Who Are The Top Players of NBA According to Data?

Paul Pierce, former NBA champion with Celtics and MVP in 2008, said recently, that NBA’s current top player, LeBron James isn’t part of the 5 all-time bests. Let me clarify. He claims that Michael Jordan, Bill Russel, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant and Larry Bird are all better players than LeBron. Knowingly, James and Pierce have history, they never liked one another, however, this statement and Netflix’s recent big hit, The Last Dance gave me the idea to delve into this topic and examine who are the best players of NBA according to data.

The Model and Data Used

When we are speaking about data in NBA, our options are inexhaustible. We have essential stats like points scored, field goals made, rebounds, assists, steals, and so on, however, we also have player tracking since the 2013–14 season. I chose the RAPTOR model from FiveThirtyEight which utilizes player tracking, yet also available for all seasons from 1976–77 onward with approximative calculations.

RAPTOR is a plus-minus statistic that measures the number of (performance) points a player contributes to his team’s offense and defense per 100 possessions, relative to a league-average player. RAPTOR score is based on two major components: the box score and the on-off score.

Without going into too much detail, these components show how the team’s performance changes when the player is on and off the floor and how the player’s teammates performed while they were on the floor without the said player. The full breakdown of the model is available on FiveThirtyEight’s website.

The model’s limitation is that these statistics assume that player performance can be added up to project team performance, moreover the model does not consider coaching or team chemistry. When we are searching for the best players of NBA these limitations shouldn’t be much of a problem as we are looking for the best individual performance. Another limitation that we cannot neglect is that RAPTOR is only available from the 1976–77 season, therefore, we cannot evaluate Bill Russel’s performance, who won 11 championships under his 13-year tenure in Celtics from 1956 to 1969.

The Best Players Of Each Season

Let’s start with the below infographic showing who was the best player of each season starting from 1977 according to their RAPTOR score, also presenting how the season’s highest RAPTOR score changed througout the years. There was just 3 cases when a RAPTOR score below 15 resulted in being the best player of the season (‘77, ‘79 and ‘99), while Jordan dominated the late 80s - early 90s having a RAPTOR score higher than 25 in 6 consecutive seasons.

Based on the number of seasons a player had the highest RAPTOR score, Jordan swept the floor with the competition by being the best in 9 seasons, followed by LeBron James, who was the best in 6 seasons.

The Absolute Bests

Since we have RAPTOR scores for each season I think it’s only fair to have a ranking based on individual seasons and on career means as well.

Best Players Based On A Single Season

Based on each player’s best season, Jordan was the best with a RAPTOR score of 28,8 in 1991 and James is the second (with 28,5 in 2009), followed by Curry, Paul, and Garnett.

Rest Of The Best 10 Are:

Best Players Considering Their Overall Career

When we are searching for the best players of NBA ever played, we cannot rely on one great season only. This is why I also compiled a ranking based on one’s career’s mean RAPTOR score.

Rest Of The Best 10 Are:

While the top 2 players remained the same, there are a lot of differences in the rankings and several interesting details behind them.

The Consistency Of Magic Johnson

Magic Johnson is the 3rd best player of NBA based on career means, however, looking at single seasons he is nowhere to be found. His best season was in 1987 when he achieved a RAPTOR score of 21,3. This is only the 31st best season ever among all players. The reason why he is so highly rated is that he was extremely consistent throughout his career.

Michael Jordan’s “Greatest Of All Times” Performance

It’s worth mentioning, that Jordan had 7 out of the 10 top seasons of a player all time, meaning he truly made a difference when he was on the court by playing on an incredibly high level.

Jordan picked up the pace very quickly being the 3rd best player in his rookie season already. He played in 15 seasons throughout his career and was the best player in 9 of them. His two worst seasons in the Bulls were ‘86 - when he struggled with injuries - and ‘95 - when he suddenly returned at the end of the season after his first retirement from basketball. Whenever Jordan was the best player in a season, he absolutely dominated the field having all-time highest RAPTOR scores demonstrating his world-class performance.

Jordan played for Washington Wizards in seasons 2001-02 and 2002-03 after his return from his second retirement, and although he had great games he couldn’t reach his previous form and finished basketball for good in 2003.

Where Is Kobe Bryant?

I know you probably missing someone and may ask, where is Kobe Bryant? Kobe had some difficulties in his first years in the professional league and only reached 4th best RAPTOR score by his 4th season. He had to wait until his 8th year in the league to achieve podium regarding RAPTOR scores. Based on this model, Kobe was never the best player in a season and had quite a number of terrible seasons affecting his career mean.

LeBron James

Lastly, let’s check the performance of LeBron James throughout his ongoing career.

As previously shown, LeBron James has the 2nd best season of NBA history with his 2008-09 season playing for Cleveland Cavaliers. Only Jordan’s ‘90-91 season surpasses James’ best performance. James was the best player in 6 seasons based on the RAPTOR score, again, only Jordan outperforming him in this regard. Worth mentioning, that since the 1976-77 season none of the highest performing players could reach the top with 2 different teams, except for LeBron James who changed teams after the 2009-10 season and yet was able to maintain his form and continued to dominate the field for 3 more years being the best player in the league.

For the 2018-19 season James signed with the 2nd most successful franchise in the associaton, the Los Angeles Lakers, however his first season left a lot to be desired. James suffered a groin injury having played only 55 games and achieved a 8,29 RAPTOR score. His second season with the prominent team cut short temporarily due to COVID-19 and it is still undecided whether the season should continue or end in it’s current standings.

Conclusion

Based on the RAPTOR model Paul Pierce is wrong about LeBron James and he is unquestionably part of the 5 best players of NBA of all time.