RealGM Top 100 List #16

[ThaRegul8r]

Barkley led the league in rebounding in 1986-87 with 14.6 per game—becoming the shortest player in NBA history to do so; he finished second in 1985-86 (12.8 RPG), 1988-89 (12.5 RPG) and 1998-99 (12.3 RPG). “Pound for pound, Barkley and Wes Unseld are the greatest rebounders in the history of the game,” said Kevin Lougherty. “Charles wasn’t even 6-foot-5, you know” (Elliot Kalb, Who’s Better, Who’s Best in Basketball?: Mr. Stats Sets the Record Straight on the Top 50 NBA Players of All Time, p. 196). “I don’t know when I’ve seen a better rebounder,” said George Karl (Philadelphia Daily News, May 13, 1986).]

I have a problem with this quote. So we are strengthening Barkley's rebounding numbers because he was short, diminishing Moses' because he was a big center, yet in all the other threads guys are getting nods on the defensive end because their position is more of an anchor than guards.

I am not saying you specifically are doing this- but that quote will persuade other people in what I think is an unfair way. "Barkley's rebounding numbers don't match up with Moses' " "but he was 6'5" so pound for pound his numbers are better". That's essentially ranking players off of 'what could have been'. If we are doing that, then we should be trying to translate all guards to centers to see how much defensive impact they WOULD have had and ranking them based on that.

I'm the one who wrote the quoted text, so it is to be attributed to me, not ShaqAttack. They are from my own personal notes.

When I wrote it (years before today), I did not do so to "strengthen Barkley's rebounding numbers." If you watched the NBA while Barkley played, you know that was mentioned frequently. I recorded a fact. Nothing more, nothing less. I also record contemporary accounts and opinions, which I have posted on numerous occasions during my time here, and I recorded what his contemporaries had to say while he was playing.

Moses has always been recognized as one of the greatest rebounders in NBA history, without qualification, in the same category as Wilt, Russell and Rodman. So I'm not sure what the problem is when Moses is regarded as the better rebounder.

I post to inform, not persuade. I care nothing about persuading anyone, as I get no benefit from persuading anonymous people on the internet, rather than people I actually interact with face-to-face, who I actually could derive some benefit from. Nevertheless, if it doesn't meet with your approval, I'll remove it, as I don't really care. I thought when I posted it that it was likely too long for most people anyway.

[Basketballefan]

Vote: Moses Malone

3 time mvp which is tied for the 6th most in nba history
NBA champion and Finals MVP with a dominant finals performance against Kareem
Arguably a top 5 rebounder ever, and some of the best post moves ever

Him and Karl Malone are pretty close(who would be my next choice), but i give Moses the edge for being more dominant in the postseason especially on the big stage(NBA finals).

[ThaRegul8r]

Please do review the overall list of that 14 year RAPM and don't make any assumptions out of hand. As far as I know, it is the closest thing we have publicly to the "holy grail" stat, capturing every facet of a player's game (without much random noise messing it up).

I assume nothing. I've already admitted my ignorance regarding some of the advanced stats many posters talk about. I asked a question based on my observation, and that question stands.

One should also use multiple pieces of evidence, not just one. I'm wary of any one statistic being purported as a "Holy Grail" and thus all one needs to know. When many different pieces of evidence are all pointing to the same thing, that's a sign that there's something there.

[ThaRegul8r]

Bizarrely, I am unable to post the post I was responding to as well as my reply. I edited in my reply and that came through fine, but when I attempted to edit in the original post I was responding to, my reply was gone and the OP was only partially there. I don't know what's going on.

[ceiling raiser]

Dirk is my pick here again, for the same reasons as he has been since KG made it in:

Spoiler:

Still going for Dirk here. My post from the last thread:

Going with Dirk here, though I don't have an issue with the Kobe vote at this point.

His ability to score on a great volume efficiently really sells this for me. Ever since developing his killer post game, he's been essentially unguardable (shutupandjam's research a few threads ago really illustrates how dominant he's been in the post). The type of coverage he gets creates unbelievable opportunities for his teammates. One of the craziest mismatches we've seen. Some great posts by Chuck, Q, and others in here so far, hoping to see more in the next couple of threads.

