RealGM Top 100 List #7

Post #361 » by **Doctor MJ** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 9:50 pm

Jim Naismith wrote:
rich316 wrote:Seems like the 4 main guys up for consideration here are Bird, Magic, Lebron, and Hakeem. I feel down on Magic in that group, and up on Hakeem and Lebron. Considering the fact that Bird and Magic had incredible talent that also complemented their games quite well surrounding them for much of their careers, while Lebron and Hakeem generally didn't, it seems that he slightly diminished team success Lebron/Hakeem experienced should count for more than that of Bird/Magic. I've read some good arguments for each of them here, although I would have liked to see more for Bird. I feel he has a legit case for the top peak of any of them, which is really saying something in that group.

While Hakeem's peak is very good, it was not sustained throughout his career. Hakeem just does not have as many great prime years as the 3 others.

RealGM Player-of-the-Year Shares
1. Bill Russell................10.956
2. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar...10.221
3. Michael Jordan............9.578
4. Wilt Chamberlain.........7.818
5. Magic Johnson............7.114
6. LeBron James.............6.652
7. Tim Duncan...............6.248
8. Larry Bird..................6.147
9. Shaquille O'Neal...........5.910
10. Julius Erving.............5.046
11. Karl Malone..............4.649
12. Bob Pettit................4.466
13. Oscar Robertson.........4.413
14. Kobe Bryant..............4.380
15. Hakeem Olajuwon.......4.380

(from http://rpoy.dolem.com/)

Fun seeing the RPOY referenced, and your point on the next page about that actually helping Hakeem compared to MVP shares is quite correct. Obviously the project was my baby and so I think it was full of awesome and very useful in helping shape one's GOAT list...

That said, I think it's important to make a distinction between perception of what happened to be achieved in a given year and what the player actually was. Put another way: No, I don't think that Hakeem's actual play through his career goes up and down like his MVP/POY candidacy suggests. Yes there is some up & down, but it is exaggerated based on the fact that we tend to fixate on the players leading contenders when looking to evaluate a particular year.

So, if a player simply sees their supporting cast drop off, and the player in question still does their same thing, they probably get less MVP/POY credit than they would have if the cast had maintained or improved. I don't see this as a flaw in the MVP/POY necessarily, because in the end those awards are about what a player actually proved in a particular season...but it only makes sense to hold a guy's season against him in the grand scheme of things if there's some kind of "proof" in the other direction.

So this is just to say: If you actually think Hakeem played worse in those seasons where his MVP/POY numbers dip, by all means hold that against him, but there is absolutely a reason to think that a metric like POY shares would underrated Hakeem given the context he played in.

MacGill · Post #362 » by **MacGill** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 9:54 pm

Honestly man! You all are some smart mutha F%Kers......my mind is blown by some of these posts.

One thing is for sure, I wasn't overrating LBJ. Dude is that good and I will be voting for him next but I am going with Hakeem. I can't really add anything which hasn't been mentioned but my reasoning is the 2 way impact you get with him.

Not elite offense, but very good offense with perhaps the best array of post moves ever (sorry McHale). Good free throw shooter and while it is seen as somewhat of a negative earlier on (since he picked up the game later) he had a great ability to add to his game throughout his career. Hell, current players are still trying to learn from him. He also showed to have the mental aspect to push through adversity, and while he had to learn to control his emotions, he was a killer and I like that in a player.

Defensively, he is as close to an equal 2 way player as I have seen. Not only was he a great shot blocker, he produced many steals and caused an awful lot of turnovers. Just an insane eye for the ball. Add to this his mobility factor as both a vertical and horizontal defender. He was so strong that he could play bigger player straight up, and at the same time come out of no where for the help block or shot alter. To his credit he had the perfect basketball body for this. Able to put on a little more bulk than KG, with a fantastic wingspan and quick reaction time. Honestly, Hakeem was just an insane athlete in every sense of the word.

So yeah, Hakeem has done it long enough where I hold his 2 way impact very high. To be able to focus on offense and defense like he did (and I don't think anyone ever did) at the same time is ridiculous. His stat lines are ridiculous, and like a few other legends, their game got deluded some because of the incredible talent the came up in the 80's-90's. But let us not forgot about who current bigs 'Dream' of and idolize

Post #363 » by **Doctor MJ** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 9:56 pm

acrossthecourt wrote:The two leagues combined were basically contracting teams, and thus the competition increased.

