#24 - GOAT peaks project (2019)

[Odinn21]

1. 1993 Charles Barkley
Natural scorer and rebounder and it wasn’t like he didn’t pay attention on defense in this particular season. That WCF performance was something to behold. The Sonics were 5th in ppg allowed and 2nd drtg (also, despite the W numbers, they led the league in SRS) and that 44/24 game 7 performance is one of the best ever game 7 performances. Also, despite losing in 6, the Suns didn’t get outscored by the Bulls in the NBA Finals. That was the level of Chuck elevating the team. I’m particularly big on this because there are team performances winning the series despite not outscoring the opponent but those series are usually decided in the last game. Not in this case.

2. 2017 Russell Westbrook
Interestingly I think RW had the highest peak among 2012 OKC trio. People usually like to bash him for his chucking many shots but this dude literally did everything. It might look a bit bizarre for voting someone with a 1st round exit in 5 games but imagine a team that bad that can not play for their lives. 240 minutes in the series and the Thunder were +15 when RW was on the court (194:29) and they were -58 when RW was off (45:31).

3. 2008 Chris Paul
I believe CP3 is the only player who's yet to make the list with 6+ RAPM. This alone should make a case for him. I believe a player's peak happens between his 25 and 32. Not 22. But even though he had many great seasons in LAC, I feel like CP3 never topped his 2007-08 season. All-around great season. Huge averages, assist and steal titles. Insane ast/tov ratio. I'm yet to achieve a conclusive result but CP3's 2007-08 regular season is probably the best season ever in terms of ast/tov (since turnovers getting recorded surely), especially we factor in his assist volume.
And even better display in the playoffs. Dominated the Mavs with one of the best playoffs series by a PG. And then gave one hell of a fight battle against the defending champions. Despite losing in 7, the overall scoreboard of the series was a tie. He was the best player in the series against another top 5 player in that year.

[E-Balla]

What are you talking about? I've posted the numbers. Toronto and San Antonio have better offenses with Demar in place of Kawhi and Danny. Explain that for me? You keep pretending I haven't already addressed this but you refuse to respond to those numbers.

man, I can see both sides of this argument to an extent, but if you genuinely think DeMar DeRozan leaves your offense better equipped to win a championship than Kawhi then I don't know what to tell you

He's better in the postseason. Not better to any large extent though, mostly just more consistent to a large degree. Raises the floor a ton, the ceiling none.

[E-Balla]

1. 1993 Charles Barkley
Natural scorer and rebounder and it wasn’t like he didn’t pay attention on defense in this particular season. That WCF performance was something to behold. The Sonics were 5th in ppg allowed and 2nd drtg (also, despite the W numbers, they led the league in SRS) and that 44/24 game 7 performance is one of the best ever game 7 performances. Also, despite losing in 6, the Suns didn’t get outscored by the Bulls in the NBA Finals. That was the level of Chuck elevating the team. I’m particularly big on this because there are team performances winning the series despite not outscoring the opponent but those series are usually decided in the last game. Not in this case.

2. 2017 Russell Westbrook
Interestingly I think RW had the highest peak among 2012 OKC trio. People usually like to bash him for his chucking many shots but this dude literally did everything. It might look a bit bizarre for voting someone with a 1st round exit in 5 games but imagine a team that bad that can not play for their lives. 240 minutes in the series and the Thunder were +15 when RW was on the court (194:29) and they were -58 when RW was off (45:31).

3. 2008 Chris Paul
I believe CP3 is the only player who's yet to make the list with 6+ RAPM. This alone should make a case for him. I believe a player's peak happens between his 25 and 32. Not 22. But even though he had many great seasons in LAC, I feel like CP3 never topped his 2007-08 season. All-around great season. Huge averages, assist and steal titles. Insane ast/tov ratio. I'm yet to achieve a conclusive result but CP3's 2007-08 regular season is probably the best season ever in terms of ast/tov (since turnovers getting recorded surely), especially we factor in his assist volume.
And even better display in the playoffs. Dominated the Mavs with one of the best playoffs series by a PG. And then gave one hell of a fight battle against the defending champions. Despite losing in 7, the overall scoreboard of the series was a tie. He was the best player in the series against another top 5 player in that year.

Alonzo Mourning had a +7.0 in 98 and a +7.9 in 99.

[Odinn21]

Alonzo Mourning had a +7.0 in 98 and a +7.9 in 99.

Ah. I meant among 10+ year stretch values. That's my mistake not clearing that out. I'm sure there are a lot more seasonal performances, not just Zo.

