[Project] Top 5 single season peaks by franchises: The Clippers

[Djoker]

1. 1974-1975 Bob McAdoo

This guy was just an offensive machine. 34.5/14.1 on +6.7 rTS and then 37.4/13.4 on +2.6 rTS in the playoffs. That's unbridled offensive greatness. And McAdoodle wasn't a bad defender either. I think of him as a proto-Durant. Tall, soft build with a beast jumper. A deserved MVP and probably the best player in the league that year given Kareem's injuries. It's really only Barry who can make a claim over McAdoo.

2. 2019-2020 Kawhi Leonard

His defense wasn't as good as it was in previous years but he was still borderline all-defensive selections and his offensive game is historically good. Scoring 30 ppg on +7 rTS in the postseason along with improved passing and he was an offensive dynamo. I really feel he was clearly a better player than CP3 although I'm sure some will disagree.

3. 2014-2015 Chris Paul

As the years went by, I found myself less and less impressed with CP3. Half the time he's injured in the playoffs and the other half he just looks too small to impact games on the highest level. This season he was relatively healthy and had a fantastic series against the Spurs then got injured... and his team became worse when he came back and proceeded to lose a 3-1 lead. I really feel like Paul is a worse player than his stats including advanced stats say about him. He was a super conservative player which kept his turnovers low but he rarely picked apart defenses with his passing. Or at least more rarely than he should have.

2005-2006 Elton Brand

This was a real case of a player peaking. This version of Brand was a whole tier better than any version before or after. He was a seriously good big man on both offense and defense. Hardly ever gets talked about these days but I remember being really impressed with him this year. Good post game, good from midrange and a hound on defense.

2014-2015 Blake Griffin

I honestly thought after his rookie year that Blake would be an MVP of the league at some point. He looked like a man among boys. So strong, fast, athletic and supremely coordinated (will never forget that dunk on Gallo lol). But a mix of injuries and lack of work ethic (?) stagnated his development and he never really improved after his early 20's. This was his best playoff run and kind of goes on here by default. Other years he usually dropped a ton in the playoffs and that's understandable given that defenses will do a good job at stopping the transition game plus lobs for dunks, two areas where Griffin did much of the damage. He never developed a reliable post game and he could hit the midrange shot but not at an elite clip.

are you sure you dont have a bias against chris paul approach?

cause you are criticizing for his conservative offense even when his actual offensive results are all time great

otherwise i dont get the criticism at his conservative play making which led to elite results almost every year

I hear you and I corrected that in my response. My main issue with Paul is lack of health and low minute tally in general. But he is a bit conservative which oversells his numbers particularly his assist to turnover ratio when compared to say a guy like Nash who generally threw more difficult passes.

[70sFan]

My choices:

1. 2014/15 Chris Paul - amazing all-around player, one of the best playmakers ever, deadly midrange shooter, very resiliant in postseason. On top of that, he was excellent defender as well.

2. 1974/75 Bob McAdoo - well deserved MVP, one of the best scorers ever and although he wasn't a defensive anchor, a lot of people underestimate his defense - he wasn't bad in Buffalo, his length and mobility helped him especially when he played next to another center.

3. 2019/20 Kawhi Leonard - the end of Nuggets series hurt him, but it's still excellent season overall. His defense also wasn't on the level it was before. Clear choice to me though.

4. 2005/06 Elton Brand - I know that he was spectacular in that season, but I don't view his offense on the same level as the other three and his defense wasn't a game changer either.

5. 1975/76 Randy Smith - Randy Smith is unpopular choice, but he had excellent all-around season. I think that his combination of playmaking, pressuring defense and scoring made him better offensive player than Griffin and I don't think Blake gives you much on defensive end.

[70sFan]

What are your reasoning of calling McAdoo a bad defender? I get it, he wasn't great defensive anchor but I see no reason to call peak McAdoo a bad defender. I've seen probably more Braves games than anyone else here and he never looked to me like a bad or even lazy defender.

He had his share of weaknesses, mostly related to his light frame but when he played next to another center or strong physical PF, he didn't look bad at all and his strengths (mobility, help shotblocking, high motor) made him clear positive in this scenario.