By the way, if Erving had the exact same season in '76 in the NBA, how would people rate it?

Good point. Yes, competition did get tougher in general. This means you can make a case for both leagues having inflated numbers while separate, but there are so many other trends in both directions on that front it's not clear how big that inflation really is.

Are you asking how I rate Erving's '76 from a GOAT perspective?

Very, very high. I believe when we did the peak project I had it 4th behind '91 Jordan, '00 Shaq, and '09 LeBron. Truly though I don't even think '91 Jordan over '76 Erving is a given. All of these guys are on the top tier GOAT peak list for me.

90sAllDecade · Post #364 » by **90sAllDecade** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:15 pm

People were comparing Hakeem's RS numbers offensively to Shaq, Robinson and Ewing.

This again is about coaching imo. Hakeem had all time ability but wasn't used as a huge focal point until Rudy T changed the system. During Chaney's and even Fitch's years his offensive role and usage was reduced. Tomjanovich saw this and focused the offense entirely through Hakeem as it should have been all along.

Shaq, Robinson (pre Duncan and later injuries reduced his production despite high usage), and Ewing all had higher usage during the regular season in comparsion. Hakeem's higher usage and true value on offense was displayed in the playoffs imo.

The others always had higher usage in the regular season while healthy comparatively.

Hakeem vs Shaq, Robinson and Ewing: Usage during the RS & PO:

Hakeem Regular Season

-Notice the big jump in usage when Rudy T took over as a full season Rockets coach in 92-93. Fitch and Chaney both never showcased Hakeem as a 29-30 usage player and that along with other team factors had lesser regular season success because of it.

Hakeem Playoffs

-During 85-86 to 87-88 and the Rudy T years the offense went through Hakeem and he posted huge numbers in the playoffs. In later years he still had high usage but was past his prime by then.

Shaq RS

Shaq PO

Robinson RS

Robinson PO

Ewing RS

Ewing PO

E-Balla · Post #365 » by **E-Balla** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:17 pm

The case against Lebron James:

I just realized we've had one of these post for most guys but not Lebron so I decided to go through reasons people would pick Lebron and dissect them.

Argument 1: Lebron is dominating an era with strong competition.

Spoiler:

Counter argument: So what about his last 3 seasons?

Spoiler:

Argument 2: Lebron has 5 GOAT level years

Spoiler:

I dipped into this a bit but no he doesn't. Let's start by agreeing that yes 09 and 12 are GOAT level years. I'll also say yes 2010, 13, and 14 are amazing too... just not GOAT level.

2010: Let's skip Lebron's regular season performance. He was amazing as usual but the regular season is only played to determine seeding and matchups for the postseason. In the first round Lebron dominated a bad Chicago team (-1.2 SRS). The playoffs in the east was really Boston, Cleveland, and Orlando. Against Boston Lebron wasn't good. No need to act like he was either. In game 2 Cleveland was out scored 52-38 at half (Lebron had 24/7/4 and 5 tovs) and in the last 3 games (all losses) Lebron put up 21/11/8 with 6 turnovers a game (47 TS, 87 ORTG). Games 4 and 6 were very winnable and if they had Lebron playing at a "GOAT season" level they would've won the series. Boston overall weren't killing Cleveland and that's with Lebron looking completely inept at times. I don't see how the argument can be made that this is a GOAT level season of just regular season play unless we're voting David Robinson in soon.

2013: I was close to giving this year a pass. A great regular season (not 09 level but still very good), a winning streak (that was way overstated because the average MOV in those games were pretty weak and they were against bad competition), and great play against 2 great defenses in the EC Playoffs. A weak Finals series shouldn't lower my opinion of him especially when he ultimately won but then you look at why he did bad in the Finals. He literally did bad in the Finals because San Antonio let him get all the outside shots he wanted, closed up he paint, dared him to shoot, and he just wouldn't. Games 1-3 (they were 1-2) Lebron played like crap. Almost 2011 level crap (if you watched games 3 and 4 in 2011 and games 2 and 3 in 2013 you'd swear they were the same game). Game 4 he was good but nowhere to be found when Miami went on a run (Wade and Bosh actually led the run in the early 4th with Lebron OFF the floor). In game 5 Lebron sucked again and in game 6 Lebron was very bad until the 4th quarter when he led Miami on a run that was just barely enough for the team to luck into an OT win (big ups for finally showing up but I don't like him cutting it so close). He then finally decided to take the open shots the defense gave him in games 1-6 and he dominated game 7. The story of this season was basically Lebron stinking up the Finals again. Overall he had 4 bad games (3 of them terrible) and 3 good games (1 of them GOAT level).