I was looking at the Admiral here as well, but I don't feel comfortable voting for him at this point in time. drza and a few others had some solid posts, but in order to justify voting for him, I need to feel extremely confident that he was having a monstrous impact after the injury. RAPM paints him as a legitimate force while playing along side Duncan, but I'd still like to see this period of his career fleshed out. I also still need to watch more tape of him during his first three years, since I wasn't watching at the time. lorak raised some concerns about his playoff defense that I'd like to read more about in the next thread or two.

Dr. J and West are interesting. I've seen very little tape of either guy in their primes, so it's hard for me to gauge where they stand defensively. Both were physical freaks and tremendous athletes who exerted plenty of effort on that end, but in order to vote for them at this point, I'd need to feel very confident about them defensively. Since I don't at the moment, I can't place them ahead of Kobe, who is a superior scorer (though probably worse than both on D, by how much I can't tell...he could be superior on that end), and did his damage in today's league. With the other two, there are questions about how they'd translate that I'm not presently capable of answering.

Interesting quote from an article that came out on Grantland recently:

The fear is real. The gurus at Stats LLC, the company behind the SportVU cameras, have developed two previously unreleased metrics designed to measure the amount of attention an offensive player gets from defenders when he doesn’t have the ball.

The first, dubbed “gravity score,” measures how often defenders are really guarding a particular player away from the ball. Korver had the fourth-highest score, behind only Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, and Paul George. The second — “distraction score” — is a related attempt to measure how often a player’s defender strays away from him to patrol the on-ball action. Korver had the lowest such score in the league.

source: http://grantland.com/features/kyle-korv ... nta-hawks/

I wouldn't be surprised if Dirk was among the top few guys in either or both categories (note: not using this as part of my reasoning for the vote, just speculating). The extent to which he's warped defenses since playing in the post more often is incredible.

I didn't really mention his defense above, but it probably isn't an issue IMO. From some of the numbers we have it seems Dirk rates at worst as a neutral defender. Considering his ability to play away from the basket on offense, he's not going to marginalize a center on that end with limited range. Great portability IMO.

• Another HOF post from drza on Dirk in this thread: viewtopic.php?p=40898045#p40898045

• After thinking about it, lorak's method for gauging postseason offensive/defensive team performance is probably the correct way to go about doing so. I've been using playoff off - avg opp def (and vice versa), but I think playoff off - expected def ( [ avg opp def + team off] / 2 ) is the better call.

• I wasn't terribly confident in my pre-project list, and after reading a bit, I do feel like I should move both Dirk (#12) and Robinson (#14) up. Order aside (I feel like I need to move some players around), my top 8 (MJ and the bigs) are locked in though, so there's not much room to maneuver.

[ThaRegul8r]

Also if people keep voting Karl over Chuck I would hope I see those same posters vote for Stockton over Nash, it's almost the same exact comparison except they weren't full-on contemporaries the way Sir Charles and The Mailman were.

At the time they actually played, I never thought Malone was better than Barkley, and Barkley was actually spoken of by his peers as being in the same category as Bird, Magic and Jordan while the latter three were playing, while Malone was not.

Barkley had a season in which he received more first-place MVP votes than Magic or Jordan, and Malone did not (Barkley did get robbed, as it's absurd that a player can receive the most first place votes yet not win). Barkley then actually won an MVP over prime Jordan during the first three-peat. Malone did not. He didn't win the award until Jordan's later years with the Bulls, and he didn't deserve it (or the one he would win later).

[HurricaneKid]

That post raises a question for me, though.

Is the mark of the goodness of a stat that one's player of choice ranks highly on it? I'm just curious. Because I see some stats are said to be the best and they just so happen to support a player that person happens to be advocating for, and then other stats are bad, and a player they advocate for just so happens to score poorly in it. So how does it work?

The quantity of erroneous readings (aka a widespread lack of resonance with established valuations) is a big deal. If there are only 1 or 2 seemingly "out there" data points in a list of 30, 50, 100 names, the stat probably has a lot of use. When half of the readouts provided by the metric seem to not make sense, it absolutely does call into question the discovery-based utility of a given statistic or formula. Unless you believe that ...

