2012-13 Player of the Year Discussion Thread

[ronnymac2]

I think Curry is still in the mix for top 5.

The top 3 is already pretty set for most people, so just starting with 4 and 5:

4. Curry
5. Gasol

Surprised at how many people are on the Parker/Duncan bandwagon. Neither one has played all that great imo. They've been solid, but not top 5 worthy.

Marc Gasol wasn't anything spectacular either. Perhaps a little better than Parker/Duncan.

[ronnymac2]

Has Wade's performance in the post-season significantly impacted your view of his season?

His performance against Indiana has.

I wasn't expecting much in the first two rounds because Miami could get by those teams without Wade playing well. He still underperformed, but I thought he could still turn it up.

But Miami has needed him in this series against a very good Pacer squad. If he was waiting for a time to go full throttle, it would be now. Miami could easily be down 3-2. Wade has sucked.

His style of play has changed, I get it. But he should be providing Sidney Moncrief-style offense: Hitting the offensive boards, making strong cuts and finishes, posting up smaller guys, and being a menace in transition. Handle the ball when LBJ is out.

His performance against Indy indicates to me that he's injured. Like, to the point where he can't play like he did the last half of the REG SEA. That severely hurts his chances of being in my top 5.

LBJ/KD/CP3...Curry and Harden are looking pretty good as a weak 4 and 5 right about now.

[therealbig3]

I think Curry is still in the mix for top 5.

The top 3 is already pretty set for most people, so just starting with 4 and 5:

4. Curry
5. Gasol

Surprised at how many people are on the Parker/Duncan bandwagon. Neither one has played all that great imo. They've been solid, but not top 5 worthy.

Marc Gasol wasn't anything spectacular either. Perhaps a little better than Parker/Duncan.

Who would your 4 and 5 be?

And IDK, I tend to give Gasol a lot of credit for how good Memphis's defense is, and I think he's a bit better on both sides of the ball at this point than Duncan, who's been surprisingly overrated by a few people. His offense has been really unimpressive. He's been helpless for huge stretches against guys like Bogut and Gasol, and I don't think his defense has been all-world like it has been in the past to makeup for that.

And considering how weak the other candidates are (not impressed by Harden's playoffs, Wade has been garbage, Melo was garbage, etc.), I tend to side with Gasol for #5.

[ronnymac2]

^^^Curry and Harden.

Is Paul George creeping up your list? Anybody's list?

[therealbig3]

Paul George is probably in my top 15, or around there, as of right now. I LOVE his game. Needs to diversify his offense a bit (way too reliant on the 3 right now), but his defense is already "there".

He's got superstar potential, for sure.

[sp6r=underrated]

James Harden has a better season than Curry and it really isn't close.

[therealbig3]

James Harden has a better season than Curry and it really isn't close.

Based on what?

Curry was MUCH better in the playoffs, and from a production standpoint, there's not a huge gap between them in the regular season either.

And the playoffs are a big deal to me.

[colts18]

James Harden has a better season than Curry and it really isn't close.

better regular season, not postseason. But Curry did go 26-7, 48-46-89 Post ASB. He was the key for the GSW run.

[CBA]

Top 4 hasn't changed: Lebron, Durant, CP3, Harden. Had Wade, Duncan and Parker at 5, 6 and 7 before the playoffs iirc and no one has been impressive enough to break through those guys so the Finals should help sift out #5.

[Kobe Bean]

LeBron
Durant
Kobe
CP3
Melo

HM Duncan

[ceiling raiser]

LeBron, Durant, CP3 and Duncan are locks IMO, not sure who the last guy in will be. Either Wade or Parker can make it in with a dominant Finals.

[Doctor MJ]

I think Curry is still in the mix for top 5.

The top 3 is already pretty set for most people, so just starting with 4 and 5:

4. Curry
5. Gasol

Surprised at how many people are on the Parker/Duncan bandwagon. Neither one has played all that great imo. They've been solid, but not top 5 worthy.

