Post by jhb on Feb 12, 2021 10:18:09 GMT -5
I'm updating my original article with tiered rankings of every GM in the league and how they drafted in creation. I will include the final charts, tables, graphs, etc. like from the original article at the bottom.
As a quick reminder, the way this worked was that each pick was charted along with their 3000 WS/48. Any player with less than 250 minutes was excluded and counted as 0 WS/48. I graphed all of those values and then created a logarithmic trendline to calculate the expected WS/48 for each draft slot. Then I calculated excess value (WS/48 over expected WS/48) and then looked at the sum, average, min, and max of those values for each team.
*AWAS = Average Wins (WS/48) Above Slot
HOF Tier
1. Soup - Mavericks (.041 AWAS)
2. Druce - Grizzlies (.040 AWAS)
Soup led the draft in total wins above slot and average wins above slot and he capped that performance by having far and away the best pick in the draft when he selected Moala Tautuaa at 22nd overall. His worst pick fell around league average compared to other GMs and he also made 11 picks, so his ability to select well was compounded by opportunity. That drafting talent was affirmed by his inaugural 6.0 championship. To his credit, Druce drafted at almost nearly the same level of success at Soup on average, coming in at only .001 WS/48 per pick behind Soup. The issue was that he took 3 less picks than Soup and didn't have the same number of opportunities to accumulate excess value.
All-League 1st Team Tier
3. Dirt - Clippers (.031 AWAS)
4. DaChap - Chaparrals (.031 AWAS)
5. Yawn - Bullets (.023 AWAS)
This tier brings me to our first big surprise of the rankings with total rookie GM DaChap finishing fourth in the league among best drafters. He was actually third overall in total wins above slot, but finished ever-so-slightly behind Dirt and the Clippers in average wins above slot because he took an extra selection. The Clippers and Chaps finished 5th and 6th respectively in terms of their best overall picks, with the Clippers scoring .155 wins/48 over slot with their selection of Kyle Hines at #26 and the Chaps scoring .126 wins/48 over slot with their selection of Kennedy Meeks at #19. Yawn rounds out this tier and brings a unique talent to the All-League 1st Team Tier, having almost no picks that were below slot value. While his best pick (surprisingly not Lloyd Sharrar, actually Kresimir Cosic at #274) was only league average in terms of value, his worst picks (Luke Hancock at #232 and Drew Neitzel at #47) were at only .003 WS/48 below slot value (best in the league). So he made no bad picks. Dirt was close behind in this regard, finishing 3rd in the league in terms of his worst pick, at only .02 WS/48 under slot for his selection of Robert Upshaw at 111.
All-League 2nd Team Tier
6. Delap - Raptors (.016 AWAS)
7. Andy Luck - Suns (.016 AWAS)
8. BK - Nets (.013 AWAS)
This tier brings us to our first GM who finished outside the top 5 in their respective conferences and that's because BK turned his outstanding creation draft into a bunch of future assets. BK probably would have finished even higher in these rankings but was being drug down by making the 3 worst picks in this tier, Vashil Fernandez at #54 (.099 WS/48 under slot), Christian Watford at 113 (.062 WS/48 under slot), and Mobius Thomas (.062 WS/48 under slot). This tier did a tremendous job finding some of the best PGs in creation with Sergei Belov going to Toronto at .169 WS/48 over the 18th slot and Theodoros Papaloukas going to Brooklyn (before heading to Dallas) at .158 WS/48 over his 33rd slot. Andy didn't have as many picks to create value as some the other GMs at this tier, but he did do a great job of exceeding the high expectations of the sixth slot with his selection of Luke Maye (.093 WS/48 over slot). He also didn't make any terribly bad picks, finishing top 6 among league GMs in terms of his worst pick made (.038 under slot with Elyjah Goss at #93).
