If Isaiah Thomas Isn't Worth The Max Or Near Max ($25-30M/Year)...

[Tr1boy]

Oops, double post.

You need a sugar break. No worries 

[PhoSita]

Just some food for thought:

League average value of an NBA Win Share (http://www.brewhoop.com/2016/8/8/12354486/value-in-the-nba-whats-the-value-of-a-win)  in 2015-16 was about $1.9M.

Isaiah accrued 9.7 WS last year, meaning he was worth roughly $18.4M in dollar value to the league last year.  He was paid $6.9M.

Based on this year's BRI/salary numbers, a Win Share should be worth ~$2.7M.

So far this year, Isaiah has already accrued 9.3 WS and is on pace to post a ~14 WS season.  That would make his dollar value to the league at somewhere around $37.8M!  He is getting paid $6.5M.

Obviously, Win Shares are not a perfect measure of a player's actual value.   These are just back-of-the-envelope estimates of value.   But it should give you a sense of just how massively underpaid IT4 is right now compared to the value he is bringing to this franchise.

Measuring it this way is persuasive, but it doesn't even fully capture the value.

How many players had 9+ WS last year?  20.  Of those 20, 6 were point guards.

There are roster spots for 450 players in the league.  That means accruing 9+ WS puts you in the top 4% of players.


Producing at the level he did last year, Isaiah was already a rare talent.  Hard to replace.  At the level he's producing this year, he's at the absolute top of the league.  Only 7 players produced 12 or more WS last season.


The bottom line here is not how much a team has to pay for a Win Share on average; rather, the point is that it's very very difficult to find that level of production in one player.

[mmmmm]

Iverson dropped off a cliff between age 32 and 33 and age 34 was his last year in the league.

sure, but Iverson also admitted he didnt lift weights leading me to believe he didnt take too much care of his body. Combine that with the practice rant and its not too much of a stretch to suggest AI could have played a lot longer if hed been smarter with his preparation.

Thomas is a brick and he is already trying to follow a Tom-Brady type regimen, maximizing sleep etc etc in the interest of longevity.

Nate Robinson, barely played after 30 despite being a career 36% shooter from three.  Calvin Murphy managed to play till 34, but was a role player his last few seasons.

Smaller players tend to have a shorter prime and larger fall than bigger players because when they lose the speed and athleticism they have no other real way to get a shot off and because they are so short they can't defend well, can't rebound well, etc. so they can't make up for the loss of athleticism and speed in other ways.

Do you have any statistics that actually support that assertion?

At some point last year, I took a look at players who played at least one 1000 minute season past their rookie contract (meaning they were legitimate NBA players) and divided them into under 6' and 6'+ and compared the percentages that posted different seasonal WS accruals past age 30 and past age 33.

I found no real difference and if anything, the smaller players did slightly better at retaining value into their 30s.

The numbers for the under-6' sample were, of course, very constrained, as there are literally only 20 players in the entire basketball-reference.com database under 6' that played a season past the age of 30 with enough minutes to qualify for the leaderboards.

But as a percentage of all under-6' players who played at all into a second contract, those 20 represented a slightly higher percentage than for larger players.

The percentage of over-30 'small' players that posted WS seasons of 5+ was also slightly better than that for players over 6'.

I would assert that big players don't necessarily age any better than small players.   They carry more weight on their joints and lower-body joints (knees, hips & ankles) are a significant point of failure in age-related declines.

[PhoSita]

Iverson dropped off a cliff between age 32 and 33 and age 34 was his last year in the league.

How many years could he have played if he'd played with today's rules, with today's spacing, with a quality outside shot?

You also have to address the role that Iverson's attitude played in the end of his career.  If he'd been more of a leader and team player, would he have stuck around longer?

[Tr1boy]

Until IT4 proves his worth in the playoffs,  no pt of prematurely saying he is a max max /30 M 5 year deal player

[PhoSita]

I think it's an absurd debate. To me, he's obviously going to get the max, and he's earned it.

It is not a debate about whether he is worth a max contract, it is whether he is worth it to the Celtics. That is a valid argument.

