The Next Magic Johnson?

Is Chris Paul as a good (or better) of a point guard as Magic Johnson?

John Hollinger addresses this question one of his latest PER Diems, and he seems to think that the answer is probably "yes." (Though Dave Berri did say it first.) Hollinger admits that both players come from remarkably different eras of play, but this doesn't deter him from making a case for Paul:

Yes, it's easier for a small guard to dominate today's game than it was for John Stockton and Isiah Thomas to dominate in the '80s, and it's true that we don't know whether Paul will have the longevity that the players above enjoyed.

Nonetheless, compare Paul's first four seasons to the first four seasons of any point guard from the postmerger era, and one conclusion becomes evident really fast: The only player who can even plausibly compare to him is Magic Johnson.

This suggestion will obviously set off a bomb of "no ways" and "impossibles" and "don't even bothers" from Laker fans everywhere, but I have yet to find anyone who has written a comprehensive defense of Magic. In fact, most fans think the suggestion is so outrageous that they would rather just dismiss the discussion as opposed to engaging in it.

Fans like J.A. Adande. Mr. Adande not only disagrees with the comparison, but his sole remark on the subject was a terse dismissal of the argument (in his "CP3 vs D Will" article). Here's the mini-rant on why it is "sacrilege" to compare Paul (or anyone probably) to Magic Johnson:

Tell any aspirants to the throne to fill in at center in a Finals game, win five championships and set the career assists record ... maybe after all that we can hold a discussion.

So, apparently CP is out of the running to ever fill Magic's shoes since he probably won't be playing center anytime soon. Never mind the fact that Magic has the height edge by 8 inches (that's right, Magic was a 6'8" point guard) and Paul is probably finished growing. (I suppose it also doesn't matter that Paul, despite his height, is averaging over 5 rebounds a game this season which is only 2 off from Magic's career average.)

But what if we took height out of the argument? Now Paul has to win at least 5 rings and break the assists record. Let's be honest here, the former is not happening. Though I expect Paul will retire with at least 1 ring, he probably won't amass 5. I think it's worth mentioning, though, that Paul doesn't have the same squad of legends playing with him. Who would you rather: Kareem, Worthy, and McAdoo or West, Chandler, and Peja? Neither option is terrible, but the Showtime crew is light years ahead of the Bees.

Ok, so he's too short and he won't win 5 championships. What's left? Oh yeah, the assists record. This is probably the most ridiculous statement of all. While it's no small feat that Magic broke the assists record (his 10,141 edged out the Big O's 9,887), it's preposterous to suggest that Paul has to accomplish the same feat in order to be considered on Magic's level. This is primarily due to the fact that a man named John Stockton came in and beat out Magic's record by 50%. Magic's total: 10,141. Stockton's: 15,806. So now, CP has to amass almost 16K assists just to be in the discussion.

While I agree that putting Paul on the same level as Magic is a bit premature, I don't think it's even remotely sacrilege to make comparisons. Dave Berri said it best:

Chris Paul in 2008-09 compares favorably to Magic Johnson. And that is a point I would emphasize. Chris Paul is developing into one of the all-time great players in NBA history. It’s not a stretch to start thinking of him in terms of players like Magic, MJ, and Bird. Yes, Paul is that good.

"Developing" is the key word in that sentence. Mr. Adande should just be happy that a point guard as exciting as CP (and possibly the most exciting since Magic) is in the league right now. Not to mention that he gets to watch that player's "development" unfold. He should also try watching more than 2 or 3 Hornets' games a season. It might help.

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Ok, so having the best point guard in the league (and arguably ever) is a small consolation if this team can't bring home a championship. These arguments that circulate through the blogosphere are ostensibly meaningless since we really have no way of be 100% certain about something as subjective as how "good" a player is/was, never mind the fact that some of these comparisons are made between players who were stars in totally different eras.

In the end, these discussions are just a way of biding our time until our respective teams take home a championship. We don't like to admit it, but it's the truth all the same.

Hollinger 2008-09 PER Projections

For those of you who understand John Hollinger's PER stat, congratulations: you're smarter than me.

