The GOAT NBA Index: Ranking and holistically scoring player performance from the 2017 playoffs.
The 2017–2018 NBA regular season is set to begin shortly, which makes this a great time to reflect on last season’s championship phase and rank the players that competed for the title. Who was the best performer across the board? LeBron? Durant? Kawhi? Curry? Parker? Teague? Irving? Which teams had the best starting lineups? The best benches? And how did key players match up against each other performance wise? We’ll be using the GOAT (GT) Index to dissect playoff activity from last year and answer these questions. So let’s get started!
What is the GOAT Index?
The GOAT (GT) Index is a weighted scoring system I created in 2016 to holistically assess, score and rank player performance. Unlike other scoring systems used in basketball, the GT Index takes the full breadth of a players performance into consideration, while also adjusting for pace/rotation minutes, meaning we will be able to rank starters and bench players on a fair scale. Being the best player on a basketball team is not simply dependent on scoring the most points, making the most assists, getting the most rebounds or steals. The GOAT (GT) Index is a combination of all those factors and more: fouls, shot effectiveness, how many plays were run through each player and how much players contributed to team wins. We’re not considering championships won, as teams win championships, not individual players, and we’ll be looking at advanced metrics (win shares, usage rates, eFG) in tandem with ppg, free throws, steals, blocks, rebounds, assists and turnovers on a per 36 mins basis, all evenly weighted. If you want a step by step walk-through of how to create the GT Index, I strongly recommend you download this GT Index report that ranks the top NBA players from the mid 1970s — early 2000s. I explain all the steps I took to create the Index in detail, plus its a great study as it pits Jordan vs LeBron, Olajuwon vs Rodman, Kobe vs Wade, Abdul Jabbar vs Shaq, and many more combinations!
Big shoutout to my good friend and fellow analyst Chris Carter, creator of the Rugby Boss for eyeballing my work and being an excellent source of feedback. The data used in this analysis was sourced from www.basketball-reference.com, and I want to thank the good guys there, in particular Sean, who provided timely answers to all my questions on their data.
Before we get to the rankings, I have to call out an important point.
Minutes, minutes, minutes…
The GT Index is built on fairness, inclusion and objectivity, and on that note my original goal was to rank every single player that participated in the 2017 playoffs. But then it became clear to me that a big challenge with this study would regard outliers: players who performed well but played limited minutes. Domantas Sabonis, who came off the bench for the Thunder last year is a perfect example. Sabonis played no more than 6 minutes total over the entire 2017 playoffs, yet made good use of his time on the court, making all 4 of his free throws, grabbing 2 rebounds, a steal and a block. If we scaled Sabonis’s metrics on a per 36 minute basis and factored in his Win/Shares, he would outrank every single player in the playoff pool, including powerhouses like LeBron James and Russell Westbrook. So to address these random outliers I created a threshold and decided to only include players that played a total of 36 minutes or more during the 2017 playoffs. Doing so meant that I had to remove these players from the analysis:
With a clean data set, we can now get right into the action.
Overall GT Index Player Rankings
Below are the GT Index/player rankings for the 2017 NBA playoffs:
The above is an overall list. Below are the top ten performers from the 2017 playoffs:
I’m sure you have alot of questions at this point. I sure did when I first ran the numbers. Let’s dig in and investigate a few key highlights:
Why Isn’t Kyrie Irving in the Top 10?
With the overall GT Index, Kyrie ranks at #33. What??? How is this possible? Mr. highlight reel himself? Even after triple checking his stats the results were the same. So I put on my analyst hat and began to investigate the “why” behind his ranking. Kyrie is known for his scoring ability and handles, and was one of the top scorers in the 2017 finals (ranked 8th). What you may not know is that Kyrie also ranked close to the worst out of the playoff pool with turnovers (129th), he was virtually non-existent when it came to rebounding (139th), blocks (88th) and steals (54th). He ranked 22nd when it came to assists, pretty average for an elite point guard. Considering the fact that he’s such a great scorer, he ranked 30th with free throws. And his glamorous trick shots, while great for highlight reels in reality were not the most effective shots (ranked 65th with eFG) . And that has alot to do with his preference for 1 on 1 play. Now granted, alot of Kyrie’s limitations were arguably because of the constraints he had to deal with playing under the coaching structure at Cleveland; we’ll discuss Kyrie some more in an upcoming section that ranks all point guards from the playoffs.
