New Franchise: Kevin Garnett vs Moses Malone

[CaliBullsFan]

Moses easy. He averaged 31.1 PPG and 14.7 RPG in his MVP prime ('81-'82). Better scorer AND rebounder than KG and arguably the greatest offensive rebounder ever. Mo kicked Kareem's ass in the '83 finals (24.5/15.3 in '82-'83) and helped lead the Sixers to a four game sweep. No way KG is kicking Kareem's ass....ever. Also, Mo somehow led a sub .500 Rockets team to the finals in '81 as well. Hakeem used to play ball with Mo in Houston during the off season as a younger player to learn from him. Show Mo some respect.

There is no argument

[FJS]

Moses all the way. He took a team of nobodies to the finals something kg couldnt pass first round. And do it in a lakers dominance era. Kg is vastly overrated.

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[ardee]

I'm one of Garnett's most vocal detractors but I'd probably go with him.

They're both top 15ish players but if you look at them as players, KG has value as a franchise center piece for longer than Moses does and also brings more to the table.

Moses is a better offensive rebounder but KG is a better defensive rebounder. I'm on my phone but I'm pretty sure the difference in pace adjusted rpg averages and TRB% is in Garnett's favor. Let's call rebounding a wash.

KG is inarguably a better playmaker, that's not up for debate. He's also a better help defender and anchor.

Moses was a better scorer but I don't think that's enough. For example I rank Dirk above KG because I think his whole offensive package dwarfs KG. I don't see that from Moses.

So I think KG helped his team in more areas and also had more years as a top level contributor. So yes I'd choose him and I'm not a fan.

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[kayess]

Moses for me as well. Not to mention he isn't going to want to be the highest paid guy in the league.

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

My god, just hwen I thought JB's arguments couldn't get any worse...

I don't want to check (I'm also pretty sure JB checked beforehand), but if Jordan were ever the highest paid player in a year/over the stretch he was in the NBA, that'd be **** hilarious

[Warspite]

I'm one of Garnett's most vocal detractors but I'd probably go with him.

They're both top 15ish players but if you look at them as players, KG has value as a franchise center piece for longer than Moses does and also brings more to the table.

Moses is a better offensive rebounder but KG is a better defensive rebounder. I'm on my phone but I'm pretty sure the difference in pace adjusted rpg averages and TRB% is in Garnett's favor. Let's call rebounding a wash.

KG is inarguably a better playmaker, that's not up for debate. He's also a better help defender and anchor.

Moses was a better scorer but I don't think that's enough. For example I rank Dirk above KG because I think his whole offensive package dwarfs KG. I don't see that from Moses.

So I think KG helped his team in more areas and also had more years as a top level contributor. So yes I'd choose him and I'm not a fan.
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Yet Moses is a better offensive player than Dirk.

Moses in his 18th season is a 16ppg 9rpg player. That would make him the best C in the NBA today.

Moses put up 19ppg 10rpg and didnt make the allstar team in 1990. Somewhat understandable since thats the GOAT allstar teams but that should also be factored in.

Moses Malone would dominate the C position much more than KG would.

Moss career Drb% is 23.8 KGs is 25.8

When you consider that KG is not done so his % will go down is it realy as big difference when Moses off rebounding is a mile ahead of everyone not named Russell?

[The Infamous1]

When I have a comparison where I don't like either guy as an offensive anchor I'll take the far superior defensive player and that's KG

[tsherkin]

Totally different styles of player, like two-sides-of-the-coin types, off/def.

I have KG floating in that 18-25ish range, since I haven't really fleshed things out beyond the top 10 or 15 personally, but I had moses as #10 until comparatively recent times.

He's got everything you'd ask for from a legend's career, really.

I like Garnett and rank him highly, but I gotta go with Moses here.

[bastillon]

this thread shows me how overrated Moses still is on this board. it's really surprising considering what we have found out about him in RPOY and top100 projects. I would think people took something out of those projects but apparently it's not the case. KG is a top10-15 player all-time without a doubt, some consider him a top10 player based on his impact and considering his pathetic troops in Minnesota.

