RealGM 2023 Top 100 Project - #14 (Jerry West)

[lessthanjake]

That happened once, in 1965. No, they made the Finals because all the better SRS teams were in the other conference.

That’s not exactly true. Just off the top of my head, it happened in 1963 as well (i.e. “it” being the #2 SRS team in the NBA being upset before they reached the Celtics).

That was when Oscar upset the 3.8 SRS Nationals in the eastern conference. It had no bearing on the Lakers’ path at all.

Yeah, I’m not really focused on the Lakers’ path specifically. I’m talking about the fact that consistently winning as an SRS favorite is not at all a given (or even all that probable), especially when you’re generally not a huge SRS favorite.

Let’s just take a step back and summarize the sequence of the discussion here: I said I was going for West over Oscar because I think West was a superior player in the playoffs and I mentioned that that helped his team get as far as they did so often. You countered that he never had an SRS upset. I then said that consistently not being a victim of an SRS upset on the way to a ton of finals is itself a very good thing and perhaps reflective of West’s playoff performances being really good (which we also know they were just from box score numbers). I noted that other teams did get SRS upset, to illustrate that winning as an SRS favorite is definitely not a given. You’re now saying that the examples of other teams being victims of an SRS upset had no bearing on the Lakers’ path. But I was mentioning other teams being upset as indication that it’s not easy to consistently win as an SRS favorite for many years. You’re right that such upsets only had a bearing on the Lakers’ run one time, but that doesn’t really go to the primary point I was making (at most it goes to one clause in a parenthetical, where I said this was part of how they made the finals so many times, despite not having the 2nd best SRS in the league—and it was a part of it because it directly helped them make the finals once!).

[eminence]

A short anecdote from Bill Russell on an interaction with Mikan while he was in high school:

Watch on YouTube

I'm certain I've seen him go into more detail on it elsewhere, but couldn't find it currently, he talked about how Mikan inspired him by taking that time to really talk with him at a time before he seemed destined for basketball stardom. I think he said he was 6'7 and had just made varsity but was struggling with getting up to speed in his sophomore year.

Mikan later went on to praise Russell prior to him turning pro: Of Russell the college basketball player, Mikan said: "Let's face it, he's the best ever. He's so good, he scares you." - in 1956

I wonder if he remembered that eager teenager he'd spoken with half a decade before?

https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2211&dat=19560303&id=ENUmAAAAIBAJ&pg=2445,4482680

[AEnigma]

That’s not exactly true. Just off the top of my head, it happened in 1963 as well (i.e. “it” being the #2 SRS team in the NBA being upset before they reached the Celtics).

That was when Oscar upset the 3.8 SRS Nationals in the eastern conference. It had no bearing on the Lakers’ path at all.

Yeah, I’m not really focused on the Lakers’ path specifically. I’m talking about the fact that consistently winning as an SRS favorite is not at all a given (or even all that probable), especially when you’re generally not a huge SRS favorite.

Let’s just take a step back and summarize the sequence of the discussion here: I said I was going for West over Oscar because I think West was a superior player in the playoffs and I mentioned that that helped his team get as far as they did so often. You countered that he never had an SRS upset. I then said that consistently not being a victim of an SRS upset on the way to a ton of finals is itself a very good thing and perhaps reflective of West’s playoff performances being really good (which we also know they were just from box score numbers). I noted that other teams did get SRS upset, to illustrate that winning as an SRS favorite is definitely not a given. You’re now saying that the examples of other teams being victims of an SRS upset had no bearing on the Lakers’ path. But I was just mentioning other teams being upset as indication that it’s not easy to consistently win as an SRS favorite for many years. You’re right that such upsets only had a bearing on the Lakers’ run one time, but that doesn’t really go to the primary point I was making (at most it goes to one clause in a parenthetical, where I said this was part of how they made the finals so many times—and it was a part of it because it directly helped them make the finals once!).

It is just annoying to see someone who spent the Magic threads complaining about that “cakewalk” conference suddenly glorifying a conference path where for the first decade of his career these were the SRS ranks of the teams West beat:
- 6/8
- 6/9
- 4/9
(- loss to 4/9)
- 6/9
- 5/9
- 10/12
- 8/12 (missing best player)
- 9/14
- 6/14
- 8/14
- 6/14

[trelos6]

My big board.



Mikan is a tough one to rate. Super high peak, but very short lived.

My big board was to help me place players in a rough area. From there I can weigh up arguments for each.

I know he was only recently added, but I’m going big.

14. David Robinson. He came into the league playing MVP level basketball. The thumb injury set him back for a season, before he exploded in 1994 for what is a fantastic 3 year stretch. This was borderline all time level quality he produced.



Taking this from Ben Taylor’s back picks, D Rob is a small step below 00-02 Shaq on the offensive end regular season.

He did drop all his efficiency in the post season,



But that graph is comparing him to 4 guys already inducted into our top 10, another who’s been nominated and one soon to come. His teams were still ok on offence. Posting +4.1, +3.5, +2.5 rOrtg in the playoffs.

Now all that is on offense. David Robinson was arguably a top 5 player in NBA history on D.

After his back and foot injury in 1997, he came back and was still valuable defensively, and alongside Duncan, the Spurs were one of the best defensive teams of all time.

15. Jerry West



Scoring, which was on elite efficiency. Great D, passing. 3 yr RS peak of 23.2 pp75 on +8.5 rTS%, which bumped up to 28.1 pp75 on +6.4 rTS% in PS. Then he had another 3 yr PS peak where he was 27 +7.6!

Nominations just to keep the habit.

1. Kevin Durant
2. Giannis Antentokounmpo

[iggymcfrack]

So, I'm very convinced by the Jokic > Giannis arguments. Time to change my nomination as well as my all-time list.

