PC Board OT Thread Take 4 [No Politics]

[ReggiesKnicks]

Hey y'all,

So I'll definitely acknowledge that the PC board feels specifically less active this year, and it seems unlikely that the whole summer kerfuffle which banned very active accounts is unrelated to this.

On a certain level it is what it is. We're not going to let people off the hook in the name of sustaining activity, and the very nature of those accounts driving controversial opinions led to more energy combatting them.

It is my hope that we can get some of our groove back in the post-season & off-season with the All-Season awards and then the Top 100. I'll definitely be running the All-Season awards and have just been waiting on the regular season to end before making a thread, but if people request we open one sooner we can.

For the Top 100, it would be good for us to discuss what we're thinking now. First off, I've never had an intention of running the 2026 iteration since I did the last one, and so if there are regular in the project who would like to run it, please let me know.

Beyond this there will be a question of whether there's sufficient activity to power the project 100 deep, but the good news is that it's generally not that hard to drive interest early in the project for true GOAT contenders.

Here is an idea.

Create a Pairwise Voting Sample for 200 players (Or 150?)

Utilize the Pairwise Voting to lead the threads of 3-5 players.

I think this could help guide the threads and streamline some of the discussion.

If someone thinks Magic Johnson is the GOAT, that's great, but you are probably in the 1%, and that discussion should shine and get it's time of day in a thread where Magic is facing off against Curry/Bird/Shaq/Hakeem and not LeBron/Jordan/Kareem/Russell.

Then, in the threads, utilize Ranked-Choice Voting.

[Doctor MJ]

Hey y'all,

So I'll definitely acknowledge that the PC board feels specifically less active this year, and it seems unlikely that the whole summer kerfuffle which banned very active accounts is unrelated to this.

On a certain level it is what it is. We're not going to let people off the hook in the name of sustaining activity, and the very nature of those accounts driving controversial opinions led to more energy combatting them.

It is my hope that we can get some of our groove back in the post-season & off-season with the All-Season awards and then the Top 100. I'll definitely be running the All-Season awards and have just been waiting on the regular season to end before making a thread, but if people request we open one sooner we can.

For the Top 100, it would be good for us to discuss what we're thinking now. First off, I've never had an intention of running the 2026 iteration since I did the last one, and so if there are regular in the project who would like to run it, please let me know.

Beyond this there will be a question of whether there's sufficient activity to power the project 100 deep, but the good news is that it's generally not that hard to drive interest early in the project for true GOAT contenders.

Here is an idea.

Create a Pairwise Voting Sample for 200 players (Or 150?)

Utilize the Pairwise Voting to lead the threads of 3-5 players.

I think this could help guide the threads and streamline some of the discussion.

If someone thinks Magic Johnson is the GOAT, that's great, but you are probably in the 1%, and that discussion should shine and get it's time of day in a thread where Magic is facing off against Curry/Bird/Shaq/Hakeem and not LeBron/Jordan/Kareem/Russell.

Then, in the threads, utilize Ranked-Choice Voting.

I appreciate the input.

Re: pairwise voting. Can you elaborate on how you see Pairwise Voting work for 200 players? Would this require every voter to have the equivalent of their own Top 200 list before we do the project? I feel like I'm probably missing something here.

Re: ranking in general. What's the easiest source we can use for this that gives results that don't feel black box?

[ReggiesKnicks]

Hey y'all,

So I'll definitely acknowledge that the PC board feels specifically less active this year, and it seems unlikely that the whole summer kerfuffle which banned very active accounts is unrelated to this.

On a certain level it is what it is. We're not going to let people off the hook in the name of sustaining activity, and the very nature of those accounts driving controversial opinions led to more energy combatting them.

It is my hope that we can get some of our groove back in the post-season & off-season with the All-Season awards and then the Top 100. I'll definitely be running the All-Season awards and have just been waiting on the regular season to end before making a thread, but if people request we open one sooner we can.

For the Top 100, it would be good for us to discuss what we're thinking now. First off, I've never had an intention of running the 2026 iteration since I did the last one, and so if there are regular in the project who would like to run it, please let me know.

