Interesting to see the direction at this point -- guys 20-35 on my list are just entirely different than some of the names being mentioned. This makes a drop-in post very challenging. Not sure what to add...maybe Celtics thoughts:
Kevin McHale. +5 peak. 28th on my list.
McHale's a guy who has really moved up for me over the years. An all-time level post player who in 1988 was right in that 95 Hakeem mold of just murdering people on offense. He was a very underrated passer, because he was sometimes an unwilling passer, but the chemistry he cultivated with Bird (and even Parish) was masterful. However, like so many guys, his offensive peak did not overlap with his defensive peak -- he was a long, super active all-nba type defender in his earlier years. Later, he was essentially a traditional center (despite player twin towers with Parish) who was long and pesky around the hoop but did not stand out on that front.
John Havlicek. +3 Peak. 42nd on my list.
He's the impetus for this post. As a Celtic fan, I find there is a tremendous misunderstanding about those 70's Celtics teams. Many people start talking about Hondo and those teams and it really sounds like ring-counting. The next level of detail I see props up Cowens (maybe people check the MVP results), but both miss the mark to me. If you can, go find film of this team. This is truly one of the early multipolar teams, so much so that I've been considering starting a thread that details the history of these teams all the way up to the 2013 Spurs.
In 1973, this Celtic group rose to power with a 7 SRS season. However this was at the absolute nadir of parity in basketball -- MOV was stretched out due to rapid expansion (not to mention the ABA pilfering talent). I don't want to minimize the 4 good teams that year or that the Celtics were among them, but these teams shouldn't be viewed historically on the same lines as other 8 SRS teams -- in addition to the expansion teams, the 9-win 76ers were in the league. These bottom-dwellers just gift wins to the top of the league.
Still, Boston's Cowens-Silas-Hondo-Chaney-White squad was formidable, and they competed at the Knick-Laker-Buck level. On broadcasts, Heinsohn always bragged about their balance and fast pace ("5 guys in double-figure motto") and pace adjusted numbers reflect this. Here's where this team was strong:
Rebounding. They were HISTORICALLY good in rebounding differential, with a great rebounder in Silas, alongside another great one in Cowens and some good positional rebounders like Hondo to boot. Cowens could play a high-post hub in the half-court, stretch the floor with his jumper and drive against slower centers. White is sort of a typical skilled scoring guard.
Now, in 1974 the Knicks and Lakers were done. It was just Boston and Milwaukee left. Interestingly, Boston posts only a 3.4 SRS with nearly perfect team healthy. This should be head-scratching -- why would this team have such a sharp change after another year of continuity in which they were perfectly healthy? My interpretation has always been that the early 70's were that weak, and that in 74, typical teams were stronger. Consider that in 73, Boston played 15 games against the cellar-dwellers at +12.9 MOV, and then following three years against the same teams (Philly, Sea, Por) outscored them by 3.4 points. All told, I see a "4-5" SRS quality team in this period powered by rebounding, two all-star (borderline all-nba) players in Hondo and Cowens. In 76 they add Charlie Scott, they have a 2.2 SRS and perhaps the silliest road to a title in NBA history.
As for Havlicek, by 76 he was far better than a role-player but on the tail end, past his peak and prime. Again, despite this, Boston continued to move along in 75 and 76 along a similar path (similar team strengths). This makes sense, given the balanced makeup of the team, the ridiculous advantage their rebounding provided, and Hondo's role. Think of a Ray Allen/Miller type in the half court, although with more slashing when he caught the ball and a better feel for passing off the curls. He was good in the midrange, perpetual motion, and at times hasty with his shot selection (the Celtic way!). I don't see anything he's better than Pippen on offense by any clear margin.
Defensively, Havlicek has quite the reputation but how is he in any way better than a teammate like Tom Sanders? Defensive reputation, especially for wings, is often earned with hard work, grit, etc. which are Hondo's specialties. I do believe he was a good defender for his position (at 6-5), and a positive in that regard. I'd probably vote him on the all-d team. But I don't see any comparison with someone like Pippen. No evidence he can shut down players, let alone multiple positions, and I've seen (or heard) anything about his ability to protect the rim or swarm or handle bigs. That all adds up to a low peak -- mis-represented by Celtic lore, championship rep, a fast-pace and weak era bloating stats.
trex_8063 wrote:I want to comment a bit on how we weight offense vs. defense for the various positions, with application toward the Stockton/Nash comparison.
I see stockton's major advantage defensively giving him the edge. I find it interesting that Nash's lack of D is seemingly getting pushed aside here when he was highly criticized for it during his prime.
Go through and look at how PGs performed against Nash and against Stockton. If you can't identify a significant difference in the individual performances, what about their defensive play makes you think they are helping the team Globally in a way that creates a significant difference? Besides Nash leading in the league in charges and such...
(PS the games I tracked Nash is not a BAD defender. He's not a positive one, but the movement to view him as around a neutral impact defender isn't merely about low defensive usage for his position, it's that he's not doing things that kill his team defensively.)
Doctor MJ wrote:What you seem to be saying is that the only reason it matters to you with regards to Nash is that he made his narrative leap from all-star to superstar the same year as the rule change occurred.
I phrase it like that and my hope is that doesn't sound crazy to you...but truthfully I have a huge problem with that because I'd say it needs to be based on something more concrete. Realistically, based on individual box score stats, there''s no reason to single Nash out here. Not only did other guys make more obvious leaps, Nash isn't even the type of player that makes that type of leap. It's score-first guards who showed signs of really getting the most help here, and quite literally Nash is the ONLY pass-first guard to even make All-NBA in '04-05. Yet it's Nash you doubt.
Does this not seem odd to you?
