RealGM 2020 Top 100 Project: #84 (Sidney Moncrief)

[sansterre]

I like Lillard fine, but he tends to drop off in the playoffs, has had a comparably short career and has limited impact metrics until recently. I think others have a better case, but then, I definitely err less toward peak than most here.

1. Jeff Hornacek - There are simply not metrics that he looks bad in. His BackPicks BPM, Win Shares CORP and VORP CORP are all well above average for this group. His PIPM is a little underwhelming, though still above average. And his peak WOWYR of +5.2 is one of the best in this group. Surprising, right? And yet, he's weirdly excellent.

Let's imagine that we looked for strong (but not dominant) shooting guard seasons. We're looking for a 2nd/3rd option, so sub 22% usage. He needs to break an OBPM of +2, TS above 57% and post PPX above 22. But we want him to be a solid passer who doesn't make mistakes, so AST% > 22% and TO% below 12.5%. That's a pretty specific player I just asked for. But Hornacek had six of those seasons; nobody else had more than 1. What if I loosened the terms? If I allowed usage rates higher than 22% I'd get Jordan and Kyrie tying with him. If I dropped the shooting efficiency requirement Fat Lever had four of those seasons. If I remove the assist requirement Hornacek had 8 seasons, with Reggie Miller and J.J. Reddick having 5 each. My point is, I'll stipulate that Hornacek was only an average usage player. But within those constraints he 1) scored efficiently, 2) passed well (or at least for volume), 3) turned the ball over very little (Assist:TO of 2.5 for much of his career) and 4) overall contributed to offenses at a solid level. And he did it for a long freaking time. He never really had a "Peak" because his seasons were metronomically excellent. He put up four straight 3+ VORP seasons in Phoenix, then another five in Utah. So if you're trying to remember Hornacek's time when he dominated the league . . . you won't find it. He was merely really good for a very long time.

And he kept showing up on strong teams. His age 25 season (1989) was when the Suns took a big step forward. Was he the one driving it? No, KJ was. But Johnson surely benefited from the spacing that Hornacek provided. And by VORP, Hornacek was the 2nd best player on both the '89 and '90 Suns (two teams that made my Top 100 list). In '92 The Suns posted a +5.68 RSRS with Hornacek as their best player (according to VORP). From 1992 to 1993 the Suns replaced Hornacek with Danny Ainge, and replaced Tim Perry and Andrew Lang with Charles Barkley and Cedric Ceballos. And the team's RSRS improved by . . . +0.59. Perry + Lang -> Barkely + Ceballos is clearly a monster upgrade. And Danny Ainge was no pushover. Was losing Hornacek a bigger blow than we thought? I don't want to overplay it; KJ missed almost half the year and that was clearly a driving force. And I'm not trying to sell you on the idea that Hornacek was a Barkley-level player. He wasn't. But even with KJ missing some time, you'd think the jump from '92 to '93 would be bigger than it was. Unless Hornacek was actually better than anyone realized.

And then Utah. Here are their seasons starting at '93:

1993: 47-35, +1.74 RSRS
1994: 53-29, +4.10 RSRS
1995: 60-22, +7.76 RSRS
1996: 55-27, +6.25 RSRS
1997: 64-18, +7.97 RSRS

They acquired Hornacek in the middle of one of those seasons; any guesses which?

Look. This is all slightly circumstantial. There are other factors that explain why the Jazz went from being decent to being the best team in the conference besides Jeff Hornacek. But Hornacek was clearly a big part of it.

Naysayers would argue that Hornacek was a bad first option. This is totally true. He had no business running your offense as the primary ball handler. But as long as he wasn't asked to take more than 20% of the team's shots he'd space the floor, can shots at a well-above average rate, pass well, not screw anything up and generate a fair number of steals. And the combination of these things had a consistent and genuine impact, even if no one of them is particularly remarkable.

We don't have AuRPM for his whole career, but here are his numbers with the Jazz starting at Age 31:

+3.4, +2.8, +5.9, +5.2, +4.5, +3.1

Two +5 seasons toward the tail-end of his career? That's damned impressive.

2. Terry Porter - Porter is a weird mix of peak and longevity. He played 35k minutes, with 13 different seasons posting higher than a +1 OBPM, and 9 different seasons posting higher than a +2 OBPM. And he retained fair value even late in his career, posting back-to-back +4 AuRPM seasons for the Spurs at the turn of the century. He's 55th in offensive win shares all-time, and 45th in VORP all-time. Most metrics really like Porter; he's more than one standard deviation above the mean in both PIPM and VORP, and his win shares and BackPicks ratings are still well above average.

