Official End of Season Awards Thread

[scott]

Interesting and too bad. Would've loved for him to saddle the Thunder and force out other guys.

OKC kind of got bailed out by Williams not qualifying for his SuperMax on top of getting Chet to sign an extension without the escalator. 10% of the cap saved right there.

 

[BankShot21]

As a voter would it matter at all if someone played 65 games or 82? Or if you've qualified you've qualified so it's all equal

 

[Quentin_Compson]

As a voter would it matter at all if someone played 65 games or 82? Or if you've qualified you've qualified so it's all equal

I think it definitely SHOULD matter, yes. Availabilty is a very important aspect when talking about RS awards because there are just so (too) many fucking games. For example, Wemby is playing just under 30 minutes a game this season - that means there is more than a third of each game that he has zero influence on.

By the way, on a podcast I listened to recently someone was making a case for Wemby as MIP - they said that the jump from all-star caliber player to top three player in the league was the most impressive improvement this season. Wemby certainly won't win MIP, but it's an interesting take nonetheless.

 

[Raven_]

Word salad. You brought up top5 DRTG on the team, I did not. You didn't specify whose DTRG you used. As illustrated, DTRG is not calculated the same across the board. You did it saying Steph is in no way deserving, only fan delusion, and used DTRG to back that up. I'm not saying he's deserving, I'm providing an example of DTRG and objective regard of player performance, ie season awards.

Bruce Bowen never finished higher than 10th on the Spurs in DRTG, 10th twice, 13th in most years. Finished 17th of 17th on the team while being voted as the 2nd best defender in the league and 1st team All-D. Objectively, he was widely regarded as a Top5 defender while finishing 17th on his own team in the stat you used.
Please explain the clash? Was Bruce Bowen a top100 defender in the league? By that metric is was far, far outside of the top100 every single season. Top 10? Did all of the All-D teams and 3 straight top2 DPOY finishes clash with the stat or does the stat not mean what you think it means? Or am I miss understanding your convoluted point? Are you just trolling?

He is historically regarded as one of the best perimeter defenders of all-time and was contemporaneously regarded as such. He was never rated (by DTRG) as a top 5 player on his own team, never rated in the top 9, despite being objectively awarded as a top10 defender in the league for 8 straight yrs.
Is it my analysis that's wrong along with consensus at the time and historically, maybe do you have it wrong, or am I missing your point?

you still don't get it.

 

[Spurminator]

As a voter would it matter at all if someone played 65 games or 82? Or if you've qualified you've qualified so it's all equal

I see it as a tie-breaker between two candidates that otherwise seem to have the same per-game impact.

 

[scott]

As a voter would it matter at all if someone played 65 games or 82? Or if you've qualified you've qualified so it's all equal

Great question. Honestly at this point it wouldn't matter to me anymore because all of the top players are load managed to the 65-70 game range anyway.

If there was an instance where Player played 65 games and Player B played 82... I'd have to look at what that meant for the team. If Player A was 56-9 in the games he played and the team was 7-10 in the other games... that might work in Player A's favor. But if they held the same winning % without the player... it would hurt his candidacy, IMO.

 

[spurs3223]

Great question. Honestly at this point it wouldn't matter to me anymore because all of the top players are load managed to the 65-70 game range anyway.

If there was an instance where Player played 65 games and Player B played 82... I'd have to look at what that meant for the team. If Player A was 56-9 in the games he played and the team was 7-10 in the other games... that might work in Player A's favor. But if they held the same winning % without the player... it would hurt his candidacy, IMO.

I mostly agree with where you are coming from re: record w/o player -- it provides a bit of evidence of more impact. But while it may provide some evidence, it's not really comparing apples to apples here, because on very good teams oftentimes the games players rest for are the ones the team already feels they can win without em. And the whole 'the best ability is availability' thing still hits home with me and playing more games should grant players a fairly substantial boost, all other things being equal.

I was thinking just now whether the 'availability' factor could be baked into the voting process. Like if you get a #1 vote playing 82 games it is worth slightly more points than getting a #1 vote playing 70 games, and substantially more than playing 55 games.

 

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

It would be awesome if Wemby gets DPOY and KJ is 6th Man. Both of those should happen.

My guess is that Wemby will be 3rd in the MVP vote. SGA, Joker, Wemby, Doncic. And I think that's ok. Let Wemby use that as playoff fuel.

 

[Ed Helicopter Jones]

Castle should make one of the All-NBA teams (all defensive teams at a minimum), and Harper should be all-Rookie first team.

