RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #39

[pandrade83]

His team improved in SRS, and he finished 4th in WS the prior year. I don't know much about the guys on the team, but looking at them, it looks like the best guys got old as they were old by basketball standards of the day (30 & 28)

Ultimately, I'm not convinced Cousy was better than Macauley in '51. When someone else gets 12 more WS than you do, your hold on it is tenuous to be generous. And there needs to be a little bit more substance as to what happened then his team wasn't very good his rookie year to convince me.

Look at Steve Nash in 05/06. He wasn't exactly killing the WS. And Steve Nash had killer efficiency.

Floor generals get very underrated in advanced stats like PER/WS. RAPM would be a good stat, but we don't have it.

He wasn't killing it in WS but he wasn't getting beat by 12 in the metric either and was still hitting double digits - a figure Cousy never hit. Stockton beat Malone 3 times in their mutual primes & Magic surpassed Kareem in '82, so it's not unheard of for a floor general to surpass an elite big. Frazier beat Reed in '70 both in the RS & Playoffs - it can be done.

I know WS isn't going to be Cousy's friend and I can accept that he's not going to kill it on the metric and it's not the only thing we should judge him on just because it's the only advanced metric we have. I can't accept that someone else is generating 12 more WS than him and then turning around and attributing GOAT impact to Cousy - or even saying that he was the best player on that particular team. WS isn't always going to tell us who was the best player on a team. But that disparity is too large.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #41:

Isiah Thomas - 3 (JordansBulls, oldschooled, scabbarista)
Paul Pierce - 2 (Dr Positivity, trex_8063)
Reggie Miller - 1 (LABird)
Bob Cousy - 1 (euroleague)
Allen Iverson - 1 (Winsome Gerbil)
Kevin McHale - 1 (penbeast0)
Tracy McGrady - 1 (twolves97)
Wes Unseld - 1 (pandrade83)

Thread will be open ~16-18 hours more.

@ Narigo - I cannot count your vote without some reasoning. Rules are rules.

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[Doctor MJ]

Vote: Reggie Miller
Alt: Paul Pierce

As I've said, I believe that Reggie is basically the archetype for the off-guard, a positional role that is now central to how the game is played. You combine that with how every moment of how he plays on offense adds to the damage he causes to the defensive scheme and the fact that +/- stats seem to me to indicate that his impact truly was excellent...and I actually think you could argue he deserves to be much higher than this.

[trex_8063]

Nothing has changed, except perhaps a determination to get Westbrook in here at some point:

39- Iverson
40- Cousy

Can you please at least copy and paste some reasoning from a prior thread. People typically won't go back to search out your posts from a previous thread, and for consistency I need some reasoning in order to count your vote.

[Hornet Mania]

39. Reggie Miller
Alt. Isiah Thomas

After much consideration I have to pick Reggie out of the relatively-even pool of players that are being tossed around at this stage. Great longevity, and (imo) impact that goes beyond the box score thanks to his constant motion (something Ray Allen also did really well, a useful comparison for those too young to see Reggie in his prime) that forced defenses to account for him even when he wasn't touching the ball ultimately put him over the top. Thomas is my alt, a fierce leader of an iconoclastic repeat champion. I don't love him as a player, but his influence on that team is (again, imo) undeniable.

[THKNKG]

Vote: Reggie Miller
Alt: Paul Pierce

As I've said, I believe that Reggie is basically the archetype for the off-guard, a positional role that is now central to how the game is played. You combine that with how every moment of how he plays on offense adds to the damage he causes to the defensive scheme and the fact that +/- stats seem to me to indicate that his impact truly was excellent...and I actually think you could argue he deserves to be much higher than this.

Short on time, so I'll piggyback this answer since its reasoning is very similar to my own.

Vote: Reggie Miller
2nd: Nate Thurmond

HM: Dikembe

(sidenote - anyone have any thoughts on Nate vs dikembe as defenders?)

[Clyde Frazier]

Vote 1 - George Gervin

Vote 2 - Dolph Schayes

Looking at gervin's playoff resume, it certainly leaves something to be desired in comparison to isiah. That said, he was still an impressive playoff performer, putting up the following #s from 75-83:

~28.8 PPG, 7 RPG, 3 APG, 1 SPG, 1 BPG, 50% FG, 82% FT, 56% TS, 113 ORTG, .163 WS/48

In 79, the spurs faced the defending champion bullets in the ECF, with a heartbreaking 2 pt game 7 loss. Gervin scored 42 pts in the game, including 24 in the 2nd half. The spurs and bullets ranked 1st and 2nd in SRS respectively that season.

In 82, the spurs made a mid season trade for talented scorer Mike Mitchell. He would only appear in 57 games for the spurs, and gervin still led the spurs to the 7th best SRS in the league. They would fall to the eventual NBA champion lakers (4th in SRS) in the WCF.

In 83, the spurs (6th in SRS) would again fall to the lakers (3rd in SRS) in the WCF. Gervin and Mitchell both had solid performances in the post season that year, but simply weren't enough for a deep lakers roster that featured magic, kareem, nixon, wilkes, mcadoo and cooper.

