Peaks Project #12

mischievous · Post #21 » by **mischievous** » Thu Sep 24, 2015 9:26 pm

Quotatious wrote:Okay, my votes:

#1 - Julius Erving '76
#2 - Dwyane Wade '09
#3 - Chris Paul '08

I'm just trying to stay consistent with my criteria, so I decided to go with '08 Paul as my #3. I've already explained my Erving and Wade picks, so let's get to CP3. His regular season was right there with Magic Johnson's best seasons, and despite the fact that his team lost in conference semifinals, CP3 actually improved his game in the playoffs, compared to the RS. Just like two of my previous picks - '09 LeBron and '77 Kareem, who were absolutely out-of-this-world awesome in the playoffs, but didn't even make the finals - that's the case with CP3, too. In terms of raw stats, he stayed about the same as he was in RS, but his advanced stats improved pretty noticeably. Even in the losing effort against San Antonio, Paul was terrific, and that series was very close, it went 7 games, and the Hornets lost game 7 by only 9 points, and even though Paul probably wasn't assertive enough as a scorer, he still had 18/8/14/5 stl. on 8/18 from the field, so it was a pretty good game, and he did a great job facilitating his team's offense - he could've had even more assists, but Peja and Jannero Pargo were missing a lot of shots in the 4th quarter. The only thing that you can really criticize CP3 for, is that he only shot 5 free throws, made just 2 of them, but otherwise, it was a really good performance and he shouldn't really get blame for that loss.

I think that '09 was Paul's best regular season (he improved his defense, too), but even the injury he was dealing with, into account, his first round series against the Nuggets was just abysmal. Billups owned him. Just like David Robinson had his best RS in '94, but you guys are taking '95 or '96 D-Rob over '94, because of a much better playoff performance, I'm taking '08 CP3 over '09.

I didn't have Paul that high before the project, but now I think he was good enough in '08 to warrant top 15 consideration. He really wasn't far behind Magic in terms of peak.

I mentioned the D-Rob/CP3 analogy earlier - I strongly considered Robinson here, as well, but I decided to take Paul over him because even though both guys were amazing in the RS, I think CP3 has a pretty substantial edge in the playoffs. He performed above his RS standards that year, D-Rob performed clearly below his standards in both '95 and '96 (and their RS standards were very similar).

I'm still taking Wade over CP3 because he's just a more dominant player (let's not ignore the eye-test completely - and based on the eye-test, Wade seems to be the superior player, to me), and his RS was even better. Still pretty good in the playoffs, especially taking those back spasms into account.

Q if i recall correctly you had Drob above Wade before the project, why the change if so?

For me, ive waffled on the 2 but i think i feel more comfortable with Wade, because i think he's more likely to lead a team to a title with the proper supporting cast than Drob would.

As for Wade vs Cp3, i agree about Wade being more dominant. There's only a handful of players in history who have had that sort of combo of volume efficient scoring and elite playmaking, and great defense to go along with it. When push comes to shove in the playoffs i trust Wade's superior scoring over Cp3's superior playmaking.

JordansBulls · Post #22 » by **JordansBulls** » Thu Sep 24, 2015 10:05 pm

1st ballot selection: Wade 2006 - Put on a show in the playoffs especially the ECF and the NBA Finals pretty much singlehandedly dominating the finals with the highest PER ever for a finals.

2nd ballot selection: Moses Malone 1983 - Dominant Season and playoffs and went 12-1 in the postseason. Won league and finals mvp.

3rd ballot selection: Julius Erving - Dominant Season and playoffs With PER of 28.7, WS/PER 48 minutes in the season 0.262-----and PER of 32.0, and Win Shares/PER 48 minutes in the playoffs 0.321 (13 playoff games, title)

mischievous · Post #23 » by **mischievous** » Thu Sep 24, 2015 11:09 pm

Ballot 1: 76 DR J. Quick raw numbers: 29.3/11/5 56.9 ts% 27.7 PER. Upped his game absurdly in the playoffs en route to a title, 34.7/12.6/4.9 61 ts% 32 PER!!. The footage on the Doctor is a little limited, but his scoring was very elite as the numbers indicate. Very good rebounder for a small forward, i can't really get a good feel for his ball handing and passing skills by the footage there is, but i would guess it is probably roughly around the level of someone like a KD or Prime Pierce which isn't on the level of say a Lebron or something like that but still pretty good. Clearly the best choice left for me.

Ballot 2: 2009 Dwayne Wade. Regular season stats: 30.2/5/7.5/ 2.2 spg/1.3 blk 57.4 ts%, 30.4 PER. The only players with a higher PER in nba history are MJ, Lebron, Shaq, Wilt, AD, and David Robinson. Still respectable in his playoff series, although back spasms limited him to some degree, still did roughly 29/5/5 on 56.5 ts% 26.3 PER. Wade was a great defender in 09, made 2nd team defense, 3rd in DPOY, elite help defender, very good man defender, excellent shot blocking for a guard. Team success often hurts Wade when it comes to this season but i think sometimes people fail to realize how bad his team was. Wade's best teammate was a Rookie Beasley who averaged 13.9 ppg, after that he had 27 games from a washed up Jermaine Oneal, then half a season from a banged up past prime Shawn Marion.

Wade had a ridiculous 13 game stretch that year where he averaged 37.2 ppg 5.9 rpg 10.4 apg 2.9 spg 1.4 bpg 55.3 fg%. This is certainly one of the greatest stretches of basketball played by anyone.

Ballot 3: 95 Robinson. 94 was his best regular season, but his playoff series was abysmal.

95 stats: 27.6/10.8/2.9 60.2 ts%, 29.1 PER, elite defender. Had a decent run to the WCF even though his playoff production did fall off quite a bit.