1. Kevin Garnett - 9.7
2. LeBron James - 9.5
3. Tim Duncan - 7.9
4. Chris Paul - 7.4
5. Dirk Nowitzki - 7.4
6. Manu Ginobili - 6.9
7. Steve Nash - 6.0
8. Paul Pierce - 5.9
9. Amir Johnson (Small Sample Size) - 5.8
10. LaMarcus Aldridge - 5.8
11. Shaquille O'Neal - 5.7

In any way approximates an accurate top 11 players of the last 14 years you should probably throw the data out or ONLY use it in conjunction with a plethora of other calculations, weighing this particular metric with a grain-o-salt. Shaq being 11th immediately jumps off the page, and then of course there are the omissions of Kobe & Wade, who are clearly (much) better players than half the names on that list, and those are problems with only the first 11 data points. That's probably the issue ardee is taking with using that list as any kind of "evidence." At best it needs to be part of a MUCH larger argument, it in no way stands on its own merits (again, unless you find this to be a plausible readout).

The problem isn't in the data. Its in the specific 14 year stretch. This dumps off some of Shaq's premier years and replaces them with Boston Shaq, Cle Shaq, etc. It adds in 18 yr old LeBron, 19 yr old LeBron, etc. I would much prefer a 1/3/5/7 year data set that included a player's best season/3/5/and 7 year stretches. That might even be worth money to me.

Kobe has always fared POORLY when it comes to RAPM. I won't add much more to that.

[DannyNoonan1221]

I post to inform, not persuade. I care nothing about persuading anyone, as I get no benefit from persuading anonymous people on the internet, rather than people I actually interact with face-to-face, who I actually could derive some benefit from. Nevertheless, if it doesn't meet with your approval, I'll remove it, as I don't really care. I thought when I posted it that it was likely too long for most people anyway.

I quoted wrong. That was a response to you. And again, I am not saying you are personally trying to persuade people. But stating his height and his great rebounding numbers is as close to saying "if he were taller he would have XXXXXX rebounds". But that is a dangerous game. If Moses was a tad bit quicker would he have been a good team defender? If iverson had been taller and stronger would he be in the top 5 of this list?

What I am saying is that by stating Barkley's height and those quotes about "pound for pound" is not exactly fair- Barkley's rebounding numbers are what they are, no matter his height... did he most likely have to work harder to get those rebounds because of his height? Yes. But we can't give him credit for rebounds he didn't get that he may have gotten had he been a traditional size PF/C.

[Melodabeast]

Kobe has always fared POORLY when it comes to RAPM. I won't add much more to that.

uhh,no. Kobe has phenomenal RAPM scores. You don't know what you're talking about.

[Owly]

Given the fact that Barkley being considered superior to Karl Malone through around '93 has been mentioned a few times (accurately enough), it probably should be highlighted that not only was Malone considered superior in the spell that I (and boxscore metrics, and seemingly MVP voters - though obviously competition was different) consider his very best years (the latter half of the 90s) but there were published lists that argued he'd suppassed Barkley (career-wise) by 1997.

Patterson/Fisher and Taragano had Barkley ahead in '88 and '93 (Malone not making their top 100s). And in 1996 Pete Vecsey had Barkley at 23 to Malone's 29. However in '97 Slam and Ken Shouler in his position specific rankings had Malone ahead. This trend would be continued by Athlon ('98), Basketball Digest ('99) Slam again ('03, '09 and '11), Elliot Kalb ('03), Lacy Banks ('04), Steve Franco ('09), Bill Simmons ('09/'10) and Beckett ('10). ESPN ranked Malone as better in positional rankings as did Charley Rosen, both in 2005. In fact of the published rankings since '97 only two have favoured Barkley and they have been two of the more eccentric ones Keith Thompson's Heroes of the Hardcourt ('05, Barkley at 21, Malone at 23); and Pat Williams and Michael Connelly ('12, Barkley at 20, Malone at 23). Of course there is rarely a large gap between the two (Banks', also an unusual list, has Malone at 6; Barkley at 19; and Beckett, which, looking at it, is another unconventional list, has Karl at 18, Barkley at 31), but there has been a fairly broad consensus that Malone had the better career. It doesn't make it so of course, but it's worth bringing up. Combined with near identical "boxscore metric" peaks (PER and WS/48 pretty much are identical, Barkley has a slightly better peak by WARP); Malone's significant longevity lead (which is confirmed in his lead in accolades and career based metrics); and Malone's superior D which isn't always accurately captured in such metrics, I'd find it difficult to think of a case that would persuade me Barkley was better.