Marc Gasol wasn't anything spectacular either. Perhaps a little better than Parker/Duncan.

Who would your 4 and 5 be?

And IDK, I tend to give Gasol a lot of credit for how good Memphis's defense is, and I think he's a bit better on both sides of the ball at this point than Duncan, who's been surprisingly overrated by a few people. His offense has been really unimpressive. He's been helpless for huge stretches against guys like Bogut and Gasol, and I don't think his defense has been all-world like it has been in the past to makeup for that.

And considering how weak the other candidates are (not impressed by Harden's playoffs, Wade has been garbage, Melo was garbage, etc.), I tend to side with Gasol for #5.

Gasol's a very interesting thing here in terms of winning bias - and I mean that in both directions.

No one was talking about Gasol really before the playoff run.
Then the playoff run happened and Memphis got 2 rounds further than expected making Gasol the MVP of one of the Final 4.
Then they got swept.
And then you have to start thinking: There's a very real chance that Grizz would have lost each of the two series they won if they other team had just been healthy. How impressive is it then to get past injured teams and then not be able to get a game of the first healthy team they play?

Now of course, every bit of that story is based on team performance. As we've talked about a lot on here, we should be making decisions based on how the player actually plays. If we put it in those terms, how did Gasol catapult himself up in the playoffs based on what you saw of him?

[Doctor MJ]

James Harden has a better season than Curry and it really isn't close.

It would be good if you elaborate here.

I think Curry's a very interesting case, because many people jumped Curry like crazy in their rankings based on the playoffs, but statistically he wasn't much different from what he'd been in the regular season. One might be inclined to say that that's evidence that people overrated his playoff run, but the dude did finish 7th in Win Shares in the regular season with various pockets of people proclaiming his performance as miraculous.

I won't deny I had Harden ahead of Curry before the playoffs, and I won't say I don't see an argument for Harden now, but Curry debates now very much have my attention.

One of the big things to think about for me: How serious was the GS threat to the Spurs? Early in the series it just looked like they had no answer for Curry. Then they won. How impressed should we be with the Curry-based Warrior performance?

[Doctor MJ]

^^^Curry and Harden.

Is Paul George creeping up your list? Anybody's list?

The thing about George as a Top 5 guy here is that if Indy by some chance beats Miami, isn't the story mostly going to be about Hibbert? Indy's a team that didn't win 50 in the regular season who in the playoffs seems to have uncanny matchup advantages, and those advantages are based on Hibbert. In fact, I don't think I'm aware of any overall player metric in the playoffs that doesn't imply Hibbert is the Pacer MVP.

None of this means that I'd rate Hibbert ahead of George for the year at this point, and I may well have George in my Top 10, but to me the guy seriously climbing is not George.

[therealbig3]

Now of course, every bit of that story is based on team performance. As we've talked about a lot on here, we should be making decisions based on how the player actually plays. If we put it in those terms, how did Gasol catapult himself up in the playoffs based on what you saw of him?

Well, it's important to note that I had Gasol ranked quite highly during the regular season, firmly inside the top 15 and probably inside the top 10, in fact. I thought he was getting really underrated by most people. And his rise is really based mostly on the fall of others. IMO, Westbrook's and Kobe's injuries unfortunately ruled them out of POY discussion. Wade and Melo flamed out badly in the playoffs. Harden's performance is up for debate, but I personally wasn't really impressed by it at all, and I think it mainly exposed weaknesses in his game that he needs to improve on before he becomes a legitimate offensive anchor for a playoff team.

So that's 5 players that Gasol leapfrogged based on nothing to do with him, really. And then you have Duncan and Parker, who I've felt have been overrated all year...very good players, but Pop is the real MVP of the Spurs, and I don't think Parker or Duncan (at this point of his career) would look nearly as good with any other coach. It's not like Parker and Duncan are lighting the world on fire as is, anyway. I've got Parker and Duncan about equal as players right now, and I'm convinced that as of right now, Gasol is a better version of Duncan, so I give him the edge over both.

