Advanced Analytics: Who’s the G.O.A.T? LeBron or MJ?
There are only a few players in the conversation for the greatest player of All-Time in the range of about 3-4 players. With that being said, as fans of the game we need to come up with a universal formula to decide hands down who is the greatest of All-Time. The formula must include relevant attributes and accolades to help determine this very difficult conversation. For example, the formula should include player’s individual stats, accolades and accomplishments. The only problem with aspect of the game is when you compare the greatest players of All-Time many of their stats and accomplishments will be very similar so no one can really separate themselves. Also in certain eras, the rules were different for instance in Wilt Chamberlin’s era there wasn’t a defensive three-second violation or in Magic Johnson early parts of his career there wasn’t a three-point line until the 79-80 season.
As we all know in the world of sports winning is everything or it should be at least. Many NBA legends have not won or been to an NBA finals in their careers. For example, Allen Iverson, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone have never won a championship despite their Hall of Fame careers. How can a player that has never won or participated in a NBA finals be considered the G.O.A.T? Winning is and should be the end all be all or the main goal for all 30 NBA teams should be to win a championship so with that being said championship wins have to be top on a player’s resume for him to be considered the G.O.A.T. Another key aspect a player needs on his resume are great advanced analytical statistics. Advanced analytics combines multiple stats into one and compares how good they were over the longevity of their careers.
Right now, there is a big debate on who is the best player we have ever seen between Michael Jordan and LeBron James. Many people believe James is better because of the era he plays in and his individual accolades he has accomplished and the ones he is predicted to accomplish. Well let’s pump the breaks just a little bit before we name King James the greatest player of all time. Jordan as of today is the best player to play the game of basketball, and here’s why. Using many advanced analytics such as win shares and PER (player efficiency rating) that compare these two great players careers side by side we can make an educated decision on who is better. For example, win shares was created by Bill James that equates an estimation of an individual players contributions to a team’s success. A win share represents one-third of a team win. Through a complex formula it credits offensive win shares by calculating a player’s marginal points from his points produced and offensive possessions and dividing it by the marginal points per win. Defensive win shares are credited by computing a player’s marginal defense from his defensive rating and dividing it by the marginal points per win. Simply add offensive and defensive win shares together to get total win shares.
Jordan has 3 seasons where he had a score over 20 win shares, while James only has 1. Air Jordan has 4 more seasons higher than James’ 2nd best individual win share season. Meaning Jordan in his prime years helped his team win more games more often than James did. Not only did he win a lot of games, he set the gold standard for success. He won six NBA championships in six tries and never played in a game 7, while playing 82 games majority of his career. Not all hope is lost for LeBron fanatics when it comes to analytics, James has more total win shares with 219.36 opposed to Jordan’s 214.02.
Another key ingredient in the formula should be a player’s PER rating. This statistic sums up all the players positive accomplishments and subtracts the negative ones and creates a per-minute rating of a player’s performance and has been around since the 1988-89 season, but has been ,expanded as far back to the 1951-52 season. Currently MJ has the highest PER rating of all-time with 27.91 followed by King James with 27.68. Meaning Jordan outplayed James majority of his NBA games.
In most advanced statistical categories Jordan outplayed James except in one very important statistic and this is box plus/minus. Box plus/minus is a box scored-based statistic that evaluates a player’s quality and contribution to the team. LeBron has a BPM of 9.18 in comparison to Jordan’s 8.09 rating. Justifying that James had to do more for his team individually for them to be successful.
Since LeBron entered the NBA in 2003-04 season he has had to carry his team to the finish line due to the lack of talent he played with in Cleveland before he took his talents to South Beach in 2010 to play with two future Hall of Famers in Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh. On the other had for Jordan, coach Phil Jackson asked him to do less “I actually had to ask him to cut back from what he was doing. I don’t want you to be the scoring leader. The scoring leaders have not won championships.” Many people like to discredit MJ due to his lack of success in his first 4 years, because he never made it a NBA finals unlike Lebron who did it in his fourth year in the league. If you look at both of their careers in the first 7 years of their career they both won the ROY award and the league MVP, also Jordan made it to 3 conference finals as opposed to James 2 conference finals appearances. Within their first 7 years they both went to the NBA finals one time except Jordan Beat the Magic Johnson Lakers in a 5 game gentlemen sweep, while Lebron got swept by the San Antonio Spurs.
Going off the eye test Jordan is the greatest player of All-Time, but LeBron is the most talented. Most talented doesn’t always correlate to the best. What Jordan did over his 15 seasons from an individual stand point and from a team aspect as been unmatched. If James wants to catch Jordan in the G.O.A.T conversation he must turn his 3-5 finals record to at least .500 or above. Although winning championships is more of a team effort reward, we can’t overlook him winning six rings in six attempts not to mention he’s the only NBA player to never have a bad performance in the finals ever, he simply dominated in every facet of the game without ever having to play in a game 7 in the finals. When LeBron retires he will most likely will lead the NBA in All-Time points and assists adding to his historic resume meaning one day in the future he could be considered the G.O.A.T, but only time will tell.
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