#19 Highest Peak of All Time (Ewing '90 wins)

[therealbig3]

And so we're basically using winning bias against T-Mac. As if no other superstar wing had a poor 3 game stretch in the playoffs.

I could also point to Kobe against Phoenix in 06, and his last 3 games as his team blew the lead.

Stat padding in game 5, and then gets himself thrown out of the game.

Goes for 50 points in game 6...in contradiction of what got his team in that position in the first place. And on that Tim Thomas 3 that sent it to OT...he was the one out of position.

Quits in game 7, goes 0-3 with 1 point in the 2nd half. That was still a winnable game, his team was down 15 points at halftime, and he had 23 at that point.

Other than big box score stats (against a much worse defensive team) that didn't have much impact, Kobe didn't play better than T-Mac down the stretch of his series.

I'm using some hyperbole, but these were all criticisms that were actually made of him at the time, and it's not like they're without warrant.

[Equit]

Is this clown serious? Kobe in Game 5 had 29/7/5/69% TS,50/8/5/3/66% TS in Game 6, and 24/4/1/1/66% TS in Game 7. How is that even remotely comparable to T-Wack playing like garbage for three straight games? LMAO.

T-wack: Never out of the first round

Kobe: 5 Championships.

LOL

[therealbig3]

Is this clown serious? Kobe in Game 5 had 29/7/5/69% TS,50/8/5/3/66% TS in Game 6, and 24/4/1/1/66% TS in Game 7. How is that even remotely comparable to T-Wack playing like garbage for three straight games? LMAO.

Other than big box score stats (against a much worse defensive team) that didn't have much impact, Kobe didn't play better than T-Mac down the stretch of his series.

Bolded it for you.

[Equit]

29/7/5/69% TS, 50/8/5/3/66% TS, 24/4/1/1/66% TS didn't have impact? LOL. What a joke. It sure beats 35% shooting or whatever it was from T-Wack.

[drza]

Is this clown serious? Kobe in Game 5 had 29/7/5/69% TS,50/8/5/3/66% TS in Game 6, and 24/4/1/1/66% TS in Game 7. How is that even remotely comparable to T-Wack playing like garbage for three straight games? LMAO.

Other than big box score stats (against a much worse defensive team) that didn't have much impact, Kobe didn't play better than T-Mac down the stretch of his series.

Bolded it for you.

Dude, stop feeding the troll.

[Equit]

29/7/5/69% TS
50/8/5/3/66% TS
24/4/1/1/66% TS

vs.

19/8/4/3/45% TS
37/11/5/2/52% TS
21/5/6/40% TS

Yeah, that's comparable.

LMAO>

[Equit]

Dude, stop feeding the troll.

I didn't know pointing out facts was trolling.

Phagget.

[drza]

1990 Patrick Ewing

Needs to be getting more discussion IMO. Here is the B-R breakdown for 90 Ewing vs 2 of his peers that are already in: 1994 Hakeem and 1995 Robinson:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 01&y3=1995

If you follow that link you might be surprised by how similar the 3 were in boxscore stats. I was...even though I was watching those years, I'd kind of started associating Ewing with his mid-1990s self. I kinda forgot how he was pre-knee injury. Ewing was scoring and rebounding at the exact same volume and efficiency as Hakeem and Robinson, and was better even than Robinson in the postseason.

I'm typing 1 handed at moment which is limiting (and annoying), so I'll stop and quote Fatal's good Ewing post for more context:

If we are considering peak Ewing only, that would be him in 1990. Offensively he was much better back then. He was moving much better, his knees were feeling probably the best they ever did in the NBA and he posted 29 ppg on 58 TS% (55 FG%). Couple of things that might throw people off are that Knicks were "only" 45-37, but consider that Oakley missed 21 games, Mark Jackson had the worst season of his career (benched in favor of 33 year old Cheeks by end of season), mid-season trades (Strickland for Cheeks), a new coach, a net negative player like old Kiki V joining the team at the end of the season (7-15 in games he played...this stretch took the air out of Ewing's MVP candidacy) and it's obvious the '90 team didn't really have the stability and continuity of the other Knick teams.