Moses is not a top20 player. maybe if you take his accolades, he does qualify but to me it is not enough for you to achieve something you need to actually have a game that backs up those awards/achievements. Moses with his selfish style couldn't even be the anchor offensively because you couldn't even run the offense through him. you needed to have a stacked offense for Moses to make a big impact. defensively he was flat out camping out for rebounds instead of playing help-D which is the reason why he rarely contested shots. matter of fact, his impact on team defensive rebounding (defensive rebounding is far more important than offensive rebounding) was very weak considering that his teams were usually mediocre in that regard. even when he was playing with Barkley on the same team, Philly was sometimes getting punked on defensive glass. shows you how much of Moses rebounding was stat-padded and how much boxing out he was doing in his days. there are huge problems with his offense contributing to bad defense - high turnovers despite low number of touches, didn't bother to get back on defense, attacked the offensive glass which made it even worse. his energy is a question mark as well. I know how relentless he was on the offensive glass but other than that? did not help on the pick and roll, did not get back on defense, rarely contested shots in the paint if he wasn't going for a block, never seen him contesting perimeter shots, wouldn't bother helping his teammate when he was beat. I mean there are all kinds of question marks and red flags regarding his style of play, defensive impact, ability to be team's go-to offense (which he was clearly not despite high ppg). all of the above doesn't show up in the boxscore and so Moses looks great as a scoring/rebounding machine. once your analysis becomes legit, you notice that behind those numbers there's very little impact compared to what you would expect.

I would take KG and it's not even close whatsoever. the gap between them on ATL is probably 10-15 places. Moses gets overrated because of boxscore lovers and lazy analysis of his game. he had tons of issues on both sides of the ball that boxscore won't tell you about. personally I feel like whatever he was doing boxscore wise is meaningless to me because I know what is hiding behind those numbers. there is a reason why his teams were constantly one of the worst defensive teams in the league. you need to get past his boxscore numbers and there's not much to talk about. his intangibles for a superstar player are possibly a negative, and I'm not even talking about intangibles like leadership etc, just stuff that doesn't show up in the boxscore but has a huge impact. defensive rotations, transition D, pnr D, contesting shots, being team's go-to offense etc. I used to overrate Moses as well but with the projects that we had on this board, Moses isn't fooling me ever again.

[bastillon]

re: Moses

link to DS post ?

This is actually mysticbb, in response to someone saying Moses should rank ahead of LeBron, because he won a championship:

No, the 76ers won the championship, a team which was already a +5.7 SRS team without Moses, a team which went to the FINALS without Moses Malone, a team which had Julius Erving on their roster making a much bigger difference to that team than Moses Malone. Do you think that the Heat without James were a 57 wins team? Do you think that the Heat without James could have went to the finals?

Continued:

Moses Malone didn't even make a huge difference to the team performance at his peak, why should I want him in other seasons when he constantly was out in the first round and not the cornerstone of a franchise being able to win.
I count 8 seasons in which Malone was healthy enough and good enough to be the best player on a championship team, that is exactly 1 season more than James has. But Malone had a lot less impact, if we don't dismiss all the evidence we have. He made a small improvement to the Rockets when he joined. He didn't improve a below average team much (granted, he had that playoff run to the finals), he didn't make a big difference to the 76ers at his absolute peak. The 76ers without him were already a 5.7 SRS team, with him that improved to 8.15 SRS with a healthy Erving playing in 1983. When Erving missed 10 games (2 games in January and 8 games in March with a wrist injury) the 76ers went down to a 3.06 SRS team. The 76ers without a absolute peak Malone were better than the 76ers with absolute peak Malone and without past peak Erving. What should I believe when peak Malone doesn't even come close a difference LeBron James made?

I think people are putting way too much stock into the boxscore numbers and way too easily they are impressed with big offensive rebounding numbers. Since the offensive rebounding numbers are available the correlation coefficient between scoring margin and ORB% is 0.06, in the last 10 years it is even -0.1. There is no clear indication that offensive rebounding helps a team to win more games. In comparison the coefficient for DRB% is 0.3. Offensive rebounding might be the single most overrated boxscore stat, even BLK% and STL show a much higher correlation to scoring margin (0.2 and 0.17 respectively). That is based on the data of 983 single team seasons from 1973/74 to 2010/11.

If you want to know how much someone helps a team win with his rebounding look at the DRB% of that player. Moses Malone's defensive rebounding is basically on par with Nowitzki's, his BLK% and STL% too. The defensive impact of Moses Malone was not big, for sure not bigger than Nowitzki's, especially when we take into account the negative effect of turnovers for the team defense. It is very likely that Moses Malone's impact on the game was lowered due to the high TO-R (turnover rate has a -0.3 correlation coefficient to scoring margin, a much bigger impact factor than offensive rebounding).

And that all is reflected in the team results with and without Moses Malone. He didn't make such a big difference, for sure not a big difference as people seem to think.

8 seasons vs. 7 seasons while James had a bigger impact, I don't see the longevity argument for Moses Malone. Nobody would pick Kevin Willis over Dwight Howard based on longevity either.