And that's around where I had Gasol in the regular season, if I had to pinpoint it...10-12, with Parker and Duncan being the two question marks.

[sp6r=underrated]

James Harden has a better season than Curry and it really isn't close.

It would be good if you elaborate here.

I think Curry's a very interesting case, because many people jumped Curry like crazy in their rankings based on the playoffs, but statistically he wasn't much different from what he'd been in the regular season. One might be inclined to say that that's evidence that people overrated his playoff run, but the dude did finish 7th in Win Shares in the regular season with various pockets of people proclaiming his performance as miraculous.

I won't deny I had Harden ahead of Curry before the playoffs, and I won't say I don't see an argument for Harden now, but Curry debates now very much have my attention.

One of the big things to think about for me: How serious was the GS threat to the Spurs? Early in the series it just looked like they had no answer for Curry. Then they won. How impressed should we be with the Curry-based Warrior performance?

Harden to me had a substantially better regular season than Curry because he produced at a higher level. He was a more dynamic scorer who could score at a higher volume than Curry and his penetration generated a ton of open shots for teammates all years through his play on the pick and roll.

A plus/minus individual such as yourself will be ready to point out Curry's superiority in unadjusted +/- but that is the result of McHale's coaching strategy. The Rockets used balanced lineups all year which makes it very difficult to stand out. I haven't seen adjusted plus/minus or RAPM (is that stuff still available online?) for this season and I still consider box score production to be more important in player evaluation than +/-.

As to the SAS-GSW series, the first two games to me were a case of SAS doing a terrible job on perimeter rotations leaving tons of empty jumpers along with Curry being hot. It is telling that Thompson was annihilating SAS from the outside during those first 2 games.

The final 4 games weren't that close. GSW one win was a game they were down in for a majority of the action. Once they tightened up on the perimeter they handled GSW with ease because they shut down their offense more than SAS offense improving.

when I engage in skill-set analysis I think the 2013 Harden would have improved more teams than Curry. Harden is elite at running the most important play right now in the NBA: pick and roll. He can generate a significant amount of high percentage shots for himself and his team playing basically anywhere in the league due to his skill in this area. By contrast, I do not consider Curry an elite ball handler nor elite off the ball player. I think there are teams in the league were his impact would be less.

A few more elite playoff games isn't going to cause me to discard the regular season 82 game sample size. This is why I am still on the Wade bandwagon and why I still prefer Harden.

[colts18]

A plus/minus individual such as yourself will be ready to point out Curry's superiority in unadjusted +/- but that is the result of McHale's coaching strategy. The Rockets used balanced lineups all year which makes it very difficult to stand out. I haven't seen adjusted plus/minus or RAPM (is that stuff still available online?) for this season and I still consider box score production to be more important in player evaluation than +/-.

RAPM with Priors
Through March 30th:

Rank Name ORating DRating Rating Pos
5 James Harden 6.6 -0.9 5.6 5472
38 Stephen Curry 1.7 1.1 2.8 5326

2013 RAPM without any prior info:

104 Stephen Curry 0.9 1.5 -0.6 5326
134 James Harden 0.4 2.1 -1.7 5472

[sp6r=underrated]

Thank you. Harden looks clearly superior in prior informed and there is a negligible difference in non-prior informed. Are you the one who applies the formula or are you getting from a website?

As said before, I think I'm in the minority of posters here right now but I still think box score production is a better indicator of player quality than +/-.

[Dr Positivity]

Feel strongly about this 5: Lebron, Durant, Paul, Parker, Gasol. Only way I can see that changing is if Wade pulls a 2006/2011 Finals

[colts18]

Thank you. Harden looks clearly superior in prior informed and there is a negligible difference in non-prior informed. Are you the one who applies the formula or are you getting from a website?

I'm not calculating. I just find the RAPM on the internet and store it on a website.