RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #6

[oldschooled]

Wow KG gaining traction right now inside the top 10. Even KG would not rank himself above Wilt, Shaq and Magic lmao. Wilt and Shaq are the 2 most dominant players ever. Best peak and prime arguably. Both are legit 2-way players (eye test or advance stats-wise). Both elevated team to ATG levels: Wilt (67 Sixers, 72 Lakers), Shaq (3 peated with a 2001 playoff record of 15-1). Both are all time great talent and specimen. Both would be selected top 5 at worst in an all time draft.

1st Vote: Wilt
2nd Vote: Shaq

[Dr Positivity]

What is KG T-Wolves defense ranks in the league? I don't think KG is a good anchor. He is a great complentary defensive player, in the tune of a Pip or Lebron rather than a Hakeem/D-Rob.

Look at 08. He had quality teammates instead of garbage, and had a historic defense.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM mobile app

Problem with this is that Hakeem had weak support too, but was able to anchor great defenses despite that. For the talk of KG defensive impact, why was Minny so bad? One wouldn't expect them to be the best, but they weren't anywhere comparable to Hakeem's.

DRTG
96 Min - #20
97 Min - #15
98 Min - #23
99 Min - #11
00 Min - #12
01 Min - #16
02 Min - #15
03 Min - #16
04 Min - #6
05 Min - #15
06 Min - #10
07 Min - #21

Boston had a historically great defense in 2008, yes. But one great year does not equal TD and Hakeem or other great defensive anchors. KG was often injured after 08, and even when he was hurt they were good defensively.

Further, when we look at all-time great defensive or offensive anchors, there a clear impact shown on their teams. You pretty much never see an elite d-anchor or o-anchor have their team dip below #15 in DRtg/ORtg. #10 is very rare, and they usually are in the Top 5. KG doesn't stack up to Russell, TD, DRob, or Hakeem in this regard. Maybe around the level of Alonzo.

The Twolves also performed strongly offense during Garnett years in my opinion and were top 5 offensive teams in several seasons despite lacking a 2nd star and having a horrid bench. If one is beholden to KG's DRTG's compared to Hakeem and Duncan then it would make as much sense to use his ORTGs to call him the best offensive player compared to them. Overall I feel it's plausible the TWolves were overperforming on offense compared to their talent level and underperforming on defense. It could be as simple as using more of their energy on offense while a team like the Spurs had more of a defensive culture. The Celtics in the 60s were a team I believe that inflated their DRTG compared to their ORTG by burning all their energy on D. I prefer other ways of judging his offense and defense than his team's ranks.

As for KG's overall impact, to me it's perfectly plausible a team can suck enough that having a top 5-6 player of all time only makes them 50 W caliber in early 2000s. If you add Lebron to the current Lakers or Nets they're not going to be a contender. He was making them like, 30 Ws better in those 50 Ws seasons. That's pretty solid. 06 and 07 was a combination of not being peak KG in impact and just playing with total scrubs

[JordansBulls]

Well, the Wilt people aren't going to give up, but the Duncan thing is a moderate to severe case of recency bias that will probably just be a ??? in a few iterations. I mean, you know you're in trouble when you're getting "he sure was a great guy" arguments for his greatness.

In any case, I arrived here knowing certain things were going to happen, so one of them did, now it's time to get back to work:

6) Wilt
7) Magic

For reasons already stated, but I'll go ahead and post some numbers that people should already know. I don't want to continue to reference the Duncan thing going forward, but it might be useful in a couple of spots, because if Tim Duncan is your #5, how on Earth can a guy who did what Wilt did comparatively not be #6, at least?

Okay, so a simple series of all time top lists. Wilt was IMPORTANT. Hugely significant. His name is all over the record books for a reason.

NBA All Time Points Per Game
1) Chamberlain 30.1
2) Jordan 30.1
3) Baylor 27.4
4) Durant 27.2
5) James 27.1
6) West 27.0
7) Iverson 26.7
8) Petit 26.4
9) Gervin 26.2
10) Robertson 25.7

#11 and #12 are Kobe and Mailman, tied at 25.0. Duncan...is not in the top 60.

NBA All Time Points, Total
1) Kareem 38387
2) Mailman 36928
3) Bryant 33643
4) Jordan 32292
5) Chamberlain 31419
6) Nowitzki 30260
7) James 28787
8) O'Neal 28596
9) Moses 27409
10) Hayes 27313

next 7 are Hakeem, Oscar, Nique, Duncan, Pierce, Havlicek, Garnet all in the 26,000+ range

NBA All Time Rebounds Per Game
1) Chamberlain 22.9
2) Russell 22.5
3) Stokes 17.3
4) Petit 16.2
5) Lucas 15.6
6) Thurmond 15.0
7) Unseld 14.0
8) Bellamy 13.7
9) Cowens 13.6
10) Baylor 13.5

Rodman is 12th at 13.1, top 2 current players are 14) Drummond 12.8 and 15) Howard 12.7. Duncan is at 10.8 tied for 33/34/35 with Boogie and Sven Nater.

