There is a lot controversy surrounding Donald Trump's supposed comments about shithole countries. Many believe that it backs up their feelings that Trump is racist. Are their shithole countries? If you judge by how countries compare to each other then there are obviously shithole countries. There are countries that are worse than average in terms of income, life expectancy, technology, crime etc. These types of countries exist. There are plenty people complain about the United States. Colin Kaepernick has gotten a lot of support for protesting the "oppression" of non whites in the United States. Well if people of color are being oppressed here, then how do you describe what is going on in Haiti. I looked for info in the per capita income in Haiti, and in 2014 it was $846 USD. If someone here made that much every two months, they would considered poor. It's a country filled with dirt roads, and a crime level well above the world average. If Haiti isn't a shithole, then what countries outside of central Africa are shitholes? The life expectancy in Haiti is 63 years old, while most of the developed world has life expectancy's that range from the late 70's to early 80's.
Let's get to Africa. What about some of the countries there. Most of the poorest countries in the world are in Africa. Are those countries shitholes? Trump is in a different position, because part of his job is International Affairs. Considering that, he should be more careful with what he says, but that is part of the charm of Trump, as well as one of his weaknesses. He doesn't have the filter that most other politicians have. He says how he feels many times in which it offends other people. The people criticizing him aren't making that argument though. That aren't saying that what he said was true, and he should have just chosen his words better. It's like people are afraid to even admit that there are shithole countries. If the inner cities in this country are shitholes then what is going on in most Africa, and Haiti is much worse.
http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/haiti/overview
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/25-poorest-countries-in-the-world/ss-BBFYCst#image=23
http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/haiti/overview
Thursday, January 18, 2018
Thursday, November 9, 2017
Michael Jordan vs Lebron James
Who is the greatest basketball player of all time? Well, based on consensus it should be Michael Jordan. Lebron has gained some more supporters in the Jordan/Lebron debate since he called Donald Trump a bum. Recently Lebron played his 1072nd career regular season game, which is the same number that Michael Jordan played. ESPN was treating it like an apples vs apples comparison, and so has plenty of people on twitter. The problem is, it isn't. Lebron came into the league out of high school, and Jordan played two seasons with the Wizards, which he was 38-40 years old. Lebron James is closing in on his 33rd birthday, and is either in his physical prime, or pretty close to it. That makes the comparison, which still is in Jordan's favor statistically, less fair. Given the different circumstances of their career, I decided to try and make some fair comparisons. Looking at them at similar stages in their life. Now what if we started with Lebron's 4th season, and make comparisons, which wouldn't count those two seasons Jordan played with the Wizards. Lebron turned 22 years old a couple months into this 4th season, while Jordan turned 22 about 3 and half months into his rookie year, so the age comparison is fair. What isn't fair is that Jordan was a rookie, while Lebron had 3 seasons of NBA experience.
1st comparison looks at Lebron from his 4th season until now, and compares it to Jordan during his first 11 seasons. The ages they were are close enough. PER is Player Efficiency Rating, and True Shooting % factors in field goals, and free throws, and gives the extra point for 3 point shots.
Regular Season
1st comparison looks at Lebron from his 4th season until now, and compares it to Jordan during his first 11 seasons. The ages they were are close enough. PER is Player Efficiency Rating, and True Shooting % factors in field goals, and free throws, and gives the extra point for 3 point shots.
Regular Season
PER
|
PPG
|
RPG
|
APG
|
SPG
|
BPG
|
TS%
| |
Lebron
|
28.8
|
27.3
|
7.4
|
7.2
|
1.6
|
0.8
|
.598
|
Jordan
|
29.6
|
32.0
|
6.4
|
5.7
|
2.6
|
1.0
|
.586
|
Playoffs
PER
|
PPG
|
RPG
|
APG
|
SPG
|
BPG
|
TS%
| |
Lebron
|
28.2
|
28.3
|
8.9
|
6.9
|
1.8
|
1.0
|
.575
|
Jordan
|
28.9
|
33.9
|
6.4
|
6.2
|
2.3
|
0.9
|
.577
|
The slight edge in PER goes to Jordan. You have to give Jordan credit for being such an efficient scorer despite being a high volume shooter. The rest of the comparison goes as someone should expect. Jordan averaged a good deal more points, with Lebron having the edges in rebounds, and assists, while Jordan averaged more steals. There are still a couple of issues here. Jordan's teams played a slightly faster pace, while there's a slight difference in minutes per game. So I decided to depend on basketball reference, and their PER 100 possession statistics.