[ThaRegul8r]

I post to inform, not persuade. I care nothing about persuading anyone, as I get no benefit from persuading anonymous people on the internet, rather than people I actually interact with face-to-face, who I actually could derive some benefit from. Nevertheless, if it doesn't meet with your approval, I'll remove it, as I don't really care. I thought when I posted it that it was likely too long for most people anyway.

I quoted wrong. That was a response to you. And again, I am not saying you are personally trying to persuade people. But stating his height and his great rebounding numbers is as close to saying "if he were taller he would have XXXXXX rebounds". But that is a dangerous game. If Moses was a tad bit quicker would he have been a good team defender? If iverson had been taller and stronger would he be in the top 5 of this list?

I don't know why people persist in inferring or reading into something rather than simply going by what's there. No one said or insinuated anything about Barkley having a certain number of rebounds if he were taller. It seems to be difficult for people to simply take what's being said how it's being said. No more, no less.

What I am saying is that by stating Barkley's height and those quotes about "pound for pound" is not exactly fair- Barkley's rebounding numbers are what they are, no matter his height... did he most likely have to work harder to get those rebounds because of his height? Yes. But we can't give him credit for rebounds he didn't get that he may have gotten had he been a traditional size PF/C.

The quotes are gone now, so it's a moot point. I won't be posting anything further about Barkley again.

[ThaRegul8r]

Given the fact that Barkley being considered superior to Karl Malone through around '93 has been mentioned a few times (accurately enough), it probably should be highlighted that not only was Malone considered superior in the spell that I (and boxscore metrics, and seemingly MVP voters - though obviously competition was different) consider his very best years (the latter half of the 90s) but there were published lists that argued he'd suppassed Barkley (career-wise) by 1997.

Patterson/Fisher and Taragano had Barkley ahead in '88 and '93 (Malone not making their top 100s). And in 1996 Pete Vecsey had Barkley at 23 to Malone's 29. However in '97 Slam and Ken Shouler in his position specific rankings had Malone ahead. This trend would be continued by Athlon ('98), Basketball Digest ('99) Slam again ('03, '09 and '11), Elliot Kalb ('03), Lacy Banks ('04), Steve Franco ('09), Bill Simmons ('09/'10) and Beckett ('10). ESPN ranked Malone as better in positional rankings as did Charley Rosen, both in 2005. In fact of the published rankings since '97 only two have favoured Barkley and they have been two of the more eccentric ones Keith Thompson's Heroes of the Hardcourt ('05, Barkley at 21, Malone at 23); and Pat Williams and Michael Connelly ('12, Barkley at 20, Malone at 23). Of course there is rarely a large gap between the two (Banks', also an unusual list, has Malone at 6; Barkley at 19; and Beckett, which, looking at it, is another unconventional list, has Karl at 18, Barkley at 31), but there has been a fairly broad consensus that Malone had the better career.

Simmons, since he was mentioned and I already have his quote in my notes and can simply copy and paste, said: “After the ’93 season, the Barkley-Malone argument was dead; Barkley had won. After the ’94 season? Still dead. Then Malone kept chugging along and chugging along, Barkley let himself go and things began to shift. Barkley’s apex was definitely better, but not so much better that it outweighed Malone’s longevity and consistency” (The Basketball Book, p. 511). That's similar to what ElGee's been saying about longevity, as he's said in the last Top 100 Project that Malone's longevity was his argument. And that's why the final career ranking has changed from contemporary opinion at the time they were both in the league concurrently.

[Doctor MJ]

I'll also note that if you just took the offensive part of this metric, Kobe certainly shows up:

1. LeBron James - 7.2
2. Steve Nash - 6.6
3. Kobe Bryant - 6.2

I find it extremely interesting that Kobe as a defender is worse than Nash. Whether that is a reflection of the stat and that we should be hesitant or reflective of Kobe's actual defense I don't know. But I would have never thought those two were close, let alone Nash ahead. Interesting.

Yup this is the thing that really comes out about Kobe when we look at these stats. People point to his stats and say "You're telling me that's not awesome?", but it's the defense that kills him. And that's interesting given that Kobe was the default All-D guy he was for so many years based on reputation but the data suggests this was not reasonable.

2 things though:

1) As has been pointed out by others: You're defensive RAPM can get manipulated if you tend to play on defensive-oriented lineups or offensive-oriented lineups. So if Kobe's playing in offensive oriented lineups, his defensive RAPM is going to look worse than his actual defensive impact is (and his offensive RAPM will look better than it should). People have suggested that's the case with Kobe, and I agree that I think that's part of what's going on.