In the playoffs Ewing pulled off an upset against the Celtics by winning three straight elimination games (had 33/19, 44/13/5/7/2 on 75% shooting (!), 31/8/10/4 in those three games respectively). Against the Pistons in the next series he was in foul trouble in some games but still averaged 27/10 on 56 TS% against them. This is a version of Ewing without the offensive inefficiency that we're used to from him in the 90s. He gets more space on his baseline fadeaway and he's better at finishing baskets when he gets the ball down low. You can't look at his offensive impact later on in the 90s when the "Ewing Theory" really caught steam and use that say he was a net negative player offensively in the early 90s/late 80s (particularly 1990) because he was a different player then, especially physically. Felt like he aged 5 years between 1990 and 1992.

Despite all of this, you don't want a roster where you depend on Ewing for 30 points a night, and with a proper team I doubt he would be asked to score that much and would expend more energy on the boards/defense. But still, it's nice to know that he had another gear offensively that year where you could really ride him to wins.

The only thing is that in '90, his team defensive performance wasn't quite as dominant as we're used to. But that's more because of the personnel surrounding him, continuity issues and the biggest difference is probably that he wasn't under a defensive minded coach like Riley yet. His shot blocking is dominant here, 4 bpg, second only to Hakeem, which is impressive considering how much energy he was expending on offense. With the way he was moving back then (and it's not like he's inexperienced...he was 27 in 1990), I don't see how he doesn't have the same impact defensively if put in a system where defense is emphasized. So team defensive performance is down that year, but he's still the same great defensive anchor.

So while over the course of Ewing's career, I think there are questions about his offensive impact, I don't have those concerns when we look at just his peak.

[bastillon]

Ebere/Equid is a huge troll obviously but he does have a point. there is no reason to compare Kobe's 06 series vs Suns and TMac's 03 series vs Detroit in the last 3 games. boxscore wise TMac is destroyed as Equid suprisingly correctly pointed out. his impact was very likely a lot higher as well. I mentioned how poorly Orlando played with TMac on the court in the last 3 games. as far as impact goes, it was a different situation. Lakers were having a lot of success beating up on Phoenix inside up until game 4. but that strategy stopped working after that game. Kobe was doing what he was doing previously, only the strategy failed. his boxscore stats actually improved in that 3-game timespan.

in TMac's case his individual performance suffered a lot. it was clearly because of Detroit changing their focus more into TMac and letting Prince guard him a lot more after 1st four games. also where did you get this notion that we're nitpicking random 3-games for TMac ? it has been stated several times by me and others that it was 3-consecutive games, vs the same playoff opponent, with the series on the line and there was clear causation with Prince's presence making TMac's impact suffer. if TMac just had bad shooting games I'd more reluctant to punish him as part of variance. he exploded in the first 4 games, struggled in the last 3, that's ok (I guess). but when Prince was clearly the reason why TMac started to suffer it makes me wonder... what if Detroit put Prince on TMac right from the get go ? are the Magic swept ? it wasn't about TMac having a random 3-game stretch, it was about him unable to adjust to a better defender/unable to produce against him period.

so all in all, I see Kobe as playing pretty much the same way outside of game 6 (more on that below), while TMac's struggles (playing much worse) were linked to opponnent's adjustments. really big difference.

Goes for 50 points in game 6...in contradiction of what got his team in that position in the first place. And on that Tim Thomas 3 that sent it to OT...he was the one out of position.

that was one of the worst comments you've ever made on realGM. Phil specifically demanded that Kobe went all out in that game. let alone focusing on one play, for a guy who seems to champion consistency and large samples. wow, another one with double standards ?

Quits in game 7, goes 0-3 with 1 point in the 2nd half. That was still a winnable game, his team was down 15 points at halftime, and he had 23 at that point.

this game was over at the halftime, come on now. I'd rather blame Phil Jackson for using that idiotic strategy again. Lakers bigs were epic fail in the first half and if they just converted their inside shots Lakers could've been leading the game. not to mention their horrible defense, nobody stepped out on the pick and rolls to defend Barbosa. Kobe actually played perfect 1st half imo, scored tons of pts on great efficiency while also getting his teammates involved and executing Phil's gameplan. this game was much more about Kwame Brown & co suckin than it was about Kobe. he did quit in the 2nd half, it was pretty obvious, but there was no way Lakers could win that game either way with that level of play of their role players (even though Nash was injured). I mean Kobe couldn't literally play better in the 1st half and they still lost by 15 pts.

