prophet_of_rage wrote:Because I rank according to talent as a basketball player in combination with results and context. And the ranking was Ewing at 8 and Reed at 9. Ewing holding nearly every Knick record counts for something. Ewing being a one man show that kept the Knicks in contention with the way more talented Bulls, Rockets, Spurs, Magic says a lot.
Fair enough. Though I’m still not sure why you would ask “How do we get around this that Nash had less success with a far more talented team?” if you take context into account like you say, the answer is pretty obvious to me.
prophet_of_rage wrote:As for the Raptors and Bucks if you watched those series contemporaneously they were not pushover teams at all and one would argue more diverse and talented than the Sixers. They were more than a match for Philly.
I didn’t challenge any of this. I actually did watch the series while it happened, though I haven’t given it a rewatch. Those teams and the Sixers were very close, and the Sixers barely outscored the other teams in both 7 game series. But I think even you see how outrageous the claim is that they were as tough as any team out West. That is what I was replying to. Do you think either of those teams beat any of the teams I listed?
prophet_of_rage wrote:The Suns also faced tough teams in the West but they were theoretically a tough team too. You can't argue they weren't good enough to ever get to the Finals. They never made it because they were consistently exploited coaching wise and with their system. They didn't lose because they were out talented.
Any conversation about cast also needs to bring up opposing competition as well. Otherwise LeBron’s 2018 playoff run should be the greatest of all time for carrying a bunch of scrubs to the Finals, but the fact that he faced a relatively meh East needs to be taken into account. So while the Suns were more talented than the Sixers, their competition was exceptionally better as well. I actually think the greatest Spurs team of all time is either the 2005 or 2007 versions, and the Suns faced both. And they lost both years because...the Spurs were the better team. In other words, the Suns weren’t good enough. Is that wrong to say? Not to mention they faced their fair share of injury problems and suspensions.
Not sure why you keep saying the Suns weren’t out talented. Duncan + Manu + Parker is a very talented core lol, plus they had arguably the GOAT coach (who in your own words, was severely out coaching MDA. Do you put any blame on Nash for this?) and a VERY strong defensive lineup. In ‘10 he faced Kobe + Pau + MWP+ + Odom. 37 year old Grant Hill played the 4th most minutes and was trying to guard Kobe. And it’s not just offensive talent, the defensive talent that other teams had was much better.
prophet_of_rage wrote:What I won't do is take numbers and then go back and repaint a picture based on what I think those numbers should mean without seeing what was going on at the time.
I don’t even know what this means lol. Again, I did see the series. We both probably haven’t seen the 2001 playoffs in its entirety since it happened, so it would be worth our time to go back and refresh our memory about what happened exactly. I’ve seen way too many people here rely on their raw memory to base their opinions, which is just not productive imo. Otherwise I can say the same things that I “saw” and we can’t have any back and forth whatsoever. If there is literally anything to suggest the Bucks/Raptors are close to the West teams, please give me some evidence that goes beyond what you saw only.
There’s no picture to be repainted. You are just grossly overestimating those 2 teams to make your point, and the reasoning is a bit muddled right now.
prophet_of_rage wrote:It's ridiculous to say that Nash was more efficient than Iverson when it was Nash's jon to get the ball to scorers in a wide open system whereas Iverson was charged with scoring the ball no matter what with no spacing in isolation at 5'10 and 160 lbs in the pre-freedom of movement NBA.
I didn’t really touch on this in my response, but it’s worth talking about. Let me just say it’s not ridiculous at all to say Nash was more efficient than Iverson because (1) he actually was, but more importantly (2) we saw Iverson on a good team where he didn’t need to chuck up shots, and not only was Nash still much more efficient, but the team noticeably improved the next year after replacing Iverson with Billups (despite Melo missing more games and playing worse than he did in the 08 RS). You can talk all about how badly Nash would do with an offensively limited roster, but how well would Iverson do with a roster like Nash had? In my mind, there is no way he matches the heights the Suns did, and I care much more about lifting a team to contender status than carrying a limited roster through tough series’ against even competition and then getting blown out by a real contender.
And even though it seems like Iverson was “carrying” much more than Nash, take this into consideration: when Iverson was on the floor, the Sixers played like the 12th best offense in the league, and the 24th with him off in 2001 (difference of +3.9 in ORTG). Nash beats that +3.9 improvement literally every year he’s in Phoenix, and some years in Dallas too. 2005 is his best, the Suns had a 120.3 ORTG when he was on (utterly ridiculous for this time period) and a 102.9 while he was off. In other words, the Suns had BY FAR the best offense in history with Nash on and the
26th best offense in the league with him off. I’m not one to take these on-off stats for face value since there’s a lot of context missing, but it puts into perspective how dominant and crucial Nash was to those teams. There is no way in hell Iverson is leading a similar offensive profile.
prophet_of_rage wrote:So if you look at who performed their role on the team better you need a mix of considerations (reaults (stats, wins, advancement) and context (role, coaching, system, peer group, personal characteristics, talent) etc.
I agree. Though again if results includes stats+wins+advancement, how does Iverson come out ahead based on just one Finals appearance and nothing else in his favor? Nash has more playoff wins, more assist titles than Iverson does scoring (if that matters to you), so is the lone Finals appearance more than enough for you?