2) RAPM doesn't take a break...players often do. So if you have a player that through the 82 game season often coasts, or is hid, on defense, but who plays reliably aggressive defense when it matters, then RAPM is going to underrate the player. People have suggested this is the case about Kobe, and I also agree that that is part of what's going on.

[Doctor MJ]

Kobe has always fared POORLY when it comes to RAPM. I won't add much more to that.

uhh,no. Kobe has phenomenal RAPM scores. You don't know what you're talking about.

They are phenomenal, just not as phenomenal as his supporters would prefer to see. Same with other so-called advanced metrics. This is why you'll basically never heard someone called both a "stat guy" and a "Kobe homer".

From my perspective it's a pretty straight froward thing. Kobe's a bad ass scorer who has won a lot of titles. Both of these things add glamour to him, and hence also influence general perception of him. Data being immune to glamour is bound to see him as very good but not quite as good as the glamour would suggest.

[DannyNoonan1221]

I post to inform, not persuade. I care nothing about persuading anyone, as I get no benefit from persuading anonymous people on the internet, rather than people I actually interact with face-to-face, who I actually could derive some benefit from. Nevertheless, if it doesn't meet with your approval, I'll remove it, as I don't really care. I thought when I posted it that it was likely too long for most people anyway.

I quoted wrong. That was a response to you. And again, I am not saying you are personally trying to persuade people. But stating his height and his great rebounding numbers is as close to saying "if he were taller he would have XXXXXX rebounds". But that is a dangerous game. If Moses was a tad bit quicker would he have been a good team defender? If iverson had been taller and stronger would he be in the top 5 of this list?

I don't know why people persist in inferring or reading into something rather than simply going by what's there. No one said or insinuated anything about Barkley having a certain number of rebounds if he were taller. It seems to be difficult for people to simply take what's being said how it's being said. No more, no less.

What I am saying is that by stating Barkley's height and those quotes about "pound for pound" is not exactly fair- Barkley's rebounding numbers are what they are, no matter his height... did he most likely have to work harder to get those rebounds because of his height? Yes. But we can't give him credit for rebounds he didn't get that he may have gotten had he been a traditional size PF/C.

The quotes are gone now, so it's a moot point. I won't be posting anything further about Barkley again.

I guess I don't understand why you suddenly are being so defensive. I wasn't trying to target you or anything like that. Just pointing out an indirect result of some of these points that seem to be contradicting past threads. Sorry if what I posted came across that way.

[DannyNoonan1221]

I'll also note that if you just took the offensive part of this metric, Kobe certainly shows up:

1. LeBron James - 7.2
2. Steve Nash - 6.6
3. Kobe Bryant - 6.2

I find it extremely interesting that Kobe as a defender is worse than Nash. Whether that is a reflection of the stat and that we should be hesitant or reflective of Kobe's actual defense I don't know. But I would have never thought those two were close, let alone Nash ahead. Interesting.

Yup this is the thing that really comes out about Kobe when we look at these stats. People point to his stats and say "You're telling me that's not awesome?", but it's the defense that kills him. And that's interesting given that Kobe was the default All-D guy he was for so many years based on reputation but the data suggests this was not reasonable.

2 things though:

1) As has been pointed out by others: You're defensive RAPM can get manipulated if you tend to play on defensive-oriented lineups or offensive-oriented lineups. So if Kobe's playing in offensive oriented lineups, his defensive RAPM is going to look worse than his actual defensive impact is (and his offensive RAPM will look better than it should). People have suggested that's the case with Kobe, and I agree that I think that's part of what's going on.

2) RAPM doesn't take a break...players often do. So if you have a player that through the 82 game season often coasts, or is hid, on defense, but who plays reliably aggressive defense when it matters, then RAPM is going to underrate the player. People have suggested this is the case about Kobe, and I also agree that that is part of what's going on.

Couldn't agree more. In my mind, this project could be nicknamed "top 100 impact players". I don't mean that because of the focus on RAPM; not at all. I just feel as if to this point the rankings/discussions have been about a player's skill set and how it translates to impacting the game.