Well it's not just Nash but out of the guys mentioned already he's the one I feel that way about. I feel the same way about Kidd (his eFG% from 05-07 is 47.6% - equal to his career high in the 10 years prior), Carter (51.3 TS% 02-04, 54.6 TS% 05-07), and Iverson (TS from 02-04 is 49.1, from 05-06 it's 53.8) but their main case and best seasons are in the handcheck era and they were all stars in that era. Nash was an All Star that had All Star impact in Dallas and suddenly had superstar impact with a new team and new rules. I'm not saying the new team had nothing to do with it but the rules helped his impact IMO.
Although maybe I"m confused because I'm largely fine with this. I do think he was improving as a player, but to me the big thing is just how he was used in the scheme he was used.
Some common ground was meant to be found soon.
Huh? Nash didn't play SSOL in 2003. I'm also really confused by the estimate of Walt's pp100. That doesn't seem to me to fit with what b-r has listed from him only a couple years later.
What I meant was I was taking his career high Dallas season because of the SSOL. Didn't even realize it was his overall career high I assumed one of the years he scored ~19 a game was. Either way Dallas played at an insanely fast speed too (speed and offensive efficiency do have a small correlation - not too many Sixers type teams out there). And I redid the math and he scored 25.5 pp100. In his prime he hovered around 22-23 pp100 most seasons. Good eye.
First thing: Clearly his numbers didn't skyrocket, which is why you just used a year from his time in Dallas as his peak to compare him to Frazier. To me this is the thing we keep getting into again and again:
The reason why people think Nash's numbers skyrocketed is precisely because what was brilliant about his game wasn't his numbers. The lack of huge numbers is what led to people's skepticism, and amazingly this led to narratives talking about his numbers being inflated, and the ultimate irony of him being labeled a system player.
His numbers did skyrocket looking at raw totals. Now after pace adjustment his scoring is about the same but his assists skyrocketed and his impact numbers went from nothing special to GOAT offense levels. I'm trying to find a smoother way to say this but would Nash be here if he stayed with Dallas averaging 17/7 instead of going to the Suns and averaging 17/11 even if his beyond surface numbers were the same? In the same light if Frazier had to be top 2 in assists yearly would he been seen as better?
As far as Frazier not doing more than was needed, I agree, and this has everything to do with why I prefer him over many point guard who racked up more assists, but in the end one needs to boil it down to what a guy actually did do that helped his team. Those Knick teams weren't winning with unbeatable offense. The offense was good but not great. So for Frazier to take on a more minimalistic approach to point guard - however much it fit with what Red wanted - do we really think he had impact to the offense anything like what Nash was doing in Phoenix?
I don't see it as even close.
On the other side of things: Of course that means the Knicks were winning with defense, for which Frazier deserves some kudos. That defense died though before Frazier left his prime, which to me is all the more evidence that those other guys on his team were really doing great things for the team defense too.
The defense died in 75. The Knicks had a terrible rotation. DD and Lucas left and John Gianelli and Hawthorne Wingo played about 1000 minutes more than they did the previous season (where they were backups). Hawthorne was out of the league within 2 seasons, and Gianelli only made the playoffs once in a starting role with the Bucks (they went from 38-44 to 49-33 when he left). I'm not sure if I can hold that against him when I watch old games and see him play lockdown D against Jerry West and disrupt offensive sets (as basic as they were back then).
GC Pantalones wrote:So the only way to compare the two as scorers is to ask how they would do if both were too dumb to attack the defense before it was ready to defend? Let's also note that the Knicks were still playing at a plenty fast pace compared to Nash's era.
I'm all for looking at guys in how they'd do in a wide variety of situations, but you have to take care not to place pointless, unrealistic handcuffs on a guy when doing the comparison.
One other thing, talking about individual scoring. One might assume that SSOL meant that Nash inflated his scoring by getting fast break points, but that wasn't how it worked. In fact, a smaller percentage of his points came from the fast break (12.5%) than did Chris Paul in his breakthrough year of '07-08 on the slow-as-molasses Hornets (15.7%).
The Suns scored a lot of fast break points on fast breaks run by Nash, but the goal was to get the ball to the guy running ahead, not for Nash to take it all the way. If you take a look at Nash's scoring in '04-05 by when it was in the shot clock, you'll actually see he shot better later in the shot clock while Marion & Amare's shooting went down.
Oh yeah I wasn't assuming Nash scored in fastbreaks. I remember in game seeing him mostly give the ball to trailers and finishers on the break. That PNR was his bread and butter.
To your point about me putting handcuffs on Nash maybe you are right. The comparison would be a lot easier to make offensively if I had more data on Walt's postseason numbers. His raw numbers (22.9/7.0/5.5 from 71-75, 57.2 TS%, 26.9 pp100 for 74-75) suggest he took more of a scoring load but I've only seen the 70, 72, and 73 Finals (by my count on an old spreadsheet he averaged 19/7.5/8 in those games) and he didn't really take over those games offensively.
I might be putting too much of an emphasis on Nash being allowed to takeover and Walt playing in a strict system. In that same light that strict system led to multiple championships and the open system, while great, completely ignored one side of the ball and made it easier for Nash to lead great offenses at the cost of making the Suns unable to get stops.
I'm kind of thinking of changing my vote but I'll give it time. I constantly switch on these two and Wade (last time there was a thread on Walt vs Nash I think I chose Nash). Maybe I'll hold my vote until the runoff (if it's between these two I'll just give up).
Not sure I understand your point. Mine was that Frazier was the most efficient guard of his day much the way Oscar and West were in the 60s (though not to the same degree). Relative to the other guards of his time, he was as efficient as Nash relative to the other guards of his day, or very close. Frazier for his day was as efficient as Nash for his -- and most likely as efficient or more than Nash would be in Frazier's day (the opposite is probably not true since Nash is such an efficient 3 point shooter). The greater utilization of the 3 point shot has turned the guard position from the least efficient (but necessary to stretch the floor) to as or more efficient than bigs on the average. Thus guard efficiency for the average guard HAS gone up since the 60s and 70s. The 3 point shot isn't necessarily more difficult in terms of skill; it's usually an open shot v. a guarded shot from the 10-15 footer. The added distance does make it a less likely shot to go it but the added points make it the most efficient shot outside of scoring right at the rim. Again, I don't see where you are countering my argument . . . maybe we aren't understanding the points each other are making.
