Big takeaway for me: Players don't change *that* much in the playoffs, but enough that two similar regular-season players can clearly separate if they go in opposite directions in the postseason. I'll get into overall level of performance in future videos...
I'd like to know where does Wilt Chamberlain ranks here. He has bad reputation in terms of playoffs production which (I don't agree with that). Also, Kareem?
Marcin Klempka doesn’t exactly answer your question, but he wrote on his website that Wilt’s team’s offense decline the most of any all-time great in the playoffs and his teams defenses improve the most of any all-timer
The only qualm I have with your rating system is that some matchups are just very exploitable for certain teams. I'm not sure if measuring an opposing team just by their regular season DRtg is enough. For example, some of the Lakers of the early 00s turned up their defense in the playoffs and they were a completely different animal. I'm not sure how you'd assess this in a stat, but I just don't know if the way you currently are adjusting efficiency numbers is completely valid. But thanks so much for all these videos, I'm truly an avid fan of this channel so keep up the awesome work!
The ending graphic makes it seem as though mostly Old 80-90s players saw the most improvement in the post szn and newer players have taken the biggest hit -- Kobe/Bron/Shaq/Duncan able to maintain a steady level performance of play between regular and post szns
I'm curious, your adjusted stats account for overall performances, meaning injuries damage the value of this stat for a player. If you take the injury time away, where does steph rank? ( meaning, game time only adjusted value) (BTW your the best basketball channel on youtube for me, by far the most quality content i've seen - keep up the good work!)
@@Rockets2024Champs Maybe, but it seems like as the talent pool around the world increases, so does the competition. We likely won't see another dominance to Wilt's 50pt scoring in the 60's. Or Kareem's 20 year scoring starting in the 70's. Magic and Birds super teams in the 80s. Or MJ's bulls in the 90s. By the 2000s there was no one true dominant player as you had Kobe and LeBron's talents, as well as Timmy and Shaq, Dirk and Garnett. It just became too competitive with generational talents at every position, across the league.
If Ben (the maker of this video) saw ur comment, he would be very disappointed. While yeah he improved in the postseason he was still not better than most of the players mentioned in the video because he was way less impressive than the others in the regular season. Plus his scoring and efficiency are the things that increased notably and there are much more to the game than just that (the maker of the video would tell u the same) www.backpicks.com/2018/01/18/backpicks-goat-29-reggie-miller/ here is a full analysis of reggie's career if u aren't interested. And the make of this analysis, yes u guessed it, the make of this video
@The Green Pill Mindset u are right everyone has his own preferences, and yeah I think Reggie is a great player but I don't think he is a top-30 player all time (especially if we are talking about all-timers peaks) and I totally disagree with u that scoring and clutchness are the most important things to define a great player and that nothing comes close, because I think defence and creation are as important (think of Nash and Bill Russell who clearly had a better career's than reggie). As for the maker of this video, yeah obviously he's not a god but I think his perspective is valuable because he actually studied those players games and career's (Reggie in this case) and he provides everything he says with evidence.
@The Green Pill Mindset "Scoring and being clutch in the playoffs are the very things that define a great player." According to you. And it's honestly not a very objective set of criteria.
Isaac In a conversation on who’s the better post-season performer “Scoring and being clutch in the playoffs is what determines a great player.” Meaning this statement here is extremely essential when determining who’s better playoff performer than who. And nobody gives a single care about the regular season. Players and fans don’t even take the regular season as seriously as much anymore. Most players play at their absolute best when it comes to playoffs time.
Not surprised about Jordan, at all. One interesting stat that I like to mention about Jordan was that when his team had home court advantage, his teams went 24-0 in the playoffs. When his opponent had home court advantage, his teams went 6-7. If you use home court as a (weak) indicator of choking vs. upping your game, Jordan's teams never choked, and pulling off nearly as many upsets as losses you were expected to take is pretty impressive in itself.
I think that with with Harden it doesn't help that the Rockets' obsession with "efficient" scoring and three pointers makes their offense incredibly predictable, and I feel that lots of NBA defenses are going to scout you over the course of a seven games series if you play every possession basically the same way.