Seriously, I don't see any reason to call Blake better defender than McAdoo. Maybe I'm missing something though...

[HeartBreakKid]

What are your reasoning of calling McAdoo a bad defender? I get it, he wasn't great defensive anchor but I see no reason to call peak McAdoo a bad defender. I've seen probably more Braves games than anyone else here and he never looked to me like a bad or even lazy defender.

He had his share of weaknesses, mostly related to his light frame but when he played next to another center or strong physical PF, he didn't look bad at all and his strengths (mobility, help shotblocking, high motor) made him clear positive in this scenario.

Seriously, I don't see any reason to call Blake better defender than McAdoo. Maybe I'm missing something though...

Blake is faster, more agile, has better vision, Blake has never been part of a bad defense and has contributed to great ones, McAdoo has never been part of a great defense and has actually been part of awful ones, Blake's defensive rebounding his first few seasons before DeAndre take off are comparable, there is statistical evidence that shows that Griffin is usually not a bad defender (DRAPM, D RAPTOR)

Maybe Blake isn't a much better defender, but it seems more likely than not that he is the better one.


We could go the other direction. What are you reasoning for saying McAdoo is a better offensive player? A lot of McAdoo arguments seem to just be PPG+TS% based. He has a great point guard (even made your own peak list over Blake Griffin), yet they topped 4th in the NBA during a period where the ABA existed and was at its strongest.

There's no doubt that McAdoo was a great offensive player, but it seems unlikely that he's in another galaxy from Griffin who was a top 5 player in his own right during his peak years. Griffin has a more holistic skill set that simply goes beyond having a lot of points on great efficiency (and while no one is saying this explicitly from McAdoo if you read the description of a lot of votes it's basically saying this is the primary reason to believe that McAdoo was the 2nd or 3rd best clipper of all time).

Griffin has been part of much better offenses than McAdoo

The Braves played in an NBA that recently expanded and the ABA was fully functional his entire tenure in Buffalo

We have impact stats that paint Griffin as a pretty incredible offensive player

Griffin's playoff stats transferred over perfectly during his peak years (14,15). He has already proven his game has resilience, even his scoring which I find to be the weakest part of his game. They were both decent sample sizes as well. McAdoo's scoring efficiency goes way down.

LAC in general, a team slammed for losing pretty early still beat some good teams here and there. Buffalo never did. Lack of playoff resilience from McAdoo certainly contributed to that.


Griffin does have Chris Paul - who is pretty good . But again, we've seen him in playoff games without CP3 and he still holds up. In contrast McAdoo "only" has Randy Smith - though by your own estimations he's better than Griffin himself. It would seem like to me

McAdoo isn't as bad as his defensive reputation suggest, he's just as good as his offensive reputation suggest, he is a legitimate MVP, and Randy Smith is the 5th best Clipper ever, they played in the least competitive era in NBA history other then when they banned black people, it would seem like to me that they should have had better results even if the rest of the roster wasn't the bees knees. Getting knocked out by great teams in the post season is very understandable, their RS record is not.


Outside of McAdoo/Smith it's not the worst roster I've ever seen for a two man punch. McMillan is very good for a "top" heavy team - especially one that can only win sub 50 games, Marin was a good starter the year he was there, Ken Charles in his prime was a decent player. The problem doesn't begin with McAdoo but it still seems rather strange to me - I feel like if he was a real "superstar" the league would have felt it more especially during that period.

[70sFan]

Blake is faster, more agile, has better vision,

I don't see how Blake is more agile on defensive end than peak McAdoo. McAdoo moved like a SF, he could stay in front of most guards just fine.

Blake has never been part of a bad defense and has contributed to great ones, McAdoo has never been part of a great defense and has actually been part of awful ones,

Clippers were bad defensively in 2011 and 2012.
Clippers were never great defensively during Blake's career. They reached peak at -2.6 in 2016, when Blake missed most of the season. They were also good in 2013, but other than that they were average throughout his career.

Braves were average in 1975 and 1976, but they missed McAdoo significantly in 1977 (went from -0.1 to +2.3, massive downgrade). He wasn't good after Braves years, but it had to do with his off-court problems and it doesn't matter in this thread.