More:

Nobody is ignoring playoff games, but that comparison wins James easily. Don't be fooled by some playoff games you might not be impressed about, but James had much more dominant performances than Moses Malone. And Malone played in 100 playoff games, James in 92.

No, I don't agree that Moses Malone was overall a player which gives me more than LeBron James. He has more personal accomplishments with the MVP awards and Finals MVP, but those awards were also really circumstantial.

I confused the poster, but I also could have sworn that DS posted some stuff against Moses too.

It was a LeBron vs Moses debate, but I think that's pretty damning evidence against Moses overall. And Duncan imo is at least on the same level as LeBron (actually, he's better imo).

Having seen Moses' peak years, I can tell you that his impact indeed went beyond mere numbers. He was the ultimate difference-maker during those years.

If that would be the case, we would have seen that in the results. But we have multiple instances in which Moses Malone missed games and the difference was between 2 and 3. "Ultimate difference makers" are usually making a bigger difference, especially when we are talking about mediocre teams in most of those cases. In 1977/78 missing Tomjanovic or Murphy made clearly a bigger difference to the Rockets than missing Malone. Somehow that great difference maker was closer to a Kevin Love type difference maker than to a Tim Duncan type difference maker.

Without him, '81 Houston misses the playoffs if you sub in an average center.

Yeah, given the fact that the Rockets barely made the playoffs, that isn't unlikely. BUT the 1981 run of the Rockets was probably one of the most luckiest streaks for a team in NBA playoff history. The only reason for the Rockets to advance against the Lakers was a lucky streak from the free throw line while the Lakers (Magic in that case) missed more free throws in game 3 than they usually did. If both teams would have made the free throws at their normal rate, the Lakers would have won that game, the difference was 8 pts in that game alone due to lucky free throw shooting in favor of the Rockets. Similar story against the Spurs in game 5, when the Rockets made 4 more than expected and the Spurs 3 less. After that the Rockets played an even worse team in the conference finals, the Kansas City Kings were a -0.49 SRS team, the Rockets -0.2 SRS team. That is probably the worst conference finals ever happened in the history of the NBA. Two below average teams in the conference finals is more related to luck than to skill.

Without him, '83 Sixers probably don't get past the Celtics.

Why should they? The 76ers didn't play the Celtics in the 83 playoffs. So much about you saying " I have watched Malone ...".

I assure you, that Sixers team was not winning a championship with Caldwell Jones instead of Moses

Yeah, they just made it to the finals one year before, while being a 5.7 SRS team. The difference isn't as huge as you might think.

No team was winning a championship in the 80s without a loaded team, making the '81 Houston run all that more impressive.

Narrative, nothing more. The 81 Rockets were a below average team, who happened to get lucky at the line twice in the first round series against the Lakers, a team which wasn't that strong in that year. The Spurs and the Kings in 1981 were far away from a loaded team. That 81 playoff run is only impressive, when you ignore the circumstances while imaging that the Rockets beat loaded teams with excellent play. But that didn't happen.


In such a comparison I take Tim Duncan, EASILY! There is no way that I'm not picking the far superior defensive player and the at least equally good offensive player.

1) his defense was poor, was a big mins guy on the worst defensive team of his era (late 70s/early 80s Rockets) so he deserves a lot of blame for that, particularly playing the center position which has the most impact on defense both in positive and negative way. if you're a bad defensive PG, it won't matter all that much, but if you're Bargnani your team is surely not gonna be able to hide you defensively.

2) his offense was dependant on playing with other star players, you couldn't run the offense through Moses like you could with many of the all time bigs, it gets worse, you couldn't even dump the ball down low and expect Moses to dominate 1 on 1 because he didn't really have much of a post-game. his scoring was all about offensive rebounding and finishing off of others. sure he had some scoring moves, that famous pump fake and drive, he fouled out your entire frontline, he was amazing FT scorer, he was surely very unconventional, but the most valuable bigs gave you a guy who is able to be a playmaker, either from the high post (Walton, KG) or from the low post (Hakeem, Shaq). Moses was neither.