NBA All Time Rebounds, Total
1) Chamberlain 23924
2) Russell 21620
3) Abdul-Jabbar 17440
4) Hayes 16279
5) Moses 16212
6) Duncan 15091
7) Mailman 14968
8) Parish 14715
9) Garnett 14662
10) Thurmond 14464

Bellamy, Unseld, Hakeem, Shaq and Buck WiIliams round out the next 5.

NBA All Time Assists, Centers
1) Abdul-Jabbar 5660
2) Chamberlain 4643
3) Russell 4100
4) Adams 4012
5) Unseld 3822

So we have a 4x MVP, 2x NBA Champion (on 2 all time great teams too), who also just so happens to be the NBA's all time leading per game scorer and rebounder, with only a single peer in each category (2 guys named Jordan and Russell, who have already been taken). He's also 2nd on the all time assist list amongst centers

Come on now. No more flying in the face of the league's history. Don't make Wilt angry, or suffer the consequences:

Watch on YouTube

Wilt is behind MJ in career ppg. 30.12 (MJ) to 30.07 (Wilt).

[penbeast0]

1 - Wilt
2 - Bird

Must I recall my arguments? Quite a few others didn't on the last thread, just sayin'

Magic was a below average defender at best, just like Bird

Bird was not close to a below average defender. He had outstanding instincts, some of the best hands ever, and for a wing his defensive rebounding is off the charts. He played out of position for a lot of his prime and had a lot of trouble in straight man D against athletic 3s, but in the modern game he'd be a 4 and a damn good defensive one at that.

The eye test says Larry was a terrible defender, he couldn't stay with 3's and didn't play post defense well against 4's and 5's. Recently, in an Adrian Dantley thread they showed the ECF finals from 1988 to show how Dantley's defense against Bird was generally excellent (Bird did go off one game) but what I really noticed was how bad Dantley made Bird look. Bird was consistently biting on fakes, blown by with Dantley's first step, and even turned around on post counters. He was awful.

And that's my memory of him defensively. When he retired, Barkley was interview as saying that he was sorry Bird was gone because now Barkley was the worst defender in the NBA. That's unfair, Barkley was worse and Bird was a decent ballhawk, but Bird was a below average defender most of his career.

[Clyde Frazier]

I just spent over 2 hours on a post only for me to somehow get "logged out" when I went to submit. I guess doing everything in word first is a good idea

That really sucks, but for future reference: I write important posts as drafts in gmail first since it autosaves as you write. Could also do it as a Google doc which autosaves as well.

[Lucky707]

As a random outside observer, I will say that these threads are becoming more and more painful to read because people are more focused in making sure their guy gets on the list in an appropriate spot rather than on appropriate debate and discussion .

[JordansBulls]

I just spent over 2 hours on a post only for me to somehow get "logged out" when I went to submit. I guess doing everything in word first is a good idea

Was it your vote or just data on some players?

[trex_8063]

.

Quoting you penbeast0 just as my sign-off: this might be my last post for about 3 days, so please carry the project on.

I was going to forward you some materials to sort of place my votes for me while I'm off the grid, but that wouldn't really be fair (we don't allow that for anyone else). I didn't miss a single thread in the last project, and was hoping I could do the same here, but I'm gonna have to miss the #7 thread.

Wanted to get my picks in for this one, though.
For this spot I've been flip-flopping between Wilt and Shaq (I've pretty well flip-flopped on them continually for the last 2.5 years), with an outside chance for Magic. If someone could have convinced me that Magic was actually a better defender than I thought, it might have been enough to favor him. But the consensus was pretty consistent with what I thought previously: basically a neutral in his best defensive years, at least smallish negative in lesser defensive years.
It doesn't bode well that the video provided by Blackmill of '83 Magic (stated to be one of his better defensive years) shows him making fairly frequent defensive mistakes (though sample size obviously an issue there). I'll not be upset if he did come out of no where and take either this spot or the next, but I'm not comfortable lending him my vote given the defensive short-comings and the lacking longevity. So I'm sticking with either Wilt or Shaq.

