RealGM Top 100 List #11

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#301 » by Quotatious » Sat Jul 26, 2014 12:47 pm

Vote - Kevin Garnett. Insanely tough decision between him and Oscar, but there are so many convincing arguments for KG (for example the research by shutupandjam, mentioned by fpliii), and even as simple as Garnett being kind of a bit worse Duncan (at least that's how I feel about it). He also had tremendous longevity, extremely portable player because of his insanely versatile skillset, and he also had one of the worst (if not THE worst) team situations for a large part of his career, among all of the candidates for #11.

I really had to spend a lot of time weighing my options here, and the outcome is a bit surprising even to me, to be honest. I didn't think I would put him that high.

Oscar will likely be the next in line for me.

FJS wrote:When you watch that Andrei Kirilenko was better at RAPM than KG in 2005 and 2006, and next to him in 2004, you should ask yourself:
1) AK was so good in that spawn?
2) Rapm it's not as good metric to decice which player it's better?

I'm not very knowledgeable about that stat (we have our experts here, and I'm certainly not one of them), but what I know for sure is that context is absolutely essential - Kirilenko was great but he was still just a super role player or a fringe all-star who didn't have NEARLY as many responsibilities on his team as Garnett had at that time, also the sample size for AK is much smaller, as he played just 110 games and 3953 minutes these two years, while KG played 158 games and 6078 minutes, so the difference as far as possessions played is huge. Comparing KG with other superstars like Duncan, Kobe or Dirk makes sense, but not with AK who isn't even close to their level.
FJS wrote:In Fact, Dikembe Mutombo was better than Olajuwon in 94, better than Jordan in 96, 97, 98... (in fact Jordan was nowhere near the top 5)... So I think that metric is overrated, and don't show the true dominance.

There's no true 1994 and 1996 RAPM, there's only a boxscore-based stat.

Also Jordan was the best in the league in 1997 NPI RAPM (Christian Laettner had higher overall score, but that's the same thing as comparing KG and AK - a comparison like that doesn't make sense). MJ was 6th in NPI RAPM in 1998, and 4th in RPI RAPM (Shaq and Zo are ahead of him, among superstars, the third guy is Mookie Blaylock) - not bad if you take his injury (torn ligament in his finger, shooting hand) into account.

http://ascreamingcomesacrossthecourt.bl ... -rapm.html
http://ascreamingcomesacrossthecourt.bl ... ormed.html

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#302 » by Warspite » Sat Jul 26, 2014 1:11 pm

ElGee wrote:Question for the room: How do you see Oscar's defense? How do you think it compares to West? Or maybe put another way, how do you not see West as a better defender, and assuming that you do, what's the margin?


I hold Wests defense on the same level as Squids. Wilt believed that West was the 3rd best shot blocker behind him and Russell. I see no reason why West wasnt as good or better than Frazier.

Oscar was passable to above avg.
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#303 » by MacGill » Sat Jul 26, 2014 1:24 pm

Really between Oscar and KG for me here. I am still not completely sold on how great Oscar's defensive impact was so I am hoping some of his supporters can expound on this a little bit more.

The problem I have with what Kobe supporters are saying is that he was this fantastic 2 way player but...but....that his impact as a 2 guard could only impact his team in a minimal way despite his all D recognition. This is huge to me because offensively, while Kobe was fantastic, he isn't in my top offensive anchor list. Probably when on fire the greatest scorer ever, but this wasn't consistent to me when you see how many times he continued to just push through poor shooting nights. For me, I value more 2 way impacts, and we still have some players on the board.

From what I am reading of Oscar, he just seemed a much more all around player, more Lebron in that regard however again, it's his defense I am not fully convinced on yet. I really did enjoy the Oscar documentary when reviewing some of game tape and he really had a natural feel for the game where I can easily see him transitioning into any era with his skill set.