Thus the argument for individual efficiency is there, but not particularly strong. Frazier dominates Nash in terms of defense and is stronger in terms of rebounding and performing on the highest stage (the NBA finals). The only argument I can see for Nash is making the claim that his playmaking is so great that it trumps everything else which is a claim I believe you frequently make pointing to Phoenix's team Ortg (and ignoring Phoenix's team Drtg which is affected by the same deliberate small ball mismatches that help make the Ortg so effective).
If you are making the claim that Phoenix's Ortg-Drtg is appreciably better than that of Frazier's Knicks and that Phoenix was able to use that efficiency to succeed to a greater degree than the Knicks; that's where the ring counting comes in. It's not just rings, it's that the offense + defense that Frazier led in NY (and he was the clear leader on both ends) was more successful than the offense + defense that Nash led in Phoenix. So, Frazier not only is the individually more impactful player (mainly due to the defensive edge) but the team success favors him as well.
Well what I'm saying is that being the most efficient guard in each era is not equally as impressive, in part because there's no reason to assume that means equal distribution.
For perspective here, Nash in '07 had a 4% higher TS% than any other big minute guard in the league.
Frazier's best year was '72. He had the highest TS% of any big minute guard. Within 4% of him though there were 11 other guards.
Another comparison, the closest star point guard (Billups) to Nash in TS% that year was 6.3%. Whereas if you go 6.3% down from Frazier you've now included half the big minute guard that played that year. So efficiency-wise, the gap between Nash and his closest analogous competitor was on the same order as the gap between Frazier and what the league average guard did.
Now, that's not a random Nash year of course. I picked a particular good year, and I'm not saying you have to only go by that when making judgments. The point is just to illustrate how off the mark it is to say "best in his era, means roughly as good as any era", as if it can be reduced to mere noise relative to some other more important factor.
And yeah clearly this makes the points about the 3 moot, because there's plenty of reason to think that Nash is just an order of magnitude ahead of his contemporaries in a way that Frazier just wasn't.
Re: Suns vs Knicks. Well I consider those Knick teams phenomenal, and Frazier to be the single most valuable player in it. I think though that it's the most clear cut case of team synergy in NBA history. That's what made it so beautiful and effective, but that's also why people disagree about who the best player on it was, and why Frazier's stats don't look like a guy carrying his team like a lead guard typically does, and why the team's rise & fall doesn't correspond as much to Frazier's prime as one might think.
I don't mean to make it out like Nash was the only thing that mattered to the Suns, but the way the Suns lived & died with Nash, I doubt that Knicks did with Frazier.
Even with all this I can see a serious debate here, don't let me give some impression otherwise, but I lean toward Nash's prime over Frazier's, and I also give Nash a longevity edge.
ronnymac2 wrote:Just for my own edification, I'd still like these questions answered:
What on the court made Mikan good on defense? How was his man defense? Defensive rebounding? Shot-blocking and rim protection/intimidation? Steals? Rotations? Pick-n-roll defense?
He was elite in every aspect you mentioned except of steals, where he was like Karl Malone - good at stripping the ball, but nothing more. Other than that he was as good on defense as Russell or Garnett.
Was Mikan a better basketball player than Nate Thurmond, Robert Parish, or Alonzo Mourning
He was. He was probably as good as Walton, maybe even better than him.
Only responding to this one because the rest seemed pretty okay to me.
GC Pantalones wrote:
First thing: Clearly his numbers didn't skyrocket, which is why you just used a year from his time in Dallas as his peak to compare him to Frazier. To me this is the thing we keep getting into again and again:
The reason why people think Nash's numbers skyrocketed is precisely because what was brilliant about his game wasn't his numbers. The lack of huge numbers is what led to people's skepticism, and amazingly this led to narratives talking about his numbers being inflated, and the ultimate irony of him being labeled a system player.
His numbers did skyrocket looking at raw totals. Now after pace adjustment his scoring is about the same but his assists skyrocketed and his impact numbers went from nothing special to GOAT offense levels. I'm trying to find a smoother way to say this but would Nash be here if he stayed with Dallas averaging 17/7 instead of going to the Suns and averaging 17/11 even if his beyond surface numbers were the same? In the same light if Frazier had to be top 2 in assists yearly would he been seen as better?
His assist totals and impact numbers went up a bunch yes, but otherwise no. And that might sound like I'm ignoring huge things but as I was referring to it before, I was referring to the box score. If we look at overall box score metrics like PER or WS, Nash's results didn't explode in Phoenix. Assists went up, but other things went down. If that's all there was - if Phoenix didn't explode, if the impact didn't explode - no one would remark about Nash really at all with regards to the rule change.
And yeah, impact exploded, but the notion that we hang something so abstract on a rule change when literally no one else experienced an impact explosion the same way doesn't make sense to me. When I see it to me it's just confusing correlation with causation.
Doctor MJ wrote:Only responding to this one because the rest seemed pretty okay to me.
GC Pantalones wrote:
First thing: Clearly his numbers didn't skyrocket, which is why you just used a year from his time in Dallas as his peak to compare him to Frazier. To me this is the thing we keep getting into again and again:
The reason why people think Nash's numbers skyrocketed is precisely because what was brilliant about his game wasn't his numbers. The lack of huge numbers is what led to people's skepticism, and amazingly this led to narratives talking about his numbers being inflated, and the ultimate irony of him being labeled a system player.
His numbers did skyrocket looking at raw totals. Now after pace adjustment his scoring is about the same but his assists skyrocketed and his impact numbers went from nothing special to GOAT offense levels. I'm trying to find a smoother way to say this but would Nash be here if he stayed with Dallas averaging 17/7 instead of going to the Suns and averaging 17/11 even if his beyond surface numbers were the same? In the same light if Frazier had to be top 2 in assists yearly would he been seen as better?
