Think in a vacuum. Rate players objectively. Consider all factors of each category (i.e. "free throw scorer" is a combo of getting to the line and %). Use a decimal point for each score. Add them up...

Value as individual defender (vs position) 1-7:
Value as team defender (switching/vs all) 1-3:
Value as individual def. rebounder (vs position) 1-2:
Value as team def. rebounder (vs all) 1-3:
Value as individual off. rebounder (vs position) 1-2:
Value as team off. rebounder (vs all) 1-3:
Value as 3 pt. scorer 1-3:
Value as inside scorer 1-3:
Value as midrange scorer 1-2:
Value as free throw scorer 1-2:
Value as passer 1-10:
Value as ball handler 1-3:
Value in transition (both ways) 1-2:
Value as teammate 1-5:

^^^ isn't perfect (was done discreetly during horrible Katherine Heigl/Rosario Dawson movie) but is prob ~ the right way to evaluate imo.

The cavs, heat, Lakers with Shaq 5-10 range, with pau 10-20 range, Pistons (both eras), big 4 celtics, rockets didn't have top 5 assist teams and won titles. So again your narrative doesn't fit what actually happens. So the spurs, warriors and bulls won based on your teamwork narrative while many of the teams since the pistons won in the 90s won with another formula.

looooooolllllllll

Just went back and looked, only one of the 5 spurs title teams had a top 5 assist ranking (the last one) another one had a 6. The rest were in the 10-20 range and in fact one was 20.

I gotta admit, thats a pretty slick bluff from twog. and the commitment to it is truly amazing. thousands of words on a completely faulty premise. just incredible.

and he woulda got away with it if capone didnt google.

so close.

guess its back to the drawing board.

You have written a lot to confirm basically what I said.

"Cavs offense wasn't the problem. It was their defense (or not having a defense that can stop the Warriors juggernaut)."

Good work.

You also failed to mention that the Cavs had an offensive rating of 120 in the playoffs and 114 during the regular season. All great offensive numbers.

If you can't work out that their problem wasn't on the offensive end, you don't know basketball (shocking!).

His teams numbers for offense last season reflect as well as most of the bulls teams.

Their offense last year was as good as the Bulls team (6 chip teams averaged about the same).

Their offense last year was better than any Spurs team.

Warriors are probably the greatest offensive team ever. Yet the Cavs offense last year was the same as what the Warriors averaged over the last 3 years.

OFFENSE IS NOT THE CAVS PROBLEM.

LeBron is 1-1 against the Spurs and 1-2 against the Warriors (and could have been 2-1 without losing 2 All Stars to injury). You speak like he's not beating these teams.



Warriors in 6 with 90s rules.



The Warriors were the best defensive team in the league last year (SA maybe equal). Bulls didn't play the best defensive team in the Finals ever.

I also see you conveniently left off Phx (9th best defense), Utah 97 (10th best) and Utah 98 (15th best).

So I stand by my statement that the Warriors were better defensively than any team the Bulls teams played in the Finals, some by a lot.

I will give props to Seattle. That team was legit defensively.

Lol at arguing with a guy that doesn't believe the warriors were an all time great defense

LOL twog

so all those teams won the championship while having top 10 assists?

how does this refute my claim that championship teams tend to have high assist rankings?.. and again - most of those teams have high talent levels, which means they don't need as much teamwork/assists

the problem is that lebron's teams have an average assist ranking of 15th for his career (yikes), so weaker teamwork has lessened his chances at winning rings since he entered the league.

otoh, the bulls' average assist ranking was 7th for jordan's career - this includes their #3 assist ranking in 1988, when jordan won 50 games in a very tough conference with zero help (rookie pippen averaged 7 ppg).. it was similar to westbrook's season this year, except jordan had less help, won dpoy, and shot 10 percentage points better with higher PER.

of course, westbrook's team ranked 25th in assists, so right away, his team is behind the curve in developing great teamwork.. and we know WHY jordan's team ranked higher in assists than westbrook's team - jordan got his dominating stats OFF-BALL, so teammates had the ball more, and they had the league's biggest assist target running off-ball


right, and those teams weren't as good as the bulls, spurs or warriors

the bulls, spurs and warriors are the best in the time frame you specified (since the 90's) because of great teamwork - so you made my point

i guess shaq/kobe would compete with those teams, but that was due to their talent, not their teamwork/assists, as the stats show - again, when a team has a lot of talent, they don't need as much teamwork (see lebron's teams)

hope that helps
.