Edit: Come to think of it, I guess Ginobili also has 6+ RAPM for 10+ season stretches.

[liamliam1234]

He's better in the postseason. Not better to any large extent though, mostly just more consistent to a large degree. Raises the floor a ton, the ceiling none.

Yes, one has consistently been shown to be absolutely indispensable to his team in the playoffs, and the other has been pretty much the opposite over his entire playoff career, but you know, not a large extent. One lifted a second-round exit team to a championship, but you know, no affect on his team’s “ceiling”.

[Odinn21]

Wonder if we'll ever see another C getting in assuming we'll stop at 40. We voted in majority of the goat center peaks.

The remaning peak seasonal performances by a center I can think of;
1949 George Mikan
1970 Willis Reed
1974 Bob Lanier
1975 Artis Gilmore
1976 Dave Cowens
2000 Alonzo Mourning
2009 Dwight Howard

There are so many non-center great peaks out there (Barkley, Westbrook, CP3, Nash, Kidd, Frazier, AD, Harden, Giannis, Kawhi, KD, Baylor, Malone, Pettit, McAdoo, Barry, Payton, Drexler), making me ask this question.

I'm not saying the competition I listed is entirely better than the C list. I believe some of 'em are clearly ahead but my point is the stiff competition.

[liamliam1234]

I am pretty confident that Payton, Drexler, Lanier, and Cowens are not making it. But that does leave 21 names for 18 spots, so it will be interesting to see which three (or four, if a specific unmentioned possibility goes how I fear it may) are excluded.

[No-more-rings]

Barry never had a team nearly that talented though. Sure Harden can win on stacked teams, who couldn't?

Moses took a horrible team to a +5 offense before. We've been through this already, he showed his style of offense could flourish before. He also took the Sixers from a yearly +6 postseason team to a +11 and from a +2-3 offense to a +6 on the postseason.

About this, Harden lost to an equally or even more stacked team so I don’t get that first point.

What Moses turned them into doesn’t matter since we haven’t got to see Harden go to an already stacked team. I’d say we’ve been through that too, that most players didn’t get that chance, KD did it at an extreme level of course so I don’t count it.

And you are really downplaying Harden’s value to the Rockets and how he turned them into what they are, by these type of comments. With Cp3’s decline they would’ve been a sub .500 team last year without Harden. The 2019 Rockets weren’t really stacked when you consider the subtractions, and Cp3’s health/decline.

Re: The passing stuff: Barry does look a bit flashier, and probably quicker/more precise but i’m still not buying his passing/playmaking to be more effective. Harden gathers more defensive attention, he just does and that opens up more opportunities.

And you also completely downplay Harden as one of the goat guards at drawing fouls/contact, some of its bogus but at some point his insane strength for a guard allow this to happen.

Nah I'll openly say Harden is clearly the better scorer no contest. We're talking about passing though and Barry is way better IMO.

RE: Defense/RAPM

So, I don’t know how you could’ve watched Harden in 2018 and thought he was a huge negative on defense. What does the google docs source say about his defense that year?

What I posted. He had a -0.86 DRAPM this year.

Because this source has him as a small positive in 2018 and a negative in 2019 but nothing huge anyway.

https://basketball-analytics.gitlab.io/rapm-data/

That site is completely inaccurate and notoriously off. No one knows how he got those calculations or why they're so wildly off of other RAPM numbers.

I’m not saying it’s a gospel source or anything but i also question if the ones you’re using for Harden vs Melo/Nash are the same, and one year RAPM is flukey anyhow.

The point on it was i think if you looked at a multi-year from like 15-19 i really doubt he’d look as bad as Nash or Melo. Harden’s defense was mediocre to bad in 2019 but he carried and absurd offensive where it should be forgivable(06 Kobe gets a pass), and I don’t think he was much worse if any in 2018 he just had a light more green than ever and Paul turned into a shell of himself sadly.

Multi-year from 2017 to 2019 exists (not 15-19 though) and Harden is a -1.77 DRAPM. Melo is a -0.66 multi-year RAPM in 2014 and Nash is a -1.5 multi-year DRAPM in 2007.

Harden was terrible, I have no idea what you were watching.

So to sum the rest up, you think Harden is terrible defensively, which is a common opinion, i think given his load last year it’s somewhat forgivable because again Kobe’s defense was trash a few of those years and many still consider 06 his peak. Harden’s offense isn’t as resilient in the postseason as Kobe’s but I don’t think it’s far off enough to warrant that much of a gap. If you think Barry’s all around offense is better, i don’t think that’s reasonable and probably have to leave it at that.

I agree that source as some weird results sometimes but most of the top players are in line with what you’d expect.

