NBA: Cumulative MVP Shares; or, Who is the Greatest of This Moment?

[Latrinsorm]

Ok, stay with me here. In the NBA, MVP ballots allow for (but do not absolutely require) 5 selections: #1 gets 10 points, #2 7, #3 5, #4 3, #5 1. Hence, it is possible to compute the "share" of an MVP by dividing the points actually received by (10 * # of voters). The maximum possible value is 1 (or 100%) for someone who receives every #1 vote. (This has never happened in the NBA.) You could then sum these "shares" over every NBA player's entire career and get this chart (http://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/mvp_shares.html), and I think most people would find at least the top 5 (if not necessarily the order of the top 5) pretty agreeable.

Another way you could look at these values is to use a moving average: rather than a raw sum with endpoints based on a player's career, we use an average over a 5 year period centered around the given year (2 in the future, 2 in the past). If we do this, we find the following leaders...

2010: LeBron James - 0.723
2009: LeBron James - 0.574
2008: LeBron James - 0.598
2007: Steve Nash - 0.475
2006: Steve Nash - 0.475
2005: Steve Nash - 0.473
2004: Tim Duncan - 0.486
2003: Tim Duncan - 0.595

That's pretty interesting! Not surprisingly the rankings include those three players who won multiple MVP awards in this span, but we see a lower number for Nash, a reflection of both his less dramatic electoral margins (never topped a .839 share) and his sudden rise and fall in MVP voting (his only serious votes came in the 2005-2007 period). Compare with LeBron, who received a .431 share in 2011, a .348 share in 2008, and a .55 share in 2006, in addition to .96+ shares in his 2009 and 2010 victories, and consequently sees a higher value.

Another interesting result comes if we ignore the numbers and merely rank based on being in the top 5 in 5-year MVP shares for any given year. With 8 years measured, there could be up to 40 people who show up, but (obviously) the actual number is much smaller: 12 players are all that appear, broken down as...

Kobe Bryant (7 appearances, 5 2nd, 2 5th)
Steve Nash (6 appearances, 3 1st, 1 3rd, 1 4th)
LeBron James (5 appearances, 3 1st, 1 3rd, 1 5th)
Dirk Nowitzki (5 appearances, 1 3rd, 4 4th)
Kevin Garnett (1 2nd, 2 3rd, 1 4th)
Chris Paul (3 5th)
Tim Duncan (2 1st, 1 2nd)
Dwight Howard (1 3rd, 1 4th)
Shaquille O'Neal (1 2nd, 1 3rd)
Kevin Durant (1 3rd)
Derrick Rose (1 5th)
Allen Iverson (1 4th)

We could apply the same 10/7/5/3/1 point scheme the MVP voting does to this tabulation, which puts Kobe, Nash, and LeBron head and shoulders above everyone else with 37, 39, and 36 points respectively. The next closest is Tim Duncan with 27.

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I feel like MVP award shares are a uniquely useful measurement of what people tend to talk about when they talk about "greatness":
1. Team success is crucial: nobody gave Kobe even a #5 vote when his Lakers missed the playoffs by 11 games. (Although looking at other pity votes people have thrown out there, someone probably should have.)
2. Personal production is also crucial: only 6 MVPs (out of 56) have won with less than .200 WS/48, two of them were Bill Russell, and five of them were before the merger. For reference, only 11 players last year posted .200 or higher.
3. Having an excellent teammate diminishes greatness and splits MVP votes: look at anything anyone said about LeBron joining the Heat, and then Derrick Rose suddenly wins the MVP.

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I really look forward to extending this analysis to earlier years, seeing how LeBron's .723 and Nash's 39 stack up historically, seeing if someone had a longer streak at the top. The biggest problem will be that MVP voting in the NBA has a really bizarre, discontinuous history prior to 1980, and the earlier years are not really comparable to the present, but we'll at least be able to see how Michael, Magic, and Bird stack up under this metric.

