Manu Ginobili or Carmelo Anthony

[Gus Fring]

Peak, Prime, Career, who do you got?

[Pelly24]

Give me Manu. I think he was just a more impactful player and more dynamic and could thrive in more settings I believe.

Career: Melo

Peak: Manu

Prime: Tie

[cupcakesnake]

Player Comparison Board or Manu Comparison Board?

I understand why people like to use Manu as a barometer. Specifically as a barometer for polarizing stars who didn't win a lot. Manu has the rings, the clutch playoff moments that these stars lack. But he never touches things like their career total points and minutes or per game averages.

But the arguments all end up being the same whether it's Melo, Iverson, Westbrook ( I think there's been threads for each of these guys now?) Pro-Manu camp will cite the on/off and impact data as well as the winning, the versatility, the mentality. People who arent pro Manu will be a bit offended by the question since they probably rank the flashier names in a higher tier and cite the per game averages and totals.

For me (pro-Manu guy), I think Melo's pure scoring ability is among the all-time greats and I'll think of him whenever the conversation is boiled down to just scoring. His strong base, the lighting quick pull up with great touch, his ability to be a physical bully, they're everything I ever wanted from a scoring package. But Melo is painfully one dimensional and never grew as a player (besides extending his range a bit). By all accounts he seems to have refused to develop as a passer or defender. A scorer with limited passing ability has a hard time propping up a good offense. A defensive sieve playing big minutes is a drain on your team and makes it much harder to win games in the playoffs.

Manu never did scoring at such a volume that Melo did, and I understand that he played in a more stable and consistent situation his whole career. But Manu could score, create for himself and others, defend like a demon, is arguably the best passing 2-guard ever, and was a pretty good shooter for his era. I'll take that versatility in every situation over Melo's master of one, 0 at everything else schtick.

[Ron Swanson]

Manu pretty comfortably for me in all 3 (though I will say 2013 Melo has a case for peak).

Manu only gets overrated when people try to argue his peak/prime in the same class/tier as guys like Kobe, Wade, and Drexler.

[Statlanta]

Carmelo Anthony.

Peak, Prime and Career.

I'd take 2009 Carmelo over any version of Manu Ginobili

[Pelly24]

Player Comparison Board or Manu Comparison Board?

I understand why people like to use Manu as a barometer. Specifically as a barometer for polarizing stars who didn't win a lot. Manu has the rings, the clutch playoff moments that these stars lack. But he never touches things like their career total points and minutes or per game averages.

But the arguments all end up being the same whether it's Melo, Iverson, Westbrook ( I think there's been threads for each of these guys now?) Pro-Manu camp will cite the on/off and impact data as well as the winning, the versatility, the mentality. People who arent pro Manu will be a bit offended by the question since they probably rank the flashier names in a higher tier and cite the per game averages and totals.

For me (pro-Manu guy), I think Melo's pure scoring ability is among the all-time greats and I'll think of him whenever the conversation is boiled down to just scoring. His strong base, the lighting quick pull up with great touch, his ability to be a physical bully, they're everything I ever wanted from a scoring package. But Melo is painfully one dimensional and never grew as a player (besides extending his range a bit). By all accounts he seems to have refused to develop as a passer or defender. A scorer with limited passing ability has a hard time propping up a good offense. A defensive sieve playing big minutes is a drain on your team and makes it much harder to win games in the playoffs.

Manu never did scoring at such a volume that Melo did, and I understand that he played in a more stable and consistent situation his whole career. But Manu could score, create for himself and others, defend like a demon, is arguably the best passing 2-guard ever, and was a pretty good shooter for his era. I'll take that versatility in every situation over Melo's master of one, 0 at everything else schtick.

Yeah I can't make up my mind about how history will look at Melo. I feel like Melo born in 1994 would be better than the Melo we saw.The mid-2000's was just such an ugly period for basketball in some ways. Guys were just unrepentant gunners. As it is though, Melo was never significantly above league average TS% and he appeared to be a below average or unwilling passer.


Manu just seems to have that rare scoring/playmaking combo and even more rare instincts. Harden has to be considered the better player, but I feel like Manu had an IQ, creativity and elasticity that Harden could never match. I would have loved to see a more durable Manu, one that got to play 34 minutes a game as a No. 1.

