NBA 2013 Season Thread for NBA Talking

[SHAFT]

Carmelo is having a helluva game. He could have high point total for the entire league tonight, but it doesn't change the fact he has currently has zero assists and 1 rebound. He's a ball stopper.

If I were the Knicks I'd move him in the offseason for anything and everything I could. Look at Denver, they got better after they traded him.

I apologize. He picked up his first assist as the end of the 3rd. He has 1.

Also, Lebron isn't playing. This is like Christmas for Carmelo. If Lebron was playing D on him this wouldn't be happening. The score is currently 80-78 Knicks and the Heat are without Lebron, Wade, and Chalmers.

[Latrinsorm]

This is what's great about the Heat. Even with their top 3 playmakers out for the game, they still embrace team basketball and assist 18 of their 30 field goals. That they combined that with 19 turnovers (Norris Cole with 7!) is less great.

This might be the quintessential Carmelo game. 50 points on 26 shots, which is just absurd, then 2 assists and 2 rebounds going up against Rashard Lewis and James Jones. Bro. Come on. Also indicative of the Knicks as a whole: of those 26 shots, 26 (100%) were jump shots. Only 3 came closer than 16 feet (none closer than 14), and with 10 3s that leaves 13 (13!!!) 2 pointers from 16 to 23 feet. When you make 9 of them, great... but even Carmelo only hits 40% of the time from that distance in the long haul.
I don't see it (edit) as much of a problem on D if we had our full roster. If we could get power forwards without this injury curse and keep it in stasis, we could keep (edit) switch benching around during the game with our three most effective players and 120 vs. 110 still wins.Maybe, but imagine what this team could do if they traded Carmelo for Iguodala (and George Karl's head immediately exploded). Elite defense, ball movement + elite shooters, Amare stops punching fire extinguishers(?).

[SHAFT]

I'd trade Pau gasol for iguodala all day every day. That's just what the lakers need, a guy like iguodala. And an athletic pg

[DoctorUnne]

The Heat have never been caught cheating...?

Their offense and Brady have been a lot better since they were caught...?

[Latrinsorm]

What do you mean "a lot better"? Brady is the most famous player on a team that has not won the Super Bowl in 8 years, therefore he is a choke job artist and a bum.
I'd trade Pau gasol for iguodala all day every day. That's just what the lakers need, a guy like iguodala. And an athletic pgWhat if you got Iguodala, Lawson, and Gallo for... Kobe?

[Keller]

I'd trade Pau gasol for iguodala all day every day. That's just what the lakers need, a guy like iguodala. And an athletic pg

As much as Latrin attempts to overtake them, Lakers fans really are the worst.

You've got Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, and Dwight Howard - and will miss the playoffs. Just need that one missing piece!!!

Get the fuck out of here.

[SHAFT]

What do you mean "a lot better"? Brady is the most famous player on a team that has not won the Super Bowl in 8 years, therefore he is a choke job artist and a bum.What if you got Iguodala, Lawson, and Gallo for... Kobe?

I'd make the trade immediately.

[SHAFT]

As much as Latrin attempts to overtake them, Lakers fans really are the worst.

You've got Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, and Dwight Howard - and will miss the playoffs. Just need that one missing piece!!!

Get the fuck out of here.

The Lakers have a lot of problems. Iguodala would be a huge help, but he certainly isn't "the missing piece".

[Latrinsorm]

As much as Latrin attempts to overtake them, Lakers fans really are the worst.

You've got Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, and Dwight Howard - and will miss the playoffs. Just need that one missing piece!!!

Get the fuck out of here.In my defense it's hard to fawn over LeBron sitting on the bench.

ALTHOUGH have you ever noticed that he always sits as close to the coaches as possible? That's Hall of Fame sitting-on-the-bench mentality. Probably the best Bench-instruction Efficiency Rating of all time, certainly of the last 37 years.
I'd make the trade immediately.Sorry, you don't get enough salary back. (Actually you do, but you wondered for a second, right?) I also would instantly make that trade, then instantly go into witness protection from both LA fans and George Karl.