3) his style of play made his offense hurt his team's defense because as he was crashing the boards, he was unable to get back on defense and that was a huge loss in an era when every team played at 100+ pace. if you look at Moses stats what stands out the most is offensive rebounding, the least valuable stat in the boxscore. then you have high volume scoring @ high efficiency but those pts come as a finisher, not from his shot creation. think Pau Gasol vs McHale. then most importantly you have his defense being well sub-par. didn't boxout very well (Rockets had bad defensive rebounding %), blocked some shots but that came from chasing blocks not from playing good defense, played well as a man defender but that's not nearly as important as help D etc. the study of Moses Malone's game teaches you which boxscore stats are important in terms of high impact, and which aren't. it teaches you what's the right way of playing basketball. Moses' style

as a result of which his boxscore stats were great but they didn't translate very well to impact. Moses was excellent at what he was doing, as boxscore stats clearly indicate, but what he was doing wasn't necessarily that valuable to his teams. it wasn't the right way.

the better scorer/rebounder/defender isn't picked here?

Playoff numbers. All 12 years for Nowitzki and for Malone from 1979 to 1989.

Code: Select all

              Gm   PPG   TS%   ORB%  DRB%  AST%  TOV%  STL%  BLK%  PER  WS/48
Malone        77   23.8  54.8  14.1  23.4  6.5   11.3  1.1   2.4   22.1 0.177
Nowitzki     128   25.9  58.4  4.2   24.6  11.8  9.4   1.4   1.8   24.7 0.205


So, overall Malone had a couple of more blocked shots and the higher ORB%. The higher BLK% came from Malone rather trying to block a shot than really defend the position and the higher ORB% was a result of Malone playing strictly underneath the opponents basket. Overall Malone's playing style did not lead to a huge impact. His defense was mediocre at best, him being late back on defense was making the defense rather worse. Nowitzki has to be seen as the better defender.
Malone's positional advantage underneath the own basket did not lead to a higher percentage of rebounds. That is a big indicator that Nowitzki is indeed the better rebounder. The raw boxscore numbers are giving a misleading impression here.
Nowitzki has a huge advantage in terms of passing and ball handling, something which can't be ignored. Overall Nowitzki was the higher impact player and a look at the advanced boxscore metrics reveals him also having the better combination of production and efficiency. Thus, the logical choice has to be Nowitzki in both cases. Especially for the team building aspect we have to see that Malone missed more games.

The one year they did miss in '78 he only played in 59 games.

The Rockets missing the playoffs in 1978 had more to do with that:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgqUZ1IAA_8[/youtube]

Until that point the Rockets play like a 0.1 SRS team. Then, with Tomjanovic out and Moses Malone in, the Rockets went down to play like a -4.4 SRS team, a 4.5 point drop. For the game without Moses Malone and without Tomjanovic the Rockets played like a -6.9 SRS team. Malone showed an impact of +2.5 on a -6.9 team, leading them to be a -4.4 team. That is something about 30 players in the league can do. But most certainly that is an impact other All-Time great players laugh about.

Afterwards, lead the 76ers to an NBA title including a playoff appearance year he was there. During their championship playoff run, he averaged 25 and 15.

The 76ers without Malone went to the finals! Seriously, which Mavericks team would have been capable of going to the finals without Nowitzki?

please show that statement to be true
offensive rebound and defensive rebounding show mixed results in a team being better offensively or defensively

Make a regression analysis on the available data since 1973/74 and you will see what I mean. Just glancing over some of the results and conclude "mixed results" is pretty much useless. For sure, you will find exception from the rule always, but in average the better teams tend to rebound better defensively, but not offensively.

well just using SRS the Rockets had a -10.73 drop but with Philly with him had a 1.79 improvement. SO Moses did have a defensive impact

The Rockets shifted a lot of minutes around and actually tanked that season in order to get the better draft pick. As the worst record in the conference at least ensured the 2nd pick.
The 76ers marginal improved, a similar thing is seen in the year later when Moses Malone missed games.

that is a very small sample size and the Warriors had Andris at center

Andris Biedrins from 2007 to 2011 had a 25.6 DRB%, that is higher than Moses Malone's. And yeah, Nowitzki did not play often as center, but when he did and played closer to the opponents basket, he showed that he can get offensive rebounds.

he just isn't the rebounder Moses is, I don't know how this is up for debate

For sure you don't understand that, because you would need to start analyzing how they played. That is for sure tougher than just taking a raw rebounds per game numbers and make assumption based on numbers without context.

But I get the feeling you think Moses is a one-trick pony who excels at the one aspect of basketball that has a very low correlation with positive team results- offensive rebounding. Is my feeling accurate?

