Do we consider variance in eras’ draft strength enough?

[lessthanjake]

Jordan competing for MVPs at age 25 isn't abnormal. That's what happens with all time greats. Just like how you see some still in the running at age 31 even though both years are removed from the commonly accepted age 27/28 Apex.

I’m not saying it’s abnormal for a guy like Jordan (though please do see my post below this about the age of MVPs in that era). I’m saying that the analogy isn’t a good one because the stage of the player trajectories that the duos you compared were at was different. I think there’s better analogies to make, and I noted what those might be.

And I disagree about there not being other MVP level players when you had guys like Wade and CP3 putting up years that were arguably better than nearly any player ever at their position sans the GOAT PG and SG in Magic and Jordan. Those guys not competing for more speaks more to the quality of their organization contexts as opposed to how high quality they were as players, which is precisely what I mean by this method you're proposing being reductive and missing the forest from the trees.

Chris Paul really wasn’t even strongly competing for consideration as the 2nd best player in the league during those years, let alone competing for #1. I know he grades out well in RS impact data, but that data does seriously overstate his stature in the league in those years. That said, I did list him in my OP, largely in recognition of what we know now about his impact data. I personally think he’s borderline here, but I probably take a dimmer view of him than most people here, and I did include him in the OP in order to not bother going down a rabbit hole about it. As for Wade, he was an MVP-level player, and once again I listed him in my OP. But LeBron also spent most of his peak years playing with Wade, so that kind of took Wade out of the equation to a degree for a while (though obviously that happened because Wade agreed to take the secondary role between the two, and he did that in large part because LeBron was better). When the other MVP-level guys in an entire seven-draft-class span are just Dwyane Wade (who LeBron teamed up with) and Chris Paul, I think it is safe to say it was a time period that was weak in MVP-level talent. I’d say Shaq’s era was even weaker, though (basically just Shaq, and perhaps arguably Kidd and Payton).

In regards to Denver, that's just false. They've managed to develop a top tier coaching staff and have shown themselves to make adequate periphery moves as far back as the Melo and Iguodala iterations. And once again in the Jokic era being able to build a Finals level team by the time we got to the bubble (imo Denver was better than Miami despite the number of games it went to). Not only that but they were able to shrug off losing Grant and replace him with KCP and eventually Gordon.

Not to mention clear organizational superiority in terms of little things such as how the Nuggets have shown a consistent track record in tracking playcalling rates by their coaches and making a concerted effort in decking out their bench with high level assistants. Along with doing an excellent job rehabbing both Murray and Porter who have turned out to be critical pieces.

You’re glossing over so much here. The Nuggets as an organization managed to waste multiple absolute peak years of Jokic’s career by giving him genuinely laughable supporting casts filled with borderline NBA players. That is an absolutely massive deal that by itself completely vitiates any point you’re making. Of course, a big reason those teams were so bad is about injuries to Murray and Porter Jr., but (1) those teams were so laughably bad outside of that that they’d probably have wasted those years even without the injuries; (2) Porter Jr. having injuries is not some surprise factor, but rather is a completely foreseeable event that was baked into the pie when the organization drafted MPJ; and (3) Murray being injured is no one’s fault, but is a massive part of the organizational context for Jokic regardless. And that’s not even getting into the fact that, talking about the current team, you mention where they did well (getting KCP and Gordon) but ignore where they’ve really failed (for instance, getting a remotely serviceable backup center). Overall, considering what happened in 2021 and 2022, I think it’s just not even remotely defensible to suggest that Jokic has had favorable organizational circumstances.

Meanwhile we have Jokic's contemporaries like Embiid and Luka mired by organizational instability in Philly both on the drafting and coaching side, or Giannis who has had it a bit easier but still dealt with an embarrassing coaching carousel this year.

I think you’re confusing the causative effect here. Those other players you’ve mentioned have largely had instability as a consequence of failing to win in the playoffs (or to make the playoffs). Ironically, the silver lining to the Nuggets putting out absolutely laughable teams in 2021 and 2022 is that those teams losing did not create much of any instability, because the teams were so bad that no sane person would’ve ever expected them to do anything.

Anyways, ultimately, the best players generally have less instability, because winning breeds stability and losing breeds instability (at least when there’s expectations of success), and the best players are able to win more in those scenarios where success could be reasonably expected. You tend to take an approach that excuses a player’s lack of success as being caused by organizational instability. To some extent that can be true, but there’s a huge extent to which the causative effect goes in the other direction, and failing to recognize that will lead you to way over-excuse players.

[lessthanjake]

Okay so this bit of framing makes little sense.

Don't really see how this method of analysis would lead to any new conclusions considering guys like Jordan and LeBron were still going toe to toe with people like Magic and KD for MVPs who are supposed to be from different generations.

