Experiment: Best Team Without Superstar [Archive]

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cardzfan1234

06-16-2009, 01:48 PM

We as Cavs fans love to pride ourselves in the fact that our guy (LeMVP) is not only the best player in the world, but does so with an inferior roster. In many ways, this debate is impossible to project - but let's just say we took the best player off every playoff team in the NBA. How would you rank these teams from 1-12? Some teams (Houston, Denver, Utah and Chicago) were difficult to decide who was the best player, so I just made a decision with McGrady over Yao and Boozer over D-Will being the most questionable. (For my defense, since Houston/Utah played without T-Mac/Boozer for much of the season, it was easier :)).

I also made each team 100% healthy, even if that wasn't the case this season. Below are the adjusted starting lineups with a few valuable bench players listed in parentheses. Looking at the 2009 rosters, lets analyze how each of the top teams would look without their top player:

Orlando: Nelson, Lee, Turkoglu, Lewis, Gortat (Pietrus, Alston, Batie)
Los Angeles: Fisher, Ariza, Odom, Gasol, Bynum (Walton, Farmar, Vujajic)
Cleveland: Mo, Delonte, Wally, Varejao, Z (Boobie, Ben, Sasha)
Boston: Rondo, Allen, Pierce, Big Baby, Perkins (T. Allen, Marbury, Powe)
Denver: Billups, Jones, Kleiza, Martin, Nene (JR Smith, Birdman, Carter)
Houston: Brooks, Artest, Battier, Scola, Yao (Wafer, Landry, Barry)
San Antonio: Parker, Mason, Finley, Bonner, Thomas (Gionbili, Hill, Gooden)
Chicago: Hinrich, Gordon, Deng, Tyrus, Noah (Salmons, Miller, Tim Thomas)
Dallas: Kidd, Wright, Howard, Bass, Dampier (Barea, Terry, Singleton)
Utah: Williams, Brewer, CJ Miles, Millsap, Okur (Korver, Kirlenko, Harpring)
Portland: Blake, Fernandez, Batum, Aldridge, Oden (Outlaw, Pryzbilla, Rodriguez)
New Orleans: Daniels, Butler, Peja, West, Chandler (Posey, Armstrong, Julian Wright)

Then I created a subjective rubric based on my opinions of the remaining team after taking away the No. 1 guy. I broke it up into four main categories and assigned each team a point value (12 for the highest, 1 for the lowest, and 2-11 for everything in between). The total point values are below. Of course this rubric of mine doesn't take into account team defense, coaching, chemistry, intangibles, etc. Its not a perfect system by any means, but I think the totals are a pretty good representation of how things might look if the top player was removed from each team.

Substitute Superstar: Houston, Boston, Los Angeles, San Antonio, Utah, Denver, Orlando, Portland, New Orleans, Cleveland, Chicago, Dallas

Starting Backcourt: Boston, Cleveland, Orlando, Utah, San Antonio, Denver, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Dallas, Portland, New Orleans

Starting Frontcourt: Los Angeles, Orlando, Houston, Boston, New Orleans, Portland, Utah, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Cleveland, San Antonio

Bench: San Antonio, Portland, Orlando, Denver, Chicago, Dallas, Boston, Utah, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Cleveland, Houston

Boston - 38
Orlando - 37
Los Angeles - 30
San Antonio - 30
Houston - 28
Utah - 28
Denver - 26
Portland - 25
Chicago - 21
Cleveland - 18
New Orleans - 16
Dallas - 15

Not a big surprise with Boston at the top followed closely by Orlando and LA. We all saw that even without Garnett, Boston is still a dangerous team with the improved play of Rondo and Big Baby. The Magic still have three All-Stars BESIDES Howard, so Orlando at the top is expected. The Lakers would have a sick frontcourt, easily the best. Dallas and New Orleans are the only teams below the Cavs, and I still believe they belong there. I didn't realize how putrid Dallas really looks without Dirk. San Antonio is near the top on the strength of Parker and Gionbili alone, probably the best 1-2 combo of any team besides Boston. Houston, Utah, Denver, and Portland round out the middle group - which sounds about right to me. Chicago slightly ahead of Cleveland makes sense. After watching this team play tough against Boston, throwing in a healthy Deng in there while removing LeBron/Rose would put the Bulls' talent ahead of the Cavs.

And in case you were wondering, it is the off-season and I am equally bored and anxious for late October!

Walter White

06-16-2009, 03:05 PM

pride ourselves in the fact that our guy (LeMVP) is not only the best player in the world
Im pretty sure LeMVP was banned? :chuckles:

The Voice

06-16-2009, 03:17 PM

Utah's superstar is Williams, not Boozer.

breanna

06-16-2009, 03:35 PM

Boozer is not Utah's superstar. It's clearly D-Will. I don't know how you could think otherwise.

cardzfan1234

06-16-2009, 03:37 PM

Utah's superstar is Williams, not Boozer.

One could make an argument either way. Because Milsap is there, Boozer is much more replaceable. As I said above, I did it partly because we saw Utah without Boozer for much of this year.

If I switched the two, the frontcourt and bench (with Millsap moving to the bench) ratings of Utah would jump up while the backcourt would arguably be the worst. In the end, my subjective rating of Utah without their best player would still probably be the same, give or take 1. The same could be said of substituting Yao for T-Mac, Billups for Melo, and Gordon for Rose.

xAusT1n

06-16-2009, 03:40 PM

ughh who did u take off of Houstons team? Tmac? pshh it should deff by yao

Primetime

06-16-2009, 03:42 PM

Good thread!

This logic should be used by the front office when determining who LeBron's teammates should be.