Clint Capela at #2?
This was the biggest surprise for me after I ran the numbers. Clint Capela came out of nowhere to clinch the #2 spot, outranking names like Westbrook, Durant and fellow teammate James Harden. Like Kyrie, I triple checked his stats to make sure I hadn’t made a mistake, and then I started digging deep for explanations. To understand Capela’s ascent, we have to set context. Remember, this analysis takes a 360 view and assesses everything about a player, including how much value they provided to their teams. The Rockets were not known for defense. But Clint Capela stepped up and changed all of that. Throughout Houston’s entire playoff run, Capela dominated defensively, which clearly shows in his ratings (he ranked 1st with blocks, 6th with rebounds and 11th when it came to win shares). He was the main reason the Rockets stayed in the playoffs as long as they did, and his high win share rating is likely due to how much the Rockets needed him: Nene’s injury in game 4 of the Spurs series meant Capela had to carry much of the burden against the twin towers of Pau Gasol and LaMarcus Aldridge. Clint Capela did everything to keep the Rockets going defensively, but unfortunately the Rockets offense did not compliment his efforts, and Houston could not make it to the championships. Clint Capela deserves his #2 spot.
Let’s now breakdown performance by position.
GT Rankings by Position: Center
Ranking at #2 after Capela came Greg Monroe, a center who made the most of his playoff debut coming off the bench. He ranked 7th in the win share department, and ranked 9th in the steals department on a per 36 min basis, which I personally found very impressive considering he’s a center. He made the best of his time on the court, and his numbers against the Raptors were nothing short of extraordinary. Rudy Gobert, the man who I thought would lead the center category in this study ranked at #4 (he ranked 3rd with rebounds). One has to wonder what Gobert’s rankings would have been had he not had to endure his knee injury. Rebounding machine DeAndre Jordan, ranked at #18 with centers…while he torched the rebound category (2nd), he under-performed in almost every other category. Dwight Howard ranked at #14, above names like Tristan Thompson and Marc Gasol, and led the playoff pool in blocked shots (1st).
GT Rankings by Position: Power Forward
Channing Frye ranked #1 amongst power forwards, surprisingly edging out Draymond Green by a few points (Frye had a GT score of 1.49 compared to Green’s 1.45). Almost dead even, with Green leading with popular stats like rebounds (ranked 20th), assists (ranked 10th) and steals (ranked 15th), while Frye led with points (ranked 24th), eFG (ranked 6th), and turnovers (ranked 8th). LaMarcus Aldridge, an All-Star who I expected to rank higher, ranked at #15, not surprising given his less than stellar performances later in the playoffs, especially against Golden State.
GT Rankings by Position: Small Forward
LeBron James emerged as the #1 player in the overall GT rankings, and as such he dominated the small forward category with a GT score of 1.64. With the exception of free throws (he ranked 104th), LeBron dominated every other category, ranking 3rd in the win-share category. Kawhi Leonard came in second among small forwards with a GT score of 1.59. Like LeBron, Kawhi took the lead in categories across the board, and he ranked 1st in the win/share category; a fitting trophy considering how his ankle injury swung the momentum in favor of the Warriors and dashed any hopes the Spurs had at winning the title. Durant came in 3rd in the small forward category with a GT score of 1.53. Durant came under fierce criticism last year for joining an already stacked Warriors squad, but he ignored his critics and enabled the Warriors with the best starting squad in the NBA (more on that below).