Wilt is basically the most statistically dominant (for peak or prime) player ever. My reservations with him have been with how his impact doesn't appear to stack up to his statistical output in multiple years (a couple years don't even appear particularly close). For all the ridiculous scoring numbers, we almost never see a team offense worth its salt in those years. This is in stark contrast to Shaq's career (who led multiple good, or occasionally elite, offenses). Now it's true Shaq always had some pretty good help; but it's also true that Shaq's offensive on/off, RAPM, and WOWY stats all say the same thing: that he was a juggernaut of offensive impact (basically the only center of the databall era to have had---fairly consistently in his prime---offensive impact in line with the very best perimeter offensive stars). A lot of it I think has to do with his offensive gravity, and his relentless pursuit of destroying the rim.

otoh, Wilt was the better defender, generally speaking. More consistent in the regard, likely higher defensive peak as well (though Shaq in '00 was a very nice anchor, fwiw). The couple years where all indications suggest very poor correlation of stats to impact for Wilt appear to be largely as a result of poor defensive effort.

70sFan presented a table showing him being more "switched on" defensively in the playoffs, though (not every single year, but semi-consistently so, and occasionally achieving some truly elite team defenses in the playoffs. I decided to look at some similar studies for Shaq (again assuming that---being a center---these guys influence the team defense more than any other one player).....

Playoff Defense
‘99: rs rDRTG: +2.1
Avg offense faced: +2.5 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: +4.55
Overall defense (relative to playoff competition): +2.05

‘00: rs rDRTG: -5.9
Avg Offense faced: +2.6 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: +4.0
Overall defense: +1.4

‘01: rs rDRTG: +1.8
Avg Offense faced: +2.4 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: -4.8
Overall defense: -7.2

‘02: rs rDRTG: -2.8
Avg Offense faced: +2.5 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: -1.8
Overall defense: -4.3

‘03: rs rDRTG: +1.1
Avg offense faced: +2.25 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: +3.95
Overall defense: +1.7

‘04: rs rDRTG: -1.6
Avg offense faced: +/- 0.0 rORTG
Avg rDRTG in playoffs: -2.2
Overall defense: -2.2


....So it's a bit all over the map in these years, but overall there is a slight positive trend in playoff defensive performance (on average it improves by 0.5-0.6 below expectation based on rs performance). Not as big a shift as was seen in Wilt's data, but just putting that out there.

Shaq generally continues to be an offensive monster in the playoffs, too.
Wilt a noticeably better rebounder, though.


So I'll admit it feels a bit like a coin-flip, but I want to get a pick in before I head off the grid (and again: I'll be back sometime Monday, penbeast), so I'm just going with my gut here:

1st vote: Shaquille O'Neal
2nd vote: Wilt Chamberlain

(wish I could just make it a half vote for each, though)

[Winsome Gerbil]

Malone has much better super star longevity

Not the same "superstar" quality.

and easier to build around.

Why? Because Minnesota's front office was incompetent? Garnett actually led a team to the championship.

I mean Garnett may have been A leader on that Boston team. But ending up on a superteam as part of a three tops setting, and settling back into playing a role is hardly the same thing as muscling a team home as its undisputed #1. At the point you can score 18ppg and you team still wins the title? You know you have some pretty amazing teammates doing their own thing at a very high level.

Garnett won a title, and he was a huge part of it. It obviously was not a ring chasing situation. But there's also a gap between that sort of "winning a title" and what Hakeem, or Dirk, or Bron a couple of years ago did, or what Mailman would have had to have done to have beaten the Jordan Bulls as his team's only 15+ppg scorer.

[ElGee]

Lakers were terribly coached and constructed in 1969. Wilt deserved some blame but so did VBK and Baylor. Coach wanted to win despite Wilt, not with Wilt. That isn't a good coaching in any way. Can you imagine Spoelstra not giving James the ball in 2011 because he didn't like him? This would make LeBron look terrible, even worse than in the finals against Dallas.

But yeah I agree. He should be blamed. I don't deny that. He should have find the way to impact the offense and he didn't. In fact, he had negative impact on Lakers offensive strategy. But both Baylor and VBK had as well, it was a combination of bad coaching, unwillingnes to adapt by Baylor and lack of high post skills by Wilt.

On the other hand, let's be fair. Wilt improved Lakers defense drasticaly. No, not in regular season, but in playoffs they were dominant. In fact 1969 Lakers were more dominant in PS defensively than Celtics.



He made Lakers better overall. It's just a matter of size of upgrade, which should have been higher. Still, I've seen too much evidences that Wilt could and did impact on teams in GOAT way. After all, two of the top 10 teams ever were anchored by Chamberlain.

Does anyone have similar data for Shaq playoffs teams? I'd like to see how his teams performed defensively. Because Wilt's teams were consistently elite defensively in playoffs. Look how much 1962 Warriors improved defensively for example. Yet people call his performance bad...