I was very close to voting for thomas here, and I'm sure I will be soon, but looking at those teams he played on in the late 80s, they were super talented. They weren't built like a big 3, but closer to the 70 knicks or 04 pistons in that they had talent across the board structured toward a specific gameplan.

Dumars, Dantley, Aguirre, Rodman, Vinnie Johnson, Laimbeer, Mahorn, etc.

And let's not forget HOF coach Chuck Daly. In no way am I knocking isiah's contribution to those team accomplishments, but he was lucky to have the support he had along the way. Had gervin and gilmore had more time together during each other's primes, i'm sure both would have helped each other to further playoff success.

[Winsome Gerbil]

Nothing has changed, except perhaps a determination to get Westbrook in here at some point:

39- Iverson
40- Cousy

Can you please at least copy and paste some reasoning from a prior thread. People typically won't go back to search out your posts from a previous thread, and for consistency I need some reasoning in order to count your vote.

Frankly I'm a little nonplussed what to even "argue" at the point. We appear to be hitting a banal point where people are just scrambling for the safety of TS% and playing for some winning teams.

I'll just repeat some stuff again:

Iverson -- 11x All Star, 7x All NBA (3/3/1), 4x Scoring Champ, 1x MVP, 26.7pts 3.7reb 6.2ast, 24,368 Career points 20.9PER
-- holds the 7th highest scoring average of all time.
6 times Iverson finished in the Top 10 in MVP voting, and won it in 2001.

Wilkins -- 9x All Star, 7x All NBA (1/4/2), 1x Scoring Champ, 24.8pts 6.7reb 2.5ast, 26,668 Career points 21.6PER
-- holds the 14th highest scoring average of all time.
5 times Nique was in the Top 10 in MVP voting, peaking at #2.

Gervin -- 9x All Star, 7x All NBA (5/2) (+2 AllABA 0/2), 4x Scoring Champ, 25.1pts 5.3reb 2.6ast, 26,595 Career points 21.4PER
-- holds the 9th highest scoring average of all time.
6 times Gervin was in the Top 10 in MVP voting, peaking at #2 twice.

Reggie Miller -- 5x All Star, 3x All NBA (0/0/3).... 18.2pts 3.0reb 3.0ast, 25,279 Career points 18.4PER
-- holds the 96th highest scoring average of all time.
Miller barely merited an MVP mention, only receiving points in 2 seasons, and finishing 13th and 16th respectively.


Paul Pierce -- 10x All Star, 4x All NBA (0/1/3).... 19.7pts 5.6reb 3.5ast, 26,397 Career points 19.7PER
-- holds the 55th highest scoring average of all time.
Pierce barely merited MVP mentions, but did finish Top 10 one season (he finished 7th).


So you tell me? How do you argue that?

In any case, I'm not changing my votes. MVPs > non-MVPs. All NBA players > sporadic All Stars. Guys who actually dominated he league > guys who didn't.

39) Iverson
40) Cousy

P.S. I should note that the term "efficiency" appears in PER (Player EFFICIENCY Rating) too, because it recognizes that "efficiency" refers to ALL a player's contributions on court, not just a single aspect like scoring efficiency.

[Outside]

Vote: Kevin McHale
Alternate: Isiah Thomas
HM: Nate Thurmond

I'm late to this thread (and have missed the past several -- that whole work and real life thing), so I'll argue for Nate in the next thread.

My vote goes to McHale due to his great combination of offensive and defensive skills and being 2nd behind Bird on multiple championship teams. Longevity hurts him here due to injuries, but I don't dock him points for being a 6th man, which was still an honored and valued position for the Celtics. He may not have started games at that time, but he finished them.

Off the top of my head, Olajuwon is the only post player I can think of with better feet and post moves than McHale. He may have looked like a gangly collection of used parts, but he used his height and length effectively. Played on a well-balanced, unselfish team, which suppressed his stats compared to others who were stars on lesser teams. That's particularly true for rebounding, where his numbers look unmpressive, but his teams were consistently among the league leaders in rebounds, and he had great rebounding teammates in the frontcourt (Bird and Parish) plus good rebounding guards. Had a TS% of 60.5. One of the great power forwards of all time, and I would normally have him much higher than this, but guys like Malone, Barkley, Garnett, and Pettit have better numbers and/or longevity.

[Pablo Novi]

VOTE: Bob Cousy
ALT: George Gervin

Repeated from last thread:
Of those not-yet selected, only Gervin comes close to Cousy's domination of their own position during their own era. Cousy was selected 1st-Team ALL-NBA TEN times (one of only 10 players ever so honored in the 80 combined years of the: NBL, ABA, NBA); plus two additional 2nd-Team ALL-NBA selections. Sure most of his Great Years were during the 1950's, a decade definitely weaker than all subsequent decades - but he DOMINATED his position for a decade - one can hardly do more or ask for more than that. (Btw, I'm no Celtics' or Cousy fan; nor was/am I a big fan of Gervin's - I liked both of their's play but neither was a favorite of mine).