His assist totals and impact numbers went up a bunch yes, but otherwise no. And that might sound like I'm ignoring huge things but as I was referring to it before, I was referring to the box score. If we look at overall box score metrics like PER or WS, Nash's results didn't explode in Phoenix. Assists went up, but other things went down. If that's all there was - if Phoenix didn't explode, if the impact didn't explode - no one would remark about Nash really at all with regards to the rule change.
And yeah, impact exploded, but the notion that we hang something so abstract on a rule change when literally no one else experienced an impact explosion the same way doesn't make sense to me. When I see it to me it's just confusing correlation with causation.
Well there was an impact explosion for most others but for them it correlated with a statistical change. Nash's increase in impact came with a minuscule statistical change which is extremely odd...
GC Pantalones wrote:Well there was an impact explosion for most others but for them it correlated with a statistical change. Nash's increase in impact came with a minuscule statistical change which is extremely odd...
Was there? What other in prime stars saw an impact explosion like Nash that year?
RE: odd, impact explosion without box score explosion. Yup, and that has everything to do with why people doubt it so much.
For myself, the roots of my Nash fetish come from my initial anti-Nash reaction in 2004. My first thought was that he couldn't possibly be having an MVP-level impact given his stats, but as I dove deeper to explain the situation I ended up re-thinking how I thought of player goodness. Before that I certainly knew that the box score didn't factor in everything there was, but I thought it was close enough at least on the offensive side of the ball. Afterward I concluded it wasn't anywhere near close enough because I just couldn't deny the impact Nash was having and that it really wasn't about his efficiency or his assists as it was about his manipulation of the defense ahead of time. And that pretty well blew my mind.
The amazing thing to me still is that even though Nash is a smart guy by normal standards, I don't think his humility is a mere act, I don't think he realizes how much of an outlier his talents are...or were I suppose.
GC Pantalones wrote:Well there was an impact explosion for most others but for them it correlated with a statistical change. Nash's increase in impact came with a minuscule statistical change which is extremely odd...
Was there? What other in prime stars saw an impact explosion like Nash that year?
RE: odd, impact explosion without box score explosion. Yup, and that has everything to do with why people doubt it so much.
For myself, the roots of my Nash fetish come from my initial anti-Nash reaction in 2004. My first thought was that he couldn't possibly be having an MVP-level impact given his stats, but as I dove deeper to explain the situation I ended up re-thinking how I thought of player goodness. Before that I certainly knew that the box score didn't factor in everything there was, but I thought it was close enough at least on the offensive side of the ball. Afterward I concluded it wasn't anywhere near close enough because I just couldn't deny the impact Nash was having and that it really wasn't about his efficiency or his assists as it was about his manipulation of the defense ahead of time. And that pretty well blew my mind.
The amazing thing to me still is that even though Nash is a smart guy by normal standards, I don't think his humility is a mere act, I don't think he realizes how much of an outlier his talents are...or were I suppose.
Well you can look at Ray Allen, Kobe, and Vince's RAPM from 03-04 to 06 (especially Ray's offense). None as crazy as Nash's leap though.
And I think Nash understands how great he is. I mean 2 MVPs can let you know...
Going controversial and voting for Kevin Durant. As short as his career has been so far, his accomplishments rival all the other guys left on the table - 1 MVP and 3 2nd places, as a contemporary of peak LeBron. His has been one of the greatest campaigns ever - already 13th all time in MVP shares - 5 consecutive and unanimous 1st all NBA teams - historical combination of scoring volume and efficiency - already one final, 2 WCF and one WCSF in the PS - GOAT MVP acceptance speech all this before turning 26 His peak is so much ahead all the other guys left that I'm ready to take 5-6 years of him than the other contenders for a full career. We all know the next project he'll be ranked much higher than this, ma imo there's really no point waiting.
trex_8063 wrote:I want to comment a bit on how we weight offense vs. defense for the various positions, with application toward the Stockton/Nash comparison.
Nash's defensive short-comings (relative to Stockton or Frazier, for instance) are often given a pass based on the claim that the PG position is not a big defensive impact position anyway; so any short-comings are minimally felt. So what is the appropriate offense:defense weight-ratio by position?
For centers is it more or less a 1:1 ratio? Or is it even 1:2+ (in favor of defense), given their responsibilities as rim-protectors/defensive anchors? Is that why/how Russell is #3?
How far does the pendulum swing back in the other direction for PG's? Is offense weighted like 5x as much as defense for a PG? 5x seems a bit extreme to me, but let's run with that as we compare Nash/Stockton.....
I'm going to run thru some offensive comparison numbers. Here are Regular Season Per 100 possession (Pts + Ast)/Per 100 Turnovers/TS% for..... Peak Season (based on Pts+Ast per 100) Stockton ('90): 42.4/4.7/.607 Nash ('07): 42.9/5.4/.654
Prime Stockton ('88-'97): 39.7/4.7/.619 Nash ('02-'11): 39.8/4.8/.613
Career Stockton: 37.8/4.5/.608 Nash: 37.1/4.7/.605
Post-Season Per 100 (Pts + Ast)/Per 100 Turnovers/TS% for..... Peak Season (based on Per 100 (Pts + Ast) in year going BEYOND 1st Round) Stockton ('88): 39.9/5.1/.618 ***In '89 he had 42.6/3.8/.601, but was a 1st round exit Nash ('05): 44.1/5.9/.604
Prime Stockton: 37.6/4.5/.574 Nash: 38.8/4.7/.589
Career Stockton: 35.8/4.3/.568 Nash: 37.8/4.6/.583
Regular Season Individual ORtg for.... Peak Season Stockton ('88, '95, '96, '97): 125 Nash ('07): 124
Prime Stockton: 122 Nash: 120
Career Stockton: 121 Nash: 118
Post-Season Individual ORtg for..... Peak Season (where went beyond 1st round) Stockton ('91): 124 ***though did have 130 ORtg in '87, 128 ORtg in '86, '89, and '01; but all were 1st round exits Nash ('10): 122
Prime Stockton: 117 Nash: 117
Career Stockton: 116 Nash: 116
Both led league-leading team offenses in their respective careers.
