Does Any Perimeter Player in History Approach Peak MJ from 1988-1993?

[8Ball]

He was busy scoring 732 points on 62% TS, while Lebron was at home watching him.

LeBron = 35k all time points.

Load Management = 10K all time points.

Wanna run the numbers for rebounds and assists too?

Bringing a dull blade to a bazooka fight

[8Ball]

Man shitting on Kawhi just doesn't feel satisfying to me.

Like a Lion eating a small mouse.

[Gudo]

Interesting thread. Thanks for your inputs and balanced posts dankok8, micku, kuniva_damighty, and bizil.

[AirBonner]

Kawhi won with multiple casts. He wasn’t chained to one teammate (Pippen) like balden

[Axe]

A tacked on popularity award that they give out every year. On the other hand how many have faced and defeated every other All-NBA First Team player in the same year in the playoffs? Or faced and defeated the two closest MVPs to him in time playing against him simultaneously in a series? Name the other players who have done either and when they did it. I cannot think of another case. Curry's accomplishments are singular and exceptional. So exceptional that even if an FMVP was all that it was made out to be (which it most certainly isn't) it would be a lesser achievement in comparison to what he has done.

Touché. I suppose this is why they handed him over the nick teens/kids choice award trophy blimp at least three times and was a runner-up for more than thrice as well. And even if he's yet to have an iconic moment in the playoffs, it should be good enough for him to grab the last spot in mount rushmore, i suppose.

[Axe]

So the FMVP is a popularity award and the regular season MVP isn't??

Apparently teens/kids choice awards from channels like cartoon network, disney or nickelodeon are more iconic nowadays than either of those media-created awards which aren't considered significant anymore.

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

Interesting thread. Thanks for your inputs and balanced posts dankok8, micku, kuniva_damighty, and bizil.

Appreciate that.

I'll say that my use of advanced stats might be annoying to some, but they definitely serve purpose. For example "BPM" might scare off posters who only understand raw stats. If they read up on it though they'd understand quick just how reliable it is.

More or less its your total box adjusted per 100 possessions. One hundred which is the average per team. This is ideal because you don't have to worry much about pace. Sure rules are different depending on the era you're talking about, but using BPM (everything is rate) is less of a headache than comparing unadjusted raw numbers. I wouldn't strictly use it for defense because blocks and steals aren't the only way you measure that end. On offense though? Why hate an all-in one thumb stat?

The results are pretty good with elite players fairing well.

RPM is even better, but only goes back to 97. Along with a boxscore this tracks play-by-play and hand tracking. More details equal better analytics along with a better understanding of impact.

[Micku]

Appreciate that.

I'll say that my use of advanced stats might be annoying to some, but they definitely serve purpose. For example "BPM" might scare off posters who only understand raw stats. If they read up on it though they'd understand quick just how reliable it is.

More or less its your total box adjusted per 100 possessions. One hundred which is the average per team. This is ideal because you don't have to worry much about pace. Sure rules are different depending on the era you're talking about, but using BPM (everything is rate) is less of a headache than comparing unadjusted raw numbers. I wouldn't strictly use it for defense because blocks and steals aren't the only way you measure that end. On offense though? Why hate an all-in one thumb stat?

The results are pretty good with elite players fairing well.

RPM is even better, but only goes back to 97. Along with a boxscore this tracks play-by-play and hand tracking. More details equal better analytics along with a better understanding of impact.

Yeah dude. I also appreciate it Gudo.

I would also you say you gott'a use it within context. It's not like you can use BPM to really say who is the best in the league. Just more how much impact a player has on that specific team, in that specific season. But not who is the best player in the league. And it also depends on lineup and match ups. Like the coach could have a good player in their worst line up constantly, but do so to not get so down in pts or not to get blown out. There are some other advance stats like usage rate, and ppl use it wrong all the time thinking it's like time of oppression. Skip Bayless and Shannon incorrectly used it that way too. And there are other stats like RPM, like you said that do play by play. There are other sites that have different stats to indicate an impact of a player.

Regardless, MJ and LeBron are the cream of the crop in almost all advance stats. Some stats, MJ beat LeBron. Others LBJ beats MJ. Some stats like VORP, LeBron is ahead due to longevity. Some like BPM, MJ is ahead career wise. Etc, etc. But advance stats aren't everything.

There are things that players do that aren't within the stats, and you could only see by watching the game closely. And there other subjective stuff, rules, defense, the way the game is played and etc. While stats don't lie, they could often mislead if you use it wrong. You gott'a be careful when comparing it across eras with some stats.

