2004-2005 Adjusted Plus-Minus Ratings

For an introduction to this method and the numbers for the 2005-2006 season please see this article: http://82games.com/lewin2.htm

Before we take a look at the 2004-2005 adjusted plus-minus leaderboard I’ll remind everyone what happened that year. The San Antonio Spurs won the title, beating the Pistons in 7 games. Steve Nash won his first MVP, and Emeka Okafor edged out Dwight Howard for rookie of the year.

Now for the leaders:

2004-05 Top 15

Player	Team	Min.	Rating
Paul Pierce	Celtics	2960	18.57
Tim Duncan	Spurs	2200	17.64
Elton Brand	Clippers	3001	13.22
Stephon Marbury	Knicks	3289	12.40
Brendan Haywood	Wizards	1865	12.38
Emanuel Ginobili	Spurs	2196	12.36
Tony Allen	Celtics	1251	11.94
Jamaal Tinsley	Pacers	1299	11.70
Jason Kidd	Nets	2446	11.15
Rashard Lewis	Supersonics	2698	10.41
Dirk Nowitzki	Mavericks	3024	10.32
Vladimir Radmanovic	Supersonics	1859	9.81
Brad Miller	Kings	2089	9.76
Shane Battier	Grizzlies	2513	9.75
Kevin Garnett	Timberwolves	3115	9.48

Obviously there are some surprises here. Paul Pierce comes in number one in a year that many considered a down year for him. However, taking a look at the rest of the players on a team that won 47 games and the Atlantic Division, Pierce must have been playing out of his mind.

It’s easy to see why the Spurs won the title given that they started two of the top six players in league in Ginobili and Duncan. The Spurs finished the regular season behind the Suns in the standings only because Duncan and Ginobili both missed games and played only about 30 minutes per game when they were healthy. During the playoffs when their minutes increased they continued to play at a high level and the Spurs cruised through the playoffs (until the finals at least).

Also see: the full list of '04-05 ratings for all players.

It seems that the outcry over Nash’s MVP win was justified, as Nash was not even among the top twenty in impact. Shaq was the popular alternative, but he had even less of an impact than Nash did. Tim Duncan probably should have won his third MVP in four years, while Pierce certainly deserved consideration for his role in the Celtics improbably playoff run. Dirk Nowitzki probably deserves mention as well for keeping making the Mavs better than the previous year despite the loss of Nash.

Stepping away from the numbers for a minute, it is possible that Steve Nash’s value is understated by this method because he offers leadership for the Suns and fosters a style of play that continues even when he leaves the court. From a statistical standpoint however, the 2004-2005 Phoenix Suns were an ensemble team that didn’t fall apart when Nash went to the bench.

Continuing with the Suns, you can see why Steve Belkin fought to veto the Joe Johnson-Boris Diaw deal. The Hawks were giving up two first round draft picks, and their best player in Diaw, for the right to pay max money to a player who was slightly below average in the previous season. While Joe Johnson has posted excellent numbers with the Hawks, he hasn’t brought them much help in the win column and they don’t play better with him court. Diaw, on the other hand, has continued doing for the Suns what he did with the Hawks: making the team better team when he is on the floor.

2004-2005 plus 2005-2006

Looking at two years together can help alleviate the sample size issues inherent in adjusted plus-minus analysis. Below are the top players in terms of average adjusted plus-minus over past two seasons. It should be noted that this is different from what Dan Rosenbaum did in his article here at 82games.com combining the 2002-2003 and 2003-2004 seasons. Dan combined the data from those two season and ran a regression on that new larger data set. This is allows a greater number of player combinations and creates a more accurate regression. The downside of this method, when compared to simply taking the weighted average of the numbers from the past two years, is that it treats a player as being unchanged from year to year, whereas we know that players can improve and decline from year to year. Overall running the regression on two years of data is probably the better method, but simply averaging (weighted by minutes) a player’s numbers from the past two years gives a good picture of who the best players have been.