Senior · Post #24 » by **Senior** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 12:44 am

trex_8063 wrote:Are either of them as good defensively as Robinson is offensively? imo, no. This is guy who averaged ~35-39 pts/100 possessions at ~+4-6% rTS, had >10+ indivdual rORTG while never leading worse than a +2.6 team rORTG during the RS in each of the three years which might be called his peak. And who is also good enough offensively that he sustains heavy criticism for averaging ~25 ppg @ ~54% TS in the playoffs (gets absolutely crucified if he does any worse). I think it's clear that his offensive output and expectation far exceeds what anyone expected to see from Oscar/Erving defensively.

I realize that's a crude method, but I think you get the gist of what I'm saying.

Bolded is the problem. D-Rob relied heavily on points that came easily during the RS and could be easily taken away against intelligent defenses in playoff series. It's basically inevitable that any contender will face quality defenses that will make you work for your points. The deficits in D-Rob's offensive skillset did not allow him to overcome the hard-nosed defenses of the Jazz and Rockets in those three years. He wasn't a particularly good playmaker (vs Houston and 96 Jazz he had more TOs than assists), relied a lot on transition points (which vanished against the slow Jazz) and his face up game was inconsistent.

From 1994-1996 Robinson utterly dominated the RS, then faltered in the playoffs against stiffer competition. You mention his 25 ppg on 54% TS. He absolutely butchered the Lakers with 30/16 on 54%, but had a lot of trouble with Denver (19/7, 49% TS) and Houston (24/11 on 55% TS), both of which had quality defensive centers. That Houston line looks better than it is; bastillon alluded to D-Rob's inconsistency and it shows.

Game 1: 5/17 FG 11/16 FT 21/9/2, 7 TO, L
Game 2: 10/18 FG, 12/14 FT, 32/12/2, 5 TO, L
Game 3: 10/15 FG, 9/9 FT, 29/9/4, 1 TO, W
Game 4: 6/16 FG, 8/10 FT, 20/16/3, 1 TO, W (this was the biggest margin of victory in the series fwiw)
Game 5: 7/15 FG, 8/10 FT, 22/12/0, 7 TO, L (SA blown out at home)
Game 6: 6/17 FG, 7/12 FT, 19/10/5, 6 TO, L (key mistakes down the stretch)

D-Rob has 2 good games in the series vs Houston and 4 bad ones. That 25 ppg on 54 TS% isn't consistent like Dirk/Hakeem/other offensive anchors, so his offensive impact looks bigger than it actually is. His TO numbers are also worrying. SA's offense during the RS was 111.7 - that number dropped to 108.7 against Houston.

And look, it's great that he dominates the RS. His box score and advanced numbers in those three years are absolutely amazing. But there's factors in the RS that make it hard to ascertain the true ability of a player - injuries, coaching strategies, back to backs, coasting, scheduling priorities, etc. In the playoffs, when teams are almost certainly giving 100%, caring about every possession and ramping up the intensity, that's when you see a player's true ability come through - whether it's the expected level, better, or worse.

gets absolutely crucified if he does any worse

Of course. When a team's star falls apart like he did after destroying everyone in the regular season he's gonna get criticized. I mean, 1994 D-Rob averaged 30/11/5 on 58% TS in the RS, then went to 20/10/4 on 47% TS vs Utah. 1996 D-Rob had 25/12/3 on 59% TS, then fell to 19/9/2 on 53% TS vs Utah. That kind of drop in production and efficiency isn't worthy of criticism for you? Players like Kobe and Lebron get killed for 2-3% drops but you're willing to look past a guy dropping by literally a third of his regular season production and 7-8% TS?

urnoggin · Post #25 » by **urnoggin** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:09 am

1st ballot: ’77 Bill Walton

One of the most impactful seasons of all time. Lead a good but not great supporting cast to a Finals winwhile averaging 18/14/4/3 on 56.3 TS% and amazing defense. Was elite at every aspect of the game (defense, passing, rebounding) except for scoring. Had a TRB% of 21.2 and a DRB% of 32.3 which is elite. Blazers had a league-high 5.39 SRS (albeit with a mediocre record of 49-33) with the 2nd best offense and 5th best defense in the league. Went 14-5 in the playoffs beating a Kareem-led Lakers team and a Sixers squad with individual talent and little chemistry (the opposite of what the Blazers were). Averaged 18/19/5/4 in the Finals which is arguably one of the best rebounding series ever.

2nd ballot: ’76 Julius Erving

In his last season in the ABA, Dr. J put up 29/11/5 with 2.5 steals and 1.9(!!!) blocks on 56.9 TS%. Was a very good defender (97 DRtg , 3.1 DBPM), using his athleticism to stay with his man and create turnovers. Obviously an elite scorer and rebounder for his position while also being an above average (but not elite) playmaker. Raised his game to a new level in the playoffs by averaging 35/13/5 and leading his team to the championship. And as everyone knows, he had a legendary Finals by dropping 38/14 on an all-time great defender in Bobby Jones.

3rd ballot: ’95 David Robinson

Averages 28/11/3 and 4.9 stocks while winning MVP and awarded all-defensive first team. Elite rebounder and defender but not an elite scorer despite the great numbers. Lack of a post-up game really showed itself in the playoffs where he was outplayed by Olajuwon and his scoring volume and efficiency took a drastic dip. Still was one of the best and most impactful players ever and had a great season despite the subpar playoffs.

The-Power · Post #26 » by **The-Power** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:13 am

Short on time again, but some quick notes/questions regarding Chris Paul. I'd like to have responses from people who already had him in their ballots (or will have soon) - especially for the ones who pick his '08 season, which should be the usual case. I had him in my 3rd ballot last thread but I'm not sure anymore.