2014: I do not see the argument for this year at all. The regular season saw Lebron coast heavily. He was worse defensively than guys with bad reputations like Melo. Offensively he was the same as 2013 Lebron outside of the win streak (which was the most impressive thing about that season) but defensively he was average at best. I actually had a few posts about this year in the 2014 Lebron or peak Kobe thread and basically I see nothing to separate this season from 95 Barkley let's say. Offensively he was a super efficient monster like usual, defensively he gave barely any effort, and in the postseason he coasted through some amazingly weak teams in the East into a Finals matchup where he played very good offensively (not great) and like the rest of his team didn't really show up defensively. The Finals performance is a positive but he didn't do anything I wouldn't expect from the batch after the next batch of guys coming up in this project.

I had more but my browser crashed and I lost it but I think people are too busy focusing on the negatives with Magic but no one really dipped into Lebron's weaknesses.

colts18 · Post #366 » by **colts18** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:24 pm

GC Pantalones wrote:
Argument 1: Lebron is dominating an era with strong competition.

Spoiler:
No not really. Lebron differs from Jordan or Magic in that his prime came in a transition period. He's way better than everyone in the league now but he has no ATG to challenge him yet (KD is getting there). If you look at Lebron's prime he had one contemporary most of the time, Dwyane Wade, and he teamed up with him (not to mention his injury issues). Looking at both Wade and Lebron's careers before Wade's steep decline they're about even.

From 04-11 yearly breakdown of better player:
04 - Wade (he won with his postseason performance)
05 - Wade (cemented it with his PS performance)
06 - Wade
07 - Lebron (but he was being outplayed by Wade before he went down)
08 - Lebron (Wade hurt again)
09 - Lebron (not by too much since Wade was so great too but Lebron demolished the planet)
10 - toss up (I'd take Wade because he outperformed Lebron by a distance with less help against Boston and he only had a slightly worse regular season)
11 - toss up (I'd take Wade mainly because overall he outperformed Lebron in the playoffs in 2 of their 4 series - they were even against Philly, and Lebron outperformed him against Chicago -- also looking at overall numbers Wade clearly comes out on top).

People seem to forget that before these last 3 past seasons (where I'd only say 12 is GOAT level - more on that later) Lebron was only the best player in his draft class for health reasons.

Overall here's Wade and Lebron's per 75 possession stats from 05-11 (I removed their rookie seasons and I used per 75 because it's basically the amount of plays the average team runs in 36-40 minutes):

Lebron - 28.4/7.3/7.1, 57.5 TS%, 117 ORTG, 28.1 PER
Wade - 27.9/5.5/6.9, 57.0 TS%, 112 ORTG, 26.6 PER
This is pretty close and removing 08 (where Wade played hurt) the PER difference is under 1. Either way in regular season play these two were pretty close and I don't think anyone would say otherwise.

Postseason:
Lebron - 26.7/8.0/6.7, 56.1 TS%, 113 ORTG, 26.3 PER
Wade - 27.2/6.0/5.6, 57.6 TS%, 112 ORTG, 25.7 PER
Lebron comes out on top at first glance but there's no adjustment for strength of defenses played and no mentions of their outliers (Wade's series against Chicago while injured in 07 - 15.2 PER and Lebron's 09 playoff performance - 37.4 PER). Here's a comparison of the 2 in the playoffs by strength of defense from 05-11:

Lebron is who I'd take to beat a creampuff team but Wade was the better player overall (when he played of course).

What the hell does this mean? Who cares about how strong the top level competitors are in a year. That has nothing to do with how good leBron. If you switched LeBron this year for 91 MJ, it doesn't make 91 MJ's season any worse.

Not to mention the overall league competition is what matter. The league LeBron is playing in is one of the strongest ever. The League has expanded by just 1 team in the last 18 years and has had a huge influx of foreign talent. That makes the league stronger. 2003 was a very strong year at the top of the ballot but that doesn't make it a stronger league than 2014.