Per 100 possessions
Regular Season
Playoffs
Pts
|
Reb
|
Ast
|
Stl
|
Blk
|
TO
| |
Lebron
|
37.6
|
10.2
|
9.9
|
2.2
|
1.1
|
4.7
|
Jordan
|
41.6
|
8.3
|
7.4
|
3.4
|
1.3
|
3.8
|
Pts
|
Reb
|
Ast
|
Stl
|
Blk
|
TO
| |
Lebron
|
36.6
|
11.5
|
9.0
|
2.4
|
1.3
|
4.5
|
Jordan
|
43.4
|
8.2
|
7.9
|
2.9
|
1.2
|
4.2
|
The comparison is similar to the per game statistics. While Lebron was great all around, Jordan was the better scorer, and turned the ball over less. Turnovers are something the goes along with high assist numbers.
Now what about the fact that Lebron already had 3 season of experience by the time he got to his fourth season? What about the wear and tear factor of Lebron's games played (though it hasn't had much effect on him)? Lebron by his second season was already and grown man, and well adapted to the game. His one season of NBA experience probably meant as much, and maybe more than all of Jordan 3 seasons of college experience. So I wanted to look at Lebron from his 2nd season until now, and compare it to Jordan's career with the Bulls. I won't go the the tables like I did previously. In terms of PER Jordan has the edge at 29.1 to Lebron's 28.4. He also get's the edge in the postseason with a PER of 28.6 to 27.9 for Lebron.
Now other parts of the comparisons between them are about their team accomplishments, and are usually unfair. Jordan fans point to his 6-0 record in the Finals, while Lebron fans point to how Lebron has beaten, and played better teams in the Finals. Both are team accomplishments. If you want to argue about who's teams were better (Jordan's, just my opinion), then you can bring up those arguments. It's not Michael's fault that he never played a team as good as the last 3 Golden State teams in the NBA Finals. During the late 90s, it was Jordan's Bulls that dominated like Golden State has recently. Should that be held against Jordan that his team was the juggernaut? Lebron has gotten to 8 NBA Finals, but the East has been soft during most of those seasons. Overall Michael's teams faced better competition on their way to the Finals, while Lebron's faced better competition in the Finals. Lebron's teams lost 3 of their 5 NBA Finals, before they even met Golden State, and their competition in those series' was similar to what Jordan and Bulls faced in the Finals. It's just that the Bulls won all of their Finals so their opponents appear weaker, because they didn't win the title. Also San Antonio 2014 domination of Miami, helps the reputation of the 2013 team. In terms of individual numbers the edge goes Jordan. Lebron is pretty close though.
Friday, September 29, 2017
2016 FBI crime statistics
The FBI's 2016 crime statistics have been recently released, and I have looked though some of the data. With so much attention, again, being paid to white criminals, and racist, I was wondering what happened to the issue of black crime. Did things get better, or worse in 2016. Data like this is also important, because one thing that is often done, is picking out individual instances, and implying that it represents to big problem. SJWs do this often when it comes to white men, but the big thing is to look at the big picture to see what is going on.
There are about 5.8 times as many white people as black people, but in terms of total arrest whites were only arrested about 2.6 times as much as blacks, so blacks are more likely to be arrested per capita. One big difference is in the type of crimes. When it comes to violent crimes numbers are worse for black people. Whites were arrested for violent crime about 1.57 times as much as black people. Adjusting for population, black people are about 3.7 times more likely to be arrested for violent crime than whites. Things get even worse for black people in terms of murder.
Black people killed more than white people, despite making up much less of the U.S. population. I looked up the data for 2015, and then blacks made up for an estimated 53.3% of murderers. Last year out of the 11390 murderers for which their race was known, blacks made up 6095 of those. That's 53.5%, which is pretty consistent with last year's data. Another thing worth mentioning is that the vast of majority of the hispanic population is counted as being white, so if we looked at non hispanic whites, the murders numbers for them would be a good deal lower than the 5004 number shown. Looking at the population data, and doing some numbers crunching black people are still about 7 times more likely to commit murder than white people. It seems like it's been that way forever, with blacks being about 7 times more likely to commit murder.