Porter was a weird sort of tweeter-guard. He rarely posted higher than league average usage rates, but made up for it with efficiency (consistently scoring in the +4 to +6% range) passing well (assist% in the 25-35% range) and being a fair ballhawk (ten different seasons at 2%+ steals). His seven-year peak:

19.9% Usage, +4.5% rTS, 30.5% Ast, 2.2% Steals, 15.4% TO, +3.3 OBPM, +3.9 BPM

It's good, but not great (though again, it's a strong peak combined with a lot of longevity). But in the playoffs he got better. For his nine-year playoff peak (89-97):

20.2% Usage, +7.3% rTS, 26.1% Ast, 1.6% Steals, 12.2% TO, +4.5 OBPM, +4.8 BPM

So in the playoffs (and in fairness, I'm taking slightly different years), Porter slowed as a distributor and grew into an extremely efficient scorer. A nine-year playoff peak with an OBPM at +4.5? That's pretty nice. I'll give you a hint on this; McHale didn't have a nine-year playoff peak at that level (though select seasons were certainly better).

Regular season Terry Porter? He was a strong player with a decently long career and a good peak. But playoff Terry Porter? Playoff Terry Porter was *really* good. Do you know how many players increase both usage and shooting against playoff defenses? Not a lot of them. But Terry Porter is absolutely on that list.

3. Horace Grant - don't have time to write out the support here but it's coming. At some point.


Hornacek > Terry Porter > Horace Grant > D.Green? > Kyle Lowry > Eddie Jones > Bosh > Bellamy > Z.Beaty > Jokic > A.Kirilenko > M.Cheeks > B.Walton > P.George > Webber > LaMarcus Aldridge > D.Issel > A.Iguodala > Schrempf > Moncrief > G.Williams > J.Worthy > C.Anthony > Lucas > Cunningham > A.Hardaway > D.DeBusschere >J.Butler > M. Johnson > D.Lillard > B.King > D.Johnson > C.Hawkins > M.Price > C.Mullin > N.Johnston > K.Irving > K.Thompson > Archibald

[HeartBreakKid]

Criteria

Spoiler:

I'm a pretty big peak guy, I'm not that interested in value of total seasons. The value of multiple seasons to me is to give me a greater sample size to understanding how good they were on the court, not necessarily the totality of their impact through out the years.

I also value impact over all else, and I define impact as the ability to help a team win games. Boxscore stats, team accolades and individual accolades (unless I agree with them personally) have very little baring on my voting so some names will look a bit wonky. The reason why I ignore accolades and winningness is because basketball is a team game and the players are largely not in control of the quality of their teammates or the health f their team (or their own personal health in key moments), thus I don't see the value of rating players based on xx has this many MVPs versus this guy has this many rings. In addition, I simply find this type of analysis boring because it's quite easy to simply look at who has a bigger laundry list of accomplishments.

1) Bill Walton. He is the best player by far here. He was probably a top 3 player in the world during his last couple years in college as well, though I believe this is NBA only. I am quite certain that Bill Walton is a top 20 peak ever. He is a top ten defensive anchor which alone adds more value than anyone left, and his offensive passing can generate very efficient offenses without him needing to score.

2)) Nikola Jokic. #2 vote I'll give to the only guy who is large and passes better than Walton. I'm not a longevity guy but Jokic has actually been a star caliber player for longer than people think. He was greatly underplayed in his 2nd season and Malone was criticized for that even back then. He has 4 seasons of all-star impact and two seasons where I had him as the 2nd best player in the league. I do think his offense is so special from his position that it causes an imbalance that makes him more valuable than two way bigs. His scoring ability might be the best among all the bigs left, and what's great about him is that he doesn't need to score a lot to have impact. Walton's defense is so intense that I can't imagine taking Jokic over that, but everyone else left is a tier or 2 down from either Walton's offense or his defense.