Before
9. Robinson
10. Giannis
11. Russell
12. CP3
13. Magic
14. Jokic

After
9. Robinson
10. Russell
11. Jokic
12. Giannis
13. CP3
14. Magic

Feels like good balance to move Russell up a spot when Magic gets moved down one, and now he's in my top 10 for the first time! I think he's a nice gatekeeper to the top 10 as everyone above him has multiple rings. Feels fair to say you should really win at least 2 to pass the guy who's won 11.

[eminence]

My big board.



Mikan is a tough one to rate. Super high peak, but very short lived.

On Mikan - I'm curious which season you're rating as All-D, but not in the other categories?

And in a hope to push him up your board a little - I think you're currently not counting his '47/'48 NBL seasons, which are eligible for the project, and judging by the success of the Lakers/Royals once moving over to the BAA/NBA was likely the superior league in those seasons. Unfortunately, they basically only tracked pts/game and FT% as far as stats go. But Mikan (as always), did lead his team to another pair of titles those years.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/nbl/players/m/mikange01n.html

[Doctor MJ]

When did Jokic become an all-nba player/MV0 candidate? When did Giannis? There's your answer.

Okay, I'll jump in there.

I'll say first:
1. I'm not ready to nominate either one of them this early in the project.
2. I think they're pretty close.
3. I don't think you're crazy for ranking Giannis ahead.
4. I think most would basketball fans would agree with you.

But I have Jokic ahead.

I think the place to start is a variant of your question: Who got really valuable first?

Giannis first started having a positive +/- with a significant on/off in '17-18 in his 5th year, and first led the team in +/- in '18-19 in his 6th year.

Jokic? Did both in his rookie season of '15-16.

Now these are coarse data points of course, but I honestly don't think there's much that's all that surprising here if you're aware of a general truth:

Basketball geniuses are often impactful right away, talented basketball bodies generally take more time, especially if they really don't have serious experience before they're drafted.

I'd argue we perceive Giannis as becoming more valuable at an earlier point in time for a few reasons:

1. Giannis joined the league earlier, so we expect him to be valuable sooner.
2. Both got brought along slowly in terms of primacy and thus the impression is given that they were "reaching star-readiness" at pretty similar rates, when the reality is that Jokic was largely ready from the jump but Denver didn't understand what they had.
3. Giannis achieved MVP level sooner. No debate here. Giannis exploded from a nowhere-near-MVP candidate kind of guy in '17-18 to the clear-cut MVP in '18-19. Jokic's rise was more gradual.

Now, one can argue that with players of this caliber all that matters is the MVP-level prime, and since Giannis got there 2 seasons earlier that's 2 extra years of longevity.

But if we just look at it year by year and we include the playoffs, here's how I'd give the nod to each guy:

'18-19: Giannis
'19-20: Jokic
'20-21: Giannis
'21-22: Jokic
'22-23: Jokic

One could of course disagree with any of those nods, but I don't look at this as a situation where Giannis has the advantage over the past half-decade.

Both guys have one chip and I'm pretty sure you're more sold on Giannis' Bucks being legit than Jokic's Nuggets. You're far from alone, but I'd disagree. I think at this point folks should see the Bucks as extremely suspect in playoff series settings, whereas I don't think there's actually any reason at all to see the Nuggets this way. I understand thinking the Nuggets should be playoff-vulnerable, but we're several years into these guys careers and it's Giannis' Bucks who are known for losing to teams they weren't supposed to lose to.

Finally, when we look at career cume stats, I think Jokic has the edge in general. Jokic has basically matched Giannis on the all-in-one box score stats for their career, has put up the bigger playoff numbers, and has the edge in pretty much any +/- stats.

So yeah, think I'll be siding with Jokic before I side with Giannis.

[trex_8063]

Hello all. Once again I want to compliment the regular contributors for the stimulating conversations [few chippy exchanges aside] in prior threads. I've been trying to keep up, but not coming close to digesting everything.
I apologize for not making more contributions myself (or better ones, for that matter). I wish I had "room" to do so presently, but I don't. Still, I'd like to continue contribute my middling-level knowledge as a voter, for whatever that's worth; so here I go....


VOTE: David Robinson (I think)
Alternate: Dirk Nowitzki (I think)

Honestly, I have these two basically neck-n-neck these days, and I'm constantly flipping back and forth on them. So I reserve the right to make a "strategic" flop at some point, pending how votes are shaping up, because I truly don't have a strong opinion on who to put first. Pretty set on one of those two, among the available candidates, though I wouldn't exactly be upset if one of West or Oscar took the spot either.

Dirk obviously holds a longevity edge over Robinson (which is pretty darn relevant to my criteria). However, I think David Robinson peaked higher, and probably has 2-3 seasons I'd rate higher than Dirk's peak [which is quite high in its own right; fringe top-20 or 22(ish)]. And DRob was still a solid contributor (I'd gauge him as at least sub All-Star) in his final season: thirteen healthy seasons [not counting '97], having come into the league a superstar [solid All-NBA level] player and never declining below Sub All-Star (and peaking somewhere between MVP and "All-Time Tier")......it amounts to a lot of career value, even without the extended prime that Nowitzki had.

For any who did not see much of Robinson, he was an athletic freak, sort of like a 7'1" version of Giannis Antetokounmpo: similar [I think] wingspan, fast in the open court, could elevate quickly off the ground, strong upper body. Not quite as lithe and agile as Giannis [to my eye, anyway], but then he was 2" taller in the balance. Just a phenomenal athletic specimen.

He combined that with good defensive instincts and timing, decent mid-range and FT shooting, a fair/decent BBIQ (he wasn't a savaant, but he wasn't Dwight Howard either) which helped translate into very solid big-man ball-control (despite consistently facing doubles/triples constantly in his prime).

