The Iron Law

The guys this author mentions – that era was long ago. The league is very different now.
I also believe there is no real blueprint in today’s NBA for fielding a championship team. All the recent title winners – Spurs, Heat, Pistons, Lakers – are a little different. They each built teams with different characteristics and managed to win it all. Not even sure how the Iron Law applies to the Pistons since none of their guys were considered top 5 in the league or top 24 all time.

I totally agree with this line of thinking, but calling it an Iron Law is misleading because it holds 80% of the time. It is possible to occasionally win with a core of excellent, but not dominant players, like the Pistons did a few years ago.

I don’t think the league has changed on this. This rule is as strong as ever. The good news for the Celts is that the only player who clearly qualifies now is Duncan. Shaq was in this class, but that time is now past. It’s also true that sometimes the differences are large and sometimes they are small. Bird and Magic were close enough in their greatness to share the era.

I totally agree with this line of thinking, but calling it an Iron Law is misleading because it holds 80% of the time. It is possible to occasionally win with a core of excellent, but not dominant players, like the Pistons did a few years ago.

I don’t think the league has changed on this. This rule is as strong as ever. The good news for the Celts is that the only player in the league who clearly qualifies now is Duncan. Shaq was in this class, but that time is now past. And with Duncan, his level of dominance is not so great that he cannot be beaten. KG is nearly as good. Still, if Duncan, Parker and Ginobili are all healthy, they have to be favored.

here is my formula.

top 10 current AllStar = 50
normal Allstar = 40
great player = 30
good player = 20
roll player = 10
bench warmer = 1

step 1. your starting 5 must be 150 or more.

step 2. any thing above 150 devide by 2 (round down) add this number to your 5 man bench

step 3. your 5 man bench must be over 75

so take the C’s (as of now)

1 KG = 50
2 R. Allen = 35
3 Pierce = 35
4 Perkins = 15
5 rondo = 20
total = 155 (5 over) so ad 2 (half of 5 rounded down) to the bench.

5 man bench

T. Allen = 20 (if healthy)
Powe = 10
scal = 10
Big B = 5
Wallace = 5
total = 52 (need 75)

As you can see we are not a champion team yet!

In basketball, you have only 5 players on the court at one time, not 9, not 11.

Your “star” is not on the bench waiting for 8 other hitters before he hits again. The “star” isn’t sitting out 2/5 of the game while the defense or special teams are on the field.

It’s a man’s world and KG is the man.

I don’t believe in this “Iron Law” at all. Sure, having stars really helps because there are only 5 guys in basketball and they play both ways.

But the so-called “Iron Law” ignores the fact that many of the greatest players of all time did NOT win many titles. Chamberlain’s teams in Philly and LA only won a couple of titles, and he was arguably the most dominant player of all time.

It’s a team game. Players who play team basketball win, and great players who play team basketball (e.g. Russell, Duncan, Jordan, Bird, Shaq) win repeatedly.

The only flaw I see in his argument is Detroit a couple of years back. No one on that team was a top 5 NBA talent, much less all-time great, and they still won. I liked the article, it was interesting, but . . .

I don’t buy all the press generated controvesy about Boston not really being a contender. The C’s are legit contenders, no question. Are there problems with depth and injury concerns? Sure. There are with all of the “contenders” and realistically all of them are “one injury away” from not being contenders.

At it’s worst this trade has us thinking NBA championship. It’s a legit shot. One imjury and done? Sure, but we are a real threat to win the title. Even more so with another solid veteran.

No trade, we’re hoping deep playoffs. One injury and we’re still done, and none of us were even entertaining the idea of winning the east, merely hoping our youth developed to the point in the next 2-3 yrs we might challenge for a conf finals before we had to replace Pierce.

What about Detroit?

How else can the clustering of champions be explained? No other sport has as few champions. The clearly obvious pattern is the leagues most dominant player. Not the third best, or the sixth best, but the best, or at least someone neck and neck, like Bird and Magic. Sure there have been incredible players who didn’t win much. It was always because there was someone even better. Shaq won 4 titles, but he might have had a hard time winning one if he had been born 10 years earlier.

my formula works for the 2004 Pistons

starting 5
 Chauncey Billups = 30
 Richard Hamilton = 30
 Tayshaun Prince = 30
 Rasheed Wallace = 30
 Ben Wallace = 30
 total = 150
5 man bench
 Elden Campbell = 20
 Darvin Ham = 20
 Lindsey Hunter = 20
 Mike James = 10
 Darko Milicic = 10
 total = 80

I think this “law” is more true now than in past eras because of how diluted the league is through expansion.

One can always point out the exception (Detroit), but the overwhelming predictive power of the observation is clear.

Of course it is a team game. But, what this means is that without one of these players, your “team” is not even in the conversation. The Celtics are now in the conversation.