Jordan was mostly competing with Magic for MVPs in a time period where it was actually Magic’s generation that would be expected to be peaking, while Jordan was in his younger years (though I’d say that flipped by the end, or at the very least there was some peak-years overlap)...23-27

1. Lebron won 3 of his MVP's within the age-range you're calling "pre-peak" and a 4th in the season that started when he was 27.
2. Players typically win their MVP's in their mid-20's, not their late 20's/early 30's.

Magic winning MVPs in 89 and 90 (aged 29 and 30) is actually what's unusual here.  

In that era of the NBA, winning MVPs in your mid-20’s was not typical at all, and winning around ages 29 and 30 was actually the most common thing. In fact, in the entire 1980s and 1990s, Jordan was the only player to win an MVP at age 25 or below (and only Moses Malone won it at age 26), and the average age for MVPs in those decades was 29.4. The typical age of MVPs has skewed a lot lower in the last decade and a half. I’m not really sure exactly why this shift has occurred, but maybe it’s due to changing demands in terms of athleticism, or something like that. I don’t really know. In any event, it is definitely true that, when Jordan and Magic competed for MVPs, Magic was much more squarely in peak-MVP-winning years for the era than Jordan was, and that when LeBron and Durant competed for MVPs, LeBron was much more squarely in peak-MVP-winning years for the era than Durant was.

[AEnigma]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent in years leading up to the later 1990s.

[Heej]

Jordan competing for MVPs at age 25 isn't abnormal. That's what happens with all time greats. Just like how you see some still in the running at age 31 even though both years are removed from the commonly accepted age 27/28 Apex.

I’m not saying it’s abnormal for a guy like Jordan (though please do see my post below this about the age of MVPs in that era). I’m saying that the analogy isn’t a good one because the stage of the player trajectories that the duos you compared were at was different. I think there’s better analogies to make, and I noted what those might be.

And I disagree about there not being other MVP level players when you had guys like Wade and CP3 putting up years that were arguably better than nearly any player ever at their position sans the GOAT PG and SG in Magic and Jordan. Those guys not competing for more speaks more to the quality of their organization contexts as opposed to how high quality they were as players, which is precisely what I mean by this method you're proposing being reductive and missing the forest from the trees.

Chris Paul really wasn’t even strongly competing for consideration as the 2nd best player in the league during those years, let alone competing for #1. I know he grades out well in RS impact data, but that data does seriously overstate his stature in the league in those years. That said, I did list him in my OP, largely in recognition of what we know now about his impact data. I personally think he’s borderline here, but I probably take a dimmer view of him than most people here, and I did include him in the OP in order to not bother going down a rabbit hole about it. As for Wade, he was an MVP-level player, and once again I listed him in my OP. But LeBron also spent most of his peak years playing with Wade, so that kind of took Wade out of the equation to a degree for a while (though obviously that happened because Wade agreed to take the secondary role between the two, and he did that in large part because LeBron was better). When the other MVP-level guys in an entire seven-draft-class span are just Dwyane Wade (who LeBron teamed up with) and Chris Paul, I think it is safe to say it was a time period that was weak in MVP-level talent. I’d say Shaq’s era was even weaker, though (basically just Shaq, and perhaps arguably Kidd and Payton).

In regards to Denver, that's just false. They've managed to develop a top tier coaching staff and have shown themselves to make adequate periphery moves as far back as the Melo and Iguodala iterations. And once again in the Jokic era being able to build a Finals level team by the time we got to the bubble (imo Denver was better than Miami despite the number of games it went to). Not only that but they were able to shrug off losing Grant and replace him with KCP and eventually Gordon.

Not to mention clear organizational superiority in terms of little things such as how the Nuggets have shown a consistent track record in tracking playcalling rates by their coaches and making a concerted effort in decking out their bench with high level assistants. Along with doing an excellent job rehabbing both Murray and Porter who have turned out to be critical pieces.

You’re glossing over so much here. The Nuggets as an organization managed to waste multiple absolute peak years of Jokic’s career by giving him genuinely laughable supporting casts filled with borderline NBA players. That is an absolutely massive deal that by itself completely vitiates any point you’re making. Of course, a big reason those teams were so bad is about injuries to Murray and Porter Jr., but (1) those teams were so laughably bad outside of that that they’d probably have wasted those years even without the injuries; (2) Porter Jr. having injuries is not some surprise factor, but rather is a completely foreseeable event that was baked into the pie when the organization drafted MPJ; and (3) Murray being injured is no one’s fault, but is a massive part of the organizational context for Jokic regardless. And that’s not even getting into the fact that, talking about the current team, you mention where they did well (getting KCP and Gordon) but ignore where they’ve really failed (for instance, getting a remotely serviceable backup center). Overall, considering what happened in 2021 and 2022, I think it’s just not even remotely defensible to suggest that Jokic has had favorable organizational circumstances.