[yannisk]

If you have a good team Manu, if you have a mediocre team Carmelo

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Manu pretty comfortably for me in all 3 (though I will say 2013 Melo has a case for peak).
Manu only gets overrated when people try to argue his peak/prime in the same class/tier as guys like Kobe, Wade, and Drexler.

On a per minute base, Manu during his prime was like a tier below Kobe or Wade.
Those two were legit "best player in the league" candidates, while Manu was in the 6-10 range in my view.
With the additional plus that he could contribute in more ways and he could fit everywhere, having enormous impact on/off ball, as 1st/2nd/3rd option next to any kind of teammate.

As I say every time, Manu is really unique in history.
No player ever had his statistical footprint and impact per minute while playing so little, and that somehow forces us to think out of the standard ways to compare him to other players.

[trex_8063]

If you have a good team Manu, if you have a mediocre team Carmelo

Generally I agree with what jamaalstar21 has said, and would probably go with Manu for peak, prime, and definitely for career; though not necessarily by huge margins in any (I do think Melo's a little underrated here).

That said, there may be a point to the above statement. I mean, the first part is [imo] obvious: Manu's versatile skillset and willingness to take a more secondary role allows him to mesh successfully pretty much anywhere (and he's proven to be a guy you'd like around in the playoffs [so if you're a playoff team....]). Additionally, "good" teams can afford to load-manage him, and thus extend his usefulness......

Which sort of brings us to the 2nd part of the statement: a mediocre or poor team may not be able load-manage him [at least not if they want to have a shot at the playoffs]. I believe Manu IS theoretically capable of carrying a bad team, but it would require him playing bigger minutes [with bigger usage] and not taking so many nights off......I don't know how long Manu could do that before something gives [durability-wise]. To that end, Melo might be a better fit in that circumstance.

[Owly]

If you have a good team Manu, if you have a mediocre team Carmelo

Generally I agree with what jamaalstar21 has said, and would probably go with Manu for peak, prime, and definitely for career; though not necessarily by huge margins in any (I do think Melo's a little underrated here).

That said, there may be a point to the above statement. I mean, the first part is [imo] obvious: Manu's versatile skillset and willingness to take a more secondary role allows him to mesh successfully pretty much anywhere (and he's proven to be a guy you'd like around in the playoffs [so if you're a playoff team....]). Additionally, "good" teams can afford to load-manage him, and thus extend his usefulness......

Which sort of brings us to the 2nd part of the statement: a mediocre or poor team may not be able load-manage him [at least not if they want to have a shot at the playoffs]. I believe Manu IS theoretically capable of carrying a bad team, but it would require him playing bigger minutes [with bigger usage] and not taking so many nights off......I don't know how long Manu could do that before something gives [durability-wise]. To that end, Melo might be a better fit in that circumstance.

1) Isn't the gap in production/impact big enough that if it is found that Manu is best at circa 30mpg rather than 35 (in terms of total value, including playoffs), he's still better than Melo at the higher level of minutes (depending somewhat I suppose on replacement's level). And that's not to say all teams will necessarily manage him optimally but maybe it's a touch harsh to punish him for situations in which he might speculatively be worse if a team does a bad job (not just being bad but managing him poorly).

2) If he is more banged up does he play for Argentina less and be the same as he is for NBA (or indeed if we don't assume playing more necessarily hurts him, just hypothesize for some reason he doesn't play international and that he's better). To be fair here Melo played quite a bit for Team USA.

3) Getting into these "what if ..." team management level scenarios, "who would you rather have?" discussions, isn't Melo's higher salary demands (and higher flight risk -"Melo-Drama" and all that - even after you max him out) on the table too.