While I know few people here agree, I'm of the opinion that he peaked marginally higher than Hakeem defensively, while also being a helluva good offensive player. This was, after all, a guy who once led the league in scoring on very good shooting efficiency and turnover economy, while simultaneously averaging a team-best 4.8 apg and anchoring the 4th-rated offense (again: facing double-teams/triple-teams A LOT; that's where most of the assists came, in fact).

He was doing that while being in the conversation as the best defensive player in the league......a league containing prime/peak versions of Hakeem, Mutombo, and Ewing. Seriously think about that.

It's a narrative thing, but I'll say it again: the Spurs circa mid-90s were asking of Robinson---nay, requiring of Robinson [in order to succeed]---to be Michael Jordan on offense AND Bill Russell on defense.
And the guy was so f***ing phenomenal, that he damn near pulled it off........in the regular season.

Therein lies the [small] catch. While I'm of the opinion that his defensive value mostly held up in the ps, his offensive value did not. He fell from being a "diet Jordan" level offensive talent in the rs to being more, idk..........something notably less than that (can't think of a good comp; Dan Issell, maybe) in the ps. And sadly, the Spurs just never had the offensive talent around him to adequately pick up the slack. Sean Elliott [not there until '95], Avery Johnson [gone in '94], an aging Dale Ellis [gone by '95] and Dennis Rodman [for his offensive rebounding] were the best offensive talents he was ever surrounded by (note two weren't there in '94, the season I've referenced above).

I still believe if Rodman had not gone supernova toxic in the '95 playoffs (and I'm sorry, I refuse to hold Robinson accountable for another man's bull****), and had, you know......actually played any defense on Robert Horry (the principle thing his reputation would have you expect of him), then the Spurs may have won that series, and we'd have an entirely different perception of Robinson (and Hakeem, for that matter).
Or alternately, Rodman can still be a dink, and the perimeter core doesn't wet the bed from behind the arc, maybe the Spurs still win the series.
I know I know: if "if's" and "buts" were candy and nuts.......
Gosh, there are so many little contextual twists and turns and elements of chance in the NBA's history, though. Truly.

Robinson shapes out as one of the very best of his generation in the impact metrics we have (rs AuPM ['94-'96], RAPM ['97 onward]), despite very little of that falling in his prime:

'94: 1st in league [by silly margin: +1.5 over 2nd place (K.Malone)]
'95: 1st in league [by even sillier margin: +2.8 over 2nd place (S.Pippen)]
'96: 1st in league [+0.2 over returned Michael Jordan]
**Honestly, I think you could make an argument that David Robinson, peri-peak, was the regular season GOAT.

PI RAPM [playoffs included] after returning from injury (and well into his 30s, fwiw):
'98: 23rd
'99: 3rd (1st in NPI, fwiw)
'00: 4th
Remained top 10 in '01 [NPI], still top 20 in '02, bounces back to fringe top-10 in '03 [more limited minutes].

He was a beast, plain and simple. Lot of accumulated value during his span, imo.


As to Dirk.....
Helluva scorer, provided a lot of spacing floor warping by being a 7'0" PF/C whose range extended to the 3pt line. Wasn't a great passer, but he didn't make stupid passes either.
His mid-range shooting ability allowed him to be a high efficiency volume scorer while also reaping the benefit that mid-range based attack often provides: low turnover economy. This is a factor I'm going to bring up again when arguing for guys like LaMarcus Aldridge at a later stage. Posters will harp on "lowest efficiency shot in basketball" type of arguments, while they seemingly fail to recognize the benefit: if not attacking the congested paint area, there are fewer opportunities to turn it over.
Consequently, Dirk [and LaMarcus] are in the GOAT-tier among big-men in terms of turnover economy.
A mid-range shot may be "lower efficiency" that a shot at the rim; however, it is infinitely better than a turnover.

And once Dirk refined his go-to move (that rolling one-legged fade-away).....damn, he was just about unstoppable. That's one of the most indefensible shots we've ever seen, imo.
And again, his longevity is great.
Can't go wrong with either pick.


Nomination #1 (are we doing two?? I wasn't clear): Karl Malone [again; sigh...]
Nomination #2: Chris Paul

[lessthanjake]

That was when Oscar upset the 3.8 SRS Nationals in the eastern conference. It had no bearing on the Lakers’ path at all.

Yeah, I’m not really focused on the Lakers’ path specifically. I’m talking about the fact that consistently winning as an SRS favorite is not at all a given (or even all that probable), especially when you’re generally not a huge SRS favorite.

Let’s just take a step back and summarize the sequence of the discussion here: I said I was going for West over Oscar because I think West was a superior player in the playoffs and I mentioned that that helped his team get as far as they did so often. You countered that he never had an SRS upset. I then said that consistently not being a victim of an SRS upset on the way to a ton of finals is itself a very good thing and perhaps reflective of West’s playoff performances being really good (which we also know they were just from box score numbers). I noted that other teams did get SRS upset, to illustrate that winning as an SRS favorite is definitely not a given. You’re now saying that the examples of other teams being victims of an SRS upset had no bearing on the Lakers’ path. But I was just mentioning other teams being upset as indication that it’s not easy to consistently win as an SRS favorite for many years. You’re right that such upsets only had a bearing on the Lakers’ run one time, but that doesn’t really go to the primary point I was making (at most it goes to one clause in a parenthetical, where I said this was part of how they made the finals so many times—and it was a part of it because it directly helped them make the finals once!).

