RealGM All-Time Franchise Ranking - #27

[trex_8063]

1. Minneapolis/Los Angeles Lakers
2. Boston Celtics
3. Dallas Chaparrals, San Antonio Spurs
4. Chicago Bulls
5. Syracuse Nationals/Philadelphia 76ers
6. Philly/SF/Golden State Warriors
7. Miami Heat
8. Fort Wayne/Detroit Pistons
9. Houston Rockets
10. New York Knicks

.....

28. Charlotte Bobcats/Hornets
29. Buffalo Braves/(San Diego)/Los Angeles Clippers
30. Minnesota Timberwolves

.

[SkyHookFTW]

Sorry I got my vote in late for the #28 spot.

I think here it's time for the Rochester/Cincinnati/Kansas City-Omaha/Kansas City/Sacramento Royals/Kings. Let's see...one title way back in 1951, 29 playoff appearances since 1945, eight times knocked out in the first round, had the misfortune in the 60's of having a good team but running into, in succession, the 76ers, Celtics, and 76ers to lose three straight division semis, had a nice series in the 1980 season, became a punching bag for about 20 years (a minor success here and there), IMO were jobbed in 2002, and haven't sniffed the playoffs since their first round loss in 2005-06 to the Spurs. They have three HoF'ers total, a few RoY's, a smattering of very good players, and that's about it. 71 years and one title. Damn.

[Fadeaway_J]

I'm taking the New Orleans Hornets/Pelicans. Seven playoff appearances and a .464 W-L% are mediocre enough numbers before you consider that a) since it was initially just a relocation and name change, they inherited a solid Charlotte team rather than having to go through the lumps of being an actual expansion franchise and b) they were fortunate enough to draft not one, but two future HOFers (AD and CP3) within seven years of each other. There are franchises that have never had one player of that calibre in their entire histories, let alone two, and New Orleans parlayed that into a whopping two playoff series wins before having to trade both guys right in their primes.

[penbeast0]

I just don't think the Pelicans have a long enough run of suckitude to match up to the Kings. The Kings have been awful for their entire history except basically for the Oscar years where they were roughly a .500 team over that era and the Webber years where they were good but fell short. Truly consistently bad.

Vote KINGS

[Odinn21]

Voting for the Memphis Grizzlies franchise.

Memphis Grizzlies
24 completed seasons, 798-1143 (.411) record, 14 seasons under .500 (.583), 10 playoffs (.417), won only 4 playoff series, 29-46 (.387) playoffs record, best ever result WCF in 2013

New Orleans Pelicans
17 completed seasons, 649-751 (.464) record, 10 seasons under .500 (.588), 7 playoffs (.412), won only 2 playoff series, 20-29 (.408) playoffs record, best ever result WCSF in 2008 and 2018

Sacramento Kings
71 completed seasons, 2570-3065 (.456) record, 47 seasons under .500 (.662), 29 playoffs (.408), won only 10 playoff series, 78-107 (.422) playoffs record, best ever result NBA Title in 1951 (and WCF in 2002 in modern times)

It insane that after the current season is over, the Kings will have a losing record for two third of the seasons they competed in. But having an NBA Championsip to their name. And the other 2 candidates are yet to have a similar era to Adelman era Sacramento Kings. They never come close to sniffing a title like the Kings did in 2002.

[trex_8063]

Now that the Hornets/Bobcats are off the table, it's definitely between the Kings, Grizzlies, and Pelicans for me. I already partially reviewed a comparison of the Kings vs the Pelicans and vs the Grizzlies in the last thread. I'll review again, and also make a comparison of Grizzlies to Pelicans and see what I can glean from that; then I'll decide on a vote.

[trex_8063]

Semi-randomly I found myself reading about the Kings franchise on Wikipedia of all places......got to the section about the 90's Richmond-era Kings and found this line:

During the 1990s, Sacramento had other stars like Spud Webb, Kurt Rambis, Wayman Tisdale, Walt Williams, Olden Polynice and Brian Grant, but they only lasted with the team for a few years.