[Latrinsorm]

Here's the list out to 1983:

2010: LeBron James - 0.723
2009: LeBron James - 0.574
2008: LeBron James - 0.598
2007: Steve Nash - 0.475
2006: Steve Nash - 0.475
2005: Steve Nash - 0.473
2004: Tim Duncan - 0.486
2003: Tim Duncan - 0.595
2002: Tim Duncan - 0.584
2001: Tim Duncan - 0.593
2000: Shaquille O'Neal - 0.472
1999: Karl Malone - 0.512
1998: Michael Jordan - 0.550
1997: Karl Malone - 0.573
1996: Michael Jordan - 0.553
1995: Michael Jordan - 0.481
1994: Michael Jordan - 0.502
1993: David Robinson - 0.492
1992: Michael Jordan - 0.613
1991: Michael Jordan - 0.754
1990: Michael Jordan - 0.804
1989: Michael Jordan - 0.735
1988: Magic Johnson - 0.667
1987: Magic Johnson - 0.596
1986: Larry Bird - 0.767
1985: Larry Bird - 0.732
1984: Larry Bird - 0.793
1983: Larry Bird - 0.719

The inclusions of Karl Malone are troubling. However, if we recall that we are talking about greater players rather than best players, it becomes less so, especially when we consider that the years he tops the charts coincide with (1) Michael Jordan being retired, (2) Tim Duncan still being pretty young, and (3) a period of 5 Conference Finals or better over 7 years, which stacks up very well historically. (For comparison, Duncan's best mark is 4 in 7 years, Kobe's is the same 5.)

Less troubling are how thoroughly Jordan dominates the list, both in number of inclusions (8, next nearest are Bird and Duncan with 4) and value (only one to crack .800).

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All told, 168 players received at least a 5th place MVP vote over the period from 1981 to 2012. Of these, only 27 ever placed in the top 5 of the moving five-year average, which is a pretty neat figure for 28 measurements (32 - 2 at the front - 2 at the back). There are a few interesting ways to look at this data...

Total Appearances
Michael Jordan: 15
Magic Johnson: 10
Shaquille O'Neal: 10
Karl Malone: 10
Tim Duncan: 9
Charles Barkley: 9
David Robinson: 8
Larry Bird: 7
Kobe Bryant: 7
Steve Nash: 6
Kevin Garnett: 6
LeBron James: 5
Dirk Nowitzki: 5
Hakeem Olajuwon: 5
Allen Iverson: 5
Dominique Wilkins: 4
Moses Malone: 3
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: 3
Chris Paul: 3
Dwight Howard: 2
Alonzo Mourning: 2
Kevin Durant: 1
Julius Erving: 1
Derrick Rose: 1
Sidney Moncrief: 1
Patrick Ewing: 1
Jason Kidd: 1

-The peculiarities of Jordan's career explain how he managed to appear 15 times while only playing 15 years: he shows up in 1994 and 1999 to make up for the Washington years; by receiving a pretty good amount of votes his rookie year and landing a very strong 2nd place in 1987, he accumulates enough share to place 4th in a relatively weak 1985 top 5, and the rest is history.
-I was surprised at how unfavorably MVP voters rated Ewing. Then again, everyone he's looking up at is or is going to be in the Hall of Fame, plus he is no doubt subject to a handicap by playing in largely the same era as the greatest of all time (same could be said for others, but Hakeem and Barkley especially).
-Obviously the guys who played before the 1981 season don't stack up very well here (Kareem and Erving being the big ones, to a lesser degree Moses).

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Scoring with the 10/7/5/3/1 system, we get...
Michael Jordan: 119
Magic Johnson: 66
Tim Duncan: 59
Larry Bird: 55
Shaquille O'Neal: 53
Karl Malone: 50
David Robinson: 41
Steve Nash: 39
Kobe Bryant: 37
LeBron James: 36
Charles Barkley: 33
Kevin Garnett: 28
Hakeem Olajuwon: 21
Moses Malone: 19
Dirk Nowitzki: 17
Allen Iverson: 15
Dwight Howard: 8
Dominique Wilkins: 8
Kevin Durant: 5
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: 5
Alonzo Mourning: 4
Chris Paul: 3
Julius Erving: 3
Derrick Rose: 1
Sidney Moncrief: 1
Patrick Ewing: 1
Jason Kidd: 1

Again no big surprise, and the differences in the lists make sense: Bird had a much, much higher peak than Kobe (therefore higher average placement in the top 5), but Kobe's career was much longer. LeBron with his 3 MVPs jumps a whole bunch of people.

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It also occurred to me to divide score by career length to further make obvious the difference between a great player and a very good player who played a long time...

