Would you really tank?

[mmmmm]

The point I'm trying to make here is, again, look at all the teams that have picked a top-5 pick during the last 30 years.    That's 150 picks.   

Now, how many times has being one of the teams that was bad enough to earn one of those picks directly helped that team (participation or trade) to a title within some reasonable time-frame (say, within 10 years)?

The point you're making is that getting a top 5 pick is not a sufficient condition for winning a title, or even getting a really good player. 

Still, it's a bit of a weak point, I'd say, because there are 30 teams in the league, and only one team wins a title in any given season.  So obviously the number of teams that fall short over any given era, and given any particular type of roster construction strategy, is going to far outnumber the teams that manage to win a title.


Personally I look at it more the way that IP does -- make a list of the very best teams in the league at any given time and ask yourself how those teams acquired their best 3-5 players.  Far more often than not, a top 5-10 lottery pick plays a major role in acquiring top talent.

I'm willing to believe that ... but do you have any numbers that actually support that contention?

I would define 'plays a major role' as either "played for" or "was traded for someone who played for" the team that (a) earned a top pick and (b) went on to win a title within a reasonable time frame.

From what I have looked at, I don't think that pattern has happened as often as you are suggesting.

[mmmmm]

Between 1991 and 2010 there have been 100 players drafted in the top five in the NBA draft.  Of those 100 players, only Tim Duncan, Dwayne Wade, and Darko Milicic have won a title with the teams that drafted them.

If the goal is to re-build a champion, I don't know why everyone is so fired up about a strategy that has yielded a 2.0001% success rate over the course of the last twenty years as the only way to get it done.

Extremely misleading.   I think all 10 titles from the 1990's had a top 5 pick.  Most of those titles just had players(Jordan/Pippen) and Hakeem selected in the top 5 in the 1980's.

This just shows that the dividends from tanking can last over a decade.

It's an argument for tanking and not against.

You are misunderstanding the point.  The point isn't that teams don't need top 5 lottery talent.  The evidence is overwhelming that top-5 lottery talent is a key component of title teams.

The point though, is that being a team that picks high in the draft is not well correlated with winning a title.

All but a tiny, tiny handful of players picked in the 'top 5' that have eventually won a title have done so on teams _other_ than the one that earned that draft spot.    And when you discount Darko (who contributed zilch) and Kidd (who came back a decade later) there are only a couple of teams that have benefited towards winning a title due to earning a top-5 draft pick by losing.

This is evidence that more title teams were able to win titles without having been so bad that they 'earn' a top-5 pick.

except that you disregard basically the entire 1990's in which every single team that won a title was led by at least 1 player that they drafted in the top 5 of the draft.  The 2000's were a bit sparser in that regard, but there have been 4 champions in the 2010's, the Lakers - no, the Mavericks - yes (though Kidd is a bit convoluted), and the Heat twice - yes.  This year the favorites to win are the Thunder with 2 top 5 picks at the top, the Heat (with Wade), the Spurs (with Duncan), and the Pacers (no top 5 picks they drafted).  If you include the Clippers (who have a better record than the Heat), then you add another team that fits the category with Griffin.

Saying "every single team" is a nice, convenient way of waiving your hands over two player picks:  Jordan and Olajuwan, both of whom were picked prior to the modern weighted lottery system.

The point I'm trying to make here is, again, look at all the teams that have picked a top-5 pick during the last 30 years.    That's 150 picks.   

Now, how many times has being one of the teams that was bad enough to earn one of those picks directly helped that team (participation or trade) to a title within some reasonable time-frame (say, within 10 years)?

You don't get to count the Jordan pick 6 times in that tally.

And, again, my point is not that I won't be happy as a clam to get a top-3 pick.  Given where we are right now, I want the most talented player we can get.

My point is, it won't bother me at all if we end up with #10.  Or go on a small win streak and end up with #14.    In the long run, it (where we pick in this draft) is not likely to be the critical factor on how we get back to a title.

Even Jordan did not win a title until he was in his 7th season.   Olajuwan, not until his 10th.

Of course you get to count the 6 Bulls titles.  The 5 Lakers titles.  The 4 Spurs titles.  The 3 Heat finals.  etc.  If you don't count every title then you skew the numbers even more.  There is 1 champion a year.  Period.  Only one team gets that honor every year.  So starting out you are already at no better than 20%, now you are saying instead of 23 titles since 90-91, it is really only 8 that work (since the Bulls 6=1, the Lakers 5=1, etc.).  It really is a nonsensical argument.

No.  You still are not understanding.

The point is about the fate of a team picking in the top-5.   You are counting team titles.  Two totally different things.