Blake's defensive rebounding his first few seasons before DeAndre take off are comparable, there is statistical evidence that shows that Griffin is usually not a bad defender (DRAPM, D RAPTOR)

I'm not saying that Blake is bad defender, I just don't see any evidence of him being clealry better than McAdoo. We don't have RAPM or RAPTOR for McAdoo, so we can't compare them.

Maybe Blake isn't a much better defender, but it seems more likely than not that he is the better one.

I don't see any evidences to believe that. As I said, I may miss something but McAdoo wasn't bad defender. I can post all of his Braves games I have in my collection if anyone wants to watch them and take notes.

We could go the other direction. What are you reasoning for saying McAdoo is a better offensive player? A lot of McAdoo arguments seem to just be PPG+TS% based. He has a great point guard (even made your own peak list over Blake Griffin), yet they topped 4th in the NBA during a period where the ABA existed and was at its strongest.

We should look at the rest of the team though. Past prime McMillan was their 3rd option, which doesn't look bad but the rest of the roster was very weak, especially with Ernie missing most of the season. I also didn't pick 1975 Smith over peak Blake, he improved after that season considerably.

Calling them 4th offense doesn't give them justice either, given that they were basically identical with 3rd offense and the difference between 1st and 4th offense was very small in 1975. The league was very, very balanced in mid-1970s.

There's no doubt that McAdoo was a great offensive player, but it seems unlikely that he's in another galaxy from Griffin who was a top 5 player in his own right during his peak years.

I don't think Griffin ever reached top 5.

Griffin has a more holistic skill set that simply goes beyond having a lot of points on great efficiency (and while no one is saying this explicitly from McAdoo if you read the description of a lot of votes it's basically saying this is the primary reason to believe that McAdoo was the 2nd or 3rd best clipper of all time).

I mean, that's not necessarily true. McAdoo gave you spacing effect and Dirk-esque missmatch. Teams tried to guard him with smaller players because he could take bigs to perimeter and beat them off the dribble. He wasn't as efficient as Dirk, but his scoring and shooting gravity was more impressive in my opinion that Blake's passing.

Griffin has been part of much better offenses than McAdoo

He played with top 10 offensive player ever and more talented rosters than McAdoo...

Griffin's playoff stats transferred over perfectly during his peak years (14,15). He has already proven his game has resilience, even his scoring which I find to be the weakest part of his game. They were both decent sample sizes as well. McAdoo's scoring efficiency goes way down.

McAdoo averaged 37 ppg on +2.6 rTS% in 1975 playoffs against the best defensive team in the league. Saying that his efficiency goes way down underestimate the massive volume and defensive quality he faced. Compare that to Blake's series against Spurs in 2015 and Blake had peak Paul on his side...

LAC in general, a team slammed for losing pretty early still beat some good teams here and there. Buffalo never did. Lack of playoff resilience from McAdoo certainly contributed to that.

Braves beat solid Sixers team in 1976 and McAdoo posted 30/19/4 series. They either lost to future champions in 1974 and 1976 or future finalists in 1975. Braves took Bullets to 7 games while Bob averaged crazy numbers, they also took Celtics to 6 tough games in 1974 and 1976, McAdoo didn't play badly in any of these series.

Please, tell me when should Braves have won the series they lost?

McAdoo isn't as bad as his defensive reputation suggest, he's just as good as his offensive reputation suggest, he is a legitimate MVP, and Randy Smith is the 5th best Clipper ever, they played in the least competitive era in NBA history other then when they banned black people, it would seem like to me that they should have had better results even if the rest of the roster wasn't the bees knees. Getting knocked out by great teams in the post season is very understandable, their RS record is not

Mid-1970s was extremely competitive era, there was never a time when all teams were so close together in terms of talent.

Braves finished with 3rd best record in the league in 1975, ahead of Rick Barry's Warriors. I don't get your criticism of RS record.

Again, you seem to be extremely low on mid-1970s era because of ABA and previous expansion, but weaker talent overall didn't make the league less competitive.

[Dr Positivity]

1. Chris Paul 2015 - I usually have more mixed feelings about Paul in the playoffs than RS where he is all time great, but he was good this year including arguably his best playoff series win. I thought the Clippers problem this year was they had no depth.