No, not at all. Moses Malone was a very, very good basketballer. And when I say that he was like the earlier version of Kevin Love, you see that I'm talking about a +3 player here. He clearly had a positive impact on the outcome of the game, but not as big of an impact as his boxscore stats suggest. People seem to assume that he was some sort of great defender, but he wasn't. His raw rebounding numbers are making it seem as if he was such a great rebounder. He had a better feeling for the offensive board than others, but he also just rebounded his own missed layups quite often. His passing and ball handling was clearly worse in comparison to other All-Time great bigs, there shouldn't be a debate. Overall we can see that he didn't make such a big difference, nonetheless he was making a positive impact on the game.
Well, my words might give the impression you have, but that is mainly because a lot of people seem to just take the MVP awards, the lucky 1981 playoff run and his raw boxscore numbers in order to assume that Moses Malone had some freaking high peak.

[bastillon]

I'll let fatal9's posts speak for themselves. he changed the way I look at Moses.

Really hope Moses doesn't get overrated in this project. One of the guys whose impact is not as great as his stats would indicate.

For one thing, he is not like the other elite big men where you can build the offense around his his post game, he wasn't a good enough passer to keep everyone involved. You need to surround a player like him with players who individually can get their own, not role players who can shoot (like you could around Hakeem/Shaq/D-Rob/KAJ etc). When he was in the paint he just had tunnel vision, the ball wasn't coming out but to his credit he was an absolute horse on the offensive glass. And like other great big men, he didn't have the same defensive impact as them, monster on the offensive boards but stats inflated from rebounding own misses. Says a lot about a center when his teams are literally some of the worst defensively in the league (last in '78, second last in '79, 18th out of 22 in '80, 16 out of 22 in '81 and '82), especially when he had decent defensive players/enforcers around him (Robert Reid, Billy Paultz etc). He won a ring, but he joined a team which the year before had gone 58-24, gotten to game 6 of the finals with Caldwell Jones in his place, and had been serious contenders for three consecutive years. I don't know, from everything I've seen of him, from watching his games, from looking at his career year by year, he just comes out very overrated to me (usually ranked at 11-12 on most lists).

edit: but yes, I'm generally critical of Moses. The seasons from before he joined the Sixers don't impress me much because a) team records weren't that great (feel like talent was there), b) the defensive ratings of his teams were absolutely dreadful (like close to last place bad). I don't know if it was the style the team played (because they were quite high offensively) but they did have decent defensive players like Paultz, Reid and decent athletes, so that and his poor shot blocking numbers speak to his inability to anchor defenses (this is pretty important for great centers). I'm also critical of his post game being as easy to build around as other great centers because he lacks the passing skills and ability to read defenses/doubles (forced a lot of shots). For that reason I really see him working on a talented team with players who individually can get theres (unlike say Shaq, Hakeem, D-Rob who you can surround with role players/shooters and do quite well). When he did win a championship he joined a team that was 58-24 before he arrived, had been to finals two of the previous three years and he replaced Caldwell Jones. Then the years afterwards the Sixers had an embarrassing first round exit to the Nets in '84 and Moses seems to have generally performed poorly in the playoffs after that (ie. playoff career after 27 is basically irrelevant).

+ mysticbb:

No, the 76ers won the championship, a team which was already a +5.7 SRS team without Moses, a team which went to the FINALS without Moses Malone, a team which had Julius Erving on their roster making a much bigger difference to that team than Moses Malone. Do you think that the Heat without James were a 57 wins team? Do you think that the Heat without James could have went to the finals?

Continued:

Moses Malone didn't even make a huge difference to the team performance at his peak, why should I want him in other seasons when he constantly was out in the first round and not the cornerstone of a franchise being able to win.
I count 8 seasons in which Malone was healthy enough and good enough to be the best player on a championship team, that is exactly 1 season more than James has. But Malone had a lot less impact, if we don't dismiss all the evidence we have. He made a small improvement to the Rockets when he joined. He didn't improve a below average team much (granted, he had that playoff run to the finals), he didn't make a big difference to the 76ers at his absolute peak. The 76ers without him were already a 5.7 SRS team, with him that improved to 8.15 SRS with a healthy Erving playing in 1983. When Erving missed 10 games (2 games in January and 8 games in March with a wrist injury) the 76ers went down to a 3.06 SRS team. The 76ers without a absolute peak Malone were better than the 76ers with absolute peak Malone and without past peak Erving. What should I believe when peak Malone doesn't even come close a difference LeBron James made?

I think people are putting way too much stock into the boxscore numbers and way too easily they are impressed with big offensive rebounding numbers. Since the offensive rebounding numbers are available the correlation coefficient between scoring margin and ORB% is 0.06, in the last 10 years it is even -0.1. There is no clear indication that offensive rebounding helps a team to win more games. In comparison the coefficient for DRB% is 0.3. Offensive rebounding might be the single most overrated boxscore stat, even BLK% and STL show a much higher correlation to scoring margin (0.2 and 0.17 respectively). That is based on the data of 983 single team seasons from 1973/74 to 2010/11.