1) Chris Paul is a player whose impact is relatively well captured by the box-score - at least compared to other players with a different approach to the game. This is because Paul is a control-freak, and this isn't meant to be a negative comment. He simply likes to control everything on the court on offense and the results justify it. But simply comparing box-scores when we're talking about Paul and his case against elite gravity-players (like Curry) or elite defenders (like Walton) seems therefore a little imbalanced. The fact that he wasn't as good of a 3pt-shooter in '08 as he is now augments the tendency of less - by the basic stats - measurable impact. Disagree with anything of that? If not, what does this mean compared to some of the other players?

2) Often his defense is brought up when he's compared to someone like say Nash. But what evidence is there to believe that we should value his '08 defensive impact? And I don't even mean highly, I mean at all. Or to turn it upside down: shouldn't we rather hold his defense in that year against him? His impact on defense seemed to be neutral at best, clearly negative at worst. DRAPM and on/off splits aren't sufficient to draw a conclusion but they are so bad that we have to at least make our mind up about them and why we should rather not focus on them too much. Are people simply looking at the player he became at a later stage of his career and therefore prop up his defense of the earlier years? Or am I missing something? For what it's worth, it's very rare for more offensive-minded perimeter players (whether they take defense seriously or not) to become a really good defender in the NBA at the age of 22 - and they also rarely peak at this age overall, for what it's worth. Not saying these players don't exist but when the data we have suggests negative impact this should be something to bear in mind.

3) His playoff-numbers this season were ridiculous, absolutely. But many people mention his ATG AST/TO-ratio and use it as a supposedly strong argument. But first of all, it has been only 12 games - something we should never simply overlook. But half of the games happened to be against the team that was dead last in the NBA at forcing turnovers - the Mavericks. The Spurs, for what it's worth, had a great defense but were at the bottom in the league at forcing turnovers as well. Anyway, the AST/TO-ratio against the Mavericks was more ridiculous than it was against the Spurs - despite still being absolutely elite obviously - and the fact that the Mavericks were extremely poor at forcing turnovers is an interesting side-note to me. There is a reason that his overall playoff-numbers aren't this great in that regard even though he didn't really regress up to this year as a player. As I said, he's still arguably the best one ever in managing his turnovers while being the primary playmaker of his team. But he's rather great than 'oh my good he's completely out of this world in that respect' great like the numbers of his '08 playoffs suggest. And since it's often used as an argument I believe it's only fair to point that out at the very least, regardless of what everyone draws on that.

4) All of this leads me to believe that Paul might not have peaked in '08 even though this is what the first glance suggests. The subsequent question would be: if he actually peaked later in terms of impact and skill-set, what case can be made for other seasons this high? He had several great seasons, including '15, but I would guess that it becomes way more difficult to rank him this high.

Hope to see some (convincing) answers but at least until then my opinion changed somewhat and I won't have him in this ballot. Still not entirely sure about his replacement, though. I have some reservations regarding Erving, Wade, Walton, Robertson, Moses, Durant and co. as well but obviously everyone has some question-marks hanging above their cases at this point. Since I don't know if I can find the time to case my ballot before trex ends this thread and because Robinson has to be finally voted in I side with Walton for now; but I am absolutely open to re-think my choice, him playing less minutes due to injuries and being turnover-prone leaves some doubts I can't wipe away yet. But there were already good arguments made for him and I see reason to believe that he belongs pretty high in this project due to his impact on both ends of the floor.

Ergo:
1st Ballot: 1995 Robinson
2nd Ballot: 2015 Curry
3rd Ballot: 1977 Walton

RebelWithACause · Post #27 » by **RebelWithACause** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:27 am

This post will focus on why in my opinion DrJ shouldn't be included this early yet.

Wish I had more time to go in depth here, but life isn't making it possible.
In an analysis I usually consider the boxscore too, but I feel others have done that already.
I have not seen an analysis including the impact stats for DrJ we have, coupled with a quick and dash scoruing report and portability,
so here it is:

Offense

A lot has been said on the 1977 campaign. Dysfunctionality, reduced minutes, knee problems.
Erving came to a new team with several guys that were used to have and shoot the ball, McGinnis, Collins and B. Free.
Now for the season they rated only as the 6th best offense in the league. Is this what we expect from a offensive Top10 player All-Time, one year removed from his peak, with capable teammates?
Dysfunctionality, ego, chuckerism etc. caused most of that.
But how much is Dr J to blame here?
People are saying that the 76ers would have been better off, if they let Erving score the ball, but were they really?

We have some impact stats to measure this, granted it is raw on/off, but could be very useful here. Limited minutes should parse out his impact even better.

Offensive on/off:

77: 6th on offense

Dr. J 77 +4.1
McGinnis 77 +3.5
Free 77 +0.6
Collins 77 -0.7

78: 1st on offense

McGinnis 78 +5.8
Free 78 +2.4
Erving 78 +1.1
Collins 78 -2.4

Erving without McGinnis, Free :

Erving 79 +0.6
Erving 80 +0.9
Erving 81 -0.5

What can we see here? Collins seems to be the weak link. However, there is no clear separation between Erving and McGinnis. Actually McGinnis outclasses Erving by a bit in offensive impact during those 2 years. Very surprising.
When Free and McGinnis left, Erving actually does not have any offensive impact worth mentioning anymore the following 3 years.
His impact that he helped the 76ers with, is actually very mediocre for an offensive superstar.