It is just annoying to see someone who spent the Magic threads complaining about that “cakewalk” conference suddenly glorifying a conference path where for the first decade of his career these were the SRS ranks of the teams West beat:
- 6/8
- 6/9
- 4/9
(- loss to 4/9)
- 6/9
- 5/9
- 10/12
- 8/12 (missing best player)
- 9/14
- 6/14
- 8/14
- 6/14

You’re just trying to be personally critical for the sake of it. We aren’t in the same thread as before, so the context of discussion is totally different. You’ll find that the lack of super high playoff success has been part of my reasoning for not voting for West earlier. But, as compared to Oscar Robertson, I think playoff success—and perhaps more pertinently, individual playoff play—is an advantage for West. And that makes the difference for me in a comparison that I find hard to otherwise make a decision on. These are not inconsistent positions at all. Again, if I were even more impressed with West’s playoff resume, maybe I’d have voted for him before this thread. For me, playoffs haven’t helped West before this thread. Which is kind of how an endeavor like this project works. Something that is a liability can eventually become a positive when the players being compared to become different.

[DraymondGold]

~A Case for Jerry West~

Scoring: West is one of the greatest scorers of all time. Looking at just playoffs, West looks like the greatest scorer of the 1960s, with an unmatched combination of all-time efficiency on great volume. In the latter half of the 60s, he averaged ~28 points per 75 adjusting for inflation on a massive ~ +7.5% relative true shooting! He was arguably the best shooter of the 1960s, a title held by players like Larry Bird, Reggie Miller, Steve Nash, and Steph Curry. He had one of the best driving games of any guard, drew a historic number of free throws, and had a variety of midrange counters and pull-up shots. Put simply: his scoring was legit.

Defense: West was voted one of the Top 5 best point guard defenders ever in the last Greatest Defenders project (https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=1792345). He was voted 5th and was getting significant traction at 3rd. Oscar Robertson may be a slightly positive defender, but he didn’t get any traction in the top 24 candidates. West would also beat Dirk as a defender, and doesn’t saddle your team with a poor rim protector as a big.

Passing: West was one of the 5 or 10 best passers of the 1960s. While not as good as Oscar, he could absolutely hit dimes in transition, in the lane, or even in pick and roll when practiced (https://thinkingbasketball.net/2017/12/18/backpicks-goat-17-jerry-west/). His passing volume increased through the 60s. This culminated in West leading the the league in assists in the 1970 playoffs, as well as in the 1972 regular season and playoffs on the all-time 1972 Lakers team.

Resilience and Scalability: West is one of the most resilient players of all time. Few players increase their box production more than West — he even rivals Jordan in how much he increases his box production. While our impact data is limited, the available playoff WOWY we have as well as the team results (see below) supports West’s resilience. West’s massive wingspan (6-9!) likely helped his defensive resilience, as well as giving him a high release shot that was difficult to disrupt. West also had a variety of counters to different defenses, as he was one of the best off-ball players of the 60s. His floor spacing and ability to play both on and off the ball allowed him to fit next to more ball dominant players like Elgin Baylor. This gave his teams immense versatility, helping get the most out of his teams.

West by the Numbers
10-year Prime WOWY:
Oscar: 8.4 (1st all time)
West: 7.8(2nd all time, on a far bigger sample than Oscar,
Robinson: 4.7 (13th all time)
Dirk: 1.8 (94th all time)
So West is 2nd all time. He is just below Oscar, but West’s 5-year WOWY peak is larger, his sample size is notably larger (so we trust it more), and it holds up in the playoffs. West led a +6.9 offense without Elgin Baylor in the 1965 playoffs, while they fell to a -5.1 offense without West in the 1967 playoffs. Notably, if we include multi-year WOWY data, West actually moves ahead of Oscar (West was +6.32 in large sample multi-year prime WOWY while Oscar was +4.04).

10-year Prime Adjusted WOWY metrics:
Robinson: +9.1 (1st all time)
Oscar: +8 (6th all time)
West: +7.3 (8th all time)
Dirk: +6.1 (15th all time)

Moonbeam’s Regressed WOWY data:
West: 15 samples above 90th percentile, 8 above 97th percentile (better than Oscar in 11/18 samples)
Oscar: 15 samples above 90th percentile, 8 above 97th percentile
Robinson: 11 samples above 90th percentile, 4 above 97th percentile
Dirk: 9 samples above 90th percentile, 0 above 97th percentile
Mikan: 5 samples above 90th percentile, 4 above 97th percentile (Note: missing 1949–51)
So West looks best in Moonbeam’s Regressed WOWY. Oscar and Robinson look better in the Adjusted WOWY metrics.

Overall, West and Oscar look like the best in the impact metrics, with both having data to support them. Robinson follows next. Dirk’s argument is longevity based, while Mikan’s is impact in a weaker era. Do team results help separate Oscar and West?

Oscar vs West: Team Offenses

Regular Season Offenses:
-Oscar Career rORTG: +3.3 (+3.3 without rookie/last year, +2.6 without Kareem/rookie years)
-West Career rORTG: +2.1 (+2.6 without rookie/last year, +2.5 without Wilt/rookie years)

5-year stretches of +3 rORTG: Oscar has 7 (4 without Kareem), West 0.
Single year stretches with +3 rORTG: Oscar has 8 (4 without Kareem), West 4 (2 without Wilt).
Single year stretches with +5 rORTG: Oscar has 2 (+7.1 in ’71, 5.8 in ’72, both with Kareem), West has 2 (+5.1 in ’68 and +6.1 in ’72, one with Wilt).

Takeaways: In regular season, Oscar’s offenses > West. Oscar was slightly more consistent without Kareem and slightly better peaks with Kareem, though West had slightly higher highs than Oscar without their all-time big men.[/u]

Postseason Offenses:
-Oscar Career PS rORTG: +3.8 (+3.5 without rookie/last year, +3.9 without rookie/Kareem years)
-West Career PS rORTG: +4.0 (+4.1 without rookie/last year, +6.0 without rookie/Wilt years).