That was made by fpliii -- not sure what estimates he used for defense (may have been an older version of my method). Here it is for all GOAT big men for you:



The team defenses were good for Wilt. The flip side is that his PS offenses were not. Russell's were -1.4. Garnett's +0.8. Robinson +1.4. Every other notable GOAT player over +3. Among the top guys:

Nash 10.2
Magic 7.5
Dirk 7.3
Shaq 6.9
Kobe 6.4
Jordan 6.3
Wilt 1.2

[ElGee]

If I take a step back and follow the Wilt argument it still looks something like this:

Point: Wilt's box score numbers are undeniable.
Counter-Point: Actually, box score numbers don't auto-translate to impact (Scoring Blindness)
Point: I know that, but look at the stats he put up!

I really don't like negatively harping on one player. But I find him foundational to understanding basketball (so much so that I literally wrote a chapter in a book on this). First, Wilt's positives:

-all-time level defender
-very high peak season
-provided value in at least 3 different styles/roles
-Good longevity, especially within era

But hand-waving away the box score thing is just denying that basketball is a team game, which is where the beauty in the whole sport resides to me. It's why I'm writing this post, despite not wanting to write this post. I'm going to write quickly so apologizes for more typos than normal:

I have the unsettling feeling that you've addressed this before, but not having been part of that discussion, I'll beg your forgiveness to ask anyway -- why do you consider Wilt's scoring more detrimental to team goals compared to other great scorers? For example:

-- On the page 3 of this thread, Colts18 quotes a post promoting David Robinson as equal or better than Wilt based on the combined total of points, rebounds, and assists adjusted for pace and minutes per game. So apparently getting lots of points, rebounds, and assists is a good thing?

-- Michael Jordan is number 1 in the rankings, and a big factor is that he was such a dominant scorer. Adjusted for minutes and pace, Jordan's highest scoring seasons could be considered even more extreme than Wilt's 50 PPG season. If you adjust for pace (131.1 for Philly in 1961-62 vs 95.8 for the Bulls in 1986-87), Jordan scored at a higher rate (46.4 per 100 possessions vs 38.4 for Wilt), and that's not even adjusting for Wilt's 8.5 additional minutes per game.

I understand the concept that guys with a supersized shooting or usage rate can hurt team goals, but It seems like Wilt gets the short end of these judgments far more often than other dominant scorers.

In 1959, without Jack George the Warriors were about a -1 SRS team. When healthy the next year they were +2.5. They went from the worst offense in the league (-3.5) to second-worst (-2.4), but it's unclear how much better the 59 team was on offense when healthy without George (basically the same lineup Wilt would be added to in 60...and Paul Arizin was coming off a career-best scoring year and 2nd-team all-nab season). So right away, the data is screaming

1. 38 per game on elite efficiency doesn't automatically equate to great team offense
2. 38 per game on elite efficiency doesn't automatically improve an offense very much

I'm confused here on a couple of fronts.

I'm not sure what Jack George has to do with anything. Was he such a cancer that getting rid of him turned Philly into a really good team? I understand that SRS can be an indicator of how well a team does, but so can wins and losses; in 1958-59, Philly was 20-26 (.435) in the 46 games with George on the roster and 12-14 (.461) in the 26 games without him. The first year with Wilt, Philly was 49-26 (.653) with, as you pointed out, largely the same roster as the year before.

All scoring isn't created equal. The point isn't that a volume scorer is always detrimental -- Steph Curry had one of the great offensive seasons in NBA history averaging 30 a game last year. The point is to look beyond the box score number, to look beyond what I've dubbed a Scoring Blindness. In Wilt's case, the evidence is that he was not an offensive behemoth. And we know why, it's not a mystery. Clogged, deliberate offense that helps an individual only helps one guy. That said, he's underrated defensively IMO because of it.

Apologies about the confusion with Jack George -- I was expecting the reader to know too much there. The point was that Philly had basically no roster turnover or lineup adjustments when adding Wilt if you remove the 25g George played that year. While we don't have much film from the 60's, we are blessed with these consistent rosters, which makes it much easier to isolate the impact of players. While Blackmill is spot on, WOWY (or even modern RAPM) are not "perfect player rankers," when players like Wilt leave large footprints with 10, 20, 40, 60 game samples over and over on different teams, it's insight that we can't even always get today.

To me, the exemplar of this is that until a few years, literally no one in the public domain knew that the 68 Lakers were awesome when healthy. Then Wilt arrives and they are worse (not better). This would be like MJ retiring and Chicago winning 67 games. BTW you can view all historical lineups here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cFY3Qk8eLJo8_bKK0z4k8K-A3UpwQRGOCAsrSuUeQl0/edit?pli=1#gid=1342053438

[GSP]

I just spent over 2 hours on a post only for me to somehow get "logged out" when I went to submit. I guess doing everything in word first is a good idea

Not sure if u tried this but usually when i log back in and press back to the page it was on all the text is still there. Then i copy it all and have to refresh or go back to the page and just paste it

[Winsome Gerbil]

