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Originally Posted by Minstrel
I see. My mistake on intangibles. I thought your distinction between "PER" and "anecdotal evidence" was to debate the validity of what can't be measured by statistics, like leadership.
My response, though, was about observation in general. I don't trust it (mine included) over statistics, if there's a good measure that removes a lot or all (if possible) confounding factors.
As for BadBaronRudigor's assessment of defense, I accept it, I simply disagree with it. My impression was that I saw a fairly healthy Erving a reasonably amount in the NBA, and that he wasn't quite as good on defense as McGrady. Also, nothing I've read on Erving noted his defense as being particularly noteworthy. My assessment of McGrady's defense is that it's quite good when he's not forced to carry his team on offense, every possession, as he did in his last few Orlando years. In Toronto, in his first season or two in Orlando and in Houston, I think McGrady's defense has ranged from solid to great, and has been underrated.
In the end, though, defense is pretty subjective and I certainly never made any conclusive claims about it, I only gave my opinion.
It is possible that Erving was simply a different beast in the ABA...but that's pretty hard to guage, IMO, even if you saw him play then. A lower caliber league makes a star like Erving look that much better in relation.
As for rebounding, again, it's possible that Erving was just a different player in the ABA, but I doubt his "true ability" was much different from his age 26/27 level in the NBA, which is right at the start of athletic peak or so. Erving seemed to be a slightly better rebounder, but not by much. McGrady has been one of the very best rebounding wing players of his generation (along with Pierce).
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In the end, what are we left with? If intangibles are out, and defense is simply arguable (and thus inconclusive in cases where it's 'close'), then anything that isn't adequately quantified is simply not included?
We have McGrady and Erving roughly equal in scoring capability. I'd actually say T-Mac is deadlier, but who knows, maybe a healthy Erving in today's ruleset would catapult down the lane ad nauseam.
We have McGrady as the superior passer and ball handler(?), by a significant, but not huge gap.
And we have Erving as a better rebounder, especially on the offensive boards.
What else? We can compare steals and blocks, which Erving wins, but it counts for relatively little.
To me, logically, the more you exclude from analysis, the less general application the results will have. We're comparing players as a
whole, but only including a portion of their attributes in the actual analysis.
Doesn't it seem reasonable to say that the analysis would benefit from some consideration of the portion not included? Certainly one would think if we're applying the results to comparing players as a whole and not merely "who was a better offensive player?".
That's my take anyway. I understand that you abhor the myriad pitfalls inherent in qualitative analysis, but surely if we can weed through all the chaff, there's a kernel of insight waiting.
Doing a credible qualitative analysis is just as difficult in its own right as making a credible quantitative analysis. Poorly done, either can yield silly or downright inaccurate results.
How else would Hollinger know that he had
found a better overall measure than "efficiency" in PER without SOME sort of unquantified assumptions or observations about the game??