2012-13 NBA All-Defensive First/Second Team

But I was referring specifically to SF as you can see in the post you quoted. Duncan is better than Ibaka defensively. We're on the same page if that's what you meant.

I meant that the format doesn't require a small forward to be there, it just requires two forwards. That's why justifying the "LeBron shouldn't be on 1st Team All-D" case doesn't have to revolve around small forwards, it can be power forwards all the same. It's why I brought Duncan up.

As for Iggy, you are right about one thing. With 6'10" Gallinari, I also classified him as a SG this season. And I don't believe he belonged to class of Paul George or LeBron James defensively. Kenneth Faried was just as important if not more. You probably still could come up with a case how he belonged to the top class at SG, but you also can't say picking Tony Allen over him is anything near a travesty.

Kenneth Faried is more important? What?

I swear, those all-heart, hustle, high energy guys are almost always vastly overrated on the defensive end. Faried is a very good rebounder, hustler and decent finisher on offense. As much as I like his motor, he is not a good defender. He's not an individual stopper and most definitely not a shot blocker or a rim protector. Saying he's more important for team defense than Iguodala can only be taken as a bad joke.

Impact on Nuggets opponents' ORtg when on the court (lower is better):

McGee +2.1
Faried +1.4
Gallinari -1.2
Koufos -3.0
Iguodala -4.4 (by far the lowest of those who played at least 1000 minutes for Denver this season, Koufos being second)

Just for comparison:

LeBron -3.4
George -2.5
Noah -5.1
Sanders -5.9
Ibaka -0.5
Duncan -4.2
Asik -5.8
M. Gasol -6.9
Conley -8.1
T. Allen -6.6
Garnett -9.0
Paul +5.4
Kobe +4.3
Howard -5.0

Very few perimeter guys can have such a big impact on team defense. It's not that frequent even for bigmen.

This stat isn't ideal - the biggest flaw being that it doesn't take backups into consideration and makes some players look better/worse than they actually are (Conley at -8.1, Bayless at +7.5 or Griffin at +8.1 with Odom at -9.7). So you still have to use your head when looking at it - like pretty much every other stat. In most cases though, it lets you properly see the impact on team defense that a player has. It's much more valuable data than individual DRtg, but we'll get to that in a moment.


I don't have a problem with picking Tony Allen over Iguodala since he's an elite defender as well. I do have a problem with Paul being higher though. The guards in 1st Team All-D should be either Conley and Allen or Iguodala and Allen - which leaves the team without a PG, but once again, the format doesn't require one.

Iggy to Avery Bradley? Now that's a whole new discussion because I also think Avery Bradley's reputation played bigger role in him getting honored. Because he missed big chunk of the season like 32 games, and let's also not forget it took more than a couple games to get his defensive mojo back and that lingering injury issue.

I didn't notice that before, but looking at it now - you're right. Bradley is another terrible pick. He is a good defender (still a little overrated, probably because of being on the Celtics), but how do you name a guy who missed almost half of the damn season to the 1st Team? Had he been healthy and defending on a high level for at least close to the entire season, I'd have no problem with him being chosen to the 2nd Team.

Looking at 82games.com, I can see your point. The Clippers were at their best with him on offensive end with +11.9 ORtg. But at the same time, it's not fair to say that 5.4 differential is entirely Chris Paul's fault. But isn't it a sign where the Clippers put him to use, mostly with units that's stuctured to excel on offense? Does that mean he was terrible on defense individually and for the team? Let's look at simple team/player DRtg if individual number supports that.

when you look at his individual number, it's actually better than team average on the Clippers team who were 8th in league in DRtg(103.6) , which surprisingly is one above the Miami Heat. And the Clippers had only 3 other players who had better numbers than Paul(102) in that department. That's Jordan, and Bledsoe/Odom(who aren't even starters).

Now Chris Paul played often with Green this season, and his DRtg is the team worst 108(but the team excelled in offense). Butler also played often with Paul and his DRtg is ugly 107. Lastly Barne's number is more or less the team average. You get the point.

The on/off data also shows his hugely positive impact on the team's offense and I'm not arguing with that.

Each of the 4 5-man units that include Paul and have played together for at least 150 minutes this season has a DRtg of either 106 or 107 with the team's overall DRtg being 103.6.

No measure or statistic can justify Chris Paul being on 1st Team All-Defense or even being thought of as a good defender. He's there for steals, which is simply stupid.

Team DRtg is the best stat to measure team defense. Individual DRtg isn't worth much, because team defense is infinitely more important than individual defense, because it doesn't account for certain situations, rotations and defensive strategies which could be "let X get his, shut down everybody else" (in which case team defense will likely benefit, but DRtg of the man defending X will plummet) and it's always very reliant on the team's DRtg. Last season Carlos Boozer had the second best DRtg in the league. You can find a lot more ridiculous results of individual DRtg every season.

Fair enough. You are using opponent DRtg as nearly all end-it-all argument though.

Unfortunately no defensive metric is perfect, and it's been the biggest challenge in stat world anyways.

Exactly - we don't have perfect stats to measure a player's defense. How they change opponents' ORtg is probably the closest thing, because it shows how the team as a whole reacts to his presence on the court and work (or lack thereof) on the defensive end. Like I said, it has its flaws and it can sometimes produce weird results, but it's a far cry from individual DRtg. The only thing individual DRtg measures is the points scored by your matchup and we know team defense is much more complicated than that. Individual DRtg can have Carlos Boozer second in the entire league, on/off usually has the best players occupating top spots.