"Stars"? Olden Polynice? Spud Webb? Wayman Tisdale? (etc etc)

Did ANY of those peak at a level that could even loosely be called "star-level"? I kinda think no. Brian Grant was probably the closest, peaking perhaps around a top 40(ish) player a couple of years (though not while in Sacramento). And Rambis was washed up 34 years old by the time he arrived in Sacramento.

I guess you do have to take Wiki with a grain of salt.

Anyway, sorry for the derail.

[eminence]

I'm leaning towards either the Grizzlies or the Pelicans here. I see the case for the Kings, but to me they had some short stretches of very high level play with similar enough average level to the others to give them an advantage.

[SactoKingsFan]

Sorry I got my vote in late for the #28 spot.

I think here it's time for the Rochester/Cincinnati/Kansas City-Omaha/Kansas City/Sacramento Royals/Kings. Let's see...one title way back in 1951, 29 playoff appearances since 1945, eight times knocked out in the first round, had the misfortune in the 60's of having a good team but running into, in succession, the 76ers, Celtics, and 76ers to lose three straight division semis, had a nice series in the 1980 season, became a punching bag for about 20 years (a minor success here and there), IMO were jobbed in 2002, and haven't sniffed the playoffs since their first round loss in 2005-06 to the Spurs. They have three HoF'ers total, a few RoY's, a smattering of very good players, and that's about it. 71 years and one title. Damn.

Pretty sure the franchise has had at least 5 HoFers and Webber will eventually get in.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

[penbeast0]

Semi-randomly I found myself reading about the Kings franchise on Wikipedia of all places......got to the section about the 90's Richmond-era Kings and found this line:

During the 1990s, Sacramento had other stars like Spud Webb, Kurt Rambis, Wayman Tisdale, Walt Williams, Olden Polynice and Brian Grant, but they only lasted with the team for a few years.

"Stars"? Olden Polynice? Spud Webb? Wayman Tisdale? (etc etc)

Did ANY of those peak at a level that could even loosely be called "star-level"? I kinda think no. Brian Grant was probably the closest, peaking perhaps around a top 40(ish) player a couple of years (though not while in Sacramento). And Rambis was washed up 34 years old by the time he arrived in Sacramento.

I guess you do have to take Wiki with a grain of salt.

Anyway, sorry for the derail.

Tisdale was a freaking stud in college. I thought he was going to have Charles Barkley's career coming out and Barkley was going to have Tisdale's. But he just didn't seem to want it, just wanted to play music and enjoy life where Barkley just exploded all over the league.

[SkyHookFTW]

Sorry I got my vote in late for the #28 spot.

I think here it's time for the Rochester/Cincinnati/Kansas City-Omaha/Kansas City/Sacramento Royals/Kings. Let's see...one title way back in 1951, 29 playoff appearances since 1945, eight times knocked out in the first round, had the misfortune in the 60's of having a good team but running into, in succession, the 76ers, Celtics, and 76ers to lose three straight division semis, had a nice series in the 1980 season, became a punching bag for about 20 years (a minor success here and there), IMO were jobbed in 2002, and haven't sniffed the playoffs since their first round loss in 2005-06 to the Spurs. They have eighteen HoF'ers total (not bad at all), a few RoY's, a smattering of very good players, and that's about it. 71 years and one title. Damn.

Pretty sure the franchise has had at least 5 HoFers and Webber will eventually get in.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Yikes, bad brain fart...eighteen..why did I put three???

Edit: After checking, according to Wiki, there are indeed eighteen NBA players who have played for the Kings at one time or another in the HoF.

[SactoKingsFan]

Sorry I got my vote in late for the #28 spot.

