RealGM Top 25 Player Poll-#14 2018-19

[SkyHookFTW]

Went with Gobert.

[rcc8884]

Wait I'm confused, how did it go from a near tie between Jokic/Irving and then Oladipo takes the #13 spot lol.

All the Jokic voters went for Oladipo where there was already a significant amount of voters.

Although it doesn't seem like many outside of Celtics fans agree with me, I think Irving should be the choice here. I don't see the argument of him not being a top 20 player, let alone not a top 25 player. I think this 12-16 range is just about right for him. Although statistically he may not seem like the best choice to some, you can not deny his talent and ability to take over a game with his ability to handle the ball and score.

The argument is that he’s very injury prone and his defense severely hampers his overall impact and this is shown by his on/off data, impact stats, and how the team performs when he’s injured. He missed 20+ games in both 2016 and 2018 and when he was hurt, both times the team had near identical records with him in the lineup or out. Meanwhile, the Jazz had a losing record with Gobert out last year and still managed to finish the season with the 5 seed due to the incredible record they put together in the games he was in the lineup. Over Kyrie’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 1 point better when he’s on the floor vs. the bench. Over Draymond Green’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 13.5 points better with him on the floor than the bench.

Several formulas have been derived to try to isolate teammate effects and none of them are perfect, but they seem to pretty consistently show Kyrie outside the Top 30 in this kind of impact year after year after year. 82 games isn’t much of a sample when dealing with lineups where certain players will share the floor a lot so people will look at occasional wonky data where someone like Tyus Jones will rank higher than he should due to having even less minutes to analyze than a starter and want to throw out impact stats altogether, but if you start looking at multi-year samples, it’s kinda surprising how much sense they make and how closely they align with the eye test.

The fact that Kyrie’s outside the Top 30 not just once in one formula, but every single year in every ranking I’ve seen makes me think he’s really not having that much impact. And the formulas aren’t even disputing his offensive skill. RPM, the formula I trust most generally has him as a Top 10-15 offensive player. It’s just that those defensive shortcomings are enough to make a Top 15 offensive player only fall in the 30-40 range overall.

I understand the questions about his defense as we all know he is not a good defender. It is the same argument that gets thrown against Devin Booker on the weekly Devin Booker is overrated thread that seems like never ends. In the current state of the NBA, offense is more valuable than defense because offense has been deemed more valuable by the refs and the league itself in some of the rule changes. The best offensive player will be able to beat the best defensive player more often in one v one scenarios, which leads to elite offensive skills being more valuable than elite defensive skills and weak defensive skills being seen as less of a weakness than weak offensive skills.

Take Andre Roberson as an example. He is one of the best defensive players in the league without a doubt, but yet, you would have to expand the conversation to the best 100 players to get him in the conversation. This is because of his lack of offensive talent shooting the ball. Defense just isn't as valuable in this three-ball era.

I was having a tough time in this poll choosing between Kyrie, Gobert, and Draymond as I see these three players a good ways above the rest who are currently in the poll. Gobert and Draymond are two of the best defensive players in the game right now, while Kyrie is an elite offensive player. I understand the advanced statistics do not say Kyrie is in the top 15 as you said and his defense brings him down to the 30 range. But, when watching Kyrie play on a night-to-night basis (not saying I did, although I did watch a good bit of Celtics), you cannot deny his offensive impact and I just think some of these statistics that have him around 30 overcompensate for defense in this high scoring, fast paced era.

[iggymcfrack]

All the Jokic voters went for Oladipo where there was already a significant amount of voters.

Although it doesn't seem like many outside of Celtics fans agree with me, I think Irving should be the choice here. I don't see the argument of him not being a top 20 player, let alone not a top 25 player. I think this 12-16 range is just about right for him. Although statistically he may not seem like the best choice to some, you can not deny his talent and ability to take over a game with his ability to handle the ball and score.

The argument is that he’s very injury prone and his defense severely hampers his overall impact and this is shown by his on/off data, impact stats, and how the team performs when he’s injured. He missed 20+ games in both 2016 and 2018 and when he was hurt, both times the team had near identical records with him in the lineup or out. Meanwhile, the Jazz had a losing record with Gobert out last year and still managed to finish the season with the 5 seed due to the incredible record they put together in the games he was in the lineup. Over Kyrie’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 1 point better when he’s on the floor vs. the bench. Over Draymond Green’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 13.5 points better with him on the floor than the bench.