Is it really impressive that Magic and Hakeem dominated a league in the 1980's that played very little defense?

Post #367 » by **Doctor MJ** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:27 pm

therealbig3 wrote:Thank you for that. I know I have Erving in my top 12 right now...I was just wondering, if he was a great player throughout his prime, and he played for a very long time, and I remember his peak being widely considered among the best to ever play when we were doing the peaks project (ElGee included him in his 13 greatest peaks, players he considered a level above everyone else to ever play)...then what about Erving vs Bird/Magic? Is Erving's longevity enough to overtake them? I'm not sure.

What do you think about the in/out data from 78-80 for Erving (small sample size, 16 games over 3 years...still, it's not nothing), where the Sixers played better without him? Do you think this says something about Erving overall from 77-82, and says anything about his impact in the ABA?

No problem.

I wouldn't take the in/out data seriously enough to ask whether he was truly hurting his team. To me that's clearly noise. However it goes with my general impression that Erving struggled a bit in the early years on the 76ers to really find his place, and that's maybe something I should go into a little more because my other posts might give the impression that I thought Erving was utterly unimpeachable in his behavior.

I think it's helpful to think of Erving in terms of his personality which was rather Obama-ish. Everyone everywhere respected the hell out of Erving in a way that you just didn't see with someone like Jordan because Erving didn't come in there with a "I'm the Man!" mindset. He came in and was literally shocked by how easy it all came to him. He spoke about he simply assumed that there had to be people more talented than him, and when he went to the ABA and just soared over everyone it was as surprising to him as everyone else.

Thing that's weird about that though when we're used to guys of the Jordan mindset, which includes not only the Kobes of the world but the Iversons, the Pierces, and the Austin Riverses: It's not like Erving wasn't head & shoulders above his competition in college. He was a man among boys there, and yet just assumed that on the next level there'd be guys who'd match him. It's amazing to contrast that with a guy like Rivers who wasn't remotely dominant at Duke, and yet still THOUGHT he was and that he could do his thing at the next level.

Obviously when it comes to someone like Rivers, it's a joke. If Rivers thought more like Erving, he'd probably have actually let his dad teach him to play basketball, and he'd be a good NBA player (he's certainly more physically talented than his dad). Thing is though, if Rivers was as talented as he THOUGHT he was, it probably would be good for him to have the mentality he had, rather than Erving's mentality.

So we get back to Jordan, the MAN. It's not just an ego thing, it's a mentality about getting things done. He was just a force of nature out there, and good luck restraining him. That wasn't always a good thing, but for the most part, because of his extreme talent level, it only made him better.

Where Erving was this beautiful artistic specimen that a smart coach would find he could just keep building more and more around him - that there was seemingly nothing he couldn't do - if you didn't put everything on Erving, he'd happily just do what was asked of him.

I don't think Jordan could have played Erving's '76 role as well as Erving did.
It's not clear to me that you could even build around Jordan and expect more night & day results than what Erving did in '76.
However the force of Jordan's personality I think would have led to those first few Philly teams being better than they were with Erving. The confusion of the system, Jordan would have just pushed past that, and he'd have found a way to have more clear cut in/out impact than we saw from Erving at that time.

If we're categorizing the great offensive players then, this puts two marks against Erving.

We've got the savants like Magic, Bird, and if we're generous LeBron, who are not simply great, but whose brains allow them to continue to be amazing long after the agility of youth abandons them, and this puts them in contrast with Jordan & Erving who may be great in their 30s but who simply cannot eclipse their physical prime.

And then you've got the force of personality, that frankly Magic, Bird & Jordan all had. Guys who came in with the mindset that they were the MAN and you simply had to follow their wake. Erving wasn't like that, and it held him back.

Another similar guy would be Steve Nash. With Nash he's clearly one of the savants, and he's also clearly a guy who simply assumed that there would be guys better than him. In Nash's case it's more understandable given that he doesn't look like the best offensive basketball player on the planet, but nonetheless his humility is out of line with his actual abilities. It's not necessarily clear this hurt Nash because if he'd actually had the right level of ego for his abilities people might have just thought he was crazy...but Erving wouldn't have had that issue. Everyone knew that Erving's body could do things no one else could. If he had forced the issue more, he could have cut through the confusion.