5-year stretches with +4 PS rORTG: West has 6 (4 without Wilt), Oscar 2.
5-year stretches with +5 PS rORTG: West has 4 (3 without Wilt), Oscar 0.
3-year stretches with +5 PS rORTG: West has 5 (5 without Wilt!), Oscar 1.
Single year stretch with +5 PS rORTG: West has 4 (3 without Wilt: +8.6 in ’63, +6.9 in ’65 without Baylor, +7.8 in ’66), Oscar has 3 (2 without Kareem: +7 in ’63, + 7.2 in ’66).

Takeaways: In the playoffs, West's offenses > Oscar. West looks better than Oscar during their respective peaks without their all-time big men. West has the better average in the non Wilt/Kareem years, the better 3-year samples, and the better single-year samples

Edit: Obligatory qualifier, 1) these are team stats. They depend on teammates, not just the single star. 2) These three played 40 years apart so the offenses look very different across these two eras. 3) Defense matters, both individually and when looking at team results.
But since there’s a focus on team offense for these players, I thought it would be interesting to compare the results.

Why didn’t Wet win more championships?

West was 10 points from being a 4-time champion. If his teammates just shot their average free throw rate, West would have led 3 Game 7 wins as SRS underdogs against Russell’s Celtics Dynasty.

1962 Finals, Game 7: lost to Russell by 3 points in overtime. Lakers were 4th in SRS going up against the best team in the league. At 23 years old, West played every minute of the game, and scored 35 points. Elgin Baylor, 4th man Rudy LaRusso, 8th man Ray Felix all underperformed at the free throw line relative to their regular season average. Even just one more point in regulation from a non-West player would have been a championship.

1966 Finals, Game 7: lost to Russell by 2 points. Lakers were 2nd in SRS going up against the best team in the league. West again played every minute of the game, scoring 36 points. Next in the team was Elgin at 18 points. Their 3rd through 7th man all underperformed at the foul line relative to their regular season average. An average performance at the stripe would have won it.

1969 Finalsc Game 7: lost to Russell by 2 points. Lakers were 5th in SRS while the Celtics were 2nd. West again played every minute of the game, scoring 42 points. West was part of a huge 4th quarter come back, when Wilt was playing injured. And again, 3 Lakers players underperformed at the foul line, and just shooting their season average would have won it.

In sum, West was literally 10 points short of being a 4 time champion. His team was the SRS underdog in all 3 series. He played every minute of the game in all three Game 7s. He scored over 30 points in every game, including leading at least one fourth quarter come back while his costar was injured. And just making his teammates shoot their season average at the foul line would have been enough to win in all 3 NBA Finals Game 7s, without making a single change to how West played. I have a hard time blaming West for only winning 1 championship, when he dragged his team to the finals 9 times, over performed his team SRS by winning far more games than he should have against the superior team, and was a few missed free throws by teammates away from being a 4 time champion.

[One_and_Done]

I picture a 3 on 3 game between Oscar, West and Mikan vs KD, D.Rob and Giannis, where the first team is struggling to score a single point over their contemporary foes.

It's hard to overstate the gap between the leagues they played in. Does anyone seriously think any of these guys in today's league would be stars?

We shouldn't punish guys for being born too late. This is why a flat TS% adjustment doesn't work either. If we take Giannis and pop him into 1957 his TS% will look better relative to the league, but he'll still be the same player.

[iggymcfrack]

Mikan's minimum WS/48 numbers from his earlier years soundly beat his numbers after minutes become available. If we assigned him 48 mpg (unlikely), his WS/48 for '49-'51: 0.348, 0.310, 0.344.

OK, this still doesn’t impress me much though. If anything, it just shows how poor the competition was to start and how quickly it was getting better that he could dominate the really short white guys the first 2 years the NBA existed so much more than the slightly taller short white guys a couple years later. He was only 27 when MPG data first became available, it’s not like he was in decline.

I'd say the statistical decline was largely due to the lane widening, though the leg break didn't help I'm sure.

Would Mikan doing well vs the best black competition of the day do anything for you (career 7-3 vs the Trotters, played a few other squads, though I don't remember records off the top). 5-2 with the Lakers, 2-1 with the OG Celtics in a tournament in Hawaii to show off the game (team was dubbed the 'Mikan Allstars' for the event)

Yeah, when I started looking into it more, I realized that the lane getting larger was the key factor. What's interesting is that even after it was widened it was still only 12 feet as opposed to the 16 feet it would be widened to once WIlt joined the league which makes you wonder how much more his game would be impacted if he was playing with a lane that size.

As for the games against the best black competition, no that doesn't do that much for me. The bar to clear isn't "would the Lakers still be the best team if you took all the top teams from outside the NBA?" It's "could Mikan possibly match Robinson's level of statistical domination in a league that was integrated with all the top black and white players playing together". On that count, I think it's a clear no, even if you ignore all the other reasons the player pool grew so much larger over the 40 years from Mikan's peak to Robinson's.

[rk2023]

I find the notion D. Robinson peaked over the likes of West and Robertson a hard sell (let alone Mikan).