 

[spurraider21]

we will get plenty of respresentation this year

Wemby - DPOY, All-NBA First Team, All-Defense First Team
Keldon - 6MOTY
Castle - All-Defense Second Team
Harper - All-Rookie First Team

Wemby will also be among the MVP Finalists and Mitch among Coach of the Year Finalists

 

[scott]

I mostly agree with where you are coming from re: record w/o player -- it provides a bit of evidence of more impact. But while it may provide some evidence, it's not really comparing apples to apples here, because on very good teams oftentimes the games players rest for are the ones the team already feels they can win without em. And the whole 'the best ability is availability' thing still hits home with me and playing more games should grant players a fairly substantial boost, all other things being equal.

I was thinking just now whether the 'availability' factor could be baked into the voting process. Like if you get a #1 vote playing 82 games it is worth slightly more points than getting a #1 vote playing 70 games, and substantially more than playing 55 games.

I think it ultimately all comes down to this vague notion of "what does most valuable mean"

If we mean, literally who is the most valuable player in the NBA right now in terms of how much a team would give up to get him... obviously it's Wemby.

If we mean, how valuable is he to his specific team versus not having him... I think this year I'd give the nod to Jokic (and that's why I think he should be the MVP this year) but only just barely ahead of SGA and Wemby, and I think Luka is a distant 4th.

If we mean, who is having a historic season that needs recognition, I could see great cases for Jokic and Wemby.

If we mean, the best player on the best team (which is what most voters go with because they are lazy)... then it's SGA.

I'm trying to think of where the games played thing would come into play, probably mostly for the 3rd and 4th option I guess?

 

[spurraider21]

I think it ultimately all comes down to this vague notion of "what does most valuable mean"

If we mean, literally who is the most valuable player in the NBA right now in terms of how much a team would give up to get him... obviously it's Wemby.

If we mean, how valuable is he to his specific team versus not having him... I think this year I'd give the nod to Jokic (and that's why I think he should be the MVP this year) but only just barely ahead of SGA and Wemby, and I think Luka is a distant 4th.

If we mean, who is having a historic season that needs recognition, I could see great cases for Jokic and Wemby.

If we mean, the best player on the best team (which is what most voters go with because they are lazy)... then it's SGA.

I'm trying to think of where the games played thing would come into play, probably mostly for the 3rd and 4th option I guess?

on game theory podcast they made some very compelling points for FTA other than the lazy "best player on team with best record" stuff. he's played close to 1000 minutes this year with neither J-Dub nor Chet on the floor. he's done more of a carry job than people give credit for, and his crunchtime play this year has been pretty otherworldly.

he's also just extremely consistent, something we all loved Duncan for. Wemby got that way since March, but early parts of the year, there were games he seemed checked out, or just unable to get into any rhythm offensively. never really the case with Shai. and for large stretches of the season, and especially in 4th quarters, OKC's entire offensive strategy was to give the ball to Shai and let him make something happen, which he did time and time again

while they acknowledged wemby's per minute impact was the best, FTA played about 400 more minutes, which based on wemby's averages would effectively be playing 13 additional games, which is not an insignificant amount of time within an 82 game season

if pre-ASB wemby played at the same level as post ASB wemby, it would be a different conversation imo

 

[scott]

on game theory podcast they made some very compelling points for FTA other than the lazy "best player on team with best record" stuff. he's played close to 1000 minutes this year with neither J-Dub nor Chet on the floor. he's done more of a carry job than people give credit for, and his crunchtime play this year has been pretty otherworldly.

he's also just extremely consistent, something we all loved Duncan for. Wemby got that way since March, but early parts of the year, there were games he seemed checked out, or just unable to get into any rhythm offensively. never really the case with Shai. and for large stretches of the season, and especially in 4th quarters, OKC's entire offensive strategy was to give the ball to Shai and let him make something happen, which he did time and time again

while they acknowledged wemby's per minute impact was the best, FTA played about 400 more minutes, which based on wemby's averages would effectively be playing 13 additional games, which is not an insignificant amount of time within an 82 game season

if pre-ASB wemby played at the same level as post ASB wemby, it would be a different conversation imo

Yeah, I wasn't meaning to disparage SGA with how I ranked guys... my opinion of MVP (who is the most valuable to their specific team) would have him second just a smidge above Wemby, behind Jokic, and I wouldn't scoff at another SGA MVP at all. I think what hurts Wemby more than anything else is that he is not nearly as consistent as those other two guys, like you point out. His highs are just as high as anyone... but he did have some lows that those other guys really didn't.

Joker gets the nod for me because I think Denver misses the play-in without him. Whereas this currently constructed Spurs team, assuming they had Kornet and a real backup to him, still makes the play-in at least. And I think OKC would definitely still be a playoff team, even with Williams and Chet missing time.

In the end, I will be very pleased with Wemby in third place in the MVP vote, and I'm sure some of the completely sane people on this website will take that finish with pride.