The same rockets system is what puts him on the " one of the greatest scorers ever " list to begin with . Imagine players like Lebron , Durant , Jordan , Kobe in the same system .
That's what happens when a GM does nothing but look at and analyze advanced stat sheets in order to construct a roster. Stats are a tool to be used, but not to be used by.
Yet the Rockets could have won in 2018 against the Warriors if CP wasn't injured (just a what if, and that series was honestly close). I'm not a fan of heliocentric offensive approaches, but basically, unless your team has five awesome defenders, Harden (and CP) is likely to cook against the relatively inferior defender. It's the ultimate "we are coming at you and stop us if you can" approach, and they don't care about predictability if they believe even the Dubs can't stop them.
Great video! Reinforces why Reggie Miller is a Hall of Famer and my favorite player of all-time. He would always flip the switch once the playoffs started. And he did it against great teams with Hall of Famers of their own.
Every time I learn a new fact about Jordan I'm even more impressed and dumbfounded. I don't think there is any other athlete in which the eye test, narrative, and stats all reinforce each other so perfectly. He looks like the greatest player ever, he looks like the greatest playoff performer and clutch performer ever, he's considered by most to be the greatest player ever, and then both his regular stats and advanced stats just back it up. That man is just simply the GOAT and I about anyone in my lifetime will come along and take away that mantle from him. It's absurd.
What even is the eye test. Because I always see people talk about it but I don’t think it’s that valuable. The eye test is pretty much only based on your opinion and cannot be backed up or quantified.
@@Sam-tj9np the eye test actually stands for strengths and weaknesses to their game. The only real weakness you can say that Michael Jordan had was his three-point shooting which was League average at the time. Everybody else has a few. Larry Bird was unathletic and had mediocre defense. Magic Johnson had straight up bad defense. LeBron has inconsistent defense and free throw shooting. Shaq was dog s*** at free throws. Kobe was not efficient etc etc
Ever since NBA & ABA merged, there're only 3 times that a 3-peat happened. Jordan had 2 of them. The rest was produced by Shaq & Kobe. It took the likes of Shaq & Kobe, both top 10 ever mind you, to do one. Jordan had 2 by himself. Each and every angle we look at it, Jordan just blew Lebron the wannabe outta water.
I mean the dude who made the video in his analysis had Kareem over him and I believe by now also LeBron over him. Jordan is the GOAT only if we ignore longevity.
Playoff Hakeem is nuts, 1.4 for pretty much his entire stretch of greatness. I remember seeing a list of the elimination games he played in, not a SINGLE bad game when it mattered. Some of the box scores were insane.
Steph at the very least has the benefit of versatile talented players and even a guy like Durant. Don't tell me Reggie played with the kind of talent to beat out MJ in the playoffs when you look at that Bulls roster.
@@t4d0W 1998 Pacers: It was a very deep and balanced team. *Reggie Miller HoF.* *Chris Mullin HoF ( age 34 ).* - An experienced veteran. *7"4 Rik Smits - 1x All-star.* *Mark Jackson - 1x All-star, 1x Assists Leader.* *6"10 Dale Davis - 1x All-star.* *6"9 Antonio Davis - 1x All-star.* Both were very athletic and good players. *6"10 Derreck McKey - 2x All-Defensive Team.* He was one of the best Defenders in the league. He was guarding Michael Jordan. *Jalen Rose, Travis Best.* An older and weaker version ( Without Antonio Davis ) of this team was able to win 2 games againt the Lakers ( Kobe, Shaq and Clen Rice ) in the 2000 Nba Finals.
People need to stop acting like curry was injured in 2016. Wcsf and wcf of that year were probably 2 of the best series he has ever played. He just choked in the finals
And all the negativity Kobe gets is unwarranted because he doesn't change and if you consider the amount of injuries he played through and the defenses he faced that is incredible.