Top seasons by PER (all nominated players)
Robinson 30.7 -> 22.0
Robinson 29.4 -> 29.1 (worth checking the difference vs. PHX and UT)
Robinson 29.1 -> 22.6
Mikan 29.0
Mikan 28.5
Nowitzki 28.1
Robinson 27.8 -> 24.1
Oscar 27.6
Nowtizki 27.6
Robinson 27.4 -> 26.1
Oscar 26.7
Oscar 26.2
Nowitzki 26.1
Oscar 25.9
Nowitzki 25.6
Oscar 25.5
Oscar 25.2
West 25.0

Top seasons by WS/48 (all nominated players)
Robinson .296
Robinson .290 -> .105 and .214 respectively
Nowitzki .275
Oscar .278
Nowitzki .275
Robinson .273
Robinson .269 -> .176 and .183 respectively
Mikan .268
Robinson .264 -> .234
Mikan .264
Robinson .261 -> .243
West .261

In both cases, I listed the best West season and all seasons that beat it. I know people don't like PER, but these are the only measures where we can compare all nominated players since BPM and impact stats didn't exist yet for most of the players we're comparing. And again, measures like PER and WS/48 are always going to underrate Robinson and never overrate him because of his elite, elite defense! He has some of the best non-box impact of all-time! It's very telling that his statistical peak is even more dominant than Mikan.

So I am going to ignore the Mikan discussion here. If one doesn't choose to rank him due to his reign being pre shot-clock [where we are all devoid of film (essentially)], that is a fine opinion with me. When looking at Robinson however, I've mentioned my stance on him before - which will come in towards the end of the message. As an overarching 'hypothesis' and food for thought though:

I think his value perhaps is overstated in the RS years he grades out very highly and understated in the corresponding PS runs.

In the given years you have cited for Robinson, I've added the corresponding PS values. He takes a decent nosedive more often than not. There have been various posts describing this as well:

Proxy (ft. TB Greatest Peaks) - 2022 Peaks Project:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=100921927#p100921927

Fatal9 - Hakeem vs. Robinson Sensitivity Analysis:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=93659633#p93659633

ElGee - OBEV/GameScore Sensitivity Analysis:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1338043#p40799443

When looking at how the four guys you've cited (excluding Mikan, good chance they are my 'next 4 best') stack up going RS to PS, this is what the results yield. For transparency, I'm not the most enthused with BBR's portfolio of "advanced stats" and this is just for the purpose of the overarching exchange. I'm going to hone in one their MVP-calibre, lone star seasons with more to add after listing the stats

Spoiler:

Code: Select all

Robinson - 1990 through 1996:
27.8 PER, 59.2% TS, .260 WS/48, 8.7 BPM (5.4-3.3)
24.1 PER, 55.7% TS, .189 WS/48, 6.5 BPM (3.9-2.6)

Dirk - 2005 through 2011:
25.1 PER, 58.6% TS, .229 WS/48, 6.1 BPM (5.4-0.7)
25.2 PER, 58.6% TS, .211 WS/48, 6.9 BPM (5.9-1.0)

West - 1964 through 1970:
23.9 PER, 56.9% TS, .237 WS/48
24.3 PER, 55.9% TS, .232 WS/48

Oscar - 1961 through 1967:
26.0 PER, 56.8% TS, .235 WS/48
24.1 PER, 56.6% TS, .197 WS/48

So.. out of the grouping, Robinson perhaps has the highest baseline in the RS - but the lowest in the playoffs and the biggest fall of this quartet. I can fully acknowledge that some of his defense excellence is unquantifiable, but as another sort of devils' advocate in the holistic scheme of things.. the other three much more accurately serve as primary creators for an offense and thus face a harder situation at accruing high box derivations - as opposed to a hybrid on/off ball big in Robinson. In favor of Robinson again, I can acknowledge his situation at his best was far from ideal. As I and Proxy pointed out, such makes him one of the most valuable (in a vacuum here) and situationally impactful players of all time and gives him a very gaudy box/impact profile. If this is taken at face value and he's held to a standard of a top 10, "clearly best option at 14" - shouldn't the playoff drop-offs in a vacuum hold a tangible foundation for conversation? When looking at his career arc and some more signals (eg. resilience, supporting cast, manual scouting and film study) - I am basically left with a belief I've held heading into the project and am firm on at this moment in time. I see a player with a pretty damn strong top 20 case, but one where championing them this early and this much over the other nominees off of some RS BBR data is a questionable approach.

Spoiler:

I'm not quite low on David Robinson's longevity as I think he logs Weak-MVP level years for most of the 90s (perhaps even until 2001, of course this is with the 1996-97 campaign missed). He, at minimum, has 11 all-NBA+ level years - where this is without me counting 2002 as one. What I'm not as high on is Robinson's best years - as I now see him being nominated / gaining steam in this regard.

Great defender whom in theory would be maximized as more of a 2-O, 1-D player playing off of an excellent self/team creator (heck even scaling down for Tim Duncan didn't yield great offenses - but serviceable ones catalyzed by Duncan's scoring safety-net blended with the best non-Russell defensive run in history). I am aware that his impact in the 1994-96 campaigns was astounding, and wasn't necessarily put forth in a situation to succeed / be optimized within that time frame. In a sense, he gets the 'playoff choker' moniker unfairly thrown his way in a sense where he's being penalized for his goodness and situational value (both on/off and WOWY studies, the latter to my recollection only, grade him very highly). Rather than making it too much of an indictment on Robinson, I just think that it more hinges on the difference between being a top-20 peak/prime player vs. the top-10 or so one that some Robinson supporters may be arguing off of the Box Score / limited APM & AuPM data there is to assess him.

The biggest reason I see this being the case is due to volume scoring (rather lack thereof). I would certainly take peak Robinson/Garnett in an all-time team builder / draft sort of exercise rather than a pragmatic "build around this star and their contract" hypothetical over (let's use close proximity and compared examples in - ) Hakeem and Duncan here. A great argument exists that the former two offer some great off-ball skills (harder to say in the pre synergy / 2nd spectrum era), but I don't think either showed an ability to warp defenses through scoring [thus serving as an offensive centerpiece] akin to Hakeem/Duncan. All 4 are clear pantheon+ level defenders, but I reckon I would take the other three listed here over Robinson on that end. As I mentioned earlier, I see this leading towards a gap in how good Hakeem/Duncan were at their best contrasted to Garnett and further contrasted to Robinson.