If I take a step back and follow the Wilt argument it still looks something like this:



I really don't like negatively harping on one player. But I find him foundational to understanding basketball (so much so that I literally wrote a chapter in a book on this). First, Wilt's positives:

-all-time level defender
-very high peak season
-provided value in at least 3 different styles/roles
-Good longevity, especially within era

But hand-waving away the box score thing is just denying that basketball is a team game, which is where the beauty in the whole sport resides to me. It's why I'm writing this post, despite not wanting to write this post. I'm going to write quickly so apologizes for more typos than normal:

I have the unsettling feeling that you've addressed this before, but not having been part of that discussion, I'll beg your forgiveness to ask anyway -- why do you consider Wilt's scoring more detrimental to team goals compared to other great scorers? For example:

-- On the page 3 of this thread, Colts18 quotes a post promoting David Robinson as equal or better than Wilt based on the combined total of points, rebounds, and assists adjusted for pace and minutes per game. So apparently getting lots of points, rebounds, and assists is a good thing?

-- Michael Jordan is number 1 in the rankings, and a big factor is that he was such a dominant scorer. Adjusted for minutes and pace, Jordan's highest scoring seasons could be considered even more extreme than Wilt's 50 PPG season. If you adjust for pace (131.1 for Philly in 1961-62 vs 95.8 for the Bulls in 1986-87), Jordan scored at a higher rate (46.4 per 100 possessions vs 38.4 for Wilt), and that's not even adjusting for Wilt's 8.5 additional minutes per game.

I understand the concept that guys with a supersized shooting or usage rate can hurt team goals, but It seems like Wilt gets the short end of these judgments far more often than other dominant scorers.

In 1959, without Jack George the Warriors were about a -1 SRS team. When healthy the next year they were +2.5. They went from the worst offense in the league (-3.5) to second-worst (-2.4), but it's unclear how much better the 59 team was on offense when healthy without George (basically the same lineup Wilt would be added to in 60...and Paul Arizin was coming off a career-best scoring year and 2nd-team all-nab season). So right away, the data is screaming

1. 38 per game on elite efficiency doesn't automatically equate to great team offense
2. 38 per game on elite efficiency doesn't automatically improve an offense very much

I'm confused here on a couple of fronts.

I'm not sure what Jack George has to do with anything. Was he such a cancer that getting rid of him turned Philly into a really good team? I understand that SRS can be an indicator of how well a team does, but so can wins and losses; in 1958-59, Philly was 20-26 (.435) in the 46 games with George on the roster and 12-14 (.461) in the 26 games without him. The first year with Wilt, Philly was 49-26 (.653) with, as you pointed out, largely the same roster as the year before.

All scoring isn't created equal. The point isn't that a volume scorer is always detrimental -- Steph Curry had one of the great offensive seasons in NBA history averaging 30 a game last year. The point is to look beyond the box score number, to look beyond what I've dubbed a Scoring Blindness. In Wilt's case, the evidence is that he was not an offensive behemoth. And we know why, it's not a mystery. Clogged, deliberate offense that helps an individual only helps one guy. That said, he's underrated defensively IMO because of it.

Apologies about the confusion with Jack George -- I was expecting the reader to know too much there. The point was that Philly had basically no roster turnover or lineup adjustments when adding Wilt if you remove the 25g George played that year. While we don't have much film from the 60's, we are blessed with these consistent rosters, which makes it much easier to isolate the impact of players. While Blackmill is spot on, WOWY (or even modern RAPM) are not "perfect player rankers," when players like Wilt leave large footprints with 10, 20, 40, 60 game samples over and over on different teams, it's insight that we can't even always get today.

To me, the exemplar of this is that until a few years, literally no one in the public domain knew that the 68 Lakers were awesome when healthy. Then Wilt arrives and they are worse (not better). This would be like MJ retiring and Chicago winning 67 games. BTW you can view all historical lineups here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cFY3Qk8eLJo8_bKK0z4k8K-A3UpwQRGOCAsrSuUeQl0/edit?pli=1#gid=1342053438

Well more than Wilt just arriving went on. And even Wilt arriving...I mean he was 32 years old by that point, and ate up all of 13.6 shots a game. That's hardly a deal breaker. But the larger issue is that they lost their depth. And the depth they lost actually took more shots than Wilt did when he arrived.

[Blackmill]

It doesn't bode well that the video provided by Blackmill of '83 Magic (stated to be one of his better defensive years) shows him making fairly frequent defensive mistakes (though sample size obviously an issue there).

I would never consider Magic much better than a net-zero defender. Maybe just slightly at his best. And he definitely had years where he was worse. But I'm a little surprised you thought he made frequent defensive mistakes in the video I posted. I count 12 (52%) good plays, 7 (30%) bad plays, and 4 (18) neutral plays. I don't know for sure, but remembering when Vantage Sports was publishing detailed tracking data, my guess is making a mistake (of varying degree) 30% of the time isn't too different than what your average player does if you look closely.