All-League 3rd Team Tier
9. Tyler - Lakers (.009 AWAS)
10. Trofie - Bucks (.009 AWAS)
11. JHB - Hawks (.008 AWAS)
12. Tim - SuperSonics (.008 AWAS)
13. Heebs - Pacers (.007 AWAS)
14. Skrouse - Magic (.005 AWAS)
The two best picks in this tier come from JHB with Le'Bryan Nash at #31 and Devin Williams at #28 scoring .096 and .102 WS/48 above slot value. The only problem was two of the four worst picks also came from JHB and the Hawks with his PG picks dragging down his total score as John DiBartolomeo and Vassilis Spanoulis at 115 and 176 scored .094 and .056 WS/48 below slot. Tim also did well in his limited opportunities (only 6 selections), scoring over .05 WS/48 above slot with both Andre Hollins and Noah Dickerson, but his selection of Jeff Newton at 184 drug his score down. Skrouse and the Magic showed that being almost exactly league average in drafting prowess can be overcome with aggressive trades, scoring a 60 win season despite some overall average picks. His best and worst picks were about league average, his average was average, but he was aggressive and that helped carry him to a successful season. The Bucks scored in the bottom 12 in the league in terms of his best pick, with only ~.05 WS/48 above slot with Lavar Ball and Perry Ellis at 199 and 254 respectively, but he was also among the best in the league at limiting bad picks, leading him to accumulate the most total excess wins among this group. The Pacers weren't far behind, doing slightly less with each pick but accumulating total wins by making a league-leading 12 selections, their best among them being Josh Hetvelt (.075 WS/48 above slot) and Drazen Dalipagic (.069 WS/48 above slot). Tyler led the way in this group with a similar approach to Trofie, not making any truly exceptional picks, his best Mike Gansey at #122 (.052 WS/48 above slot), but he was second best in the league at not making bad picks.
Starter Tier
15. IanBoyd - Timberwolves (-.006 AWAS)
16. Ward - Warriors (-.007 AWAS)
17. Troy - Stags (-.007 AWAS)
18. Odin - Bobcats (-.007 AWAS)
Another tier down, another example of pure aggression overcoming bad drafting to lead to a very successful season with the Bobcats. This is a tier where truly great drafting starts to become rare, only two selections among this tier scored higher than .100 WS/48 above slot, with the Timberwolves taking Ian Voyoukas at 53 and the Bobcats' selection of Demetrius Mitchell at 16. After those, only 12 picks from this tier scored above slot value, most notable being Wayne Estes and James Blackmon, who had to overcome high expectations as both were top 10 picks. The Bobcats probably would have scored much better but their total scores were drug down by two underperforming top 100 picks, LiAngelo Ball who was .04 WS/48 under his 65th slot value, and Carlos Saurez who didn't register enough minutes to count his totals as the 88th pick in the draft. I think it was pretty clear the operational strategy of everyone but the Bobcats in this tier was to try and build future value rather than go for a winning team in the present, so for that being the strategy I would say fair job overall of at least making the most of the picks you did take.
Sixth Man Tier
19. PointyEgg - Spurs (-.012 AWAS)
20. 20s - Cougars (-.013 AWAS)
21. Ank - Knicks (-.015 AWAS)
I think this is a tier that gets an unfair reputation based purely on the data, which is why I elevated them above the rest of the rotation level guys below. There are some bigs in this tier, that on the surface, score poorly in WS/48 above slot value but I don't necessarily agree that they are bad picks. First of all, it would have been nearly impossible for Bojan to exceed the expected slot value of the #1 pick at .371 WS/48, but he came extremely close. That doesn't give Ank the credit he deserves at #1 for truly taking what was probably the best selection of the draft. Additionally, guys like Kenny George and Chief Kickingstallionsims probably don't get the credit they deserve for their defensive prowess in WS/48 calculations, leading them to look like bad picks at .061 and .044 WS/48 below slot value, respectively. The only truly terrible pick of this group was Pointy's upside play of Esa Ahmad at #70, scoring .115 WS/48 below slot and dragging down his overall performance significantly. Each team only had one selection above .03 WS/48 above slot value, with Ed Crosswell at 278 to the Cougars, Russ Shelton at 146 to the Knicks, and Brian Zoubek at 163 to the Spurs leading the way in terms of excess value.
Rotation Tier
22. Ba - Pipers (-.019 AWAS)
23. Bankz - Sixers (-.019 AWAS)
24. Duc - Heat (-.022 AWAS)
This was shockingly the tier with the least good picks. No single pick in this tier scored above .033 WS/48 per slot, but outside of a few picks they limited the damage in terms of making bad picks. The Heat did a really bad job with their top 85 picks, with all three scoring among the five worst in this tier at .056 WS/48 below slot or worse. The Pipers and Sixers both had one truly bad pick with their selections of Joe Wolfinger at 83 and Earl Calloway at 102, respectively. Among the eight selections from this group that did score above draft slot value, the only top 100 pick was the Heat selecting Brock Motum at #91.
