Owly wrote:1) Most of the NBA history isn't now. For a long time players were locked to their clubs. Then they weren't but there wasn't a player max or a contract length max.
If you were well run you pretty much could guarantee your star stayed for the length of their career if you wanted them.
So if look the 70s, in 1970 6 of the 10 all-nba players switched teams in their career, 1971 7, 1972 8 - so 70% changed teams in the early 70s. Included in that is
Oscar, Wilt, and Jabbar who won titles after leaving the team by forcing a trade.
Owly wrote:
2) Is personal taste. But logically if 10th best season is (... using box composites for the sake of simplicity 27.3 PER [LBJ], 25.8 [MJ], 24.8 PER [Karl Malone],
22.9 [Nowitzki], 22.1 [Stockton], 25.3 [Kareem], 24.4 [Duncan] ... I can't see why that would be off the table.
I also disagree with the framing. They aren't better "because of" their tenth season. A player could be a greater player with a greater career because
their full career is better. If your career is at a Buck Williams level (this is mean but just talking versus elites here), year 10 doesn't raise you
much because you aren't moving the needle much (and you weren't close in the first place ... it's not year 10, it's the total). But if you keep providing
longevity of quality why ignore it.
So do you take Stockton over Larry Bird? Stockton's 5th best PER is 22.9, but his 16th is 21.0. That's problem the question - how do you draw the scale so Bird > Stockton?
Owly wrote:3) Even if I really followed/agreed with the logic ... Russell did play in his era and his teams did win those titles. I don't get the
idea that somehow even if you value the titles less than means, okay well lets ignore these years (in which he is the best player on a champ,
which is what you've chosen to care about here).
Maybe the weakest argument of the four.
Should have left the timeline adjustment factor in the comment. Okay, the most titles anyone has won is 11, so if you value the best player ever by champions won, The max score would be 11, and I am trying to assign share to it, so Russell's number would be 11 times x, MJ 6 times y, etc. Again, weakest argument, so I'll drop it.
Owly wrote:4) Leaving aside how handsomely paid Russell was (I don't think that was why he stopped) ... this is a case for a more generous interpretation of older
players (a multiplier to any formula, something specifically solving this problem). Cutting all careers off at 7 years is a blunt tool
(arbitrary year number, chopping out relevant data) used bluntly (isn't applied only to the specific situation to even things out for older
player but indiscriminately on all, creating bigger problems).
Yes 7 is arbitrary and probably too short, but I am trying to value players in their era - so anything that Kevin Garnett accrued in value in his first 4 years were things not available to Oscar Robertson. And the career length of guys like Fulks, Arizin, Neil Johnston, Mikan were shorter than today because of that. It's hard to penalize Russell because he quit after 13 years .