A look at single victim/single offender data shows some other patterns that are staying the same. Of the murders in which the race the offender was known 83.3% of white people murdered were killed by other whites, while 90.8 percent of blacks murdered were killed by other blacks. Last year I had those numbers at 81.3, and 89.3 percent respectively, but I made the mistake of counting all murders, and not just those in which the race of the offender was known. If I did this year's stats the same way as I did last year, the percentages would be 81.6% of murdered whites being killed by whites, and 89.5% percent of murdered blacks being killed by other blacks.
There's another pattern that has stayed similar to last year. Black people killed white people, more than white people kill black people. According to the single victim/single offender data 533 black people killed whites, and 243 white people killed blacks. That's a ratio of 2.19/1, which is similar to the 2.21/1 ratio from last year.
Another issue is the fact that the murder rates increased for the second consecutive year. It went from 4.4 per 100,000 to 4.9 from 2014 to 2015, and in 2016 it went up to 5.3. While we won't get 2017's murder statistics until late September next year, this article https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/murder-is-up-again-in-2017-but-not-as-much-as-last-year/, predicts an increase in murder for 2017 based on data from big cities. Hopefully this isn't a long term pattern.
Links
Murder Victims stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-1.xls
Murder Offender stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-2.xls
Single Victim/Single Offenders Murder stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-3.xls
Demographics https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045216
Arrests stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21
Murder rates 1997-2016 https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/violent-crime/tables/table-1
There are about 5.8 times as many white people as black people, but in terms of total arrest whites were only arrested about 2.6 times as much as blacks, so blacks are more likely to be arrested per capita. One big difference is in the type of crimes. When it comes to violent crimes numbers are worse for black people. Whites were arrested for violent crime about 1.57 times as much as black people. Adjusting for population, black people are about 3.7 times more likely to be arrested for violent crime than whites. Things get even worse for black people in terms of murder.
Black people killed more than white people, despite making up much less of the U.S. population. I looked up the data for 2015, and then blacks made up for an estimated 53.3% of murderers. Last year out of the 11390 murderers for which their race was known, blacks made up 6095 of those. That's 53.5%, which is pretty consistent with last year's data. Another thing worth mentioning is that the vast of majority of the hispanic population is counted as being white, so if we looked at non hispanic whites, the murders numbers for them would be a good deal lower than the 5004 number shown. Looking at the population data, and doing some numbers crunching black people are still about 7 times more likely to commit murder than white people. It seems like it's been that way forever, with blacks being about 7 times more likely to commit murder.
A look at single victim/single offender data shows some other patterns that are staying the same. Of the murders in which the race the offender was known 83.3% of white people murdered were killed by other whites, while 90.8 percent of blacks murdered were killed by other blacks. Last year I had those numbers at 81.3, and 89.3 percent respectively, but I made the mistake of counting all murders, and not just those in which the race of the offender was known. If I did this year's stats the same way as I did last year, the percentages would be 81.6% of murdered whites being killed by whites, and 89.5% percent of murdered blacks being killed by other blacks.
There's another pattern that has stayed similar to last year. Black people killed white people, more than white people kill black people. According to the single victim/single offender data 533 black people killed whites, and 243 white people killed blacks. That's a ratio of 2.19/1, which is similar to the 2.21/1 ratio from last year.
Another issue is the fact that the murder rates increased for the second consecutive year. It went from 4.4 per 100,000 to 4.9 from 2014 to 2015, and in 2016 it went up to 5.3. While we won't get 2017's murder statistics until late September next year, this article https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/murder-is-up-again-in-2017-but-not-as-much-as-last-year/, predicts an increase in murder for 2017 based on data from big cities. Hopefully this isn't a long term pattern.