[One_and_Done]

I prefer players who don't have a glaring defensive weakness you can kill. Just because the contenders were weak this year I'm not going to forget that. Jokic would have lost this year to those same high pick and roll teams like the 21 Suns or the 22 Warriors, he was just fortunate not to be facing them. Next year I expect KD or someone else to win, then the narrative will shift back to them.

I prefer Curry, KD, Kawhi, and Giannis over Jokic peak to peak, because they don't have those same exploitable weaknesses. Jokic is a GOAT like player on offense, but that other side of the.coin matters too.

[Doctor MJ]

I picture a 3 on 3 game between Oscar, West and Mikan vs KD, D.Rob and Giannis, where the first team is struggling to score a single point over their contemporary foes.

It's hard to overstate the gap between the leagues they played in. Does anyone seriously think any of these guys in today's league would be stars?

We shouldn't punish guys for being born too late. This is why a flat TS% adjustment doesn't work either. If we take Giannis and pop him into 1957 his TS% will look better relative to the league, but he'll still be the same player.

My immediate though here is that Oscar & West are guards and none of the other guys are guards. That makes for awkward hypotheticals.

When you're talking about West and Robinson for example, if you're talking about a one-on-one game, the answer is pretty clear: No 3's you take the big, with 3's 3>2.

Oscar vs KD is funny because it's actually a bit backward. While Oscar's the guard, I'd absolutely expect Oscar to murder KD if they were in physical contact on the interior, but have more faith in KD's outside shooting.

I'd take either Robinson or Giannis over Mikan so that's not really something I'd debate you on.

[One_and_Done]

I considered including a point guard like CP3 instead, but then I thought 'why bother? How much dribbling ability do you ever need to get by these old timers? KD and Giannis have decent handles, they'll be fine. West only had one good hand anyway'.

[trex_8063]

When did Jokic become an all-nba player/MV0 candidate? When did Giannis? There's your answer.

Okay, I'll jump in there.

I'll say first:
1. I'm not ready to nominate either one of them this early in the project.

With my heavy lean on total career value, I'm not either. I suspect both will already be taken off the table before I'm ready to support them.

2. I think they're pretty close.

Yup. I presently have them in adjacent places on my ATL.

3. I don't think you're crazy for ranking Giannis ahead.

Having them adjacent myself, it would hardly seem crazy to me either.

But I have Jokic ahead.

I do too.

[iggymcfrack]

So I am going to ignore the Mikan discussion here. If one doesn't choose to rank him due to his reign being pre shot-clock [where we are all devoid of film (essentially)], that is a fine opinion with me. When looking at Robinson however, I've mentioned my stance on him before - which will come in towards the end of the message. As an overarching 'hypothesis' and food for thought though:

I think his value perhaps is overstated in the RS years he grades out very highly and understated in the corresponding PS runs.

In the given years you have cited for Robinson, I've added the corresponding PS values. He takes a decent nosedive more often than not. There have been various posts describing this as well:

Proxy (ft. TB Greatest Peaks) - 2022 Peaks Project:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=100921927#p100921927

Fatal9 - Hakeem vs. Robinson Sensitivity Analysis:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?p=93659633#p93659633

ElGee - OBEV/GameScore Sensitivity Analysis:
https://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=1338043#p40799443

When looking at how the four guys you've cited (excluding Mikan, good chance they are my 'next 4 best') stack up going RS to PS, this is what the results yield. For transparency, I'm not the most enthused with BBR's portfolio of "advanced stats" and this is just for the purpose of the overarching exchange. I'm going to hone in one their MVP-calibre, lone star seasons with more to add after listing the stats

Spoiler:

Robinson - 1990 through 1996:
27.8 PER, 59.2% TS, .260 WS/48, 8.7 BPM (5.4-3.3)
24.1 PER, 55.7% TS, .189 WS/48, 6.5 BPM (3.9-2.6)

Dirk - 2005 through 2011:
25.1 PER, 58.6% TS, .229 WS/48, 6.1 BPM (5.4-0.7)
25.2 PER, 58.6% TS, .211 WS/48, 6.9 BPM (5.9-1.0)

West - 1964 through 1970:
23.9 PER, 56.9% TS, .237 WS/48
24.3 PER, 55.9% TS, .232 WS/48

Oscar - 1961 through 1967:
26.0 PER, 56.8% TS, .235 WS/48
24.1 PER, 56.6% TS, .197 WS/48

So.. out of the grouping, Robinson perhaps has the highest baseline in the RS - but the lowest in the playoffs and the biggest fall of this quartet. I can fully acknowledge that some of his defense excellence is unquantifiable, but as another sort of devils' advocate in the holistic scheme of things.. the other three much more accurately serve as primary creators for an offense and thus face a harder situation at accruing high box derivations - as opposed to a hybrid on/off ball big in Robinson. In favor of Robinson again, I can acknowledge his situation at his best was far from ideal. As I and Proxy pointed out, such makes him one of the most valuable (in a vacuum here) and situationally impactful players of all time and gives him a very gaudy box/impact profile. If this is taken at face value and he's held to a standard of a top 10, "clearly best option at 14" - shouldn't the playoff drop-offs in a vacuum hold a tangible foundation for conversation? When looking at his career arc and some more signals (eg. resilience, supporting cast, manual scouting and film study) - I am basically left with a belief I've held heading into the project and am firm on at this moment in time. I see a player with a pretty damn strong top 20 case, but one where championing them this early and this much over the other nominees off of some RS BBR data is a questionable approach.