3) Sidney Moncrief - Sidney does everything well. He is lacking longevity, with maybe 5 great seasons - but outside of that he gave a team everything they'd need. Incredible defensive ability, great passing, good scoring (modest volume but outlier efficiency), good rebounder and he plays well with other stars. The Bucks were a pretty consistent threat in the 80s and Sidney may have been the largest individual reason why. Once his prime really started to hit he was a consistent playoff performer as well. Not only does he seem more well rounded than some of the new contenders (Bosh, B Jones, McAdoo, Marion, Wallace) but he is an outlier in two categories, scoring efficiency and defense. Seems like a superstar almost.












Hawkins > Porter > G Williams > Lillard > Issel > Hornacek > H Grant > Bosh > Cunningham > Dennis Johnson >Lucas > C Anthony > DeBusschere

[Hal14]

Votes among players who have received traction:

1. Dennis Johnson
2. Chris Bosh
3. Sidney Moncrief
4. Damian Lillard
5. Nikola Jokic

[Cavsfansince84]

84. Dave DeBusschere
-10 yr prime where he averages 16.5/11.3/2.9 on ts+ of 96
-6x all defense 1st team, 1x all nba 2nd team
-Finishes top 11 in mvp voting from 72-74 while playing for Knicks teams that win lots of games after Reed has injuries
-Big part of two Knicks title teams
-Known for being gritty defender/rebounder and great team guy who also could hit big shots in the playoffs

85. Neil Johnston
-Only a 6 year prime but during which he led the league in win shares 5 straight years(even while playing on a 12 win team), scoring 3 straight years, ts% twice, rebounding once and had ts add over 250 5 straight years(which is incredible).
-5x all nba(4x 1st team, 1x 2nd)
-Co-led the Warriors to a title with Arizin in 56. So in short I think the argument could be made that from 53-58 he was a top 3-5 player in the league every year and had a span of dominance which few players have matched statistically. Also, imo is more athletic than most people probably give him credit for with good length to go with good handles for a center and solid outside shooting(more so for his era).

86. Billy Cunningham
-Averaged 21.2/10.4/4.3 during 11 year career on career ts+ of 101
-5x all nba/aba(4x 1st team, 1x 2nd team)
-4x top 10 in mvp voting(high of 1st in aba, high of 3rd in nba)
-1x nba champ
-joins 35 win Carolina team in the aba and the next year(73) with him they win 57 games and lose in 7 in the conf finals
-from 68-73 playoffs averaged 24.8/12.1/4.5 on ts of 54%(roughly +2.5% league avg)

87. Worthy
88. Lucas
89. Cheeks
90. Mullin
91. Lillard
92. DJohnson
93. Porter
94. Issel
95. Melo
96. Butler
97. Moncrief
98. Jokic
99. Dumars
100. Griffin

others: Webber>King>Williams>Bosh>Grant>Bellamy>Hornacek>Price>Walton>Hawkins

[Doctor MJ]

I'm not a big playoff weighter but those that do - and I think nearly everyone on here does so more than me - have to see that certainly all the bkb-ref aggregates, and I would imagine any box-composite sees a very strong playoff player, especially in prime.

20.4 PER (22.2 age 24-30); .150WS/48 (.177, 24-30); 4.7 BPM (6.3).

Numbers comparable to others in earlier of whom you could make the same criticisms (better team on D probably powered more by others and ensemble cast, next dynasty not good yet, last dynasty[/ies] not healthy...) not that I'd advocate for repeating a mistake but internal consistency from the panel at large - insofar as voter pool is the same - would see a case for Gus now or considerably earlier.

No the scoring efficiency isn't good ... but the turnover economy given the offensive creation burden (for self and others) is. And the steals. And the offensive rebounds for a ... what do we designate him ... combo guard (or point)?

Mind you as you noted Baron would fit the playoff game raising archetype if you didn't need a title with it (or Wanzer - with a title and filthy efficiency if you don't largely discount that era ... maybe even if you do if one genuinely is primarily playoff driven).

I wouldn't necessarily be voting Williams here (based on past projects I might be pushing Elton Brand, I don't know). At very least though "you're still talking about a guy no one would even remember" clanks with me because virtually no one does remember him despite all those numbers and even accolades wise a top 5 MVP finish (103 in career MVP shares, and that's with ABA votes at full weight so having Larry Brown et al above him, and not accounting for the fact that a fair chunk of his prime is under the single vote system which gave out considerably fewer MVP shares per year) and first team all-NBA (both coming off a year he sat out because he played in an era where free agents weren't really "free" yet) ... I certainly wouldn't think of Williams as a player who's remembered too much.