With KG, the knock on him from others is poor team success, especially post season disappointments. I still don't truly understand what this has to do about him as an individual basketball player?? Just because his career wasn't full of MJ highlight moments he showed what all the other greats showed when a proper team of contention was put around him. I find too many anti-KG crowd looking to see his defensive impact made on his teams and making a notion that his impact is not that of Russell or some other defensive greats. Well, KG wasn't a true 5 defender as he really only had the length, (it's like asking Shaq to guard SF's) but the way he could disrupt on court play was amazing. Basically dependent on the opposing big KG guards 1-5 better than anyone else I have ever watched which in itself is an amazing feat. You don't need a conventional offensive anchor team (player) to contend or win with him as he can contribute on both ends at a very high level. SO if we are talking strictly player, which this is, KG's defensive versatility is unmatched with the remaining players left (still waiting on Oscar) and offensively he can carry the load, defer to his teammates, and shoot free throws decently. And as I did with Hakeem, that's just way too valuable to any team, regardless if someone is a more prolific scorer. That my friends, is why we have a team it doesn't have to just fall on one player.

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#304 » by The Infamous1 » Sat Jul 26, 2014 1:49 pm

MacGill wrote:Really between Oscar and KG for me here. I am still not completely sold on how great Oscar's defensive impact was so I am hoping some of his supporters can expound on this a little bit more.

The problem I have with what Kobe supporters are saying is that he was this fantastic 2 way player but...but....that his impact as a 2 guard could only impact his team in a minimal way despite his all D recognition. This is huge to me because offensively, while Kobe was fantastic, he isn't in my top offensive anchor list. Probably when on fire the greatest scorer ever, but this wasn't consistent to me when you see how many times he continued to just push through poor shooting nights. For me, I value more 2 way impacts, and we still have some players on the board.

From what I am reading of Oscar, he just seemed a much more all around player, more Lebron in that regard however again, it's his defense I am not fully convinced on yet. I really did enjoy the Oscar documentary when reviewing some of game tape and he really had a natural feel for the game where I can easily see him transitioning into any era with his skill set.

With KG, the knock on him from others is poor team success, especially post season disappointments. I still don't truly understand what this has to do about him as an individual basketball player?? Just because his career wasn't full of MJ highlight moments he showed what all the other greats showed when a proper team of contention was put around him. I find too many anti-KG crowd looking to see his defensive impact made on his teams and making a notion that his impact is not that of Russell or some other defensive greats. Well, KG wasn't a true 5 defender as he really only had the length, (it's like asking Shaq to guard SF's) but the way he could disrupt on court play was amazing. Basically dependent on the opposing big KG guards 1-5 better than anyone else I have ever watched which in itself is an amazing feat. You don't need a conventional offensive anchor team (player) to contend or win with him as he can contribute on both ends at a very high level. SO if we are talking strictly player, which this is, KG's defensive versatility is unmatched with the remaining players left (still waiting on Oscar) and offensively he can carry the load, defer to his teammates, and shoot free throws decently. And as I did with Hakeem, that's just way too valuable to any team, regardless if someone is a more prolific scorer. That my friends, is why we have a team it doesn't have to just fall on one player.

I will come back to amend this as my vote to see if I get anything more on Oscar's defense.


Why? He's one of the greatest scorers of all time while being one of the best non pg playmakers ever. He's been the primary facilitator and volume scorer on 2 championship teams(while being second in scoring on 3 others)

With Kobe, you don't need a great pg because he can handle that responsibility and you don't need another elite scorer because he can also handle that responsibility

Also I'm very interested in your explanation n how Kobe wasn't consistent as a scorer or an offensive player in general
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#305 » by Baller2014 » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:10 pm

If anyone is curious, I did a quick count. I haven't included Drza, though I assume from his constant campaigning that he is all aboard the KG train.

KG- 6 (Dr MJ, Baller2014, Fplii, Realbig3, Ronny, Quo)

Oscar- 6 (Javil, Owly, Hbreakhigh, Shaqattack, Lorak, Sacto)

Kobe- 5 (GC Pan, UBF, bbfan?, Jbulls, Ardee)

West- 1 (Moonbeam)
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#306 » by The Infamous1 » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:16 pm

Now that I think about it, how many guys have been both the primary scorer and primary playmaker on a championship team? Off the top of my head

Lebron-12/13 heat
Kobe- 09/10 lakers
Wade-06 Miami
??

