ESPN ranked Kevin Love over Al Horford.

[Richesly]

I can't believe this. I agree with Love over Duncan, too. If we talking currently, Duncan is basically a one sided big man. Defense and the PnR. Duncan loss a lot of his post game because his feet is slow now.

[Akrazotile]

ESPN's anti-Lebron bias as usual rearing its ugly head.

Horford >>>>>>>> Love

[outbreak]

Minny Love i'd agree with but not how he's looked in Cleveland playing Lebron ball.

[Richesly]

Minny Love i'd agree with but not how he's looked in Cleveland playing Lebron ball.

I mean, it's just Horford atleast made the damn all-star team last year and has done so 3 times. He's a bigman that can do everything. Got his first triple double last game on top of that. First full season in 3 years and averaged 17/9/3 and 1.5 blocks a game. Arguably Hawk's best player.

[SwishSquared]

I mean, it's just Horford atleast made the damn all-star team last year and has done so 3 times. He's a bigman that can do everything. Got his first triple double last game on top of that. First full season in 3 years and averaged 17/9/3 and 1.5 blocks a game. Arguably Hawk's best player.He is the Hawks' best player imo. I'm guessing they expected Love's impact to increase with LBJ potentially reducing his workload while factoring Horford would decline a bit this year?

I think Horford's well-roundedness makes him better but I can buy Love being better offensively.

[G0ATbe]

So:kobe:? He's a still a 25/14 big man, cant fault him for not thriving under lebald ball. Players hardly ever do.

[Uncle Drew]

It's a projection... And Love at his best shits on Horford no doubt. Call me when Horford has a 26/13/4 season. And with Love's increased role in the offense, due to Kyrie's injury and LeBron taking some more rest, it's imaginable he'll approach those numbers again.

[Richesly]

So:kobe:? He's a still a 25/14 big man, cant fault him for not thriving under lebald ball. Players hardly ever do.

Thing is, that's speculation. Can't use speculation when ranking players. Gotta use facts and reasonable cause of why the player will be that number this season.

[Richesly]

It's a projection... And Love at his best shits on Horford no doubt. Call me when Horford has a 26/13/4 season. And with Love's increased role in the offense, due to Kyrie's injury and LeBron taking some more rest, it's imaginable he'll approach those numbers again.

Haha, Love's 2nd season had almost more win shares than his "amazing" 26/13/4 season. What impact he has! :roll:

I remember when Hawks played Cavs in the regular season, and Millsap/Horford kept going at Love until they took him out. That gave us a 16 point run because Horford and Millsap scored 8 straight buckets on him.

[SwishSquared]

Thing is, that's speculation. Can't use speculation when ranking players. Gotta use facts and reasonable cause of why the player will be that number this season.The list is a projection of who will be the best players in 2015-2016. Else it would be a ranking of best players in 2014-2015.

I could be mistaken but I think the former, rather than the latter, is the point of that list.

[Uncle Drew]

Haha, Love's 2nd season had almost more win shares than his "amazing" 26/13/4 season. What impact he has! :roll:

:wtf:

09/10:
WS: 4.9
WS per 48: .138

13/14:
WS: 14.3
WS per 48: .245

Almost more indeed. :roll:

[Uncle Drew]

FYI, Horford's best season in terms of win shares:

WS: 10.9
WS per 48: .183

heh

[stalkerforlife]

No excuses...

for the Cavs.

[Richesly]

:wtf:

09/10:
WS: 4.9
WS per 48: .138

13/14:
WS: 14.3
WS per 48: .245

Almost more indeed. :roll:

Oops, sorry, I meant third season.

[Uncle Drew]

Oops, sorry, I meant third season.

.245 opposed to .210. Almost more, jep.

[Uncle Drew]

While we're at it.

Love's worst season in many in win shares:
WS: 8.7
WS per 48: .165

The great Al Horford's season in win shares:
WS: 8.7
WS per 48: .179

:roll:

[dunksby]

Al Horford sucks, overrated as ****, Millsap>>>>>>>>

[Richesly]

FYI, Horford's best season in terms of win shares:

WS: 10.9
WS per 48: .183

heh

Problem is, Horford was always behind Joe Johnson and Josh Smith in their primes. He was never the first option and prefers not to be.