Links
Murder Victims stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-1.xls
Murder Offender stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-2.xls
Single Victim/Single Offenders Murder stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-3.xls
Demographics https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045216
Arrests stats https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/tables/table-21
Murder rates 1997-2016 https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/topic-pages/violent-crime/tables/table-1
Friday, September 15, 2017
Brady vs Manning In The Regular Season (Written Before 2017 season)
Tom Brady will go down as being a better quarterback than Peyton Manning. That is surely true. As surely as Joe Montana is generally considered a better quarterback than John Elway, and Dan Marino. In football, which is such a team game, so much credit is given to the quarterback for team wins, and teams winning championships. I believe that too much is put into how many Super Bowls a quarterback wins. It is important to consider it, but that is a team accomplishment, and individual greatness is what I am looking at. Still Brady is seen now as the greatest quarterback of all time. There isn't much arguing against it at this moment. I wanted to compare Peyton Manning and Tom Brady in the regular season, and look at the advanced metrics of DYAR (Defense Adjusted Yards Above Replacement), from Football Outsiders. Manning and Brady are two of the greats who've played their entire career in the DYAR era. I looked at pass plays as counted by pro football outsiders, which counts sack plays, and their career DYAR. Pro Football Outsiders doesn't show their career numbers for their metrics like other sites so I had to do come calculator work
Pass Plays DYAR
Peyton Manning 9668 26296
Tom Brady 8633 21136
The edge goes to Manning even when you factor in pass plays, which Manning had around 1000 more of than Brady. Doing the division Manning averaged 2.72 DYAR per pass play, while Brady has averaged 2.45. I wonder why Manning would have that type of edge. Their career passer ratings are close to equal. 97.2 for Brady, and 96.5 for Manning. One advantage of Manning is that he got sacked less often. Despite having 1156 more pass attempts is his career Manning was sacked over 100 times less than Brady
http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/B/BradTo00.htm
http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/MannPe00.htm
Manning had 9380 pass attempts, and was sacked 303 times, which adds up to 9683, which is close enough to the total pass plays I got from Football Outsiders. Maybe some of those sacks weren't counted as pass plays. Brady has 8224 pass attempts and has been sacked 417 times. That adds up to 8641 plays. Manning's sack percentage for his career 3.1, while it's 4.8 for Brady. Manning has slight edges over Brady in Net Yards Gained per pass attempt (NY/A), and Adjusted Net Yards per Pass Attempt(ANY/A). Despite their big difference in playoff success their playoff numbers are fairly even. Brady has the slight edge in passer rating, while Manning has edges in NY/A, and ANY/A, the margins of which are similar to Manning's advantages in the regular season.
Pass Plays DYAR
Peyton Manning 9668 26296
Tom Brady 8633 21136
The edge goes to Manning even when you factor in pass plays, which Manning had around 1000 more of than Brady. Doing the division Manning averaged 2.72 DYAR per pass play, while Brady has averaged 2.45. I wonder why Manning would have that type of edge. Their career passer ratings are close to equal. 97.2 for Brady, and 96.5 for Manning. One advantage of Manning is that he got sacked less often. Despite having 1156 more pass attempts is his career Manning was sacked over 100 times less than Brady
http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/B/BradTo00.htm
http://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/M/MannPe00.htm
Manning had 9380 pass attempts, and was sacked 303 times, which adds up to 9683, which is close enough to the total pass plays I got from Football Outsiders. Maybe some of those sacks weren't counted as pass plays. Brady has 8224 pass attempts and has been sacked 417 times. That adds up to 8641 plays. Manning's sack percentage for his career 3.1, while it's 4.8 for Brady. Manning has slight edges over Brady in Net Yards Gained per pass attempt (NY/A), and Adjusted Net Yards per Pass Attempt(ANY/A). Despite their big difference in playoff success their playoff numbers are fairly even. Brady has the slight edge in passer rating, while Manning has edges in NY/A, and ANY/A, the margins of which are similar to Manning's advantages in the regular season.