[Latrinsorm]

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/9131247/groups-representing-sacramento-seattle-vie-nba-kings

The Kings are worth $525m. The Kings? Attendance ranks last seven years: 30th, 26th, 29th, 29th, 30th, 27th, 16th. Some of this is due to their tiny stadium, but even going by percent they've been bottom third every one of those 6 lousy years. (Another weird thing, the Bulls are well above 100% every year. At what point do they just say "okay our capacity is actually what we said *1.03"?)

[Latrinsorm]

My favorite line of the Knicks recap: "With his second straight 50-point game well within reach (Anthony had 50 on Tuesday against Atlanta), Anthony took just five shots in the fourth." Only 5 shots in a quarter? Wow! Bro, only two guys in the NBA are averaging 20+ shots per game: Kobe and Carmelo. Tomorrow I'll go back through the years and see what's the lowest a scoring leader has ever finished in FGA/game, Durant is currently 7th (and of course second on his own team to Westbrook).

My favorite part of the box score: soon to be max player Josh Smith goes 0 for 7 from the line. Since 1964 that has only happened 18 times. The record is 11 by a Shaquille O'Neal, but only one man has ever had more than one: Jerome Lane. That's crazy enough, but he managed 0 for 7 in 11 minutes and 0 for 8 in 5(!!!!!). That's crazy enough, but in the game he went 0 for 8 the rest of his team went 23 for 23. His career stats: 44.1% from the field, 37.9%(!!!) from the line. Went to St. Vincent - St. Mary High School in Akron, Ohio. Once famously broke a backboard dunking, perhaps after weakening it with bricks.

[DoctorUnne]

Melo's gunning for the scoring title

[Latrinsorm]

Melo's gunning for the scoring titleIt would be true to form. Let's look over their remaining schedules, recognizing that both they and the teams they play may throw in the towel between now and the end of the season:

Melo
MIL (avg defense), @OKC (good), DC (good) (I was surprised too), @CHI (good), @CLE (bad), IND (good), @CHA (bad), ATL (good)
total: 5 good, 1 avg, 2 bad; 4/4 home/away

Durant
SA (good), @IND (good), NY (avg), UTA (bad), GS (avg), POR (bad), SAC (bad), MIL (avg)
total: 2 good, 3 avg, 3 bad; 4/4 home/away

Looks pretty good for Durant.
Tomorrow I'll go back through the years and see what's the lowest a scoring leader has ever finished in FGA/game, Durant is currently 7th (and of course second on his own team to Westbrook).Since the merger, 23 of the 36 scoring champions led the league in FGA/game, an additional 7 finished 2nd, and the other 6...
Durant 3rd, 4th(, plus wherever he ends up this year)
Robinson 3rd
Dantley 3rd, 11th
Gervin 10th

By %, only 4 scoring champions have finished with fewer than 90% of the leading FGA/game:
2012: Kevin Durant finishes 2nd with 19.7 per game, or 85.7% of Kobe Bryant's 23.0.
2000: Shaquille O'Neal finishes 2nd with 21.1, 85.1% of Allen Iverson's 24.8.
1984: Adrian Dantley finishes 11th with 18.2, 81.6% of Mark Aguirre's 22.3.
1978: George Gervin finishes 10th with 19.6, 78.1%(!) of Pete Maravich's 25.1.
(2013 so far: Kevin Durant is 7th with 17.9, 82.1% of Carmelo Anthony's 21.8.)

This is the first case (again, since the merger) where a scoring champion has finished behind a teammate in FGA/game. It's not a perfect stat (especially for FT drawing machines like Dantley or Durant), but I think it's still interesting. On one side you have Durant, O'Neal, Dantley, Gervin. On the other you have Bryant, Iverson, Aguirre, Maravich, Anthony. Are these coherent groups? I think yes.

.

We can also look at it the other way: which scoring champions did so the same year as an astonishing lead in FGA/game? Two stand out:

1977: Pete Maravich's 28.0(!) per game over Billy Knight's 21.6 (77.1%).
2002: Iverson's 27.8(!!!) per game over Michael Jordan's 22.1 (79.5%). His 39.8 shooting percentage is by far the worst of any 27+ FGA/game season in NBA history, crushing Jack Twyman's 42.2%.

[SHAFT]

As much as I enjoy talking shit about Carmelo, I have to admit, he's playing incredibly well over the last few weeks. I'd love to see the Knicks give the Heat a real test in the playoffs. The NBA is better when the Knicks are playing good.