Once again, Horford isn't a double edged sword either. When you put in Horford, you absolutely get better defensively and offensively. He has the best mid range jumper in the league for a big man. Can even shoot the 3, just never does. But I can speculate he'd average 35% from 3 if he shot it, lets say over 115 threes.

Great post game, too. Something Love also can't do other than a post fadeaway.

Let's compare their pros and cons.

Love

Pros:
+Spacing
+Can shoot from anywhere
+Has LeBron
+Transition 3s

Cons:
-Lacks both post and perimeter defense
-Very simple post game
-Won't make plays
-Spot-up shooter



Horford

Pros:
+Can run the floor like a guard
+Both Athletic and Finesse
+Has a complex post game
+Has great ballhandling for a 4/5
+Spacing

Cons:
-Struggles against much taller bigs


Go home.

Also, stop comparing winshares from when Love was the first option. Comparing first option's W/S to someone who had never been the first option is like comparing straights to gays.

[Uncle Drew]

Problem is, Horford was always behind Joe Johnson and Josh Smith in their primes. He was never the first option and prefers not to be.

Once again, Horford isn't a double edged sword either. When you put in Horford, you absolutely get better defensively and offensively. He has the best mid range jumper in the league for a big man. Can even shoot the 3, just never does. But I can speculate he'd average 35% from 3 if he shot it, lets say over 115 threes.

Great post game, too. Something Love also can't do other than a post fadeaway.

Let's compare their pros and cons.

Love

Pros:
+Spacing
+Can shoot from anywhere
+Has LeBron
+Transition 3s

Cons:
-Lacks both post and perimeter defense
-Very simple post game
-Won't make plays
-Spot-up shooter



Horford

Pros:
+Can run the floor like a guard
+Both Athletic and Finesse
+Has a complex post game
+Has great ballhandling for a 4/5
+Spacing

Cons:
-Struggles against much taller bigs


Go home.
Win shares tell me other wise.

Go home.

[GIF REACTION]

Horford is good but he is a bonafide 2nd option that should probably be a 3rd

Love was a first option that probably should have been a 2nd, which he is now

[Richesly]

Win shares tell me other wise.

Go home.

You keep comparing love's winshares from minny when he was the first option to Horford who had never been the first option. You can't do that, lol.

Compare last seasons winshares though, son. Horford doubled Love.

[Uncle Drew]

You keep comparing love's winshares from minny when he was the first option to Horford who had never been the first option. You can't do that, lol.

Compare last seasons winshares though, son. Horford doubled Love.
I just did, in post #16. Their win shares are exactly the same, despite Love struggling for 3/4 of the season. :roll:

[Richesly]

Horford is good but he is a bonafide 2nd option that should probably be a 3rd

Love was a first option that probably should have been a 2nd, which he is now

I mean, I think Horford would have made Minnesota better if that was him. Thing is, Horford was behind Josh Smith and Joe Johnson's primes. This was also before Josh Smith's boys got him to chuck 3s. Smith at this time led the league in blocks, with Joe averaging 25 a game.

[GIF REACTION]

Horford could never put up 26/13

[Uncle Drew]

Hm, Horford was never the #1 option on offense due to Joe Johnson and Josh Smith, yet he had his best offensive season in terms of win shares when they both were ON the team.

[Richesly]

I just did, in post #16. Their win shares are exactly the same, despite Love struggling for 3/4 of the season. :roll:

Lol, Love's DWS should be 0. I guess they just gave him that haha.

And really using struggling as an excuse? Struggling is because of the player. Has NOTHING to do with an injury, mental state, etc. His own fault because he's ass.

[Uncle Drew]

Lol, Love's DWS should be 0. I guess they just gave him that haha.

And really using struggling as an excuse? Struggling is because of the player. Has NOTHING to do with an injury, mental state, etc. His own fault because he's ass.
He's the same player as Horford, according to win shares. :confusedshrug:

[Richesly]

Horford could never put up 26/13

I agree. But honestly, Horford's mindstate wouldn't allow him to do that, and that's why I agree.