Several formulas have been derived to try to isolate teammate effects and none of them are perfect, but they seem to pretty consistently show Kyrie outside the Top 30 in this kind of impact year after year after year. 82 games isn’t much of a sample when dealing with lineups where certain players will share the floor a lot so people will look at occasional wonky data where someone like Tyus Jones will rank higher than he should due to having even less minutes to analyze than a starter and want to throw out impact stats altogether, but if you start looking at multi-year samples, it’s kinda surprising how much sense they make and how closely they align with the eye test.

The fact that Kyrie’s outside the Top 30 not just once in one formula, but every single year in every ranking I’ve seen makes me think he’s really not having that much impact. And the formulas aren’t even disputing his offensive skill. RPM, the formula I trust most generally has him as a Top 10-15 offensive player. It’s just that those defensive shortcomings are enough to make a Top 15 offensive player only fall in the 30-40 range overall.

I understand the questions about his defense as we all know he is not a good defender. It is the same argument that gets thrown against Devin Booker on the weekly Devin Booker is overrated thread that seems like never ends. In the current state of the NBA, offense is more valuable than defense because offense has been deemed more valuable by the refs and the league itself in some of the rule changes. The best offensive player will be able to beat the best defensive player more often in one v one scenarios, which leads to elite offensive skills being more valuable than elite defensive skills and weak defensive skills being seen as less of a weakness than weak offensive skills.

Take Andre Roberson as an example. He is one of the best defensive players in the league without a doubt, but yet, you would have to expand the conversation to the best 100 players to get him in the conversation. This is because of his lack of offensive talent shooting the ball. Defense just isn't as valuable in this three-ball era.

I was having a tough time in this poll choosing between Kyrie, Gobert, and Draymond as I see these three players a good ways above the rest who are currently in the poll. Gobert and Draymond are two of the best defensive players in the game right now, while Kyrie is an elite offensive player. I understand the advanced statistics do not say Kyrie is in the top 15 as you said and his defense brings him down to the 30 range. But, when watching Kyrie play on a night-to-night basis (not saying I did, although I did watch a good bit of Celtics), you cannot deny his offensive impact and I just think some of these statistics that have him around 30 overcompensate for defense in this high scoring, fast paced era.

All of those things you mentioned are already being taken into account in these formulas though. It’s not like they rank the players offensively and then rank the players defensively and then take an average. They look at “on average how many points better does Kyrie make the offense” and “on average how many points worse does Kyrie make the defense” and then come to a cumulative number. They’re literally just looking at how much he affects the actual score of both teams. Once the points are on the board, a point you keep the other team from getting is just as valuable as a point you gain yourself.

And again, even with all his points, the 2016 Cavs were 37-16 with him, 20-9 without him. The 2018 Celtics were 41-19 with him, 14-8 without him. If he was really having this elite impact because his offense was so incredibly valuable relative to how harmful his defense was, we’d see it in the results. Jazz going 37-19 with Gobert compared to 11-15 without him, that’s an impact. It shows up on the scoreboard and it shows up in the win/loss record. Warriors being +10.9 with Draymond on the floor and -2.6 with him on the bench over the last 6 years of playoff games, that’s a real impact too. This impact that Kyrie’s having on the games is strictly hypothetical, it just doesn’t show up in the scores and results of the games.

[wablty]

My main interests with these threads at this point is to see how deep the "Karl Towns defense" group think runs on this forum right now. Everyone is missing the forest for the trees.

[iggymcfrack]

Anyone else following the results of this thread like an actual game? We’ve got another one going down to the wire. 48-47 lead for Kyrie over Gobert now with an hour and a half remaining, was 47-42 earlier. One last chance for uncommitted delegates to carefully consider their votes.

[iggymcfrack]

My main interests with these threads at this point is to see how deep the "Karl Towns defense" group think runs on this forum right now. Everyone is missing the forest for the trees.