Sort of. Hollinger, one of ESPN.com's better writers (and one of the original Basketball Prospectus wizards), uses a stat of his creation that, as a single number, is meant to represent a player's mean production per minute of time on the court. In other words, instead of looking at specific stats like points, assists, or steals, PER translates those numbers (via an immensely complicated equation that equalizes pace and minutes played*) into a single number that sums up a player's efficiency. In this particular system, 15 is the league average, with the league leader landing somewhere in the high 20s and low 30s.

So, with that in mind, check out the PER projections for 08-09 season.

If you are curious as to where he gets his dummy/projected stats to fill out the PER equations, he uses something he calls "similarity scores". Permit me to quote his explanation from a related article:

For each player, I use as a comparison the players from the past 20 years who are the most similar, based on age, height and stats over the past three seasons. Some players will have more comparables than others, depending on how unusual they are -- guys with freak heights (Yao Ming, Nate Robinson), freak ages (Dikembe Mutombo) or freak stats (Andrei Kirilenko) will have relatively few, while a more generic player like Al Harrington or Devin Brown could have over a hundred.

From that point, I see what their most similar players did a year later, and project those changes onto the stats of the player being studied. So, for example, the reason that J.R. Smith's PER is projected to rise sharply this year is because the most similar players also saw their PERs increase sharply at the same age; similarly, Andre Miller is expected to tank because a number of similar players hit the wall at his age.

Great, so maybe I shouldn't have drafted Andre Miller in my fantasy league... of course he does fill the utility slot as I also nabbed CP3 and Jose Calderon in an attempt to OWN the assists in my league. What uuuuuup...

But, seriously, despite CP's position in the numero uno slot, I have to say that Hollinger's stat is somewhat bothersome to me, and I've found that other writers agree (in theory... I'm not actually part of a circle that makes me privy to arguing with these people). For instance, Dean Oliver (author of Basketball on Paper) dislikes Hollinger's method since it produces a completely abstract number in place of quantifiable stats. Numbers that bear no relationship to accrued statistics (see: Quarterback Passer Rating) are difficult to digest, especially for the average sports fan. This is not to say that all sports fans are dumb, but rather that the complicated equations and seemingly arbitrary numbers that are the result hide the logic and brainwork put into their own creation. These stats force people to blindly accept what appears to be an arbitrary system of measurement in which one number is labeled "good", one "average", and one "bad". From there, you are left to extrapolate the rest.

Instead of player-based systems like Hollinger's (and there are many others like it), Oliver believes you're better off measuring team success than attempting to isolate one player's performance. He uses a simple method to calculate "efficiency" through an offensive and defensive rating.

This method produces a number that relates back to the most basic element of basketball: points. The resulting offensive rating reflects the amount of points a team will score for every 100 possessions (likewise, the defensive rating reflects how many points a team will allow from an opponent every 100 possessions). By bringing the possession number to a constant (100), we can effectively compare the run-and-gun offenses of D'Antoni and Nellie with the Mavs and Spurs more calculated (read: slow) approach.

Oliver then goes on to even deeper analysis using ratings to help mold larger extrapolations (at one point even calculating a win/loss record for individual players), but his basic argument is the same: basketball is a team sport with a myriad of player interactions on both sides of the court, and it is thereby almost impossible to truly calculate a single person's impact (though his formulas seek to do so).

This, of course, does not mean that Oliver's method is more correct than Hollinger's. In fact, Hollinger's method is a remarkable indicator of team success (i.e. despite Kevin Durant's gaudy point totals last season, he was never particularly "efficient", as he had to handle the load of his mostly incompetent teammates). It has also a reliable method for predicting rookie success in the NBA.

And so it goes. More and more "holy grail" of stats methods come out all the time. You just have to wade through it and make your own opinions. If nothing else though, it certainly does inspire a greater appreciation for the beautifully complex sport of basketball.

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*Oh, and by the way, here's the PER formula in case you want to keep track at home:

uPER = (1/Min) * (3P + [(2/3) * AST] + [(2 - factor * (tmAST/tmFG)) * FG] + [FT * 0.5 * (1 + (1- (tmAST/tmFG)) + (2/3) * (tmAST/tmFG))] - [VOP * TO] - [VOP * DRBP * (FGA - FG)] - [VOP * 0.44 * (0.44 + (0.56 + DRBP)) * (FTA - FT)] + [VOP * (1 - DRBP) * (TRB - ORB)] + [VOP * DRBP * ORB] + [VOP * STL] + [VOP * DRBP * BLK] - [PF * ((lgFT/lgPF) - 0.44 * (lgFTA/lgPF) * VOP))])

where...

factor = (2/3) - [(0.5 * (lgAST/lgFG))/(2 * (lgFG/lgFT))]
VOP = [lgPTS/(lgFGA - lgORB + lgTO + 0.44 * 0.44 * lgFTA)]
DRBP = [(lgTRB - lgORB)/lgTRB]

then adjust for pace...