This is interesting. So what your saying is the Bulls had great teamwork in 1988, being that they averaged so many assists.

Must mean their leader wasn't very good. Because if they had a really awesome leader and really good team work, then they would obviously win the championship. Wouldn't they?

That would be your logic.

But maybe... just maybe... you are overrating the assist thing.

You know... just maybe.

609/Twog,

How many forum sites have you been banned on?

And,

How many accounts have you had banned here on TwoPlusTwo?

Yeah, so half the teams won without "elite" teamwork--I was wrong about the Spurs being in that same group--in fact of the title teams they have the worst (20th) and some of the worst with the exception of the last one which was first.

So basically the Bulls (6) + Warriors (2) + Spurs (1) + Mavs (1) are in the top 5; the other 15 teams including the Spurs (4), Lakers (5) + Piston (3) + Heat (2) + Cavs (1) are all out of the top 5--in fact a few are in the 10-20 range. So again, I'm not making your point for you. My point is that your narrative isn't nearly as strong as you think it is.

Elite talent wins titles be it with good assisting or not. In fact a majority of the teams of this era don't follow your "elite teamwork rule." Yes maybe the best of the teams have, but 2 of the dynasties have not (Lakers / Spurs sans the last title) while 1 (Bulls) and the current one (Warriors) do.

Jordan wouldn't have won 6 titles with twog aka gene hackman in Hoosiers coaching him

NO SHOTS UNLESS YOU PASS 4 TIMES FIRST (unless you run the picket fence or a jimmy chitwood 30 foot ISO)

LOL

yup. and be careful not to score too many times when its passed to you from jordan. we dont want his assist percentage to be too high.

along with hackman, I think twog would totally fall for the same type of stat fallacy that mike mcarthy did when he learned that teams who run the ball 20 times a game in the playoffs usually win so he eschewed rodgers throwing the ball and ran the ball a bunch.

How can twog be an actual person. lol / smh

Think of all the time he wasted creating new e-mail accounts to keep posting on here

LOLOLOL

who are you quoting above?


lebron has a losing record against the spurs, warriors and mavs - so no, he isn't beating them

and the 2 times he DID beat them, it was by 1 possession - a bounce that could've gone either way

btw - in the 2017 Finals, the warriors averaged 29.4 apg versus the cavs 21.6 apg - how the hell were the cavs going to beat a supposedly more talented team with worse teamwork?


steph curry can barely stay healthy in today's cream puff league - he'f get crumpled like a piece of paper in the 90's.

and can you imagine the warriors in the 70's???... every team in the league would destroy them..

it's a good thing today's players have that line out there so they can compete by shooting their mostly stand-still jumpers.. because without that line, they'd have to play actual basketball... and they'd get killed.


That's fine except the stats don't support it

the lakers, blazers, sonics and jazz all had similar or lower drtg's to the warriors, and ranked the same relative to the league.

so your notion that they're a better defensive team is just you SAYING it, nothing more

furthermore, the lack of spacing made it much tougher to score in the 90's - if you asked curry or lebron to play without 3-point spacing, they'd look at you like you're crazy, because it's way harder to score that way.. so jordan's stats and the bulls' dominance is more impressive

btw, it's funny that you think the 2017 Finals was a tougher defensive environment than any of Jordan's Finals, even though both teams achieved a 115+ ortg.. smh.. you're arguing that it was harder to score against the warriors, even though they just gave up higher ortg than anyone jordan ever faced (except the 90' sixers in ecsf, when jordan averaged 45 ppg)


the cavs' ortg in the regular season was 113.6, so nowhere near all-time great, without considering anything else..