2. Kawhi Leonard 2020 - This was probably his best regular season since the injury, not super crazy on the playoffs, congrats on lighting up the Mavs for a few games. But still I think he's a better player than McAdoo.

3. Bob McAdoo 1975 - MVP year and his playoff performance seems pretty good, sure his efficiency was down from RS, but he had to score 37ppg against the best defense in the league

4. Elton Brand 2006 - Very good in the playoffs and I trust him more as a defender and shooter than Blake.

5. Blake Griffin 2014 - I think this was peak Blake, he was still decent in the playoffs and MVP contending in the RS.

[Odinn21]

3. Bob McAdoo 1975 - sure his efficiency was down from RS

Actually, it wasn't down that much. I've been using ElGee's approach for postseason rts.

Using regular season average for regular season rts makes sense because the distribution is fairly spread out.
For postseason however, ElGee compares a player's ts value against the opponent team's opponent ts.

Here's how I mean with an example of 1975 McAdoo;
He scored 34.5 ppg on +6.7 rts (.569 individual ts compared to .502 league average ts)
He scored 37.4 ppg on +4.5 rts (.528 individual ts compared to .483 ts that the Wizards held their opponents)

The drop was smaller than that 4.1 gap between the individual numbers would suggest.

[Doctor MJ]

1. '74-75 Bob McAdoo - he won MVP for a reason

2. '14-15 Chris Paul - outstanding run
3. '14-15 Blake Griffin - just about as outstanding of a run

4. '05-06 Elton Brand - one shining moment

5. '19-20 Kawhi Leonard - could easily shoot up to #1 if he puts it all together for a season for the Clippers

[Odinn21]

Nearly 10 hours left on the clock for this one.
---
Unrelated to the notification; I felt a bit bad about nearly half of the votes having 2020 Leonard over 1975 McAdoo. I feel like 1975 McAdoo and 2015 Paul are in a race for the top spot and 2020 Leonard is a clear #3. Leonard missed more than 20% of the regular season games to manage the load, there's a massive difference in motor / playtime between him and McAdoo and did not have a wow-ful postseason unlike his 2019 performance.

[ZeppelinPage]

1. '15 Chris Paul
Strong year across the board, does everything well, and plays a low turnover game. Think most people have Chris Paul in their top 3 so not too much to say here.

2. '75 Bob McAdoo
I agree with 70sfan in regards to McAdoo's defense, he was long and could guard the wing--overall a clear positive on film. I also want to note he averaged 1.2 steals with 3.3 blocks in his 2nd year, then when his volume went up during his MVP year (expending more energy on offense) he only dropped to 1.1 steals 2.1 blocks. Those are pretty damn good numbers, and the film backs up that he was solid on defense. I've seen him steal on the perimeter and swat shots away near the block. I think McAdoo's prime is very underrated. And for those saying he dropped off in the postseason: well, so does every player--McAdoo still dropped 37 a game on a -6 relDRtg KC Jones coached team with plus efficiency. The Braves were absolutely outmatched that series as well (2.16 SRS vs 6.59 SRS) with no homecourt advantage. Props to him for the series he had, definitely my #2.

3. '20 Kawhi Leonard
Not the best ending to the season, but overall he was still incredibly valuable. Fantastic shooter, improved his passing, still a big plus on defense. I think Kawhi gives you more than the rest across the board with this season.

4. '14 Blake Griffin
Peak Griffin was nice offensively, think the others are a little more well rounded still.

5. '06 Elton Brand
Slightly worse than the rest on offense, still took a tough Suns team to 7 games and had a 62 TS%. Randy Smith is a quality player, I think I just like Elton's value on offense a tad more--close overall though.

[Djoker]

3. Bob McAdoo 1975 - sure his efficiency was down from RS

Actually, it wasn't down that much. I've been using ElGee's approach for postseason rts.

Using regular season average for regular season rts makes sense because the distribution is fairly spread out.
For postseason however, ElGee compares a player's ts value against the opponent team's opponent ts.

Here's how I mean with an example of 1975 McAdoo;
He scored 34.5 ppg on +6.7 rts (.569 individual ts compared to .502 league average ts)
He scored 37.4 ppg on +4.5 rts (.528 individual ts compared to .483 ts that the Wizards held their opponents)

The drop was smaller than that 4.1 gap between the individual numbers would suggest.