With that, Kobe's defensive ability is interesting. If he was coasting as many people have pointed out, and what I think is a pretty big aspect of that part of his game, but still had the ABILITY to be a great defender- in the end it comes down to his actual impact. If he was coasting or being hidden on the defensive end, then one could argue his IMPACT could be negative? That depends on how much game plans changed for LA in order to hide him or let him coast. I am not saying this happened for sure, but just making my point that Kobe could have been a better all around defender than Russell, but if he coasts for long stretches it doesn't matter. This is a discussion regarding his impact, not his ability. And if it's not a discussion regarding his impact then we need to start back at #1 in my opinion.

[AussieBuck]

I'll also note that if you just took the offensive part of this metric, Kobe certainly shows up:

1. LeBron James - 7.2
2. Steve Nash - 6.6
3. Kobe Bryant - 6.2

I find it extremely interesting that Kobe as a defender is worse than Nash. Whether that is a reflection of the stat and that we should be hesitant or reflective of Kobe's actual defense I don't know. But I would have never thought those two were close, let alone Nash ahead. Interesting.

Kobe was a great on ball defender and a terrible off ball defender. People see him shut down an iso play and laud him then when he doesn't chase/rotate/switch it's seen as a team breakdown. Nash played to his limitations and followed team rules on help D rather than gambling. That and every time he got screened Amare was his C so free playups for everyone.

[Doctor MJ]

I'll also note that if you just took the offensive part of this metric, Kobe certainly shows up:

1. LeBron James - 7.2
2. Steve Nash - 6.6
3. Kobe Bryant - 6.2

I find it extremely interesting that Kobe as a defender is worse than Nash. Whether that is a reflection of the stat and that we should be hesitant or reflective of Kobe's actual defense I don't know. But I would have never thought those two were close, let alone Nash ahead. Interesting.

Kobe was a great on ball defender and a terrible off ball defender. People see him shut down an iso play and laud him then when he doesn't chase/rotate/switch it's seen as a team breakdown. Nash played to his limitations and followed team rules on help D rather than gambling. That and every time he got screened Amare was his C so free playups for everyone.

Right this is the thing that's more damning to me. It's pretty typical in a typical regular season game to see Kobe sag off his man and try to find some way to hit a home run by stealing the ball and racing down the court for an easy bucket. That's not what hiding on defense is. That's simply being uninterested in doing the team grunt work that makes sure the team doesn't needless give up easy buckets.

And this says things about the assumption that he can become a huge defender when you need him to. What he can do is dial up his intensity in man coverage of a star perimeter player if that's what his team needs. That's not nothing, but ironically, what it means is that it'd be most useful when playing against himself. Since most team's don't have a shooting guard shooting at the volume he shoots, there are diminishing returns to this.

I would expect to take his defense over Nash's, but I'm not entirely sure about that. With Nash you know exactly what the issue is at all times. You know he's always going to make the officially correct play given his limitations, and you can work to help him accordingly. With Kobe, help defense often means running out to the guy he just left open.

[D Nice]

I'll also note that if you just took the offensive part of this metric, Kobe certainly shows up:

1. LeBron James - 7.2
2. Steve Nash - 6.6
3. Kobe Bryant - 6.2

I find it extremely interesting that Kobe as a defender is worse than Nash. Whether that is a reflection of the stat and that we should be hesitant or reflective of Kobe's actual defense I don't know. But I would have never thought those two were close, let alone Nash ahead. Interesting.

Kobe was a great on ball defender and a terrible off ball defender. People see him shut down an iso play and laud him then when he doesn't chase/rotate/switch it's seen as a team breakdown. Nash played to his limitations and followed team rules on help D rather than gambling. That and every time he got screened Amare was his C so free playups for everyone.

This is blatant untruth unless you're talking strictly about post-'04 Kobe. The only season between '00 and '04 that he would even be mildly guilty of this would be 2003. And again, once he gets adequate offensive support in '08 it (once again) becomes a once-in-a-while thing that exclusively applies to the regular season.

Unless he's costing us regular season wins that inhibit optimal post-season seeding it is largely insignificant. BIG PICTURE PEOPLE.

How the **** are people this misinformed? This is the exact kind of rhetoric that probably stops us from even wanting to engage in meaningful discourse.

And at supporting Kobe = not being statistically inclined. That's probably one of the most insulting (and inaccurate) things I've ever read on realgm.

[AussieBuck]

You're getting worked up just in case I'm referring to more than the last decade?