Loubin Augustine um, no, because with the adjusted metrics, Kobe is middle of the pack. Kobe didn’t improve in playoff games compared to regular season.
Just how much an impact does Steph’s two injured runs have on his overall dip? When overlooking everything, it looks like if you take those two seasons out of the equation he gets noticeably better. Is that correct?
I just looked at Michael Jordan’s playoff numbers. I mean I knew that they were going to look insane. But they were way more insane than I’d ever imagine. Also just the consistency of his performance in the playoffs throughout his career. I suggest all of you go check them out too.
Bo basicly no matter how you cut it, MJ is an absolute monster. Despite already being at the top with his regular season numbers, he is also the player with the best increase in production when it matters the most. Though I am surprised Kawhi isn't here, considering he deosn't really try in the regular season and is a playoff monster.
you're right but Wilt purposely lowered his offensive numbers in the end of his carrer though , his fall wouldn't be as massive if he kept scoring more during his decline
@@warkunitale The end of his career isn't exclusive to the playoffs, just as the beginning of his career isn't exclusive to the regular season. In the same year that he averaged 50 ppg in the regular season, it went down to 35 ppg in the playoffs.
In this years playoffs Kawhi scoring went from 27pts to 30pts, while opponent stars scoring dramatically dropped (partly from Gasol and Raps upped defense). It sure looks like Kawhi improves significantly in the playoffs.
For players who nearly always play in 1-2 Round playoff runs it’s far easier to have an increase in production / good box score statistics due to shorter amount of rounds/games played. Such as T-Mac, Gervin, and Chris Paul. On top of that, T-Mac and CP3 rarely faced 60-win teams or lost to eventual NBA Finalists / champions. The one time Chris Paul played 3 rounds in 2018, he averaged his least assists in any playoff run. The one time he played a 60-win team (2012 Spurs adjusted for 82 games) he shot his worst FG% in any series at 37% with 4.5 TOpg. The one time he lost to an eventual NBA Finalist/Champion up to 2018 in the Warriors, he shot his 2nd-worst FG% in any series at 41% and his least APG in any series at 4.6. Playing a small number of games/rounds in all pre-Rocket playoff runs and avoiding 60-win teams / eventual NBA Finalists in nearly all playoff series is a huge factor in why his statistical performance looks good on the box score. But as he saw he fell flat statistically in the 2 series he did face a 60-win or Finals/Title team. Emphasizing how padded and protected his playoff statistics have been under short 1-2 round runs against easier opponents.
Generally not drastic declines and improvements as expected based on player reputations. Great to see your channel growing, keep up with the excellent work!
The Klay and Draymond part were nice add. People 20 years from now will see the highlights and think Steph and Klay were the core of this dynasty, but it really was Steph and Dray.
Ppl love to call klay the 2nd best SG in the league but ignore that he significantly drops off in the playoffs and especially in the finals. He's highly regarded but doesn't get held to the same standards as his peers.
Great stuff. But does this account for a high percentage shooter's number dropping the playoffs. Example if a guy shot 51% from the field in the regular season but dropped to 45% in the playoffs and another player then maintained 45% for both the season and playoffs. Now the 51% guy drops from great to good. Can that be necessarily penalized just because the player is very efficient during the season. In the playoffs minutes and shots volume go up, so percentages will vary at times.
Don't let these analytics with no context fool you, CP3 has definitely choked many times in the playoffs. Basketball games aren't played on a computer.
Yea, and this video also came out right before the 2019 playoffs, and Curry went absolutely nuts in the 2019 playoffs just like he did this year in 2022
So dis basically jus solidified what we already knew; players like Kobe, LeBron, Duncan, Shaq, IT (Original one), Hakeem, John Havilcheck (ion really kno him but ik he was a big part of those Bill Russel Celtics teams), Reggie Miller (even tho he a choker), & Jordan was statistically great in da post season. Shaq, LeBron, Kobe, Duncan, Jordan, Hakeem really seem to be some of da best playoff players to me too. Btw where was Jerry West? I heard he did good af in da playoffs. James Worthy & Robert Horry (ik he was mentioned in da video) good too
I think you should do the same with teams. Which team have improved or decline the most in playoffs? Maybe then compare in relation with this players. That would be awesome. Keep the good work.