Before we all get carried away, I think an argument could be made that there are several “dominant” players in the league besides Kevin Garnett. Staring with Duncan, you’d have to mention Kobe, James, Wade, and Steve Nash as well. As Ainge put it, this edition of the Celtics hasn’t won anything yet. I think the non-emotional odds are that they will reach the Eastern Conference semifinals if they somehow manage to overcome a lack of quality point guard play.

I think some folks are underrating Rondo. He will be disruptive on defense and if they are a running team, his outside shooting will less of an issue. If they choose to walk it up (a mistake in my opinion) Rondo can dribble slowly up the court and go into one of Doc’s sets. But with a rebounder like KG it should be pedal to the metal.

Thanks for the kind words and constructive comments everyone. I think if you read the original research cited in the realgm piece that wasa published a year ago, it will answer many of the questions that are being raised.

Thanks,

Elrod

Man, I think this law is more like graphite, not iron. (I crack myself up)

The criteria for who the best players are is not subjective. It is taken from the all-pro teams and the MVP voting

Um, those are subjective. And usually voted on by lots of people not paying attention.

I am sure this might be a necessary, but is it a sufficient condition? How well we do will depend on how well Ainge is able to fill out the roster.

warriorspirit,
Your numbers thingie reminds me of that Aflac caveman commercial, the one that’s set up to llok like a cable debate show. The woman gives some nonsensical drivel about the individual ego and the group id being in constant conflinct. The moderator asks the caveman if he has a response. He says, Yeah, I have a response: What?

I guess I’m a caveman, because those numbers seem to be pulled straight out of your butt to me.

I’m totally down with this. Look at the Bulls championship runs. They won championships with such starting players as B.J. Armstrong, Bill Cartwright (past his prime), John Paxson, Scott Williams, Luc Longley, and Ron Harper (past his prime). Granted, KG isn’t quite Jordan, but I think that Pierce and Allen stack up pretty favorably with Pippen and Horace Grant or Dennis Rodman. Sure, they could use more bench depth, and I suspect they’ll be a stronger team in 08-09 than this upcoming season (especially after Ryan Gomes comes running back to us as a free agent), but they’ve got most of the ingredients for a championship team right now.

This guy should not be allowed name things – the Iron Law – Iron what the hell does have to do with a player being a top 20 talent – An ironman already has a bball meaning and that’s a player that doesn’t miss games and plays through injuries (KG and PP – but they’re not on AC Green levels).

Its misleading for several reasons mostly ones that irritate me, and makes me antagonistic.

Why do people confuse winning with contending. The article stated that every year there are other great players in the league but only one can win.

Obviously, the odds of 1 great player without any supporting cast on a team winning the championship is small, but they should make the playoffs. Who here does not believe that without the injuries to PP, AJ and TA (Wally too) the C’s would’ve been at least the 8 seed last year.

2004 was only an abberation for Detroit and they won simply because during that time and remember this people, Shaq and Kobe are imploding, it doesn’t show very much but it was pretty obvious, it was the reason they decided to call it quits and the team was dismantled.Furthermore, Karl Malone was not himself anymore, sure he was still great but way past his prime, infact he never returned the following year, could have but didn’t simply because he knew Shaq was leaving. This was compounded by the fact that he was injured in that series against Detroit. If he played at least at 65%, then that would have tilted that series in their favor…Like all other series any injury can tilt the balance in favor of the opposing team, just ask Washington in last yrs playoffs.

The iron law would have applied still in favor of the Lakers in 04 but as it is, the rest was history.

So if Boston can stay reasonably healthy, then there is no reason for PP,KG and RA not to win a ring in any of their 3-5 yr window.

I think some folks are underrating Rondo. He will be disruptive on defense and if they are a running team, his outside shooting will less of an issue. If they choose to walk it up (a mistake in my opinion) Rondo can dribble slowly up the court and go into one of Doc’s sets. But with a rebounder like KG it should be pedal to the metal.

I think Rondo has a bright future with the accent on the word future. Another analogy on the order of Iron Law would be the question: How many titles have been won with teams employing a second-year point guard as their starter?

A really interesting article. Elrod at the end, points to chemistry as being a hurdle and compares it to the McGrady-Yao situation. Looking at those three at the press conference should, I think, remove this as a problem. Sure each will need to adjust to each other and the other members of the team. To me chemistry problems between good players = ego problems. I don’t think there will be ego problems here. One problem I do expect early on will be that each will want to be too unselfish and will not take his shots. If this is a problem it won’t last long and I don’t think Doc will need to say more than a word to correct it. These are three guys who just want to win. They don’t care who people think is the best. To paraphrase Bill Russell, the ring on your finger shuts everyone up. It shows you’re a winner and no one can take it away or argue about it. It’s solid proof.