If you want to know how much someone helps a team win with his rebounding look at the DRB% of that player. Moses Malone's defensive rebounding is basically on par with Nowitzki's, his BLK% and STL% too. The defensive impact of Moses Malone was not big, for sure not bigger than Nowitzki's, especially when we take into account the negative effect of turnovers for the team defense. It is very likely that Moses Malone's impact on the game was lowered due to the high TO-R (turnover rate has a -0.3 correlation coefficient to scoring margin, a much bigger impact factor than offensive rebounding).

And that all is reflected in the team results with and without Moses Malone. He didn't make such a big difference, for sure not a big difference as people seem to think.

8 seasons vs. 7 seasons while James had a bigger impact, I don't see the longevity argument for Moses Malone. Nobody would pick Kevin Willis over Dwight Howard based on longevity either.

Having seen Moses' peak years, I can tell you that his impact indeed went beyond mere numbers. He was the ultimate difference-maker during those years.

If that would be the case, we would have seen that in the results. But we have multiple instances in which Moses Malone missed games and the difference was between 2 and 3. "Ultimate difference makers" are usually making a bigger difference, especially when we are talking about mediocre teams in most of those cases. In 1977/78 missing Tomjanovic or Murphy made clearly a bigger difference to the Rockets than missing Malone. Somehow that great difference maker was closer to a Kevin Love type difference maker than to a Tim Duncan type difference maker.

Without him, '81 Houston misses the playoffs if you sub in an average center.

Yeah, given the fact that the Rockets barely made the playoffs, that isn't unlikely. BUT the 1981 run of the Rockets was probably one of the most luckiest streaks for a team in NBA playoff history. The only reason for the Rockets to advance against the Lakers was a lucky streak from the free throw line while the Lakers (Magic in that case) missed more free throws in game 3 than they usually did. If both teams would have made the free throws at their normal rate, the Lakers would have won that game, the difference was 8 pts in that game alone due to lucky free throw shooting in favor of the Rockets. Similar story against the Spurs in game 5, when the Rockets made 4 more than expected and the Spurs 3 less. After that the Rockets played an even worse team in the conference finals, the Kansas City Kings were a -0.49 SRS team, the Rockets -0.2 SRS team. That is probably the worst conference finals ever happened in the history of the NBA. Two below average teams in the conference finals is more related to luck than to skill.

Without him, '83 Sixers probably don't get past the Celtics.

Why should they? The 76ers didn't play the Celtics in the 83 playoffs. So much about you saying " I have watched Malone ...".

I assure you, that Sixers team was not winning a championship with Caldwell Jones instead of Moses

Yeah, they just made it to the finals one year before, while being a 5.7 SRS team. The difference isn't as huge as you might think.

No team was winning a championship in the 80s without a loaded team, making the '81 Houston run all that more impressive.

Narrative, nothing more. The 81 Rockets were a below average team, who happened to get lucky at the line twice in the first round series against the Lakers, a team which wasn't that strong in that year. The Spurs and the Kings in 1981 were far away from a loaded team. That 81 playoff run is only impressive, when you ignore the circumstances while imaging that the Rockets beat loaded teams with excellent play. But that didn't happen.


In such a comparison I take Tim Duncan, EASILY! There is no way that I'm not picking the far superior defensive player and the at least equally good offensive player.

3. Moses. Was no better on D than he was in 1980, and scored less...but he was a better rebounder and a better shooter. It just nags at me, though, that he had a good team around him again...and they underperformed again. The same is true of the 1979 Lakers...but the 1979 Rockets didn't have a guy like Elvin Hayes screwing things up. (This time, the Lakers had the problem with AD.) And Kareem was better in the playoffs than Moses was. There's just no way I can put Moses over Kareem.