[Latrinsorm]

He's been scoring like crazy, but something is terribly wrong if J.R. Smith is on your team and you are the biggest ball hog.

I don't think the Knicks would test the Heat at all, because the Knicks have no bigs after Chandler. You can't out-perimeter the Heat in a series, we saw that last year with OKC (and Carmelo will never be the player Durant is). Look at their line-up today, for instance: Felton, Prigioni(!), Shumpert (comically listed on espn as a SF, is in fact a combo guard), Anthony, Chandler. Bench: Kidd, Smith, Novak, Copeland. You definitely can't out-smallball the Heat: let them off the hook (knowing who they were!) with Bosh at C, Battier at PF, forget about it. You probably remember James averaged 10 rebounds per game in the Finals, but you may not remember that Wade had as many rebounds as Durant (6 per) and that Miami (Miami!!!) ended up having 11 more rebounds over the series while shooting better. If you're not going to out-rebound, out-shoot, out-hustle, out-execute, out-superstar the Heat... what's left?

Now the Knicks might get some bigs back... or they might not. And even if they do, they're all between the tail end and the tail, tail, tail end of their careers or are Amare, and they've never made that work. I don't see it.

[thefarmer]

If you're not going to out-rebound, out-shoot, out-hustle, out-execute, out-superstar the Heat... what's left?


Foul Lebron until he cries about 'non basket' hits.

[Latrinsorm]

The NBA already showed their hand on that one by giving Taj a post facto flagrant. It's not going to fly in the playoffs, plus nobody on the Knicks is tough enough to go after LeBron like that except Chandler anyway, plus that's maybe the one case in the league where each player is as valuable to his team so a double loss doesn't net hurt Miami. (Kurt Thomas would do it, but he currently can't walk.) Chris Paul at least has Bledsoe behind him, who's behind Chandler? Judging from their last game it's Chris Copeland.

[Latrinsorm]

The format of espn's #nbarank is frustrating enough, but ranking Bryant ahead of Wade? Just so, so, so stupid. What ever happened to "wins are the only stat that matters"? Kobe's team might not make the playoffs. Wade's team is the #1 overall seed. Oh, Wade's team has the best player on the planet? Too bad, wins are the only stat that matters.

Let's talk about the other stats. Wade has a higher PER (1.4) and WS/48 (.26). Kobe is leading the league in turnovers (tied). Kobe is scoring 5.7 more points per game, but needs 6.0 more touches to do so, which is atrocious.

KOBE DOESN'T PLAY DEFENSE. The Lakers when he sits are 104.9 DRtg, which would be good for 11th in the league. Their 108.1 when he plays would be 23rd, right between the Raptors and Suns. The Heat when Wade sits are 108.9, when Wade plays are 103.9. Or: Wade is as good at defense as Kobe is bad at it, is as good or arguably better on offense. Wade's team is dramatically better. How is this a discussion? ESPN!!!!!

[SHAFT]

If I were picking a team on the playground and every player in the nba was available, I'd take Kobe right after lebron and Durant.

[Latrinsorm]

You're crazy if you think Wade wouldn't knock Kobe out of a playground game within 3 minutes (within 1 minute) [within 1 play]. Wade broke Kobe's nose in an all-star game. You're also crazy if you think the Lakers wouldn't be a 6 or better seed with Wade instead of Kobe this year.

Seriously, how do you ever pick Kobe while picking a team? He is not a good shooter, he is a ball stopper, he is an actively (almost purposefully) bad defender, he routinely degrades his teammates. Did you see the postgame interview he gave last night? Interspersed with the "highlight" of him running a PnR with Gasol, then ignoring Gasol on the uncontested roll to the hoop in favor of a double teamed 20 footer? He is seriously a worse teammate than Westbrook, at least Westbrook doesn't yuk it up to an adoring horde of media.

The "pick teams" game is pretty fun but a forum is a horrible format for doing it in. Obviously you'll have to come down from Harlem(/the airport) for the NYC meet-up.

[SHAFT]

I was at the game last night. He took the game over and won it for them. Gasol and Kobe are the reasons they won.

I have no delusions about the lakers, I think they'll be crushed by OKC in the first and probably win a game or 2 if they play the Spurs in the first round, but I still think Kobe is the 3rd best player in the league.