There have been 150 such picks in the last 30 years.   How many of those _picks_ contributed directly to winning a title for the _team_ that earned that pick (by losing).

I'm counting picks here.  Not titles.   Jordan's 6 titles all stem from one pick.

While he was winning his 6 titles, other teams picked 30 players in the top 5 of 6 drafts.  How many of those teams have since won a title (as a result of one of those picks)?

[D.o.s.]

You guys are still missing the point:

[it] wasn't an oversight.  Rather, it was a case of [them]not fitting into the category I was looking for.

Very cute.  I just presented some facts.  Folks are choosing to interpret those facts in the ways that they see fit. 

That's cool.  But, the facts that I presented are, indeed, facts.

Well, actually, what you're doing is presenting some 'facts' that are utterly devoid of context and then saying "well that's not actually what I'm talking about" when people are applying context to what you're saying.

Before 2008, using your logic, you could've said "all but four United States Presidents have been at least 47 years and 351 days old. I don't know why people believe Obama is going to win when he doesn't fit that mold."

That 'fact' relates to the 2008 presidential race exactly as much as your 'fact' relates to the role of a top 5 pick in building an NBA championship team.

That's not what I'm doing at all.  My facts were presented as a counter-argument to those who were saying that we "can't possibly rebuild" without getting a top five draft pick.

I'm not saying a top five pick couldn't be extremely useful to rebuilding a contender, I'm only saying it's not an absolute necessity.

I'm sorry you misunderstood my point.

No one was saying that a top-5 pick was an absolute necessity, though. Just that most teams that have successfully won NBA championships have used a top-5 pick to do it.

So, you know, good job, gold star.

[Celtics18]

You guys are still missing the point:

[it] wasn't an oversight.  Rather, it was a case of [them]not fitting into the category I was looking for.

Very cute.  I just presented some facts.  Folks are choosing to interpret those facts in the ways that they see fit. 

That's cool.  But, the facts that I presented are, indeed, facts.

Well, actually, what you're doing is presenting some 'facts' that are utterly devoid of context and then saying "well that's not actually what I'm talking about" when people are applying context to what you're saying.

Before 2008, using your logic, you could've said "all but four United States Presidents have been at least 47 years and 351 days old. I don't know why people believe Obama is going to win when he doesn't fit that mold."

That 'fact' relates to the 2008 presidential race exactly as much as your 'fact' relates to the role of a top 5 pick in building an NBA championship team.

That's not what I'm doing at all.  My facts were presented as a counter-argument to those who were saying that we "can't possibly rebuild" without getting a top five draft pick.

I'm not saying a top five pick couldn't be extremely useful to rebuilding a contender, I'm only saying it's not an absolute necessity.

I'm sorry you misunderstood my point.

No one was saying that a top-5 pick was an absolute necessity, though. Just that most teams that have successfully won NBA championships have used a top-5 pick to do it.

So, you know, good job, gold star.

If nobody was saying that, then I take it all back. 

I have to add, though--at the risk of your ceaseless, snarky condescension--that pretty much all teams end up with a top five pick at some point.  As a matter of fact, the bad teams end up with them much more often than the good teams. 

Having a top five pick, then, is kind of a useless criteria to pick as the primary point of causation for building a championship contender. 

I may as well say that teams with a point guard, a shooting guard, a small forward, a power forward, and a center are the teams that end up winning championships.  It is therefore imperative that we have those positions filled on our roster. 

[D.o.s.]

You also have to score more points than the other team to win. Let's not forget that.

[SHAQATTACK]

Would I tank



In a NEW YORK second.


For best chance possible to land Parker ......

To do less is criminal

[PhoSita]

I'm willing to believe that ... but do you have any numbers that actually support that contention?

I would define 'plays a major role' as either "played for" or "was traded for someone who played for" the team that (a) earned a top pick and (b) went on to win a title within a reasonable time frame.

From what I have looked at, I don't think that pattern has happened as often as you are suggesting.

I'm interested in the idea of undertaking a larger "case study" as far as this goes, but for now let's just take a look at a snapshot of the league this season.