He's a guy who shares the ball too much and puts 100% on both sides of the floor. Top of that, he plays the 5 every game, something Love would dream of being able to do.

He's a bigman with LeBron's playstyle.

[Richesly]

He's the same player as Horford, according to win shares. :confusedshrug:

Lol, man you gotta be ****in around dawg. They are nothing alike.

[Uncle Drew]

Lol, man you gotta be ****in around dawg. They are nothing alike.
Love win shares: 8.7
Horford win shares: 8.7

Eat shit. Your thread sucks.

[Lebronxrings]

:biggums:

espn :facepalm

[dhsilv]

The list is a projection of who will be the best players in 2015-2016. Else it would be a ranking of best players in 2014-2015.

I could be mistaken but I think the former, rather than the latter, is the point of that list.

It's not even "best" player per say for next year.

"We asked, "Which player will be better in 2015-16?" To decide, voters had to consider both the QUALITY and the QUANTITY of each player's contributions to his team's ability to win games. Over 100 voters weighed in on nearly 30,000 pairs of players."

Though does this mean we expect Love to play as many games or more than horford? Eh? I mean that quantity thing is pretty iffy.

[Richesly]

Love win shares: 8.7
Horford win shares: 8.7

Eat shit. Your thread sucks.

Love averaged 44% from the field to Horford's 56%. And he only averaged 1.2 more points LOL.

Horford averaged tons of more assists, blocks, way better +/-.

Your opinion sucks.

[GIF REACTION]

Love averaged 44% from the field to Horford's 56%. And he only averaged 1.2 more points LOL.

Horford averaged tons of more assists, blocks, way better +/-.

Your opinion sucks.
use TS%

[GIF REACTION]

Love gonna be putting up 20/10 early on

[Uncle Drew]

Love averaged 44% from the field to Horford's 56%. And he only averaged 1.2 more points LOL.

Horford averaged tons of more assists, blocks, way better +/-.

Your opinion sucks.
Cool story.

Win shares.

[JT123]

ESPN's agenda with overrating Lebron's teammates continues

[T_L_P]

Duncan's lost a lot of his post game, sure, but it's still elite. Look at how he scored most of his points in the Clippers series - on the block (and he did it shooting 59%).

Yeah, he''s one-sided alright. :oldlol:

Oh, and Duncan last year put up 14/9/3 with elite defense. Horford put up 15/7/3 with underrated defense but still clearly worse than Duncan's.

19/11/3 in the Playoffs with soaring efficiency for Duncan. 14/8/4 with mediocre efficiency for Horford.

I'm a Horford fan, but he's not better than Duncan, or Love.

[SwishSquared]

It's not even "best" player per say for next year.

"We asked, "Which player will be better in 2015-16?" To decide, voters had to consider both the QUALITY and the QUANTITY of each player's contributions to his team's ability to win games. Over 100 voters weighed in on nearly 30,000 pairs of players."

Though does this mean we expect Love to play as many games or more than horford? Eh? I mean that quantity thing is pretty iffy.I think ESPN builds in some ambiguity to protect itself in case it needs to backtrack. That sounds like a straw man but seems to be the reason they won't publicly reveal the RPM calculation.

Also, this is purely semantics, but how exactly is saying that the list is a compilation of "who is better" between a pair of players different than a list of the projected best players? Is the latter more of a pure leaguewide ranking whereas the former is the result of a several rounds of comparisons? Seems the same list would result :confusedshrug:

[24-Inch_Chrome]

Do you have a date set for your meltdown this year?

We gonna have to wait for the playoffs to start?

[chips93]

Duncan's lost a lot of his post game, sure, but it's still elite. Look at how he scored most of his points in the Clippers series - on the block (and he did it shooting 59%).

I dont watch enough of the spurs to really know, but do you think he could really survive making the post shots he made against deandre?

it felt like everything was well contested and that he had a hot hand, that if he had to take shots that tough over the course of a season, that he wouldn't score so efficiently?