Jordan was the primary scorer on the bulls but pippen was their facilitator. I guess you can say Magic on the last laker title team
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#307 » by An Unbiased Fan » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:22 pm

MacGill wrote:The problem I have with what Kobe supporters are saying is that he was this fantastic 2 way player but...but....that his impact as a 2 guard could only impact his team in a minimal way despite his all D recognition. This is huge to me because offensively, while Kobe was fantastic, he isn't in my top offensive anchor list. Probably when on fire the greatest scorer ever, but this wasn't consistent to me when you see how many times he continued to just push through poor shooting nights. For me, I value more 2 way impacts, and we still have some players on the board.

From what I am reading of Oscar, he just seemed a much more all around player, more Lebron in that regard however again, it's his defense I am not fully convinced on yet. I really did enjoy the Oscar documentary when reviewing some of game tape and he really had a natural feel for the game where I can easily see him transitioning into any era with his skill set.

I came into this project hoping for good discussions, but it's kinda amazing how dismissive things have gotten the last few threads. Quite a few posters have put together some good posts, but they are basically skipped over, or not even addressed by most.

1) I find it strange that peer-review is OK for guys like West & Oscar, but not Kobe in terms of defense. I'm not sure why you say Kobe's D impact was minimal. KG didn't have great defenses in Minnesota. When both have decent support, they had Top 7 or so defenses. KG is definitely the better defender, but from 08-11 LA was #5, #6, #4, #6, for example. The whole thing is weird how criteria seems to shift when Kobe's name is mentioned.

As for Oscar...well the Royals were arguably the worse defensive squad of their era. It's not until he joins KAJ, that he's on a team with a decent defense. Seems strange to question Kobe's impact, and mention Oscar in this context. Better yet, what will you use to measure Oscar's defense, since peer review & videos are not apparently good guides.

2) Pace-adjusted numbers: http://doubledribble.wordpress.com/2012 ... ted-stats/

61-69 Oscar: 25.7 ppg, 6.9 apg, 5.7 rpg
^
Very good, but don't see how that's better than prime Kobe.

3) Longevity - Oscar was elite from age 22-31, just like KG, and about 5 years less than Kobe.

MVP shares
Kobe - 4.206
KG - 2.753
Oscar - 2.479


Its nice to see guys like Oscar & West get some run here, but strange how they haven't been mentioned much before, and now all of a sudden they're the choice without any real comparisons. What makes Oscar better than Kobe?
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#308 » by RSCD3_ » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:28 pm

Vote for Kevin Garnett

He has the best two way impact player among bigs with decent longevity.

His supposed playoff struggles have been debunked many times as his decrease In productivity is similar to other major stars and he performed much better against tougher competition than a lot of players.

He put up big box score and advanced metrics and won a mvp resoundingly and could have won the finals mvp in which his defensive impact was greater than paul pierce.

His GOAT lateral ability for a big and being 7 foot with long arms allowed him to blow up pick and rolls and turn plays into iso's with the clock running out )

He also is very portable as he can provide good offense as an excellent Mid range shooter with a very good post game but Is willing.

in the past he would be able to stay in front of most PF's and now that the league has gone smaller he would have had about 3 inches over alot of forwards

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#309 » by ardee » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:52 pm

So random quotes and anectodes are ok to go by for Oscar and West's defense, but consistent voting results are not ok for Kobe?

This stuff is honestly disrespectful. Kobe not one of the best offensive anchors of all time? The guy led historic offenses with good casts and stunningly overachieving offenses when saddled with crap. Other than Jordan, Magic, Bird, LeBron and Nash, who is definitely better?

If you guys want to vote a guy with the worst Playoff record of anyone in contention with one of the most consistent and dominant players in history, then fine, I'm not going to argue anymore, because such a decision is beyond all reasonable logic :?