I think here it's time for the Rochester/Cincinnati/Kansas City-Omaha/Kansas City/Sacramento Royals/Kings. Let's see...one title way back in 1951, 29 playoff appearances since 1945, eight times knocked out in the first round, had the misfortune in the 60's of having a good team but running into, in succession, the 76ers, Celtics, and 76ers to lose three straight division semis, had a nice series in the 1980 season, became a punching bag for about 20 years (a minor success here and there), IMO were jobbed in 2002, and haven't sniffed the playoffs since their first round loss in 2005-06 to the Spurs. They have eighteen HoF'ers total (not bad at all), a few RoY's, a smattering of very good players, and that's about it. 71 years and one title. Damn.

Pretty sure the franchise has had at least 5 HoFers and Webber will eventually get in.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Yikes, bad brain fart...eighteen..why did I put three???

Edit: After checking, according to Wiki, there are indeed eighteen NBA players who have played for the Kings at one time or another in the HoF.

That must include guys like Cousy who only played 7 games. There's been 10 HoFers who played several seasons for the Royals/ Kings.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

[giordunk]

Thanks again for keeping this running. I think Pelicans for me. I'm bouncing around on my criteria but I think the short history and the fact that both times they've had All-Time franchise players leave says something about the organization currently not being that competent.

I think Grizzlies has shown better signs of a franchise than the Pelicans - Pera is decent ownership, and they were able to build that Grit and Grind era and even though it's over, some of that culture has leaked over for the future.

The Kings/Royals I will put over these two franchises because of more history. They had a Championship which still counts for something, and the 2002 Kings really should count as like a half championship.

[Dr Positivity]

Vote Pelicans. From their "inception" on it seems like the Grizzlies run has been a lot better. That's enough to outweigh the laughable Vancouver era. Kings have reached higher highs than either on multiple occasions, despite the ineptitude otherwise

[Owly]

Pretty sure the franchise has had at least 5 HoFers and Webber will eventually get in.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Yikes, bad brain fart...eighteen..why did I put three???

Edit: After checking, according to Wiki, there are indeed eighteen NBA players who have played for the Kings at one time or another in the HoF.

That must include guys like Cousy who only played 7 games. There's been 10 HoFers who played several seasons for the Royals/ Kings.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Given 3, "at least 5", 18 and 10 in various forms have been mentioned.

The basketball reference list ... (http://bkref.com/tiny/rRSZO) with first and last seasons, and total win shares for franchise
Oscar Robertson 1961 1970 154.2
Jack Twyman 1956 1966 75
Bobby Wanzer 1949 1957 63.9
Jerry Lucas 1964 1970 57.8
Tiny Archibald 1971 1976 53.7
Mitch Richmond 1992 1998 50.4
Bob Davies 1949 1955 49.7
Arnie Risen 1949 1955 48.9
Vlade Divac 1999 2004 39.4
Wayne Embry 1959 1966 32
Maurice Stokes 1956 1958 16.1
Clyde Lovellette 1958 1958 10.1
Alex Hannum 1953 1954 3.6
Šarūnas Marčiulionis 1996 1996 2.6
Red Holzman 1949 1953 1.8
Bob Cousy 1970 1970 0.1
Jo Jo White 1981 1981 0.1
Guy Rodgers 1968 1968 0
Ralph Sampson 1990 1991 -0.9

This list has 19 (assume 18 was the 19 was including Embry as a "contributor", but not Holzman as a coach).

As a Bkb-Ref WS list, it has a blind spot for the NBL. As such it misses at least Al Cervi and possibly others.

[trex_8063]

Quoting myself from the last thread (comparison of the Kings to the Grizzlies):

The Kings' all-time rs win% is .456 vs .413 for the Grizzlies; even in the SAME 24-YEAR SPAN that the Grizzlies have existed in, the Kings rs win% is .453.
Their all-time % of seasons going to the playoffs is comparable (.408 vs .417). In the same 24 years that the Grizzlies have existed, they've made the playoffs just ONE less time (9 times, vs 10 for the Grizzlies), though have a better playoff record in those appearances (5-9 (.357) vs 4-10 (.286) for the Grizzlies).
They've been as far as the conference finals 8 times to the 1 time for the Grizzlies (have had one trip since the Grizzlies became a franchise; had 7 other trips prior to that [including one in the post-merger era]).
And they have the one pre-shotclock title.