[Richesly]

Do you have a date set for your meltdown this year?

We gonna have to wait for the playoffs to start?

No clue what you are talking about. How many times do people confuse me with atljonesnbro lol.

I didn't even post during the cavs series, and posted maybe twice during Wiz series and didn't post during nets series.

[24-Inch_Chrome]

http://i.imgur.com/eUR9Z15.png

[T_L_P]

I dont watch enough of the spurs to really know, but do you think he could really survive making the post shots he made against deandre?

it felt like everything was well contested and that he had a hot hand, that if he had to take shots that tough over the course of a season, that he wouldn't score so efficiently?

He really limits himself in the post during the Regular Season because using his full array of moves puts too much pressure on his busted knees.

He goes all out in the Playoffs which is when his efficiency in the post vastly increases.

So no, he couldn't do what he did against the Clippers for a full season - he'd break down pretty quick, and obviously he wouldn't be able to shoot 60% consistently. It's a shame that his knees are so bad because he's still one of the very best in the post; he just can't showcase that much anymore.

[Richesly]

http://i.imgur.com/eUR9Z15.png

Bro, whats wrong with you? That was a joke I posted while I was high. How the hell did you even take that serious?

[iznogood]

Problem is, Horford was always behind Joe Johnson and Josh Smith in their primes. He was never the first option and prefers not to be.

Once again, Horford isn't a double edged sword either. When you put in Horford, you absolutely get better defensively and offensively. He has the best mid range jumper in the league for a big man. Can even shoot the 3, just never does. But I can speculate he'd average 35% from 3 if he shot it, lets say over 115 threes.

Great post game, too. Something Love also can't do other than a post fadeaway.

Let's compare their pros and cons.

Love

Pros:
+Spacing
+Can shoot from anywhere
+Has LeBron
+Transition 3s

Cons:
-Lacks both post and perimeter defense
-Very simple post game
-Won't make plays
-Spot-up shooter



Horford

Pros:
+Can run the floor like a guard
+Both Athletic and Finesse
+Has a complex post game
+Has great ballhandling for a 4/5
+Spacing

Cons:
-Struggles against much taller bigs


Go home.

Also, stop comparing winshares from when Love was the first option. Comparing first option's W/S to someone who had never been the first option is like comparing straights to gays.
A lot of what you say is true, but I'm not sure about Horford's post game, would you care to link any of his post moves? Also, hHe's worst statistically than Kevin Love in that aspects. He posts up less often and also scores less per possession. And this was in 2014-2015 when Kevin Love posted up far less than he did in Minnesota. Kevin Love also has a very good jump hook, which is actually his go to move and not the turnaround jumper. He mostly shoots that jumper on the left block and they don't post him much on the left block nowadays.

[Richesly]

A lot of what you say is true, but I'm not sure about Horford's post game, would you care to link any of his post moves? Also, hHe's worst statistically than Kevin Love in that aspects. He posts up less often and also scores less per possession. And this was in 2014-2015 when Kevin Love posted up far less than he did in Minnesota. Kevin Love also has a very good jump hook, which is actually his go to move and not the turnaround jumper. He mostly shoots that jumper on the left block and they don't post him much on the left block nowadays.

I may have underestimated Love when it came to stats, honestly. I guess since the rankings were decided on stats, I can see why he's ahead. I just still think Horford is still the more impactful player. Millsap is better though, I can easily win that argument with stats too!

[dhsilv]

I think ESPN builds in some ambiguity to protect itself in case it needs to backtrack. That sounds like a straw man but seems to be the reason they won't publicly reveal the RPM calculation.

Also, this is purely semantics, but how exactly is saying that the list is a compilation of "who is better" between a pair of players different than a list of the projected best players? Is the latter more of a pure leaguewide ranking whereas the former is the result of a several rounds of comparisons? Seems the same list would result :confusedshrug:

My understanding is they ranked players based on those two criteria and someone did some math and came up with the results. So they didn't get in a room and name the best player. They all voted on a scale (not sure what it was) and then someone totaled it.

Why would you expect espn to give away RPM given they paid for it? It allows them to do projections and provide a value add if you will.