The problem with Curry metric is that he always get double team in play-off, defender even guard him intensely from half-court range . This result in the decline of his stat, but the space he create make Warrior as a team become so much better. So yeah, overall i like your idea, but stat alone without context is not a good way to judge a player performance.
I agree with you, but I would be hard to imagine that he didn't already take that into account. Besides a lot of others on the list were also constantly doubled team.
thank you. people don't understand his offensive impact. Teams base their defensive schemes off trying to shut down curry. the space he creates just by being on the floor makes up for this decline
I've already watched all your videos (including the newest one.) Now I'm rewatching some for fun and I gotta say. I can tell you had a very specific visualization of what these videos you wanted to make would look like. From the music, editing, grueling statistics, and inviting thumbnails. You took that fine idea and made (what I believe is) exactly what you wanted to make. Behind the scenes it must be so much more demanding than some comment on youtube can summarize it up to be. Basically I think you had a dream and executed it perfectly. Not to long ago this youtube channel popped up but already you have 139,000 subscribers. That's a lot. Already you are one of the best basketball youtubers. Your work is wholly unique and provides a wonderful way of looking at basketball. Through the scientific process, through analyzing the analytics. You make those numbers fun for people who might've never been interested in them. I love your videos and love to see that you've succeeded and continue to succeed. The subscribers may have come relatively quickly but we all know that doesnt mean less work was involved to get there. Your videos are amazing and I'll always continue to watch them, I'm sure many others will too. Keep it up like we know you will and thanks for making content that's educational yet entertaining AND has to do with one of the best sports on earth! Thanks Ben!!
It's impossible to measure how much a player shrinked or improved in the playoffs, it was bold of you to try to do it but the result isn't reliable to me. So many factors can affect a player's performance... Curry for exemple is viewed as the worst post-season performer of all-time compared to his regular season averages, but injuries a'd opposing schemes aren't taken into account. No one ever viewed Larry Bird as a choker, yet he's at the bottom of your list. More importantly, one factor that your stat doesn't account for is opponent's strength throughout the regular season. Some years, the playoffs teams are all very good so its harder to perform well in the playoffs, but the non-playoffs teams are so bad that it results in a massive upgrade in the regular season stats, hence creating an artificial gap between the player's performances. Good video nonetheless, but I have to say I find it a bit absurd to try and measure playoffs performances there's way too many factors for the result to be precise and reliable.
Along with injuries, people forget that Curry is fouled on almost every possession when he is off ball. Just look at the defenders pull and bump him when he runs his routes off ball. Add that to the fact that he teams plan their defensive scheme around stopping him and the fact that he is doubled every possession as well, it's only natural for his stats to go down.
This is terrific. I would love to see charts containing the overall playoff value of these players compared to replacement players, and other star players. I suspect that the stars who declined the most are still very good. You would expect the best regular season performers to make the list, because they have a lot more value to lose. Also would be cool to exclude stars and see which role players stepped up the most in the playoffs.
I'd like to know where does Wilt Chamberlain ranks here. He has bad reputation in terms of playoffs production which (I don't agree with that). Also, Kareem?
I'm surprised you didn't touch on Derozan and Lowry, two of this era's most infamous playoff "chokers" I know Lowry isn't actually as bad as everyone makes him out to be but I'm curious at Derozan's overall metrics.
lowry if put in context has the same excuse as curry/cp3: injuries. when lowry is healthy in the playoffs he delivered his usual production but it doesnt help that he always gets hurt after all star break/before playoffs. id like to see more metrics too on current players maybe comparing similar duos lowry/derozan beal/wall dame/mccollum who really chokes here.
