unbiased Fan]

I'm still unsure how 2003 Tmac trumps 1996 Penny. Penny was a better leader, a better playmaker, and more efficient.

I just see 1996 Penny as a more complete, and imapctful player.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHdvNXek3nY[/youtube]

[fatal9]

3. In 1998 Jazz offense was nothing special without Stockton.

For whatever reason, they began playing better after the first 6 games when they made a switch in their starting SF (Russell to Keefe). They went from 2-4 to 9-3 after making this change (5 of those wins against playoff teams). That was their starting lineup for rest of the season with Stockton. In the 12 games that Malone played with that starting lineup, but without Stockton, Jazz appear to post a +4-5 offense (does anyone have the exact ortng for those games?), which would make them top 5 offense in the league.

[Doctor MJ]

I think it's absurd that people are questioning Malone's team impact when his strength as a scorer and offensive player is how well he does it WITH the team (and how well the team does with a player like him on the floor). No, I don't think old Stockton and old Hornacek playing 30 mpg are the co-anchors of an offense that was better than MJ's Bulls. I can’t throw out all I see based on a single piece of data that isn't even from the time period in question and is filled with confounding variables galore.

Well I think it's very clear you have a lot of confidence in what you see with your own eyes. In that you're far from alone, and frankly most people along those lines don't impress me very much. However, you back it up with written insight that makes it clear that you SHOULD have a lot of confidence. Any time you write, I look forward to reading it.

Clearly, I have less confidence in my eyes than you do in yours, and I think we're both right to work in the way we do. I can't speak to the rest of your analysis process, but I have a lot of confidence in what I supplement my visual analysis with. That's not a replacement for absolutely top notch watching ability, it just is what it is.

As I say this, to me it makes one likely to say: Well if you're jumping on to a new data trend this quickly, then your process is flawed. Fine to have that opinion. Just remember I was not saying "Malone absolutely has no business anywhere near here, look at his RAPM", I was just pointing out a piece of apparently contradictory data that put me on alarm and made me cautious when deciding whether to champion him over other greats.

[Doctor MJ]

RA isn't the problem, the assertions based on the data being produced is the issue. I understand that people want to see beyond boxscore numbers, since the amount of useful data we have is rather lacking. But RAPM isn't what people are making it out to be. There is no way to properly correct the date for lineups, depth, coaching schemes, and so on. The minutes Malone played were of a differing competitive & intensity level than the other 13 mpg. The attempt to extrapolate just his and his alone's impact during those 35 mpg is impossible using the APM model. You simply don't have data that can accomplish this task.

I don't really understand what you think happens as a result of the lack of date correction. I mean, I guess I take it as a given that we all understand things go better and worse and that any kind of average-based result is placing value on knowing what's the typical result. That's why all our stats in basketball are averages. Points per game, baskets per attempt, etc, it's all averages.

You want to take issue with the variance? Fine, variance issues we all agree are an issue. It doesn't sound like that's what your concern is though really. It sounds like instead of looking at this as a "too much variance" issue, you're looking at it as a "variance exists therefore I can't have any faith in it" way. And I see this and it just makes me think you're not understand how much variance you're tolerating in every other bit of basketball analysis you do.

I welcome analyzing the opponents, though i question RAPM's effctivenes in this regard. But again, the issue is the underlying APM data which springboards the whole thing. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it'll stick be a pig.

And my point really wasn't that Manu was better against scrubs, but rather that he spent more mpg playing in units against them. Guys like him will do very well with RAPM, which is no surprise.

When you talk like this, it's just seems you really don't understand how these stats are actually made. Oddly, I don't think this really disturbs you, but were I in that situation, it would disturb me a good deal.

RAPM is not adding opponent analysis to APM. Rather, the entire notion that there's an inherent bias based on the quality of a player's typical competition makes no sense if you're using RA which APM is. I'm not really sure how to explain this to you given your "lipstick on a pig" philosophy.

Re: "my point really wasn't". I wasn't confused, I was just making a distinction between a reasonable and an unreasonable fear of APM which both could have existed in your head given your previous statement. So now, you're just making clear that your fear wasn't the reasonable one.

Re: "guys like Manu do very well by RAPM." WHAT guys?

Ginobili's had a 1-year prior informed RAPM +2.5 deviations above norm SIX times. Here's the entire list of other guys who've done that more than once in the data we have:

Garnett
Duncan
Dirk
LeBron
Nash
Wade
Kobe
Shaq
Paul

Why do I get the feeling that you're taking the fact that Odom had one year with a big rating, and taking that to mean everything?

ftr, a guy pulling that off once does not make me a believer. A guy pulling it off year in and year out does. Like I said, the variance issue is real, and this is how it comes into play, but there's no reason throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Utility and impact are synonyms dude. I fully understand that depending on how a guy is used his impact/utility/helpfulness/value will vary, which is why I and others have been trying to make others understand the distinction between VALUE and ABSOLUTE GOODNESS.

I would have to completely disagree here. Utility is about about how a coach utilizes a player within the system and in the lineups.

Steve Nash's numbers in Dallas don't impress, yet...once he lands in PHX with a high octane team, and a new coaching system, his APM numbers exploded. Clearly, his improvement came from the system which UTILIZED him better. NOT that Nash all of a sudden became a much BETTER player.

You quoted just two of my sentences, and yet it appears you still didn't take the time to really grok them, so now I've red bolded some key words in our two posts.

Utility is a synonym of impact
Goodness is the nominalization of good, and better is the superlative of good, which means they essentially synonymous.

I do understand that there are multiple word senses for 'utility', and that you are conflating them. One meaning simply describes the fact that something is being used in a certain way, the other takes 'utility' to mean "how useful" something is. I wouldn't take issue with this except that clearly one of those word senses is a synonym for 'impact' and the other is not, and you're choosing to focus on the one that is not when you say they aren't synonyms, but you're also quite clearly talking about utility as if it can be quantified elsewhere.

[JordansBulls]

By the way, does anyone think it's possible to argue that Tmac's peak was actually in 2002, not 2003? I thought Tmac was better in terms of all-around play that season. He did a great job rebounding, defending that season compared to 2003 and other year in Orlando really. His scoring and passing was there too, it always was although not as good as 2003. 2003 was his best scoring/offensive outburst season but 2002 was his best all-around season.

I think 2005 Tmac and 2007 Tmac was better than 2002 Tmac.

No way. Any version of Tmac in Orlando was better than any version of Tmac in Houston.

Tmac was more of a slasher in his Orlando days and was more efficient because of that while Tmac in Houston was more of a jump shooter and was less efficient because of that. Also, T-Mac's all-around/two-way game came more so in Orlando than in Houston. Tmac was a one-sided player as soon as he got to Houston.

I would argue 2005 Tmac was better than 2003 Tmac. But that is just my opinion on that.

[Regulio]

So basically Malone's RAPM is based on incomplete data and not in his prime/peak years. In fact 3-4 after his peak. Why should it matter then is beyond me.