Two Year Top 20

	2004-05			2005-06			Two Years
Player	Team	Min	Adj +/-	Team	Min	Adj +/-	MinTot	2YrAve
Rasheed Wallace	Pistons	2694	7.18	Pistons	2776	20.20	5470	13.79
LeBron James	Cavaliers	3380	5.99	Cavaliers	3357	19.59	6737	12.76
Andrei Kirilenko	Jazz	1351	8.51	Jazz	2601	13.83	3952	12.01
Ron Artest	Pacers	289	7.88	Kings	1603	11.83	2494	11.37
Emanuel Ginobili	Spurs	2196	12.36	Spurs	1808	10.01	4004	11.30
Ben Wallace	Pistons	2670	3.78	Pistons	2887	17.92	5557	11.13
Brad Miller	Kings	2089	9.76	Kings	2918	11.07	5007	10.53
Stephon Marbury	Knicks	3289	12.40	Knicks	2194	7.57	5483	10.47
Dirk Nowitzki	Mavericks	3024	10.32	Mavericks	3085	10.52	6109	10.42
Kobe Bryant	Lakers	2685	5.40	Lakers	3273	14.34	5958	10.32
Chris Paul				Hornets	2804	10.22	2804	10.22
Paul Pierce	Celtics	2960	18.57	Celtics	3080	2.07	6040	10.16
Tim Duncan	Spurs	2200	17.64	Spurs	2779	3.25	4979	9.61
Elton Brand	Clippers	3001	13.22	Clippers	3092	5.33	6093	9.22
Kevin Garnett	Timberwolves	3115	9.48	Timberwolves	2956	8.05	6071	8.78
Steve Nash	Suns	2567	7.21	Suns	2794	9.63	5361	8.47
Jason Kidd	Nets	2446	11.15	Nets	2968	5.90	5414	8.27
Tony Allen	Celtics	1251	11.94	Celtics	976	3.36	2227	8.18
Alonzo Mourning	Heat	242	1.12	Heat	1298	11.78	2001	8.03
Shane Battier	Grizzlies	2513	9.75	Grizzlies	2835	6.00	5348	7.76

This list shows us which players have consistently made their team better over the past two seasons. Rasheed and Ben Wallace are buoyed by abnormally high 2005-2006 numbers, the reasons for which have been discussed in the 2005-06 article. Even so they clearly deserve to be considered among the NBA’s best, as they have led the Pistons to 118 wins over the past two years.

The other top names are largely as you might expect. LeBron, Nowitzki, Kobe, Pierce, Duncan, Brand, Garnett, Nash and Kidd all improved their team more than eight points per one hundred possessions above average. This seems to be about the cutoff for and elite player. Nineteen players reached this mark, of those eleven have been listed so far.

The remaining eight deserve some discussion. Andrei Kirilenko, Ron Artest, Manu Ginobili and Brad Miller are all guys who are generally left out of the best players in the league discussion, but seem to consistently have elite level impact. Stephon Marbury was once considered one of the brightest young stars in the league, but recently he’s been under heavy fire from the media for not being “a winner.” The numbers tell a somewhat different story as the Knicks clearly played much better with Marbury on the court over the past two years.

Chris Paul has only played one NBA season, so it remains to be seen if he can consistently play at an elite level, but if his rookie season is any indication he already merits discussion with Steve Nash and Jason Kidd as the league’s best point guards. Alonzo Mourning is at the other end of his career. He is no longer considered an elite player, and rightly so because he plays limited minutes, but when he is out there he has consistently made an impact for the Heat.

The most surprising player in the top twenty would have to be Tony Allen. Allen had a superb rookie season in 2004-2005 followed by a mediocre 2005-2006 in which he struggled with injuries. This year Allen was playing extremely well before he tore his ACL (trying to dunk after the whistle was blown). As a Celtics fan, I hope he returns to 100% as he has shown the ability to be a true impact player.

At the opposite end of the list we some expected names and some less so. Primoz Brezec, Maurice Evans, DeShawn Stevenson, Mark Blount, Chris Mihm,, Michael Olowokandi, Sebastian Telfair and Eddy Curry have consistently killed their teams over the past two years. Apparently Al Jefferson and Steve Blake belong in that category as well, which saddens me because the Celtics have anointed Jefferson our franchise player and because I’ve been a fan of Blake since his Maryland days. Hopefully Jefferson’s improvement in traditional statistics this year has been accompanied by a similar improvement in effect on the team. Also worth noting is that the Celtics have had five of the ten worst players over the past three years (Telfair, Olowokandi, Mihm, Blount, Jefferson).

Also see: the full list of Two Year average Ratings for all players.

Coming in future columns:
- Individual offensive and defensive adjusted plus-minus ratings
- Player wins and losses based on adjusted plus-minus ratings

Special Thanks To:
Dan Rosenbaum
Roland Beech
Vittorio Addona

David Lewin is a 19 year-old college sophomore from Wayland, Massachusetts. He currently attends Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota where he plays football. He has contributed research and articles to Pro Football Prospectus 2006 and FootballOutsiders.com in addition to 82games.com. David is interested in a career in sports when he graduates and is always looking for interesting summer opportunities. A list of his articles can be found at 82games.com/lewin.htm. He can be reached at dlew33@yahoo.com