Other than big box score stats (against a much worse defensive team) that didn't have much impact, Kobe didn't play better than T-Mac down the stretch of his series.

empty statement. why don't you give some evidence ?

BTW, Kobe in 08 against the Pistons in the regular season, per 36 (2 games):

24.9 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 5.1 apg, 5.6 TOpg, 56.0% TS, 105.8 ORating

I will remember that. expect to have this brought up when you start talking sh*t about large samples. unbelievable. I would never expect that comment from you.

And so we're basically using winning bias against T-Mac. As if no other superstar wing had a poor 3 game stretch in the playoffs.

okay let's play this game. find similarly bad stretch for a superstar in the playoffs: 3 games, consecutive, the same opponent, series on the line, combo of huge dropoff in the boxscore and terrible on-court beatdown, caused by team putting a different defender on that superstar. Kobe, LeBron, Wade would literally get crucified.

[bastillon]

1990 Patrick Ewing

Needs to be getting more discussion IMO. Here is the B-R breakdown for 90 Ewing vs 2 of his peers that are already in: 1994 Hakeem and 1995 Robinson:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... 01&y3=1995

If you follow that link you might be surprised by how similar the 3 were in boxscore stats. I was...even though I was watching those years, I'd kind of started associating Ewing with his mid-1990s self. I kinda forgot how he was pre-knee injury. Ewing was scoring and rebounding at the exact same volume and efficiency as Hakeem and Robinson, and was better even than Robinson in the postseason.

I'm typing 1 handed at moment which is limiting (and annoying), so I'll stop and quote Fatal's good Ewing post for more context:

oh I'm sorry but this Olajuwon parallel is just way off. his offense was nowhere near Hakeem because he was far worse at both scoring and passing. his stats really overstate his offensive abilities here. peak Hakeem was pretty much a perfect low post player. do you really think Knicks would have those results with Olajuwon ?

I'm not sold on Ewing's offense at all. I understand that he seemed a lot better in 90 going by his stats but the fact that it's such an outlier among his other years really concerns me. it's probably just some coincidence of several factors (team style, coaching schemes, his better play) instead of Ewing legitimately improving his game. I mean what happened between 89 and 90 that Ewing became so much more potent offensively ? why sudden regress in 91 and then another sudden, bigger dropoff in 92 ? is it really all health ? I'm not sold on this.

I do think Ewing's prime gets underrated in comparison to D-Rob though. if the argument for D-Rob is that although he is a fundamentally flawed offensive anchor, he fits perfectly as the perfection 2nd option, the same holds true for Ewing. I would never trust him to run my offense through him because of his weak passing and heavy reliance on inconsistent jumpshot but I could see him being a much better 2nd option. D-Rob got voted in way too early though. his offensive impact was just weak in the postseason and I don't think his defense makes up for that.

[bastillon]

the more I analyse and read about TMac, the less impressed I am. I've always considered him a great talent but I don't regard him as Kobe/Wade ballpark player anymore. his history of impact stats is really unimpressive, even moreso than not winning in the first round since the latter was linked to some other stuff such as supporting cast etc. I understand his 03 RAPM may be screwed because of prior from 02 but why didn't he impact the game more later on ? let's take a look at 04-09 APM. TMac is at 5.14, really nowhere near elite. guys like Yao, Shaq, Gasol and Pierce best him. I understand he was better in 03 but I'd still expect him to produce higher impact with his alleged all around game. his defense for example, which was also brought up as a point here, paints him as a net negative (slight), even though big part of this was Houston period where he was supposedly high impact defender.

I do think TMac is an elite player at his best, his offense was clearly top-notch, but I just don't see how he's all-time level offensive player (like top5-10) and his defense doesn't seem that impressive after all. there are also many many questions about TMac which are gonna be left unanswered by their nature - portability, ceiling, unproven-ness in the deep playoff rounds, is he physically capable of playing a full RS + PS without suffering an injury at some point ? is he mentally capable of handling the big games as a favorite when in fact he was doing a lot better as an underdog, there are just so many asterisks I can't vote TMac over guys like Nash, Ewing, West whose all-time level impact was well documented and who have proven themselves as high impact players in multiple environments (high/low ceiling, different teammates etc).