He gets credit for the extra minutes. Maybe you say he can be a floor raiser even more than he was on a bad team taking on his high usage (and being a good player - actually this is pretty much what he was '14 and '15), but I'm not sure about putting too much into that with the counter being ... and what about a better team. And it's been accepted that Manu is better for that but, even disregarding salary, there are real questions about whether optimizing Melo and optimizing a good team would work. Melo has some good on-off seasons but the best team performance for one is the 3.12 SRS '09 Nuggets (and he's 3rd in on-off within team and 4th or equal-3.5th [depending in Engellman's ordering matters, but in any case tied calculating to 1d.p.]) ... there's an argument he's not just worse for a contender than Manu but that it's plausible that defensive issues (especially if he wants to play the three, which I believe he did) get magnified and iso attack skills because severely less valuable. Basically, if you want to put Manu under the microscope in bad situations ... it's probably even more pertinent (if you have any element of Championship Probability Added to your rankings) to investigate Melo in good ones. And then too looking at impact/on-off stuff and say lokking into them for middling teams ... aren't there some years where the Spurs aren't spectacular with Manu off the floor ('05, '08 and '11 they're slightly into negative with him off the floor and more frequently so in the playoffs - very possibly some colinearity there, not saying Spurs would be below average sans Manu in those years, though I would note some on here have been pushing that he was playing backups a lot [as a negative], if one really bought into that then it would be Manu's bench versus bench periods that carried an otherwise average - I got sidetracked but just to say I think there's impact stuff trying to mitigate for competition ... Manu was really good) I think Manu is not only better if you are on a contender or at the fringe of but clearly better lifting you from the middle to contention. Melo might be more optimized on a bad team, better (than MG)? I don't know but the combination of being speculative and requiring the time to speculate on a 0% title probability outcome make it hard for me to get to into it or weight it that much. Others' mileage may differ.

[trex_8063]

If you have a good team Manu, if you have a mediocre team Carmelo

Generally I agree with what jamaalstar21 has said, and would probably go with Manu for peak, prime, and definitely for career; though not necessarily by huge margins in any (I do think Melo's a little underrated here).

That said, there may be a point to the above statement. I mean, the first part is [imo] obvious: Manu's versatile skillset and willingness to take a more secondary role allows him to mesh successfully pretty much anywhere (and he's proven to be a guy you'd like around in the playoffs [so if you're a playoff team....]). Additionally, "good" teams can afford to load-manage him, and thus extend his usefulness......

Which sort of brings us to the 2nd part of the statement: a mediocre or poor team may not be able load-manage him [at least not if they want to have a shot at the playoffs]. I believe Manu IS theoretically capable of carrying a bad team, but it would require him playing bigger minutes [with bigger usage] and not taking so many nights off......I don't know how long Manu could do that before something gives [durability-wise]. To that end, Melo might be a better fit in that circumstance.

1) Isn't the gap in production/impact big enough that if it is found that Manu is best at circa 30mpg rather than 35 (in terms of total value, including playoffs), he's still better than Melo at the higher level of minutes (depending somewhat I suppose on replacement's level). And that's not to say all teams will necessarily manage him optimally but maybe it's a touch harsh to punish him for situations in which he might speculatively be worse if a team does a bad job (not just being bad but managing him poorly).

I don't think we can claim to know [for certain] that Manu's impact would be substantially bigger [than Melo's, as we're accustomed to seeing from him while playing for Spurs teams] while playing for a bad team....

*If we assume higher mpg and less games off, that is naturally going to lower his per-minute effectiveness (fatigue, nagging injury, higher incidence of foul trouble [causing him to play cautiously/less aggressively], etc).
**Higher usage on offense could conceivable drain him more, making him further less effective on the defensive end (while not necessarily having a positive effect [impact-wise, per-minute] on the offensive end.
***Greater degree of defensive attention (because he's now on a bad team) could [likely, I would say] reduce his per-minute effectiveness/impact on offense.
****Such a high-usage role might not be a role where he is truly "optimized" (as I tend to think he more or less was in San Antonio); and/or lesser quality coaching/schemes [than enjoyed with Pop in S.A.] may reduce effectiveness.

Could he still be more effective/impactful [per-minute] for a bad supporting cast than Melo? Sure. But I think it's far from a given that it would be better by a margin that's "big enough" to off-set the [imo] inevitable durability issues (not withstanding potential walking away from international play). That's all I'm saying.

3) Getting into these "what if ..." team management level scenarios, "who would you rather have?" discussions, isn't Melo's higher salary demands (and higher flight risk -"Melo-Drama" and all that - even after you max him out) on the table too.

tbh, I tend to approach these hypothetical questions purely from an evaluation of them as players, and salary doesn't enter into my thinking at all. If we were to add in consideration of salary, then sure, that could certainly be a factor that tips the scales in Manu's favour, even for a bad team.