GT Rankings by Position: Shooting Guard
Patrick McCaw was another surprise, taking in the #1 rank in the shooting guard category with a GT score of 1.35. McCaw is a young, long two way player that showed alot of promise and made the best use of his limited minutes on the court on both the defensive and offensive ends (check out his highlights from last years playoffs), and his presence on Golden State only speaks to their scouting brilliance. Jimmy Butler and Dwayne Wade, both from the Bulls ranked #2 (1.29) and #3 (1.28) in the shooting guard category. Klay Thompson struggled through much of the playoffs, and his inconsistency scoring wise dropped him down to #20 (0.89) among shooting guards.
GT Rankings by Position: Point Guard
Basketball in recent years has shifted to favor guards and perimeter play, which makes this category very exciting. Russell Westbrook emerged as the #1 ranked point guard from the 2017 playoffs (GT score of 1.57), beating Steph Curry by a fraction (Curry at #2 logged a GT score of 1.52). Westbrook set remarkable records last season, and during the playoffs continued his triple double campaign. Chris Paul ranked at #4, ranking 2nd overall with assists. Coach D’Antoni’s decision to move Harden from the 2 to the 1 was a brilliant idea; Harden ranked at #6 among point guards (with a GT score of 1.36), and rewarded his coach by torching offensive metrics (ranked 6th overall in points per 36 and 4th overall with assists) but it almost seems as if he (Harden) got burned out toward the end of Houston’s playoff run (Harden had the 2nd highest usage rate during the playoffs). Kyrie Irving came in at #8 among point guards, while Isaiah Thomas ranked at #10. Kyrie Irving was an excellent scorer during the playoffs, but a floor general (think Chris Paul) he was not. But then context is needed: perhaps Irving’s role during the playoffs was not to be a pass first point guard but rather a scorer (where the league seems to be heading)? That may be the case, but there were still point guards that outperformed him in other areas beyond assists. The GT Index rewards all around play, which is why Russell Westbrook dominated the point guard category.
GT Rankings: Starting Lineups
Injuries is perhaps the best word that sums up the 2017 playoffs, and Golden State, along with a few other teams may not have won key games were it not for injuries that forced lineup changes. Golden State emerged with the leagues best starting 5 with a combined GT score of 1.28, no surprise there. Cleveland came in second with a starting lineup GT score of 1.23. Both Cleveland and Golden State had no significant injuries to contend with. The Spurs on the other hand had to deal with star player injuries (Leonard, Parker) as did the Celtics (Isaiah Thomas), Clippers (Blake Griffin), Bulls (Rajon Rondo) and Grizzlies (Zach Randolph, Tony Allen) which in a sense reflects how much those players meant to their teams.
GT Rankings: Bench Lineups
As key players fell to injuries during the 2017 playoffs, coaches played chess and used bench players to fill the voids left by their high performing stars. San Antonio led the way in this category as players like Patty Mills and Ginobili were called upon. Channing Frye was a difference maker for Cleveland coming off the bench, and he emerged as one of the most effective shooters for Cleveland (he ranked 6th with eFGs). Golden State ranked at #3 with overall bench performance. Outside of Matt Barnes, Golden State boasted a powerful bench that housed players like Javale Mcgee, Patrick MCaw, Ian Clark and Shaun Livingston. The Celtics exposed Chicago’s inexperienced and unmotivated roster, by winning four consecutive games and blowing the Bulls out in spectacular fashion in game 6 of their series.
The 2017 GT Index Roster Selection
These players made the cut for the GT Index 2016-2017 Team.
Starters
- PG: Russell Westbrook
- SG: Patrick McCaw
- SF: LeBron James
- PF: Channing Frye
- C: Clint Capela
Bench
- PG: Stephen Curry
- SG: Jimmy Butler
- SF: Kawhi Leonard
- PF: Draymond Green
- C: Greg Monroe
