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Next up is Duncan -- 2004 had enough nagging injuries/mobility decline that it was hard to compete with the prior seasons. I actually think 2001 was pretty close, although there's a jump in his passing beginning in 2002, and he did just generally look more in control on offense in those MVP seasons. 

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Duncan peak comp final.mp4

This is "Duncan peak comp final.mp4" by Ben Taylor on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

Comments

Anonymous

Imagine Duncan and Robinson running more pick and roll - that would have been terrifying to play against

Anonymous

Duncan’s impact metrics are crazy

Anonymous

It’s hard to agree with that conclusion on Duncan's scoring struggles against good defensive teams in the playoffs since those performances were heavily impacted by injuries. There were only 3 playoff series he played against -2.0 rDRtg or better defensive efficiency from 2001 to 2005; 2002 Lakers series, Robinson (#2 scoring option in that season) was injured for better part of the series and while Duncan was sharing minutes on O’Neal with Malik Rose, he still scored 29.0 ppg on .517 ts when the rest of the team scored 56.8 ppg on .474 ts. The 2nd and the 3rd series were in 2005 playoffs when he was recovering from an injury. The Nuggets series wasn’t a challenge for the Spurs. The finals series was against a goat level defensive team with goat level defensive frontcourt (Wallace*2, McDyess) and Duncan had to play against such defense with mobility issues. Those injuries should’ve been addressed because I don’t think the other players on that graph had such injury impacted series ratio. Their efficiency suffered on merit considerably more. --- Edit; I forgot about 2003 Nets being a very strong defense. Still, 3 out of 4 are not reliable examples for such approach.

Anonymous

No Nash, I was surprised

Ben Taylor

I'm not sure what you mean. (Also not clear on your last point on KG’s video.) 28 playoff games against good defenses: 23.5 / 75 @ 52.6% TS (+1.7%). 91 regular season games: 23.4 / 75 @ 52.9% (+2.3%) If you only use 01-03 (small sample) his drop-off looks LARGER, going from 60.1% TS vs the weak defenses to 54.1% vs the strong ones. And it’s the same pattern: 01-03 regular season was 23.2 / 54.4%. 01-03 Playoffs only (11g) was 24.6/53.1.% (vs 02LAL + 03NJN) Anything we do for one player we want to do for everyone else. If I were taking out games for one player, I’d take them out for everyone else. If I were using really small samples for everyone, I’d investigate for variance/outliers or try to use a larger sample. (This is why KG's PS number have more uncertainty and require falling back on regular season info.)

Anonymous

It's a bad batch of eggs. That's what I meant. I forgot about '03 Nets being better than -2.0 rDRtg. Curious about that extra 5 games, 1 series. I couldn't find that. '02 Lakers series 5 games (Robinson, the team's 2nd scoring option was injured) '03 Nets series 6 games (no major injury) '05 Nuggets series 5 games (Duncan was recovering from a sprained ankle and was having mobility issues) '05 Pistons series 7 games (The very same against a goat level defensive team) Only 1 series in 4 series & 6 games in 23 games were free of major injury impact. In '02 Lakers series, Duncan still posted 29.0 ppg 27.1 pp75 on .517 ts on a 85.8 ppg .487 ts team, also +6.4 obpm (+0.5 change from what he had against +2.0 or worse rDRtg teams in regular season). In '03 Nets series, he posted 24.2 ppg 22.5 pp75 on .546 ts on a 87.8 ppg .507 ts team, also +6.5 obpm (-0.5 change from what he had against +2.0 or worse rDRtg teams in regular season). In '05 Nuggets series, he posted 22.0 ppg 26.7 pp75 on .513 ts on a 100.4 ppg .545 ts team, also +3.2 obpm (-1.5 change from what he had against +2.0 or worse rDRtg teams in regular season). In '05 Pistons series, he posted 20.6 ppg 22.5 pp75 on .471 ts on a 84.9 ppg .518 ts team, also +3.7 obpm (-1.0 change from what he had against +2.0 or worse rDRtg teams in regular season). --- I don't know how's the situation for the others but this is just bad batch of eggs to look at. When he wasn't limited physically in '02 and '03, it was obvious that Duncan could match his performances against the weak defenses in regular season in the playoffs against the strong defenses. So, it is very hard to agree how he's below average just because he was recovering from an injury in half of 4 playoff series the Spurs played against strong defenses. I'm not sure the others had such questionable samples with injuries. I'm curious about that 5 extra playoff games though. --- I used BBRef BPM 2.0 for OBPM numbers. Also followed the usual per 100 formula then just reverted to per 75 with simple 0.75 weighting, your process might be different than this. Just an FYI.

Ben Taylor

So are you objecting to using a small sample to make a conclusion about Duncan's playoff scoring?

Anonymous

With playoffs, sample size is always small. What I'm objecting is your conclusion on Duncan's playoff scoring didn't look like you had factored in high variance coming from the injuries. Those injuries should've been addressed at least, even if there were no calculations for them. I think my point was very clear when I said this; "Those injuries should’ve been addressed because I don’t think the other players on that graph had such injury impacted series ratio. Their efficiency suffered on merit considerably more."

Ben Taylor

Ah, OK. I think I've figured out the confusion -- the graph includes regular season games too. (In Duncan's case, 119 games versus good defenses.) Thus the point that "the pattern doesn't change in the PS."

Anonymous

Yeah, regular season games seem like the missing component in my interpretation. --- I think I provided somewhat enough to say the pattern changed in the postseason because when Duncan geared up and played with higher motor in the playoffs, his performance against the good defenses in the playoffs (2002 Lakers & 2003 Nets series) were on par with his performances against the bad defenses in regular seasons when he wasn't physically limited. Though it's obvious that 2 series isn't exactly a big enough of a sample size. In Duncan's peak case though, it's 2 of 6 series he played in the playoffs in 2002 and 2003, not exactly bad. But I think it's time to call it on my part because I don't think I can add more. I mean I can add some more about Duncan's postseason track record but it would not be directly related to topic at hand, so, it'd just take some time up.

Anonymous

Hey Ben, I was wondering if there will a retrospective player profile series in the future with guys who had All-NBA/All-Star impact at their peak, but may be a bit under appreciated now. Guys like Jack Sikma, Sidney Moncrief, Mark Price, Kevin Johnson, Andrei Kirilenko, Chauncey Billups, etc.

Anonymous

It is incredible Duncan comes in the 1st of PIPM and AUPM even if many noises affect these metrics. I thought Lebron would come there, when I watched the episode of MJ.