The Lakers have had multiple injuries, they currently have multiple philosophies as to what wins ball games, and they're old and slow. I appreciate Kupchak and the Buss family, but they've done a poor job putting this roster together. It looked good prior to the season, lots of HOF'ers, but they don't mesh well. Look at the West's PG's they have to play! Steve Nash can't check anyone, let alone Steve Blake.

[Latrinsorm]

They could mesh so well though. Steve Nash running pick and rolls with Howard, Gasol laying waste from the high post, Kobe standing in the corner a la Wade in Miami letting him (1) use his intellect to get easy baskets off the ball and (2) devote energy on the defensive end. That's a lethal team on offense and a credible team on defense.

Mike D'Antoni didn't come up with the "Kobe always has the ball and everyone else skedaddle" offense. Nash, Howard, and Gasol didn't come up with it. Metta World Peace's magical knee cartilage didn't come up with it. They're lousy because Kobe refuses to adjust to having a real point guard for once, and it makes me crazy that when he shoots an unsustainable percentage for one quarter he's the hero.

But enough of that. If Miami and LA swapped Wade for Kobe straight up before the season, there is a 100% chance the Heat do worse and the Lakers do better. How is Kobe better than Wade?

[SHAFT]

Did you watch the Lakers tonight Latrin? I don't want to hear it.

[Atlanteax]

Did you watch the Lakers tonight Latrin? I don't want to hear it.

It was amusing how many times Gasol was "Kobe, you are *AWESOME* !!!"

[Latrinsorm]

Kobe had an amazing game. I've never claimed that was impossible. (Medically impossible maybe, but not literally.)

Let me just say this: did Kobe need to take more FGAs than Howard and Gasol put together against the fearsome Portland front line of Aldridge and Leonard?

It's not to Kobe's credit every time the Lakers win, even when he plays well.

[SHAFT]

I think Kobe took advantage of Portland starting 4 rookies. Plus he didn't want to be shown up by lilliard, who is incredible and should be the clear favorite for ROY.

[Atlanteax]

Lakers need to pray that Utah loses a game to Minnesota.

[Latrinsorm]

In yesterday's espn.com All NBA First Team (http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/page/5-on-5-130411/2012-13-all-nba-first-team) article, a comment by Darius Soriano struck me: "Kobe earns the nod not just for his fantastic production but also for his adaptation to different roles and excellence in all of them. Whether an off-ball worker or on-ball wizard, Kobe has carried a top-10 Lakers offense decimated by injuries, all while adjusting to new schemes." My first thought was "Kobe off-ball? smh" but I wondered if there was any objective way to quantify that short of charting every play of every game, and here is something I think does a pretty good job of it...

hoopdata.com keeps track of a stat called %As, which is Assisted Field Goals per Field Goal. Of players with 30+ MPG and 30+ games, Kyle Korver is by a wide margin the highest at 94.7%, Chris Paul is by a slight margin the lowest at 22.4%, and the league average is 52.8%. One of the problems with the assist stat in general is it only works on field goals: there are no assist misses (passes resulting in missed field goal attempts), assists for the foul (passes resulting in a miss or even no shot at all but with FT attempts), assists if you weren't a bum (passes resulting in turnovers or offensive fouls), the last category being the most nebulous. Put another way, every player shoots 100% on assisted field goals, but no player shoots 100% on what would be assisted field goals if they went in. Hence, we can't simply multiply out a player's # of assisted field goals and call every other field goal attempt an on-ball attempt.

Many sites keep track of Usage, which is defined as (FGA + .44 * FTA + TOV) / team possessions while on floor and (roughly) keeps track of how many possessions a player finishes. Of the same players, Carmelo leads with 34.67 and Tyson Chandler is last with 13.12, and the league average is 22.81.

We would expect that a player would definitely shoot better, possibly draw more fouls, and probably turn it over less as the recipient of potential assists (hence the word assist), but let's try applying it directly and see what happens. 89 players match the requirements set above as of 03/27/2013 (when hoopdata last updated their database). We compute...

(league As%) * (player Usg)
(player As%) * (league Usg)

The logic being: the lower a player's As%, the more they have the ball to start a play; the higher a player's Usg, the more they have the ball to end a play. That gives us...