Here are the top 10 teams in the league by record at the moment:


2014:

1. San Antonio
(Duncan - drafted #1, Leonard - draft-trade #15, Parker - drafted #28)

2. Indiana
(George - drafted #10, West - FA, Hibbert - drafted #17)

3. OKC
(Durant - drafted #2, Ibaka - drafted #24, Westbrook - drafted #4)

4. Miami (LeBron - FA, Bosh - FA, Wade - drafted #5)

5. LAC
(Griffin - drafted #1, Jordan - drafted #35, Paul - trade)

6. Houston
(Harden - trade, Howard - FA, Parsons - drafted 38th)

7. Portland
(Lillard - drafted #6, Aldridge - trade-draft #2, Matthews - FA)

8. Golden State
(Curry - drafted #7, Lee - FA, Bogut - trade)

9. Memphis
(Conley - drafted #4, Randolph - trade, Gasol - trade)

10. Dallas
(Nowitzki - drafted #9, Calderon - FA, Ellis - FA)


Sometime in the next few days, I'll make a post that goes a little bit more in depth into how these teams were built, and also look at the top 10 teams from the past couple of decades.  I think this group is probably pretty representative.  There are some exceptions, but pretty much every team is relying on at least one player they took in the top 5-10 of the draft.


Note:

Why look at the top 10?  History tells us that one of these teams is likely to win the title this season.  Generally speaking, the team that wins a title finishes with a top 5-10 record.  We could also look at top 5 in offensive and defensive efficiency, because those tend to be pretty good indicators of which teams are truly elite and have a shot to go deep in the playoffs.  For my purposes, overall record is good enough to give us an informative sample of the "top tier" of teams.

[indeedproceed]

If I had the time, I think the best thing to do would look at teams who hit a top-5 pick based on at least a lottery-bound record, but who had achieved some sort of threshold for success within the previous 3 years of the top-5 pick. Then , measure their success following that pick, whether by the picks actual play, or the play of the assets gained by trading the pick.

[D.o.s.]

If I had the time, I think the best thing to do would look at teams who hit a top-5 pick based on at least a lottery-bound record, but who had achieved some sort of threshold for success within the previous 3 years of the top-5 pick. Then , measure their success following that pick, whether by the picks actual play, or the play of the assets gained by trading the pick.

I.e. the transformation from the 02-03 Celtics to the  06-07 Celtics to the  07-08 Celtics.

[PhoSita]

If I had the time, I think the best thing to do would look at teams who hit a top-5 pick based on at least a lottery-bound record, but who had achieved some sort of threshold for success within the previous 3 years of the top-5 pick. Then , measure their success following that pick, whether by the picks actual play, or the play of the assets gained by trading the pick.

I don't know how useful a sample size you could make with such specific parameters, though.

[indeedproceed]

If I had the time, I think the best thing to do would look at teams who hit a top-5 pick based on at least a lottery-bound record, but who had achieved some sort of threshold for success within the previous 3 years of the top-5 pick. Then , measure their success following that pick, whether by the picks actual play, or the play of the assets gained by trading the pick.

I don't know how useful a sample size you could make with such specific parameters, though.

The Thunder, Spurs, celtics, come to mind in recent(ish) memory. But yes, it likely wouldn't stand up to the t-test.

[Celtics18]

I'm willing to believe that ... but do you have any numbers that actually support that contention?

I would define 'plays a major role' as either "played for" or "was traded for someone who played for" the team that (a) earned a top pick and (b) went on to win a title within a reasonable time frame.

From what I have looked at, I don't think that pattern has happened as often as you are suggesting.

I'm interested in the idea of undertaking a larger "case study" as far as this goes, but for now let's just take a look at a snapshot of the league this season.


Here are the top 10 teams in the league by record at the moment:


2014:

1. San Antonio
(Duncan - drafted #1, Leonard - draft-trade #15, Parker - drafted #28)

2. Indiana
(George - drafted #10, West - FA, Hibbert - drafted #17)

3. OKC
(Durant - drafted #2, Ibaka - drafted #24, Westbrook - drafted #4)

4. Miami (LeBron - FA, Bosh - FA, Wade - drafted #5)

5. LAC
(Griffin - drafted #1, Jordan - drafted #35, Paul - trade)

6. Houston
(Harden - trade, Howard - FA, Parsons - drafted 38th)

7. Portland
(Lillard - drafted #6, Aldridge - trade-draft #2, Matthews - FA)

8. Golden State
(Curry - drafted #7, Lee - FA, Bogut - trade)

9. Memphis
(Conley - drafted #4, Randolph - trade, Gasol - trade)

10. Dallas
(Nowitzki - drafted #9, Calderon - FA, Ellis - FA)


Sometime in the next few days, I'll make a post that goes a little bit more in depth into how these teams were built, and also look at the top 10 teams from the past couple of decades.  I think this group is probably pretty representative.  There are some exceptions, but pretty much every team is relying on at least one player they took in the top 5-10 of the draft.