and their rating was only 4.8 points above league-average, which isn't impressive or uncommon

so what are you arguing anyway?.. that the cavs' offense is good (but not all-time great)?.. i'm not disputing that.. that's common knowledge

what i'm saying is that lebron underachieves his big 3 talent by never having an all-time ranked offense.. he also underachieves by having lower offensive rankings than jordan's teams, who had less offensive help.



barely, and the assist rankings are far apart

indeed, the spurs' ortg is achieved via teamwork, whereas the cavs' ortg is achieved via talent - consequently, the spurs are the better team and win more rings

it's quite simple


yes it is

the cavs' big 3 and record payroll should be a dominant team with 115 ortg and top 5 in assists, resulting in 60-70 wins.. they shouldn't be underdogs against the warriors

but instead, the cavs were 13th in assists with poor teamwork, so they only won 51 games.. 51 wins is a pure comedy given their record payroll and talent.

ultimately, jordan had all-time ranked offenses, whereas lebron never has - lebron's offenses rank lower, despite more offensive help

i know a local 7th grader.. he's a great leader, and his team has great teamwork.

but his team couldn't win in the NBA - not enough talent

same thing with jordan's bulls but on a different scale - his team had no talent.. he won 50 games with no help, based on good teamwork and his force of will on both ends..


not at all - the best basketball involves great teamwork and the best teams in history had high assist rankings

however, lebron can't play the best basketball or have an all-time team because he lowers teammates' assists and therefore the team's assists and teamwork

but keep acting like that's no big deal.. keep acting like it doesn't prevent his teams from being better and achieving more..

accept the realtiy - lebron reduces teamwork.. at what point is 3/8 not a function of random circumstance?...3/10? 3/11?.... maybe at 3/12 you'd think must be something else going on
.

Why the username 609 I wonder?

Is this your 609th forum account?

Keep preaching brother!

people from miami might know about 609

i have 1 active account on ish.. one inactive account on hoopshype.. a few dozen banned accounts here (about 1 post per account), and 5 or so banned accounts on realgm

so ish is the only site that i post on, other than this site, for now


no need - i've informed the lebron fans sufficiently

fidstar has sunk to fabricating quotes and weak trolling

and i have other lebron fans saying that teamwork doesn't matter lol

all because i showed that lebron reduces teamwork.. what a bunch of lames - if the stats showed that lebron was murdering people, they'd start arguing that murdering was okay

teamwork? why would anyone need that in basketball? (lebron fans looking at each other quizzically)
.

is lebron even better than kobe?

Again you take it to the next level. You basically use assists as being the only true indicator of great teamwork. I think teamwork is important but that isn't the only reason teams win. If that was the case we would have had a lot of different winners. Why couldn't the suns lead by Nash ever win it all? I'm going to guess because their d wasn't very good, again nothing to do with assist totals and the fact that their top end talent wasn't nearly as good as other teams again nothing to do with assists. Do assists matter? To an extent. When more than 50% of teams and 2 dynasties won without your stat being important, I'd reconsider your points. Do you think the warriors with Durant would be that much worse if their assists were lower? Could they not beat the cavs?

If you combine great talent and great teamwork, be it offensively or defensively your teams are going to be tough to beat. Again, most of your discussion ignores d all together. Personally I think d is what seperates the bulls/warriors/spurs from many of lesser great teams and high assist totals don't indicate anything really about team d. Likewise, all of these teams had years to mature together and weren't built inorganically so they could figure out things over time and experience and likely test things out while the inorganic teams have to figure things out quicker. I honestly don't think the heat would have struggled if wade was healthier/younger at the end of their tenure. The cavs are fine in most situations where the warriors especially with Durant don't exist.