I think Manu is not only better if you are on a contender or at the fringe of but clearly better lifting you from the middle to contention. Melo might be more optimized on a bad team, better (than MG)? I don't know but the combination of being speculative and requiring the time to speculate on a 0% title probability outcome make it hard for me to get to into it or weight it that much. Others' mileage may differ.

I basically agree: I think Manu is FAR better for a good team, and at least equal [if not better] at raising the middle to contention or at least up to solid playoff level. For a poor cast, where a lot is put upon him, I'm just not sure. If he is better [per minute] there, too, I guess I'd go so far as to say I'm skeptical it's by a significant margin.

As to how much weight or credit to give to efforts/production/impact that occur in a 0% title probability situation, as you say: "mileage may differ" depending on who you talk to. For myself, I still put a lot of consideration into those kinds of seasons. My reason is that for me player comparisons is about comparing players to ALL of their professional peers (not just the good ones).

This probably, in part, stems from the fact that I have a [loosely ordered toward the back end] ATL that goes as far as ~#350. By that point we're getting into a lot of guys who perhaps don't shift the needle a ton regardless of circumstance, guys who perhaps don't have much of a playoff resume [because they played for mostly poor teams], guys who aren't too distanced from the mean in many ways, etc. So I disregard nothing.

[Owly]

Generally I agree with what jamaalstar21 has said, and would probably go with Manu for peak, prime, and definitely for career; though not necessarily by huge margins in any (I do think Melo's a little underrated here).

That said, there may be a point to the above statement. I mean, the first part is [imo] obvious: Manu's versatile skillset and willingness to take a more secondary role allows him to mesh successfully pretty much anywhere (and he's proven to be a guy you'd like around in the playoffs [so if you're a playoff team....]). Additionally, "good" teams can afford to load-manage him, and thus extend his usefulness......

Which sort of brings us to the 2nd part of the statement: a mediocre or poor team may not be able load-manage him [at least not if they want to have a shot at the playoffs]. I believe Manu IS theoretically capable of carrying a bad team, but it would require him playing bigger minutes [with bigger usage] and not taking so many nights off......I don't know how long Manu could do that before something gives [durability-wise]. To that end, Melo might be a better fit in that circumstance.

1) Isn't the gap in production/impact big enough that if it is found that Manu is best at circa 30mpg rather than 35 (in terms of total value, including playoffs), he's still better than Melo at the higher level of minutes (depending somewhat I suppose on replacement's level). And that's not to say all teams will necessarily manage him optimally but maybe it's a touch harsh to punish him for situations in which he might speculatively be worse if a team does a bad job (not just being bad but managing him poorly).

I don't think we can claim to know [for certain] that Manu's impact would be substantially bigger [than Melo's, as we're accustomed to seeing from him while playing for Spurs teams] while playing for a bad team....

*If we assume higher mpg and less games off, that is naturally going to lower his per-minute effectiveness (fatigue, nagging injury, higher incidence of foul trouble [causing him to play cautiously/less aggressively], etc).
**Higher usage on offense could conceivable drain him more, making him further less effective on the defensive end (while not necessarily having a positive effect [impact-wise, per-minute] on the offensive end.
***Greater degree of defensive attention (because he's now on a bad team) could [likely, I would say] reduce his per-minute effectiveness/impact on offense.
****Such a high-usage role might not be a role where he is truly "optimized" (as I tend to think he more or less was in San Antonio); and/or lesser quality coaching/schemes [than enjoyed with Pop in S.A.] may reduce effectiveness.

Could he still be more effective/impactful [per-minute] for a bad supporting cast than Melo? Sure. But I think it's far from a given that it would be better by a margin that's "big enough" to off-set the [imo] inevitable durability issues (not withstanding potential walking away from international play). That's all I'm saying.

3) Getting into these "what if ..." team management level scenarios, "who would you rather have?" discussions, isn't Melo's higher salary demands (and higher flight risk -"Melo-Drama" and all that - even after you max him out) on the table too.

tbh, I tend to approach these hypothetical questions purely from an evaluation of them as players, and salary doesn't enter into my thinking at all. If we were to add in consideration of salary, then sure, that could certainly be a factor that tips the scales in Manu's favour, even for a bad team.