Tuesday, August 29, 2017
Mayweather/Mcgregor Reaction
The fight I thought was a farce went down this past Saturday. The general feeling is that Conor Mcgregor did better than expected, and that the fight was competitive. I don't know what to think. How do I judge the fight when it was pretty clear to me that Floyd was carrying him? In the first 3 rounds Mayweather threw a total of 28 punches. Was it really Conor's awkward stance, and pitty pat punches that was making Floyd hesitant to throw punches? Floyd got semi serious in round 4, and caught Conor with some sharp punches in the middle portion of the round. Mcgregor was landing his own punches, but they had no snap whatsoever. He did land a good uppercut in the first round, but beside that he was just making contact with punches that make Floyd's punches look like Julian Jackson's by comparison. Floyd continued to gain steam, and win easily until the 9th round, where he finally went all out. Mcgregor had shown signs of fatigue before that. Late in the 7th round he laid on the ropes, and took a deep breath after they were broken apart. Now in the 9th he was taking hard punches to go along with that fatigue. He had very little left, and was nothing but a punching bag for that round, and the 10th round, until the referee stopped the fight a little more than a minute into the round. As a fighter Mcgregor looked awkward. His stance was awkward, and his punches lacked steam. Floyd was very kind to him, and Conor would have taken a serious beating had he been in there with a strong aggressive fighter like Canelo, or GGG. Mayweather showed his 40 years to some extent, though it's hard to tell how much age caught up with him in this fight, because he seemingly could take over whenever he felt like it.
The fight was a money grab, and a very successful one at that. Floyd went in there with an opponent that was no threat to beat him, and he behaved like it. He walked forward for most of the fight, which isn't what he does. He could afford to do it here, because Mcgregor's punches didn't have the type of power to make him pay for coming forward. He had a big smile on his face after the second round. It is also worth noting that Mayweather says that he tried to place a 400k bet that he would knockout Mcgregor within 9.5 rounds, but wasn't allowed to. He wanted to place another bet on him winning by knockout, but wasn't allowed to do either. He did get someone else to place a bet for him. The numbers aren't in yet, but this fight is either the 1st, or 2nd biggest money fight in history, with Pacquiao/Mayweather being the other. At 40 years old, and not the fighter he used to be, maybe Floyd will retire for good, or maybe some issues, like tax problems, could have him coming back for another money grab.
The fight was a money grab, and a very successful one at that. Floyd went in there with an opponent that was no threat to beat him, and he behaved like it. He walked forward for most of the fight, which isn't what he does. He could afford to do it here, because Mcgregor's punches didn't have the type of power to make him pay for coming forward. He had a big smile on his face after the second round. It is also worth noting that Mayweather says that he tried to place a 400k bet that he would knockout Mcgregor within 9.5 rounds, but wasn't allowed to. He wanted to place another bet on him winning by knockout, but wasn't allowed to do either. He did get someone else to place a bet for him. The numbers aren't in yet, but this fight is either the 1st, or 2nd biggest money fight in history, with Pacquiao/Mayweather being the other. At 40 years old, and not the fighter he used to be, maybe Floyd will retire for good, or maybe some issues, like tax problems, could have him coming back for another money grab.
Friday, August 4, 2017
Michael Jordan Is Wrong: Lebron is better than Kobe
Michael Jordan recently said that Kobe Bryant was better than Lebron James, because 5 sounds better than 3. He brought up the ring count. This is something he did before, when Lebron only had 2 rings. There could be a number of reasons that Jordan prefers Kobe to Lebron. Jordan, and Kobe are friends, and I've never heard of him being a friend of Lebron's. Kobe also copied many of Michael Jordan's moves, and mannerisms. Maybe in MJ's mind, a vote for Kobe over Lebron is like a vote for him over Lebron. I'm as big a Michael Jordan fan as there is, but he is wrong on this one. Lebron James is better than Kobe Bryant. Sure Kobe has 5 championships, but championships are a team accomplishment. They are something to consider when judging who is better than who, but there are plenty other things to look at. If Jordan said that Kobe and Lebron as so close in terms of their individual greatness, that he gave the edge to Kobe because of rings that would make a little more sense, even though Kobe isn't up there with Lebron in terms of individual greatness.