Meanwhile we have Jokic's contemporaries like Embiid and Luka mired by organizational instability in Philly both on the drafting and coaching side, or Giannis who has had it a bit easier but still dealt with an embarrassing coaching carousel this year.

I think you’re confusing the causative effect here. Those other players you’ve mentioned have largely had instability as a consequence of failing to win in the playoffs (or to make the playoffs). Ironically, the silver lining to the Nuggets putting out absolutely laughable teams in 2021 and 2022 is that those teams losing did not create much of any instability, because the teams were so bad that no sane person would’ve ever expected them to do anything.

Anyways, ultimately, the best players generally have less instability, because winning breeds stability and losing breeds instability (at least when there’s expectations of success), and the best players are able to win more in those scenarios where success could be reasonably expected. You tend to take an approach that excuses a player’s lack of success as being caused by organizational instability. To some extent that can be true, but there’s a huge extent to which the causative effect goes in the other direction, and failing to recognize that will lead you to way over-excuse players.

And I'm saying the analogy is ultimately meaningless because MVP shares are hugely affected by your team situation and in itself doesn't determine how good a player is any better than conventional methods. The fact that there weren't enough MVP level players to your liking from his adjacent draft classes doesn't change the fact that overall LeBron still had multiple generations of all time great talent and memorable teams to deal with in his prime. So I just don't see what hole you're trying to fill in here, and I find this whole line of inquiry even more reductive and pointless than other methods people use. Unless this is a roundabout way of trying to devalue his MVPs which is ultimately meaningless imo when trying to assess actual player goodness which is presumably the purpose of these discussions.

The Nuggets managed to adequately retool around Jokic despite injuries to major rotation players. The backup center gripe is miniscule in the grand scheme of what makes an organization competent and hardly anywhere near as destructive to Jokic's career as the guys who actually had years of their primes melted by actually terrible organizations.

And yeah sure, makes total sense to blame Philly's organizational instability on Embiid choking in the playoffs or failing to make it. After all who can forget Adam Silver uprooting the entire Hinkie brain trust and replacing them with the decrepit Colangelos who nuked the team's draft assets because Embiid choked .

When Embiid's teams suffered injuries they panicked and blew up (front office turnover, terrible trades, nonsensical personnel decisions). When Jokic's teams suffered injuries they simply doubled down on developing their players/coaching staff and retooling. That's the difference between an organization that among the class of the league and one run by a bunch of shmucks like Philly.

And no, none of this takes away from the fact that Jokic is simply a straight up better player than Embiid with more answers to on-court problems. However, it's pretty ignorant to think that just because Jokic is a great player that it somehow means his greatness rubs off on the high level decision makers.

We've seen all time greats with stable organizations and all time greats with unstable organizations. That statement does not track or make sense in the grand scheme of sports. Sometimes I think you people take the "LeGM" memes literally and assume players actually have the time or inclination to give frequent input on executive and player decisions

I don't use this to excuse players. I do this to quantify some of this eponymous "luck" that everyone talks about when they say how much luck it takes to win a championship. That s*** is not easy and even the greatest players of all time who may have been a step ahead of everyone else in their era still need enough fortune in terms of organizational context to win. And that's what gets lost in the sauce in a lot of these baseless and reductive thought exercises that don't actually accomplish anything as far as meaningfully moving basketball discussion forward.

[Heej]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent in the later 1990s.

Almost as if once you're a generational player within range of your general NBA prime, winning MVP is almost wholly dependent on how good your organizational context is vs other generational contenders that year and how well you take advantage of it. But hey let's throw critical thinking out the window and just say the other guys simply weren't all that good.

[AEnigma]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent leading up to the later 1990s.

Almost as if once you're a generational player within range of your general NBA prime, winning MVP is almost wholly dependent on how good your organizational context is vs other generational contenders that year and how well you take advantage of it. But hey let's throw critical thinking out the window and just say the other guys simply weren't all that good.

Yep, wrote this a few months ago:

Prior to 2021, every champion except two had multiple hall-of-famers on it: the 1977 Blazers and the 1994 Rockets. Now, tough for us to predict some of these more recent ones, but I think Marc Gasol and/or Kyle Lowry will make it for the 2019 Raptors, Jrue has a possible shot for the 2021 Bucks, and Jamal Murray could conceivably end up there for the 2023 Nuggets.

Every champion (2023 Nuggets pending) had an all-star that year and at least one other player who had been or would be an all-star within two years. On a similar note, every champion had at least three players who had been or would be an all-star at some point, and if I say within eight years, then that only cuts out the 1994/95 Rockets.