E-Balla · Post #368 » by **E-Balla** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:35 pm

colts18 wrote:
GC Pantalones wrote:
Argument 1: Lebron is dominating an era with strong competition.

Spoiler:
No not really. Lebron differs from Jordan or Magic in that his prime came in a transition period. He's way better than everyone in the league now but he has no ATG to challenge him yet (KD is getting there). If you look at Lebron's prime he had one contemporary most of the time, Dwyane Wade, and he teamed up with him (not to mention his injury issues). Looking at both Wade and Lebron's careers before Wade's steep decline they're about even.

From 04-11 yearly breakdown of better player:
04 - Wade (he won with his postseason performance)
05 - Wade (cemented it with his PS performance)
06 - Wade
07 - Lebron (but he was being outplayed by Wade before he went down)
08 - Lebron (Wade hurt again)
09 - Lebron (not by too much since Wade was so great too but Lebron demolished the planet)
10 - toss up (I'd take Wade because he outperformed Lebron by a distance with less help against Boston and he only had a slightly worse regular season)
11 - toss up (I'd take Wade mainly because overall he outperformed Lebron in the playoffs in 2 of their 4 series - they were even against Philly, and Lebron outperformed him against Chicago -- also looking at overall numbers Wade clearly comes out on top).

People seem to forget that before these last 3 past seasons (where I'd only say 12 is GOAT level - more on that later) Lebron was only the best player in his draft class for health reasons.

Overall here's Wade and Lebron's per 75 possession stats from 05-11 (I removed their rookie seasons and I used per 75 because it's basically the amount of plays the average team runs in 36-40 minutes):

Lebron - 28.4/7.3/7.1, 57.5 TS%, 117 ORTG, 28.1 PER
Wade - 27.9/5.5/6.9, 57.0 TS%, 112 ORTG, 26.6 PER
This is pretty close and removing 08 (where Wade played hurt) the PER difference is under 1. Either way in regular season play these two were pretty close and I don't think anyone would say otherwise.

Postseason:
Lebron - 26.7/8.0/6.7, 56.1 TS%, 113 ORTG, 26.3 PER
Wade - 27.2/6.0/5.6, 57.6 TS%, 112 ORTG, 25.7 PER
Lebron comes out on top at first glance but there's no adjustment for strength of defenses played and no mentions of their outliers (Wade's series against Chicago while injured in 07 - 15.2 PER and Lebron's 09 playoff performance - 37.4 PER). Here's a comparison of the 2 in the playoffs by strength of defense from 05-11:

Lebron is who I'd take to beat a creampuff team but Wade was the better player overall (when he played of course).

What the hell does this mean? Who cares about how strong the top level competitors are in a year. That has nothing to do with how good leBron. If you switched LeBron this year for 91 MJ, it doesn't make 91 MJ's season any worse.

Not to mention the overall league competition is what matter. The league LeBron is playing in is one of the strongest ever. The League has expanded by just 1 team in the last 18 years and has had a huge influx of foreign talent. That makes the league stronger. 2003 was a very strong year at the top of the ballot but that doesn't make it a stronger league than 2014.

Is it really impressive that Magic and Hakeem dominated a league in the 1980's that played very little defense?

It does have nothing to do with Lebron but it makes people think he's better than he was because it's hard to look at someone's game in a vacuum. For example you see people posting his high PER totals but in the 80's pre Jordan 25-27 would lead the league. It's a league average based stat but people see his high numbers and salivate at his dominance when the truth is he wasn't that far ahead of the pack.

Also overall competition is lower than the late 80s and about even with the early 80s. Strategy is different and they play more defense now/run less but there's also no post play.

Also Hakeem dominated the mid 90's aka the second strongest defensive era their is.

EDIT: I was trying to counter argue all the people that were using Bird/Jordan as a way to knock Magic/Hakeem down a peg in this comparison. Lebron wasn't by far the best until he played in a league with no other top 10 guys so the same arguments used for them could be used for him.

colts18 · Post #369 » by **colts18** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:37 pm

GC Pantalones wrote:It does have nothing to do with Lebron but it makes people think he's better than he was because it's hard to look at someone's game in a vacuum. For example you see people posting his high PER totals but in the 80's pre Jordan 25-27 would lead the league. It's a league average based stat but people see his high numbers and salivate at his dominance when the truth is he wasn't that far ahead of the pack.