Gervin was selected ALL-League NINE times (5 X 1st-Team, 4 X 2nd-Team) (the highest number of selections for any player we have not yet voted-in not-named Cousy).

The significance of being selected to ALL-League teams can not be over-stated. The 100++ people who are the selectors are PAID to report on the sport - who could possibly be in a better position to report on which players dominated each year. Further, the large number of them is super-effective in canceling out any individual biases (much like, but much better than: Olympic Diving voting (where the top and bottom votes are eliminated, and the diver's score is based on the remaining votes)).

The ALL-League selection process is so good, that since I've been paying attention to it (the 59-1960 season); I've never had any MAJOR problems with it. Imo, it TRUMPS by a huge margin any and all reliance on any other factor / stat or combination of them. Again, THEY were there, it was THEIR JOB to observe closely and report accurately. They did get it right.

Cousy (and Gervin) had WAY MORE Great Years (as defined here as being selected ALL-League 1st-Team or 2nd-Team) than many of the players we've already voted in to our GOAT list; and WAY MORE Great Years than ALL of the players currently getting more traction than they are.

[trex_8063]

Frankly I'm a little nonplussed what to even "argue" at the point. We appear to be hitting a banal point where people are just scrambling for the safety of TS% and playing for some winning teams.

I assume you're referring to Win Shares and/or WS/48. By the same token, one could suggest you're "scrambling for the safety" of scoring lots of points for bad-ish teams (ppg and PER).
Personally, I don't like to cast aside any metric. And fwiw, the formula results I'd presented previously (the formulas which consistently ranked Pierce somewhere in the 36-42 range) had a heavy basis in PER and MVP Shares, as well as a little in Awards/Honors accrued.


And fwiw, all the guys you mentioned played ~13-14 seasons (~14.5 for Nique---with a couple of absences in between---14 for Gervin, ~13.7 for Iverson iirc, and 13.1 for Cousy).

With Miller and Pierce we're looking at 18 and 19 seasons, respectively. Thus noting career averages is not exactly apples to apples (i.e. how much might your candidates' career numbers have fallen if they played another 4-6 seasons). fwiw, Pierce's PER after 14 seasons was 20.7, Miller's was 18.9. But whereas that was it for the careers of the guys you mentioned, Pierce went on to have three more legitimately "good" years; Miller had FOUR more.


Anyway, thank you for providing some arguments.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #51 (17 counted votes, requiring 9 for true majority):

Reggie Miller - 4 (Doctor MJ, Hornet Mania, LABird, micahclay)
Isiah Thomas - 3 (JordansBulls, scabbarista, oldschooled)
Paul Pierce - 2 (Dr Positivity, trex_8063) *Narigo, sadly I cannot count your vote with reasons
Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Kevin McHale - 2 (Outside, penbeast0)
George Gervin - 1 (Clyde Frazier)
Allen Iverson - 1 (Winsome Gerbil)
Tracy McGrady - 1 (twolves97)
Wes Unseld - 1 (pandrade83)

So Gervin, AI, TMac, and Wes are first eliminated. Three become ghost votes (2 for Gervin, 1 for Schayes), one vote transfers to Cousy.

Miller - 4
Thomas - 3
Cousy - 3
Pierce - 2
McHale - 2

So Pierce and McHale are next eliminated. I feel a little bad for Gervin at this point, as he seems somewhat a victim of the system being used, but two more secondary votes for Gervin become ghost votes. One transfers to Isiah, one vote to Miller.

Miller - 5
Isiah - 4
Cousy - 3

So Cousy is next eliminated. Yet another 2ndary vote for Gervin becomes a ghost vote, and one vote transfers to Isiah.......which leaves us with an interesting dilemma:

Miller - 5
Isiah - 5

Does anyone remember, has this happened before such that we have precedent on what to do in this situation? I'll be looking, but if anyone remembers, please speak up.

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[drza]

Pressed for time.

Vote: Isiah Thomas
2nd: no strong feeling at moment

Isiah justification: I've done a few posts supporting Zeke in this project. Cliff notes - while the Bad Boys were a defense-first team, their exact defense without a strong offense led directly to a drop from 59 wins & title in 1990 to only 50 wins in 1991. Here are links to a couple of articles linking Thomas to the success of the Pistons offense, more fleshed out:

Link 1: http://hoopslab.rotowire.com/post/164458238801/isiah-thomas-better-impact-than-shown-by

Link 2: http://hoopslab.rotowire.com/post/164848231531/isiah-thomas-part-2-key-to-championship-level

[drza]

lol. I literally would have had that post up before trex's vote count, but I took a couple of extra minutes to put the image in there. Am I the tie-breaker?

[trex_8063]

I was about to throw this into a run-off between Reggie and Isiah, but drza just came in with his pick a mere 3 minutes after I posted the vote count (which I think is close enough since we don't actually have set-in-stone start/stop times for these). His vote would push Isiah over the top and eliminate the need to extend this thread for another day.

Will include his, which makes it:

Isiah - 6
Reggie - 5

Calling it for Isiah. Will have the next up in a moment....

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