[dankok8]

Advanced Stats Comparison:

1987-1993 Jordan

Season: 30.4 PER, 0.285 WS/48, 11.4 BPM
Playoffs: 29.8 PER, 0.264 WS/48, 12.2 BPM

2012-2018 Lebron

Season: 28,7 PER, 0.252 WS/48, 9.1 BPM
Playoffs: 29.6 PER, 0.258 WS/48, 10.4 BPM

It's a clean sweep for MJ in all these metrics. I would never use these stats but just including them for those who care about them! LOL

[dankok8]

Appreciate that.

I'll say that my use of advanced stats might be annoying to some, but they definitely serve purpose. For example "BPM" might scare off posters who only understand raw stats. If they read up on it though they'd understand quick just how reliable it is.

More or less its your total box adjusted per 100 possessions. One hundred which is the average per team. This is ideal because you don't have to worry much about pace. Sure rules are different depending on the era you're talking about, but using BPM (everything is rate) is less of a headache than comparing unadjusted raw numbers. I wouldn't strictly use it for defense because blocks and steals aren't the only way you measure that end. On offense though? Why hate an all-in one thumb stat?

The results are pretty good with elite players fairing well.

RPM is even better, but only goes back to 97. Along with a boxscore this tracks play-by-play and hand tracking. More details equal better analytics along with a better understanding of impact.

The reason to hate all-in one thumb stats is because they use somewhat arbitrary weights for boxscore stats. For instance PER weighs each assist as 0.67 of a point and BPM weighs it as 0.5 of a point. Why those values and why are they different if regressions were used to determine average assist values? Mind you if you change 0.67 to something like 0.60 in the PER the formula the all-time leaders list looks very different.

That's why I don't like those stats. I don't think they show much. Doesn't matter that MJ is number 1 in most Advanced Stats which validates them (?) but they are still useless IMO.

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

Yeah dude. I also appreciate it Gudo.

I would also you say you gott'a use it within context. It's not like you can use BPM to really say who is the best in the league. Just more how much impact a player has on that specific team, in that specific season. But not who is the best player in the league. And it also depends on lineup and match ups. Like the coach could have a good player in their worst line up constantly, but do so to not get so down in pts or not to get blown out. There are some other advance stats like usage rate, and ppl use it wrong all the time thinking it's like time of oppression. Skip Bayless and Shannon incorrectly used it that way too. And there are other stats like RPM, like you said that do play by play. There are other sites that have different stats to indicate an impact of a player.

Regardless, MJ and LeBron are the cream of the crop in almost all advance stats. Some stats, MJ beat LeBron. Others LBJ beats MJ. Some stats like VORP, LeBron is ahead due to longevity. Some like BPM, MJ is ahead career wise. Etc, etc. But advance stats aren't everything.

There are things that players do that aren't within the stats, and you could only see by watching the game closely. And there other subjective stuff, rules, defense, the way the game is played and etc. While stats don't lie, they could often mislead if you use it wrong. You gott'a be careful when comparing it across eras with some stats.

Agreed.

How you impact your teams' success should be the standard though. Its a team sport and BITW is blurred by different criterias. For me "best" is that player who passes the eye test first. So skills and dominance always take precedence. Then I get into the impact stuff or the effectiveness that player has on their club. Raw numbers are deadlast on my agenda. That wasn't always the case but after seeing the decline in regular-season defense and Westbrook's TD fiasco nobody will convince me otherwise.

A higher BPM doesn't always mean better player though. No doubt. What if that guy has to do more for his team than someone playing on a loaded club? They have a larger burden but again it doesn't just make them better. That was always the argument from Kobe fans back in 08-10. They argued that because Kobe played in a system with a championship cast, he didn't get to rack up numbers like Bron did in Cleveland. Not a bad argument. But as we've seen over the years, good team or bad, Bron rates fairly well every year.

Good call on the mishandling of USG btw. See it all the time. I don't like 3ball but he's one of the FEW posters here that actually understands time of possession. He posts correct data from NBA's official tracker. How long you actually have the ball in hand. Not BBall-refs "usage" which is only your box converted into a percentage.

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

Advanced Stats Comparison:

1987-1993 Jordan

Season: 30.4 PER, 0.285 WS/48, 11.4 BPM
Playoffs: 29.8 PER, 0.264 WS/48, 12.2 BPM

2012-2018 Lebron

Season: 28,7 PER, 0.252 WS/48, 9.1 BPM
Playoffs: 29.6 PER, 0.258 WS/48, 10.4 BPM

It's a clean sweep for MJ in all these metrics. I would never use these stats but just including them for those who care about them! LOL

Jordan was better, sure. But don't pretend these numbers aren't in the same tier. Or that prime Bron never "approached" Jordan.

The reason to hate all-in one thumb stats is because they use somewhat arbitrary weights for boxscore stats. For instance PER weighs each assist as 0.67 of a point and BPM weighs it as 0.5 of a point. Why those values and why are they different if regressions were used to determine average assist values? Mind you if you change 0.67 to something like 0.60 in the PER the formula the all-time leaders list looks very different.