It is even easier to argue for re-signing him because of his value to the Celts.  They have nobody that can hope to replace his production in the role he occupies in the offense.

This is not like, say, the Trailblazers, who can hand the keys to CJ McCollum if Lillard is injured.  Isaiah is the only player on the Celts who can come close to filling the role he plays in the offense.

The Celtics have demonstrated an ability to get by without Isaiah, mostly because they turn into a much more defensively oriented team, but without him over a long sample they would probably be a .500ish team, without the firepower to have any hope of going farther than the first round.

[Phantom255x]

IT literally brought Boston back on the map.

After the PP34 and KG trade.. no one really cared about Boston for a while.

Now with IT there is a ton of excitement and buzz.

You let him go and what is that telling the league?

Plus it's not like someone is already there or coming in to replace his 30 PPG production.

Please don't tell me that Fultz or Ball will come in and drop 30 PPG in their first few seasons..

Horford and Crowder are only here because of IT (Crowder said he wouldn't have re-signed if the C's planned to continue tanking, and with IT there, they weren't).

[Chris22]

Until IT4 proves his worth in the playoffs,  no pt of prematurely saying he is a max max /30 M 5 year deal player

Exactly.
Cleveland shut him down completely in the playoffs last year.

[Phantom255x]

Until IT4 proves his worth in the playoffs,  no pt of prematurely saying he is a max max /30 M 5 year deal player

Exactly.
Cleveland shut him down completely in the playoffs last year.

Obviously.

How is IT supposed to do his thing if we never played CLE last year in the playoffs? 

And last year against Atlanta, he did average 24.0 PPG (more than his season averages too). Not his fault Bradley was injured and Crowder played hurt. Literally no one stepped up. Imagine Lebron averaging 35 PPG in the playoffs but Irving and Love are ice cold or hurt (ex. 2015 Finals - Warriors won the Finals)

[Ilikesports17]

Until IT4 proves his worth in the playoffs,  no pt of prematurely saying he is a max max /30 M 5 year deal player

Exactly.
Cleveland shut him down completely in the playoffs last year.

Obviously.

How is IT supposed to do his thing if we never played CLE last year in the playoffs? 

And last year against Atlanta, he did average 24.0 PPG (more than his season averages too). Not his fault Bradley was injured and Crowder played hurt. Literally no one stepped up. Imagine Lebron averaging 35 PPG in the playoffs but Irving and Love are ice cold or hurt (ex. 2015 Finals - Warriors won the Finals)

2 years ago, Isaiah was a good 6th man averaging 19/5 on 41/35/86 shooting.
Now Isaiah is an MVP candidate averaging 30/6 on 47/39/91 shooting. He is a different player on a different team.

[PhoSita]

Please don't tell me that Fultz or Ball will come in and drop 30 PPG in their first few seasons..

Exactly.

If the Celts draft Fultz, he will be age 19 for his rookie season.  Ball would be age 20.

That means that at the start of Isaiah's next contract, Fultz will be 20, and Ball will be 21.  Either one would be just turning 25-26 years old when Isaiah is in his mid-30s and getting ready to retire or be relegated to a bench role.

Point guards tend to take a while to develop.  Just look at Smart.  Fultz and Ball, talented as they are, both look very raw to me.  Fultz will be a project on defense.  Ball will take time to adjust to NBA defenders.

There's no reason to think the Celts couldn't draft their future franchise point guard in June -- assuming Fultz and Ball are the real deal -- and then re-sign Isaiah next summer.  What's wrong with having Isaiah lead the way for another six or seven seasons and then turning the reigns over to Fultz or Ball when he's done?  What's wrong with 12-15 years of elite point guard play?

[Moranis]

Iverson dropped off a cliff between age 32 and 33 and age 34 was his last year in the league.

sure, but Iverson also admitted he didnt lift weights leading me to believe he didnt take too much care of his body. Combine that with the practice rant and its not too much of a stretch to suggest AI could have played a lot longer if hed been smarter with his preparation.

Thomas is a brick and he is already trying to follow a Tom-Brady type regimen, maximizing sleep etc etc in the interest of longevity.