For me, the above establishes the Grizzlies as the marginally worse franchise during their same years of existence ('96-'19):
the ONE additional first-round exit for the Grizzlies is not enough to overcome the fact that the Kings had a notably better rs win% (.453 vs .413) and a better playoff win%, with the same number of CF appearances, and especially noting the Kings also peaked higher (both in terms of rs wins and SRS) during this time-period [they actually have MULTIPLE seasons better than the Grizzlies' peak].

So given I have the Kings as slightly better during the same span of years, the previous 47 seasons for the Royals/Kings have to not only be poor, but SO poor as to push them behind the Grizzlies.
In those other 47 seasons, they had a .458 rs win%, made the playoffs 20 times (.426 of all seasons), had a 10-19 playoff series record (.345), made the CF 7 times (.149 of all seasons; includes one in the post-merger era), and won a title in 1951.

Now, I'm torn on how I should consider additional years [of the older franchise] when comparing two franchises with great disparity in the number of years played. Part of me thinks I should compare those additional years to a mean or average: any amount ABOVE average is of benefit to that older team; any amount BELOW average is of detriment to them.......because, at least in a comparison to a franchise like the Grizzlies, to do otherwise is basically giving extra credit for almost any kind of longevity (even bad longevity).
Another part of me thinks I should compare the quality of those additional years to the quality of the team they're specifically being compared to.......because [arguably, anyway] to do otherwise could be construed as rewarding the Grizzlies for a shorter history and/or penalizing the Royals/Kings for longevity (even though those extra years are certainly no worse than the Grizzlies' history).

I'm not sure which is the better philosophy; I think I'm sort of subconsciously aiming for some kind of happy medium between the two [perhaps erring ever so slightly toward the first one].

So given those first 47 years of the Royals/Kings are kinda bad [but not godawful; certainly no worse than the Grizzlies, and arguably a pinch better], and given I think they're a little ahead of the Grizzlies for the '96-'19 span, where does that leave me? I'm still not sure. Will compare one of these two teams to the Pelicans next.....

[trex_8063]

Pelicans vs Kings.......

In the same 17 seasons ('03-'19) that the Pels have existed in:

*the Pels have the better rs win% (.467 vs .423).
**The Pels have made more playoffs (7 to 4).
***The Kings have a better playoff record though [2-4 (.333) vs 2-7 (.222)]; both teams made it as far as the conf semis [twice] during this span.

Overall, I think the Pels are definitely a little better in those 17 years: notably better rs win%, three additional playoff appearances (even if they all were just quick 1st round exits). So it hinges on the previous 54 seasons the Kings have, during which.....

*they had a .467 rs win%
**made the playoffs 25 times (.463)
***had a 13-24 (.351) record in the playoffs
****made the CF 8 times (.148)---->note for example the Rockets [whom we voted in #9] made the CF 8 times in 52 seasons (.154)
*****won a title in 1951

It's really not that bad of a 54-year span; it is a little below average though.
So given the philosophies I discussed in my prior post, and that I think the Pel's had the little better '03-'19 span, I suppose I'm compelled to give the edge to the Pelicans in this comparison.

So I need to come to a decision between the Kings and the Grizzlies.

[trex_8063]

After consideration of the factors outlined in posts 16-17 above, I'm going to vote Memphis Grizzlies for this spot. Razor-thin margin, though, and I cannot fault anyone voting for the Kings here (even the Pelicans don't seem a bad choice).

[trex_8063]

btw, I presently make the count:

Pelicans - 3
Grizzlies - 2
Kings - 2


I think [by far] the tightest vote we've had in any thread thus far. This one will remain open until tomorrow morning, though.

[eminence]

I've decided to go with the Memphis Grizzlies here, tight with the Pels though. Just a bit lower lows than the Pels, though average pretty similar. '08 Hornets/Pels likely the best team between the two franchises a small boost.