At the end of the day Harden’s defense can’t hurt you that baldy if he showed he can be a high minute guy on an elite defense, and one that stiffled the KD-Curry Warriors.

[No-more-rings]

1. 19’ Kawhi- For me it’s as simple as his playoff run being imo better than anyone else who’s left. Yeah he missed 20ish games, but he accomplished what everyone strives to do and only some can dream of. And 2017 proved he can play a full season and still be rested enough to dominate, sure you can bring his durability into question, I remember him being a little banged up against the Warriors and maybe some of the Bucks series but he’s shown to have held up better than someone like Cp3 has proven.

I think it’s seriously time for Kawhi to get in here, he’s being knocked way too much for missed regular season games and stuff. His postseason was Wade, Kobe, Dirk level or perhaps slightly behind. That’s a big deal.

2. 19’ Harden- I’m not going to copy that whole thing again, but pre-Warrior Durant wasn’t really even a better postseason scorer than Harden and his all around offense falls comfortably behind when passing/playmaking is added. And i’ve seen nothing from either eye test or data that KD was ever some big difference maker on defense. Harden loses ground against others from defense, that’s why he’s behind Kobe and Wade, but we can’t simply push him so far down where we’re debataing him with like the Ray Allens or Gervins, etc.

3. 18’ Harden- I think even this version is a little better than Westbrook or Cp3 who are close on my radar. Probably would’ve went 17 Kawhi here, but I can’t ignore the injury.

[homecourtloss]

1. 1993 Charles Barkley
Natural scorer and rebounder and it wasn’t like he didn’t pay attention on defense in this particular season. That WCF performance was something to behold. The Sonics were 5th in ppg allowed and 2nd drtg (also, despite the W numbers, they led the league in SRS) and that 44/24 game 7 performance is one of the best ever game 7 performances. Also, despite losing in 6, the Suns didn’t get outscored by the Bulls in the NBA Finals. That was the level of Chuck elevating the team. I’m particularly big on this because there are team performances winning the series despite not outscoring the opponent but those series are usually decided in the last game. Not in this case.

I charted the entire series since it’s all available on YouTube. Suns actually outscored the Bulls by 12 when Barkley was OFF the court. Some of that had to do with Jordan also sitting but both played heavy minutes so there wasn’t much of that. It also had some to do with Barkley’s elbow injury when he fell on it. Anyway, here’s how it breaks down.

Bulls vs. Suns, 1993

Game 1: Final 100-92, Bulls; Barkley, -10

Game 2: Final 111-108, Bulls, Barkley +0

Game 3: Final 129-121 Suns, Barkley, -7

Game 4: Final 111-105 Bulls; Barkley -7

Game 5: Final 108-98 Suns, Barkley +15

Game 6 Final: 99-98 Bulls, Barkley -3

Total: Barkley, -12

Barkley was only a plus on court in one game.

[E-Balla]

About this, Harden lost to an equally or even more stacked team so I don’t get that first point.

What Moses turned them into doesn’t matter since we haven’t got to see Harden go to an already stacked team. I’d say we’ve been through that too, that most players didn’t get that chance, KD did it at an extreme level of course so I don’t count it.

And you are really downplaying Harden’s value to the Rockets and how he turned them into what they are, by these type of comments. With Cp3’s decline they would’ve been a sub .500 team last year without Harden. The 2019 Rockets weren’t really stacked when you consider the subtractions, and Cp3’s health/decline.

I just... Don't agree. At all. The team's performance with him on the bench each of the last 3 seasons has been good because they're a good team without him. Clearly over .500 pevel. And I've been high on the players in his supporting cast for the longest so this isn't a case of me overrating someone like EG, I always held him in high regard.

So to sum the rest up, you think Harden is terrible defensively, which is a common opinion, i think given his load last year it’s somewhat forgivable because again Kobe’s defense was trash a few of those years and many still consider 06 his peak. Harden’s offense isn’t as resilient in the postseason as Kobe’s but I don’t think it’s far off enough to warrant that much of a gap. If you think Barry’s all around offense is better, i don’t think that’s reasonable and probably have to leave it at that.

I agree that source as some weird results sometimes but most of the top players are in line with what you’d expect.

At the end of the day Harden’s defense can’t hurt you that baldy if he showed he can be a high minute guy on an elite defense, and one that stiffled the KD-Curry Warriors.

1. Kobe in 06 isn't his peak IMO. Even if it was he's better than Harden on both sides of the ball comfortably.

2. Barry's offense isn't better than Harden. Again Harden is arguably the WOAT defensive SG and is below where if rate Nash. It's a huge negative.