3.03: Russell Westbrook
2.42: Tony Parker
2.36: John Wall
2.32: Chris Paul
2.22: James Harden
2.22: Kobe Bryant
2.21: Jrue Holiday
2.19: Kyrie Irving
2.14: Rajon Rondo
2.06: Greivis Vasquez
2.04: Carmelo Anthony
1.76: Jeff Teague
1.76: LeBron James
1.74: Kemba Walker
1.68: Damian Lillard

...for our top 15. That seems pretty much right, right? We see a lot of point guards and general offensive focal points, we see no teammates (although Ray Felton came in 16th and Wade 19th). If we take hoopdata's position assignments as given and graph out the values, we see...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v456/johnnyoldschool/GetOnTheBall_zpsae97c16c.gif

...so it looks pretty good. Primarily points play on the ball, then wings about the same, then bigs about the same. The high men for 1-3 are in the above list, the high 4 is LaMarcus Aldridge (makes sense) and the very high 5 is Boogie Cousins which surprised me. I would have guessed Marc Gasol, but he's way down between Chris Bosh and Wes Matthews. Maybe the time he played with Rudy Gay dominates? We'll see if he moves up as more recent data is added. It's also interesting to look at the bottom man for each position: Ridnour - Thompson - Korver - Ibaka - Chandler, compared to again the top for each: Westbrook - Harden - Anthony - Aldridge - Cousins. The bottom 5 team would be amazing, the top 5 team would be awful, which makes sense if the metric accurately measures how much a guy will defer, only so many shots to go around.

Alright, so the main takeaway is that Kobe does not play off the ball and Westbrook has the ball way too much. Duh. But with science. It would be better to get standard deviations for each and compare them that way rather than raw division, but the extremes are reasonably close (2.36 to .56 for %Ast, 1.52 to .58 for Usg) so I expect pretty much the same.

.

And for the record, the 2012 values for Nash, Kobe, Pau, Howard: 2.77 (1.13 this year), 1.77 (2.22), 0.84 (0.64), 1.14 (0.73), or -1.64, +0.45, -0.20, -0.41: for some weird reason everyone but one guy got lower. Nice work, Princeton.

The 2010 values for Wade, LeBron, Bosh: 3.07 (1.61), 2.25 (1.76), 1.40 (0.70), or -1.46, -0.49, -0.70: everyone gives up some, then they win the title.

[SHAFT]

Latrin, what's the tl;dr version?

[Latrinsorm]

Kobe plays off the ball almost exactly as much as James Harden, Jrue Holliday, and Kyrie Irving; namely, hardly at all.

He also plays off the ball less this year than last year.

Westbrook has the ball more than anyone else in the league, and it's not close. Given that his teammate is the best scorer of the past 15 years, this is probably not good.

[SHAFT]

Looks like Kobe has a torn Achilles. Aye yay yay...

Well, this offseason will be interesting.

[Latrinsorm]

I really wanted Kobe to be healthy so that when they got crushed in the playoffs there would be no excuses. Now if they play well it'll be "they were a contender with Kobe!", if they play poorly it'll be "see? everything Kobe does is great!".

The people talking about how his huge minutes load was (1) necessary for the Lakers to win and (2) totally unrelated to his injury are very, very, very hard to take seriously. Kobe is the first 34 year old in over a decade to play every minute of a game, let alone on a back-to-back. He came back in 2 days from a "severe" left ankle sprain, took a whole week off, then averaged 42.8 minutes per game and played every one of the team's next 10 games, then by astonishing coincidence a tendon in the same foot suddenly explodes. I'm no doctor, but come on now.

I also can't believe people are killing D'Antoni for this, when he has outright said that Kobe decides his own minutes. It's a player's league, and nowhere is that more clear cut than on the Lakers this year.

[Atlanteax]

There seems to be a lot more affirmative talk about Kobe being amnestied post-injury than before (when consensus was 'would never happen').

Now *that* will be interesting. Amnesty him for next year, he still gets paid $30m, team avoids $80m in luxury taxes ... and does he sign to play with Lakers again in 2014 ... to end his *playing* career as a Laker?

[Latrinsorm]

It's the smart move, and Kobe is a smart guy... but Kobe has always been more egotistical than smart, so I don't see how anyone can predict what he would do.

