Showing posts with label Allen Iverson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Allen Iverson. Show all posts

Sunday, January 21, 2024

New Cards for 22 of Greatest 75 Players for New Teams

Click here for the google sheet or on the images below for the 22 all-time great players for the new Value Add Basketball Game teams we are now creating.

The four other new teams we are adding are from the www.kenpom.com era, so I can make them based on those stats and do the whole team at a time. The coincidentally are based on four incredible players in four consecutive seasons who made the Athletic list of the greatest 75 players of all time;

Texas 2007 Kevin Durant #13 player of all time.

UCLA 2008 Russell Westbrook #46 player of all time.

Arizona St. 2009 James Harden #33 player of all time.

Weber St. 2010 Damian Lillard #68 player of all time.

The process for the 20th century teams takes much longer, and one step we always do is compare the NBA stats of the great players, particularly for stats not kept on college when they played (minutes played, three point shots, steals, blocked shots etc).

We basically took each players best NBA season (obviously against much tougher competition than they faced in college, and assumed they’d draw more fouls and hit 10% more of their 3-point shots (much closer arc) and 2-point shots (much easier defenders).

Below are the cards we created for each player. Note the dunk range and adjusted defense range are all the same, 51-56 and -6. These are usually for the whole team to adjust for level of competition, however since these players cards are based on playing against NBA players we don’t need to adjust the cards down for the ones who played lighter competition.

Durant, Westbrook, Harden and Lillard will be created with the rest of their teams from www.kenpom.com, but we will later add the 22 teams that go with these players.

Do note on the cards below that some great players from the days when front line players played inside, often with their backs to the basket, and would never have taken a 3-pointer, have no 3-pointers but do score and get fouled on a "1" on the 20-sided die roll instead.






Blue numbers on these stats were estimated using various methods because those stats were not kept then.


Here are the College Basketball links to the players above.

Jason Kidd Robert Parish Ray Allen Dave Cowens Allen Iverson Alonzo Mourning John Stockton Karl Malone Wes Unseld Bob Pettit Hal Greer Julius Erving Chris Webber Bob McAdoo Billy Cunningham Dolph Schayes Gary Payton Lenny Wilkens Steve Nash Walt Frazier Reggie Miller Tiny Archibald

Saturday, January 20, 2024

All-time Great Players' Bracket with Links Added to Each Player

 We realize the bracket we posted was a little hard to read since the great players did not fit on the bracket, so we re putting the teams in the same order with links to each star. If you click each link it takes you to the player's page at the College Basketball Reference  The number to the the left of each team is the seed, while the number to the right is where they rank of our 226 great teams in our game. 

We also chose iconic college basketball arenas for each of our four regions. No football stadiums for us, but we also chose to need big enough arenas to seat at least 15,000 imaginary fans. That eliminated iconic Cameron Indoor Stadium (Duke, sell out 9,314) or Hinkle Fieldhouse (Butler, sell out 9,100).

Seed   Midwest Region - All-time Great Players' Teams        Sweet 16                       
 Assembly Hall (Indiana, sell out 17,472) 
   
1Michigan 1993 (Chris Webber) #19 
 Bye 
  Midwest Semi-Final
16Florida St. 1968 (Dave Cowens) #205Mich, FSU, Cent
17Centenary (LA) 1976 (Robert Parish) #206 
   
   
8Oregon St. 1990 (Gary Payton) #169 
25Weber St. 2010 (Damian Lillard) #224 
  Midwest Semi-Final
9California 1993 (Jason Kidd) #170OSU,Web,Cal,Mass
24Massachusetts 1971 (Julius Erving) #223 
   
SeedWest Region - All-time Great Players' Teams Sweet 16
 The Pit (New Mexico, sell out 15,411) 
   
4UCLA 2008 (Russell Westbrook) #46 
 Bye 
  Western Semi-Final
13Texas 2007 (Kevin Durant) #185UCLA,Tex,UTEP
20UTEP 1970 (Tiny Archibald #67) #212 
   
5Georgetown 1989 (Alonzo Mourning) #55 
 Bye 
  Western Semi-Final
12UCLA 1987 (Reggie Miller) #183Gtown, UCLA, UNC
21North Carolina 1965 (Billy Cunningham) #216 
   
SeedEast Region - All-time Great Players' Teams Sweet 16
 Madison Square Garden (New York, sell out 19,812) 
   
2Connecticut 1996 (Ray Allen) #21 
 Bye 
  Eastern Semi-Final
15Louisiana Tech 1985 (Karl Malone) #199Uconn,LaTech, SantaC
18Santa Clara 1996 (Steve Nash) #207 
   
   
7Louisville 1968 (Wes Unseld) #166 
26NYU 1948 (Dolph Schayes) #225 
  Eastern Semi-Final
10Arizona St. 2009 (James Harden) #172Lville,NYY,AZ,Gonz
23Gonzaga 1981 (John Stockton) #221 
   