I get what you’re saying. Towns is an improving young player and I felt like his defense did get a little better the last couple months of the season. He seems like he should be a Top 15 player next year. But there are just so many qualified guys. How do you choose between a second year Ben Simmons, arguably the best playoff performer of the last 5 years in Draymond Green, the best defensive player in the game in Gobert looking to bounce back from an injury year where he was incredibly impactful, Lowry who’s Top 10 in RPM every year, and an improving Towns? There really is just so much depth in the league right now. I feel like you can think he’s just a half-step below Durant and Curry and still not rank him in the Top 16 or 17 guys.

[iggymcfrack]

Wow, was looking with only a few seconds left and Gobert was up a vote and it ended as a tie!!!! This game’s going to overtime! What a thriller! I guess there’s a run-off vote now?

[lakerz12]

My main interests with these threads at this point is to see how deep the "Karl Towns defense" group think runs on this forum right now. Everyone is missing the forest for the trees.

Are you saying you think he's a top 15 player? Look at his playoff performance. The only way he would be a top 15 player is if he were an elite defender.

[Saints14]

Wait I'm confused, how did it go from a near tie between Jokic/Irving and then Oladipo takes the #13 spot lol.

All the Jokic voters went for Oladipo where there was already a significant amount of voters.

Although it doesn't seem like many outside of Celtics fans agree with me, I think Irving should be the choice here. I don't see the argument of him not being a top 20 player, let alone not a top 25 player. I think this 12-16 range is just about right for him. Although statistically he may not seem like the best choice to some, you can not deny his talent and ability to take over a game with his ability to handle the ball and score.

Seems like the main argument for Irving over the past few polls boils down to "well, slotting Kyrie here sounds about right"

[Tim Kempton]

Irving is a superb player, but Gobert is a true game changer. His impact on the Jazz is absolutely undeniable. Without him, they likely miss the playoffs. Gobert deserves this spot. Probably should have been voted in already.

[Tai]

The argument is that he’s very injury prone and his defense severely hampers his overall impact and this is shown by his on/off data, impact stats, and how the team performs when he’s injured. He missed 20+ games in both 2016 and 2018 and when he was hurt, both times the team had near identical records with him in the lineup or out. Meanwhile, the Jazz had a losing record with Gobert out last year and still managed to finish the season with the 5 seed due to the incredible record they put together in the games he was in the lineup. Over Kyrie’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 1 point better when he’s on the floor vs. the bench. Over Draymond Green’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 13.5 points better with him on the floor than the bench.

Several formulas have been derived to try to isolate teammate effects and none of them are perfect, but they seem to pretty consistently show Kyrie outside the Top 30 in this kind of impact year after year after year. 82 games isn’t much of a sample when dealing with lineups where certain players will share the floor a lot so people will look at occasional wonky data where someone like Tyus Jones will rank higher than he should due to having even less minutes to analyze than a starter and want to throw out impact stats altogether, but if you start looking at multi-year samples, it’s kinda surprising how much sense they make and how closely they align with the eye test.

The fact that Kyrie’s outside the Top 30 not just once in one formula, but every single year in every ranking I’ve seen makes me think he’s really not having that much impact. And the formulas aren’t even disputing his offensive skill. RPM, the formula I trust most generally has him as a Top 10-15 offensive player. It’s just that those defensive shortcomings are enough to make a Top 15 offensive player only fall in the 30-40 range overall.

I understand the questions about his defense as we all know he is not a good defender. It is the same argument that gets thrown against Devin Booker on the weekly Devin Booker is overrated thread that seems like never ends. In the current state of the NBA, offense is more valuable than defense because offense has been deemed more valuable by the refs and the league itself in some of the rule changes. The best offensive player will be able to beat the best defensive player more often in one v one scenarios, which leads to elite offensive skills being more valuable than elite defensive skills and weak defensive skills being seen as less of a weakness than weak offensive skills.

Take Andre Roberson as an example. He is one of the best defensive players in the league without a doubt, but yet, you would have to expand the conversation to the best 100 players to get him in the conversation. This is because of his lack of offensive talent shooting the ball. Defense just isn't as valuable in this three-ball era.

