RealGM Top 100 #37

[Fencer reregistered]

I have my doubts about ranking Parish too high. Yes, he was money on the open jumper, and with a good release and great arc he didn't have to be all THAT open to hit it. And yes, he was a good finisher and garbageman, as well as being a solid outlet passer. And he was long and mobile and all that.

Even so, he felt like the guy who really WAS looking better because of his awesome teammates.

[lorak]

And in the same environment Sharman was MUCH more efficient that Cousy. Other guards also.

Not the PG types.

There was not such thing as PG at the time. And BTW, Sharman several times was in top 10 in assists.
What we have to look is where Cousy rank among other high volume guards, because he shot a lot, so if his efficiency was lower than other high volume guards he hurt his team offense more.

http://bkref.com/tiny/xshIQ
All guards from 1951 to 1963 who scored at least 15 ppg. Cousy is almost last on the list when sorted by FG% and there's big separation between him and Shue, who was almost 40 FG% (39.9). All other 7 guards shot above 41 FG%! So Cousy's 37.5 FG% looks really poor in comparison with them.

[Fencer reregistered]

There was not such thing as PG at the time.

I disagree. Assist quantity + being labeled as "guard" rather than "guard-forward" is a reasonable proxy. (One could add in height as well.) And I only identified two seasons where Sharman got even half as many assists as Cousy. Most years he was 3rd on the team, after Russell. Or 4th (K.C. Jones). Or even 5th (Heinsohn).

[lorak]

What with rest of my post? Don't you think it's important that Cousy looks worse in terms of FG% than most other high volume scoring guards of his time? His FG% relatively to LA also is much worse than LA for most of his career.

[Fencer reregistered]

What with rest of my post? Don't you think it's important that Cousy looks worse in terms of FG% than most other high volume scoring guards of his time? His FG% relatively to LA also is much worse than LA for most of his career.

How many more points per game would Cousy have had to score on the same number of FG attempts for your criticism not to apply?

[Fencer reregistered]

I wish we had more game tape. The little we have looks nothing like highlight films. Heck, in Cousy's last game, it seems is of Sam Jones was more the PG than he was.

On the other hand, the little I've found on YouTube does support my theory of "Throw it in the general direction of the basket, and trust your rebounders ..." This is both in the half court and on the break (Russell seems to have been a heckuva trailer).

[ElGee]

I wish we had more game tape. The little we have looks nothing like highlight films. Heck, in Cousy's last game, it seems is of Sam Jones was more the PG than he was.

On the other hand, the little I've found on YouTube does support my theory of "Throw it in the general direction of the basket, and trust your rebounders ..." This is both in the half court and on the break (Russell seems to have been a heckuva trailer).

It seems to me that you've just made the case against Cousy in your own posts.

(1) The Celtics ran with or without Cousy. In 1963 their estimated pace was 128.3 (first in the league by over 4 pos). In 1964 it was 125.1, first in the league by nearly 5 pos. They only "slowed down" in 1966, Red's last year as coach when their clearly some changes taking place on the team...

(2) Jacking up shots on the fastbreak is independent of Cousy. Yes, it's possible he helped the team a bit in that regard with his passing (the highlight film point), but Boston's offense was never very good.

(3) Rebounding all those crazy shots is also independent of Cousy.

I do think Cousy was a positive impact despite his inefficiency and the fact that he never really quarterbacked a top offense (heck, how much of a QB was he in those days?) He's a guy who helped, got others better shots, made some super high-efficiency passes at times (for layups) that others wouldn't make, but he also had no role defensively and shot the ball a lot with weak results.

Here are Boston's estimated offensive rankings (using the simple method) from 56-65:

56 2.1 2nd relative to league avg. of 8 teams
57 -0.4 5th
58 -0.9 t-5th
59 -0.8 5th
60 -0.1 5th
61 -4.0 8th
62 -1.7 7th of 9 (expansion Bulls were last, Sam Jones' role increases)
63 -3.4 9th
64 -4.3 9th (Cousy leaves, Russell and Jones only Celtics over 42%)
65 -3.2 8th

I think in his best years we're looking at one of those all-nba level players, comparable to someone like KJ at the top of his impact IMO (note the Celtics offense did seem to improve at the beginning of this story).

Still, I think it's totally fair to say Cliff Hagan was better at times (certainly in 1958). Or Schayes or Arizin. Certainly by 1960 -- only 6 years into out project parameters -- you've got Russell, Wilt, Baylor and Pettit who are just blatantly better (and regarded as such). Hagan was better too. I tend to like Sharman more as well -- the GOAT early shooter and someone with an excellent basketball mind.