Michael Jordan: 7.93
Magic Johnson: 5.08
Larry Bird: 4.23
LeBron James: 4.00
Tim Duncan: 3.93
David Robinson: 2.93
Shaquille O'Neal: 2.79
Karl Malone: 2.63
Steve Nash: 2.44
Kobe Bryant: 2.31
Charles Barkley: 2.06
Kevin Garnett: 1.65
Moses Malone: 1.27
Dirk Nowitzki: 1.21
Hakeem Olajuwon: 1.17
Allen Iverson: 1.07
Dwight Howard: 1.00
Kevin Durant: 1.00
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: 0.56
Dominique Wilkins: 0.53
Chris Paul: 0.43
Julius Erving: 0.43
Alonzo Mourning: 0.27
Derrick Rose: 0.25
Sidney Moncrief: 0.10
Patrick Ewing: 0.06
Jason Kidd: 0.06

I think this is the most interesting result yet. The players still active are LeBron (presumably going up), Duncan and Nash (definitely going down), Bryant (presumably going down), Garnett (definitely going down), Howard (???), Durant (definitely going up), Rose (???), and Kidd (definitely going down), so there's plenty of wiggle room in the relative standings (except for poor Jason). It's also striking that you can go back through the Finals for every year except two of the period and one of the 11 players with >2 points per year is there...

LeBron, LeBron
Kobe, Kobe, Kobe, LeBron vs. Duncan, Shaq, Duncan, Shaq and Karl and Kobe (all on the same team! and lost! it's still unbelievable!), Duncan and Robinson, Shaq and Kobe, Shaq and Kobe
Shaq and Kobe, Duncan and Robinson, Jordan vs. Karl, Jordan vs. Karl, Jordan, Shaq, XXX, Jordan vs. Barkley, Jordan, Jordan vs. Magic
XXX, Magic, Magic, Magic vs. Bird, Bird, Magic vs. Bird, Magic vs. Bird, Magic, Bird

Even the omissions are interesting: 1994 when Jordan rode the bus, 1990 when Kareem finally stopped dragging Walton and Lanier up and down the court.

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So that's that! Kobe sucks hahahahahahahaha. :|

[SHAFT]

Right now it's lebron. But when you laugh at Kobe, remind your yourself of the number 5.

[Latrinsorm]

Hey they're both looking up at Loscutoff.

Honestly the main thing that interested me Kobe-wise is how far ahead Duncan was of him. People don't seem to talk about him anymore in the greatest since Michael conversations, perhaps because he's an unbelievable whiner on the court, but it's hard to slice it such that Kobe tops Duncan.

[SHAFT]

Magic/bird 80's, Jordan 90's, Kobe 00's.

[Latrinsorm]

Yeah, that's the kind of thing I mean. How do you rank Kobe ahead of Duncan? This isn't a rhetorical question, I'm honestly curious.

1. The advanced stats love Duncan, and they underrate defensive impact.
a. Consider that Duncan's career WS/48 mark (.214) is higher than every year of Kobe's but one (the 2006 campaign, which goes to show how vulnerable advanced stats are to volume, suggesting that Duncan is actually further ahead). Career to career they are currently 11th and 29th.
b. Consider that Kobe's career usage rate (31.8) is higher than every year of Duncan's, and it's not close (highest was 29.7). Career to career they are currently 5th to 20th. (Note: usage rate can only be recorded since the 1978 season.)
c. Their PER marks are pretty close at 24.7 for Duncan vs. 23.4 for Kobe, but that still ends up 9th for Duncan and 18th for Kobe.

2. Team success is I think a draw or even slightly leaning towards Duncan.
a. Yes, 5 > 4. But 4 is pretty close to 5.
b. Duncan has never missed the playoffs in a season where he played 70+ games or 2000+ MP (prorated for strike seasons), a perfect 15 for 15. It's a pretty astonishing accomplishment; even among all time greats the only others who match 100% are Erving (10 NBA, 15 total), Magic (11), Bird (11), and Russell (13). Not only is Kobe only 13 for 14, his missing the playoffs by 11 games stands way, way, way out. Even Jordan's Wizards only missed the playoffs by 5 games.
c. The obvious (and warranted) response to that factoid is that the rest of his team stunk that year... but doesn't that coin have two sides? If we look at those same seasons (70+/2000+), examine games with and without the player, and extrapolate over an 82 game season, we get the following records...