The Dilemma of Moses. Moses Malone had, as always, good numbers. Rick Barry was fading and was only a little above average at this point. But Calvin Murphy was there, and so was a young Robert Reid. And Allen Leavell. Rudy T played 1800 effective minutes. They had the Whopper and Dunleavy. It was not a bad team. The team had balance between outside scoring and interior scoring, and good playmaking. And they underperformed—again. What they really lacked was interior D, and that falls under Moses’s area. In many seasons, his strengths superseded his flaws. I don’t think they did this year. (And MVP and All-NBA voters at the time agreed.)

overall, Moses career should be really re-evaluated for him to get back to that borderline top10 status that he seemed to have established couple of years ago. he's really no better than Artis Gilmore to me. I'd rather have A-Train to start a franchise. Moses boxscore stats have very little to do with actual impact. I think mystic proved that missing Rudy Tomjanovich had greater impact on their record in 78 and missing Dr J had greater impact in 83. that tells you a lot about Moses.

what isn't talked about enough is Moses finals blooper in 81. many have criticized Bird for his poor finals performance, but at least he dominated the game in different ways unlike Moses who just choked bad with like 15 ppg on 40% and didn't do anything else. 81 Rockets are one of the worst teams ever to make the finals and that accomplishment is way overblown. it all started with Magic being absolutely horrendous in the first round, making bad play after bad play in the crunch time of a best of 3 series. and because western conference just sucked bad back in the day, you could get to the finals after beating LA without encountering any serious opposition. that's not nearly as impressive as making the finals in the 00s west. it should be compared to Nets being lucky to play terrible opponents in 02-03.

[G35]

Moses for me as well. Not to mention he isn't going to want to be the highest paid guy in the league.

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not everyone would. Duncan wouldn't.....

[G35]

What I read from all that is the 1981 Rockets had a lucky streak to the finals, the 1983 Sixers weren't any better with Moses than without, that his game was dependent on other players, his perception is based around boxscore numbers, and that he was out of the first round a lot.....a lot of that sounds just like KG.

That 2008 Celtics team had a whole lot of luck in the 2008 playoff's i.e. worst record ever for an NBA champion, they played two 7 game series vs a 37 win Hawks team and 45 win Cav's team. They played in a finals against a Laker team without their starting SF and C.

How can you hate on that 1983 Sixer season? The Sixers had to go up against either the stacked frontline of the Celtics or the Lakers. With Darrell Dawkins and Caldwell Jones! Moses made it an even playing field. In fact if Moses had teamed up with Doc earlier the top 10 would be a lot more crowded and the legacies of Bird, Magic, Kareem, Worthy, McHale, Parish would look a lot different. Those Sixers teams crushed everyone in the playoff's. KG has never been on a team as dominant as those 83 Sixers.....

[NO-KG-AI]

Moses for me as well. Not to mention he isn't going to want to be the highest paid guy in the league.

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not everyone would. Duncan wouldn't.....

Duncan didn't take the max?

Can't recall a player who didn't get whatever he could after his first deal. Besides, pay rate=/= impact on the floor.

If a player could play for 1 dollar, it wouldn't make him the GOAT. Keep reaching though

[bastillon]

What I read from all that is the 1981 Rockets had a lucky streak to the finals, the 1983 Sixers weren't any better with Moses than without, that his game was dependent on other players, his perception is based around boxscore numbers, and that he was out of the first round a lot.....a lot of that sounds just like KG.

That 2008 Celtics team had a whole lot of luck in the 2008 playoff's i.e. worst record ever for an NBA champion, they played two 7 game series vs a 37 win Hawks team and 45 win Cav's team. They played in a finals against a Laker team without their starting SF and C.

How can you hate on that 1983 Sixer season? The Sixers had to go up against either the stacked frontline of the Celtics or the Lakers. With Darrell Dawkins and Caldwell Jones! Moses made it an even playing field. In fact if Moses had teamed up with Doc earlier the top 10 would be a lot more crowded and the legacies of Bird, Magic, Kareem, Worthy, McHale, Parish would look a lot different. Those Sixers teams crushed everyone in the playoff's. KG has never been on a team as dominant as those 83 Sixers.....

most of the arguments against Moses are about his skillset. there are all kinds of problems with his game particularly with his defense.

as for as Celtics 2008 - they had a great SRS which is a much better tool to work with than record because it involves strength of opposition and margin of victory into the analysis which is something you have to consider if you are treating it seriously. also Lakers 08 after Gasol's trade were by far their strongest version. results were there regardless of who they were missing. they destroyed western conference in a manner they never repeated. calling those Lakers a team missing starting SF and C is intellectually dishonest considering just how dominant they were with Gasol that year. it makes no sense whatsoever in particular because Sixers never beat a team as good as those Lakers 08.

also nobody is hating on Sixers 83, they were a great team. you don't have to convince anybody they were great. but what about the fact that Sixers were perennial championship contenders before Moses even got there? those who say that Celtics 08 were more stacked are absolutely out of their minds because we have seen Celtics play without Garnett extensively and they were nowhere near 80-82 Sixers. Celtics without KG were a playoff team and just that. Sixers without Moses were championship contenders. those are facts. so regardless of how good those Sixers were, you can't use that as something that seperates Moses from other all-time greats because they were already stacked before he even got there.

also, as dominant as those Sixers were, I'm wondering why they never repeated their success in later years. Moses playoff career after 83 is basically meaningless. he did absolutely nothing despite playing on stacked teams for a lot of years. how do you explain him being out in the first round in '84 for example? I can't think of any other all-time great team that would just disappear off the map after their outburst despite being so dominant the year before.