Even with that uncertainty, how can the Lakers not do it? They need to add significant talent to contend, and they cannot possibly do that next year with $78m on the books before Dwight's new deal (who would make 9 players under contract incl. Kobe). Something's gotta give.

[Latrinsorm]

From espn.com re: Dwight: "As much as his stock dropped this season, his numbers were actually pretty solid. In fact, given that he was surrounded by more talent than in Orlando, statistically he's right where he should be."

Was he actually surrounded by more talent than in Orlando? Look at the 2010 team: 10 man rotation of Howard, Vince Carter, Rashard Lewis, Jameer Nelson, J.J. Redick, Matt Barnes, Mickael Pietrus, Jason Williams, Ryan Anderson, Marcin Gortat. Brandon Bass is starting for the Celtics and in his 5th year he barely played for that team.

Team stats, they were 3rd in ORtg and 4th in DRtg; this year's Lakers are 9th and 20th(!).

Each team had 5 rotation guys with 15+ PER, but almost every case is a strong defensive advantage for the Magic...
Howard vs. post-surgery Howard
Nelson vs. Nash
Carter vs. Bryant (by default)
Anderson vs. Jamison (ditto)
...which leaves Redick vs. Gasol as not really comparable.

The Magic had 7 rotation guys shooting at least 36.7% on at least 2.7 three point attempts per game. The Lakers have Steve Blake.

Going by 82games simple rating, Clark and Duhon are worse than anyone on that Magic team by a wide margin. Through 8 the Magic hit -0.9, the Lakers hit -3.6. I'm not saying the 2010 Magic supporting cast was clearly better, but I think it's a lot closer than some people might think.

[Latrinsorm]

One last thing on the "D'Antoni should have been able to rein in Kobe!" notion: Kobe Bryant has seen 9 coaching changes in his career.

Del Harris (2+ years)
Bill Bertka (1 game)
Kurt Rambis (rest of year but strike year, not sure if ever received full tag or just interim)
Phil Jackson (5 years, 3 titles)
Rudy Tomjanovich (1/2 year)
Frank Hamblen (the second 1/2, interim)
Phil Jackson (6 years, 2 titles)
Mike Brown (1+ years)
Bernie Bickerstaff (5 games, interim)
Mike D'Antoni (rest of year so far)

Even ignoring the interim guys, we're talking 5 changes from very well-established coaches. Del Harris was COY, Phil Jackson needs no elaboration, Rudy Tomjanovich was a gold medal coach and 2 time NBA champ, Phil Jackson was still Phil Jackson, Mike Brown was COY. All gone, Kobe stays. It's easy to see without looking too far who pulls the strings in Laker land.

[SHAFT]

I'm interested to see what 'Antoni can do with a full offseason and training camp. The Lakers are already paying Mike Brown, they won't dump 'Antoni.

[Stretch]

4931

[Latrinsorm]

Carmelo Anthony: 28.7 points per game (#1), 22.2 field goal attempts (#1), 35.6 USG (#1). 56.0 TS% (#48), 50.2 eFG% (#82).
Kevin Durant: 28.1 points per game (#2), 17.7 FGA (#8), 29.8 USG (#6). 64.7 TS% (#1), 55.9 eFG% (#19).

LeBron is going to lead the league in field goals made for the 4th time without ever having led the league in field goal attempts. Others who have done so:

Adrian Dantley (1)
Clyde Lovellette (1)
Tim Duncan (1)

It is a random and fairly meaningless stat, but it's still interesting that LeBron has done it more than everyone else in history combined. What about the reverse: leading the league in FGAs without ever leading in FGs? It turns out that happens a lot...

Allen Iverson (4)
Antoine Walker (1)
Bob Cousy (1)
Calvin Murphy (1)
Dominique Wilkens (2)
George Yardley (1)
Hakeem Olajuwon (1)
Jack Twyman (1)
Jerry Stackhouse (1)
Mike Mitchell (1)
Pete Maravich (2)

[thefarmer]

Fuck the Lakers.

Fuck them to hell.

[Atlanteax]

Assuming Spurs are unable to play healthy (particularly Parker, Duncan, and Ginobili) ... Lakers have a (small) chance to make it to the next round...