I don't think it's a fluke that smaller players tend to see the bigger drop. The more intense and focused defense of the playoffs is going to effect the guys who can't bully their way through double teams and whatever else defense throw at them. However, players who are smart with that can still do tons for their teammates despite their own drop. Curry's a great example, because with the whole world trying to double and triple him to just get the ball out of his hands, he does an excellent job of making sure the defense has committed to him before passing it out to teammates (usually Draymond) who have the clear advantage. Harden, conversely, is pretty bad at that sort of play, which is why his drop hurts so much more - he doesn't give his teammates nearly as many advantages because he often passes out of the traps and double teams too soon to really get them that advantage. So, instead of facing an easy to beat defense, they face an even defense, only their best player suddenly isn't involved in the play. Chris Paul though, like Curry, does know how to take advantage of aggressive defense and often does so. I'd say his biggest failing is actually just his ability to stay healthy. His best playoff runs all seem to end in injury. And the big thing missing from this whole analysis is defensive impact. I know that Bill Russell was listed in the positives because of the plus/minus stuff, but if his full defensive impact could be quantified so that it could be weighed against the other greats, it'd be seen that he's one of the most impactful players of all time. It's not a mistake that the finals MVP trophy is named after him. Defense is just so much hard to quantify.
60% is not 4% higher than 56%. You're better than this. You should be looking at standard deviations from the mean. For instance: a player who shoots .600 eFG% is 20% more efficient than a player who scores .500 eFG%, but that doesn't mean he's 20% more valuable. As stats increase linearly, their value increases exponentially.
This has always been such an interesting topic for me and it is really not talked about. In my opinion, mvps and all these regular seasons stats don't matter. The bigger (and the more ofter) u come up in the playoffs, the higher ur rank will be.
Truer today than ever before. Every star rests and doesn't play defense in the regular season these days, and teams only play their best lineups deep into the playoffs.
Milto 22 ideally this would be the case, but put simply it’s too small a sample to put much stock into. Multi year regular season based regressions have proven to be far more predictive of playoff success than, well, actual post season success is. Playoff impact metrics are more novelty than analysis
@@ethangilworth7891 small sample size but in context playoffs is in a high pressure environment with defenses designed according to scouts will show who has that focus(not measured) to take on the pressure and who folds is not just novelty since regular season does not take this into account
i love the knee sprain defence that is constantly used when talking about Curry choking. Please explain to me why, despite appearing in 4 NBA Finals, Steph Curry has never won an FMVP?
@Kevin D Even if they won game 7 he wasn't going to win in 2016, everyone knew it. So that leaves him 0-4 Finals. Pretty much puts him at a Tony Parker level.
@Kevin D I see 1 championship in 2015 where Lebron was the best player on the court and Steph looked off most nights despite not having to guard Kyrie. Then I see 1 championship in 2016 that he lost in embarassing fashion. Then I see 2 championships where Durant carried the team.
@Kevin D i watched all the finals. TS% and numbers is great and all, but if you actually watch the games, if he was so great in 2015, he would have been the FMVP, no? Well, perhaps the voters saw something you didn't, because they did NOT feel he was good enough.
Thanks for this video, that was pretty great as always. I would like to say a video focued more on performances than changes and which players had the greatest post seasons of all time. Thanks again
I love this video. I am curious if you looked at Rajon Rondo when putting together your numbers? Did he qualify as a "star" or play enough? It is well known he picks up his play in the playoffs, but I was wondering how his improvement fared in your system.
Are improvements in playoffs about transcending or saving stamina during regular season ? Are declines in playoffs about not beeing better when it matters the most, or are they linked to carrying the team too much during the regular season, which could lead to exhaustion and injuries ? Can homecourt advantage, less traveling and/or less sleeping away from home, be considered as factors that could influence playoffs performances ?
Klay declining like that isn't the most surprising thing in the world - I'd say he, more than any other player for the Warriors, is the best bell-weather for how well the Warriors system itself is defended. The first thing you need to address when playing them are the easy Klay looks.
Klay creates a lot of these easy looks himself tbf. He's one of the best off ball players in the league and being on the Warrior's is something you could argue that he has more of an effect on the Warrior's style of off ball play than they do on him.
