November 18, 2010

Paul Millsap - The Ultimate Shaft

So today I got home after a long morning and noticed that the NBA All Star Ballot was out. Even though I know its just a popularity contest I still wanted to go on and vote. I know that Chris Paul and Kobe will get the popular vote over Derron and Okur would not be likely out with a injury... But the avid jazz fan that I am I decided to hop on. D Will... Check! Okur... Check! AK?... Surprised! Jefferson... Check! Millsap.... um.... what... where is my boy Millsaps name?

To my despair he was left of the ballot! How could this be was the first thing that I thought. Then I thought, well maybe its just cause I am a Jazz fan and I think he is better only cause he is a Jazz player. So I did what any normal person would do... I compared the other forwards on the ballot, but not to my surprise Millsap was better than most then statistically. So here is what I did

I took the top 8 categories (Points, Rebounds, Assists, Field Goal %, Free Throw %, Steals, Blocks and Turnovers) I took the current to date stats of all the forwards on the west ballot and ranked them from 1-25 The best person in that category got 1 point and the worse got 25. I did that will all 8 categories and them added them up. And this is what I came up with




Player PPG RBG APG FG% FT% SPG BPG TO Total
1 Pau Gasol 6 2 1 3 12 16 2 9 51
2 Rudy Gay 4 14 4 5 2 3 8 16 56
3 Paul Millsap 8 9 5 2 14 9 11 5 63
4 Luis Scola 5 7 12 4 16 13 10 7 74
5 Carmelo Anthony 2 13 6 13 5 4 9 23 75
6 Kevin Durant 1 16 9 21 1 5 6 25 84
7 David West 15 17 14 7 7 7 7 12 86
8 Tim Duncan 19 8 10 6 21 14 1 15 94
9 LaMarcus Aldridge 11 12 13 18 11 8 4 24 101
10 Andrei Kirilenko 22 22 3 20 9 10 5 11 102
11 Al Jefferson 14 10 23 17 10 25 3 4 106
12 Dirk Nowitzki 3 11 21 14 3 24 12 20 108
13 Lamar Odom 16 6 2 1 25 22 21 17 110
14 Kevin Love 9 1 19 22 4 21 16 19 111
15 Zach Randolph 13 3 18 9 18 15 24 13 113
16 Ron Artest 25 25 17 23 6 2 17 1 116
17 David Lee 18 4 7 15 17 11 23 22 117
18 Michael Beasley 7 20 20 8 19 12 13 21 120
19 Blake Griffin 12 5 16 10 24 17 19 18 121
20 Hedo Turkoglu 21 24 11 16 15 18 14 2 121
21 Jeff Green 10 15 25 19 8 19 20 8 124
22 Grant Hill 23 19 15 12 13 20 15 10 127
23 Trevor Ariza 24 21 8 25 20 1 22 6 127
24 Carl Landry 17 18 24 11 23 23 25 3 144
25 Caron Butler 20 23 22 24 22 6 18 14 149


Additionally I thought, if Millsap was on a team like the Kings or Timberwolves where they did not have as much talent as the Jazz, Lakers or Spurs then his numbers would be higher. So I went back and while I can not penalize the players or take them out cause their teams suck, I had to put a HUGE asterisks next to their name that their numbers would not be as good if they were on one of the better teams. So I have made anyone that is on a team below .500 in red!

Surprisingly Millsap came out 3rd in total value according to my personal evaluation, which I think is a decent way of showing.

One might say that they kept him out cause they have to include all teams and even it out, so I took the ballot and looked at the teams and who had the most invites

Team #
Hawks 6
Lakers 6
Bucks 5
Celtics 5
Grizzlies 5
Pistons 5
Suns 5
Bobcats 4
Bulls 4
Cavaliers 4
Clippers 4
Heat 4
Hornets 4
Jazz 4
Magic 4
Mavericks 4
Rockets 4
Sixers 4
Thunder 4
Warriors 4

The Utah Jazz have 4 total players on the ballot while teams like the Lakers (6) Hawks (6) Bucks (5) Celtics Grizzlies (5) Pistons (5) and Suns (5) have more. So its not a total team problem. Then I noticed that the Jazz had quite a few forwards in the mix, maybe that was the reason. they do have 3 forwards. But I also noticed that Al Jefferson is listed as a forward and has played every game for the Jazz as a center. Which hurts Big Al's chance cause the competition is tougher! Al could have easily been listed as a center and Millsap as a forward and kept it fair.


And if anything else, I am well aware that the All Star Game, really isn't the All Star Game as much as it is the Popularity Star Game and Mr Stern is more about the face than the actual game! But in my opinion Millsap deserves to be there more than anyone else on the Jazz... But Williams.

So was this on purpose? Or does stern and his "All Star Committee" really think that Millsap does not deserve to be on the list? I would put this as bad as when Williams got shafted in 2009 from the All Star team... But at least he was on the ballot!

Put your comments below with your opinion and don't forget to log in and vote Millsap as a write in on the ballot!

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