Also overall competition is lower than the late 80s and about even with the early 80s. Strategy is different and they play more defense now/run less but there's also no post play.

Also Hakeem dominated the mid 90's aka the second strongest defensive era their is.

PER is based on league average. Top stars don't make much of a difference in PER so if the league average is stronger now, then having a high PER now is more impressive.

We know that defense is easily better now than late 80's. To have late 80's better than now you would have to say that offense was better than and better by a decent margin. I don't see it. Players today are much better shooters and better ballhandlers compared to the past.

E-Balla · Post #370 » by **E-Balla** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:45 pm

colts18 wrote:
GC Pantalones wrote:It does have nothing to do with Lebron but it makes people think he's better than he was because it's hard to look at someone's game in a vacuum. For example you see people posting his high PER totals but in the 80's pre Jordan 25-27 would lead the league. It's a league average based stat but people see his high numbers and salivate at his dominance when the truth is he wasn't that far ahead of the pack.

Also overall competition is lower than the late 80s and about even with the early 80s. Strategy is different and they play more defense now/run less but there's also no post play.

Also Hakeem dominated the mid 90's aka the second strongest defensive era their is.

PER is based on league average. Top stars don't make much of a difference in PER so if the league average is stronger now, then having a high PER now is more impressive.

We know that defense is easily better now than late 80's. To have late 80's better than now you would have to say that offense was better than and better by a decent margin. I don't see it. Players today are much better shooters and better ballhandlers compared to the past.

They have more range on their shots but midrange games are extremely lacking. Overall the 80's players probably shot better (I know the 80s was the peak era for freethrow percentage) from all other areas of the floor.

And defense isn't easily better strategy is just different. Back then teams hit the offensive glass way more which lead to more fast breaks and a faster pace but defensively they had 2 major game changers we don't really have today: handchecking and rim defenders. That made penetration less common and post play/midrange play a necessity. The league now isn't stronger than the mid 80's and it's weaker than the early 90's. Who cares if there haven't been expansion teams in a while tanking has teams putting out complete crap yearly (the Bobcats) and sometimes literally trading a competitive team away to lose games (Philly).

Post #371 » by **penbeast0** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 10:46 pm

colts18 wrote:...
We know that defense is easily better now than late 80's....

How do we know this? I don't see it; less outstanding big men, less paint protections and I do believe that big men influence defense more than any other position. What we have now is better defense aimed at stopping the 3 ball because we have more offense built around the 3 ball (which is, unfortunately, boring at times and not as highly tailored to showing off multiple offensive skills and great superstars); I don't see how this is "better" overall.

ronnymac2 · Post #372 » by **ronnymac2** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:07 pm

Are we in run-off mode?

DQuinn1575 · Post #373 » by **DQuinn1575** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:13 pm

ronnymac2 wrote:Are we in run-off mode?

Someone have a count with names?

Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

Post #374 » by **penbeast0** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:24 pm

[quote="andrewww"]Current vote count approximately 1 day in Updated to the present:

Magic (9)
JordansBulls
Andrewww
GC Pantalones
Basketballefan
Ardee
TrueLAfan
An Unbiased Fan
Clyde Frazier
RayBan-Sematra

LeBron (16)
Penbeast0
SactoKingsFan
Rico381
Trex_8063
DannyNoonan1221
Dquinn1575
Acrossthecourt
Baller2014
fpliii
Narigo
DoctorMJ
batmana
PCProductions
rich316
O-6
Chuck Texas

Hakeem (6)
Gregoire
Ronnymac2
therealbig3
HeartbreakKid
colts18
MacGill

I counted "preemptive runoff votes" as having changed their vote. I am not going back past the start of the runoff looking for these in the future so please don't do this in the future. And . . . be sure to put analysis with your votes; again, for the sake of counting the votes, I don't want to be making judgement calls as to whether previous posts actually made your case for the person you were voting for.

This gives us a 16 to (9+6) 15 victory for LeBron. I could easily have gone the other way with my judgments and put us into a runoff (DoctorMJ, fpliii, magicmer) but I don't think it would have changed the eventual outcome.
LEBRON JAMES

acrossthecourt · Post #375 » by **acrossthecourt** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:24 pm

penbeast0 wrote:
colts18 wrote:...
We know that defense is easily better now than late 80's....