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#310 » by The Infamous1 » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:54 pm

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/LAL/2006.html

This was the 8th best offensive team in the nba
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#311 » by ardee » Sat Jul 26, 2014 2:59 pm

FJS wrote:When you watch that Andrei Kirilenko was better at RAPM than KG in 2005 and 2006, and next to him in 2004, you should ask yourself:
1) AK was so good in that spawn?
2) Rapm it's not as good metric to decice which player it's better?

In Fact, Dikembe Mutombo was better than Olajuwon in 94, better than Jordan in 96, 97, 98... (in fact Jordan was nowhere near the top 5)... So I think that metric is overrated, and don't show the true dominance.

21 players above Jordan.
http://stats-for-the-nba.appspot.com/ratings/1998.html


Or Amir Johnson being better than Shaq for the millennium.

Or KG being better than Wade in 2009.

Or Manu being comparable to Kobe.

Or Tony Parker being a better defender in 2013.

There's no way to explain these results but no one bothers to even consider that RAPM is really a pretty strange thing to go by.

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#312 » by ardee » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:01 pm

The Infamous1 wrote:http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/LAL/2006.html

This was the 8th best offensive team in the nba


Yeah, but KG taking decent defensive guys like Hassell to a below average defense (often times mid-20s) is more impressive.

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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#313 » by G35 » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:12 pm

Nothing has changed my mind that Kobe is the most polarizing figure on this board.......

PaulieWal wrote:
G35 wrote:True, I think it will be a win if he is in the top 15......


Top 15? That's a little hyperbolic. I see him getting voted in at 10 or 11.
I'm so tired of the typical......
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#314 » by MacGill » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:19 pm

Question? Why are there people whining about where a player lands? If you want to discuss points, great do it, but it seems like some are sulking because others have made fantastic posts about other players, to help change perception, which to me is sad. For me, I am clear in that I'll take offensive and defensive balance versus the higher offense and more minimal defensive impact by position. What is wrong with that?

It's a choice....and obviously if certain players were such a lock they'd be in already because I don't think anyone is really strategically voting. And if they are, they are one vote. I mean we have KM, DN, Kobe, Oscar, West etc all as great players putting the basket in the net. This is no different than others dismissing other methods of gauging player impact and trying to say why we shouldn't. If you buy into it....great, if not, make your case and move on. It's not like posters are just focusing on one element of positivity or negativity. Everything is being looked over.
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#315 » by ElGee » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:22 pm

An Unbiased Fan wrote:
ElGee wrote:
An Unbiased Fan wrote:RR is extremely useful for regularization, but the problem you're trying to solve requires the data to first be individualized to an extent


Given the possibility that you might be some kind of math genius that is way beyond me...Can you please explain a situation when you would use Ridge Regression so I can understand it? What you're saying is incompatible with everything I know. Thanks.

I've used ridge and even lasso quite a few times on various programming projects. Probably most prominently on the AI side. Like one keyboard app I worked on where we needed to predict the various words a person would input next(for word suggest). Had another game I worked on where we used ridge to solve multiplayer tendencies. My first row with it was years back when I "attempted" to use it in my personal quest to make a new kickass lossy compression algorithm...which failed hard, and made me realize its limitations. I'm actually currently using it in a facial recognition project I'm working on to predict facial components/markers on a variety of faces.

I have no problem with it, or with RAPM for what it is. I just have a big issue with RAPM results being labeled as individual impact, when I see it reflective of lineup trends. Ridge simply can't be applied with that data to give you the output you desire. That's been shown over and over again. Change up your input variables to some individual like Synergy type data, or some parsed out PbP data, and I think it could be something. but simple +/- lineup data isn't going to cut it, for what you're trying to accomplish.

Anyway, can we drop the RAPM debates. It's just pointless and tedious.

PCProductions wrote:Saying RAPM can't find individual value is like saying we can't prove the existence of black holes because we can't see them.

No bro, just no.


Thanks for the reply. It's left me at sort of a loss though because it's not clear to me why you would use these methods here, and in my past (limited) exposure to, specifically, facial recognition machine learning algorithms, it was not used (although I can surmise an explanation). But just know that this really doesn't address in any way your concerns related to RAPM/lineups. If I'm the student on this, I still have no idea why you would use RR in those situations but not with lineup data. The first discussion I had with someone in this area I consider a subject matter expert (quite a smart Math PhD) who is also a basketball and sports fan, his response was essentially "cool!" not "you can't do that."