Now I won't argue that Stockton is Nash's equal offensively. But I would argue the gap isn't huge (and I think all of the above is ample support of that). So let's go back to the above suggestion of a 5:1 ratio weighting offense 5x as important as defense for PG's. And just for the sake of simplicity within this example let's just go with an uber-simple rating on a scale of 1-10 for both sides of the ball.
Nash Offense---10 (one of the best ever, no question) Stockton Offense---9 (again: gap not huge, well supported by the above; exact rating is debatable, obviously).
Nash Defense---4 (effort is there, reasonable defensive IQ is there, just isn't tall/big enough to be versatile [guard other positions] or even the rare big/strong PG, and lacks the lateral quickness to guard well many other PG's) Stockton Defense---9 (he's tough, aggressive, DIRTY, with high defensive IQ; and unlike Nash, he had the lateral quickness to stay with other PG's his own size....basically he's elite guarding his own position, and also tends to create many turnovers; frankly only reason he's not more like a 10, imo, is that he simply lacks the size to be versatile defensively)
So with the 5:1 ratio I proposed (and again, I think that's fairly extreme already; I mean if we were to stretch it to 10:1, for instance: that's basically saying that a PG [particularly one who's a sub-par defender anyway] can literally sit on the sideline when his team's on defense with minimal adverse effect on the outcome)..... Nash: 10 (x5) + 4 = 54 Stockton: 9 (x5) + 9 = 54
I'm not suggesting this as an actual method of evaluation, but just using this simple system to get everyone to think about how they're factoring (or disregarding) PG defense, and to illustrate that the defensive gap is relevant between Nash/Stockton even with defense weighted way down. EDIT: And don't forget Stockton has at least a small longevity advantage, too.
It can certainly be debated who was better at their very best, but the longevity/durability issues of Reed are pretty extreme.
If that's "extreme" in that case, then what about Nash and Stockton?
Frazier played 175 regular season and 15 playoff games more than Reed. Stockton played 287 regular season and 62 playoff games more than Nash.
And it's not like it can't be debated who was better between John and Steve, because as you could see many people think Stockton was the better player.
As I've already said, to me when we talk about offense, the only guys in the discussion with Nash were voted in a while ago. Yes, the defense is an issue, but he wasn't have horrendously bad impact over there. He was a smart player who made good decisions, and stayed within the scheme that was designed, and that meant that even on a team without a truly scary frightening presence his team was fully capable of being good on defense. Tough for me to use the defense as the argument against him too hard here unless were talking about a serious defensive badass.
Like, say, Frazier . . . .
Or, say, Jason Kidd...
OK, I've been out of town for awhile and couldn't really post. I must say that I'm pretty relieved that Nash didn't get in while I was gone, because I really was hoping for some Nash vs Kidd discussion. We've had some Nash vs Stockton vs Frazier (though, if I'm being honest, not NEARLY as much or as in depth as I'd like to see. So far it's been a lot of advocating for one or the other, while I'd really love to see someone make in depth cases in direct comparison)...but none for Nash vs. Kidd. Considering that Nash and Kidd overlapped so much in era, and that in my eyes it was a great comparison, I'm going to try to make up for some of the radio silence here. So, without further ado, let's get started.
The box scores: the least important part of this comparison?
Playoffs, 10 year primes per 100 possessions Jason Kidd 1998 - 2007: 20.6 pts (49% TS), 9.9 reb, 11.8 ast (4.3 TO) Steve Nash 2002 - 2010: 25.5 pts (58.9% TS), 5.1 reb, 13.3 ast (4.7 TO)
I put these stats here for easy reference and for posterity's sake, but for point guards in general (and especially these two) their impacts are about so much more than the box scores that this data isn't especially telling to me without couching it in with the rest of their game. So let's go ahead and jump into the stylistics and other aspects of the comparison, and I'll bring up box score stats as the need arises.
The style makes the fight: two opposite ends of the spectrum
I think for many, the Suns version of Nash defines an ideal point guard. He was an offensive wunderkind. A maestro capable of controlling every aspect of his team's offense while leading said offense to historic ratings; a distributor/general that knew the strengths/weaknesses of his troops to a T and was capable of putting them into maximal situations to succeed; an excellent penetrator who was able to deform defenses and get them out of position off the dribble which helped him to get those easy shots for teammates; and on top of that, an excellent shooter who could put up scoring efficiencies unseen at the point guard position outside of Stockton but who could also call his own number to volume scorer at similarly great efficiency when the team needed him to. That is a very complete offensive package, and he was able to demonstrate it effectively for several years in Phoenix.
Kidd, on the other hand, is seen as more of a misfit than an ideal as point guard. I say this because his J was limited enough that he was known as Ason Kidd as a young player. Thus, Kidd could never be the scoring threat to opponents that Nash (or, frankly, most point guards) could be. And it's not just that his jumper wasn't a strength (after all, as his career progressed he developed his 3-point shot enough to be (I believe) 3rd on the all-time made 3s list)...it's that he couldn't reliably score off the dribble or on the move outside of layups. This did limit his abilities as a half-court point guard, and also limited his ability to have individual take-over games as a scoring PG. But even with that said and that limitation placed front and center, Kidd was still high on the list of best offensive players in the NBA during his run (see the RAPM section below). He was an incredible floor general, also able to maximize the talents of his teammates and to set them up in positions to succeed. I remember reading the USA today back when Kidd was a high school senior, and them deeming him the #1 prospect in the country before he went to Cal because his court vision was ridiculous. He was outstanding at finding teammates off the bounce, and excelled at doing so on the fast break. Of course, even with that vision Kidd didn't have nearly the offensive impact that Nash had in Phoenix...but he DID also have a very strong defensive impact. Kidd was a great on-ball defender (especially against big guards), he was a monster defensive rebounder from the guard position, and he was also very disruptive in team defense. Thus, it is the combination of his offense AND defense that makes his impact comparable to Nash even at Nash's best in Phoenix.