SeedSouth Region - All-time Great Players' Teams Sweet 16
 Rupp Arena (Kentucky, sell out 20,500) 
   
3North Carolina 1972 (Bob McAdoo) #38 
 Bye 
  Southern Semi-Final
14Providence 1960 (Lenny Wilkens) #198UNC,Prov,Marsh
19Marshall 1956 (Hal Greer #70) #210 
   
6Georgetown 1995 (Allen Iverson) #56 
 Bye 
  Southern Semi-Final
11LSU 1953 (Bob Pettit Jr) #180Gtown,LSU,SoIL
22Southern Illinois 1967 (Walt Frazier Jr) #220

Thursday, December 28, 2023

NBA Great Camby Leads UMass 1996 vs. Liberty & No. 2 Scorer McGhee

I don't usually mix my professional life with this fun sports blog page, but at the risk of losing half my readers, our next Value Add Basketball Game tournament starts with a personally interesting match-up for me as I start a new faith-based organization. Liberty University has been a faith-based leader from the days of Jerry Falwell to DC Talk concerts and beyond, while their opponent is the first of three schools taken to the Final Four by John Calipari, who goes to Mass every morning no matter what - as recounted in this piece. OK, the rest is about basketball, no preaching :-).

This is the first match-up in a tournament of the 16 teams now being calculated and added to even our game at 200 great teams. The 1-seed UMass 1996 was truly an overlooked team when I did earlier cards, as I already rank them as one of the top 40 all-time great teams in my game. Our 16-seed Liberty 2023 is one of the two incredible athletic department stories coming out of Virginia today - the other being James Madison University whose current 2024 team will play our No. 2 seed Oregon State 1982. 

While the underdog, the amazing Darius McGhee of Liberty is the kind of opponents 1-seeds fear. He gets the ball a ton (on a roll of 2, 6 or 7 on the 8-sided die as the player in the country who shot more than any other player last year). If the defense doesn't stop him with a blocked shot or by forcing a turnover, then he hits a 3-pointer on a 1-5 on the 20-sided die. He lit it up with 821 points last season, the second highest total in the country. That included closing the season with 26 points in an NIT upset of Villanova and 31 points in a near upset at Wisconsin in the NIT, to end the season ranked as the 10th best player in the country at www.kenpom.com. At 5'9 he was not big enough for the NBA, but got on the court in the G-League. 

The favorites are John Calipari's first of three schools to make the Final 4 - the only other coach being Rick Pitino. Calipari's Minutemen featured National Player of the Year Marcus Camby, who was also the No. 2 player in the NBA draft being only AI, Allen Iverson. The writers picked UMass No. 1, and coaches said No. 1 behind Kentucky. While the Wildcats did beat them in the Final 4, UMass gave them their closest battle of the tournament - losing by only 7 after Kentucky had blown out their first four opponents by 20+. The Kentucky 1996 team is also u. The game and quite possibly the best of all times though right now we rank Bill Walton's UCLA champs at No. 1.

This left no doubt UMass was the No. 2 team that season, and Calipari would go on to take Memphis and Kentucky to the Final 4, getting his title in 2012 with Kentucky and Anthony Davis. Camby would just miss averaging a career double-double over 16 years in the NBA - including leading the league in blocked shots three years in a row. We are almost done with the cards for the 16 new teams - bringing our total to 200 great teams - but as we often do we start with these sheets for both teams which will be turned into cards soon. 



Liberty 2023, Ht, Pts, Pos – No. 16 Seed of 16 new Value Add Basketball Teams

Colin Porter, 5'9,7.8 ppg, PG-1

Darius McGhee, 5'9,22.8 ppg, SG-2

Joseph Venzant, 6'3,4.2 ppg, SF-3

Kyle Rode, 6'7,10.9 ppg, PF-4

Blake Preston, 6'9,6.7 ppg, C-5

Brody Peebles, 6'2,7.4 ppg, PG-1

Jonathan Jackson, 6'4,1.4 ppg, SG-2

Isiah Warfield, 6'5,2.9 ppg, SF-3

Zach Cleveland, 6'7,3.4 ppg, PF-4

Shiloh Robinson, 6'7,7.6 ppg, C-5


Massachusetts 1996, Ht, Pts, Pos – No. 1 Seed of 16 new Value Add Basketball Teams

Edgar Padilla, 6'2,8.9 ppg, PG-1

Carmelo Travieso, 6'2,12.6 ppg, SG-2

Donta Bright, 6'6,14.5 ppg, SF-3

Dana Dingle, 6'7,10.1 ppg, PF-4

Marcus Camby, 6'11,20.5 ppg,NBA, C-5

Charlton Clarke, 6'3,1.4 ppg, PG-1

Tyrone Weeks, 6'7,5.8 ppg, SG-2

Rigoberto Nunez, 6'7,0.5 ppg, SF-3

Inus Norville, 6'9,2.4 ppg, PF-4

Ted Cottrell, 6'9,0.9 ppg, C-5