Spoiler:

Magic does a good job at covering the open man once the Lakers start trapping and correctly doubles Moses late in the shot clock to force a tough shot. (good)

Kareem rotates to Iavarony since no one picked him up in transition and Magic gets in front of Moses's rim run. This surprises Moses enough that he misses the layup. (good)

Magic tries to strip the ball from Moses after a defensive rebound and fouls, which is non-shooting, but moves the Lakers towards the penalty. (bad)

Magic helps on Toney's drive and forces a traveling violation. (good)

Cooper gambles on a backcourt steal leaving the rest of the Lakers defending 4-on-5. Magic fronts Dr. J rather than contest Cheek's jumper. I think this is an acceptable play given the situation. (neutral)

Cooper falls down, and Cheeks drives, but Magic rotates and stops the penetration. (good)

Magic gives up a lob to Dr. J. (bad)

Magic makes a good read, as he notices Dr. J is looking to pass, getting the deflection and almost the steal. (good)

Dr. J blows by Magic. (bad)

Magic argues with the ref and doesn't get back in transition. (bad)

Magic helps on Moses after an offensive rebound and draws offensive foul. (good)

Magic gets back in transition and contests the jumper. (good)

Magic has to guard Moses in transition, sags off him enough to cut off Cheeks drive, while preventing the pass to Moses. (good)

Magic has to guard Moses again in transition, and does a good job keeping vertical and close, forcing a tough shot. (good)

Magic gets a defensive rebound. (neural -- because it wasn't that contested)

Iavarony is able to get just inside the paint because Magic is off to his side. Magic could have contested better. This play is tricky, though, because Toney was unguarded on the weakside. I'll call it a bad play but with a better camera angle it may have been neutral. (bad)

Magic looks like he's unaware of Toney, but suddenly helps, and Toney turns the ball over as a result. (good)

Magic is slow following Jones since Moses has a mismatch with Landsberger. Magic weakly contests the jumper. (neutral)

Magic and Landsberger miscommunicates on the PnR which allows Cheeks to get free throws. Magic stunted so I'm not so sure his plan was actually to switch. I think it's bad especially since there was no reason to switch. (bad)

An offensive play somehow made it into the video...

Magic sags towards Dr. J who's guarded by Landsberger in transition, which lets Toney get into the paint, but with help nearby I think this is the correct read. Ideally, though, Magic is quick enough to still get in front of Toney. (neutral)

Magic helps on Dr. J's drive and then on Toney's drive. Does a real good job contesting Toney's shot but a foul on McGee is called beforehand. (good)

A weird offensive rebound on a free throw has Magic guarding Moses. Magic gets off balance which lets Moses drive and gets to the rim. (bad)

Magic contests Dr. J's jumper. (good)

[Dr Positivity]

68 was an abnormally strong year for the Lakers. If you compare 69 Lakers to the other West and Baylor teams, Wilt's impact looks a little better, still not through the roof though. It's possible the pre 68 Lakers teams are a better comparison for a team that lost a lot of depth to get Wilt. Wilt's 2nd season with the Lakers where he plays 12 Gs is also a not bad measure for his value to them, they ended up having a noticeably worse season despite having a 21ppg Happy Hairston. On the whole I would say Wilt likely has value to the Lakers his first few seasons. But if it's just making them 55 W team instead of 45 W team, that's probably still below what other contenders do here. I side with Wilt's impact to Warriors and Sixers looking positive as well (Improves team in rookie season, is catalyst to PHI quickly rising to the top ), although the question again is whether it's enough to be put over some sick players impact wise

[Tesla]

1st Vote: Shaquille O'Neal
2nd Vote: Wilt Chamberlain

This a difficult one for me. I have Shaq/Wilt/Magic/Bird/Kobe/Hakeem all in the same ballpark and I am having a hard time ranking them. The reason I went with Shaq first is that I trust his peak the most. I do feel both my picks in terms of being face of the franchise probably have actually the most issues out of the rest of the deserving candiates this high, but I can't deny their dominance.

I have Wilts longevity better, which typically for me is enough to have him ahead when everything else is close (which it is) but I'm choosing Shaq because I feel like he had more of a mean streak in terms of imposing himself to win. Shaq could clown around, be a diva---but once he began to enter his peak, if it was a big game you can count on him being the best player on the court -- against anyone and he would do it in incredible fashion over and over and over. I feel like that was Shaqs best quality, he may have been able to impose himself more than anyone in a 3 to 5 year streak in the playoffs. While he has some durability concerns, he was still typically healthy enough to win his team enough games to get into the playoffs, and from there he typically showed up and played through whatever injuries he had lingering.