How do we know this? I don't see it; less outstanding big men, less paint protections and I do believe that big men influence defense more than any other position. What we have now is better defense aimed at stopping the 3 ball because we have more offense built around the 3 ball (which is, unfortunately, boring at times and not as highly tailored to showing off multiple offensive skills and great superstars); I don't see how this is "better" overall.

Because sports generally progress with time, because we have a much larger portion of guys from different countries, because the population in the US is larger now, because the higher salaries are making the NBA more attractive....

It's a net zero sport. If some guys look bad, it's because others are better.

Midrange game is lacking (which I think is untrue) but who cares? It's clearly been proven to be a worse shot. We would not have higher competition if guys focused on their midrange game more.

HeartBreakKid · Post #376 » by **HeartBreakKid** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:29 pm

GC Pantalones wrote:-snip-

I totally disagree with your point about James playing against weaker competition.

For one, Kevin Durant and Chris Paul are not chop liver. Kevin Durant is probably the top 20 best basketball players if we're talking peak. There are people who think Chris Paul's peak is even better than Magic's, and many more who think it is second at the very least. If we're talking actual impact, both guys are with in the top 25 best players ever. Durant would have been MVP many years other than this one.

I have a hard time believing that the league is not better than it was 10 years ago, much less 40-50 years, or however far back you want to go. I'm in the belief that a star will more or less be a star no matter what, because what makes stars is that they are so much better than the average player that they are like Gods amongst men. However, the typical roleplayer in the NBA is clearly getting better as the years go by. How can it be other wise?

More people are playing basketball, from more countries, more techniques are being introduced (albeit not many, as basketball has largely stayed the same for along time), better quality athletes, better quality training. I have a hard time seeing the league from head to toe being weaker than say the NBA in the 90s during its expansion era. The NBA in the 70s is the only exception because a lot of the talent went to the ABA.

Most of all, are we forgetting that James played against the best players of the 2000s?

Chris Paul and Kevin Durant might be his competition during his championship years, but...what about before that?

Did Lebron James not play against Dirk Nowitzki in his prime, and was James not considered a better player than him? In 08, 09 and 10 - even 2011 during the RS, that was the general consensus, one could argue that just because ti is the consensus doesn't mean it is right, however it's pretty clear to see that pre peak Lebron James was as good as the best players from the 2000s, a smidget worse, but James is a much better player now than what he was as a Cav.

James played against Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, D-Wade, Nowitzki and Steve Nash, when all of them were in his prime. He was either considered better than some, or as good as them all. From 06-10 all of those players were more or less in their primes, or at the very least had prime years, and James was either an MVP run away or an MVP candidate in all of those years, and that was him before his peak.

So I don't get the competition argument. If James competed with the who's who of the 2000s before his peak, why does that diminish that he is dominating the competition in the 2010s? The only real great player of the 2000s whos prime didn't properly align with James was Shaquile O'Neal. Other than that, James looked as good as anyone else.

Also, you're discrediting James MVP seasons, and then citing things like Shaq's competition being old Karl Malone, Gary Payton and Zo? Seriously? How on earth is Kevin Durant and Chris Paul inferior competition to those guys? How is Zo great competition to you, yet you do not even mention Dwight Howard who has played against James his entire career?

E-Balla · Post #377 » by **E-Balla** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:35 pm

acrossthecourt wrote:
penbeast0 wrote:
colts18 wrote:...
We know that defense is easily better now than late 80's....

How do we know this? I don't see it; less outstanding big men, less paint protections and I do believe that big men influence defense more than any other position. What we have now is better defense aimed at stopping the 3 ball because we have more offense built around the 3 ball (which is, unfortunately, boring at times and not as highly tailored to showing off multiple offensive skills and great superstars); I don't see how this is "better" overall.

Because sports generally progress with time, because we have a much larger portion of guys from different countries, because the population in the US is larger now, because the higher salaries are making the NBA more attractive....

It's a net zero sport. If some guys look bad, it's because others are better.

Midrange game is lacking (which I think is untrue) but who cares? It's clearly been proven to be a worse shot. We would not have higher competition if guys focused on their midrange game more.

Ok Daryl Morey you believe that if you want to but everyone knows it's easier to take away the three and the paint than the midrange game. If more people had midrange games you wouldn't see things like Houston collapsing in the playoffs because they can't play defense or score tough baskets.