Good post- particularly enjoy the Baron & Wanzer connection. Owly, I want you and others to know that some of the arguments you've made about Williams have hit home with me. I think higher of Williams than I used to because of it.

I am going to start by picking at a loose thread: Offensive rebounding.

When I look at the Sonics in their championship year what I see is that Williams doesn't stand out as an offensive rebounder. Forgive me for trying to guess what might have happened here, but I'm struck by the fact that if you just look at Williams' stats through a modern guard lens of "Zero to Westbrook", Williams looks like a stand out...as do a ton of other guys in the league.

Given that the reason why modern guys don't get offensive rebounds like they used to any more because attempting to do so would hurt their team, praising Williams here is a bit backwards. He's more like a typical - albeit it certainly better than average - guy from his era focusing on a thing that wouldn't work against better opponent strategy.

Of course now you could say I'm getting into the whole "judging based on today's game rather than the player's own era" which I'd say isn't my intent, but the spectre of Lillard obviously looms over my post.

Re: Baron. What's cool with Baron is we can see basically what happened using shooting data. After Baron's 3rd year, he started playing less aggressively trying to get to the basket - and settling for other shots instead - but only in the regular season. In the playoffs he remained just as aggressive and got savvier with time.

We don't have as concrete data for Williams or Wanzer so I'm less confident there, but my mental model for guards whose rise in the playoffs seems like it could be Baron-like to be similarly attacking the basket when the stakes are highest.

[HeartBreakKid]

I'm not a big playoff weighter but those that do - and I think nearly everyone on here does so more than me - have to see that certainly all the bkb-ref aggregates, and I would imagine any box-composite sees a very strong playoff player, especially in prime.

20.4 PER (22.2 age 24-30); .150WS/48 (.177, 24-30); 4.7 BPM (6.3).

Numbers comparable to others in earlier of whom you could make the same criticisms (better team on D probably powered more by others and ensemble cast, next dynasty not good yet, last dynasty[/ies] not healthy...) not that I'd advocate for repeating a mistake but internal consistency from the panel at large - insofar as voter pool is the same - would see a case for Gus now or considerably earlier.

No the scoring efficiency isn't good ... but the turnover economy given the offensive creation burden (for self and others) is. And the steals. And the offensive rebounds for a ... what do we designate him ... combo guard (or point)?

Mind you as you noted Baron would fit the playoff game raising archetype if you didn't need a title with it (or Wanzer - with a title and filthy efficiency if you don't largely discount that era ... maybe even if you do if one genuinely is primarily playoff driven).

I wouldn't necessarily be voting Williams here (based on past projects I might be pushing Elton Brand, I don't know). At very least though "you're still talking about a guy no one would even remember" clanks with me because virtually no one does remember him despite all those numbers and even accolades wise a top 5 MVP finish (103 in career MVP shares, and that's with ABA votes at full weight so having Larry Brown et al above him, and not accounting for the fact that a fair chunk of his prime is under the single vote system which gave out considerably fewer MVP shares per year) and first team all-NBA (both coming off a year he sat out because he played in an era where free agents weren't really "free" yet) ... I certainly wouldn't think of Williams as a player who's remembered too much.

Good post- particularly enjoy the Baron & Wanzer connection. Owly, I want you and others to know that some of the arguments you've made about Williams have hit home with me. I think higher of Williams than I used to because of it.

I am going to start by picking at a loose thread: Offensive rebounding.

When I look at the Sonics in their championship year what I see is that Williams doesn't stand out as an offensive rebounder. Forgive me for trying to guess what might have happened here, but I'm struck by the fact that if you just look at Williams' stats through a modern guard lens of "Zero to Westbrook", Williams looks like a stand out...as do a ton of other guys in the league.

Given that the reason why modern guys don't get offensive rebounds like they used to any more because attempting to do so would hurt their team, praising Williams here is a bit backwards. He's more like a typical - albeit it certainly better than average - guy from his era focusing on a thing that wouldn't work against better opponent strategy.

Of course now you could say I'm getting into the whole "judging based on today's game rather than the player's own era" which I'd say isn't my intent, but the spectre of Lillard obviously looms over my post.

Re: Baron. What's cool with Baron is we can see basically what happened using shooting data. After Baron's 3rd year, he started playing less aggressively trying to get to the basket - and settling for other shots instead - but only in the regular season. In the playoffs he remained just as aggressive and got savvier with time.