Benchwarmer Tier
25. Mike - Bulls (-.026 AWAS)
26. Fecta - Hornets (-.027 AWAS)
27. Majic - Trailblazers (-.030 AWAS)
28. Boomslick - Pelicans (-.033 AWAS)
AKA the oof magoof tier. Only ten picks in this entire tier above slot value, with only J.P. Batista at 257 to the Hornets and Jose Booth at 224 to the Bulls scoring at over .05 WS/48 above slot. Only one top 100 pick in this entire tier scored a positive WS/48 above slot value, Tyrone Davis to the Trailblazers at 77. There was a notably poor performance in the top 50 among this group, with four of their collective six top 50 picks scoring .100 WS/48 below slot value. They were the four worst picks among this group. Shawn Kemp Jr. (Hornets, #7), William Buford (Pelicans, #13), Irwin Dambrot (Trailblazers, #48), and John Calipari Bulls (#21), welcome to the Hall of Shame. The other two Top 50 selections didn't fair much better with Raymond Lewis (Trailblazers, #11) scoring .069 WS/48 under slot and Chase Harler (Bulls, #38) scoring .045 WS/48 under slot. Again, oof magoof.
Minor League Tier
29. Irush - Kings (-.047 AWAS)
I'm so sorry, Irush. But this draft was even more historical than the Mavs draft, just in the wrong direction. Here we've got the most negative wins accumulated, lowest AWAS, and the worst pick in the draft (Jon Davis at -.152 WS/48). That was compounded by the fact that WS don't typically look favorably upon shotblockers if they're also inefficient offensive players (sorry Dino) and Irush making only one selection that was above expected slot value in Darnell Gant at 187, coming in at only .001 WS/48 above slot. Don't give up on us Irush, you can still turn this around.
Data
WS/48 by Selection Chart
Draft Stats by Team
Top 25 Value Selections
Bottom 25 Value Selections
As a quick reminder, the way this worked was that each pick was charted along with their 3000 WS/48. Any player with less than 250 minutes was excluded and counted as 0 WS/48. I graphed all of those values and then created a logarithmic trendline to calculate the expected WS/48 for each draft slot. Then I calculated excess value (WS/48 over expected WS/48) and then looked at the sum, average, min, and max of those values for each team.
*AWAS = Average Wins (WS/48) Above Slot
HOF Tier
1. Soup - Mavericks (.041 AWAS)
2. Druce - Grizzlies (.040 AWAS)
Soup led the draft in total wins above slot and average wins above slot and he capped that performance by having far and away the best pick in the draft when he selected Moala Tautuaa at 22nd overall. His worst pick fell around league average compared to other GMs and he also made 11 picks, so his ability to select well was compounded by opportunity. That drafting talent was affirmed by his inaugural 6.0 championship. To his credit, Druce drafted at almost nearly the same level of success at Soup on average, coming in at only .001 WS/48 per pick behind Soup. The issue was that he took 3 less picks than Soup and didn't have the same number of opportunities to accumulate excess value.
All-League 1st Team Tier
3. Dirt - Clippers (.031 AWAS)
4. DaChap - Chaparrals (.031 AWAS)
5. Yawn - Bullets (.023 AWAS)
This tier brings me to our first big surprise of the rankings with total rookie GM DaChap finishing fourth in the league among best drafters. He was actually third overall in total wins above slot, but finished ever-so-slightly behind Dirt and the Clippers in average wins above slot because he took an extra selection. The Clippers and Chaps finished 5th and 6th respectively in terms of their best overall picks, with the Clippers scoring .155 wins/48 over slot with their selection of Kyle Hines at #26 and the Chaps scoring .126 wins/48 over slot with their selection of Kennedy Meeks at #19. Yawn rounds out this tier and brings a unique talent to the All-League 1st Team Tier, having almost no picks that were below slot value. While his best pick (surprisingly not Lloyd Sharrar, actually Kresimir Cosic at #274) was only league average in terms of value, his worst picks (Luke Hancock at #232 and Drew Neitzel at #47) were at only .003 WS/48 below slot value (best in the league). So he made no bad picks. Dirt was close behind in this regard, finishing 3rd in the league in terms of his worst pick, at only .02 WS/48 under slot for his selection of Robert Upshaw at 111.