If that leaves you saying, "hey, prime Couz was still top-7 or 8 even with those guys...well, there were like 40 starters in the whole dang league.

[ElGee]

Ugh. Just lost a huge freaking post responding to fatal about Reggie Miller. Not going to re-do it, don't have time, will summarize:

-If you don't like the Miller nomination, argue specifics against it, don't just say he was worse than other players. Obviously, some of us disagree with you. We've given specifics supporting him, ignore us or debate in earnest with us.

-Comparison with Ray Allen is most informative, so I'll speak to that. Allen's got 2 obvious things over Miller.

1) All-star nods, which are luck. Allen had ridiculously weak competition.

2) His gaudy volume numbers in Seattle. But, on ball players get inflated numbers. Is there anyone building a dream team that wants Allen for what he did in Seattle? C'mon, he's a HOF lock primarily because of his off ball role as a shooter/spacer.

And when you look at Allen in that role, Miller matches or beats him everywhere you look. More volume, more efficiency, and widens the gap in the playoffs.

Do you have a link to some of your posts from the past threads? I remember skimming them before, but will read them in detail to see your take/argument for Reggie. I looked through the last couple of threads but couldn't find them.

What I've written about Miller recently is quoted below. Keep in mind

(1) Spacing/Ease of Fit
(2) His fantastic longevity compared to basically everyone on the board

if you don't think Reggie Miller can be the awesome alpha dog and carry a huge scoring load in an offense, there's no reason to think Hondo can. Havlicek, of course, is an excellent perimeter defender, although from what I've seen I'd say he's clearly a level down from someone like Tom Sanders (his own teammate).

Just for some perspective on Havlicek's scoring (and all his numbers at that pace), his per75's from 66-68 are:

17.6 pts/5.0 reb/4.0 ast -3.7% rel TS
18.7 pts/5.0 reb/2.8 ast -5.2% rel TS
17.3 pts/5.6 reb/3.9 ast -1.2% rel TS

This is a player who was simply asked to shoot a lot in a fast system, and he didn't do it particularly well. Now, I have some respect for his overall game as I highlighted above, but I think it's important to put into perspective what kind of a player he was and what he was doing in that system. For comparison, here are Reggie Miller's per 75's from 94-96:

23.0 pts/3.1 reb/3.6 ast +10.8% rel TS
23.8 pts/3.2 reb/3.7 ast +7.7% rel TS
23.7 pts/3.3 reb/3.9 ast +8.3% rel TS

I happen to think Reggie was an underrated/misunderstood offensive player, and slightly underrated as a defender. Never really saw him as a bad defender, despite reputation.

And for a crowd that has obsessed over playoff performance, Reggie does something fairly special. He raises his scoring by FOUR points per game in the PS in his prime. What makes this so extraordinary is that he does it against the most difficult group of defenses I've seen from any star I've looked at, a shift from 105.9 in the RS environment to 101.9 in the PS (96.3% expected change.) We'd expect to see the following *if he maintained* the same level of play:

18.8 ppg 59.3% TS 117 ORtg .186 WS/48

Instead, his 1990-2001 PS numbers are:

23.5 ppg 60.6 TS% 122 ORtg .194 WS/48

Consider among the competition (http://www.backpicks.com/2011/08/15/adj ... ger-stars/) Miller increases his scoring more than anyone, has the second best TS%, tied for the best ORtg (with a massive 5 points better than expected) and increases his WS/48 (something only Hakeem does). His PS numbers normalized to the average environment, per the post, are:

Normalized: 24.0 ppg 62.0 TS% 125 ORtg

We expect to see Reggie's numbers go down more than any star on that list, and they go up more than anyone's. And the team's offensive numbers are quite impressive throughout that time as well (both RS, then in the PS) and coincide with Miller's play.

Pacers RS relative to league, then PS relative avg. opponent DRtg
90 +3.4 +0.0
91 +3.8 +9.7
92 +3.5 +4.0
93 +3.9 +11.2 (Knicks "GOAT" defense)
94 -0.2 +1.7
95 +1.3 +6.9
96 +3.2 -1.0 (Miller plays 1g)
98 +3.4 +7.2
99 +5.2 +8.3
00 +4.4 +8.1
01 -1.0 +1.4

That means save for 1990 (1st PS) and 1996 (played one game), the Pacers offense improved in performance in every single PS Miller played in during his prime.

