Tonight Ray Allen hit his 2,561 career three-pointer, breaking the all-time mark by Reggie Miller. This event led me to wonder, how does Ray Allen compare to Reggie Miller? In fact, I can imagine people spending some time this evening debating this issue (those some people don’t include me… my wife and I are watching the Lakers-Celtics game but my wife doesn’t really care to discuss this issue).
So let me offer some thoughts.
These thoughts – as is often the case in this forum – involves some numbers. Let’s start with Wins Produced and WP48 [Wins Produced per 48 minutes]. The following table reports each player’s career numbers (Ray Allen’s numbers are prior to Thursday night’s game).
As one can see, these players are quite similar.
- Each player was close to average his rookie season.
- Each player hit his peak with respect to Wins Produced and WP48 at the age of 25 (players tend to peak in their mid-20s).
Each player had his second best season at the age of 28 (players don’t decline very rapidly after their peak).Each player had his third best season after the age of 35 (Reggie Miller at age 38 and Ray Allen so far this season; and yes, it is possible — but not likely — that a player can keep playing well into his thirties).- Except for Miller’s rookie season, each player was always above average (average WP48 is 0.100; and good players in the NBA — unlike what we see in baseball and football — tend to be above average throughout their careers).
- Their career marks are quite similar. Ray Allen currently has a career WP48 of 0.168 while Reggie Miller had a career mark of 0.164. After the age of 35, Miller had a career mark of 0.169.
When we turn to the individual stats we again see that these players were very similar.
Both their career Win Score per 48 minutes [WS48] and their WS48 mark in their peak season were essentially the same. And this production was achieved in much the same fashion. Obviously both were amazing shooters. Miller, though, was a bit better. Then again, Allen was a bit better on the boards. The net effect is that both have a level of productivity that is essentially the same.
So there you go. If you got involved in a fight tonight arguing that Reggie Miller (or Ray Allen) was clearly the better player (or worse player), well… you might have wasted some energy. At least, I think the answer is both players are quite good. Furthermore, I think both players are pretty much the same.
– DJ
P.S. By the way, Ray Allen’s record is not the big story tonight. Jerry Sloan departing the Jazz is definitely something I will comment upon. Hopefully I can get those comments posted tomorrow.
Update: Received an e-mail that noted that there was a mistake in Ray Allen’s numbers. Allen played for two teams in 2002-03 and his numbers with Milwaukee and Seattle from that season were listed as separate seasons. This has now been fixed. That change, though, changed the story somewhat with respect to the second and third best seasons of Allen’s career. The basic story — Allen and Miller are quite similar and each peaked at 25 — remains the same.
Wages of Wins Journal 
Matt
February 11, 2011
Its interesting to see WP for two players who have only ever really been shooters, rather than rebounders.
marc
February 11, 2011
hey i got an idea:
Let’s invert the process of making your model.
Let people rate certain players in terms of “wins” produced.
100 is standard etc, 200 star-level etc.
Then check, in which way you would have to weigh the available boxscore
data.
And compare those weights to your choices.
Maybe a bit naive, but I’m not that much into stats.
Should be at least quantify the doubts people have about your model,.. maybe.
kevin
February 11, 2011
Ray would probably be ahead a little more if he didn’t miss so much time in his 27-28 years. I thought his offensive game was a little more versatile since he was better at taking the ball to the rim, at least when he was younger and has less mileage on his legs.
But other than that, they are pretty similar. It was cool to see Reggie congratulate Ray at the game last night. Very sportsmanlike.
kevin
February 11, 2011
Re: Sloan. I thought he was the best defensive guard I had seen until Jordan came along. In fact, when I was in high school playing ball, I patterned myself after him (obviously coming up a bit short). Extremely tough, fearless and relentless, his willingness to absorb physical punishment shortened his career some. The NBA has lost a good man.
Matt
February 11, 2011
^Some would have you believe that’s what Hollinger did with PER.
Evan
February 11, 2011
Dear Marc, we already have that — it’s called points scored per game.
Jimbo Jones
February 11, 2011
The eyes tell me that Ray Allen is smoother and generally had a weaker supporting cast around him than Reggie. They also tell me that Ray plays better on defense and is indeed more of a complete offensive player than Reggie. Not surprised at all that the numbers were so even, despite what the eyes say.
All that said, both will obviously be remembered as two all time snipers – but with Ray still going strong he might end overtaking Reggie in peoples eyes (and minds).
scondren
February 11, 2011
fascinating that they continue to produce at a high level despite old age (For an athlete). Has anyone here studied how aging curves affect different types of players (ie, slashers who rely on athleticism v. shooters v. big men etc).
stephanieg
February 11, 2011
Heresy from a Hoosier: Jesus was a better dribble drive player in his prime than Reggie. He could do an OK job of running the offense from the top. He still seems quicker than Reggie ever was. He can shoot while running near top speed better than anyone I’ve ever seen. During his best years Ray hit more 3s than Reggie’s best at similar or better percentage. e.g. Reggie only shot more than six 3s a game once; Ray did that 8 times. Usage/efficiency argument all over again I guess though.
Reggie had an edge about him…he played a little dirty. Used his elbows and knees, knicked his feet out on shots (which made the NBA change the rules iirc) and wasn’t above getting in scuffles. He made MJ fly off the handle, so that has to count for something. I also think he plays better than Ray on the road in big games, but I could be wrong.
But when the Pacers were at their best from 98-2000…was he even the fourth most productive player on the team?
Random observation (probably confirmation bias): ever since he’s been on the Celts, Ray is a laughably bad fast break player. He’s OK if someone passes it to him. But if he has the ball it’s gonna be a turn over or missed layup unless the other team bails him out or gets weird luck (like he’ll make a dumb pass, but it’ll somehow go off the other team’s leg and roll to an open team mate or something).
dm
February 12, 2011
I can’t believe your wife makes you watch basketball games doesn’t she know how painful that is for you?
marc
February 12, 2011
Dear Evan, i doubt that this is an appropriate metric.
Seriously, any metric not having Kobe at one is flawed, isn’t it?
Matt i think of Per as if it’s telling you how much a player does do,
but not how well really.
Usually good players get more opportunities than terrible players by their respective teams, in that sense Per and “efficient production” are correlated?
Kent
February 12, 2011
Dr. Berri, what do you think of this story– http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/sports/basketball/12araton.html?_r=1&ref=sports ? It would be interesting to attach wins scores to it. How much worse are the Lakers w/o Bynum and w/ Anthony do to the loss of rebounding?