We don't have as concrete data for Williams or Wanzer so I'm less confident there, but my mental model for guards whose rise in the playoffs seems like it could be Baron-like to be similarly attacking the basket when the stakes are highest.

Coaches chose to not go for offensive rebounds in favor of getting back on defense - but for the most part we know Gus Williams was a solid defender (coincidentally we know Damian Lillard is not so he must be doing something wrong despite modern coaching).

But if we are using this standard that offensive rebounds hurt defenses in today's game (not entirely true, it's just the current preference), therefore, Gus Williams must be hurting his team - what about Damian Lillard shooting 26 footers? That wouldn't be a very good shot in the 70s at all.

[Clyde Frazier]

Not done with my melo writeup, but super busy the last few days so want to make sure I get my vote in.

Vote 1 - Carmelo Anthony
Vote 2 - Chris Bosh
Vote 3 - Sidney Moncrief

The Rest: Cunningham > King > Tiny > DeBusschere > Terry Porter > Jerry Lucas > Gus Williams > Hornacek > Horace Grant > Dennis Johnson > Lillard > Hawkins > Jokic > Walton

Peak carmelo developed into one of the best offensive players in the league. The “iso melo” stigma really became an outdated narrative as you saw all he really needed was a decent PG rotation to keep the ball moving (a little different, but billups certainly got the best out of him in denver). He became one of the better off the ball players in 12-13, actually shooting more efficiently and on higher volume than durant in catch and shoot situations. His transition to a great 3 pt shooter also opened up his game, and he stepped into transition 3s about as well as anyone in the league.

He’s obviously known for his great post up and face up game, but not acknowledged as much for being a great offensive rebounder for his position. He had a deceptively quick second jump and soft touch around the rim for put backs. He also possessed a unique rolling spin move to the hoop i’m not sure anyone else in the league has. The one thing he was really average at is finishing at the rim, and i’d say that partially has to do with him not being able to take advantage of the way the game is called these days. He wasn’t a freak show athlete like lebron, and he doesn’t have those long strides like durant / harden where they know the angles and draw fouls as easily as they do.

I then look at someone like dominique, who was voted in at #73, and I don't think carmelo should fall too far behind. Let's look at their first 11 seasons (dominique actually comes off as worse if you look at his whole career):

https://stathead.com/tiny/Vr6aD

They’re very comparable in most areas, and carmelo actually comes out as the better postseason performer, something wilkins was well criticized for, but still managed to get voted in much earlier. Melo also has a clear edge in relative scoring efficiency. I noted trex's argument in past threads about nique consistently carrying offenses with not much support. It's a valid point, although a good portion of melo's prime was wasted on poor PG play, which was the key to unlocking his best performance.

I'd also point out that while melo's transition to a role player was a bit rocky, he didn't call it quits like iverson when asked to come off the bench. You could make the argument that he was scapegoated in houston (to be clear, no conspiracy theories here about him getting blackballed -- that was just dumb). There's some revisionist history there as he literally came off the bench for HOU, so he did what they asked. Then last year in portland he did exactly what you'd want from a role player in year 17: 38.5% from 3 on 3.9 attempts per game, posting a positive net rating and on/off along with being a great teammate.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #27:

Damian Lillard - 2 (Doctor MJ, penbeast0)
Nikola Jokic - 1 (Dutchball97)
Bill Walton - 1 (HeartBreakKid)
Jeff Hornacek - 1 (sansterre)
Dave DeBusschere - 1 (Cavsfansince84)
Chris Bosh - 1 (trex_8063)
Carmelo Anthony - 1 (Clyde Frazier)
Dennis Johnson - 1 (Hal14)
Sidney Moncrief - 1 (Odinn21)


Once again Lillard is a default winner which needs to be validated against ALL those eliminated [illustrates the importance of including ALL candidates on your ordered listing].

Lillard leads DJ and Hornacek by 8-2 each.
He leads both of Jokic and Walton 7-3.
He leads DeBusschere 5-4, with 1 unknown (Hal14)......the best DeBusschere can do is tie, which is insufficient to overturn a default win.
He's tied with Bosh 5-5 (again: a tie won't cut it).

He's trailing Moncrief 4-6, though. So we have to have a runoff to give Lillard a chance to come back. Looking for NEW runoff votes from the existing voter panel.