You are likely not winning titles without a hall-of-fame talent next to you. To Jokic’s credit, he may be doing that… but hard to look at how Murray plays and think he is not providing that level of value regardless of whether he receives recognition for it based on his regular season nonchalance.

[Heej]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent leading up to the later 1990s.

Almost as if once you're a generational player within range of your general NBA prime, winning MVP is almost wholly dependent on how good your organizational context is vs other generational contenders that year and how well you take advantage of it. But hey let's throw critical thinking out the window and just say the other guys simply weren't all that good.

Yep, wrote this a few months ago:

Prior to 2021, every champion except two had multiple hall-of-famers on it: the 1977 Blazers and the 1994 Rockets. Now, tough for us to predict some of these more recent ones, but I think Marc Gasol and/or Kyle Lowry will make it for the 2019 Raptors, Jrue has a possible shot for the 2021 Bucks, and Jamal Murray could conceivably end up there for the 2023 Nuggets.

Every champion (2023 Nuggets pending) had an all-star that year and at least one other player who had been or would be an all-star within two years. On a similar note, every champion had at least three players who had been or would be an all-star at some point, and if I say within eight years, then that only cuts out the 1994/95 Rockets.

You are likely not winning titles without a hall-of-fame talent next to you. To Jokic’s credit, he may be doing that… but hard to look at how Murray plays and think he is not providing that level of value regardless of whether he receives recognition for it based on his regular season nonchalance.

And just wanna add that over 80% (54/67) of NBA Championship teams all time had coaches who ended up or are likely on pace to make the Hall of Fame. Including both teams you listed without multiple HoF players.

[lessthanjake]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent in years leading up to the later 1990s.

This is just obscuring the fact that in the entire 1980s and 1990s (so no, not just starting in 1993), no one besides Jordan won the MVP at age 25 or below (and even Jordan only won it once at age 25 or below, while only Moses won it in his age 26 year). The age of MVP winners in general is pretty obviously a better gauge of when peak MVP years were in a timeframe than looking at the age of players when they *first* won MVP. Not to mention that that list only really includes a couple other players from Jordan’s era anyways (and they first won MVP at age 27). In the early decades of the NBA, the age of MVPs was lower (average of about 26.3 in the 1960s and 1970s). It then went up during the entirety of the 1980s and 1990s, before dipping down again after that (with the 2000s still skewing a bit older than the years after that). The 1980s and 1990s timeframe is a bit of an anomaly but it is a long enough timeframe that this wasn’t just a product of one young generation being weak in one era. The best players in the NBA for a long timeframe were consistently older than they generally are these days. I’m not sure the reason for that, but it happened. My guess is that this is caused by those being years where strength (an attribute that I believe peaks later) was relatively more important (compared to the importance of other physical attributes) than it was in other timeframes—which I think tracks with that timeframe having a slower pace than the prior eras, and having a bigger emphasis on things like crashing the offensive glass than later eras. But that’s just a guess that could be wrong, and there certainly might be other explanations. Regardless of the explanation, I think there was a definite shift for a couple decades or so there in what the peak NBA age was.

In any event, it seems you’re generally agreeing with the type of analysis I’ve done here, since you are asserting that the MVP winners in the late 1990s specifically were older in part because of “the paucity of young talent in years leading up to the later 1990s.” This is exactly the sort of thing I’m talking about—and indeed is one of the things I wrote about in my OP. So it’s good to see you agree that this can be a useful approach!

[lessthanjake]

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent leading up to the later 1990s.

Almost as if once you're a generational player within range of your general NBA prime, winning MVP is almost wholly dependent on how good your organizational context is vs other generational contenders that year and how well you take advantage of it. But hey let's throw critical thinking out the window and just say the other guys simply weren't all that good.

Yep, wrote this a few months ago:

Prior to 2021, every champion except two had multiple hall-of-famers on it: the 1977 Blazers and the 1994 Rockets. Now, tough for us to predict some of these more recent ones, but I think Marc Gasol and/or Kyle Lowry will make it for the 2019 Raptors, Jrue has a possible shot for the 2021 Bucks, and Jamal Murray could conceivably end up there for the 2023 Nuggets.

Every champion (2023 Nuggets pending) had an all-star that year and at least one other player who had been or would be an all-star within two years. On a similar note, every champion had at least three players who had been or would be an all-star at some point, and if I say within eight years, then that only cuts out the 1994/95 Rockets.

You are likely not winning titles without a hall-of-fame talent next to you. To Jokic’s credit, he may be doing that… but hard to look at how Murray plays and think he is not providing that level of value regardless of whether he receives recognition for it based on his regular season nonchalance.