I was having a tough time in this poll choosing between Kyrie, Gobert, and Draymond as I see these three players a good ways above the rest who are currently in the poll. Gobert and Draymond are two of the best defensive players in the game right now, while Kyrie is an elite offensive player. I understand the advanced statistics do not say Kyrie is in the top 15 as you said and his defense brings him down to the 30 range. But, when watching Kyrie play on a night-to-night basis (not saying I did, although I did watch a good bit of Celtics), you cannot deny his offensive impact and I just think some of these statistics that have him around 30 overcompensate for defense in this high scoring, fast paced era.

All of those things you mentioned are already being taken into account in these formulas though. It’s not like they rank the players offensively and then rank the players defensively and then take an average. They look at “on average how many points better does Kyrie make the offense” and “on average how many points worse does Kyrie make the defense” and then come to a cumulative number. They’re literally just looking at how much he affects the actual score of both teams. Once the points are on the board, a point you keep the other team from getting is just as valuable as a point you gain yourself.

And again, even with all his points, the 2016 Cavs were 37-16 with him, 20-9 without him. The 2018 Celtics were 41-19 with him, 14-8 without him. If he was really having this elite impact because his offense was so incredibly valuable relative to how harmful his defense was, we’d see it in the results. Jazz going 37-19 with Gobert compared to 11-15 without him, that’s an impact. It shows up on the scoreboard and it shows up in the win/loss record. Warriors being +10.9 with Draymond on the floor and -2.6 with him on the bench over the last 6 years of playoff games, that’s a real impact too. This impact that Kyrie’s having on the games is strictly hypothetical, it just doesn’t show up in the scores and results of the games.

The one thing I'll say is that part of the reason the Celtics have been able to win without Kyrie is that they were able to defend well without him, and thus win games that were in the 80s or 90s. They were 11-2 without him when they allowed less than 100 points, but 3-6 without him when they were allowed more than 100 points. Even though in those 9 games they scored 100 points 7 times, it does suggest they were unable to keep up the needed scoring for one reason or another without Kyrie (and Hayward). Yet in the playoffs, they allowed 100+ points in 11 of 19 games, and were 4-7 in those games. Obviously, the Celtics brought Kyrie and to a degree Hayward in for their offense, so it's a stretch to say Kyrie being out didn't show up on the scoreboard/W-L in the regular season or the playoffs.

The funny thing is that during the season, people were saying they couldn't rely on only winning games 90-89 come playoff time, and sadly I think that got proven right. I'm sorry RPM can't address something like that, but that doesn't prove the Celtics are somehow better off without Kyrie. And leave it to a Laker fan to point out that after lauding the Celtics for their playoff run last year, that somehow they're "significantly worse" than the Raptors WITH Kyrie and Hayward. Based off what? Surely you can't have the Celtics being worse with Kyrie.

And by the way, if RPM is so great why is there nothing for playoffs? 2017 playoff RAPM has Kyrie 13th overall (5th in offense), and 2016 28th overall (2nd in offense). Obviously better in 2017 than 2016, but Rozier in 2018 had a playoff RAPM ranking him 65th, and Tatum being 36th. If difference in sample sizes for some players really renders RPM that useless that playoff numbers weren't run, then that's interesting. Either way, as far as RAPM, interesting that it seems to serve Kyrie a little more in the playoffs when he's supposed to be much more of a liability than the regular season, with your point of switching him 75 times in a possession...

[rcc8884]

The argument is that he’s very injury prone and his defense severely hampers his overall impact and this is shown by his on/off data, impact stats, and how the team performs when he’s injured. He missed 20+ games in both 2016 and 2018 and when he was hurt, both times the team had near identical records with him in the lineup or out. Meanwhile, the Jazz had a losing record with Gobert out last year and still managed to finish the season with the 5 seed due to the incredible record they put together in the games he was in the lineup. Over Kyrie’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 1 point better when he’s on the floor vs. the bench. Over Draymond Green’s career in the postseason, his teams have been 13.5 points better with him on the floor than the bench.

Several formulas have been derived to try to isolate teammate effects and none of them are perfect, but they seem to pretty consistently show Kyrie outside the Top 30 in this kind of impact year after year after year. 82 games isn’t much of a sample when dealing with lineups where certain players will share the floor a lot so people will look at occasional wonky data where someone like Tyus Jones will rank higher than he should due to having even less minutes to analyze than a starter and want to throw out impact stats altogether, but if you start looking at multi-year samples, it’s kinda surprising how much sense they make and how closely they align with the eye test.