Note:

Why look at the top 10?  History tells us that one of these teams is likely to win the title this season.  Generally speaking, the team that wins a title finishes with a top 5-10 record.  We could also look at top 5 in offensive and defensive efficiency, because those tend to be pretty good indicators of which teams are truly elite and have a shot to go deep in the playoffs.  For my purposes, overall record is good enough to give us an informative sample of the "top tier" of teams.

You'd be hard pressed to find any team in the league that hasn't had at least one top ten draft pick in the last decade and a half. 

This renders your example kind of moot.  If all teams have landed in the top ten in the draft at least once in the last decade and a half, saying that the reason that the top teams are elite is because they have players that they've drafted in the top ten represents some fairly faulty logic. 

[indeedproceed]

This renders your example kind of moot.  If all teams have landed in the top ten in the draft at least once in the last decade and a half, saying that the reason that the top teams are elite is because they have players that they've drafted in the top ten represents some fairly faulty logic.

I think you're falling victim to the same sort of extremist phrasing (which I'm sure was unintentional) that you were arguing against earlier in the thread.

He's not saying that getting a top-anything pick was 'the reason', he's been saying from the beginning that it is part of the reason, and if you look at his examples, all the top-10 picks he listed were/are critical pieces of the teams' current success.

He's not saying they weren't lucky to pick 'the right team', and he's not saying they're he only reason for the teams success, but he is saying they're an extremely valuable piece to the teams current success, one they wouldn't have had if they'd picked outside the lottery.

[D.o.s.]

snarky snark snark

[mmmmm]

I'm willing to believe that ... but do you have any numbers that actually support that contention?

I would define 'plays a major role' as either "played for" or "was traded for someone who played for" the team that (a) earned a top pick and (b) went on to win a title within a reasonable time frame.

From what I have looked at, I don't think that pattern has happened as often as you are suggesting.

I'm interested in the idea of undertaking a larger "case study" as far as this goes, but for now let's just take a look at a snapshot of the league this season.


Here are the top 10 teams in the league by record at the moment:


2014:

1. San Antonio
(Duncan - drafted #1, Leonard - draft-trade #15, Parker - drafted #28)

2. Indiana
(George - drafted #10, West - FA, Hibbert - drafted #17)

3. OKC
(Durant - drafted #2, Ibaka - drafted #24, Westbrook - drafted #4)

4. Miami (LeBron - FA, Bosh - FA, Wade - drafted #5)

5. LAC
(Griffin - drafted #1, Jordan - drafted #35, Paul - trade)

6. Houston
(Harden - trade, Howard - FA, Parsons - drafted 38th)

7. Portland
(Lillard - drafted #6, Aldridge - trade-draft #2, Matthews - FA)

8. Golden State
(Curry - drafted #7, Lee - FA, Bogut - trade)

9. Memphis
(Conley - drafted #4, Randolph - trade, Gasol - trade)

10. Dallas
(Nowitzki - drafted #9, Calderon - FA, Ellis - FA)


Sometime in the next few days, I'll make a post that goes a little bit more in depth into how these teams were built, and also look at the top 10 teams from the past couple of decades.  I think this group is probably pretty representative.  There are some exceptions, but pretty much every team is relying on at least one player they took in the top 5-10 of the draft.


Note:

Why look at the top 10?  History tells us that one of these teams is likely to win the title this season.  Generally speaking, the team that wins a title finishes with a top 5-10 record.  We could also look at top 5 in offensive and defensive efficiency, because those tend to be pretty good indicators of which teams are truly elite and have a shot to go deep in the playoffs.  For my purposes, overall record is good enough to give us an informative sample of the "top tier" of teams.

You'd be hard pressed to find any team in the league that hasn't had at least one top ten draft pick in the last decade and a half. 

This renders your example kind of moot.  If all teams have landed in the top ten in the draft at least once in the last decade and a half, saying that the reason that the top teams are elite is because they have players that they've drafted in the top ten represents some fairly faulty logic.

Yeah, and the above isn't really addressing the query that I proposed.

You need to, as IndeedProceed also stated, look at how teams that "earned" a top-5 pick then went on to perform in subsequent years.  My threshold was winning a title within 10 years.  A more forgiving threshold might be to make the Conference Finals within 8, or whatever.   I would also impose the requirement that the particular draft pick actually _contributed_.  That would rule out Darko and Beasely (because neither contributed in any way or form to the subsequent titles their teams achieved), but would include say, the Jeff Green pick (traded for Ray).

The measurable you are looking for is:  What % of the 150 such picks in the last 30 seasons met that threshold?

EDIT:  Darko would further be disqualified because his pick was traded to Detroit.  Detroit didn't earn it by being bad.