This is way off topic, but don’t you think Jamal Murray would easily end up a hall-of-famer if the Nuggets win even just one more title? If you’re the consensus #2 player on multiple title teams, I think it’s pretty much a foregone conclusion that you’ll make the hall of fame.

[LukaTheGOAT]

Jordan competing for MVPs at age 25 isn't abnormal. That's what happens with all time greats. Just like how you see some still in the running at age 31 even though both years are removed from the commonly accepted age 27/28 Apex.

I’m not saying it’s abnormal for a guy like Jordan (though please do see my post below this about the age of MVPs in that era). I’m saying that the analogy isn’t a good one because the stage of the player trajectories that the duos you compared were at was different. I think there’s better analogies to make, and I noted what those might be.

And I disagree about there not being other MVP level players when you had guys like Wade and CP3 putting up years that were arguably better than nearly any player ever at their position sans the GOAT PG and SG in Magic and Jordan. Those guys not competing for more speaks more to the quality of their organization contexts as opposed to how high quality they were as players, which is precisely what I mean by this method you're proposing being reductive and missing the forest from the trees.

Chris Paul really wasn’t even strongly competing for consideration as the 2nd best player in the league during those years, let alone competing for #1. I know he grades out well in RS impact data, but that data does seriously overstate his stature in the league in those years. That said, I did list him in my OP, largely in recognition of what we know now about his impact data. I personally think he’s borderline here, but I probably take a dimmer view of him than most people here, and I did include him in the OP in order to not bother going down a rabbit hole about it. As for Wade, he was an MVP-level player, and once again I listed him in my OP. But LeBron also spent most of his peak years playing with Wade, so that kind of took Wade out of the equation to a degree for a while (though obviously that happened because Wade agreed to take the secondary role between the two, and he did that in large part because LeBron was better). When the other MVP-level guys in an entire seven-draft-class span are just Dwyane Wade (who LeBron teamed up with) and Chris Paul, I think it is safe to say it was a time period that was weak in MVP-level talent. I’d say Shaq’s era was even weaker, though (basically just Shaq, and perhaps arguably Kidd and Payton).

In regards to Denver, that's just false. They've managed to develop a top tier coaching staff and have shown themselves to make adequate periphery moves as far back as the Melo and Iguodala iterations. And once again in the Jokic era being able to build a Finals level team by the time we got to the bubble (imo Denver was better than Miami despite the number of games it went to). Not only that but they were able to shrug off losing Grant and replace him with KCP and eventually Gordon.

Not to mention clear organizational superiority in terms of little things such as how the Nuggets have shown a consistent track record in tracking playcalling rates by their coaches and making a concerted effort in decking out their bench with high level assistants. Along with doing an excellent job rehabbing both Murray and Porter who have turned out to be critical pieces.

You’re glossing over so much here. The Nuggets as an organization managed to waste multiple absolute peak years of Jokic’s career by giving him genuinely laughable supporting casts filled with borderline NBA players. That is an absolutely massive deal that by itself completely vitiates any point you’re making. Of course, a big reason those teams were so bad is about injuries to Murray and Porter Jr., but (1) those teams were so laughably bad outside of that that they’d probably have wasted those years even without the injuries; (2) Porter Jr. having injuries is not some surprise factor, but rather is a completely foreseeable event that was baked into the pie when the organization drafted MPJ; and (3) Murray being injured is no one’s fault, but is a massive part of the organizational context for Jokic regardless. And that’s not even getting into the fact that, talking about the current team, you mention where they did well (getting KCP and Gordon) but ignore where they’ve really failed (for instance, getting a remotely serviceable backup center). Overall, considering what happened in 2021 and 2022, I think it’s just not even remotely defensible to suggest that Jokic has had favorable organizational circumstances.

Meanwhile we have Jokic's contemporaries like Embiid and Luka mired by organizational instability in Philly both on the drafting and coaching side, or Giannis who has had it a bit easier but still dealt with an embarrassing coaching carousel this year.

I think you’re confusing the causative effect here. Those other players you’ve mentioned have largely had instability as a consequence of failing to win in the playoffs (or to make the playoffs). Ironically, the silver lining to the Nuggets putting out absolutely laughable teams in 2021 and 2022 is that those teams losing did not create much of any instability, because the teams were so bad that no sane person would’ve ever expected them to do anything.

Anyways, ultimately, the best players generally have less instability, because winning breeds stability and losing breeds instability (at least when there’s expectations of success), and the best players are able to win more in those scenarios where success could be reasonably expected. You tend to take an approach that excuses a player’s lack of success as being caused by organizational instability. To some extent that can be true, but there’s a huge extent to which the causative effect goes in the other direction, and failing to recognize that will lead you to way over-excuse players.

On what basis does that data overstate his impact? The very same metrics that you and I laud, have Paul grading out well over several years?