Spoiler:

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[quote=”sansterre”].[/quote]

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[Owly]

Not done with my melo writeup, but super busy the last few days so want to make sure I get my vote in.

Vote 1 - Carmelo Anthony
Vote 2 - Chris Bosh
Vote 3 - Sidney Moncrief

The Rest: Cunningham > King > Tiny > DeBusschere > Terry Porter > Jerry Lucas > Gus Williams > Hornacek > Horace Grant > Dennis Johnson > Lillard > Hawkins > Jokic > Walton

Peak carmelo developed into one of the best offensive players in the league. The “iso melo” stigma really became an outdated narrative as you saw all he really needed was a decent PG rotation to keep the ball moving (a little different, but billups certainly got the best out of him in denver). He became one of the better off the ball players in 12-13, actually shooting more efficiently and on higher volume than durant in catch and shoot situations. His transition to a great 3 pt shooter also opened up his game, and he stepped into transition 3s about as well as anyone in the league.

He’s obviously known for his great post up and face up game, but not acknowledged as much for being a great offensive rebounder for his position. He had a deceptively quick second jump and soft touch around the rim for put backs. He also possessed a unique rolling spin move to the hoop i’m not sure anyone else in the league has. The one thing he was really average at is finishing at the rim, and i’d say that partially has to do with him not being able to take advantage of the way the game is called these days. He wasn’t a freak show athlete like lebron, and he doesn’t have those long strides like durant / harden where they know the angles and draw fouls as easily as they do.

I then look at someone like dominique, who was voted in at #73, and I don't think carmelo should fall too far behind. Let's look at their first 11 seasons (dominique actually comes off as worse if you look at his whole career):

https://stathead.com/tiny/Vr6aD

They’re very comparable in most areas, and carmelo actually comes out as the better postseason performer, something wilkins was well criticized for, but still managed to get voted in much earlier. Melo also has a clear edge in relative scoring efficiency. I noted trex's argument in past threads about nique consistently carrying offenses with not much support. It's a valid point, although a good portion of melo's prime was wasted on poor PG play, which was the key to unlocking his best performance.

I'd also point out that while melo's transition to a role player was a bit rocky, he didn't call it quits like iverson when asked to come off the bench. You could make the argument that he was scapegoated in houston (to be clear, no conspiracy theories here about him getting blackballed -- that was just dumb). There's some revisionist history there as he literally came off the bench for HOU, so he did what they asked. Then last year in portland he did exactly what you'd want from a role player in year 17: 38.5% from 3 on 3.9 attempts per game, posting a positive net rating and on/off along with being a great teammate.

Re the link Wilkins has a clear though not huge lead consistent across the site's box composites. Wilkins has a lead in minutes too. Wilkins has an adjacent year ('94) where he plays a full year and has box composites above Carmelo's average for the span.

That "dominique actually comes off as worse if you look at his whole career" isn't entirely clear. It will depend on what one means and how it is framed but for career box composites the leads remain clear (though given the rate based metrics would disadvantage Carmelo for playing more non-prime minutes in the NBA [rather than Europe for Dominique] I would support a cutoff broadly similar to the one used ... but extending for Dominique's full prime and acknowledging that it was longer).

He does have the playoffs over Dominique - and so depending on how one weights that I suppose one can make an "internal consistency" call for Carmelo votes (or indeed perhaps a case for Carmelo as higher) - but then so will just about every candidate for this spot (maybe not Moncrief though you would assume Sidney maintained a significant advantage in non-boxscore D - and Squid hurt by injury in '86 playoffs and bad productivity role player runs late on).

[Doctor MJ]

Coaches chose to not go for offensive rebounds in favor of getting back on defense - but for the most part we know Gus Williams was a solid defender (coincidentally we know Damian Lillard is not so he must be doing something wrong despite modern coaching).

But if we are using this standard that offensive rebounds hurt defenses in today's game (not entirely true, it's just the current preference), therefore, Gus Williams must be hurting his team - what about Damian Lillard shooting 26 footers? That wouldn't be a very good shot in the 70s at all.

To be clear, I'm not trying to penalize Williams for hurting his team by participating in crashing the boards along with the rest of his teammates. I'm just saying that what at first glance seemed to indicate Williams was doing the same thing as Lillard but doing so better actually deconstructs to Williams putting more energy into something that in a higher quality league would hurt your team.