And I also see people talk about longevity...well, unlike John Stockton (8 years, 88-95), Reggie continued to play at a relevant level until about 2001, maybe even 2002. (And what he did in 2005 after the melee could even be construed as still having that ~AS-level play at 39! 18 ppg in 31 mpg post AS-break, +9.0 on/off...)

A final note on Miller, which is to note how relatively large his scoring volume actually was in the PS. He has great value in spacing, sucking up other defenders and opening up options/angles and a lack of doubles for his teammates. Yet he's scoring a lot too. Here are the % of his team's points scored in some of his better scoring playoffs:

92 25.1%
93 30.6%
94 25.7%
95 25.9%
00 24.5%
01 35.9%
02 25.8%

For comparison,
Kobe is between 28.9-29.5% from 08-10.
K. Malone 27.1-29.6% from 94-98.

And since that makes this, shockingly, Iverson vs. Miller, why would Iverson get the nod? There's very little to suggest he had a significantly better peak, and Miller's longevity is just phenomenal. Not to mention he fits well in so many spots.

I guess that's my biggest separator between these two guys. I understand criteria is a little different for some, but how do you reconcile how well Reggie Miller seems to fit, umm, basically everywhere, how consistent he was, how dedicated...in other words, what a good investment he was. Versus Iverson, who I defend constantly, but just isn't as easy to build around. You're stuck playing him at the 2 basically, and that creates a few issues on offense and defense if building 7+ SRS teams is your goal. (It's my goal )

With all the great examples of the power of shooters and spacing we've seen in this project (see: Nowitzki, Allen, Radmanovic, Stojakovic), Miller was not only the key cog that ~111-113 type offenses were built around, but I see no reason why he wouldn't be a *killer* addition to many of the great offenses of all-time. He strikes me as the very type of guy who could elevate even 115+ offenses...he's either better than the best shooter they have, or he's opening up a new hyper-efficient, spacing dimension while needing fewer plays run for him than the normal 20 ppg type.

[ElGee]

@drza, I completely forgot to respond to this last time:

I'm referencing this post that you never addressed: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1130780&start=90#p28830065

There is some interesting data in that post, but again, we're arguing different things. That post again references raw on/off values, while I very specifically have been using Kidd's Adjusted +/- scores

We were never arguing different things. APM uses the raw numbers...You addressed some of the specifics with APM telling a better story than the RAW CHANGE in on/off. That's a nice statement about APM...kind of.

You noted that Nash finished in the 30s in APM in 05 and 6th in 07. When I said I thought his 07 season was better (or comparable) that doesn't mean his 05 season should be treated like it's barely AS-level. Yikes - that's not good at all.

And the entire crux of the point is about the team environment. You never addressed the general trend about improving lower efficiency offenses more and higher efficiency offenses less, other than to say "it was interesting." (That has nothing to do with any kind of adjustment.)

I don't mean to belabor this point, just realized the spark of that entire tangent was glossed over...

[Doctor MJ]

What with rest of my post? Don't you think it's important that Cousy looks worse in terms of FG% than most other high volume scoring guards of his time? His FG% relatively to LA also is much worse than LA for most of his career.

How many more points per game would Cousy have had to score on the same number of FG attempts for your criticism not to apply?

Eh, put it this way: Regardless of you position, if you're shooting the ball like a volume scorer, your efficiency needs to be compared with other volume scorers. Doesn't make sense to say "But he's a point guard so it's okay" because everyone needs to justify the shots they take since they always represent a decision not to let others shoot.

[Laimbeer]

Also, I'm really desperate for people to answer my concerns regarding Cousy vs Dolph Schayes. If any one votes for Cousy without having a clear impression of who Schayes was, they have no done their due diligence as a voter.

To state the issue again: Cousy & Schayes were ranked pretty similarly by contemporaries. Having Cousy ahead of Schayes was always a reasonable opinion, but people in the 1950s would think you totally crazy to think that Cousy was a talent for the ages and Schayes was nothing special. I don't see how you can think Cousy is a Top 20-30 player based on what he did at the time without having Schayes as a major contender for your nomination at this point once Cousy goes in.

Cousy is somewhat ahead of Schayes for me because he was just a bit more dominant at his position, and the titles, right or wrong, don't hurt. Schayes is certainly a contender at this point - he's a top 40-50 guy, and it amazes me Paul Pierce and TMac went ahead of him. He should be making the nomination list at 47 or higher, but a handful or two of guys rated too high has pushed him down in terms of available spots.