Spoiler:

I'm not quite low on David Robinson's longevity as I think he logs Weak-MVP level years for most of the 90s (perhaps even until 2001, of course this is with the 1996-97 campaign missed). He, at minimum, has 11 all-NBA+ level years - where this is without me counting 2002 as one. What I'm not as high on is Robinson's best years - as I now see him being nominated / gaining steam in this regard.

Great defender whom in theory would be maximized as more of a 2-O, 1-D player playing off of an excellent self/team creator (heck even scaling down for Tim Duncan didn't yield great offenses - but serviceable ones catalyzed by Duncan's scoring safety-net blended with the best non-Russell defensive run in history). I am aware that his impact in the 1994-96 campaigns was astounding, and wasn't necessarily put forth in a situation to succeed / be optimized within that time frame. In a sense, he gets the 'playoff choker' moniker unfairly thrown his way in a sense where he's being penalized for his goodness and situational value (both on/off and WOWY studies, the latter to my recollection only, grade him very highly). Rather than making it too much of an indictment on Robinson, I just think that it more hinges on the difference between being a top-20 peak/prime player vs. the top-10 or so one that some Robinson supporters may be arguing off of the Box Score / limited APM & AuPM data there is to assess him.

The biggest reason I see this being the case is due to volume scoring (rather lack thereof). I would certainly take peak Robinson/Garnett in an all-time team builder / draft sort of exercise rather than a pragmatic "build around this star and their contract" hypothetical over (let's use close proximity and compared examples in - ) Hakeem and Duncan here. A great argument exists that the former two offer some great off-ball skills (harder to say in the pre synergy / 2nd spectrum era), but I don't think either showed an ability to warp defenses through scoring [thus serving as an offensive centerpiece] akin to Hakeem/Duncan. All 4 are clear pantheon+ level defenders, but I reckon I would take the other three listed here over Robinson on that end. As I mentioned earlier, I see this leading towards a gap in how good Hakeem/Duncan were at their best contrasted to Garnett and further contrasted to Robinson.

Certainly, Robinson falls in the postseason, no question, and it's one of the larger falls of any of the top star players. The thing is even when he falls, he just falls to the level of the other guys in this range statistically. And even then, he still has a massive non-box advantage due to his incredible defense. Like if it weren't for the playoff falls, his combination of all-time defense and all-time regular season numbers would probably make him a top 5 player all-time. His regular season play was that good. The 3 years of peak RS on/off data we have for him beats any 3-year stretch for LeBron.

It seems like Robinson almost gets punished for playing so well in the regular season in that it affixes the choker label on him where if he just had the same level of postseason play and played worse in the regular season, people would rank him higher. I don't think that's fair. Robinson's incredible regular season play was a major asset to his team and it gave them higher seedings and the best possible chance to try to put some sort of miracle run together with his weak supporting casts. He should get the grade he deserves based on his postseason play and then a little extra for being even better in the regular season. In all 10 of his prime postseason runs from 1990-2001, he posted a BPM of 6 or higher. Dirk, the only other player currently nominated for whom BPM is available did that 7 times total. I really think that the expectations of what we think he should have been able to do take away from us appreciating what he actually did.

Like compare his postseasons to Oscar and West. How are they in any way better? Robinson put up at worst equal numbers in a tougher era with larger contribution outside the box score. He went 17-10 against tougher playoff competition than West went 16-12 against which is in turn much more impressive than Oscar's playoff record of 8-9. He won as many rings as both of them combined and was much more impactful than he was given credit for on the championship teams. It just seems like he has a clear edge any way you look at it, and the only thing he gets docked for is failing to reach the same heights of performance he achieved in the regular season.

[penbeast0]

I'm not sure that the Russell Celtics qualify as weaker competition than whoever San Antonio was playing but I'm a big DRob fan too. Just not quite yet.

[Doctor MJ]

I prefer players who don't have a glaring defensive weakness you can kill. Just because the contenders were weak this year I'm not going to forget that. Jokic would have lost this year to those same high pick and roll teams like the 21 Suns or the 22 Warriors, he was just fortunate not to be facing them. Next year I expect KD or someone else to win, then the narrative will shift back to them.

I prefer Curry, KD, Kawhi, and Giannis over Jokic peak to peak, because they don't have those same exploitable weaknesses. Jokic is a GOAT like player on offense, but that other side of the.coin matters too.

I don't think the contenders this year were all that weak. I think the Lakers were the team that in theory should have been able to bully Jokic, and instead they got swept.

I understand you thinking that Jokic has a specific match up weakness against guard-driven teams both because of his size and because of the fact that that's who beat the Nuggets the previous two years, but I would object to the idea that the '20-21 Suns were stronger than contenders this year. I think people forget that those Suns were in the process of getting "upset" by the LeBron-AD Lakers until AD got hurt.

The matchup with the Warriors is of course one we'd like to see, but I think it's important not to look at their 2022 series as something that was particularly damning of Jokic. I think we need to remember that the Nuggets were supposed to lose that series, and in the end, it's not like the other teams the Warriors' played fared all that much better. Clearly the Nuggets need to have a sense for how they handle the Warrior perimeter attack, but so does everyone else, and the rule with every single team is that you can't really expect to handle it optimally without excellent perimeter defenders.

You're expecting the Suns to win next year, and frankly they may. They're certainly serious contenders. But I also think we need to keep in mind how unsustainably hot Devin Booker needed to get in order to keep the Nuggets from sweeping them as well.

In general, I really don't think we should ever be dismissive of a champion who wins their series with relative ease. The Nuggets went 16-4 in these playoffs and were never seriously threatened. Can we point to any champions in the past who won a title like that and are now seen as fluke champions?