[MisterHibachi]

Why does contract size even matter in comparing players like this? If you offered anyone the contract KG got from the Wolves, I doubt many say no. You're gonna pay your franchise cornerstone as much as he wants, cuz you know, he's your FRANCHISE CORNERSTONE.

Regardless, contract size =/= impact on the court.

It's like saying the main reason you're not taking Joe Johnson over LeBron James is because he has a bigger contract.

[NO-KG-AI]

Why does contract size even matter in comparing players like this? If you offered anyone the contract KG got from the Wolves, I doubt many say no. You're gonna pay your franchise cornerstone as much as he wants, cuz you know, he's your FRANCHISE CORNERSTONE.

Regardless, contract size =/= impact on the court.

It's like saying the main reason you're not taking Joe Johnson over LeBron James is because he has a bigger contract.

Grasping for straws by the people who are running out of arguments in the face of overwhelming evidence.

[JordansBulls]

Moses for me as well. Not to mention he isn't going to want to be the highest paid guy in the league.

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not to me. They would only take that amount had they already proven themselves in the league and won a few titles already. No one would take that type of money before they were already a top player in the league on a bad team. They would want other pieces around them first and possibly win titles and then worry about contracts like that.

In this comparison Moses wouldn't demand as much money overall before he was worth it would would allow you to bring in other pieces to the team.

[NO-KG-AI]

Moses for me as well. Not to mention he isn't going to want to be the highest paid guy in the league.

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not to me. They would only take that amount had they already proven themselves in the league and won a few titles already. No one would take that type of money before they were already a top player in the league on a bad team. They would want other pieces around them first and possibly win titles and then worry about contracts like that.

In this comparison Moses wouldn't demand as much money overall before he was worth it would would allow you to bring in other pieces to the team.

You're operating on assumptions with nothing to back it. I can't think of a player who didn't take a max offer if it was on the table after his first deal. Players have only ever settled for less AFTER they've gotten their big money. Everyone accepts the max. Even still, it's not like the wolves had the highest payroll, they messed up regardless. This cap argument is ridiculous.

Also, how much someone was paid has no bearing on how good of a player they are..

[JordansBulls]

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not to me. They would only take that amount had they already proven themselves in the league and won a few titles already. No one would take that type of money before they were already a top player in the league on a bad team. They would want other pieces around them first and possibly win titles and then worry about contracts like that.

In this comparison Moses wouldn't demand as much money overall before he was worth it would would allow you to bring in other pieces to the team.

You're operating on assumptions with nothing to back it. I can't think of a player who didn't take a max offer if it was on the table after his first deal. Players have only ever settled for less AFTER they've gotten their big money. Everyone accepts the max. Even still, it's not like the wolves had the highest payroll, they messed up regardless. This cap argument is ridiculous.

Also, how much someone was paid has no bearing on how good of a player they are..

Again the guys who took the max were guys who were already superstars in the league. I'm not talking about 2003 or 2004 KG who by then was worth it, I'm talking like 1999 KG who had a 6 year /126 million dollar contract which was even more than Shaq.
Obviously that doesn't define how good the player was in there prime, but if you are getting a guy who by his 4th season is demanding that type of money, how do you expect your franchise to ever put adequate talent around them? I can understand once the team is a contender and the star wanting that type of money, but if you getting it before you proved anything than that changes things.

[bastillon]

Lmao. Everyone would take a contract that makes them the highest paid player.

Not to me. They would only take that amount had they already proven themselves in the league and won a few titles already. No one would take that type of money before they were already a top player in the league on a bad team. They would want other pieces around them first and possibly win titles and then worry about contracts like that.

In this comparison Moses wouldn't demand as much money overall before he was worth it would would allow you to bring in other pieces to the team.

You're operating on assumptions with nothing to back it. I can't think of a player who didn't take a max offer if it was on the table after his first deal. Players have only ever settled for less AFTER they've gotten their big money. Everyone accepts the max. Even still, it's not like the wolves had the highest payroll, they messed up regardless. This cap argument is ridiculous.

Also, how much someone was paid has no bearing on how good of a player they are..

you are wasting your time and you know it.