Lakers w/ Kobe: 53.8 wins
Lakers w/o Kobe: 48.8 wins
Spurs w/ Duncan: 58.5 wins
Spurs w/o Duncan: 43.9 wins

Duncan adds 14.5 wins to his team, Kobe only 4.9. In the specific case of the 2005 Lakers, they were 28-38 (42.4%) with Kobe, 6-10 (37.5%) without him. Even if he had played the whole season they would have missed the playoffs by 10 games. When taken along with the first round exits in the next two years, we have an extended period of team middlingness for Kobe in years of his athletic prime (aged 26 to 28). Consider that in the same age range, Duncan put up 2 banners, and look at those 2003 (http://www.basketball-reference.com/playoffs/NBA_2003_finals.html) Finals boxscores! David Robinson in his last year was very old, Tony Parker in his second year was very young (60% from the line! woof!), Manu's rookie year was rocky to say the last... did Duncan demand a trade? Did he inexplicably harbor resentment for 7 years, giving an interview where he took shots at Malik Rose and Kevin Willis? No, he put up 24 points, 17 rebounds, 5 assists, and 5 blocks a game... all while maintaining a 27.7 usage rating!

If we don't demote Kobe because he failed miserably with a poor team, why should we promote him because he succeeded with a good team? Shouldn't it be both or neither?

3. MVP voting clearly favors Duncan.
a. 2 wins to 1. (Obviously neither is winning any more.)
b. 4.207 shares to 4.054. (Kobe might catch him here, but it would be a travesty.)
c. As described above, MVP voters never really viewed Kobe as the #1 guy for any extended period of time, while Duncan dominated for a 4 year stretch. They had Steve Nash ahead of Kobe for years, for Pete's sake. I like Steve and think he's underrated historically, but come on already. Everyone fell back in love with Kobe after the Gasol trade let him win again, but the past doesn't change.

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Obviously there are plenty more ways to rate players, and this isn't intended to be a comprehensive list. But it does beg the question, in what way does Kobe compete?

[AnticorRifling]

I don't see Pistol Pete on the list, clearly you're trolling.

[Latrinsorm]

On my screen SHAFT's posts (and avatar) are perfectly separated by a page up.

Pete didn't make the list because (1) he retired in 1980 and as stated the data I used only goes back to 1981 but (2) he wouldn't be anyway because he never received enough MVP votes. Don't blame me, blame the voters (late 70s NBA players). Bunch of cokeheads.

[Keller]

Latrin doing work. Jesus Christ.

[Latrinsorm]

Before going into the pre-1983 measurements (that take into account pre-1981 votes), I want to briefly go into the wackiness of those votes...

From 1981 to the present we've used the same system: sportswriters cast (up to) 5 votes, 10 points for 1st, 7, 5, 3, 1. Before that (some of) the players voted (and I have no idea how they picked which ones did vote, or if they could vote for themselves, or if they could vote for their teammates).
From 1980 to 1977 they each cast only 1 vote.
From 1976 to 1966 they cast 5 votes, but the system granted 5 points for 1st, 4 for 2nd, 3 for 3rd, 2 for 4th, 1 for 5th.
Additionally, the records from 1972 to 1965 only include 5 names each year. They could merely be the top 5, or only those who received at least one first place vote.
In 1965 they again cast only 1 vote.
From 1964 to 1958 they cast 5 votes with the 5/4/3/2/1 system.
And from 1957 to 1956 they cast only 1 vote. (1956 being the first year the MVP was awarded.)

So the consequences of this as far as numerical share are concerned are pretty substantial. If a guy got 50/50 #1 votes/#2 votes in the modern system, he would have a .850 share. In the 1 vote system, he'd have a .500 share. In the 5/4/3/2/1 system, he'd have a .900 share. Plus, the impact on voter psychology is incalculable. If you generally knew a guy was going to win the MVP but just didn't like him, you might throw him a #2 vote instead of the #1, but what if you only had a #1 vote? Your pissiness might have an actual impact. As such, I don't see any point in comparing numerical share across eras.

And an enormous problem is what to do with ABA MVPs. No records exist for their voting, and how could we weight them with the NBA award? For that matter, should we penalize 1970s NBA MVPs for playing in a decimated league? To me the only reasonable answer is qualitative: we won't put too much emphasis on the results for the NBA from 1968-1976, and we'll know that Julius Erving should by rights be higher on our final list. (None of the other ABA MVPs are that interesting.)

With all that said, we can still run the analysis and see what happens...

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Reigns at the Top
2010-2008: LeBron James
2007-2005: Steve Nash
2004-2001: Tim Duncan
2000: Shaquille O'Neal
1999: Karl Malone
1998: Michael Jordan
1997: Karl Malone
1996-1994: Michael Jordan
1993: David Robinson
1992-1989: Michael Jordan
1998-1987: Magic Johnson
1986-1982: Larry Bird
1981-1980: Moses Malone
1979-1970: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
1969-1966: Wilt Chamberlain
1965-1959: Bill Russell
1958: Bob Pettit

Seems about right! I don't know who the 1970s equivalent of Karl Malone would be (McAdoo?) but Kareem didn't leave any doubt there. It's fascinating to consider whether Michael could have (unknowingly) matched Kareem's 10 year run if he hadn't decided baseball would be a jolly diversion.