The impact stats: databall helps greatly in evaluating Nash's effect vs Kidd's
As has often been pointed out, Nash measures out as the highest impact offensive player of the databall era using RAPM. From Doc MJ's spreadsheet of 1998 - 2012 normalized PI RAPM, and using his technique of ranking by the best 5 years, Nash's offensive marks are off the charts with a 5-year average of +9.1 that laps the field (LeBron is 2nd best at +8.1, and no one else is over +8). Kidd's offensive scores are further down the list at #16 overall (best 5-year average of +4.7). He is the 9th rated guard on offense by this method, trailing Nash, Wade, Kobe, Ginobili, Paul, Baron Davis, Chauncey BIllups and Ray Allen.
However, on the defensive side of the ball, Kidd comes out much stronger with a best 5-year average of +3.3 that ranks him 40th on defense overall but 4th among guards (behind Tony Allen's +3.9, Eddie Jones' +3.5, and Doug Christie's +3.3). Nash, on the other hand, ranks #650 overall on defense using this method and only once had a value above 0 (0.6 in 2012).
Thus, when you look at their overall 5-year peaks according to this method, it is fairly close. Nash has the 5-year advantage with an average of +7.9 (8th overall) vs. Kidd's 5-year average of +6.9 (12th overall). To put this in perspective, this difference is similar in magnitude to the differences between the 5-year best marks of Shaq (+10.3) and Duncan (+9.3)...slightly smaller than the distance between LeBron's +10.5 and Dirk's +9.1, but slightly larger than the distance between Wade's +8.4 and Kobe's +7.5. In other words, there is a reasonable line there and in Nash's favor, but that the difference isn't very big at all. And this is for their best 5-year spans.
As you might expect, Nash's best 5 years all come from his time with the Suns and 4 of Kidd's 5 best marks came from his time with the Nets. However, it does have to be at least mentioned that both players played in multiple situations. How much those other time periods are weighed is of course up to the evaluator, but I think we should include that data here to make for easier evaluation:
Kidd (Late 90s, Phoenix): average scaled RAPM of +4.8 from 1998 - 2000 Kidd (late 00s, Dallas): average scaled RAPM of +4.4 from 2008 - 2011 Nash (early 00s, Dallas): average scaled RAPM of +0.5 from 2002 - 2004
I think this was important to point out for a few reasons. Nash is universally rated higher in Phoenix than in Dallas, but I don't think many people appreciate the massive scale of difference in his impact. In Phoenix he was the most impactful offensive player of this generation, but in Dallas (despite being a 2-time All Star) he was pretty much measuring out as a net neutral player. Kidd, on the other hand, measured out as a strong positive player at every stop in his career. His +4.8 and +4.4 averages would both have snuck into the top-20 scores from 1998 - 2012, despite his roles changing dramatically.
Postseason: where Nash separates himself from Kidd...or does he?
As I mentioned above, Suns Nash is considered to be an ideal offensive point guard in part because of his excellent scoring efficiency that scales with higher scoring volume in the postseason. Scoring in the playoffs is much more difficult on both a team and individual level against the ramped up quality and effort of defenses in the postseason, so individual scoring (at great efficiency) is highly valued. This is one of the big areas where Nash is postulated to separate himself from Kidd as a player.
However, while having an individual offensive player that can carry the load in the face of increased defensive pressure is very valuable, it should be noted that there is the obvious other side to the coin, that perhaps defensive impact also has the potential to scale up in value in the postseason. After all, if defenses as a whole are making the larger impact with respect to offense that many of us see and point out, then perhaps the defense of an individual might also scale up in value in the postseason vs. the regular season?
That isn't proven. But of course, I have started populating a postseason on/off +/- table of the elite players of this generation from 2001 on. I've posted many disclaimers and examples of data each time I bring this up in the project, so let me go ahead and re-post them in spoilers here so that you can decide how much (if any) credence to put into these results. Colts18, for instance, gives them no value. I, on the other hand, do think the data is worth seeing and evaluating. So:
Spoiler:
(Aside on playoff on/off +/-) One thing that I like to look at when available (but which is considered controversial as a quantitative tool) is the postseason on/off +/- scorers. There was a time (not that long ago) when on/off +/- was the state of the art for "impact" studies, before APM came into being. There are obvious issues with on/off +/- that led to developing APM, such as the potential for big teammate effects, level of competition effects (e.g. there's no correction for playing against a starting unit or back-ups), and skews due to back-up quality or even rotations (shout out to Unbiased Fan). These issues are exacerbated in the postseason, as many stars rarely leave the court and the sample sizes can get vanishingly small.
I'm aware of these issues, but I'm also convinced that in long playoff runs in a given season (e.g. conference finals or beyond) or multi-year samples we can get large enough samples to be able to get some useful information. I tend to find that really high on/off +/- values over runs or periods help indicate heavy lifting, whereas really negative marks over extended periods don't indicate negatives so much as a lack of a positive drive. Also, I'm less impressed with entire units having high on/off scores (usually indicates a strong unit more-so than a strong individual) but I note when a star puts up a huge number on an island. Reminder: B-R only has this data from 2001 to present.