[lessthanjake]

Jordan competing for MVPs at age 25 isn't abnormal. That's what happens with all time greats. Just like how you see some still in the running at age 31 even though both years are removed from the commonly accepted age 27/28 Apex.

I’m not saying it’s abnormal for a guy like Jordan (though please do see my post below this about the age of MVPs in that era). I’m saying that the analogy isn’t a good one because the stage of the player trajectories that the duos you compared were at was different. I think there’s better analogies to make, and I noted what those might be.

And I disagree about there not being other MVP level players when you had guys like Wade and CP3 putting up years that were arguably better than nearly any player ever at their position sans the GOAT PG and SG in Magic and Jordan. Those guys not competing for more speaks more to the quality of their organization contexts as opposed to how high quality they were as players, which is precisely what I mean by this method you're proposing being reductive and missing the forest from the trees.

Chris Paul really wasn’t even strongly competing for consideration as the 2nd best player in the league during those years, let alone competing for #1. I know he grades out well in RS impact data, but that data does seriously overstate his stature in the league in those years. That said, I did list him in my OP, largely in recognition of what we know now about his impact data. I personally think he’s borderline here, but I probably take a dimmer view of him than most people here, and I did include him in the OP in order to not bother going down a rabbit hole about it. As for Wade, he was an MVP-level player, and once again I listed him in my OP. But LeBron also spent most of his peak years playing with Wade, so that kind of took Wade out of the equation to a degree for a while (though obviously that happened because Wade agreed to take the secondary role between the two, and he did that in large part because LeBron was better). When the other MVP-level guys in an entire seven-draft-class span are just Dwyane Wade (who LeBron teamed up with) and Chris Paul, I think it is safe to say it was a time period that was weak in MVP-level talent. I’d say Shaq’s era was even weaker, though (basically just Shaq, and perhaps arguably Kidd and Payton).

In regards to Denver, that's just false. They've managed to develop a top tier coaching staff and have shown themselves to make adequate periphery moves as far back as the Melo and Iguodala iterations. And once again in the Jokic era being able to build a Finals level team by the time we got to the bubble (imo Denver was better than Miami despite the number of games it went to). Not only that but they were able to shrug off losing Grant and replace him with KCP and eventually Gordon.

Not to mention clear organizational superiority in terms of little things such as how the Nuggets have shown a consistent track record in tracking playcalling rates by their coaches and making a concerted effort in decking out their bench with high level assistants. Along with doing an excellent job rehabbing both Murray and Porter who have turned out to be critical pieces.

You’re glossing over so much here. The Nuggets as an organization managed to waste multiple absolute peak years of Jokic’s career by giving him genuinely laughable supporting casts filled with borderline NBA players. That is an absolutely massive deal that by itself completely vitiates any point you’re making. Of course, a big reason those teams were so bad is about injuries to Murray and Porter Jr., but (1) those teams were so laughably bad outside of that that they’d probably have wasted those years even without the injuries; (2) Porter Jr. having injuries is not some surprise factor, but rather is a completely foreseeable event that was baked into the pie when the organization drafted MPJ; and (3) Murray being injured is no one’s fault, but is a massive part of the organizational context for Jokic regardless. And that’s not even getting into the fact that, talking about the current team, you mention where they did well (getting KCP and Gordon) but ignore where they’ve really failed (for instance, getting a remotely serviceable backup center). Overall, considering what happened in 2021 and 2022, I think it’s just not even remotely defensible to suggest that Jokic has had favorable organizational circumstances.

Meanwhile we have Jokic's contemporaries like Embiid and Luka mired by organizational instability in Philly both on the drafting and coaching side, or Giannis who has had it a bit easier but still dealt with an embarrassing coaching carousel this year.

I think you’re confusing the causative effect here. Those other players you’ve mentioned have largely had instability as a consequence of failing to win in the playoffs (or to make the playoffs). Ironically, the silver lining to the Nuggets putting out absolutely laughable teams in 2021 and 2022 is that those teams losing did not create much of any instability, because the teams were so bad that no sane person would’ve ever expected them to do anything.

Anyways, ultimately, the best players generally have less instability, because winning breeds stability and losing breeds instability (at least when there’s expectations of success), and the best players are able to win more in those scenarios where success could be reasonably expected. You tend to take an approach that excuses a player’s lack of success as being caused by organizational instability. To some extent that can be true, but there’s a huge extent to which the causative effect goes in the other direction, and failing to recognize that will lead you to way over-excuse players.

On what basis does that data overstate his impact? The very same metrics that you and I laud, have Paul grading out well over several years?

Read what I said again. I said it overstated his “stature” in the league not overstated his “impact.” (And I note that I very frequently say that impact metrics are inherently flawed and don’t tell us the whole story). Again, though, I listed him in the OP, so there’s little reason to go down a rabbit hole on this.