Beyond this there will be a question of whether there's sufficient activity to power the project 100 deep, but the good news is that it's generally not that hard to drive interest early in the project for true GOAT contenders.

Here is an idea.

Create a Pairwise Voting Sample for 200 players (Or 150?)

Utilize the Pairwise Voting to lead the threads of 3-5 players.

I think this could help guide the threads and streamline some of the discussion.

If someone thinks Magic Johnson is the GOAT, that's great, but you are probably in the 1%, and that discussion should shine and get it's time of day in a thread where Magic is facing off against Curry/Bird/Shaq/Hakeem and not LeBron/Jordan/Kareem/Russell.

Then, in the threads, utilize Ranked-Choice Voting.

I appreciate the input.

Re: pairwise voting. Can you elaborate on how you see Pairwise Voting work for 200 players? Would this require every voter to have the equivalent of their own Top 200 list before we do the project? I feel like I'm probably missing something here.

Re: ranking in general. What's the easiest source we can use for this that gives results that don't feel black box?

Pairwise Voting would give a snapshot of how to start as it would provide a framework of a rough Top 100 (150 or 200) list.

Basically people can spend some time doing Pairwise Voting and it would allow whoever is running the project to draw these players into the discussion in the order based on Pairwise.

It would eliminate the need for "nominations" or different methodologies to incorporate a new player into the discussion while also keeping the discussion focused on a fixed amount of players.

[Doctor MJ]

Here is an idea.

Create a Pairwise Voting Sample for 200 players (Or 150?)

Utilize the Pairwise Voting to lead the threads of 3-5 players.

I think this could help guide the threads and streamline some of the discussion.

If someone thinks Magic Johnson is the GOAT, that's great, but you are probably in the 1%, and that discussion should shine and get it's time of day in a thread where Magic is facing off against Curry/Bird/Shaq/Hakeem and not LeBron/Jordan/Kareem/Russell.

Then, in the threads, utilize Ranked-Choice Voting.

I appreciate the input.

Re: pairwise voting. Can you elaborate on how you see Pairwise Voting work for 200 players? Would this require every voter to have the equivalent of their own Top 200 list before we do the project? I feel like I'm probably missing something here.

Re: ranking in general. What's the easiest source we can use for this that gives results that don't feel black box?

Pairwise Voting would give a snapshot of how to start as it would provide a framework of a rough Top 100 (150 or 200) list.

Basically people can spend some time doing Pairwise Voting and it would allow whoever is running the project to draw these players into the discussion in the order based on Pairwise.

It would eliminate the need for "nominations" or different methodologies to incorporate a new player into the discussion while also keeping the discussion focused on a fixed amount of players.

I see, so this would be a thing where we set it up so that people with time do a bunch of A vs Bs, and then that would be used to seed nominations rather than having an actual Nomination vote done in parallel to the Induction vote. Is that right?

When we get further in this, I'll certainly include it among the options. It's something that can be manipulated so that's bad, but it still may be our best option.

[eminence]

Positive: would streamline threads in a way I would like - it can be weird to have most of the discussion in a thread wind up being about nominations and discussing 2-3 players who don't get voted in for another half dozen threads

Negative: 0% chance I get Bob Davies in using that method

[ReggiesKnicks]

I appreciate the input.

Re: pairwise voting. Can you elaborate on how you see Pairwise Voting work for 200 players? Would this require every voter to have the equivalent of their own Top 200 list before we do the project? I feel like I'm probably missing something here.

Re: ranking in general. What's the easiest source we can use for this that gives results that don't feel black box?

Pairwise Voting would give a snapshot of how to start as it would provide a framework of a rough Top 100 (150 or 200) list.

Basically people can spend some time doing Pairwise Voting and it would allow whoever is running the project to draw these players into the discussion in the order based on Pairwise.

It would eliminate the need for "nominations" or different methodologies to incorporate a new player into the discussion while also keeping the discussion focused on a fixed amount of players.

I see, so this would be a thing where we set it up so that people with time do a bunch of A vs Bs, and then that would be used to seed nominations rather than having an actual Nomination vote done in parallel to the Induction vote. Is that right?