Maybe were just not clearly communicating here so let me simplify: Is it OK to use OLS regression on PBP data? And if not, why?
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#316 » by Doctor MJ » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:28 pm

SactoKingsFan wrote:I was pretty sure I’d be voting for KG due to his great peak, defensive impact and versatility, but I decided to reconsider Oscar for this spot after seeing the WOWY data provided by ElGee.
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It should be noted that as a result of looking at his own data in WOWY, ElGee came away more impressed by Jerry West than Oscar Robertson.
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#317 » by Owly » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:30 pm

An Unbiased Fan wrote:
MacGill wrote:The problem I have with what Kobe supporters are saying is that he was this fantastic 2 way player but...but....that his impact as a 2 guard could only impact his team in a minimal way despite his all D recognition. This is huge to me because offensively, while Kobe was fantastic, he isn't in my top offensive anchor list. Probably when on fire the greatest scorer ever, but this wasn't consistent to me when you see how many times he continued to just push through poor shooting nights. For me, I value more 2 way impacts, and we still have some players on the board.

From what I am reading of Oscar, he just seemed a much more all around player, more Lebron in that regard however again, it's his defense I am not fully convinced on yet. I really did enjoy the Oscar documentary when reviewing some of game tape and he really had a natural feel for the game where I can easily see him transitioning into any era with his skill set.

I came into this project hoping for good discussions, but it's kinda amazing how dismissive things have gotten the last few threads. Quite a few posters have put together some good posts, but they are basically skipped over, or not even addressed by most.

1) I find it strange that peer-review is OK for guys like West & Oscar, but not Kobe in terms of defense. I'm not sure why you say Kobe's D impact was minimal. KG didn't have great defenses in Minnesota. When both have decent support, they had Top 7 or so defenses. KG is definitely the better defender, but from 08-11 LA was #5, #6, #4, #6, for example. The whole thing is weird how criteria seems to shift when Kobe's name is mentioned.

As for Oscar...well the Royals were arguably the worse defensive squad of their era. It's not until he joins KAJ, that he's on a team with a decent defense. Seems strange to question Kobe's impact, and mention Oscar in this context. Better yet, what will you use to measure Oscar's defense, since peer review & videos are not apparently good guides.

2) Pace-adjusted numbers: http://doubledribble.wordpress.com/2012 ... ted-stats/

61-69 Oscar: 25.7 ppg, 6.9 apg, 5.7 rpg
^
Very good, but don't see how that's better than prime Kobe.

3) Longevity - Oscar was elite from age 22-31, just like KG, and about 5 years less than Kobe.

MVP shares
Kobe - 4.206
KG - 2.753
Oscar - 2.479


Its nice to see guys like Oscar & West get some run here, but strange how they haven't been mentioned much before, and now all of a sudden they're the choice without any real comparisons. What makes Oscar better than Kobe?

1) You basically answer your own question "I find it strange that peer-review is OK for guys like West & Oscar, but not Kobe in terms of defense", "what will you use to measure Oscar's defense". The former asks why peer review etc is okay, the latter essentially acknowledges that there are no exclusively defensive based measures of impact for that time frame(I guess you could split WoWY numbers in into offensive and defensive). And people have used peer review stuff on Kobe, just not exclusively the all-NBA stuff which has known flaws (pro-stars, often lazy based on stats or reputation, limited to position comparisons where there may be a relatively small range of impact). And I'm not saying Kobe's a bad defender, that I fully buy in to +/- variants or that his all D things are garbage. But you know why what's being used is being used. I don't know that many have voted West or Oscar doing so based on expressed high levels of confidence in high levels of (specifically) defensive impact (though they might assume that some WoWY "impact" was on the defensive end). And it's not like people haven't tried to look at net impact.

In terms of "The whole thing is weird how criteria seems to shift when Kobe's name is mentioned" you might want to address this at specific individuals or it's going to be hard to respond to.