PER = [uPER * (lgPace/tmPace)] * (15/lguPER)

Done. Piece of cake.

The Links, vol. 1

To our beloved readers,

We at Hometown Hornets sincerely apologize for not providing coverage of the first two playoff games in what is turning out to be an extremely fun series against Dallas. We realize that by adding another writer to the staff (of one) it should hypothetically be easier to churn out fascinating posts covering games, off the court activities, and whatever other crazy stuff we find. This is apparently not true, as the Hornets' recent successes has prompted us to more often be twelve sheets to the wind instead of waxing philosophic on the mental toughness and brilliant performances of CP3 in his NBA playoff debut.

As rabid fans of basketball, we understand your insatiable need for copious amounts of unnecessary, biased, and ego-centric writing. Since we have failed you in providing this service as of late, we offer you these here links and the possibly flimsy promise of doing better in the coming weeks.

Take these and love us again:

1. Hollinger has done an excellent job as the ESPN writer assigned to our series. His coverage of Game 1 and Game 2 of the Dallas series has been phenomenal, especially since it strokes every Hornets fan's ego six ways from Sunday.

2. Scoop Jackson has started drinking the Cresent City koolaid as well. His recent article is somewhat heavy-handed in its conceit, but how can I say no to something so beautiful. Scoop uses a great quote by Mark Jones concerning CP:

Don't be fooled by the angelic face; there's a killer inside.

3. Great article by Ian O'Connor of MSNBC commenting on the irony of Byron Scott effectively "bum rushing" Jason Kidd out of the playoffs four years after their famous run-in. The last paragraph floored me:

He [Byron]has the Hornets playing defense and making life miserable for one of the great playmakers of all time. If Kidd offers to shake his hand at the close of this series, Byron Scott should do what Kidd used to do best: Pass.

4. ESPN the Mag published the results of some of their recent research and compiled a pretty cool Franchise Rankings for all of professional sports. Hornets koolaid anyone?

5. And finally, if you happen to be focused enough to see beyond the playoffs (or perhaps your team isn't participating in such events) and you're looking forward to May 20 and June 26, here's a Mock Draft Listing. Again, this kind of prediction and analysis is about as reliable as my insights on curling, but it's still fun to yell at your computer screen when various writers make dumb (albeit fake) picks.

XOXOXO,
HLD & CWS

CP34MVP

For those of you who can't get enough of the Crescent City stroking Chris Paul, now's your chance to wear your pride. Thanks to the genius of CafePress (and a little design ingenuity on my part) you can now be a part of the greatest comeback in NBA history.

Purchase the CP34MVP shirt and wear it everywhere. Wear it to work, to school, to sleep, to bars, to weddings, to galas, to prom, and even to games! Seriously, how can you go wrong? Answer: you can't. There is no markup and no one is making a dime on this (except for the cafepress people who host it). So spread the word on CP34MVP nation-wide... oh, we are going global with this, baby.

16 dollars? That's a bigger steal than the 2.73 Chris gets every game!

The Hornets have also launched CP3MVP.com. Coincidence?... yeah, probably. But it is a cool site, plus they're offering an insane gift package for whoever makes the best short video about why CP3 deserves the award. All you have to do is upload your entries to their myspace page. Hmmmmm... I need to join myspace... and think of an idea...

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In the totally unrelated world of links, check out John Hollinger's extremely flattering article about the Hornets quiet rise to the top of the Western Conference (as of posting we are the 1 seed since we own the tie-break with the Lakers).

And finally, there was a great article via Yahoo! that is setting the stage to make the late, great "Pistol" Pete Maravich the Chuck Norris of the NBA.

Pistol Pete's chest pass wound up being our best attack during the Vietnam War. It's too bad he never had to pass.

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Coming your way: commentary/recap/poor attempt at humor for the Hornet's big W against the Rockets last night. Peace.