Re: Lillard 26 footers a bad shot in the 70s. Not sure exactly what you're referring to on this.

If you're saying it would be considered a bad shot by coach because they didn't realize humans were capable of this, well, I'm not going to hold it against Lillard that '70s coaches were ignorant.

If you're saying it would be considered a bad shot because there was no 3-point line, I mean, I really don't think it makes any sense to try to knock guys who played in the 3-point era for taking 3-point shots.

[trex_8063]

I was hoping we might get LA Bird, or 1-2 others to chime in on the runoff, but no one showed.
So we go with Moncrief as the victor (leads 6-4 in Condorcet).

Side-note: I think I'm going to further augment the protocol to say that if ever a challenger has a Condorcet lead [on the default winner] of 3 or more, we just give him the spot.
I'd previously entered a provision that said if the lead was 4 or more we do that; but even a 3-vote lead is insurmountable given the level of participation [hell, even 2 votes may be insurmountable, but for now we'll keep the runoffs in place for a 2-vote lead].

Unless anyone objects....

Spoiler:

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[quote=”sansterre”].[/quote]

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[penbeast0]

Even though I voted for Dame first because of Sid's tragically short career, I'm very happy to see Moncrief on the list. One of my favorite players to watch.

[LA Bird]

I missed this runoff but I would have voted for Moncrief here. I do wonder where Butler starts to come up for voters since his career numbers are almost identical to prime Moncrief's before his decline and both are obviously top perimeter defenders.

Per 100 possession
1980-86 Moncrief: 25.9 points, 7.9 rebounds, 5.8 assists, 120 ORtg, 104 DRtg. Total: 76.9 WS, 28.9 VORP.
2012-20 Butler: 26.1 points, 7.8 rebounds, 5.7 assists, 120 ORtg, 106 DRtg. Total: 75.1 WS, 30.0 VORP.

[Clyde Frazier]

Not done with my melo writeup, but super busy the last few days so want to make sure I get my vote in.

Vote 1 - Carmelo Anthony
Vote 2 - Chris Bosh
Vote 3 - Sidney Moncrief

The Rest: Cunningham > King > Tiny > DeBusschere > Terry Porter > Jerry Lucas > Gus Williams > Hornacek > Horace Grant > Dennis Johnson > Lillard > Hawkins > Jokic > Walton

Peak carmelo developed into one of the best offensive players in the league. The “iso melo” stigma really became an outdated narrative as you saw all he really needed was a decent PG rotation to keep the ball moving (a little different, but billups certainly got the best out of him in denver). He became one of the better off the ball players in 12-13, actually shooting more efficiently and on higher volume than durant in catch and shoot situations. His transition to a great 3 pt shooter also opened up his game, and he stepped into transition 3s about as well as anyone in the league.

He’s obviously known for his great post up and face up game, but not acknowledged as much for being a great offensive rebounder for his position. He had a deceptively quick second jump and soft touch around the rim for put backs. He also possessed a unique rolling spin move to the hoop i’m not sure anyone else in the league has. The one thing he was really average at is finishing at the rim, and i’d say that partially has to do with him not being able to take advantage of the way the game is called these days. He wasn’t a freak show athlete like lebron, and he doesn’t have those long strides like durant / harden where they know the angles and draw fouls as easily as they do.

I then look at someone like dominique, who was voted in at #73, and I don't think carmelo should fall too far behind. Let's look at their first 11 seasons (dominique actually comes off as worse if you look at his whole career):

https://stathead.com/tiny/Vr6aD

They’re very comparable in most areas, and carmelo actually comes out as the better postseason performer, something wilkins was well criticized for, but still managed to get voted in much earlier. Melo also has a clear edge in relative scoring efficiency. I noted trex's argument in past threads about nique consistently carrying offenses with not much support. It's a valid point, although a good portion of melo's prime was wasted on poor PG play, which was the key to unlocking his best performance.

I'd also point out that while melo's transition to a role player was a bit rocky, he didn't call it quits like iverson when asked to come off the bench. You could make the argument that he was scapegoated in houston (to be clear, no conspiracy theories here about him getting blackballed -- that was just dumb). There's some revisionist history there as he literally came off the bench for HOU, so he did what they asked. Then last year in portland he did exactly what you'd want from a role player in year 17: 38.5% from 3 on 3.9 attempts per game, posting a positive net rating and on/off along with being a great teammate.