Let us try and compare him with another wing facing some similar problems.
In 2011 and 2012 we saw LeBron coming into a rather similar situation. Came off a 1-man team to a team with redundancy on offense, 3 guys wanting primacy,trying to fit in to maximize the offense. Huge offensive talent in both situations. So let us have a look at Lebrons on/off offense those 2 years:

LeBron 11 +4.6
LeBron 12 +12.4
Dr. J 77 +4.1
Dr. J 78 +1.1

Now LeBron struggled a bit to adjust, but was still having more impact on a better offense than DrJ in 1977. 2011 is considered the worst year of Lebrons prime (09-15) for reference.
LeBron adjusted and lifted the Heat much more in his second year, whereas Dr. J actually regressed with his offensive splits.
This further hurts Dr. Js portability.

Moses vs Erving 83-85:

Now what stuns me as well, but isn't as relevant, because DrJ wasn't near his peak form anymore, is that Moses, who was a very good offensive player, but not a transcendent one, comes in and leaves DrJ in the dust by a huge margin, impact wise.
Not only during one year, but all of 83,84 and 85.

Conclusion: Very good offensive player for sure, but not transcendent, which would be a given to outclass the likes of Walton or Robinson.

Defense

Often DrJ is heralded for his great raw steal and block numbers. However his defense left a lot to be desired. Not too much effort, not there to make the right play. DrJ seems to be the Kobe Bryant of the 80s concerning his defensive reputation.
A lot of tools, but not impacting the game on defense. Take a look here:

Defensive on/off:

DrJ 77: -0.2
DrJ 78: +0.5

But he played less minutes and had less primacy?! Shouldnt he have more energy to focus on defense and be a better than
neutral/average on defense then? Does that mean that at his peak in 1976 when he played a ton more minutes and was more of a one-man-band he was a below average defender ?
History tells us that the greater the offensive responsibility, the worse the defense gets.

Conclusion: DrJ a minus defender at his peak?! very possible

Skill-Set

Not having too much time here, so making this short. Everyone knows his strengths, so weaknesses are:

- average ball handler
- average passer
- limitations off ball
- no range outside of 16-18 ft
- bad or at leat very inconsistent jump shooter

Portability

DrJ doesn't seems to be that portable. Doesn't possess the playmaking skills to make others better and catalyze an offense, as clearly evidenced with the 76ers. Not that good off ball, needs the ball, but is not the most adapt with it.
Cannot maximize his impact playing with other good offensive players. No range to spread the floor. Wing clogging the paint isn't all that.

Conclusion: Should get some points substracted because of his limited portability

Overall conclusion:

A year or 2 removed from his peak, I don't see any reason to believe that his game got that much worse.
I am having a hard time accepting that Dr. J was as great as he is made out to be. There are several doubts about his game and impact.
I feel that his popularity and legend is catapulting him to heights he doesn't really deserve. We have some impact stats about his NBA
time, which are really wonky by the way, but they are suggesting he would not fare well if RAPM existed for the time.
With analytical thinking there should be concerns about having him that high, because of his boxscore filling and exciting play.

That is not even touching in on the fact that the ABA (as well as the NBA), before the merger, were leagues that did not have
huge the quality, especially the ABA.

Now I am all for including him in the Top20, but as of now, I feel it is too early.

mischievous · Post #28 » by **mischievous** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:38 am

For those ranking Walton ahead of Wade, was the defensive edge really enough to make up for the huge offensive edge? Personally, i can't see it but id like to hear some elaboration.

Post #29 » by **Quotatious** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:59 am

bastillon wrote:
Quotatious wrote:Okay, my votes:

#1 - Julius Erving '76
#2 - Dwyane Wade '09
#3 - Chris Paul '08

I know you have probably explained this in the past threads but I didn't have time to follow them. Can you elaborate on the argument for Erving over Walton? Literally I have no idea what criteria make Dr J better. I don't think anybody should have doubts as to Walton's superiority after 77 finals. Dr J was really good but Walton was on another level. Like 86 Hakeem was great in the finals, but Bird was really a different animal... That sort of difference.

I watched the entire '77 finals two weeks ago, and I don't think Walton was "much" better. Arguably better, yes, but it's a pretty small gap, IMO. Erving was much better on offense (Walton was a fantastic passer for a bigman, and a decent/good scorer, but his scoring wasn't anywhere near "dominant" or "elite" - Erving has a huge edge as a scorer), Walton was much better on defense. I think both played extremely well. I think you can easily argue that Walton's offense > Erving's defense (Doc allowed Bob Gross to be extremely effective offensively against him, Gross even went off for a career-best series when Erving was guarding him, but on the other hand, Dr J's help defense was superb, he was very disruptive in passing lanes and the Blazers perimeter players could never feel confident about making a layup when Doc was lurking on D, looking for a block).

To be fair, I would give Walton the edge for that series, but I strongly disagree there was a big gap between them. Erving was one guy on the Sixers who really shouldn't be blamed for that series loss.

I think the biggest reason why the Sixers lost is that McGinnis was so horrible. I see '77 Erving/McGinnis the same way as I see Wade/LeBron in '11 finals. Erving/Wade both had a great series, McGinnis/LeBron were both absolutely awful, and that's the reason why the Sixers and Heat lost as a favorite, but it certainly wasn't because of Erving or Wade (they had two of the best ever finals series by a guy who played for the losing team). Henry Bibby was mostly bad, too. Doug Collins played well, but he also had two off-games, game 4 and 6.

Watching those games, I also felt like the Sixers (except for Dr J) made a really poor job executing on offense, and they (especially Bibby and Free) went right at Walton, making it easier for him defensively. No doubt that Walton played terrific defense, but it wasn't exactly a display of high bball IQ on the offensive end by the Sixers, especially when they were playing on the road.