Nate Robinson, barely played after 30 despite being a career 36% shooter from three.  Calvin Murphy managed to play till 34, but was a role player his last few seasons.

Smaller players tend to have a shorter prime and larger fall than bigger players because when they lose the speed and athleticism they have no other real way to get a shot off and because they are so short they can't defend well, can't rebound well, etc. so they can't make up for the loss of athleticism and speed in other ways.

You know Nate Robinson couldn't hold a candle to IT, right?  Players get worse as they get older.  Nate was starting from a threshold of sometimes useful bench player.  His peak year by advanced stats were either at age 24 (18.9 PER, 5.9 win shares, 2.6 BPM, 2.6 VORP) or 28 (18.0, 5.9, 1.7, 1.9).  In between those two years he had a major dip in production, such that his age 28 year looks like a bit of an aberration, and then he reverted to prior form and fell out of the league.

IT, meanwhile, has seen a steady growth through his career (PERs of 17.6, 17.5, 20.5, 20.6, 21.5, and 27.5) from age 22-27.  Furthermore, his worst years were near that of Robinson's best years.  Early on his career it looked like they might be similar players, but at about age 25 their careee arcs took very different paths.  Robinson entered his decline phase at 25.  Thomas is in his age 27 season (having just turned 28), and is still ascending.  Even if this is the best it gets for IT (and it may be), there is nothing in his career path that says he's likely to quickly decline.  He's not Nate Robinson.  He stoped being Nate about 4 years ago.

Calvin Murphy, meanwhile, had a much steadier career.  His production was relatively constant until about age 30, tailed off for a couple of years, and then had a year of productivity spike at 32.  If IT were to follow this career arc, you'd absolutely sign up for a max deal.  Mirroring Murphy, but at his higher performance baseline, he'd have 2-3 more all-star campaigns in him, a dip to being still a productive starter, and then one last hurrah of stardom probably in the final year of his deal.  Again, the point is that IT is starting from a significantly higher performance threshold than either Murphy or Robinson (or 99% of NBA players).  Whereas Murphy's dip took him to decent starter or good bench player, he started from a level of very good starter.  IT is at MVP-level.  A commensurate drop mirroring Murphy brings him to very good starter in a couple of years.

Barring an ACL tear (which takes out players of all sizes, and contributed to Robinson's departure from the league, but was far from the sole cause) or Achilles (again, it can get anyone), there's no reason to believe Thomas will not have a typical career arc of most players who reach his current elite level of performance around age 26-28. He'll get a bit worse over the life of the contract, but odds are he'll still be well worth it.

I mentioned Iverson first and then followed it up with Robinson and Murphy.  Iverson had a pretty fast and big decline.  I would be surprised if Thomas was an all star at even 32 [i.e. the 2nd year of a new contract).  I would expect starter level at that age but not mich more.  You don't give that expected production a 5 year max deal. It will kill the team.  3 year max if Boston is a contender is fine even with some expected decline but you can't go more than that

[Moranis]

Please don't tell me that Fultz or Ball will come in and drop 30 PPG in their first few seasons..

Exactly.

If the Celts draft Fultz, he will be age 19 for his rookie season.  Ball would be age 20.

That means that at the start of Isaiah's next contract, Fultz will be 20, and Ball will be 21.  Either one would be just turning 25-26 years old when Isaiah is in his mid-30s and getting ready to retire or be relegated to a bench role.

Point guards tend to take a while to develop.  Just look at Smart.  Fultz and Ball, talented as they are, both look very raw to me.  Fultz will be a project on defense.  Ball will take time to adjust to NBA defenders.

There's no reason to think the Celts couldn't draft their future franchise point guard in June -- assuming Fultz and Ball are the real deal -- and then re-sign Isaiah next summer.  What's wrong with having Isaiah lead the way for another six or seven seasons and then turning the reigns over to Fultz or Ball when he's done?  What's wrong with 12-15 years of elite point guard play?

in order for the young guy to reach his potential he has to play as many minutes as he can.  Sure a season or two you can curb minutes but you can't do it for years and years and expect the player to grow.  Look at Smart and Brown and how much better they look without Bradley taking a ton of minutes and that is just a couple of weeks.  Young players need to play