Top 5s

Of the 253 players to receive at least one vote for NBA MVP, 44 place in the top 5 in a particular year under this analysis. The top 10 scored by the 10/7/5/3/1 method are...

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: 123
Michael Jordan: 119
Bill Russell: 89
Wilt Chamberlain: 88
Larry Bird: 80
Magic Johnson: 67
Moses Malone: 59
Tim Duncan: 59
Shaquille O'Neal: 53
Karl Malone: 50

Talk about a beautiful top 6! Nobody in the world can rationally argue that someone outside it should replace someone on it. Moses, Karl, and Shaq are a little high, but that's what happens when you play for 19 years in the NBA as each of those men did. Kareem being ahead of Michael is also explained by the decimated league effect.

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For reasons that will be made clear shortly, here's the top 21 for the same score divided by years played (in the NBA and from 1958 onward)...

Michael Jordan: 7.93
Bill Russell: 7.42
Wilt Chamberlain: 6.29
Larry Bird: 6.15
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: 6.15
Magic Johnson: 5.15
Bob Pettit: 4.13
LeBron James: 4.00
Tim Duncan: 3.93
Jerry West: 3.43
Moses Malone: 3.11
David Robinson: 2.93
Oscar Robertson: 2.86
Shaquille O'Neal: 2.79
Dave Cowens: 2.64
Karl Malone: 2.63
Bob McAdoo: 2.57
Willis Reed: 2.50
Steve Nash: 2.44
Kobe Bryant: 2.31
Julius Erving: 2.09
Charles Barkley: 2.06

I love it! We've got the same top 6, but we've filled in around Duncan with Pettit and West (reasonably uncontroversial, I think) and of course LeBron (certainly controversial). Although I've got to say, at first blush I don't see how his case for top 10 of all time is that much worse than Kobe's overall, and you constantly hear people say Kobe is top 10 all time as if it's a foregone conclusion.

The one that stands out for me is how low Oscar Robertson is. I happened to know that in the season he averaged a triple double he finished 3rd in the MVP voting behind Chamberlain's second place 50-25 season and Russell's being Russell season, but apparently the voters were generally unimpressed with him. (Relatively speaking, obviously, he did end up 14th greatest of every player from 1958 to today.) I wonder if his sparkling personality contributed, especially when those voting had to face it on the court rather than in the newspaper.

Some surprising inclusions are Willis Reed and Dave Cowens, but I think that's a positive reflection on the metric. Obviously those perceiving how great they were in the moment could have no way of knowing their careers would be cut short either through injury or being a weirdo.

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Triviality (well... MORE of a triviality)

So the top end of the list is pretty interesting, but I wondered... which of the 253 players to receive an MVP vote was the worst? I've run out of time tonight, but tomorrow is another day.

[Latrinsorm]

Out of the 253 players to receive an MVP vote, I selected the 54 who had a career share of .003 or lower as a starting point for the Worst MVP Vote Ever.

Of those 54, 15 never made an NBA All-Star team.

Of those 15, 5 finished with or currently have a career NBA PER lower than 15... John Barnhill, Caldwell Jones, Quinn Buckner, P.J. Brown, Stephen Jackson. Closer looks at each...

John Barnhill
-11 career NBA PER
-Drafted in the 11th round. (You heard me.)
-Playing next to HOFers Bob Pettit, Cliff Hagan, and Lenny Wilkens in their primes in St. Louis, he received a fifth place vote in his rookie year. (Hagan and Wilkens received 0 votes.)
-Never improved, bounced around the NBA, bounced into the ABA and rode Mel Daniels' coattails to a championship.
-Hall of Fame probability (http://www.basketball-reference.com/about/hof_prob.html) is a complicated metric that essentially rates how similar a player is to those currently in the Hall. Mr. Barnhill gets a 0.000, good for 663rd place all time.
-Other people playing in the 1963 season: Bill Russell, Elgin Baylor with 34/14, Oscar Robertson with 28/10/9.5, the aforementioned Pettit with 28/15, some guy named Chamberlain with 44(!!!)/24(!!!), Jerry West, Bob Cousy, John Havlicek, Rookie of the Year Terry Dischinger.