Hmm... it would make sense to me as well to compare TS relative to opponent team's opponent TS. But where do you find opponent TS? Do you have to just manually calculate using opponent PTS/FGA/FTA?

[HeartBreakKid]

1) 2015 Chris Paul - No one is even close. Guy anchored amazing offenses, even out played another Clipper contender head to head (Leonard), one of his best defensive seasons. Too bad his hamstring injury took a couple games off or the Clippers would have made the WCF for sure.

2) 2020 Kawhi Leonard - Not a sexy pick or someone we really associate with the Clippers, but he's more or less as good of a scorer as anyone else left and he's a better defender and shooter on top of that. He was actually really good for the Clippers in the post season, it's just that he had a poor game 7 and that's often what people remember.

3) 2006 Elton Brand - So I went back the past couple days cause I really wanted to see how good Brand's defense was as well as make a better judgment on Bob McAdoo. I was actually surprised by how good Brand's offense looked. I remember him being more of a bruiser, and relative to Griffin/McAdoo he probably is - but his mid range jumper was really damn good. Like super good, he doesn't shoot as far from the paint as Bob but he is just as fluent getting it off, way ahead of Griffin in that perspective. When you consider his defense which is still really good (he's agile and has big paint presence), I think he is most likely a better player than Bob/Griffin. His passing is pretty decent too.

4) 2015 Blake Griffin - I just think his passing is more useful in a playoff setting. McAdoo is way more fluent scorer though even if his efficiency hasn't proven to sustain during the post season. But with Griffin if he's not scoring well or not (and he actually does score just as well in the PS as he does in the RS), he has really great playmaking to make up for it. I'm still not really rationalizing how McAdoo is better unless someone just values the RS a lot. Though they are fairly close. Also, it's worth noting that McAdoo's MVP came from player voting which is more bias than media voting, so it's not exactly the greatest testimonial of dominance as the media based MVP's (which I disagree with sometimes but are objectively less bias by its nature).

5) 1975 Bob McAdoo - I took a break to come away from the thread and decided to sleep on McAdoo. I was actually thinking of putting him ahead of Griffin but when I thought about Griffin's passing it still doesn't make that much sense to me. The real surprise was me bumping Brand from #5 to #3. Bob though is easily better than Randy Smith who is #6 so not much else to say here.

[Dutchball97]

Unrelated to the notification; I felt a bit bad about nearly half of the votes having 2020 Leonard over 1975 McAdoo. I feel like 1975 McAdoo and 2015 Paul are in a race for the top spot and 2020 Leonard is a clear #3. Leonard missed more than 20% of the regular season games to manage the load, there's a massive difference in motor / playtime between him and McAdoo and did not have a wow-ful postseason unlike his 2019 performance.

I do agree on Kawhi being a clear third but besides the people voting for Kawhi at #2, there are also a couple voters who have Kawhi at #5 or #4 (including yourself) so it should even out in the long run. While multiple people rating Kawhi over McAdoo will impact McAdoo's chances at the #1 spot drastically, I also believe that is how it should be. People are more divided on McAdoo, while nearly everyone seems to have CP3 at #1 or #2 so it should be only logical to have CP3 come out ahead because of that.

[Colbinii]

3. Bob McAdoo 1975 - sure his efficiency was down from RS

Actually, it wasn't down that much. I've been using ElGee's approach for postseason rts.

Using regular season average for regular season rts makes sense because the distribution is fairly spread out.
For postseason however, ElGee compares a player's ts value against the opponent team's opponent ts.

Here's how I mean with an example of 1975 McAdoo;
He scored 34.5 ppg on +6.7 rts (.569 individual ts compared to .502 league average ts)
He scored 37.4 ppg on +4.5 rts (.528 individual ts compared to .483 ts that the Wizards held their opponents)

The drop was smaller than that 4.1 gap between the individual numbers would suggest.

Hmm... it would make sense to me as well to compare TS relative to opponent team's opponent TS. But where do you find opponent TS? Do you have to just manually calculate using opponent PTS/FGA/FTA?