[LukaTheGOAT]

I’m not saying it’s abnormal for a guy like Jordan (though please do see my post below this about the age of MVPs in that era). I’m saying that the analogy isn’t a good one because the stage of the player trajectories that the duos you compared were at was different. I think there’s better analogies to make, and I noted what those might be.



Chris Paul really wasn’t even strongly competing for consideration as the 2nd best player in the league during those years, let alone competing for #1. I know he grades out well in RS impact data, but that data does seriously overstate his stature in the league in those years. That said, I did list him in my OP, largely in recognition of what we know now about his impact data. I personally think he’s borderline here, but I probably take a dimmer view of him than most people here, and I did include him in the OP in order to not bother going down a rabbit hole about it. As for Wade, he was an MVP-level player, and once again I listed him in my OP. But LeBron also spent most of his peak years playing with Wade, so that kind of took Wade out of the equation to a degree for a while (though obviously that happened because Wade agreed to take the secondary role between the two, and he did that in large part because LeBron was better). When the other MVP-level guys in an entire seven-draft-class span are just Dwyane Wade (who LeBron teamed up with) and Chris Paul, I think it is safe to say it was a time period that was weak in MVP-level talent. I’d say Shaq’s era was even weaker, though (basically just Shaq, and perhaps arguably Kidd and Payton).



You’re glossing over so much here. The Nuggets as an organization managed to waste multiple absolute peak years of Jokic’s career by giving him genuinely laughable supporting casts filled with borderline NBA players. That is an absolutely massive deal that by itself completely vitiates any point you’re making. Of course, a big reason those teams were so bad is about injuries to Murray and Porter Jr., but (1) those teams were so laughably bad outside of that that they’d probably have wasted those years even without the injuries; (2) Porter Jr. having injuries is not some surprise factor, but rather is a completely foreseeable event that was baked into the pie when the organization drafted MPJ; and (3) Murray being injured is no one’s fault, but is a massive part of the organizational context for Jokic regardless. And that’s not even getting into the fact that, talking about the current team, you mention where they did well (getting KCP and Gordon) but ignore where they’ve really failed (for instance, getting a remotely serviceable backup center). Overall, considering what happened in 2021 and 2022, I think it’s just not even remotely defensible to suggest that Jokic has had favorable organizational circumstances.



I think you’re confusing the causative effect here. Those other players you’ve mentioned have largely had instability as a consequence of failing to win in the playoffs (or to make the playoffs). Ironically, the silver lining to the Nuggets putting out absolutely laughable teams in 2021 and 2022 is that those teams losing did not create much of any instability, because the teams were so bad that no sane person would’ve ever expected them to do anything.

Anyways, ultimately, the best players generally have less instability, because winning breeds stability and losing breeds instability (at least when there’s expectations of success), and the best players are able to win more in those scenarios where success could be reasonably expected. You tend to take an approach that excuses a player’s lack of success as being caused by organizational instability. To some extent that can be true, but there’s a huge extent to which the causative effect goes in the other direction, and failing to recognize that will lead you to way over-excuse players.

On what basis does that data overstate his impact? The very same metrics that you and I laud, have Paul grading out well over several years?

Read what I said again. I said it overstated his “stature” in the league not overstated his “impact.” (And I note that I very frequently say that impact metrics are inherently flawed and don’t tell us the whole story). Again, though, I listed him in the OP, so there’s little reason to go down a rabbit hole on this.

You then go onto say he's borderline, so you do opine on his value. But okay, nevermind.

[OhayoKD]

Okay so this bit of framing makes little sense.

Jordan was mostly competing with Magic for MVPs in a time period where it was actually Magic’s generation that would be expected to be peaking, while Jordan was in his younger years (though I’d say that flipped by the end, or at the very least there was some peak-years overlap)...23-27

1. Lebron won 3 of his MVP's within the age-range you're calling "pre-peak" and a 4th in the season that started when he was 27.
2. Players typically win their MVP's in their mid-20's, not their late 20's/early 30's.

Magic winning MVPs in 89 and 90 (aged 29 and 30) is actually what's unusual here.  

In that era of the NBA, winning MVPs in your mid-20’s was not typical at all, and winning around ages 29 and 30 was actually the most common thing.

So the thing that was common younger at pretty much every point before and after this era (which incidentally also an outlier in terms of average age of the league and 1-time all-stars) becomes common at an older age and this...speaks to strong draft classes hurting Jordan?