I also think TMac's cast from 03 gets underrated offensively. their top20 defense was much deserved but I'd expect them to play a lot better offense if TMac was this all-time level offensive player (lmao @ "he's close to Nash", there's no evidence for that). as I said, Garnett 03 anchored top5 offense with similar role players offensively.

[ardee]

Ebere/Equid is a huge troll obviously but he does have a point. there is no reason to compare Kobe's 06 series vs Suns and TMac's 03 series vs Detroit in the last 3 games. boxscore wise TMac is destroyed as Equid suprisingly correctly pointed out. his impact was very likely a lot higher as well. I mentioned how poorly Orlando played with TMac on the court in the last 3 games. as far as impact goes, it was a different situation. Lakers were having a lot of success beating up on Phoenix inside up until game 4. but that strategy stopped working after that game. Kobe was doing what he was doing previously, only the strategy failed. his boxscore stats actually improved in that 3-game timespan.

in TMac's case his individual performance suffered a lot. it was clearly because of Detroit changing their focus more into TMac and letting Prince guard him a lot more after 1st four games. also where did you get this notion that we're nitpicking random 3-games for TMac ? it has been stated several times by me and others that it was 3-consecutive games, vs the same playoff opponent, with the series on the line and there was clear causation with Prince's presence making TMac's impact suffer. if TMac just had bad shooting games I'd more reluctant to punish him as part of variance. he exploded in the first 4 games, struggled in the last 3, that's ok (I guess). but when Prince was clearly the reason why TMac started to suffer it makes me wonder... what if Detroit put Prince on TMac right from the get go ? are the Magic swept ? it wasn't about TMac having a random 3-game stretch, it was about him unable to adjust to a better defender/unable to produce against him period.

so all in all, I see Kobe as playing pretty much the same way outside of game 6 (more on that below), while TMac's struggles (playing much worse) were linked to opponnent's adjustments. really big difference.

Goes for 50 points in game 6...in contradiction of what got his team in that position in the first place. And on that Tim Thomas 3 that sent it to OT...he was the one out of position.

that was one of the worst comments you've ever made on realGM. Phil specifically demanded that Kobe went all out in that game. let alone focusing on one play, for a guy who seems to champion consistency and large samples. wow, another one with double standards ?

Quits in game 7, goes 0-3 with 1 point in the 2nd half. That was still a winnable game, his team was down 15 points at halftime, and he had 23 at that point.

this game was over at the halftime, come on now. I'd rather blame Phil Jackson for using that idiotic strategy again. Lakers bigs were epic fail in the first half and if they just converted their inside shots Lakers could've been leading the game. not to mention their horrible defense, nobody stepped out on the pick and rolls to defend Barbosa. Kobe actually played perfect 1st half imo, scored tons of pts on great efficiency while also getting his teammates involved and executing Phil's gameplan. this game was much more about Kwame Brown & co suckin than it was about Kobe. he did quit in the 2nd half, it was pretty obvious, but there was no way Lakers could win that game either way with that level of play of their role players (even though Nash was injured). I mean Kobe couldn't literally play better in the 1st half and they still lost by 15 pts.

Other than big box score stats (against a much worse defensive team) that didn't have much impact, Kobe didn't play better than T-Mac down the stretch of his series.

empty statement. why don't you give some evidence ?

BTW, Kobe in 08 against the Pistons in the regular season, per 36 (2 games):

24.9 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 5.1 apg, 5.6 TOpg, 56.0% TS, 105.8 ORating

I will remember that. expect to have this brought up when you start talking sh*t about large samples. unbelievable. I would never expect that comment from you.

And so we're basically using winning bias against T-Mac. As if no other superstar wing had a poor 3 game stretch in the playoffs.

okay let's play this game. find similarly bad stretch for a superstar in the playoffs: 3 games, consecutive, the same opponent, series on the line, combo of huge dropoff in the boxscore and terrible on-court beatdown, caused by team putting a different defender on that superstar. Kobe, LeBron, Wade would literally get crucified.

Thank you

You know the funny thing? This was a ROOKIE Tayshaun Prince, who played 42 games in the regular season and barely averaged 26 mpg. He was a NOBODY at that point and he just locked T-Mac up and threw away the key.