3. Harden's defense can hurt you. The argument that a team can cover for a player so they can't be that bad is shortsighted and strange. What badness can't be covered up for with enough effort from the other 4 players? A lineup with one of us and the 4 best players on earth would perform, but I'm sure our weaknesses aren't small issues.

[Odinn21]

1. 1993 Charles Barkley
Natural scorer and rebounder and it wasn’t like he didn’t pay attention on defense in this particular season. That WCF performance was something to behold. The Sonics were 5th in ppg allowed and 2nd drtg (also, despite the W numbers, they led the league in SRS) and that 44/24 game 7 performance is one of the best ever game 7 performances. Also, despite losing in 6, the Suns didn’t get outscored by the Bulls in the NBA Finals. That was the level of Chuck elevating the team. I’m particularly big on this because there are team performances winning the series despite not outscoring the opponent but those series are usually decided in the last game. Not in this case.

I charted the entire series since it’s all available on YouTube. Suns were actually outscored the Bulls by 12 when Barkley was OFF the court. Some of that had to do with Jordan also sitting but both played heavy minutes so there wasn’t much of that. It also had some to do with Barkley’s elbow injury when he fell on it. Anyway, here’s how it breaks down.

Bulls vs. Suns, 1993

Game 1: Final 100-92, Bulls; Barkley, -10

Game 2: Final 111-108, Bulls, Barkley +0

Game 3: Final 129-121 Suns, Barkley, -7

Game 4: Final 111-105 Bulls; Barkley -7

Game 5: Final 108-98 Suns, Barkley +15

Game 6 Final: 99-98 Bulls, Barkley -3

Total: Barkley, -12

Barkley was only a plus on court in one game.

We already discussed that (in the KG thread I think) a single playoff series is a too small of a sample size. I made that comment thinking MJ's opponents in the NBA Finals.
---
By the way, I'm having trouble with picking a single season for KD.
In 2017, he missed 20 games in regular season and the team went 16-4 without him, and 2-0 in the playoffs. So, it's very hard to pick 2017 since he missed so many games and his team did very well without him.
In 2019, he was having the best playoffs performance of his career but ended up missing nearly half of the games. (10/22)
In 2014 and 2016, he had monstrous regular season performance but was very underwhelming in the playoffs.

It feels like 2012 is the most complete season of his career. 2013 also has a case. But we know there're multiple seasons he was simply better than his 2012 and/or 2013 versions of himself.

[homecourtloss]

1. 1993 Charles Barkley
Natural scorer and rebounder and it wasn’t like he didn’t pay attention on defense in this particular season. That WCF performance was something to behold. The Sonics were 5th in ppg allowed and 2nd drtg (also, despite the W numbers, they led the league in SRS) and that 44/24 game 7 performance is one of the best ever game 7 performances. Also, despite losing in 6, the Suns didn’t get outscored by the Bulls in the NBA Finals. That was the level of Chuck elevating the team. I’m particularly big on this because there are team performances winning the series despite not outscoring the opponent but those series are usually decided in the last game. Not in this case.

I charted the entire series since it’s all available on YouTube. Suns were actually outscored the Bulls by 12 when Barkley was OFF the court. Some of that had to do with Jordan also sitting but both played heavy minutes so there wasn’t much of that. It also had some to do with Barkley’s elbow injury when he fell on it. Anyway, here’s how it breaks down.

Bulls vs. Suns, 1993

Game 1: Final 100-92, Bulls; Barkley, -10

Game 2: Final 111-108, Bulls, Barkley +0

Game 3: Final 129-121 Suns, Barkley, -7

Game 4: Final 111-105 Bulls; Barkley -7

Game 5: Final 108-98 Suns, Barkley +15

Game 6 Final: 99-98 Bulls, Barkley -3

Total: Barkley, -12

Barkley was only a plus on court in one game.

We already discussed that (in the KG thread I think) a single playoff series is a too small of a sample size. I made that comment thinking MJ's opponents in the NBA Finals.
---

Oh, I agree, but I wanted to point out the data if it wasn’t available. The series was interesting, though, especially how much the games were decided by Majerle’s open three shooting. Barkley spent time on court without Jordan on court and really didn’t push the needle much as far as score was concerned.

[Narigo]

1.2014 Durant- Cant believe hes fallen so far. At his peak, he was competing against LeBron as the best player in the league .

2.1990 Charles Barkley- 89-91 Barkley was a monster offensively. It hard to pick which season is his best one. He had a great post game and good ball-handler especially transition. Extremely efficient from the field.