Besides, I'm really not a fan of drawing retroactive conclusions based on the way Erving played in '77. Literally no player stays the same from one season to another, especially if he goes to another team, and his role on that team changes dramatically compared to his previous team (which was exactly the case with Erving between '76 and '77 - in '76, he was the unquestioned alpha dog, in '77, he was merely one of the three best offensive players on his team, in equal opportunities type offense, and personally, I give him a lot of credit for stepping up his game in the '77 playoffs compared to the RS, and then even more so in the finals, particularly in terms of scoring, where his volume AND efficiency was going up, as his team started to fall apart, especially as McGinnis started to play like a scrub).

mischievous wrote:Q if i recall correctly you had Drob above Wade before the project, why the change if so?

Yes, I did. I had Robinson at 13 and Wade at 16 (so not a big gap).

mischievous wrote:For me, ive waffled on the 2 but i think i feel more comfortable with Wade, because i think he's more likely to lead a team to a title with the proper supporting cast than Drob would.

That's the reason I'm higher on Wade right now, too. I mean - both were absolute monsters statistically, both in terms of boxscore numbers, as well as non-boxscore impact (we know that Robinson was ranked 3rd in the league in raw plus minus in '94, led the league in '95, and ranked 4th in '96, while Wade had +14.0 on/off court net rating, and he was ranked 4th in the league in single year RAPM, second among superstars behind LeBron), but Wade really seemed to be a better playoff performer than D-Rob (even Wade's '09 series against the Hawks, when he was dealing with back spasms, was better than vast majority of D-Rob's playoff series, in his prime, not to mention that Wade's '06 playoff run was far beyond Admiral's capabilities as a #1 option).

mischievous wrote:As for Wade vs Cp3, i agree about Wade being more dominant. There's only a handful of players in history who have had that sort of combo of volume efficient scoring and elite playmaking, and great defense to go along with it. When push comes to shove in the playoffs i trust Wade's superior scoring over Cp3's superior playmaking.

That's the way I feel about it, too. I'd rather have a guy who can dominate as a scorer and he's self-sufficient in this regard, than an elite playmaker - obviously we're splitting hairs here, as CP3 was an excellent scorer and elite playmaker, but I think that Wade was less dependent on his teammates - even though he's a very good scorer, CP3's biggest strength has always been playmaking, and sometimes you can make perfect passes, but if your teammates can't knock down shots, you're not gonna win. Wade was much better in terms of taking games over with his scoring.

Post #30 » by **Quotatious** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 2:08 am

mischievous wrote:For those ranking Walton ahead of Wade, was the defensive edge really enough to make up for the huge offensive edge? Personally, i can't see it but id like to hear some elaboration.

I'd say the offensive gap in Wade's favor is bigger, and Walton wasn't a better playoff performer, but I'll say this - I feel like I'm probably underrating Walton by not voting for him yet. I feel the same way about Robinson, too. I just think there are so many great candidates at this point that it's okay to vote for someone else.

I said I feel like I'm underrating Walton because Russell was voted in at 9, and Walton is basically a better offense, worse defense, worse durability version of Russell. Both are dominant rebounders, great leaders. Russell may have the edge as a playoff performer, but on the other hand, Walton's offensive advantage might be bigger than Russell's defensive advantage...It's hard to say how they compare defensively, with so little full game footage of Russell (and not a whole lot of Walton, but at least we have the entire '77 finals, and game 2 of the LAL/POR series, available, so it's already much better than anything we have for Russell, in one season).

Kareem vs Walton gap seems too big, too. Hell, some guys even argued that Walton was better/more impactful than Kareem in '77, and it's easy to see why, considering that Walton's team swept Kareem's team in the playoffs...(obviously I'm strongly opposed to evaluating players based on team success, and those games were very close, but that sweep is still some food for thought, definitely, as well as WOWY studies of '78 Walton and Kareem, when both guys missed a lot of games - Walton played 58, Kareem 62, and Kareem's team looked better without him based on those studies, IIRC).

Players like Russell and Walton are difficult to evaluate because so much of their value doesn't show up in a boxscore.

theonlyclutch · Post #31 » by **theonlyclutch** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 2:22 am

Maybe I have missed some posts, but would like some notes w.r.t Oscar's scoring and playmaking skillset and how that contributes positively to his overall offensive impact, would also like some data w.r.t Oscar's defensive impact, I've shyed away from voting for early/late 60s BBall, therefore more notes on this would be useful, thanks.

Post #32 » by **trex_8063** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 2:39 am

bastillon wrote:
trex_8063 wrote:
Hopefully closing this one down Friday morning.

I've done a reasonably thorough breakdown of my Robinson/Walton comparison in prior thread. In a nutshell how I see Robinson vs. either Dr. J or Oscar (not that you asked)......

Is Robinson as good defensively as either of those two are offensively? All indications point to "yes" (better, I would say).

Are either of them as good defensively as Robinson is offensively? imo, no. This is guy who averaged ~35-39 pts/100 possessions at ~+4-6% rTS, had >10+ indivdual rORTG while never leading worse than a +2.6 team rORTG during the rs in each of the three years which might be called his peak. And who is also good enough offensively that he sustains heavy criticism for averaging ~25 ppg @ ~54% TS in the playoffs (gets absolutely crucified if he does any worse). I think it's clear that his offensive output and expectation far exceeds what anyone expected to see from Oscar/Erving defensively.

I realize that's a crude method, but I think you get the gist of what I'm saying.

You are overrating Robinson's offense by some insane margins.

I don't think it's overrating Robinson's offense at all to suggest it's at least as good as the defense of Oscar or Erving. And I certainly don't think it's "insanely" overrating it to suggest that.
Quite honestly, you'd have to be monumentally overrating the defense of Oscar/Erving if you not only think I'm overrating, but "insanely overrating" Robinson's offense to suggest that it at least compares in quality to their defense.

bastillon wrote:I did a breakdown a couple threads back on Robinson and his insane postseason inconsistency on offense. He had key moments in career, when he was at his highest peak, and scored like 12 or 14 pts in crucial games. If Robinson was playing at ~35-39 ppg level in those key moments, he would be the GOAT candidate. The problem was, he was looking hopeless and literally made no impact offensively in some games.