When we get further in this, I'll certainly include it among the options. It's something that can be manipulated so that's bad, but it still may be our best option.

It was solely be used for seeding inductees into discussion, you are correct.

It comes with its warts. It comes with potential bad actors.

The benefit may not outweigh the pitfalls.

I use it in my other hobbies and have seen it used in other hobbies, but those are typically less enfranchised hobbyists, a much larger sample, and for something where there isn't incentive to be a bad actor.

[Dr Positivity]

I lurk the nhl equivalent of this forum and the version they use for top player type projects is

Everyone pms top 100 ballot (or maybe like 120 for the last blowout). This dictates the rest of the project.

The top 10 nominees are presented and the order voted on with 5 players getting in, then in the next thread the next 5 nominees from the original list are added to the 5 nominees that didn’t get in the previous round

Emergency vote if someone gets in 1st of their group immediately after being added as it suggests they could have gone higher if not for poor nominating

Eg. After top 100 vote the top 10 nominees are:

LeBron, MJ, Russell, Kareem, Duncan, Shaq, Wilt, Hakeem, KG, Magic

The top 5 is voted 1. LeBron 2. Kareem 3. MJ 4. Russell 5. Duncan

The ballot for the next thread is Shaq, Wilt, Hakeem, KG, Magic + Bird, Curry, Jokic, Oscar, West, based on being ranked next in the original nominations. If Curry was voted first of that group and 6th overall, an extra thread would be made to see if he should be higher in top 5.

[LA Bird]

Pairwise voting is essentially the ELO rater on basketball reference back in the days. For anyone who doesn't remember, that was shut down because it turned into a stan war where the only objective was to crash the ratings of other players. Kobe fell out of top 500 at one point. Knowing how much effort last year's banned posters went through to manipulate projects, can we honestly expect an anonymous system like this to not be botted? Besides, there is no benefit to ranking individual pairs instead of simply submitting the complete pre-list for calculation. The growth rate of the number of random pairs is n log n. With 100+ players, that's a lot of redundant pairs to go through before you get everyone ranked.

I think the biggest problem with past top 100 projects is the slow turnover from round to round. Between a player first getting discussed for nomination and finally being inducted, it's maybe three weeks of the exact same arguments being reposted across ten threads. The same group of players who were in contention for being nominated will be in contention for being inducted just a few rounds later again. Dr P's NHL suggestion fixes most of my concerns but it does raise some new questions (how many people have 100+ long pre-lists and how are we combining them). And while I like the idea of cutting out round by round nominations, it does feel like it would also cut down on broader inter-tier discussions as player placings get semi locked in before the project even starts. Regardless of the exact method though, I think we should have 3+ players voted in each round.

[parsnips33]

Started reading Keith O'Brien's Heartland - a book about the early life of Larry Bird and his college career. I'm totally hooked. It's refreshing to read and think about the human aspect of basketball when so much of the discourse has become about statistics

[eminence]

Brief break in game 3 - a judge ruling that a college football player can't be ruled ineligible for betting against his own team is crazy. Can the NCAA enforce literally anything if they can't enforce that?

[sp6r=underrated]

The Cubs and Red Sox in North American sports used to be the clear answer for franchises that failed to win titles despite having a ton of advantages, including a huge fanbase, when I was growing. That ended decades ago for the Sox and a decade ago for the Cubs. After that the Knicks did seem to get that feel after their 2 decades in the total wilderness after a great 90s that just missed a title. Not that the Knicks are gone who holds that place.

NHL is a much smaller league but the Maple Leafs do have that spot. Massive city and an enormous fanbase. There is no reason they should be devoid of cups but they are. A real leaf run, by NHL standards, would get massive attention.
I'll admit I don't have a great feel for the NFL. Right now the Browns but I'll say they'll get surpassed by the Cowboys if they don't have another SB by 2040. They have an enormous national following, tons of haters, always on TV. We're only at the year mark but they could get to the same place if they go another generation without a SB.

Does an NBA have a team in this spot?

[jalengreen]

The Cubs and Red Sox in North American sports used to be the clear answer for franchises that failed to win titles despite having a ton of advantages, including a huge fanbase, when I was growing. That ended decades ago for the Sox and a decade ago for the Cubs. After that the Knicks did seem to get that feel after their 2 decades in the total wilderness after a great 90s that just missed a title. Not that the Knicks are gone who holds that place.