Examples of some of the best single-season postseason on/off +/- championship runs: LeBron '12: +24.3 per 100 possessions (he also went +24.2 in his 2007 Finals run) Duncan '03: ++23.1 per 100 possessions Shaq 2002: +22.9 per 100 (also went +25.3 during 2004 Finals run) Wade 2006: +22.2 per 100
Famous counter-intuitive counter-examples: LeBron '11: -14.7 per 100 Dwight '09: -12.7 Duncan '05: -5.3
Examples of some of the best 3 - 4 year stretches of postseason on/off +/- Duncan 01 - 03: +27.4 Manu 03 - 06: +21.6 (caveat: came off bench in 44/70 games) Shaq 02 - 04: +21.5 LeBron 07 - 10: +20.4
Examples of some of the best career +/- scores (from 2001 - 2014) Manu Ginobili +11.2 (caveat: 128/180 games off the bench) Jason Kidd +10.2 (+10.2 in Jersey, +14.9 in Dallas, negative else) Duncan +8.9 Shaq +8.6 (+16.3 in LA, -6.4 in Miamii, negative else) LeBron +8.1 (+12.3 in Cleveland, +4.6 in Miami)
With that done, here again is the career (or at least since 2001, which is when B-R has postseason on/off +/- results available) on/off +/- data in both the regular and post season for most of the current players that either have already been voted in or are coming up on the horizon. The chart is listed in descending order for who has the best difference between postseason and regular season on/off +/-, but at a glance you can also see who has the best regular season and best postseason on/off +/- scores (per 100 possessions):
Player Team Years Reg On/off PO On/off Change Kidd Tot 01 - 13 6.3 10.2 +3.9 Kobe LAL 01 - 14 6.7 8.3 +1.6 Shaq Tot 01 - 11 7.7 8.6 +0.9 Duncan SAS 01 - 14 8.3 8.9 +0.6 Nash Tol 01 - 14 7.5 4.8 -2.7 Paul Tot 06 - 14 9.0 6.2 -2.8 LeBron Tot 04 - 14 11.2 8.1 -3.1 Wade Mia 04 - 14 7.8 3.7 -4.1 Dirk Dal 01 - 14 11.1 1.8 -9.3
And here, again, is a similar chart for these same players when focused on their best years. The following table will track important multi-year periods in these players careers...e.g. the Lakers years for Shaq, the "dynasty" years when Duncan's Spurs won the majority of their titles, the pre-LeBron years for Wade, the Cleveland years for LeBron, the Jersey years for Kidd, the post-Shaq years for Kobe, the Suns years for Nash and the post-Nash years for DIrk:
For both their entire careers (post 2000), as well as for their peak years, Kidd has better on/off +/- scores in the postseason than in the regular season, and in both epochs Kidd's scores are solidly higher than Nash's.
Again, your mileage may vary as to how much you weigh these postseason +/- numbers. However, I would like to re-post Lorak's post from the #20 thread where he points out the trends of the postseason offenses and defenses of Nash's squads, and at least loosely ties them to his postseason on/off scores:
Spoiler:
lorak wrote:There's no "ergo" in that, unless you will provide evidence showing how often Nash was actually defending opposing PGs or that "hiding" him on Bowen or opposing SGs hurt his teams defense. But I think that I agree with your general conclusion - that Nash's defense was a problem for DAL/PHO in the playoffs. In fact, I'm looking at his on/off playoffs splits and I'm shocked how bad he looks:
year MIN off ORTG on ORTG off DRTG on DRTG off DRTG net OVERALL net 2001 110 104,0 106,4 110,0 105,0 5,0 -7,4 2002 065 112,6 106,7 108,2 129,0 -20,8 26,7 2003 241 111,4 106,4 112,5 106,0 6,5 -1,5 2004 045 101,3 105,2 102,8 94,9 7,9 -11,8 2005 114 118,7 113,7 114,3 108,8 5,5 -0,5 2006 182 116,5 104,9 110,6 119,3 -8,7 20,3 2007 116 112,5 107,1 105,8 105,2 0,6 4,8 2008 067 105,6 100,0 110,2 97,6 12,6 -7,0 2010 229 120,6 114,2 114,8 108,5 6,3 0,1
Sure, "off" in playoffs always deals with small sample issue, but here we see year by year consistency - he improves offense and defense with him usually was much worse than without him. What's surprising, is that overall his net impact in playoffs doesn't look so great as in regular season. Five years with negative (!) on/off, one slightly positive (0.1), one ok (4.8) and only two really great.
Conclusion I've always loved this debate, because I always thought that Kidd was better and was surprised at how conclusive it was considered in these parts that Nash topped him. We had some good Nash vs Kidd talk in the 2011 Top 100 project, but I wasn't able to get much pro-Kidd traction. Which is fine, as this is more about information than the ranking to me. However, it's interesting to me that at the time of the 2011 project, we lacked the pre-2003 RAPM scores and the basketball-reference playoff on/off +/- scores, and that lack of data definitely hurt Kidd in those rankings. A HUGE part of Nash's case is tied up into his impact, with RAPM scores used as evidence of that impact. The fact that so many of the offenses that Nash has run have been so great is obviously also big evidence, but the RAPM data is more granular and shows that those offenses (at least in Phoenix) can be correlated directly to Nash's presence. Without that +/- support, those that question why Nash should get the benefit of his team's outstanding team ORatings without that opening him up to the ringz argument as the ultimate team accomplishment would have an excellent poing. So +/- results are VERY important to Nash's "campaign".
Thus, I find it interesting that the expanded +/- data really muddies the comparison between Nash and Kidd to such a large degree. Yes, Nash had the advantage in RAPM over their 5 best years (both a higher mark, and a consistently higher year-to-year mark when compared in rank order with Kidd, e.g. Nash's best is better than Kidd's best, his 2nd best better than Kidd's 2nd best, on down through that top 5 or 6 slots). However, that advantage at their 5-year bests wasn't very large...while Kidd's advantages in their non-peak RAPM scores was much larger. Kidd had the impact of a star at pretty much every stage of his career and every role...even when that role was seemingly more role-player late in his career in Dallas. Nash, outside of his time in Phoenix, didn't. Plus, Kidd's postseason +/- scores also look better than Nash and (for Nash in particular) these results seem to track with his team's performances. And could be a solid evidence point that in this particular comparison, defense DOES matter even though it's point guards we're discussing.