The fact that Kyrie’s outside the Top 30 not just once in one formula, but every single year in every ranking I’ve seen makes me think he’s really not having that much impact. And the formulas aren’t even disputing his offensive skill. RPM, the formula I trust most generally has him as a Top 10-15 offensive player. It’s just that those defensive shortcomings are enough to make a Top 15 offensive player only fall in the 30-40 range overall.

I understand the questions about his defense as we all know he is not a good defender. It is the same argument that gets thrown against Devin Booker on the weekly Devin Booker is overrated thread that seems like never ends. In the current state of the NBA, offense is more valuable than defense because offense has been deemed more valuable by the refs and the league itself in some of the rule changes. The best offensive player will be able to beat the best defensive player more often in one v one scenarios, which leads to elite offensive skills being more valuable than elite defensive skills and weak defensive skills being seen as less of a weakness than weak offensive skills.

Take Andre Roberson as an example. He is one of the best defensive players in the league without a doubt, but yet, you would have to expand the conversation to the best 100 players to get him in the conversation. This is because of his lack of offensive talent shooting the ball. Defense just isn't as valuable in this three-ball era.

I was having a tough time in this poll choosing between Kyrie, Gobert, and Draymond as I see these three players a good ways above the rest who are currently in the poll. Gobert and Draymond are two of the best defensive players in the game right now, while Kyrie is an elite offensive player. I understand the advanced statistics do not say Kyrie is in the top 15 as you said and his defense brings him down to the 30 range. But, when watching Kyrie play on a night-to-night basis (not saying I did, although I did watch a good bit of Celtics), you cannot deny his offensive impact and I just think some of these statistics that have him around 30 overcompensate for defense in this high scoring, fast paced era.

All of those things you mentioned are already being taken into account in these formulas though. It’s not like they rank the players offensively and then rank the players defensively and then take an average. They look at “on average how many points better does Kyrie make the offense” and “on average how many points worse does Kyrie make the defense” and then come to a cumulative number. They’re literally just looking at how much he affects the actual score of both teams. Once the points are on the board, a point you keep the other team from getting is just as valuable as a point you gain yourself.

And again, even with all his points, the 2016 Cavs were 37-16 with him, 20-9 without him. The 2018 Celtics were 41-19 with him, 14-8 without him. If he was really having this elite impact because his offense was so incredibly valuable relative to how harmful his defense was, we’d see it in the results. Jazz going 37-19 with Gobert compared to 11-15 without him, that’s an impact. It shows up on the scoreboard and it shows up in the win/loss record. Warriors being +10.9 with Draymond on the floor and -2.6 with him on the bench over the last 6 years of playoff games, that’s a real impact too. This impact that Kyrie’s having on the games is strictly hypothetical, it just doesn’t show up in the scores and results of the games.

Sorry for making you wait, I had to be somewhere. I like you and your thoughts.

I don't think using records for a comparison with Irving will give the best results. Those Cavs teams had Lebron and when Kyrie was out, Lebron knew he had to do it all and took the game upon himself leaving the records with and without Irving as having the (almost) exact same ratio of wins compared to losses. The Cavs with Lebron are still going to be able to beat my Suns with or without Kyrie.

With the Celtics, that ratio is positive in Kyrie's favor for him helping the team but I also do not think this is a fair representation for him. This Celtics team was very very good without Kyrie as they help very solid players everywhere and terrific depth due to the great executive decisions that had been made in the previous years. When you have a Swiss Army Knife in Horford, one of the most polished rookies in recent memory in Tatum, solid sophomore in Brown, and depth down to your 10th or 11th man that could be 6th or 7th men on other teams, I am not surprised the Celtics still succeded without Irving. But again, that team would still beat most teams with or without Irving due to the all-around quality of that team.

Gobert is much more valuable to his team than Irving is as without Gobert, they were lacking their defensive presence as well as the around-the-rim threat and there was not someone else on the team who could step up and take his place (Would Ekpe Udoh, who wasn't in the league the past two years, start in his place?). This causes such a significant drop off over Gobert that the team is unable to win games without him.