NHL is a much smaller league but the Maple Leafs do have that spot. Massive city and an enormous fanbase. There is no reason they should be devoid of cups but they are. A real leaf run, by NHL standards, would get massive attention.
I'll admit I don't have a great feel for the NFL. Right now the Browns but I'll say they'll get surpassed by the Cowboys if they don't have another SB by 2040. They have an enormous national following, tons of haters, always on TV. We're only at the year mark but they could get to the same place if they go another generation without a SB.

Does an NBA have a team in this spot?

Not the spirit of your question admittedly because they entirely lack the fanbase, but fwiw the Clippers with Ballmer will feel like it in terms of “having a ton of advantages.” Ballmer has over 3x the net worth of the 2nd wealthiest owner. And he is obsessed with basketball and doing whatever he can to win.

Here’s an article on how he funneled money into his son’s high school’s basketball team because they sucked: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/times-watchdog/with-ballmerrsquos-aid-elite-school-pushed-limits-of-prep-sports-rules/

In the car after one of his son’s particularly bad games, Ballmer fumed about how Lakeside’s coach was managing the team, according to Gordon’s March deposition. During his rant, Ballmer began plotting a way to bring in new personnel.

“I’m going to open up a foundation, and we’re going to get black people in here,” Ballmer declared, according to Gordon’s testimony from March.

And um, recent allegations.

We’ll see how long he’s able to keep kicking (he’s 70) but it’s arguably the biggest “advantage” (how much does a fanbase actually help?) and it’d feel pretty notable if they’re never able to turn it into a championship.

[Dr Positivity]

With the Mets spending money lately and 40 year drought I think they are fringing on that camp. The Bears maybe can be called a huge city and old team that hasn't been that great last few decades.

Not the same question but the Clippers winning the title would probably be my pick for best title drought story left in NBA, the Suns made more runs but the Clips after miserable history for so long and getting to upstage Lakers in their city would be great

[Dr Positivity]

Title runs this decade by how much it felt like it caught on with the casual sports fan/general public (just strictly based on vibes as if I hadn't seen the ratings though I know those may not line up perfectly)

1) Chiefs 2023 - Mahomes Chiefs are the top 2, but this one came after the Swift Kelce relationship bringing in some new they throw the sportsball types
2) Chiefs 2022
3) Eagles 2024 - Faced Chiefs in SB

4) Seahawks 2025 - Would have been below Rams if not for how sports overall seems slightly hotter in 26

5) Rams 2021

6) Buccaneers 2020 - I’m putting all the covid ones lowest in their sport
although it otherwise would've been a hot matchup

7) Knicks 2026 - Knicks market/drought and underdog run seems to have genuinely caught on, celebrities/politicians/etc., if it had gone 7 it might have hit huge ratings

8) Dodgers 2025 - Ohtani Dodgers after people are a bit more used to them, 7 game, US vs Canada series

9) Dodgers 2024 - Another Ohtani Dodgers WS vs the marquee villain Yankees

10) Warriors 2022 - Recognizable Warriors core, Celtics as finals opponent
11) Astros 2022 - Astros had some established figures like Altuve and Phillies run was also reasonably popular


12) Braves 2021 - Because Astros are in WS I guess
13) Bucks 2021 - New age superstar and Paul/Suns going for first ring (ratings would suggest putting it lower)
14) Celtics 2024 - Doncic run may have caught some interest, famous Celtics franchise
15) Rangers 2023 - First Texas WS, weak WS opponent

16) Nuggets 2023
17) Thunder 2025

While 2023 series was not ratings gold, I feel they struggled with the 2025 with two small market teams with newer stars despite it going 7

18) Dodgers 2020
19) Lakers 2020

I'm putting the baseball one higher since the crowd situation wasn't that bad, albeit short regular season

20-26) NHL, I think the last one to sniff casuals traction was Ovechkin winning in 2018, 2026 is actually highest rated despite Carolina being like a Pacers of their league in terms of franchise sexiness