It should also serve as evidence that since the Cavs won the most games when being so low on the list, they have the best star player over all other teams.

funkmasta

06-16-2009, 03:42 PM

cardzfan1234

06-16-2009, 04:25 PM

I'm shocked that you would rank Houston's bench last, considering that they were a huge part of the reason that they were able to take LA as far as they did. They might have one of the deepest teams IMO.

I agree the bench played well in the LA series, but overall I just don't see that being a desirable bench. Wafer and Landry have some skills, but outside of that the bench is not very productive. You could make an argument to possibly put them ahead of Cleveland, New Orleans, or LA - but its close.

Most of the other teams I put ahead of Houston in regards to bench was because they have one go-to bench guy (i.e. Manu, Kirlenko, Pietrus, Salmons, etc.) I don't see Wafer of Landry as that type of player. But the more I think about it, from a purely talent stand point, I would give up Boobie and any of our bench bigs up for the production of Wafer/Landry (combined 19 ppg). So maybe Cleveland does have the worst bench. :mad:

BooyaCS

06-16-2009, 04:39 PM

Actually if you look over all the rosters most of them you can say have 2 superstar/allstar players.

LA - Kobe/Gasol
Orlando - Howard/Hedo
Denver - Billups/Melo
Utah - Williams/Boozer
Houston Yao/TMac
Boston - KG/Allen/Pierce
SA - Duncan/Parker

Boarderline 2 stars
NO - Paul/West

Only 1
Chicago - Rose
Cleveland - LBJ
Dallas - Dirk

The Voice

06-16-2009, 04:43 PM

BooyaCS

06-16-2009, 05:18 PM

Still it proves my point that we only have 1 true "star" caliber player on the team with a bunch of very good players.

This is why a Josh smith makes more sense to me than Shaq. Smith has the ability to develop into a great/superstar player while Shaq is almost done. It also shows that NO, Dallas, Chicago, Cleveland need more talent.

Jon

06-19-2009, 05:26 PM

You have to go with Yao and Deron as the stars of their team, and when consider where the teams will be you have to look at the role of the superstar. Orlando is built around Dwight much like we're built around LeBron. Gortat's done really well for them, but I just don't see them being a functional team without him. Similiarly whenever you remove the primary playmaker from a team you're going to hurt them real bad. On the other hand, Denver would be ok without Melo because they'd still have Billups to create and other guys to setup. Same with Boston. They miss KG but they have other bigs they can setup and other bigs who try to defend.

Primetime

06-19-2009, 05:37 PM

williemayshayes

06-19-2009, 07:41 PM

Mo Williams and Delonte I would consider to be "very good." The others are just role players.

Ehh we might slightly overrate delonte from time to time...he plays well enough in stretches to earn such talk, but he is not quite the caliber of being a "star"

Let me revise that to Mo - "very good" and West - "rock solid".

Jon

06-20-2009, 12:01 AM

Slightly overrate Delonte?

Take away LeBron and Mo and Delonte are back to being - off the radar nothings.

The_dawg09

06-20-2009, 02:04 PM

this thread is really using the term "superstar" loosely, isn't it?

Thunder

06-20-2009, 04:41 PM

Slightly overrate Delonte?

Take away LeBron and Mo and Delonte are back to being - off the radar nothings.

Mo was still good. He was known for his scoring ability and clutch shots by many non-Bucks fans. Delonte was just a roleplayer, and all he is now is a better roleplayer...

breanna

06-20-2009, 04:52 PM

this thread is really using the term "superstar" loosely, isn't it?

Yes it is. There aren't many real superstars in this league. You have superstars, all-stars, and stars. Don't get them mixed up. Oh, and then you just have the role players.

Damien O'Connel

06-20-2009, 04:59 PM

All this demonstrates is how dominant lebron is. I really don't understand how people can say kobe is a better player, do you really think if lebron was on the lakers they would be a worse team? I've really been pushing this hard lately: it really shouldn't be an argument who the best player in the league is right now, and it is an insult to how hard lebron plays every night not to call him the best.

cardzfan1234

06-20-2009, 05:14 PM

this thread is really using the term "superstar" loosely, isn't it?

You're right, it really is referring to the best/most important player on a good team. In order to be a superstar, it must be a pristegious thing. That may include maybe 10 or so players in the NBA. Some would say a little more, others a little less. LeBron, Kobe, Wade, CP3, and Howard are the definite superstars. Guys like Duncan, KG, Yao, Dirk, Melo, etc. are also right there in the discussion.

Jon

06-20-2009, 11:52 PM

Mo was still good. He was known for his scoring ability and clutch shots by many non-Bucks fans. Delonte was just a roleplayer, and all he is now is a better roleplayer...

Disagree. He was known for toasting certain teams, but the Bucks were -6.7 with Mo on the floor, and -7.0 with him off the floor and was considered a swinging gate on defense.

That's average/mediocre at best.

Th3xTrUtH

06-21-2009, 11:33 AM

what are your thoughts on washingtons?

at 1 point butler and arenas was just awesome... now im not sure their superstars but just really good players

Jon

06-21-2009, 12:23 PM

Gilbert is the closest thing they have to a superstar and they aren't much different without him *if* their other players are healthy and they have a competent PG to replace him.

But that gets back to my argument about role. Arenas makes the Wiz a more potent offensive team, but he hurts them on defense, and since they have other potent offensive players having him in the game just shifts where the scoring has to come from.

So with a healthier roster and Antonio Daniels and Roger Mason playing well, they barely missed Arenas in terms of W-L's; but with those two guys gone, Heywood out, playing their young guys, and other health problems they dropped to near worst in the league.

There's a fine line ...