I see it as:

19. West
20. Barkley
21. Nash
22. Paul
23. Moses

Then T-Mac comes into the discussion for me. It'll be a travesty if he gets voted in above West.

[The Infamous1]

29/7/5/69% TS
50/8/5/3/66% TS
24/4/1/1/66% TS

vs.

19/8/4/3/45% TS
37/11/5/2/52% TS
21/5/6/40% TS

Yeah, that's comparable.

LMAO>

It's not even close and it shows the anti Kobe bias people have

Tmac- 26 ppg on just 45% T/S shooting the last 3 games

Kobe-34-6-4 on 67% TS shooting the last 3 games

As for that game 7

Halftime
Kobe - 21 points, 8 Made FGs
Rest of Lakers - 24 points, 9 Made FGs

Kobe shot 50% for the game. Rest of his teammates 32%.

Odom - 35%
Smush - 31%
Kwame - 20%

[C-izMe]

I'm with bastillion on this. Hakeem is far out but the fact that DRob got selected so high and Ewing isn't getting votes already is crazy. Personally I rank them neck and neck. Ewing is slightly worse defensively and I can hear an argument that they're equal on offense. I think it's more DRob being overrated then Ewing being underrated though (even though Pat is underrated. I mean Bernard and Walt were mentioned before he was).

[MisterWestside]

Not sure exactly what you're asking here. Sounds like you agree that TMac's game is more like Kobe's than Wade's, you just think he was better than Kobe. He very well may have been, I just have uncertainties.

I was just curious on what your qualms about T-Mac were. You said that he's more like Kobe but it seems you'd lean more toward Kobe than T-Mac -- which you could do. But I wanted to highlight the strength he had over Kobe.

Oh I'm just saying my friend:

You made a comment about Nash that was really more about volume scoring vs floor generalship than it was about the players in question.

Well I think all of these concepts are connected. Nash is a great floor general -- he's also been surrounded with great "fitting" players especially during his tenure in Phoenix, and he's not put in a position where he has to increase his usage to carry a less talented squad like T-Mac in Orlando. A reflection of Nash's dynamic skillset? Sure. But when you make the move to Phoenix and a coach ALSO consider the talented skillsets of Marion, Amar'e, Johnson, Barbosa, etc. there's no incentive to ask Nash to change his usage; you can just set up shop and put a more "team-centric" offense together.When you see its high level of play, then you can just switch and change parts accordingly. Can you honestly say with a straight face that Nash was that much more talented of a player than any of his teammates in Phoenix? Can we say the same for T-Mac in Orlando?

I suppose it's a bit of a chicken and the egg argument, but this is why I consider coaching, teammates, and front office philosophies in these projects to be relevant when ranking these peaks. Some personnel are more capable of implementing an offensive system and getting their players to run it to optimal efficiency than others, but that takes work and creative genius. And the teammates to put it together.

[MisterWestside]

I understand his 03 RAPM may be screwed because of prior from 02 but why didn't he impact the game more later on ?

Why is that relevant though? We're talking about 2003 T-Mac here.

as I said, Garnett 03 anchored top5 offense with similar role players offensively.

Can't agree with that. And I've always admired Garnett for playing well with the "trash" he played with in Minny, but even he would take some of his teammates over T-Mac's in 2003.

[bastillon]

I understand his 03 RAPM may be screwed because of prior from 02 but why didn't he impact the game more later on ?

Why is that relevant though? We're talking about 2003 T-Mac here.

as I said, Garnett 03 anchored top5 offense with similar role players offensively.

Can't agree with that. And I've always admired Garnett for playing well with the "trash" he played with in Minny, but even he would take some of his teammates over T-Mac's in 2003.

why is this relevant ? because TMac wasn't all THAT different in 03. I see it as expanding our sample size. I understand he wasn't quite as productive but I'd still expect his impact to be quite better, especially on the defensive end where he didn't seem to make any at all. I mean really, where's the empirical evidence that TMac made a bigger impact on defense than Nash ?

as for Orlando vs Minnesota, could you elaborate ? Garrity was a stretch four so he had a huge offensive impact for TMac with his spacing, Gooden was better offensive player than anyone on the Wolves not named Szczerbiak (who played half year anyway) he also had Mike Miller/Grant Hill (together played almost entire season, let's call him Grant Miller), Kemp/DeClerq at center (compared to Rasho they're likely better offensively since Rasho was a huge negative on offense). I don't think this cast was quite as bad as people think it is offensively. Garrity/Gooden and DeClerq/Kemp actually seem pretty strong in comparison to their counterparts on the Wolves (Rasho and Peeler/Gill). I think it's quite probable Wovles were worse than Magic without Garnett or TMac playing.