I think Manu is not only better if you are on a contender or at the fringe of but clearly better lifting you from the middle to contention. Melo might be more optimized on a bad team, better (than MG)? I don't know but the combination of being speculative and requiring the time to speculate on a 0% title probability outcome make it hard for me to get to into it or weight it that much. Others' mileage may differ.

I basically agree: I think Manu is FAR better for a good team, and at least equal [if not better] at raising the middle to contention or at least up to solid playoff level. For a poor cast, where a lot is put upon him, I'm just not sure. If he is better [per minute] there, too, I guess I'd go so far as to say I'm skeptical it's by a significant margin.

As to how much weight or credit to give to efforts/production/impact that occur in a 0% title probability situation, as you say: "mileage may differ" depending on who you talk to. For myself, I still put a lot of consideration into those kinds of seasons. My reason is that for me player comparisons is about comparing players to ALL of their professional peers (not just the good ones).

This probably, in part, stems from the fact that I have a [loosely ordered toward the back end] ATL that goes as far as ~#350. By that point we're getting into a lot of guys who perhaps don't shift the needle a ton regardless of circumstance, guys who perhaps don't have much of a playoff resume [because they played for mostly poor teams], guys who aren't too distanced from the mean in many ways, etc. So I disregard nothing.

I think I was reasonably clear and there's nothing too much to disagree with here so I'll just add a couple of notes.

1) You don't seem to address the possibility that if a bad team found him best at such, he could maintain his actual role (and the hypothesis that he wouldn't despite it [notionally] being worse for them than keeping lower minutes etc ... seems to hinge on bad management - for if it weren't [bad management] then he would be more effective ... maybe you could argue his exact role doesn't exist elsewhere once teammates change but that would seem to be a case for junking impact numbers outright, or else that your discussion partner is using only them to the exclusion of all else, for it would seem a call to massively downgrade impact because it is circumstantial but you assume the discussors know this and it is less so over larger samples in that they play more of the roles that coaches plausibly see fit to play them to maximize them).

2) I don't see that greater defensive attention harms impact necessarily. Worse for him but easier baskets for teammates. "But his teammates aren't as good", sure but that can equally be played that they need his help more than the Spurs did.

3) I don't say that I completely discount 0% title upside scenarios (and to be clear I'm talking player seasons and after dropping them into such, not any season that doesn't happen to be on a contender) but that they do carry somewhat lesser weight because my process, if a had a proper one would, I think, include some Championship Probability Added and that it's hard to justify the time speculating of comprehensively speculating (guessing?) on hypotheticals towards this negative end for each player, especially where they have had huge impacts on good teams,

4) I don't know and it depends "versus what?" (league average starter, league average player, next man up on actual roster, replacement level player) and what your scales are but I would think 350 down have some needle moving seasons, even against the meanest of those bars, albeit perhaps not dramatically so. In any case kudos for looking that deep. Can't say I liked the end result but I admired Slam's ambition for going for a 500 list in 2011.

[trex_8063]

I think I was reasonably clear and there's nothing too much to disagree with here so I'll just add a couple of notes.

1) You don't seem to address the possibility that if a bad team found him best at such, he could maintain his actual role (and the hypothesis that he wouldn't despite it [notionally] being worse for them than keeping lower minutes etc ... seems to hinge on bad management - for if it weren't [bad management] then he would be more effective ...

Perhaps I am making assumptions. However, I don't think those assumptions are completely baseless. A poor team is more likely to have bad management/coaching [than a contender team], I think you would agree. Not talking causation, but merely likelihoods.

Additionally, on a roster with relatively sparse talent, I think a coach may feel pressure (from management, fans, media, etc) to play the ONE outstanding player he has for big minutes. Call it the Butch Van Breda Kolff syndrome: he may wish to avoid potential criticism that may come were they to lose a contentious game while playing Manu only 32(ish) minutes, for example.

If it rubs the wrong way when I just make assumptions as though it's a given, I'm willing to alter my statement slightly to say: I think it's likely that Manu is not load-managed in the same way and/or it's likely his role will be altered when playing on a bad team.

maybe you could argue his exact role doesn't exist elsewhere once teammates change but that would seem to be a case for junking impact numbers outright, or else that your discussion partner is using only them to the exclusion of all else, for it would seem a call to massively downgrade impact because it is circumstantial but you assume the discussors know this and it is less so over larger samples in that they play more of the roles that coaches plausibly see fit to play them to maximize them).