Both players could score, and that is the area where Kobe is closest to Lebron. Lebron has averaged 36.7 points per 100 possessions, and 27.1 points per game. Before Kobe fell off late in his career he averaged 36.1 points per 100 possessions and 25.5 points per game. Now the fact that he played with Shaq early in his career can be seen as a large part of the reason that his averages are under Lebron's. The thing is a prime Kobe got plenty shots while playing with Shaq. The big difference is in the roles they played when they came into the league. Lebron was already bigger and stronger than most NBA players when he got to the league out of high school. He only shot 41.7% from the floor, but played over 39 minutes per game as a rookie, and averaged over 20 points per game. Kobe on the other hand was a backup in his first two seasons. He played only 15.5 minutes per game in his rookie year, and 26.0 in his second season. It wasn't until his third season that he got big time minutes, and it wasn't until his 4th that he established himself as one of the best players in the league. Lebron was already one of the top players in his second season. Lebron was two years ahead of Kobe. Lebron never averaged 35+ like Kobe did in 2005-06, and he never scored 81 in a game, but he has been so consistent over the course of his career, and he's a more efficient scorer than Kobe. Kobe never shot 50 percent in a season. Lebron has shot around 50% for his career, with a career high of 56.5%. Kobe's true shooting percentage for his career is 55.0%, and was 55.5 before he really fell off. Lebron's is 58.4%. Both were less efficient as scorers in the postseason, but Lebron has scored the same 36.7 points per 100 possessions, while Kobe's average per 100 possessions fell to 34.7 in the playoffs, and Kobe didn't play any playoffs games after he became washed up and injury prone, so it's more fair to compare their career postseason stats. Lebron may well be the better scorer of the two, but it's debatable. What's more obvious is that Lebron is clearly better at mostly every thing else. He's a better passer than Kobe, a better rebounder, just as good at getting steals, and clearly a better shot blocker. Overall Lebron is the better defensive player. Kobe was on the NBA's first team all defensive team for 9 seasons, but I think there were a few of those in which he got on the first team based on reputation. Lebron is the better of the two defensively. He is probably a better perimeter defender, and his shot blocking gives him another element to his defense. In terms career PER Lebron is second all time at 27.6, while Kobe's career mark is 22.9, but Kobe was washed up for those last three seasons. What was his mark before then? It wasn't much better at just 23.4. Lebron has had 4 seasons with a PER of over 30, including 3 over 31, and another at 30.7. Kobe's career high is 28.0, and in that season he was given free reign to jack up shots. Kobe had a 26.2 PER one year, and a 26.1 in another, but has no other season of 25+. In terms of the postseason it's 27.7 for Lebron, and 22.4 for Kobe. Lebron is the better individual player.
Kobe's argument is largely dependent on the ring thing, but as great rings are, they are overrated in judging an individual's greatness. Michael Jordan finished his career with more rings than Magic, and Bird, but 5 less than Bill Russell, and Robert Horry surpassed Jordan in championships with his 7th title in 2005. The thing is that Jordan didn't need to pass Bird, and Magic in terms of championships to be considered better than them. He was already considered the greatest player of all time when he retired the first time, and he only had 3 titles then, which was 2 less than Magic, and the same as Bird. He didn't gain his status as the consensus GOAT when he came back and won 3 more, he was already the consensus greatest of all time before then. He just added to his legacy. The argument for Jordan as greatest of all time back then wasn't about rings. It was about his scoring ability, dominance, skill, athleticism, and mastery of the game. After his retirement, though, 6 has become some magic number. People wondered could Kobe get 6, and he finished his career with 5. Horry got 7, but isn't close to being in the GOAT debate, and 6 seems to be the number that Lebron is measured against. Instead of looking at Lebron's individual greatness, and looking at rings as a bonus, the 6 title things is put there as some obstacle that he has to reach. Kobe won 3 titles with Shaq, and while Kobe was important to those teams, Shaq was the key. I don't consider Kobe to have been a Robin, but if there was a Robin between the two of them, it surely wasn't Shaq. He did win two titles as the lead player, but had an underrated cast of big men in Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, and Andrew Bynum. While Bynum had injury problems, he was strong in the 2010 playoffs. Both Kobe, and Lebron have played with some talented players, but Kobe had better teammates than Lebron. He played with a prime Shaq. Lebron never played with a player that had that type of dominance. Dwyane Wade was still great when Lebron got to Miami, but slowly went downhill. I don't know how much value I should put in Lebron's 8 Finals appearances since the East hasn't been strong in recent years, but he has done a lot to get his teams in position to be in the Finals.