2) Those pace adjusted numbers haven't accounted for the meanness in scorekeeping with regard to assists. You also notably ignore the efg% calculated or made any attempt to calculated ts% versus league norms.

Here's the ts% leaders for the span cited http://bkref.com/tiny/FM1rK

pick an equivalent Kobe span if you go 04-05 to 12-13 (Kobe as first option years, but feel free to try a different range)
http://bkref.com/tiny/1Z8ZC
http://bkref.com/tiny/LbGQq
Kobe at 122. A much bigger league sure but still that's another area with a substantial Robertson edge. Kobe is very big volume, above average efficiency. Oscar is big volume (2nd in points over that span), tremendous (best in the league) efficiency.

So basically the numbers you've posted are very misleading and by ignoring relative ts% and artificially diminishing the assist numbers you're hiding the two areas where Oscar evidently had a large impact on offense.

3) I've pointed this out before (in response to you) but apparently you missed it so here goes. MVP shares work okay for comparing how players were percieved within the same era (with the usual, favours players on good teams, sometimes narrative driven caveats). However MVP voting formats have changed. For most of Oscar's first few years there are about 1.8 total MVP shares awarded; for '65 and '66 about 1; for '67 and '68 about 1.6. Last year there were, iirc about 2.4. Even assuming MVP competiton was the same in each era (and note here that Oscar was competing with two roughly similarly timed primes from numbers three and four on this list) MVP shares across eras is a flawed measure.

It's not that I don't think Kobe has a case here (I think a lot of players do). I just think the above one is far from watertight.
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#318 » by ElGee » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:31 pm

To the question about diminishing returns, I ran an ad hoc study a few years ago looking at raw offensive rating with and without a team's best player. Here are the results:

ORtg w/out star (Occurrences) Avg. Change
> 107 (21) +7.46
100-107 (115) +8.56
< 100 (31) +10.45

I'm not in love with the methodology or the sample size, but to me it's reflecting/suggesting something. And FTR, the entire concept of this has to do with basically core pillars of team strength. Team's in modern basketball have key dimensions that they excel at, and adding to those dimensions has incredible diminishing returns because their is only 1 ball.
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#319 » by Doctor MJ » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:36 pm

ardee wrote:So random quotes and anectodes are ok to go by for Oscar and West's defense, but consistent voting results are not ok for Kobe?

This stuff is honestly disrespectful. Kobe not one of the best offensive anchors of all time? The guy led historic offenses with good casts and stunningly overachieving offenses when saddled with crap. Other than Jordan, Magic, Bird, LeBron and Nash, who is definitely better?

If you guys want to vote a guy with the worst Playoff record of anyone in contention with one of the most consistent and dominant players in history, then fine, I'm not going to argue anymore, because such a decision is beyond all reasonable logic :?

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When we look at guys like Oscar & West we're looking for anything we can find to help guide us because it was so long ago, and hence it's good to see quotes. This doesn't mean those quote clinch anything. One quote said Oscar was better at everything in basketball than Michael Jordan, that's obviously absurd and shows why we always remain skeptical with anything like this.

Re: "historical offenses". I'm not sure what you mean. Only thing I can think of is the playoff performance of the '01 Lakers, but that wouldn't justify the plural you're using.
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drza
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Re: RealGM Top 100 List #11 

Post#320 » by drza » Sat Jul 26, 2014 3:37 pm

Garnett vs Oscar

There has been lots of excellent information given on both KG and Oscar in this project, which is a great thing. It lets us speak with some degree of confidence about the characteristics of each player, and the type of impact that they were having. I do like to start with numbers where possible, though, so I'll start by re-posting some of the numbers we have for both from this thread.