I want to touch on KG again, as I did before in I believe the #3 thread. I really feel
like I am hating on KG but I really like him as a player (whats not to like? which is maybe partly for his ranking reach?) I would be reacting this way if people were arguing for Barkley, Both Malones, Etc this high ie: great players but great players that just dont deserve to be this high.

KG was really really good, but he won one championship with Boston in 4-5 possible years, its great but hardly better than what others have done that have not been voted in. I know its not all about rings, winning, etc but he also has some production shortcomings as well. I just dont get it, there is a lot of thought and research that people are putting in backing KG and its really good stuff but its ignoring a lot of simple and basic facts that occured, and it occured really recently. I watched KG a lot, he was a player I really wanted on my team, but I never even felt like he was the best player in the league except perhaps 03-04, where he certainly played like the best player in the league, but I still probably didnt feel like he was the very best when push came to shove. So in hindsight we have these wonderful impact type stats that show us all the MVP voters were wrong most of his career (he was only top 5 MVP voting half the time as more than a handful of other candiates still not voted in were) I was wrong in my assessment of him, he actually was the greatest player of his era but he just had really bad teams...And when he had a great team, he won one championship. I need to ignore so much in order to rank him this high, we might as well take all impact stats we have, make a little formula with them and do a decending +\- ranking for all the ATG ranking and call it a day. My other issue with KG was his general imprint beyond the court was weak, hell Paul Pierce was more of the face of that Boston team. Anyhow, I think a lot of the arguements for KG are good, and do make me sway towards him... when you are comparing him to like level greats. CP3 has incredible impact too, but I'm not about to take arguements of him over Magic Johnson seriously in terms of a GOAT ranking.... compare him to GP, Kidd, Nash.. great! OK thats my 2cents again, Ive put in more effort bashing KG picks than defending my own :\ , so I think Ive talked about enough on this matter.

[Dr Spaceman]

1 - Wilt
2 - Bird

Must I recall my arguments? Quite a few others didn't on the last thread, just sayin'

Magic was a below average defender at best, just like Bird

Bird was not close to a below average defender. He had outstanding instincts, some of the best hands ever, and for a wing his defensive rebounding is off the charts. He played out of position for a lot of his prime and had a lot of trouble in straight man D against athletic 3s, but in the modern game he'd be a 4 and a damn good defensive one at that.

The eye test says Larry was a terrible defender, he couldn't stay with 3's and didn't play post defense well against 4's and 5's. Recently, in an Adrian Dantley thread they showed the ECF finals from 1988 to show how Dantley's defense against Bird was generally excellent (Bird did go off one game) but what I really noticed was how bad Dantley made Bird look. Bird was consistently biting on fakes, blown by with Dantley's first step, and even turned around on post counters. He was awful.

And that's my memory of him defensively. When he retired, Barkley was interview as saying that he was sorry Bird was gone because now Barkley was the worst defender in the NBA. That's unfair, Barkley was worse and Bird was a decent ballhawk, but Bird was a below average defender most of his career.

I mentioned then, as I will now, that by that time Bird was suffering the ailing back that would end his career effectively. Now you might say the bad back shouldn't have him biting on fakes and letting Dantley eat his lunch. But I'd say sure it could. We don't know anything, relatively speaking, about the mind-body connection and injuries can affect guys in weird ways. These guys spend hours upon hours every single day trying to make heir body do what they want... and when it doesn't, it can lead to all kinds of weird results. I don't know why an ankle injury would cause James Harden to miss a bunch of 3s and move like he's playing on benzos, but that's exactly what happened.

Bird was an entirely different player in his youth when he had a healthy body. The C's were consistently a defensive powerhouse, even before McHale took on a huge role, and that simply doesn't track with Bird's reputation as an awful defender. He was playing a high leverage frontclurt position and the team wasn't falling apart. I think people put too much stock in the 1v1 matchups with Wilkins and Dantley, but the game is played for 48 minutes. It's entirely possible Bird was getting killed a few times a game and yet simply making it up with all the smaller contributions he'd make over the course of a game. Bird was also simply a gamer; a type of guy with that spurt of spatial and court awareness and probably the most coordinated athlete we've ever seen simply doesn't become a defensive liability. There's too much pride at stake, simply put, and he was a prideful guy. I'm comfortable saying from 80-84, at the very least, he was somewhere between a +1 and +2 on the defensive end. Not elite, but certainly a difference maker.

[Dr Positivity]

Malone has much better super star longevity

Not the same "superstar" quality.

and easier to build around.

Why? Because Minnesota's front office was incompetent? Garnett actually led a team to the championship.