Yeah, I don't really see a reason to use a smaller sample here to establish a normative standard in a conversation specifically centered on the effect of absolute strength. Jordan "fought for MVP's" with Magic when he was in "peak winning MVP age" and Magic was slightly past it. To whatever degree you want to put weight on this, Magic is the one doing unusual things, especially in 1990 when he wins an MVP at 30 against Jordan at 27. By historic trends, 1988 to 1991 would be when we expect Jordan to start ripping them off like Lebron, Russell(4 in 5 both), and Kareem did(3 in 4, 4 in 6, 5 in 7), all of whom got started at 24 or younger just like Jordan.

I’m not really sure exactly why this shift has occurred, but maybe it’s due to changing demands in terms of athleticism, or something like that.

If it's the "changing demands in athleticism", then why were earlier periods seeing MVPs win younger:

Spoiler:

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent leading up to the later 1990s.

Jordan was at the age you are supposed to win MVP's and Magic was past it(significantly so by the end) and they ended up going 2-2. You can make whatever extrapolations from that you want, but it doesn't make much sense to present early Jordan as the norm bucker.

[lessthanjake]

Okay so this bit of framing makes little sense.


1. Lebron won 3 of his MVP's within the age-range you're calling "pre-peak" and a 4th in the season that started when he was 27.
2. Players typically win their MVP's in their mid-20's, not their late 20's/early 30's.

Magic winning MVPs in 89 and 90 (aged 29 and 30) is actually what's unusual here.  

In that era of the NBA, winning MVPs in your mid-20’s was not typical at all, and winning around ages 29 and 30 was actually the most common thing.

So the thing that was common younger at pretty much every point before and after this era (which incidentally also an outlier in terms of average age of the league and 1-time all-stars) becomes common at an older age and this...speaks to strong draft classes hurting Jordan?

Yeah, I don't really see a reason to use a smaller sample here to establish a normative standard in a conversation specifically centered on the effect of absolute strength. Jordan "fought for MVP's" with Magic when he was in "peak winning MVP age" and Magic was slightly past it. To whatever degree you want to put weight on this, Magic is the one doing unusual things, especially in 1990 when he wins an MVP at 30 against Jordan at 27. By historic trends, 1988 to 1991 would be when we expect Jordan to start ripping them off like Lebron, Russell(4 in 5 both), and Kareem did(3 in 4, 4 in 6, 5 in 7), all of whom got started at 24 or younger just like Jordan.

I’m not really sure exactly why this shift has occurred, but maybe it’s due to changing demands in terms of athleticism, or something like that.

If it's the "changing demands in athleticism", then why were earlier periods seeing MVPs win younger:

Spoiler:

First-time MVPs by year:
Pettit — 23
Cousy — 28
Russell — 24
Wilt — 23
Oscar — 25
Unseld — 23
Reed — 27
Kareem — 24
Cowens — 24
Erving — ABA MVPs at 24-26, then 31 in NBA
McAdoo — 24
Walton — 25
Moses — 24
Bird — 27
Magic — 27
Jordan —25

Not really seeing a meaningful shift, no. Then starting 1993 we get a stretch of first-timers at 30, 31, 29, 33, and 28 before it dips back down to normal (with Nash an outlier), reflecting what we all have known and recognised about the paucity of young talent leading up to the later 1990s.

Jordan was at the age you are supposed to win MVP's and Magic was past it(significantly so by the end) and they ended up going 2-2. You can make whatever extrapolations from that you want, but it doesn't make much sense to present early Jordan as the norm bucker.

I’ll generally repeat similar stuff to what I said to AEnigma earlier. I think we have enough info to say there’s a meaningful difference in the eras on this. There was a very marked shift that lasted for a long time. My guess is that it has to do with changing relative importance of different physical traits. As we all know, the way the game is played in the NBA has wildly changed by era, with things like the pace of the game changing a ton over time (particularly going down a lot from the first couple decades), the physicality that was allowed changing over time, the focus on things like crashing the offensive glass declining after the 1980s and 1990s, changes in use of spacing, etc. With changing styles of play will naturally come different relative importance of various physical traits. And people peak in different physical traits at different ages. It seems perfectly reasonable to think that, as the way the game is played changes and different physical traits become more or less important in relative terms, the age that players generally peak can also change. And I think that’s what we saw in the 1980s and 1990s. My guess is that this is with strength having relatively more importance in that timeframe than other timeframes (as earlier timeframes had sky high pace, and later timeframes focused more on spacing and less on crashing the glass). I’m not sure that that’s exactly right, and I’m sure there’s more to it than just that, but to act like we must think every era of a vastly-changing game had the same general peak age despite clear evidence to the contrary just seems wrong to me. The reality is that Jordan and Magic competed for MVPs smack in the middle of a lengthy time period in which MVPs were typically won by people of Magic’s age and not Jordan’s age. If you want to see that and somehow conclude that “Jordan was at the age you are supposed to win MVP's and Magic was past it,” then I suppose that’s your prerogative.