Some games, I more or less agree. fwiw, he also had good games at critical moments:

G4 of 1st round '94 (facing elimination): 27 pts @ 55.1% TS, 12 reb, 4 ast, 2 tov (against 7th-rated defense, too)
G5 of '95 WCSF (up 3-1, chance to eliminate, overtime game, fwiw): 34 pts @ 57.7% TS, 17 reb
G6 of '95 WCSF: 31 pts @ 63.8% TS, 15 reb
and a couple that we've already mulled over:
G3 of '95 WCF: 29 pts @ 76.5% TS, 9 reb, 4 ast, 1 tov
G4 of '95 WCF: 20 pts @ 49.0% TS, 16 reb, 3 ast, 1 tov (held Hakeem to 20 pts on 39.5% TS)

And fwiw, even players with as stellar playoff resumes as Hakeem drop the ball at critical moments:

'93 WCSF G5 (facing elimination): 14 pts @ 53.8% TS, 4 ast, 6 tov
'94 WCSF G6 (chance to eliminate opp): 23 pts @ 48.6% TS
'94 WCF G4: 16 pts @ 40.5% TS
'95 WCSF G1: 18 pts @ 44.3% TS (though only in 27 min, because it was a blow-out loss)
aforementioned G4 of '95 WCF (at stake: evening of series and giving HCA back to SA).

Not suggesting Hakeem had as many of this type of failing as Robinson; it's an issue for Robinson, no doubt. Just sayin': I can cherry pick games too.

And that is what feels so irritatingly unfair to me: in the 3-year peak period of Robinson's career ('94-'96), he played 272 total games (243 rs and 29 playoff). You could take ALL the rs game (every single one, the good and the bad) and any playoff game in which he at least played "decent".......basically you'd have a sample of 260-265 games over which Robinson avg ~27 ppg @ ~59% TS. And then maybe like 7-10 games or so over which he averaged like 20 pts @ 50% TS.

And on the basis of those 7-10 games, he's labeled as little more than mediocre offensively (despite the 260+ games to the contrary). I can understand the importance of stage and circumstance; but I feel a lot of the big picture is lost when it comes to Robinson. Everyone wants to formulate their opinion of him based on a mere handful (literally) of memorable poor performances.

Post #33 » by **trex_8063** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:35 am

Thru post #32:

David Robinson - 15
Julius Erving - 15
Dwyane Wade - 10
Bill Walton - 8
Stephen Curry - 5
Oscar Robertson - 3
Moses Malone - 2
Chris Paul - 1
Kobe Bryant - 1

Still dissatisfied with the turn-out, though don't know what else I can do to stimulate that, other than threaten to troll posters mercilessly in the future if they don't participate.

drza · Post #34 » by **drza** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:37 am

trex_8063 wrote:Hopefully closing this one down Friday morning.

I've done a reasonably thorough breakdown of my Robinson/Walton comparison in prior thread. In a nutshell how I see Robinson vs. either Dr. J or Oscar (not that you asked)......

Is Robinson as good defensively as either of those two are offensively? All indications point to "yes" (better, I would say).

Are either of them as good defensively as Robinson is offensively? imo, no. This is guy who averaged ~35-39 pts/100 possessions at ~+4-6% rTS, had >10+ indivdual rORTG while never leading worse than a +2.6 team rORTG during the rs in each of the three years which might be called his peak. And who is also good enough offensively that he sustains heavy criticism for averaging ~25 ppg @ ~54% TS in the playoffs (gets absolutely crucified if he does any worse). I think it's clear that his offensive output and expectation far exceeds what anyone expected to see from Oscar/Erving defensively.

I realize that's a crude method, but I think you get the gist of what I'm saying.

I think the bolded/underlined line is incorrect. Oscar, from my viewpoint, is one of the offensive GOATs. He was the Magic Johnson of his era, and he's associated with #1 offenses more than anyone else except the other offensive GOATs (like Magic Nash/Dirk in this generation). His game has all of the hallmarks of huge impact...he was an incredible floor general, a high efficiency scorer, and his excellent size made him a huge mismatch in the backcourt.

I think that defense can be incredibly valuable, you know that. But from what we've seen, in the databall era, the highest impact offensive players are higher than the highest impact defensive players. To me, Oscar is on the highest shelf of offensive impact in history, so as great as Robinson was on defense I think that Oscar was clearly more impactful on offense.

As for Dr. J on offense...that's debatable, but I'm leaning towards '76 Dr. J being on the raw LeBron continuum of impact in which case his offense would be a bit better as well.

Plus, I don't agree with the way that you've been using averages as a "defense", if you will, of the playoff criticism of Robinson. The criticism was never that he couldn't DOMINATE lesser competition to the highest level of destruction, it was that when the competition gets hardest that Robinson's offensive impact went WAY down and his defensive impact may as well. Therefore, using averages from the '95 and '96 playoffs that are built on Robinson destroying lesser teams then playing poorly (with bad results on both offense AND defense) in every huge series featuring a player of his caliber from 94 - 96 does NOT address the criticism.

Focus: I'm not saying that the criticism of Robinson is necessarily correct. I'm saying that using his performance against lesser teams to argue that he doesn't shrink against the toughest competition doesn't in any way address the criticism. I'm still kind of waiting/hoping that someone from the Robinson camp would help to frame those criticisms in a more favorable light, but it kind of looks like he's just going to get voted in without that ever really being addressed.

drza · Post #35 » by **drza** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:43 am

Vote:

1) BIll Walton 1977
2) Oscar Robertson 1963
3) Dr. J 1976

I'm more and more comfortable with the Walton pick. His defense is as good as anyone on the board, his offense is the kind of sneaky high impact that you can get from a truly gifted high-post-hub-big man. His measured non-boxscore-impact is ultra top-shelf, and he performed in the postseason. If not for his health questions I think he'd have already been voted in by now, so this looks like a good time for him.