[Doctor MJ]

Re: Sharman. He along with Arizin are probably the two early 50s players that intrigue me the most.

Given his

1) Best in the game shooting
2) Tendencies toward solid efficiency
3) And his great success as a coach

I truly wonder if the Celtics would have been better if they had let him be the lead guard instead of Cousy. Hard to imagine ranking Sharman ahead of Cousy because he's so much less proven as a passer and seer-of-the-court, but truly I think so much of what makes a great floor general is an accurate sense of ones own abilities relative to teammates. God-level court vision will go to waste if your narcissism is too extreme.

Getting back on Arizin. So you've got a guy who invents the jump shot (others probably invented it too, but he discovered it on its own), becomes extremely good at, is renowned for his jumping ability, has a strong reputation as a tenacious defender which has drawn comparisons as a proto-Moncrief/Jordan, and then he's basically the first guy in NBA history who impresses by the on/off metric:

'50-51 joins Philly: SRS improves by 5.66
'53-54 leaves: SRS goes down by 6.68 to a 12 win team despite having statistical superstar Neil Johnston

'55-56 2nd year back, but first taking back lead scoring role away from Johnston: 5.72 improvement over not having Arizin in '53-54 and the team wins the title.

It's really quite something.

[Doctor MJ]

Cousy is somewhat ahead of Schayes for me because he was just a bit more dominant at his position,

Just want to touch on quickly:

People brought up prime Schayes losing out to Baylor, Pettit, and Arizin on some All-NBA awards. To me those are simply superb players and Cousy's fortunate that he didn't have to deal with players on that level in the guard position earlier on. Zero doubt in my mind that if Oscar & West are born 5 years earlier, Cousy has 5 less All-NBA 1st team awards.

[Doctor MJ]

btw, fatal you me to link to my previous point on Miller, and truth be told I don't remember what all I posted in these threads. I think what ElGee posted in response to you gives you the best argument you're going to get (better than anything I've posted). This post of mine does come to mind thought:

Also wanted people to meditate on Miller vs Nique a bit since Nique just almost got nominated.

First thing is that they both played in the NBA until they were 39. Career Win Shares? Miller 174, Wilkins 118. Pretty self explanatory what that means, the obvious rebutal is "What about peak?".

Well think about this: In the playoffs, Wilkins had a PER north of 20 only twice, never reaching higher than 23. Miller by contrast broke 20 in the playoffs 10 times.

Miller's placement for All-NBA and All-Star accolades was weak in large part because he didn't actually have huge scoring numbers. While someone like Nique broke 30, Miller didn't break 25. However, come playoff time, both broke 25 in 5 years. But while Nique's best efficiency of those years was 52.7% TS, and he was always flirting with 50%, all of Reggie's had him with TS% north of 60.

In other words, in addition to being far more able to contribute helping his team at an advanced age, even in their primes, when it really mattered, Miller was known as a playoff hero for a reason. This was not someone whose game relied only on being able to get a middling number of open shots per game, but rather someone who could volume scorer with great effectiveness as his teammates struggled with fierce playoff defense.

So obviously that was before Nique got nominated quite a while ago, and I never saw anyone rebut it. Nique's a star because of his scoring ability, and literally if you look at his scoring the playoffs, I have no idea how you think he's as impressive as Miller is in the playoffs.

Yes, Nique gets some rebounding numbers, but there was a reason Nique bounced around not far into his 30s and the Pacers continued to swear by Miller until his final year at age 39, and didn't want him to retire even that year.

[ElGee]

vote: Tracy McGrady
nominate: Reggie Miller

Again, I'll change to Pierce if needed (or Paul on the nomination).

It does peeve me a little to see Willis Reed nominated and yet people seem hung up on T-Mac or something. Reed has all these positive connotations because of his "warrior" lore and his incredibly high-profile, 2 championships in New York.

But, Reed has a serious longevity issue. He *played* 10 years. Reggie Miller played like an all-star in 2004 at 39...Reed had been retired for 8 seasons at that point in time (age 39). But wait, he MISSED 2 years almost entirely. That doesn't give him 8 prime years...it gives him 8 years in the NBA.

And in 1973, I don't even see what evidence there is to suggest he was an all-star level player (or top-20 player). In 1971 he struggled with a knee injury (and then shoulder injury on the eve of the playoffs) and was a 16 pt/41% scorer in the PS...down from 21/46% in the RS, which I find fairly significant because if you get a hobbled Reed in the PS he's not giving you the same value. Maybe others don't find this relevant?