That's why I don't like those stats. I don't think they show much. Doesn't matter that MJ is number 1 in most Advanced Stats which validates them (?) but they are still useless IMO.

PER is definitely flawed, but I am talking about BPM. It is by far more reliable than ANY regression box stat. Unlike BPM and RPM, the values for PER are bloated and there are no positional. role or team adjustments. Basically things that go outside a box score.

in BPM assists are worth more for a big or post player than a PG. Since point guards handle the ball all the time they get lower value assists. A big's assist is usually higher value so this is where regression kicks in. Rebounding is weird, but for bigmen a rebound is static. For guards, offensive rebounds are valuable. Steals and blocks are both worth more for smaller players than for post players. Fouls are a negative for both guards and bigs (fouls are not calculated in PER). Points are static for every position.

Not everyone will agree with the placed values for these categories. but BPM 2.0 is pretty fair. If you read up on it they explain their reasonings and detail why each value was assigned. Again not perfect. Still better than spewing raw numbers across eras, and acting like that is legit analysis.

[dankok8]

Jordan was better, sure. But don't pretend these numbers aren't in the same tier. Or that prime Bron never "approached" Jordan.



PER is definitely flawed, but I am talking about BPM. It is by far more reliable than ANY regression box stat. Unlike BPM and RPM, the values for PER are bloated and there are no positional. role or team adjustments. Basically things that go outside a box score.

in BPM assists are worth more for a big or post player than a PG. Since point guards handle the ball all the time they get lower value assists. A big's assist is usually higher value so this is where regression kicks in. Rebounding is weird, but for bigmen a rebound is static. For guards, offensive rebounds are valuable. Steals and blocks are both worth more for smaller players than for post players. Fouls are a negative for both guards and bigs (fouls are not calculated in PER). Points are static for every position.

Not everyone will agree with the placed values for these categories. but BPM 2.0 is pretty fair. If you read up on it they explain their reasonings and detail why each value was assigned. Again not perfect. Still better than spewing raw numbers across eras, and acting like that is legit analysis.

Funny enough BPM is the one Advanced Stat where MJ dominates Lebron. 11.4 to 9.1 edge in the regular season, 12.2 to 10.4 edge in the playoffs.

Still a good statistic should be good not just for determining the #1 and #2 player ever but beyond that. When I see Chris Paul is 5th all time in BPM and Stockton is 8th all time, it really destroys its credibility. Note that BPM is a rate stat and doesn't reward longevity so those kind of results are really bad.

A higher BPM doesn't always mean better player though. No doubt. What if that guy has to do more for his team than someone playing on a loaded club? They have a larger burden but again it doesn't just make them better. That was always the argument from Kobe fans back in 08-10. They argued that because Kobe played in a system with a championship cast, he didn't get to rack up numbers like Bron did in Cleveland. Not a bad argument. But as we've seen over the years, good team or bad, Bron rates fairly well every year.

Bron rates fairly well but actually his numbers drop off more noticeably on good teams compared to Jordan's. If we use titles in championships runs only, Jordan's edge over Lebron gets even bigger. 1991-1993 Jordan put up 6.1 ppg more than 2012/2013/2016 Lebron. The efficiency, assists and turnovers are close enough. I just can't overlook the consistent 5-6 ppg in scoring volume when comparing their peaks. I just think that's a huge edge. And then like you said MJ's defense was more consistent as well.

Maybe when I said "never approached" in the OP that was hyperbole but peak Jordan is still clearly the best perimeter player ever in his prime.

[Micku]

Funny enough BPM is the one Advanced Stat where MJ dominates Lebron. 11.4 to 9.1 edge in the regular season, 12.2 to 10.4 edge in the playoffs.

Still a good statistic should be good not just for determining the #1 and #2 player ever but beyond that. When I see Chris Paul is 5th all time in BPM and Stockton is 8th all time, it really destroys its credibility. Note that BPM is a rate stat and doesn't reward longevity so those kind of results are really bad.



Bron rates fairly well but actually his numbers drop off more noticeably on good teams compared to Jordan's. If we use titles in championships runs only, Jordan's edge over Lebron gets even bigger. 1991-1993 Jordan put up 6.1 ppg more than 2012/2013/2016 Lebron. The efficiency, assists and turnovers are close enough. I just can't overlook the consistent 5-6 ppg in scoring volume when comparing their peaks. I just think that's a huge edge. And then like you said MJ's defense was more consistent as well.

Maybe when I said "never approached" in the OP that was hyperbole but peak Jordan is still clearly the best perimeter player ever in his prime.