 

[spurraider21]

yeah i agree if we just look to "which player's team would be the worst without them" its Jokic as you said

i also know that historically, with few exceptions, we tend to have some of the "best player/best team" built into the discussion. i think it would just be inconsistent to completely toss that part of the equation given the history of the award. its also why many people were saying wemby's only shot at MVP would be overtaking OKC as the top seed

its silly, yes, but it is part of the award's unofficial criteria

 

[scott]

yeah i agree if we just look to "which player's team would be the worst without them" its Jokic as you said

i also know that historically, with few exceptions, we tend to have some of the "best player/best team" built into the discussion. i think it would just be inconsistent to completely toss that part of the equation given the history of the award. its also why many people were saying wemby's only shot at MVP would be overtaking OKC as the top seed

its silly, yes, but it is part of the award's unofficial criteria

I think some of the "best player on the best team" kind of gets inherently baked into the "which team would be the worst without them", because it's only the best teams that have room to fall if you consider how they would be without their best player. Miami could theoretically be horrible without Bam... but going from a 43 win team to a theoretical 25 win team would mostly just have people shrugging their shoulders.

Interesting, this line of thinking does put Tatum's value to BOS in question while simultaneously making you think Haliburton must be one of the most valuable players in the league?

 

[spurraider21]

I think some of the "best player on the best team" kind of gets inherently baked into the "which team would be the worst without them", because it's only the best teams that have room to fall if you consider how they would be without their best player. Miami could theoretically be horrible without Bam... but going from a 43 win team to a theoretical 25 win team would mostly just have people shrugging their shoulders.

Interesting, this line of thinking does put Tatum's value to BOS in question while simultaneously making you think Haliburton must be one of the most valuable players in the league?

its why tatum is not winning mvp anytime soon. same reason nobody won on the warriors when they had KD

 

[John B]

Wemby is the most impactful player since Curry changed the game to small ball. Only few players have done that in the history, changing how the game is played. Shaq forced teams to go big, Curry connecting from the logo had teams going small to catchup, scrambling for defense. Wemby has the same impact, and on both sides of the court! Wemby is the most impactful player, the most valuable player, and they are winning having the 2nd best record in the league. Wemby should win the MVP.

I’m okay with Jokic winning, because he averages triple-double on a winning team, in contrast to when Westbrook was just stat padding on a terrible team. SGA turns me off, with his overly foul baiting, and the refs whistle happy makes it worse.

Wait, this should be in the Unpopular Opinion thread

 

[Raven_]

I think it ultimately all comes down to this vague notion of "what does most valuable mean"

If we mean, literally who is the most valuable player in the NBA right now in terms of how much a team would give up to get him... obviously it's Wemby.

If we mean, how valuable is he to his specific team versus not having him... I think this year I'd give the nod to Jokic (and that's why I think he should be the MVP this year) but only just barely ahead of SGA and Wemby, and I think Luka is a distant 4th.

If we mean, who is having a historic season that needs recognition, I could see great cases for Jokic and Wemby.

If we mean, the best player on the best team (which is what most voters go with because they are lazy)... then it's SGA.

I'm trying to think of where the games played thing would come into play, probably mostly for the 3rd and 4th option I guess?

It means nothing, you give it to who you consider the best player in the league.

 

[O_V]

Great question. Honestly at this point it wouldn't matter to me anymore because all of the top players are load managed to the 65-70 game range anyway.

If there was an instance where Player played 65 games and Player B played 82... I'd have to look at what that meant for the team. If Player A was 56-9 in the games he played and the team was 7-10 in the other games... that might work in Player A's favor. But if they held the same winning % without the player... it would hurt his candidacy, IMO.

Yeah that's a good use for it. The downside of that logic is that it's what got Steve Nash one of his undeserved MVPs. He was out for a couple of games and the team shit the bed because D'Antoni ran a six or seven man rotation that relied heavily on him and voters twisted that to mean he was more valuable than actual MVP candidates.

 

[O_V]

It means nothing, you give it to who you consider the best player in the league.

Yeah, basically everything else is just how they rationalize their choice.

 

[Fireball]

As a voter would it matter at all if someone played 65 games or 82? Or if you've qualified you've qualified so it's all equal

of course. if you cant make a case otherwise, the one with more games should get the nod

 

[Fabbs]

FWIW this season without.
12-6 Spurs w/o Wemby
11-6 Nuggets w/o Jokic

Obviously a bunch of factors would figure in the W/Ls,

For me Wemby is the biggest difference maker in the with / without catagorie.
Jokic a very close 2nd.
Talk the hand if you're going to try to tell me Jokers record vs Wemby. Farking 4 point play by dipstick Fox or Wemby walks off with a W and Nuggets go to 4th seed. (Well Spurs walk off. Same result in record.)

 

[spurraider21]

Luka and Cade won their grievances. Ant didn’t

 

[inagra]

Both get on first team

 

[Raven_]

this charade proved what i've been saying about the 65 game rule, but it will still influence the politics so they will give it to shai if nothing else, just because of the precedent.. joke.