I'm not quite sure what you're saying here. The purple line is very "all or nothing" [i.e. take the impact numbers at face value or don't use them at all], as though there is no middle-ground for interpreting context. The lines that follow then seem to say it's not worth mentioning the circumstantial to persons who already understand that circumstances DO influence the impact numbers [which logically undermines the purple line].

Role and fit influence impact metrics; to me, this isn't even open for debate. Acknowledging this doesn't render them useless to me (indeed, I find them VERY valuable).
And the fact that my discussion partner realizes this [which I believe you do] is not something I see as a reason to not discuss it in greater detail [or perhaps bring it up at all]; that philosophy would sort of put a silencer on a LOT of things that we discuss here, no?

3) I don't say that I completely discount 0% title upside scenarios (and to be clear I'm talking player seasons and after dropping them into such, not any season that doesn't happen to be on a contender) but that they do carry somewhat lesser weight because my process, if a had a proper one would, I think, include some Championship Probability Added and that it's hard to justify the time speculating of comprehensively speculating (guessing?) on hypotheticals towards this negative end for each player, especially where they have had huge impacts on good teams,

I don't think you necessarily have to walk away from a Championship Probability Added philosophy/criteria to look at good players on bad teams. Note Elgee's criteria and making an assessment of "Title Odds on a Random Team"; he still makes that assessment and awards a % probability (even though players had precisely a 0% chance in some of those years).

4) I don't know and it depends "versus what?" (league average starter, league average player, next man up on actual roster, replacement level player) and what your scales are but I would think 350 down have some needle moving seasons, even against the meanest of those bars, albeit perhaps not dramatically so. In any case kudos for looking that deep. Can't say I liked the end result but I admired Slam's ambition for going for a 500 list in 2011.

Yes, I should have specified, I tend to assess players versus roughly "replacement level" [or at least a little below league avg]. This may seem arbitrary and/or flippant, but I basically assume that a replacement level player is.....well, replaceable (and easily so). So anything ABOVE that level is what we might call "career value added" (although realistically the "value added" in one season of league-average play, for example, is near-negligible).

But as that is my principle toward assessing Total Career Value (basis of my ATL), there are a lot of career role players who emerge in my top 350 (guys who never moved the needle a lot......but moved it just a smidge, and did so for a number of years). In many instances they may rank ahead of guys who moved the needle more severely, but did so for only a short time (guys like Ralph Sampson or Bill Walton come to mind).

[Owly]

I think I was reasonably clear and there's nothing too much to disagree with here so I'll just add a couple of notes.

1) You don't seem to address the possibility that if a bad team found him best at such, he could maintain his actual role (and the hypothesis that he wouldn't despite it [notionally] being worse for them than keeping lower minutes etc ... seems to hinge on bad management - for if it weren't [bad management] then he would be more effective ...

Perhaps I am making assumptions. However, I don't think those assumptions are completely baseless. A poor team is more likely to have bad management/coaching [than a contender team], I think you would agree. Not talking causation, but merely likelihoods.

Additionally, on a roster with relatively sparse talent, I think a coach may feel pressure (from management, fans, media, etc) to play the ONE outstanding player he has for big minutes. Call it the Butch Van Breda Kolff syndrome: he may wish to avoid potential criticism that may come were they to lose a contentious game while playing Manu only 32(ish) minutes, for example.

If it rubs the wrong way when I just make assumptions as though it's a given, I'm willing to alter my statement slightly to say: I think it's likely that Manu is not load-managed in the same way and/or it's likely his role will be altered when playing on a bad team.

maybe you could argue his exact role doesn't exist elsewhere once teammates change but that would seem to be a case for junking impact numbers outright, or else that your discussion partner is using only them to the exclusion of all else, for it would seem a call to massively downgrade impact because it is circumstantial but you assume the discussors know this and it is less so over larger samples in that they play more of the roles that coaches plausibly see fit to play them to maximize them).

I'm not quite sure what you're saying here. The purple line is very "all or nothing" [i.e. take the impact numbers at face value or don't use them at all], as though there is no middle-ground for interpreting context. The lines that follow then seem to say it's not worth mentioning the circumstantial to persons who already understand that circumstances DO influence the impact numbers [which logically undermines the purple line].