Regular season, 10 year primes per100 possessions
Oscar Robertson ('61 - 70): 29.3 pts (57.2% TS), 8.5 reb, 10.3 ast (TO not recorded)
Kevin Garnett (1999 - 2008): 30.2 pts (55% TS), 16.8 reb, 6.6 ast, 3.7 TO

Playoffs, 10 year primes per 100 possessions
Oscar Robertson ('61 - 70): 29.7 pts (56.6% TS), 9.3 reb, 9.4 ast (TO not recorded)
Kevin Garnett (1999 - 2008): 29.5 pts (52.3%), 16.8 reb, 5.9 ast, 3.9 TO

*Oscar doesn't have per-100 numbers on B-R, but since they almost certainly were playing at least 100 possessions/game pace I used his actual per-game numbers

First blush impression, both are very impressive and well-rounded stat lines...which really you'd expect from these two. ElGee has also posted WOWY numbers for both players (and in KG's case we also have RAPM and other non-boxscore data), and both exhibit huge impacts (on the order of the best of their generations, with Oscar competing with West and maybe Russell while KG's peers in this respect are Shaq and LeBron). In both instances, it's clear that a) the boxscore impression of impressiveness is beared out and b) both are impacting the game well beyond the box scores.

So where does that leave us in a comparison?

Well, at this point let's discuss what we know about each player's style. Oscar is one of the best point guards in history, a great floor general that can score in volume at high efficiency. He showed that he could use these skills to lead excellent team offenses in a unipolar approach in Cincinnati. Then, he showed that he could modify his offensive approach to be the general in an offense built around Kareem's scoring in Milwaukee. This exhibits excellent offensive magnitude and portability, better than Nash (great unipolar in Phoenix but not as impactful in Dallas with Dirk) or Kobe (great unipolar post-Shaq but more co-existed than enhanced Shaq) and analogous to Magic moving between these roles for the Lakers as Kareem aged.

There's been some question about his defensive ability, but I don't necessarily see it as a negative. We have anecdotal evidence to suggest that Oscar was a solid man-to-man defender (good at using his size and athletic ability to keep opponents out of the paint), but that he wasn't a big help defender (like maybe West may have been). From the non-boxscore data that I've seen, solid man defensive wings don't tend to have huge defensive impact but they can be small positives. Think Paul Pierce as opposed to LeBron James. From this I would deduce that Oscar could be a part of either bad defenses or good defenses, depending on his environment, but that he wouldn't be the catalyst for either.

With Garnett, it has been covered in great detail that he is one of the best defensive players of all-time. In Minnesota he established himself as one of the to best defensive players in the league while carrying a heavy offensive load. This led Boston to believe that he was the best defensive player of his generation, and that they could build an outstanding defense around his talents. Then, they proceeded to do so, with Garnett as the anchor of a championship-caliber defense.

The questions about Garnett have been on offense. I don't know that a consensus has been agreed upon yet, but there is a lot of evidence that he is (at least) capable of being the best offensive player on a championship caliber team. Let's move for a second beyond the RAPM debates (where KG at his peak measured out as a top-3 offensive player in the league) or the questions about KG's postseason scoring efficiency (does it decline as some think, or is it still great when taken in context?). Instead, let's look at big picture evidence. Garnett's scoring volume in both the regular and postseason was similar to Oscar's (as evidenced by the box score scoring stats above) and he was doing this while maintaining a larger distribution responsibility than any of the other elite big men under consideration (as evidenced by the box score assists). KG wasn't on Oscar's level as an offensive player...not even on Dirk's, or Kobe's, or West's, or the other elite offensive players under consideration. BUT, Garnett WAS a big offensive positive. He was the leading scorer on 3 different teams that made the conference Finals, and was the leading scorer (and primary 4th quarter and crunch time scoring option)on a championship squad. Whether he could have been more offensive elite may be up for debate, but that Garnett was unquestionably good enough on offense to lead a contender from the front has been proven.

At the end of the day, both KG and Oscar are elite, worthy choices here. They have all of the stats to demonstrate this, and further analysis into either seems to indicate that they were even better than their stats would indicate. However, while Oscar can be the engine for any type of elite offense, he isn't going to be a big push either way on defense. KG, on the other hand, can be the centerpiece of historic caliber defenses while still being the best offensive player as well. As RonnyMac has pointed out, his portability with maximal impact is pretty much unprecedented. While Oscar is a worthy choice here, I think Garnett is a better one.

Vote: Kevin Garnett
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