In the Finals both men have had mediocre series'. Kobe had one in 2000 (he did come through in game 4), and another in 2004, while Lebron wasn't that good in his first two NBA Finals in 2007, and 2011. From there the advantage goes to Lebron. Kobe had some really good Finals, but Lebron has had some all time great Finals, and that's a big difference. Kobe was never as good in the NBA Finals as Lebron was the three times he won the title, and you can argue Lebron was better in the last 3 Finals series that his team lost, than Kobe was in any of his Finals appearances.
So yeah, Lebron is better than Kobe in my humble opinion.
Both players could score, and that is the area where Kobe is closest to Lebron. Lebron has averaged 36.7 points per 100 possessions, and 27.1 points per game. Before Kobe fell off late in his career he averaged 36.1 points per 100 possessions and 25.5 points per game. Now the fact that he played with Shaq early in his career can be seen as a large part of the reason that his averages are under Lebron's. The thing is a prime Kobe got plenty shots while playing with Shaq. The big difference is in the roles they played when they came into the league. Lebron was already bigger and stronger than most NBA players when he got to the league out of high school. He only shot 41.7% from the floor, but played over 39 minutes per game as a rookie, and averaged over 20 points per game. Kobe on the other hand was a backup in his first two seasons. He played only 15.5 minutes per game in his rookie year, and 26.0 in his second season. It wasn't until his third season that he got big time minutes, and it wasn't until his 4th that he established himself as one of the best players in the league. Lebron was already one of the top players in his second season. Lebron was two years ahead of Kobe. Lebron never averaged 35+ like Kobe did in 2005-06, and he never scored 81 in a game, but he has been so consistent over the course of his career, and he's a more efficient scorer than Kobe. Kobe never shot 50 percent in a season. Lebron has shot around 50% for his career, with a career high of 56.5%. Kobe's true shooting percentage for his career is 55.0%, and was 55.5 before he really fell off. Lebron's is 58.4%. Both were less efficient as scorers in the postseason, but Lebron has scored the same 36.7 points per 100 possessions, while Kobe's average per 100 possessions fell to 34.7 in the playoffs, and Kobe didn't play any playoffs games after he became washed up and injury prone, so it's more fair to compare their career postseason stats. Lebron may well be the better scorer of the two, but it's debatable. What's more obvious is that Lebron is clearly better at mostly every thing else. He's a better passer than Kobe, a better rebounder, just as good at getting steals, and clearly a better shot blocker. Overall Lebron is the better defensive player. Kobe was on the NBA's first team all defensive team for 9 seasons, but I think there were a few of those in which he got on the first team based on reputation. Lebron is the better of the two defensively. He is probably a better perimeter defender, and his shot blocking gives him another element to his defense. In terms career PER Lebron is second all time at 27.6, while Kobe's career mark is 22.9, but Kobe was washed up for those last three seasons. What was his mark before then? It wasn't much better at just 23.4. Lebron has had 4 seasons with a PER of over 30, including 3 over 31, and another at 30.7. Kobe's career high is 28.0, and in that season he was given free reign to jack up shots. Kobe had a 26.2 PER one year, and a 26.1 in another, but has no other season of 25+. In terms of the postseason it's 27.7 for Lebron, and 22.4 for Kobe. Lebron is the better individual player.
Kobe's argument is largely dependent on the ring thing, but as great rings are, they are overrated in judging an individual's greatness. Michael Jordan finished his career with more rings than Magic, and Bird, but 5 less than Bill Russell, and Robert Horry surpassed Jordan in championships with his 7th title in 2005. The thing is that Jordan didn't need to pass Bird, and Magic in terms of championships to be considered better than them. He was already considered the greatest player of all time when he retired the first time, and he only had 3 titles then, which was 2 less than Magic, and the same as Bird. He didn't gain his status as the consensus GOAT when he came back and won 3 more, he was already the consensus greatest of all time before then. He just added to his legacy. The argument for Jordan as greatest of all time back then wasn't about rings. It was about his scoring ability, dominance, skill, athleticism, and mastery of the game. After his retirement, though, 6 has become some magic number. People wondered could Kobe get 6, and he finished his career with 5. Horry got 7, but isn't close to being in the GOAT debate, and 6 seems to be the number that Lebron is measured against. Instead of looking at Lebron's individual greatness, and looking at rings as a bonus, the 6 title things is put there as some obstacle that he has to reach. Kobe won 3 titles with Shaq, and while Kobe was important to those teams, Shaq was the key. I don't consider Kobe to have been a Robin, but if there was a Robin between the two of them, it surely wasn't Shaq. He did win two titles as the lead player, but had an underrated cast of big men in Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, and Andrew Bynum. While Bynum had injury problems, he was strong in the 2010 playoffs. Both Kobe, and Lebron have played with some talented players, but Kobe had better teammates than Lebron. He played with a prime Shaq. Lebron never played with a player that had that type of dominance. Dwyane Wade was still great when Lebron got to Miami, but slowly went downhill. I don't know how much value I should put in Lebron's 8 Finals appearances since the East hasn't been strong in recent years, but he has done a lot to get his teams in position to be in the Finals.