3.1997 Karl Malone

[No-more-rings]

1.2014 Durant- Cant believe hes fallen so far. At his peak, he was competing against LeBron as the best player in the league .

Only in the regular season, the postseason gap even that year was pretty big.

[freethedevil]

1.2014 Durant- Cant believe hes fallen so far. At his peak, he was competing against LeBron as the best player in the league .

He wasn't anywhere near as good as Lebrun in the playoffs, so no, "competing" is being used very liberally here.

[euroleague]

1. KD 14 - he carried a pretty weak team, and dominated on both ends. Had a great season, and did better by quite a lot than the LBJ teams against the Spurs. Criticized for his playoff performance, but he was defended by all time great counters to him.

2. Karl Malone 98 - He dominated his contemporaries, beating more talented teams and anchoring great regular season teams. Stockton was getting old, his teammates outside of stockton were mostly ineffective, and blaming him for losing to MJ/Rodman/Pippen/Kukoc with how much talent he had is asinine. This was an elite peak, and he still would've won if the foul was called on MJ on his push-off.

3. Isiah Thomas 90 - while he slacked a bit in the regular season, he absolutely dominated the playoffs. Isiah is one of the most underrated players in terms of playmaking impact, defensive coordination, and what he brought to the team.

[No-more-rings]

1. KD 14 - he carried a pretty weak team, and dominated on both ends. Had a great season, and did better by quite a lot than the LBJ teams against the Spurs. Criticized for his playoff performance, but he was defended by all time great counters to him.

2. Karl Malone 98 - He dominated his contemporaries, beating more talented teams and anchoring great regular season teams. Stockton was getting old, his teammates outside of stockton were mostly ineffective, and blaming him for losing to MJ/Rodman/Pippen/Kukoc with how much talent he had is asinine. This was an elite peak, and he still would've won if the foul was called on MJ on his push-off.

3. Isiah Thomas 90 - while he slacked a bit in the regular season, he absolutely dominated the playoffs. Isiah is one of the most underrated players in terms of playmaking impact, defensive coordination, and what he brought to the team.

Thomas over Kawhi, Westbrook, Harden, Cp3, Giannis, and Barkley?

[euroleague]

1. KD 14 - he carried a pretty weak team, and dominated on both ends. Had a great season, and did better by quite a lot than the LBJ teams against the Spurs. Criticized for his playoff performance, but he was defended by all time great counters to him.

2. Karl Malone 98 - He dominated his contemporaries, beating more talented teams and anchoring great regular season teams. Stockton was getting old, his teammates outside of stockton were mostly ineffective, and blaming him for losing to MJ/Rodman/Pippen/Kukoc with how much talent he had is asinine. This was an elite peak, and he still would've won if the foul was called on MJ on his push-off.

3. Isiah Thomas 90 - while he slacked a bit in the regular season, he absolutely dominated the playoffs. Isiah is one of the most underrated players in terms of playmaking impact, defensive coordination, and what he brought to the team.

Thomas over Kawhi, Westbrook, Harden, Cp3, Giannis, and Barkley?

Barkley will be my next one up. Isiah went to the Finals with no other all-stars. One of the most underrated players on this board. Barkley had Maurice Cheeks, who was better than anyone Isiah had.

Those Pistons were some of the best teams ever, beating the Celtics/Bulls/Lakers. Dumars got better as time went on, but without Isiah he was nothing. Laimbeer is in a similar boat. Dennis Rodman became an elite defender as well, but initially Isiah was carrying that team.

1990 the Bulls were basically the same as 91. Pistons at their peak were better than the Bulls, with arguably less talent, because of how elite he was as a floor general on both ends.

In the Finals, Isiah averaged 28/5/7 on 63% TS with great defense on Porter (1.6 spg .4 bpg).

[Sublime187]

Wonder if we'll ever see another C getting in assuming we'll stop at 40. We voted in majority of the goat center peaks.

The remaning peak seasonal performances by a center I can think of;
1949 George Mikan
1970 Willis Reed
1974 Bob Lanier
1975 Artis Gilmore
1976 Dave Cowens
2000 Alonzo Mourning
2009 Dwight Howard

There are so many non-center great peaks out there (Barkley, Westbrook, CP3, Nash, Kidd, Frazier, AD, Harden, Giannis, Kawhi, KD, Baylor, Malone, Pettit, McAdoo, Barry, Payton, Drexler), making me ask this question.

I'm not saying the competition I listed is entirely better than the C list. I believe some of 'em are clearly ahead but my point is the stiff competition.

I think Howard and Mourning should definitely be considered.