Oscar vs Dr. J is close, and I'm still considering. But I'm defaulting that with his excellent floor generalship on top of excellent high-efficiency scoring, Oscar was more better on offense than Dr. J may have been on defense. Another top-shelf impact player that continued it in the postseason.

Dr. J, with his leading his team in every major boxscore category while leading them with monster performances to a title, I'm currently seeing with an impact in the "raw LeBron" category.

theonlyclutch · Post #36 » by **theonlyclutch** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:52 am

My final ballot:

1st - 1996 David Robinson (This has been going for how long now?)

Reasons here: http://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1406391&p=44635030#p44635030

2nd - 2015 Stephen Curry

Reason - I actually have Curry's peak above Bird's, as the-power's epic post explained very succinctly, Curry's nutso shooting skillz, as well as his willingness and competency to play off the ball, puts opposing defenses into very compromising situations, which translate into loads of open looks for his teammates (slightly OT, but any non-warriors GM wanting to give a fat RFA offer to Barnes would do well to remember this :wink:

). This fact also means that Curry is significantly more portable than most of his fellow competition at guard. It also helps that his boxscore stats in the RS are amazing, 26.2/8.5/4.7 per 36, 122 ORTG, 28 PER, 63.8% TS, and (mostly) held through in the PS, despite facing wayy more attempts by opponents to actively deny him the ball...

3rd - 1964 Oscar Robertson

Reason - This is a pretty good merging of team success and individual production, awesome boxscore production, and great impact, as WOWY studies on Robertson have shown older versions of him doing. Hugely versatile as a guard and was damn efficient doing whatever he does, the only chink on him is that he is likely not as portable as Curry in different team situations, besides that, I believe their actual impact to be in the same-ish ballpark.

eminence · Post #37 » by **eminence** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:56 am

The-Power wrote:Short on time again, but some quick notes/questions regarding Chris Paul. I'd like to have responses from people who already had him in their ballots (or will have soon) - especially for the ones who pick his '08 season, which should be the usual case. I had him in my 3rd ballot last thread but I'm not sure anymore.

1) Chris Paul is a player whose impact is relatively well captured by the box-score - at least compared to other players with a different approach to the game. This is because Paul is a control-freak, and this isn't meant to be a negative comment. He simply likes to control everything on the court on offense and the results justify it. But simply comparing box-scores when we're talking about Paul and his case against elite gravity-players (like Curry) or elite defenders (like Walton) seems therefore a little imbalanced. The fact that he wasn't as good of a 3pt-shooter in '08 as he is now augments the tendency of less - by the basic stats - measurable impact. Disagree with anything of that? If not, what does this mean compared to some of the other players?

2) Often his defense is brought up when he's compared to someone like say Nash. But what evidence is there to believe that we should value his '08 defensive impact? And I don't even mean highly, I mean at all. Or to turn it upside down: shouldn't we rather hold his defense in that year against him? His impact on defense seemed to be neutral at best, clearly negative at worst. DRAPM and on/off splits aren't sufficient to draw a conclusion but they are so bad that we have to at least make our mind up about them and why we should rather not focus on them too much. Are people simply looking at the player he became at a later stage of his career and therefore prop up his defense of the earlier years? Or am I missing something? For what it's worth, it's very rare for more offensive-minded perimeter players (whether they take defense seriously or not) to become a really good defender in the NBA at the age of 22 - and they also rarely peak at this age overall, for what it's worth. Not saying these players don't exist but when the data we have suggests negative impact this should be something to bear in mind.

3) His playoff-numbers this season were ridiculous, absolutely. But many people mention his ATG AST/TO-ratio and use it as a supposedly strong argument. But first of all, it has been only 12 games - something we should never simply overlook. But half of the games happened to be against the team that was dead last in the NBA at forcing turnovers - the Mavericks. The Spurs, for what it's worth, had a great defense but were at the bottom in the league at forcing turnovers as well. Anyway, the AST/TO-ratio against the Mavericks was more ridiculous than it was against the Spurs - despite still being absolutely elite obviously - and the fact that the Mavericks were extremely poor at forcing turnovers is an interesting side-note to me. There is a reason that his overall playoff-numbers aren't this great in that regard even though he didn't really regress up to this year as a player. As I said, he's still arguably the best one ever in managing his turnovers while being the primary playmaker of his team. But he's rather great than 'oh my good he's completely out of this world in that respect' great like the numbers of his '08 playoffs suggest. And since it's often used as an argument I believe it's only fair to point that out at the very least, regardless of what everyone draws on that.

4) All of this leads me to believe that Paul might not have peaked in '08 even though this is what the first glance suggests. The subsequent question would be: if he actually peaked later in terms of impact and skill-set, what case can be made for other seasons this high? He had several great seasons, including '15, but I would guess that it becomes way more difficult to rank him this high.

Hope to see some (convincing) answers but at least until then my opinion changed somewhat and I won't have him in this ballot. Still not entirely sure about his replacement, though. I have some reservations regarding Erving, Wade, Walton, Robertson, Moses, Durant and co. as well but obviously everyone has some question-marks hanging above their cases at this point. Since I don't know if I can find the time to case my ballot before trex ends this thread and because Robinson has to be finally voted in I side with Walton for now; but I am absolutely open to re-think my choice, him playing less minutes due to injuries and being turnover-prone leaves some doubts I can't wipe away yet. But there were already good arguments made for him and I see reason to believe that he belongs pretty high in this project due to his impact on both ends of the floor.