[SwishSquared]

My understanding is they ranked players based on those two criteria and someone did some math and came up with the results. So they didn't get in a room and name the best player. They all voted on a scale (not sure what it was) and then someone totaled it.

Why would you expect espn to give away RPM given they paid for it? It allows them to do projections and provide a value add if you will.They released the formula for PER, which they also "paid" for. Just saying another instance where they don't disclose everything so they can backtrack if need be. Same way they left this criteria/ranking ambiguous, which you insinuated yourself by calling it "iffy."

I didn't say they all got into a room and voted on 1-450. I'm saying either method would lead to the same list, essentially. For all intents and purposes, it's a ranking of the best players from a list of criteria consisting of quantitative and qualitative impact on wins. I don't see how the criteria and end result are mutually exclusive of compiling a "best of" list.

It doesn't matter though...

[LikeMike]

I can't believe this. I agree with Love over Duncan, too. If we talking currently, Duncan is basically a one sided big man. Defense and the PnR. Duncan loss a lot of his post game because his feet is slow now.

Salt.

[All Net]

I can't believe this. I agree with Love over Duncan, too. If we talking currently, Duncan is basically a one sided big man. Defense and the PnR. Duncan loss a lot of his post game because his feet is slow now.
Thats because he is

[JellyBean]

And? I mean really. Wasn't too many teams knocking on Horford's door during free agency. That speaks volumes.

[iznogood]

I may have underestimated Love when it came to stats, honestly. I guess since the rankings were decided on stats, I can see why he's ahead. I just still think Horford is still the more impactful player. Millsap is better though, I can easily win that argument with stats too!
I wasn't trying to argue that the stats say Love is better at posting up, but I tried to look for a Horford post moves highlight reel on youtube and there isn't any. And when I watch the full highlights I don't see much of his post game as well, since Horford prefers to face up and attack from triple threat. Yet you claim he has a complex low post game. He doesn't even post up often, which you could argue is due to the fact that Atlanta's game is not based on low post isolations and that he usually matches up against bigger players, but I'm pretty sure they'd run more for him if his post game was that great. The same goes for his 3 point shooting. Don't you think that coaches would make him shoot the 3s instead of the long 2s he shoots if his percentage was good enough?

I also didn't understand what did you mean by saying Love doesn't make plays. He is an excellent passer and Minesotta used to run a lot of sets with Love distributing the ball. Cleveland does as well from time to time.

[dhsilv]

They released the formula for PER, which they also "paid" for. Just saying another instance where they don't disclose everything so they can backtrack if need be. Same way they left this criteria/ranking ambiguous, which you insinuated yourself by calling it "iffy."

I didn't say they all got into a room and voted on 1-450. I'm saying either method would lead to the same list, essentially. For all intents and purposes, it's a ranking of the best players from a list of criteria consisting of quantitative and qualitative impact on wins. I don't see how the criteria and end result are mutually exclusive of compiling a "best of" list.

It doesn't matter though...

I've still never seen PER on the website, I always thought someone reverse engineered it, but so be it. ESPN isn't giving out their current one and 538 has a similar model they use for player ranking and they have been pretty direct that it is proprietary. But that's fair enough.

The thing I do like about the criteria of these is that a player like Kobe who you might say "yeah he's better than player y" will get ranked lower because a voter has to assume Kobe isn't going to play a lot of games, thus quantity will be reduced. It creates a construct where at the very least we has fans have two methods to comment on and we don't just have to have ignorant and uninformed opinions when we judge things differently. Now clearly 99.9999% of the internet doesn't read criteria before commenting, but I can't fix the internet.

[Paul George 24]

It's a projection... And Love at his best shits on Horford no doubt. Call me when Horford has a 26/13/4 season. And with Love's increased role in the offense, due to Kyrie's injury and LeBron taking some more rest, it's imaginable he'll approach those numbers again.
CAN LOVE PLAY DEFENCE ????????

[Paul George 24]

FYI, Horford's best season in terms of win shares:

WS: 10.9
WS per 48: .183

heh
DID LOVE EVER LEAD HIS TEAM TO PLAYOFFS ???????????