And sports don't always get better. Have boxers gotten better?

Mutnt · Post #378 » by **Mutnt** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:39 pm

I was just thinking about CP3 actually. Not in terms of actually nominating him in this project as of now, but when the time comes, I'm definitely interested in how people rank him. The dude has an outstanding peak, has been a top 3 player for quite some time now and is an insanely good basketball player.

acrossthecourt · Post #379 » by **acrossthecourt** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:43 pm

GC Pantalones wrote:
acrossthecourt wrote:
penbeast0 wrote:
How do we know this? I don't see it; less outstanding big men, less paint protections and I do believe that big men influence defense more than any other position. What we have now is better defense aimed at stopping the 3 ball because we have more offense built around the 3 ball (which is, unfortunately, boring at times and not as highly tailored to showing off multiple offensive skills and great superstars); I don't see how this is "better" overall.

Because sports generally progress with time, because we have a much larger portion of guys from different countries, because the population in the US is larger now, because the higher salaries are making the NBA more attractive....

It's a net zero sport. If some guys look bad, it's because others are better.

Midrange game is lacking (which I think is untrue) but who cares? It's clearly been proven to be a worse shot. We would not have higher competition if guys focused on their midrange game more.

Ok Daryl Morey you believe that if you want to but everyone knows it's easier to take away the three and the paint than the midrange game. If more people had midrange games you wouldn't see things like Houston collapsing in the playoffs because they can't play defense or score tough baskets.

And sports don't always get better. Have boxers gotten better?

How did San Antonio collapse?

This has nothing to do with Morey.

The best offenses shoot more three's, the best teams shoot more three's, and the past few champions have relied a ton on three-pointers.

It was a quick comment about how midrange jumpers are overvalued....

Obviously, you still need some counters and some variety, but to say the game is worse today because "no one" can shoot a midrange is misguided and completely untrue.

Boxing is not the NBA. Boxing has been in shambles, people care about it less and less every year, and it's really only the heavyweights who have fallen off, and even then those guys are huge. The middleweights have been great lately. It does not compare with the NBA.

ElGee · Post #380 » by **ElGee** » Wed Jul 16, 2014 11:46 pm

I've read a lot in this project that denounces RAPM. Ardee called it a "joke." This couldn't be further from the truth and demonstrates a lack of understanding of the statistic, or perhaps a situational breakdown in logic/philosophy of science. I've also seen people use it overzealous as a player ranker or offering some kind of proof. This is not quite warranted either. To wit:

FG% measures shooting. It does NOT tell you who the best shooters are. Kendrick Perkins has a higher FG% than Kobe Bryant...but that does not make him a better, NOR is the stat "saying" he is a better shooter. There are dozens of other counterexamples like this -- does this mean you ignore FG%? No, you don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

The world works probabilistically. So do stats. You'll hear me talk about science concepts like "explain" and "predict," because that's where science came from ("epistemological philosophy"). It's trying to understanding the cause-and-effect of two (or more) variables and by understanding those things ("the explaining") allows us to predict SIMILAR, but not identical things in the future. That's all "science" is.

APM is no different. WOWY is no different. There is a degree of relatedness between the thing you can measure and the thing you want to know. However, that correlation isn't 100% because we don't have a perfect "goodness" stat in basketball! EVERY single stat fits this bill. Do you throw away all stats because of this? It completely depends on its relatedness to goodness. Left handed dribbles probably has no correlation. FG% is probably small. Assists too. You know what's pretty strongly related? RAPM. Why?

Because it does really well, in general, at telling us ("explaining") contextual value in basketball. The stat has limitations -- which is precisely what prevents it from having 100% correlation with goodness. Those limitations are notably:

The second point is where I feel people get really lost. A lack of 100% control doesn't invalidate an entire body of information! Clearly, if I had 10k lineup combinations and ran them against 10k other lineups, at 10k possessions each, I would end up with a nearly perfect measurement of player goodness. Instead, what we get is a stat that still has noise, can't really correct for time (aging/improvement) and doesn't create enough combinations to say much of anything beyond situational value. And that still makes it one of the most valuable single statistics in basketball.

Does that mean your player rankings should have an 80% correlation to RAPM? Or even 50%? No. But RAPM is incredibly valuable, although like most other statistics, still takes some context in using it to improve the accuracy of your own, overall player evaluations.