All-League 2nd Team Tier
6. Delap - Raptors (.016 AWAS)
7. Andy Luck - Suns (.016 AWAS)
8. BK - Nets (.013 AWAS)
This tier brings us to our first GM who finished outside the top 5 in their respective conferences and that's because BK turned his outstanding creation draft into a bunch of future assets. BK probably would have finished even higher in these rankings but was being drug down by making the 3 worst picks in this tier, Vashil Fernandez at #54 (.099 WS/48 under slot), Christian Watford at 113 (.062 WS/48 under slot), and Mobius Thomas (.062 WS/48 under slot). This tier did a tremendous job finding some of the best PGs in creation with Sergei Belov going to Toronto at .169 WS/48 over the 18th slot and Theodoros Papaloukas going to Brooklyn (before heading to Dallas) at .158 WS/48 over his 33rd slot. Andy didn't have as many picks to create value as some the other GMs at this tier, but he did do a great job of exceeding the high expectations of the sixth slot with his selection of Luke Maye (.093 WS/48 over slot). He also didn't make any terribly bad picks, finishing top 6 among league GMs in terms of his worst pick made (.038 under slot with Elyjah Goss at #93).
All-League 3rd Team Tier
9. Tyler - Lakers (.009 AWAS)
10. Trofie - Bucks (.009 AWAS)
11. JHB - Hawks (.008 AWAS)
12. Tim - SuperSonics (.008 AWAS)
13. Heebs - Pacers (.007 AWAS)
14. Skrouse - Magic (.005 AWAS)
The two best picks in this tier come from JHB with Le'Bryan Nash at #31 and Devin Williams at #28 scoring .096 and .102 WS/48 above slot value. The only problem was two of the four worst picks also came from JHB and the Hawks with his PG picks dragging down his total score as John DiBartolomeo and Vassilis Spanoulis at 115 and 176 scored .094 and .056 WS/48 below slot. Tim also did well in his limited opportunities (only 6 selections), scoring over .05 WS/48 above slot with both Andre Hollins and Noah Dickerson, but his selection of Jeff Newton at 184 drug his score down. Skrouse and the Magic showed that being almost exactly league average in drafting prowess can be overcome with aggressive trades, scoring a 60 win season despite some overall average picks. His best and worst picks were about league average, his average was average, but he was aggressive and that helped carry him to a successful season. The Bucks scored in the bottom 12 in the league in terms of his best pick, with only ~.05 WS/48 above slot with Lavar Ball and Perry Ellis at 199 and 254 respectively, but he was also among the best in the league at limiting bad picks, leading him to accumulate the most total excess wins among this group. The Pacers weren't far behind, doing slightly less with each pick but accumulating total wins by making a league-leading 12 selections, their best among them being Josh Hetvelt (.075 WS/48 above slot) and Drazen Dalipagic (.069 WS/48 above slot). Tyler led the way in this group with a similar approach to Trofie, not making any truly exceptional picks, his best Mike Gansey at #122 (.052 WS/48 above slot), but he was second best in the league at not making bad picks.
Starter Tier
15. IanBoyd - Timberwolves (-.006 AWAS)
16. Ward - Warriors (-.007 AWAS)
17. Troy - Stags (-.007 AWAS)
18. Odin - Bobcats (-.007 AWAS)
Another tier down, another example of pure aggression overcoming bad drafting to lead to a very successful season with the Bobcats. This is a tier where truly great drafting starts to become rare, only two selections among this tier scored higher than .100 WS/48 above slot, with the Timberwolves taking Ian Voyoukas at 53 and the Bobcats' selection of Demetrius Mitchell at 16. After those, only 12 picks from this tier scored above slot value, most notable being Wayne Estes and James Blackmon, who had to overcome high expectations as both were top 10 picks. The Bobcats probably would have scored much better but their total scores were drug down by two underperforming top 100 picks, LiAngelo Ball who was .04 WS/48 under his 65th slot value, and Carlos Saurez who didn't register enough minutes to count his totals as the 88th pick in the draft. I think it was pretty clear the operational strategy of everyone but the Bobcats in this tier was to try and build future value rather than go for a winning team in the present, so for that being the strategy I would say fair job overall of at least making the most of the picks you did take.