[ardee]

I understand his 03 RAPM may be screwed because of prior from 02 but why didn't he impact the game more later on ?

Why is that relevant though? We're talking about 2003 T-Mac here.

as I said, Garnett 03 anchored top5 offense with similar role players offensively.

Can't agree with that. And I've always admired Garnett for playing well with the "trash" he played with in Minny, but even he would take some of his teammates over T-Mac's in 2003.

why is this relevant ? because TMac wasn't all THAT different in 03. I see it as expanding our sample size. I understand he wasn't quite as productive but I'd still expect his impact to be quite better, especially on the defensive end where he didn't seem to make any at all. I mean really, where's the empirical evidence that TMac made a bigger impact on defense than Nash ?

as for Orlando vs Minnesota, could you elaborate ? Garrity was a stretch four so he had a huge offensive impact for TMac with his spacing, Gooden was better offensive player than anyone on the Wolves not named Szczerbiak (who played half year anyway) he also had Mike Miller/Grant Hill (together played almost entire season, let's call him Grant Miller), Kemp/DeClerq at center (compared to Rasho they're likely better offensively since Rasho was a huge negative on offense). I don't think this cast was quite as bad as people think it is offensively. Garrity/Gooden and DeClerq/Kemp actually seem pretty strong in comparison to their counterparts on the Wolves (Rasho and Peeler/Gill). I think it's quite probable Wovles were worse than Magic without Garnett or TMac playing.

Ok now I wouldn't go that far.... KG had a legit second option and a 40% 3P shooter in Wally. Hudson and Rasho were better than any of T-Mac's role players.

I can't believe I saw that line actually typed out.

[bastillon]

I'd expect Mike Miller to do equally well with the Wolves.
as for Garrity, I happen to think stretch fours have enormous offensive value. they're basically taking away a big man outside the paint and leaves them in uncomfortable position where they're really unable to help. agree to disagree ?

edit: not to mention that Wally wasn't even playing in 52 games.
ElGee:

03 Wolves w/out Szczerbiak were +0.4 SRS (30g) +3.7 w/Szczerbiak

I'm assuming Wally did not improve their defense. so that makes him a very valuable offensive player... but it also makes the Wolves about top2 offense. so Garnett really does have a better supporting cast with Wally but he also has far better results.

[MisterWestside]

why is this relevant ? because TMac wasn't all THAT different in 03.

Do you mean from 02 to 03? Because T-Mac upped his shot-creation while setting career highs in ts% and tov rate. He definitely stepped his game up that season.

as for Orlando vs Minnesota, could you elaborate ? Garrity was a stretch four so he had a huge offensive impact for TMac with his spacing, Gooden was better offensive player than anyone on the Wolves not named Szczerbiak (who played half year anyway) he also had Mike Miller/Grant Hill (together played almost entire season, let's call him Grant Miller), Kemp/DeClerq at center (compared to Rasho they're likely better offensively since Rasho was a huge negative on offense). I don't think this cast was quite as bad as people think it is offensively. Garrity/Gooden and DeClerq/Kemp actually seem pretty strong in comparison to their counterparts on the Wolves (Rasho and Peeler/Gill). I think it's quite probable Wovles were worse than Magic without Garnett or TMac playing.

Garrity was solid, but Wally could do everything Garrity could do with more shot-creation. Gooden only played 500+ minutes that season.

You prefer Kemp over Rasho? Kemp was out of shape and on the wrong side of 30 in 2003; he produced at a cringe-worthy .468 ts% clip as a roleplayer and was also turnover prone. Out of the league in 04. Rasho was in DeClercq's league offensively but could also provide a little better defense and with more minutes played.

Mike Miller/Grant Hill were solid, but Hudson could give you what they provided with almost the same amount of minutes played as Grant Miller with lineup continuity. And Trent/Smith was a productive F/C combo that surpassed the inconsistent bigs on the Magic roster.