In the Finals both men have had mediocre series'. Kobe had one in 2000 (he did come through in game 4), and another in 2004, while Lebron wasn't that good in his first two NBA Finals in 2007, and 2011. From there the advantage goes to Lebron. Kobe had some really good Finals, but Lebron has had some all time great Finals, and that's a big difference. Kobe was never as good in the NBA Finals as Lebron was the three times he won the title, and you can argue Lebron was better in the last 3 Finals series that his team lost, than Kobe was in any of his Finals appearances.
So yeah, Lebron is better than Kobe in my humble opinion.
Monday, June 19, 2017
Lebron James' and Michael Jordan's NBA Finals Opponents
How much of that has to do with the dominant performances of Jordan's teams in the Finals. I mean while Lebron has won 3 of the 8 Finals he has been in, his teams have actually been outscored in 6 of those Finals. I decided to take a look at how each their Finals opponents performed in their conference playoffs. So I looked at the stats for each of their series' leading into the Finals, to come up with an estimate of their point differential per 100 possessions. ESPN uses a slightly different formula than Basketball-Reference.com, which is the site that I used to come up with my estimates. My estimates aren't exact, but are close enough to the truth to make a good comparison
Jordan's Opponents
1991 Lakers +5.24
1992 Blazers +7.81
1993 Suns +1.19
1996 Sonics +3.66
1997 Jazz +5.71
1998 Jazz +7.32
Lebron's Opponents
2007 Spurs +3.76
2011 Mavericks +8.22
2012 Thunder +7.37
2013 Spurs +10.91
2014 Spurs +8.52
2015 Warriors +8.55
2016 Warriors +6.47
2017 Warriors +16.36
You can't blame Lebron for the Cavs losing to the Warriors this year. The 2016-17 Golden State team is truly one of the greatest teams of all time. In my opinion the best NBA team ever was either them or the 95-96 Bulls. My data isn't as one sided as ESPN's. In fact the 92 Blazers, had better a differential per 100 possessions than 3 of the 8 teams that Lebron played in the Finals, while the 98 Jazz beat out 2 of Lebron's Finals opponents. Still 5 of the teams Lebron played in the Finals had better Net Efficiency in their conference playoffs, than any of the teams Jordan played in the Finals. In terms of regular season SRS, according to Basketball-Reference, Lebron's oppnents have been better in the Finals than the teams Jordan played in the finals, but the difference is the past 3 Golden State Warriors teams. The average regular season SRS of Lebron's Finals opponents was 8.20, while it was 6.84 for Jordan's opponents. Before the 2015 Finals the average SRS of Lebron's opponents, in the Finals, was 6.77,
and Lebron's teams won only 2 of those 5 series. The idea of Lebron's Finals opponents being so much better than Jordan's is largely based on 2 things. The last three Golden State teams, and the fact that 5 of those teams won the championship. It just so happens that they had to beat a team with Lebron on it to win the title. It was of those paradoxical things. If your team wins all of the Finals, your opponents look weaker, and if you lose in the Finals, your opponents look better. I did gain a bit of an appreciation of the 2011 Mavericks, whom I considered to be the worst team either Jordan, or Lebron played in the Finals. While they were the worst of those 14 teams in the regular season, they had a great run to the title. A better way to look at things would be to factor in the regular season, and playoff stats of all of these teams, and factor in their strength of schedule, but that would be complicated. Another thing worth mentioning is that these are team accomplishments.
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