Sixth Man Tier
19. PointyEgg - Spurs (-.012 AWAS)
20. 20s - Cougars (-.013 AWAS)
21. Ank - Knicks (-.015 AWAS)
I think this is a tier that gets an unfair reputation based purely on the data, which is why I elevated them above the rest of the rotation level guys below. There are some bigs in this tier, that on the surface, score poorly in WS/48 above slot value but I don't necessarily agree that they are bad picks. First of all, it would have been nearly impossible for Bojan to exceed the expected slot value of the #1 pick at .371 WS/48, but he came extremely close. That doesn't give Ank the credit he deserves at #1 for truly taking what was probably the best selection of the draft. Additionally, guys like Kenny George and Chief Kickingstallionsims probably don't get the credit they deserve for their defensive prowess in WS/48 calculations, leading them to look like bad picks at .061 and .044 WS/48 below slot value, respectively. The only truly terrible pick of this group was Pointy's upside play of Esa Ahmad at #70, scoring .115 WS/48 below slot and dragging down his overall performance significantly. Each team only had one selection above .03 WS/48 above slot value, with Ed Crosswell at 278 to the Cougars, Russ Shelton at 146 to the Knicks, and Brian Zoubek at 163 to the Spurs leading the way in terms of excess value.
Rotation Tier
22. Ba - Pipers (-.019 AWAS)
23. Bankz - Sixers (-.019 AWAS)
24. Duc - Heat (-.022 AWAS)
This was shockingly the tier with the least good picks. No single pick in this tier scored above .033 WS/48 per slot, but outside of a few picks they limited the damage in terms of making bad picks. The Heat did a really bad job with their top 85 picks, with all three scoring among the five worst in this tier at .056 WS/48 below slot or worse. The Pipers and Sixers both had one truly bad pick with their selections of Joe Wolfinger at 83 and Earl Calloway at 102, respectively. Among the eight selections from this group that did score above draft slot value, the only top 100 pick was the Heat selecting Brock Motum at #91.
Benchwarmer Tier
25. Mike - Bulls (-.026 AWAS)
26. Fecta - Hornets (-.027 AWAS)
27. Majic - Trailblazers (-.030 AWAS)
28. Boomslick - Pelicans (-.033 AWAS)
AKA the oof magoof tier. Only ten picks in this entire tier above slot value, with only J.P. Batista at 257 to the Hornets and Jose Booth at 224 to the Bulls scoring at over .05 WS/48 above slot. Only one top 100 pick in this entire tier scored a positive WS/48 above slot value, Tyrone Davis to the Trailblazers at 77. There was a notably poor performance in the top 50 among this group, with four of their collective six top 50 picks scoring .100 WS/48 below slot value. They were the four worst picks among this group. Shawn Kemp Jr. (Hornets, #7), William Buford (Pelicans, #13), Irwin Dambrot (Trailblazers, #48), and John Calipari Bulls (#21), welcome to the Hall of Shame. The other two Top 50 selections didn't fair much better with Raymond Lewis (Trailblazers, #11) scoring .069 WS/48 under slot and Chase Harler (Bulls, #38) scoring .045 WS/48 under slot. Again, oof magoof.
Minor League Tier
29. Irush - Kings (-.047 AWAS)
I'm so sorry, Irush. But this draft was even more historical than the Mavs draft, just in the wrong direction. Here we've got the most negative wins accumulated, lowest AWAS, and the worst pick in the draft (Jon Davis at -.152 WS/48). That was compounded by the fact that WS don't typically look favorably upon shotblockers if they're also inefficient offensive players (sorry Dino) and Irush making only one selection that was above expected slot value in Darnell Gant at 187, coming in at only .001 WS/48 above slot. Don't give up on us Irush, you can still turn this around.
Data
WS/48 by Selection Chart
Draft Stats by Team
Top 25 Value Selections
Bottom 25 Value Selections