Nash has major traction here, and I wouldn't even be surprised if he gets the vote. But to me, Kidd has an excellent argument against Nash. Maybe Nash at his best may have been slightly better, but Kidd was right there with him at his best, but had a pretty large impact longevity edge, demonstrated much better portability, and (to the extent that you believe it) may have been the more impactful post-season performer. I think that's a pretty strong case.
Warspite wrote:No Arizin is not better than Cousy but Cousy has a top 15 resume.
What is strange to me is Willis Reed. A 2 time MVP with 2 titles and he is maybe the most portable big man of all time who would be a much better player today than in his own era.
However IMHO we should let the bigs take a back seat and let the 20s be about PGs and scoring wings.
Reed is a strange one because people are focussed on the retrospective narrative that points to Frazier being the star of the team (often using his mythical 19 assist game as a basis for that) and some comments made by his coach.
To me it would almost be a case of someone using Spoelstra's quotes saying Bosh is Miami's most important player to discredit LeBron or Wade in 30 years time (see: http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports.com/ ... nt-player/).
Here's one of my posts from the 2011 Top 100:
lukekarts wrote:I completely agree. Reed was the leader of the Knicks in 1970 and I've always been slightly confused as to how, over time, perception has put Frazier in the limelight. It was well documented about how much of an impact Reed had in that series vs. LA, and when he returned from injury to inspire the win. It could of course be the 17 vs. 7 assists info that came to light on this forum last week.
You touched on Reed's accolades, in 1970 alone, he was MVP. Finals MVP. All Star. All NBA 1st. All Defensive 1st. Champion. 20.9/13.7 where his numbers, which don't necessarily blow you away, but he was a good leader on the court.
What was notable that year, was his success against Chamberlain (playing alongside Baylor and West). Whilst it wasn't the absolute prime of Wilt's career - he turned 33 that season, he was nonetheless a 27/18 guy! And 5th on this list.
Here's the matchup:
Game 1 - Willis Reed - 37 pts / Wilt Chamberlain 17 pts (Frazier DNP) Game 2 - Willis Reed - 29 pts / Wilt Chamberlain 19 pts Game 3 - Willis Reed - 38 pts / Wilt Chamberlain 21 pts Game 4 - Willis Reed - 23 pts / Wilt Chamberlain 18 pts Game 5 - Injured / Wilt leads LAL in scoring (23 pts) Game 6 - Injured / Wilt leads LAL in scoring (45 pts) Game 7 - Reed hobbles back onto the court, Wilt no longer leads LAL in scoring (18pts)
Pretty impressive, IMO. Unfortunately, more detailed box scores are not available.
Reed's prime was short, injuries taking their course, but that series was nothing short of dominance, and it's why I've continually been nominating him.
This is the spot where I'm really not at all convinced by anyone. There's quite honestly so many options, but the lead contenders appear to be Nash, Frazier and Stockton. 3 point guards that generally speaking, offer something significantly different.
Nash offers you a peak offensive performance that is unrivalled. But, his teams never played with defensive potency, and he never even made the Finals. That's not all on him, but I have doubts as to whether the system that Nash thrives in (or maybe you call it the system Nash creates) is one that is suited for gritty, championship winning basketball.
Frazier offers a little bit more of an all round game, and along with Reed and Debusschere (who will probably both feature in this list) was successful and was known as a great playoff performer. But, as my prior post indicates, I'm not convinced Frazier was the best player on that team; equally, Reed will appear higher on the list than any of Nash's teammates.
Finally, John Stockton. Brilliant longevity and a pretty balanced game for a PG, but never really became the second option scorer that Utah needed. Given that he was playing with a better player than Nash or Frazier ever had in their peaks, how much do we hold lack of success against him? He did play when several other top 10 players were playing basketball so it's not all on him...
There is no consolation prize. Winning is everything.
drza wrote:... Nash has major traction here, and I wouldn't even be surprised if he gets the vote. But to me, Kidd has an excellent argument against Nash. Maybe Nash at his best may have been slightly better, but Kidd was right there with him at his best, but had a pretty large impact longevity edge, demonstrated much better portability, and (to the extent that you believe it) may have been the more impactful post-season performer. I think that's a pretty strong case.
Nice job. And, adding to that, while a fine defensive guard, I never saw Kidd as nearly the defensive force of Payton (the most disruptive) or Frazier (the highest peak defensive presence). I do think he's a better open court passer than either; but in terms of scoring, I'd take Payton and even more Frazier over him.
“Most people use statistics like a drunk man uses a lamppost; more for support than illumination,” Andrew Lang.
Ryoga Hibiki wrote:Going controversial and voting for Kevin Durant. As short as his career has been so far, his accomplishments rival all the other guys left on the table - 1 MVP and 3 2nd places, as a contemporary of peak LeBron. His has been one of the greatest campaigns ever - already 13th all time in MVP shares - 5 consecutive and unanimous 1st all NBA teams - historical combination of scoring volume and efficiency - already one final, 2 WCF and one WCSF in the PS - GOAT MVP acceptance speech all this before turning 26 His peak is so much ahead all the other guys left that I'm ready to take 5-6 years of him than the other contenders for a full career. We all know the next project he'll be ranked much higher than this, ma imo there's really no point waiting.
He's a valid choice; I think he's played enough to establish a level of excellence and a window that his team can exploit to go after rings. On the other hand, last time we thought the same thing of Dwight Howard . . . .
“Most people use statistics like a drunk man uses a lamppost; more for support than illumination,” Andrew Lang.
Not sure what to add...maybe Celtics thoughts:
Let's also note that the Knicks were still playing at a plenty fast pace compared to Nash's era.