It will be fascinating to see how well they can do in playoffs w/o Kobe.

[Latrinsorm]

My hat's off to the Lakers. It's really amazing they were able to dig themselves out of the enormous hole they needlessly put themselves in, which is kind of a backhanded compliment but I feel it's at least 3/4s sincere.

I also sincerely feel they have a better chance with no Kobe than with Kobe. They have and are using two of the four best offensive centers in the playoffs, and basketball is a big man's game, it's an enormous advantage.

[SHAFT]

Lakers in 7!

[thefarmer]

I think the only reason the Lakers won was because the beard needed a grooming after all the minute-heavy games it's had to play lately.

Also, I was hesitant about Asik about mid-season, but he held up a lot better toward the end and even did good things in the Laker game. Obviously Howard is the better player, but up until the last bit of the 4th and overtime (which yes, I know it matters most), Asik held his own.

[SHAFT]

That game last night was brilliant. Couldn't watch it but I listened to it and it was still remarkable. Going into the 4th I didn't think the lakers had a chance.

[Atlanteax]

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nba/story/_/id/9238503/kobe-bryant-los-angeles-lakers-battles-mom-nj-business-auction

I agreed with the 3rd popular comment which was basically "whether she is the best or worst mom in the world, she should not be doing this, it is still his stuff"

[Latrinsorm]

I would love it if in a few (half dozen) [ten] years when Kobe's playing career is finally over, he sits down with a good writer and does a no holds barred autobiography. So much weird, awkward stuff has happened in his life, and like Russell Westbrook you have to wonder if the peculiarities of his upbringing were key in creating his peculiarly sociopathic basketball style.

[DoctorUnne]

We'll see what happens. In the playoffs though with your season on the line and you're down 3 at the end of the game, do you want LeBron taking that shot or Ray Allen? How about when you need 2/2 free throws to put the game out of reach? In my opinion there's no one better in the NBA with those scenarios than Allen. What Allen adds/subtracts on the court during the regular season is not really going to impact whether Miami gets the #1 seed. But that playoff scenario will happen at some point, and his contribution there will be pretty impactful to Miami's title hopes.

I wish it were possible for every Heat fan except Latrin to have their team win the championship, but for Latrin to exist in a world where the Heat didn't trade for Ray Allen, LeBron took that last second three (like the one he did just before that), and he bricked it (like the one he did just before that). You don't deserve to have another ring for LeBron after all you've hated on Allen.

[Atlanteax]

Okay, a bump for the first section in the .jpg below, courtesy of xkcd:

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/dominant_players.png

[Latrinsorm]

One thing that struck me as odd was why he didn't give David Robinson a red line. I understand for Neil, Moses, Wade, their reigns were short, but Robinson was on top for 3 years. I'd also like to know his method for including people. I can understand not having everyone with at least 1 year at the top, but Dirk was in the top five for 6 out of 7 years and he didn't get in. My guess is a requirement like "top three for four out of five years".

We all know that PER has its flaws, though, so I wondered if we could get a better picture of individual dominance with PER and WS. It turns out winning the double is pretty common: in the 60 years of the shot clock era it's happened 42 times. There are only 10 people with multiple years, however, and the distribution is pretty interesting:
Wilt (7)
Kareem (7)
Erving (3 ABA)
Moses (2)
Bird (2)
Jordan (7)
Robinson (2)
Shaq (2)
Garnett (2)
LeBron (5)

Ideally we want Russell, so how can we get that? I'm personally not that big a fan of PER anyway, so let's ditch it entirely and simply do top five finishes in regular season Win Shares. If we do we find 13 people with 7 or more, and graphing their WS gets pretty messy. If we further require a Finals MVP then we drop Karl, Oscar, Robinson, and Stockton, and now we get...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v456/johnnyoldschool/NBAxkcd_zps352fa7e6.png

Note that this graph prorates Win Shares for the 1999 and 2012 seasons, and also takes a moving five year average to smooth out year-to-year variations. Net result over Randall Xkcd's is that we've added Russell/Magic and dropped Shaq, which I think is right and proper. We've also added Dirk, which is slightly troublesome, but at least we haven't added Karl.

We can't get Bird without also adding Shaq, West, and Moses. It's not like those three guys are bums, but I think it dilutes the graph to extend it that far.