Yeah bro. I think many ppl would agree that MJ prime/peak is better than LeBron, at their respective era still. But we talking about how close it is. That's when the approach comes into play and possibly where we disagree. But if you were to say MJ is clearly the best, then it's cool. The numbers indicate it, eyes test (but that's more subjective), advance numbers show it. But again, LeBron was never consistent consecutively like MJ was at both ends. MJ played at a higher lvl in the RS and continued or enhance that in the PO. Lebron earlier years he went hard on the RS, but his PO was up and down in Miami, but recent years it's been great offensively at least. His years varied defensively. He was better in 12, 13, 16 than he was 17 and 18. But 14, 17 and 18 he at his peak offensively, but not defensively. Those years, he was definitely in the same tier offensively, but not defensively.

MJ was great at both ends 88-93 consecutively.

Though you can find a person who would argue his defensive impact wasn't as huge as LeBron, tho I'm not too sure if that's true. But MJ offensively was too crazy.

However even if we use raw stats to compare, it's still a bit messy. Like 80s ball is different from late 90s ball. Late 90s ball is different from late 00s ball. Etc, etc. I know what's not what you intent, but it has to be said a bit. What that said, MJ was a monster. The games are available so ppl can just watch'em for the eye test.

But it just depends. You don't consider LeBron to be the same tier, right? Like I don't think he has to be better or even the same necessary to be on the same tier. Like Magic and Bird, are they not on same tier? You could say Bird has the better peak or prime tho. Duncan and KG, right? They might be on the same tier, but Duncan would be consider better. You could argue who had the better peak. You could toss Dirk in there. Barkley and Karl Malone. Dominique Wilkins or Carmelo? But what do you think of it? Or is MJ just on a tier of his own in your eyes?

[dankok8]

Yeah bro. I think many ppl would agree that MJ prime/peak is better than LeBron, at their respective era still. But we talking about how close it is. That's when the approach comes into play and possibly where we disagree. But if you were to say MJ is clearly the best, then it's cool. The numbers indicate it, eyes test (but that's more subjective), advance numbers show it. But again, LeBron was never consistent consecutively like MJ was at both ends. MJ played at a higher lvl in the RS and continued or enhance that in the PO. Lebron earlier years he went hard on the RS, but his PO was up and down in Miami, but recent years it's been great offensively at least. His years varied defensively. He was better in 12, 13, 16 than he was 17 and 18. But 14, 17 and 18 he at his peak offensively, but not defensively. Those years, he was definitely in the same tier offensively, but not defensively.

MJ was great at both ends 88-93 consecutively.

Though you can find a person who would argue his defensive impact wasn't as huge as LeBron, tho I'm not too sure if that's true. But MJ offensively was too crazy.

However even if we use raw stats to compare, it's still a bit messy. Like 80s ball is different from late 90s ball. Late 90s ball is different from late 00s ball. Etc, etc. I know what's not what you intent, but it has to be said a bit. What that said, MJ was a monster. The games are available so ppl can just watch'em for the eye test.

But it just depends. You don't consider LeBron to be the same tier, right? Like I don't think he has to be better or even the same necessary to be on the same tier. Like Magic and Bird, are they not on same tier? You could say Bird has the better peak or prime tho. Duncan and KG, right? They might be on the same tier, but Duncan would be consider better. You could argue who had the better peak. You could toss Dirk in there. Barkley and Karl Malone. Dominique Wilkins or Carmelo? But what do you think of it? Or is MJ just on a tier of his own in your eyes?

Yea... As far as perimeter players only are concerned I consider MJ on his own tier as far as peaks. Lebron may be the closest but he's still a good distance away. For me how do I decide tiers? For me the same tier is if I can see an argument for the other player. And in this comparison I can't see an argument for Lebron over MJ as a peak player. That doesn't mean the gap is huge but it's a clear gap.

You mentioned basic and advances stats and eye test...

Don't forget team impact. The 1991, 1992 Bulls (and also 1996 and 1997 but that wasn't MJ's peak) were much better offensively than any team Lebron ever played on. And it was basically Pippen and some good role players. It wasn't the Showtime Lakers type talent with Magic/Kareem/Worthy/Scott. Or the 80's Celtics with Bird/McHale/Parish/DJ or the 10's Heat with Lebron/Wade/Bosh/Allen or the 10's Warriors with KD/Curry/Klay/Green. Four 90's Bulls teams were top 20 all time in ORtg and that's despite playing in a more defensive era. And mind you MJ wasn't at the head of some gimmicky offense either that was sacrificing defense for offense like the SSOL Suns or Nellie's Mavs or something like that. The Bulls were a really good defensive team and a GOAT-level offensive team at the same time. And their offense completely fell apart without MJ. The Bulls went from one of the greatest offenses ever to below league average during his first retirement.