Ergo:
1st Ballot: 1995 Robinson
2nd Ballot: 2015 Curry
3rd Ballot: 1977 Walton

Paul Supporter here (likely have him 3rd on my ballot again), so here's my take on a couple of your questions.

1) Most of the top point guards are ball controlling, and I don't really feel Paul is excessively more-so than the others: Magic/Nash, or even the elite scoring guards to an extent Kobe/Wade. I do agree that it makes his impact generally more easy to capture in the boxscore.

2) I personally don't give him many points for his defense in '08. To his credit he made 2nd team all defense, but he certainly wasn't a big factor on defense. I don't have this influencing my ranking of him that much because unless they are large negative on defense (Nash) I don't value PG defense that much, it just doesn't seem to be an important part to building a strong defense. So to me PGs are ranked almost entirely off of their offensive value, where I rank Paul very highly - right with Magic/Nash/Curry for peak all-time.

3) Agreed, those two series are on extreme end for his ast/tov ratio. But he's still pretty clearly amongst the best ever in that regard for anyone who's at star level (sorry Jose Calderon).

Career Ast to TOV: RS/PS

Magic: 2.89/3.37
Stockton: 3.72/3.56
Paul: 4.13/3.35
Nash: 2.97/2.77
Thomas: 2.46/2.67
Payton: 2.96/2.73
Billups: 2.64/2.58
KJ: 2.97/26.4
Parker: 2.39/1.89
Kidd: 3.02/2.81

Stockton and Paul are the only two with real arguments for being the best at protecting the ball while still distributing at a high level.

4) Skill-wise I agree he's improved since '08, but the injuries really did slow him down. The biggest difference to me is that 22 year old Paul could simply carry a heavier load than any of the later post-injury versions, playing heavier minutes at a higher usage percent than in later seasons. For one play, a game, or even a series I'd heavily consider taking later versions, but for a full season I feel '07-'08 gives you your best chance at success.

SideshowBob · Post #38 » by **SideshowBob** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 4:36 am

I'm pretty much following the ballot I posted here.

Ballot

10.Walton 77 +7.25 (+2.75 O/+4.50 D)

11.Robinson 94 +6.75 (+2.75 O/+4.00 D)

12.Magic 87 +6.75 (+7.00 O/-0.25 D)

13.Erving 76 +6.75 (+5.00 O/+1.75 D)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Walton

Spoiler:

Robinson

Spoiler:

Erving

Spoiler:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Considering Wade, West, Curry for the next few spots. After that IMO it's a **** - I posted a ballot but I have no idea if I'm going to end up staying consistent with my earlier posted ballot at all. I've been pretty strict on sticking to the positions I had coming into the project, but I don't expect that to hold for the 15-30 spots.

LA Bird · Post #39 » by **LA Bird** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 4:38 am

1. 1995 Robinson

2. 1977 Walton

Reasoning the same as before except I have moved Robinson up a spot:

Spoiler:

3. 2015 Curry

Considering Wade and Dirk for this spot but for now, I will have Curry here. The-Power's post said everything I had to say. I think Curry could have challenged 1987 Magic as GOAT PG if he had maintained his regular season dominance. It's still a great playoffs run but it just seems like Draymond stepped up more for the playoffs than Curry did.

For other players:
Paul - I have 2015 as his peak. IMO, this is his best offensive season yet, his shooting from both mid-range and 3-point is at its best and his defense is also better than in his early years. My opinion of Paul and Wade's defense in 09 has dropped recently.
Oscar/West/Dr J - I generally don't rank pre-merger players against the later players but between them, I would rank them in around that order.

thizznation · Post #40 » by **thizznation** » Fri Sep 25, 2015 4:51 am

bastillon wrote:
Quotatious wrote:Okay, my votes:

#1 - Julius Erving '76
#2 - Dwyane Wade '09
#3 - Chris Paul '08

I know you have probably explained this in the past threads but I didn't have time to follow them. Can you elaborate on the argument for Erving over Walton? Literally I have no idea what criteria make Dr J better. I don't think anybody should have doubts as to Walton's superiority after 77 finals. Dr J was really good but Walton was on another level. Like 86 Hakeem was great in the finals, but Bird was really a different animal... That sort of difference.

Well when you unfairly apply criteria to one side then there will be trouble finding criteria for Erving. How does Prime Walton play on one fantastic team and then never play for another again and get gifted this amazing portability? You critique Dr J for his play with a new team when Walton never even contributed to another team anywhere near what he did with the Blazers.

The next criteria that Walton voters have been neglecting is health. Walton was only able to play 2,264 minutes in 77, Erving played 3,244 minutes in 1976. Even if Walton was more impactful than Erving, if Walton is not playing he is giving you zero impact. Can we really say that Walton was giving his team more than 30% impact than Dr J was when they were both on the floor? Walton hobbled along that year while Erving was a horse. If you have them even close in impact this should be a tipping point.

As for Wade over Dr J. I think Wade's performance was great but if we do a reverse time machine comparison could he really replicate what Dr J did in 76? Wade is going to have to deal with different carry rules, hand checking, and while he has a great wingspan Dr J has a much better standing reach and is still longer. Dr J would be more portable across eras than Wade and if we are judging true basketball ability between the two I think a trading places comparison is fair.

As for the other thread I had 63 Oscar but I'm switching to 64. I liked the increase playoff production of 63, but as quotatious pointed out 64 Oscar translated into greater team success and he was a better all around player that season.

I have still been busy unfortunately but I think there is light at the end of the tunnel. For now I'm only going to be casting two ballots.

1976 Erving
1964 Robertson