Re the link Wilkins has a clear though not huge lead consistent across the site's box composites. Wilkins has a lead in minutes too. Wilkins has an adjacent year ('94) where he plays a full year and has box composites above Carmelo's average for the span.

That "dominique actually comes off as worse if you look at his whole career" isn't entirely clear. It will depend on what one means and how it is framed but for career box composites the leads remain clear (though given the rate based metrics would disadvantage Carmelo for playing more non-prime minutes in the NBA [rather than Europe for Dominique] I would support a cutoff broadly similar to the one used ... but extending for Dominique's full prime and acknowledging that it was longer).

He does have the playoffs over Dominique - and so depending on how one weights that I suppose one can make an "internal consistency" call for Carmelo votes (or indeed perhaps a case for Carmelo as higher) - but then so will just about every candidate for this spot (maybe not Moncrief though you would assume Sidney maintained a significant advantage in non-boxscore D - and Squid hurt by injury in '86 playoffs and bad productivity role player runs late on).

To be clear, I have Dominique ahead of Carmelo. My main point was simply that he shouldn't fall too far behind in voting as in many ways they were similar players with comparable careers. I had originally picked the 11 seasons as I think after that both players started to decline. 93-94 and 94-95 were still productive years for Nique just as 14-15 through 16-17 were for Melo, but both were at a level below relative to their primes.

[trex_8063]

What made Moncrief so good at defense (or rather: WAS HE really that good [DPOY good] at defense)?

Looking at his 5-year prime, he averaged 2.0 stl and 0.4 blk. Not that these are terribly good indicators of defense, but merely pointing out it can't be based on this. Those are relatively pedestrian figures for a combo guard (avg 4.6 DReb/100, which is also fairly pedestrian).

So I figured he must have been a "stopper". But I looked at a bunch of H2H's during his prime (how they did vs Moncrief compared to their overall numbers in the same years).....I looked at Michael Jordan, Clyde Drexler, Walter Davis, Dennis Johnson, David Thompson, and Andrew Toney.
On balance [that is: collectively], there did not appear to be a downward trend in their figures when facing prime Moncrief.

Obviously that's not an exhaustive study, but it seems to imply the "stopper" label doesn't really apply.


So where does the defensive reputation come from?

When I watch some old Bucks games----recently watched most of this one:

Watch on YouTube

.....which is a cool one to watch: has twilight (final season) Bob Lanier [who we voted in at, what?....#60 iirc??], prime Moncrief, as well as other guys who may end up as candidates in this project such as Marques Johnson and Buck Williams (both in their prime). Also noteworthy guys like Paul Pressey, Otis Birdsong, Micheal Ray Richardson, and Darryl Dawkins (or heck even guys like Alton Lister, Paul Mokeski, and Junior Bridgeman are notable to me because I have old basketball cards of them ).

Anyway, when I watch these games, Moncrief looks decent/good on defense, but nothing jumping off the screen at me.
Occasionally the Bucks apply a little full-court pressure [and Moncrief is a part of that], which marginally disrupts the opposing offensive rhythm. But this isn't a consistent thing.

He's good at helping [not in ways that comes up with steals or blocks], but just impeding a teammate's man who is penetrating, or forcing a harder shot on the help D. These would be positive things that are more consistent, though I don't see them as things that are HUGE game-changers.

His man D looks merely passable/decent to me [which is consistent with the implications from the H2H's I've looked at so far].


Bottom line is I wonder if his defensive reputation may be DRASTICALLY overstated by being recipient of a couple DPOY awards that he didn't remotely deserve. And would we rate him so highly without those awards? I suspect not, as they tend to "check some important boxes" for many posters.

This is sort of after the fact, since he's already voted in. I just didn't have time to voice this stuff earlier.

[HeartBreakKid]

I thought it was well known that he is not an actual DPOY caliber defender here though. At least I wasn't voting him in with that indication, I don't even remember that he won one.

[penbeast0]

I thought it was well known that he is not an actual DPOY caliber defender here though. At least I wasn't voting him in with that indication, I don't even remember that he won one.

He was generally considered the best man defender in basketball in his prime and won the first two DPOY awards ever awarded. The fact that he was also a very good offensive player (high efficiency and 20ppg) were seen as secondary to his defensive prowess. Whether that is deserved or not, that's up to you to determine.