What I think you view what I'm saying as proving your point. Gobert seems to be more crucial to his team therefore he is the better player. But for these stats, I would say this wouldn't show the true effect as the Celtics had such a well-rounded team where the backups played like low-end starters so the drop off from all-star to your below average starter isn't as significant as the drop off from all-star to European player which would result in the team not winning as much.

You could also view what I'm saying and compare records of the teams and say how the Celtics weren't even that much better than the Jazz (55 wins to 48). Therefore, Irving really isn't that much better than your average replacement level player while Gobert is. I may be thinking too highly of the Celtics and think their team and system under Stevens is better than it actually is as I would say they even underperformed this past year. These are all fair arguments that just depend on how you overall see the Jazz and the Celtics. I would argue that even though Gobert was more important to his team, Irving is the better player but it isn't seen clearly as the drop-off to his backup isn't that steep compared to most and especially Gobert.

I would go into Draymond but this post is long enough and I want to stop typing right now. I can later if you want me to.

And yes, I literally did not use a single statistic in this whole post which is kinda shocking now thinking back

[jazzfan1971]

RPM loves it some JOkic. And I love RPM. So, I'm not going to be throwing any stones, but can someone tell me why Utah is better than Denver if Jokic is better than Gobert???

[lakerz12]

RPM loves it some JOkic. And I love RPM. So, I'm not going to be throwing any stones, but can someone tell me why Utah is better than Denver if Jokic is better than Gobert???

Jazz were only 2 games better in the regular season. That's basically nothing. But I would say Gobert's supporting cast was slightly better. If Milsap plays a whole season I'd feel differently.

A lot of it obviously comes down to your team strategy...Gobert, as a defensive juggernaut, could be a better player overall on some teams. While Jokic is the obvious choice for an offensive minded team.

[h4rrison]

Demar Derozan

[wablty]

My main interests with these threads at this point is to see how deep the "Karl Towns defense" group think runs on this forum right now. Everyone is missing the forest for the trees.

Are you saying you think he's a top 15 player? Look at his playoff performance. The only way he would be a top 15 player is if he were an elite defender.

Look at a lot of surefire HOF players first playoff performance. Kevin Durant sucked. Giannis sucked. Dozens of great players sucked. Towns played last year at 21-22.

And this thread is about the best players for the upcoming season, not about the top 15 players last year (which he probably was anyway). Even marginal improvement from there will vault him forward. If he's even an average defender, he instantly becomes a fringe MVP candidate. He compares favorably to Dirk. If he suddenly figures it all out and his defensive acumen goes all the way to good (not great), and his defensive problems if you watch are largely situational awareness and focus, he becomes a Best Player in the World candidate. Karl Towns is probably the most gifted scoring big we've ever seen. There's never been a 7 footer who is as good as he at the bucket and from 3 (and everywhere in between) at volume. His efficiency is astounding and he isn't even getting star calls yet.

[wablty]

RPM loves it some JOkic. And I love RPM. So, I'm not going to be throwing any stones, but can someone tell me why Utah is better than Denver if Jokic is better than Gobert???

Rubio and Mitchell.

[jazzfan1971]

RPM loves it some JOkic. And I love RPM. So, I'm not going to be throwing any stones, but can someone tell me why Utah is better than Denver if Jokic is better than Gobert???

Rubio and Mitchell.

Love those 2. But Rubio was hot garbage the first month we had him and as good as Mitchell was, he wasn't much better than Harris. And you had to like Jamal Murray's game.

I mean I guess you could say Rubio and Mitchell were better than Murray and Harris, but it wouldn't be a big gap. Would it?

[Funcrusher]

RPM loves it some JOkic. And I love RPM. So, I'm not going to be throwing any stones, but can someone tell me why Utah is better than Denver if Jokic is better than Gobert???

Rubio and Mitchell.

Love those 2. But Rubio was hot garbage the first month we had him and as good as Mitchell was, he wasn't much better than Harris. And you had to like Jamal Murray's game.

I mean I guess you could say Rubio and Mitchell were better than Murray and Harris, but it wouldn't be a big gap. Would it?

The rest of the Nuggets team outside of those three was trash, and Millsap was injured most of the season.