[90sgoat]

Lebron's third option is better than the Hawks first option:facepalm

[CarlosBoozer]

Whats so good bout horford? :kobe:

[ImKobe]

even worse when you consider that Kevin Love as a #1 option never made the Playoffs while Horford just came off a season where he was the leader of a 60 win team that made the ECF while Love is a 3rd option who doesn't play much defense in Cleveland. You can't honestly tell me that ESPN experts believe Love will produce more this season than Horford...


Duncan is debatable because of his age, but last season he played almost every game and was by far the best player on his team in the Playoffs and put up big numbers while Love was being benched in crunch time during the regular season because he couldn't defend worth a lick and TT showed us in the POs that he's a better fit than Love because he defends and keeps possessions alive by getting offensive rebounds, basically does everything DJ does and he can make FTs...

Love can put up points and rebound but this ranking doesn't make sense if we look at the previous season and the fact that Kevin is prone to injuries..

[SwishSquared]

I've still never seen PER on the website, I always thought someone reverse engineered it, but so be it. ESPN isn't giving out their current one and 538 has a similar model they use for player ranking and they have been pretty direct that it is proprietary. But that's fair enough.

The thing I do like about the criteria of these is that a player like Kobe who you might say "yeah he's better than player y" will get ranked lower because a voter has to assume Kobe isn't going to play a lot of games, thus quantity will be reduced. It creates a construct where at the very least we has fans have two methods to comment on and we don't just have to have ignorant and uninformed opinions when we judge things differently. Now clearly 99.9999% of the internet doesn't read criteria before commenting, but I can't fix the internet.:applause:

[Uncle Drew]

CAN LOVE PLAY DEFENCE ????????
Can you speak proper English?

There's your answer.

[CarlosBoozer]

Love can throw dem full court passes doe

[chips93]

They released the formula for PER, which they also "paid" for. Just saying another instance where they don't disclose everything so they can backtrack if need be. Same way they left this criteria/ranking ambiguous, which you insinuated yourself by calling it "iffy."

there isnt actually a formula or algorithm for RPM. They get the plus/minus for every player, then adjust each value, based on the plus/minus of the players they are playing with and against.

http://regressing.deadspin.com/just-what-the-hell-is-real-plus-minus-espns-new-nba-s-1560361469


[The] metric isolates the unique plus-minus impact of each NBA player by adjusting for the effects of each teammate, opposing player and coach. ... The RPM model sifts through more than 230,000 possessions each NBA season to tease apart the "real" plus-minus effects attributable to each player, employing techniques similar to those used by scientific researchers when they need to model the effects of numerous variables at the same time.

[chips93]

DID LOVE EVER LEAD HIS TEAM TO PLAYOFFS ???????????


no way would horford have dragged that minny squad to the playoffs in the west

[TemporaMutantur]

Can you speak proper English?

There's your answer.

In his defense, that's the British spelling.

Probably not British though, so **** him.

[JtotheIzzo]

30 out of 30 NBA GMs would choose Horford.

Stats are the whoredom of the dumb.

[Dr. Ice]

no way would horford have dragged that minny squad to the playoffs in the west

Horford is a two time ncaa tourney winner and has never missed the playoffs in his career. Winning is natural to him.

[Levity]

the arbitrary context ESPN uses when ranking their players is baffling.

this season Horford will most likely be better than Love, impact wise. Not because love is any lesser of a player, but because hes the third go-to guy on the cavs (2nd until kyrie comes back) No doubt ESPN realizes this, yet, they seem to want to rank him according to his talent prior to joining the cavs. Which is fine if they want to do it that way, but be consistent on how you rank all your players.

[Uncle Drew]

Horford is a two time ncaa tourney winner and has never missed the playoffs in his career. Winning is natural to him.
Making the playoffs = winning?

[Spurs5Rings2014]

I don't get it. Do you wanna hear "no excuses" in the play offs when you get swept again? Wouldn't Cavs' hearing "no excuses" be better and save you more face when you get bounced? What's the deal here, man?