Basketball-reference.com ---> Seasons ---> Miscellaneous Statistics

[Odinn21]

Hmm... it would make sense to me as well to compare TS relative to opponent team's opponent TS. But where do you find opponent TS? Do you have to just manually calculate using opponent PTS/FGA/FTA?

Basketball-reference.com ---> Seasons ---> Miscellaneous Statistics

Actually, BBRef does not have an opponent ts% list on there. They only list ts% for scored points, not allowed points. It needs manual calculation from team totals.
They have opponent efg% however.

Also; pbpstats.com have opponent ts% going back to 2000-01 season under Totals>Opponent section.

[Odinn21]

The Clippers results;

Code: Select all

1. 8-2-1-0-0 / 99 points / 0.900 share / '15 Chris Paul
2. 3-3-3-1-1 / 70 points / 0.636 share / '75 Bob McAdoo
3. 0-5-3-2-1 / 57 points / 0.518 share / '20 Kawhi Leonard
4. 0-1-3-6-1 / 41 points / 0.373 share / '06 Elton Brand
5. 0-0-1-2-7 / 18 points / 0.164 share / '15 Blake Griffin

6. 0-0-0-0-1 /  1 points / 0.009 share / '76 Randy Smith

Results on Google Sheet

[Baski]

1. 2015 Chris Paul
Clearly his best year as a Clipper. His most injury-free season in which he led the Clippers to the league's best offense in the RS and had a heroic series against the Spurs.

2. 2020 Kawhi
The only eligible year. He was the same guy as 2019 on offense but was notably better defensively, and load managed less.

3. 2015 Blake Griffin
He seemed better than his 2014 version. Destroyed the Spurs in the POs. This was his most skilled version before injuries took the athleticism away.

4. 1975 McAdoo
Great stats. Easily his best year and the best year of any remaining Clipper. MVP counts for a lot.

5. 2006 Elton Brand
Same case as for McAdoo. Defense..................................
Dammit I missed the count

[HeartBreakKid]

1. 2009 Chris Paul
My favourite version of Paul. Had his career high and led the league in many stats. This was the athletic Paul that attacked defenses more aggressively than his post-injury (a bit unfairly) criticized as risk-averse form. I always thought he should've been 3rd at worst in MVP voting that year.

2. 2017 Kawhi
As much his 2019 and 2020 versions get hyped for their offense, I feel this version was already that good and would've earned the green light to put up the numbers he does now. Also this version struck the best balance between offense and defense. Peak defensive Kawhi wasn't very reliable on O. (What is normally seen as) Peak offensive Kawhi is not that far off from 2017 Kawhi, if at all.

3. 2015 Blake Griffin
He seemed better than his 2014 version. Destroyed the Spurs in the POs. This was his most skilled version before injuries took the athleticism away.

4. 1975 McAdoo
Great stats. Easily his best year and the best year of any remaining Clipper. MVP counts for a lot.

5. 2006 Elton Brand
Same case as for McAdoo. Defense..................................
Dammit I missed the count

You're supposed to use the seasons they actually played for the club.

[Baski]

1. 2009 Chris Paul
My favourite version of Paul. Had his career high and led the league in many stats. This was the athletic Paul that attacked defenses more aggressively than his post-injury (a bit unfairly) criticized as risk-averse form. I always thought he should've been 3rd at worst in MVP voting that year.

2. 2017 Kawhi
As much his 2019 and 2020 versions get hyped for their offense, I feel this version was already that good and would've earned the green light to put up the numbers he does now. Also this version struck the best balance between offense and defense. Peak defensive Kawhi wasn't very reliable on O. (What is normally seen as) Peak offensive Kawhi is not that far off from 2017 Kawhi, if at all.

3. 2015 Blake Griffin
He seemed better than his 2014 version. Destroyed the Spurs in the POs. This was his most skilled version before injuries took the athleticism away.

4. 1975 McAdoo
Great stats. Easily his best year and the best year of any remaining Clipper. MVP counts for a lot.

5. 2006 Elton Brand
Same case as for McAdoo. Defense..................................
Dammit I missed the count

You're supposed to use the seasons they actually played for the club.

I'm caving my face in facepalming right now