It's hard to even conceive of a worse MVP vote than this, but the next guy comes close...

Caldwell Jones
-12.1 career NBA PER
-Had two very good seasons in the ABA, excellent defender and rebounder, scored as many as 19 points per game, and had one All-Star nod.
-Lost any semblance of offensive production in the NBA. Sent as compensation by the 76ers for signing Moses Malone before the 1983 season, which worked out pretty well for them.
-Ended with one of the worst HoF probabilities you can see without trying: 0.000, 858th all time.
-Received a fifth place vote for the 1981 MVP, the first year the sportswriters voted and frankly looked pretty inept doing it, with a total of 31 players receiving at least one vote, including Quinn Buckner. Other people playing that year: MVP winner and teammate Julius Erving, Larry Bird (20/10/5/2 steals) in his second year, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, rebounding leader Moses Malone, George Gervin, Magic Johnson (although he only played 37 games), scoring leader Adrian Dantley, Michael Ray Richardson leading the league in steals for the second consecutive year.
-With all that said, he was named to the NBA All-Defense first team, although it's not clear if the All-Defense team was just as much a travesty then as it is now.

P.J. Brown is an interesting case for different reasons...
-14.1 career PER isn't incredible, but it's a heck of a lot closer to average than the other two.
-Good defender, made a surprisingly large contribution to the 2008 Celtics championship run.
-Received his 5th place MVP vote for the 2005 award that Kobe notoriously received 0 votes in, which is bad enough, but...
-Played for a terrible team! The 18-64 Hornets! The '63 Hawks made the Western Division Finals, the '81 76ers made the Eastern Conference Finals, the Hornets had the worst record in the West.
-And he was arguably not even their best player!!! Chris Andersen finished with an 18.5 PER and 1.5 blocks in 20 minutes a game (and uncountable missed dunks at the slam dunk contest), which is not incredible but PJ only managed a 15 PER, 10 points, and 9 rebounds, so the bar is pretty low.
-At age 35, he was well on his way out of the NBA. You could make the argument someone saw a bright future for John Barnhill, saw a brilliant (if fleeting) past for Caldwell Jones. P.J. was nothing more (or less) than a journeyman big man who was efficient with limited offense and solid defensively.

It's really one of the more baffling and blatant votes of all time. Someone went way, way, way out of their way to vote against Kobe, why not pick someone like Wade, LeBron, Duncan? If defensive big men really excite you, why not Garnett or Camby?

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I think you have to go with P.J. Brown as the worst vote ever. Barnhill might have voted for himself (his being the era where players voted), Jones and Buckner were both in the first fumbling year of sportswriter votes, you can't mess with Captain Jack, and for all the (deserved) scorn I heap on Kobe, you can't be voting for a random guy from the worst team in the conference over him. That's just silly.

[Stanley Burrell]

The bibliography format may be different, but...

Latrin-dude, have you ever thought about submitting a bunch of raw math and analytics to a neutral sports franchise? Might be a far cry, but ?

[DoctorUnne]

Daryl Morey has been employing quants for years.

[Latrinsorm]

The bibliography format may be different, but...

Latrin-dude, have you ever thought about submitting a bunch of raw math and analytics to a neutral sports franchise? Might be a far cry, but ?Hey thanks. :) I don't think there's a snowball's chance but I've sent applications with less hope, so what the hell? I would look at the Knicks but they're probably the only franchise left that doesn't look at deep stats, sorry.

[Kembal]

I am confused how you have Jordan in 1994-1996. Wasn't he out of the league?

[Latrinsorm]

Jordan was out of the league for the 1994 and most of the 1995 seasons. However, if we're looking at 1994 with this metric we sum the MVP award shares for 1992 (.938), 1993 (.577), 1994 (0), 1995 (.011, hilariously), and 1996 (.986) to get an average of .5024. It so happens that nobody else posted a higher figure for that five year period, even though they were playing for a team not based in Binghamton for 100% as opposed to 60% of it. The next closest were David Robinson at .4948 and Hakeem at .3782. If you want to say that 60% of Michael Jordan was as great as 100% of David Robinson, I won't stop you.

In the same way this absence affects every year from 1992 to 1997. Jordan's lowest award share post-broken leg pre-Wizards was .577, and if we throw that in for 1994 and 1995 instead of 0 and .011, he crushes Robinson's 1993 average (.719 to .492) and Malone's 1997 average (.666 to .573), giving him a 10-year streak to rival Kareem's.