I mean Garnett may have been A leader on that Boston team. But ending up on a superteam as part of a three tops setting, and settling back into playing a role is hardly the same thing as muscling a team home as its undisputed #1. At the point you can score 18ppg and you team still wins the title? You know you have some pretty amazing teammates doing their own thing at a very high level.

Garnett won a title, and he was a huge part of it. It obviously was not a ring chasing situation. But there's also a gap between that sort of "winning a title" and what Hakeem, or Dirk, or Bron a couple of years ago did, or what Mailman would have had to have done to have beaten the Jordan Bulls as his team's only 15+ppg scorer.

I agree KG didn't carry the team as much as Dirk, Hakeem, or 03 Duncan who were the only all-stars on their team. But few have seasons like that, and yet are credited as outright #1 more commonly than KG is. Why can't KG be a "best player" on the level of say... 2009 and 2010 Kobe? When getting from the media's PPG bias and using better stats like RAPM, WS/48, BPM, I don't see a reason to think KG's lead over Pierce and Allen is smaller than's Kobe's over Gasol and Odom. There's more evidence to suggest the opposite - Gasol leads both 09 and 10 Lakers in WS/48 and BPM and Odom has higher 09 RAPM, Kobe in 10. Even in PER, a stat designed to favor Kobes over Garnetts, Garnett's lead in 08 over the rest of the Celtics is easily more impressive than either Kobe year (Kobe actually trails Pau in 2010)

Or how about 2005 Duncan where there's a good case that Manu just straight up has as good a season as him. Manu is ahead in RAPM and BPM, Duncan is narrowly ahead in WS/48,in the regular season but then he has the decided edge in playoff advanced stats and many feel he should have gotten Finals MVP. 99 Duncan can also be debated where Robinson had higher WS/48 and BPM. It's a pretty reasonable possibility to me that Robinson playing as an elite defender and high post floor spacer was the most high impact player on that team.

Then there's seasons like say 01 and 02 Shaq, 06 Wade, 07 Duncan where yes, it's clear who the best player was, but is a gap like 01 Shaq vs Kobe any more of a difference than say KG vs Pierce? If you value KG's impact enough, not really.

[Tesla]

Agreed on Bird, in his prime/peak he was a positive on the defensive end. Very smart, good on the boards and did more good than bad on that end. Players like Dantley scored on everyone, and even made them look silly at times but he was in many ways the anti-Bird, he was very low impact overall playee but a high effiency scorer - which is an oddity, but thats exactly what he was.

[Tesla]

Not the same "superstar" quality.


Why? Because Minnesota's front office was incompetent? Garnett actually led a team to the championship.

I mean Garnett may have been A leader on that Boston team. But ending up on a superteam as part of a three tops setting, and settling back into playing a role is hardly the same thing as muscling a team home as its undisputed #1. At the point you can score 18ppg and you team still wins the title? You know you have some pretty amazing teammates doing their own thing at a very high level.

Garnett won a title, and he was a huge part of it. It obviously was not a ring chasing situation. But there's also a gap between that sort of "winning a title" and what Hakeem, or Dirk, or Bron a couple of years ago did, or what Mailman would have had to have done to have beaten the Jordan Bulls as his team's only 15+ppg scorer.

I agree KG didn't carry the team as much as Dirk, Hakeem, or 03 Duncan who were the only all-stars on their team. But few have seasons like that, and yet are credited as outright #1 more commonly than KG is. Why can't KG be a "best player" on the level of say... 2009 and 2010 Kobe? When getting from the media's PPG bias and using better stats like RAPM, WS/48, BPM, I don't see a reason to think KG's lead over Pierce and Allen is smaller than's Kobe's over Gasol and Odom. There's more evidence to suggest the opposite - Gasol leads both 09 and 10 Lakers in WS/48 and BPM and Odom has higher 09 RAPM, Kobe in 10. Even in PER, a stat designed to favor Kobes over Garnetts, Garnett's lead in 08 over the rest of the Celtics is easily more impressive than either Kobe year (Kobe actually trails Pau in 2010)

Or how about 2005 Duncan where there's a good case that Manu just straight up has as good a season as him. Manu is ahead in RAPM and BPM, Duncan is narrowly ahead in WS/48,in the regular season but then he has the decided edge in playoff advanced stats and many feel he should have gotten Finals MVP. 99 Duncan can also be debated where Robinson had higher WS/48 and BPM. It's a pretty reasonable possibility to me that Robinson playing as an elite defender and high post floor spacer was the most high impact player on that team.

Then there's seasons like say 01 and 02 Shaq, 06 Wade, 07 Duncan where yes, it's clear who the best player was, but is a gap like 01 Shaq vs Kobe any more of a difference than say KG vs Pierce? If you value KG's impact enough, not really.

He certainly can be, and most people feel he was... I certainly give him credit for that one time he did it.