Role and fit influence impact metrics; to me, this isn't even open for debate. Acknowledging this doesn't render them useless to me (indeed, I find them VERY valuable).
And the fact that my discussion partner realizes this [which I believe you do] is not something I see as a reason to not discuss it in greater detail [or perhaps bring it up at all]; that philosophy would sort of put a silencer on a LOT of things that we discuss here, no?

3) I don't say that I completely discount 0% title upside scenarios (and to be clear I'm talking player seasons and after dropping them into such, not any season that doesn't happen to be on a contender) but that they do carry somewhat lesser weight because my process, if a had a proper one would, I think, include some Championship Probability Added and that it's hard to justify the time speculating of comprehensively speculating (guessing?) on hypotheticals towards this negative end for each player, especially where they have had huge impacts on good teams,

I don't think you necessarily have to walk away from a Championship Probability Added philosophy/criteria to look at good players on bad teams. Note Elgee's criteria and making an assessment of "Title Odds on a Random Team"; he still makes that assessment and awards a % probability (even though players had precisely a 0% chance in some of those years).

4) I don't know and it depends "versus what?" (league average starter, league average player, next man up on actual roster, replacement level player) and what your scales are but I would think 350 down have some needle moving seasons, even against the meanest of those bars, albeit perhaps not dramatically so. In any case kudos for looking that deep. Can't say I liked the end result but I admired Slam's ambition for going for a 500 list in 2011.

Yes, I should have specified, I tend to assess players versus roughly "replacement level" [or at least a little below league avg]. This may seem arbitrary and/or flippant, but I basically assume that a replacement level player is.....well, replaceable (and easily so). So anything ABOVE that level is what we might call "career value added" (although realistically the "value added" in one season of league-average play, for example, is near-negligible).

But as that is my principle toward assessing Total Career Value (basis of my ATL), there are a lot of career role players who emerge in my top 350 (guys who never moved the needle a lot......but moved it just a smidge, and did so for a number of years). In many instances they may rank ahead of guys who moved the needle more severely, but did so for only a short time (guys like Ralph Sampson or Bill Walton come to mind).

I think we just differ on 1. Some is covered later. But put simply: somewhat on the probability of teams messing him up; partly on my own reluctance to engage in (or with others), and doubt over my own ability ability to measure how probable such is and how harmful it would be and meaningfully aggregate this; and significantly in the value of such a downside case (see both the below, but especially the following).

2nd quote (1b?) is very much with regard to if one were to make the argument preceding the purple i.e. "his exact role doesn't exist anywhere else". To take that line is either to assume your debate partner differs wildly from you either because they don't value anything else or you don't value at all. (This wasn't at you). Otherwise you're they're pointing out something both parties know is technically true, and highlights contextuality -which again both parties should know - but also that for big multi-year samples, per the above, rather misses the point that coaches did did try to optimize them and this is the impact they had. I can see the case for pushing someone up, giving the benefit of the doubt if you think they were in bad situations, it's harder for me to see the case for "he's got a huge sample saying he was hugely impactful, but what if he played for idiots?". (Maybe you're higher than me on Spurs as outlier good managers?)

3 may have crossed wires here (or just agreeing and I'm not realizing it)? What you're outlining is pretty much what I'm thinking. And the point is those precisely that if say (made up numbers here) peak Carmelo moves a 20 win team to a 40 win team (if we could know that) ... that 40 win team has only an infinitesimally small chance to win it all. If he moves a 30 win team up 15 wins (to 45), it still is. Apart from top ... 35, say, peaks (otoh), the difference made to teams that aren't already in the average band (and terminology is woolly here) the CPA/CORP is going to be near enough 0. So if one is to incorporate CPA, that aspect of your evaluation skews focus away from focus on how they'd do on what otherwise be low-end teams.

[SinceGatlingWasARookie]

Suppose the Pistons draft Carmelo instead of Darko. Then they trade Corliss Williamson and give Carmelo the Williamson role. The still make the Rasheed Wallace trade and still win the championship. Do we then get a version of Carmelo that tries do fit into a team or does Carmelo want to take shots away from the other Pistons and still make a mediocre effort on defense?

[Dutchball97]

It's Manu for all three.

[Jaivl]

The more talented player: Ginóbili.

[slimreaper2021]

Many for peak (2005 vs 2009), prime and career