That leaves 1969 and 1970 as a 2-year MVP-level peak. (Clearly some good years before in 68 and 67, and maybe 65 and 66 as AS-level stuff depending on how you feel about his first two campaigns...or how much you even know about them. )

So what's different about McGrady, who clearly had a higher peak IMO, and Reed? Well, McGrady has like 7 all-nba level seasons. That's the difference. And I'm not comparing them head-to-head, as Reed has just been nominated, but I see so few people talking about McGrady in the last few threads and I can't help think there are non-basketball reasons for that. (Anchoring from pat lists, Winning bias or simple inconsistency in rubric application.)

[Lever2Beaver]

Dave Cowens is the player most worthy of selection
If your thinking Pierce or McGrady your in need of correction
For Cowens has the hardware and the resume too
Elite for a spell with team success through the roof
Twice an Champion as many as Wilt or the Dream
Greatest performance in game seven when he bested Kareem
MVP finishes 1, 2, 3 and 4
All-NBA and All-Defensive three times or more
A Finals triple double- 20/20 to boot
Elite defender and rebounder and man could he shoot
Cowens is the guy who you want on your squad
not the over sized center who is prone to plod
But mobile determined and most of all revered
They still haven't made the man, Dave Cowens feared

[Snakebites]

Vote: Tracy McGrady
Nominate: Bob Mcadoo

I was considering Zo here, but ultimately I think the time is right for debate among the 70s big men MVPs. Zo can get the nod next time from me.

[Doctor MJ]

Vote: Pierce

So I don't feel strong about Pierce here but having to pick one, I don't find myself torn by indecision though. To go through the contenders:

-Howard? I don't actually think he's been an elite impact player for that long. I keep going back to the comparison with Paul. Paul was a serious MVP candidate in '07-08, and a +/- threat basically from his rookie year. I didn't even really consider Howard as a strong MVP candidate until '08-09, which was also the first year he started actually blocking shots like star shot blocker.

I'll take Howard over Paul just by a bit, but for both of them, I say they need a bit more longevity to pass Pierce.

-TMac? I basically feel like peak TMac has more impact than peak Pierce, but prime TMac & Pierce are comparable with Pierce having better ability to work with strong talent, and of course more durability and longevity. Were TMac's peak longer he'd get the nod, but it's not a long peak. He's got one year where he's clearly superior to Pierce, and other than that year it starts getting pretty debatable. Pierce has two years with more Win Shares than McGrady's 2nd best year for example. I'm okay with still giving McGrady the nod for a couple more of those years, but not by such an amount that it makes up for all the other years.

-McHale? Cowens? Reed? Long of longevity is a real problem here. I just don't see these guys as being way ahead on peak, so seems pretty straight forward.

-Nique? Simply should not be nominated. I have Reggie Miller easily ahead of Nique.

-Hayes? Really questionable on him. Y'all know I like efficiency of course, but I can let it slide to some degree with the Iversons of the world because they are truly guys who can do their thing all by their self. I can't for the life of me ever think I'd implement a system based around forcing the ball in to a big man to volume scorer at hideously inefficient levels. I mean yeah he was on some successful teams, but I'm not sold that his scoring was really a serious plus here. Rebounding and shotblocking is nice, but do remember that when he was putting up the big numbers he was playing massive minutes. He wasn't actually unreal at any of these things except stamina.

Nomination: Reggie Miller once again.

[Laimbeer]

Cousy is somewhat ahead of Schayes for me because he was just a bit more dominant at his position,

Just want to touch on quickly:

People brought up prime Schayes losing out to Baylor, Pettit, and Arizin on some All-NBA awards. To me those are simply superb players and Cousy's fortunate that he didn't have to deal with players on that level in the guard position earlier on. Zero doubt in my mind that if Oscar & West are born 5 years earlier, Cousy has 5 less All-NBA 1st team awards.

Okay, but your question was how anyone could see Cousy this high and Schayes nowhere close. My answer to that is I do feel we're in Schayes territory as well.

[Dr Positivity]

I'll hold off on the Reed argument until he's in voting range. On the longevity, he has the same longevity value as KJ, Hill, Mourning, Cowens, McAdoo more or less and I like Reed the most as a player. So the question is what to do with long careered Miller/Allen/Hayes/English/Iverson against him, or the short peaked Paul against him