The Numbers Game: A Decade in Perspective

Who were the best fantasy players of the past decade? Which year was Kevin Durant‘s most productive, from a fantasy standpoint? These questions and more are the focus of today’s Numbers Game, which aggregates every player’s fantasy values for every regular season from 2006-2016.

Not included are players who averaged fewer than 20 minutes or appeared in fewer than 40 games during any given season. This forces us to say farewell to guys like Renaldo Major, Jeljko Rebraca, Brian Skinner, Mike Hall, Derrick Caracter, and Nolan Smith, as well as many seasons from more prominent players. Even after such massive culls, we’re left with 2,159 players’ seasons which make the cut over the past 10 years. That’s not to say 2,159 unique players — for instance, Zach Randolph makes the list eight times, and Willie Green makes the list five times. It took so long to aggregate these stats that I only scratch the surface when examining the results, but I’ll revisit the topic in next week’s column.

Random side note: three players in the past decade have appeared in 83 games during a single regular season, thanks to a perfect attendance record and a trade that resulted in an extra appearance. Those players are Ramon Sessions (2013-14), Josh Smith (2014-15) and Jarrett Jack (2010-11).

My methodology is as follows:

1) Compile league-wide stats for the past 10 seasons

2) Eliminate players who appeared in fewer than 40 games and/or averaged fewer than 20 minutes per game

3) Calculate means and standard deviations for the remaining player population (2,159), per category, and assign individual z-scores

4) Weight z-scores for FG% and FT% by volume of attempts

5) Aggregate z-score totals (9-cat) to rank the top fantasy players/seasons of the past decade

It’s important to note that this approach pits every player (who makes the statistical cut) against every other player for the past decade…even themselves. For example, Chris Paul‘s stats from 2004-05 are also competing against his stats from 2005-06, 2006-07, etc. It’s not juxtaposing results from discrete seasons, but is rather merging them all into one metric…picture an overlapping, decade-long meta-season.

The complete results are way too extensive to post here (2,159 players qualified for games and minutes played), but if you’re interested you can view (or download) the entire list via this Google Drive file.

For now, let’s begin with the top-200 values over the past decade:

*Note: These are per-game values, not cumulative/games played.

Unsurprisingly, the top of the list is dominated by familiar fantasy studs: Curry, LeBron, Durant, CP3, etc. Anthony Davis‘ phenomenal 2014-15 production earns him the No. 3 spot on the list, and Kawhi Leonard‘s most recent season ranks No. 14 over the past decade. Not too bad for a guy the Spurs’ acquired in exchange for George Hill. The first real eye-opener is Shawn Marion at No. 20 overall. He was the best overall fantasy player in 2006-07, a high-water mark for his time in Phoenix under coach Mike D’Antoni. During that season, the Matrix averaged 17.5 points, 1.0 threes, 9.8 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 2.0 steals, 1.5 blocks and just 1.4 turnovers, all while shooting 52.4% from the field and 81.0% from the line. The D’Antoni effect is worth keeping in mind when evaluating a guy like Trevor Ariza next season.

Other throwback top-50 seasons include Amare Stoudemire (2007-08), Danny Granger (2008-09), Gilbert Arenas (2006-07) and even Marcus Camby (2007-08). That campaign from Camby was an outlier for a few reasons, none more glaring than his ability to stay on the court — he played a career-high 79 games for the Nuggets in ’07-08, while averaging career-highs in rebounds (13.1), assists (3.3) and blocks (3.6). Those numbers led more than a few upside-seeking fantasy owners to ruin in the next few years.

There are plenty of players and statistics to gawk at, and it’s fun to be reminded that Rashard Lewis was once an elite fantasy option, but more helpful is an overview of players’ positions among the top-200 seasons from the past decade:

I’m using only a player’s primary position, not multi-position eligibility as seen on Yahoo and other fantasy sites. Centers prove to be exceedingly scarce among the most elite fantasy players of the past 10 years, whereas power forwards are in ready supply. Bear in mind that I’m using 9-cat values and, as usual, plenty of centers lose a ton of value due to lousy FT% on high-volume attempts. If you eliminate FT% from the equation, the mix of positions/seasons in the top-200 looks like this:

Centers get a huge boost with FT% tossed out, and predictably there’s a decline in guards. If you’re planning to punt FT% next season, it’s worth noting that Stephen Curry‘s ridiculous, decade-leading 2015-16 fantasy campaign made him the No. 1 option even when you discount his 90.8% FT shooting on 5.1 attempts per game. If you luck into the first pick, it’s worth thinking about pairing Curry with someone like DeAndre Jordan, Hassan Whiteside, Andre Drummond or Marcus Camby. Wait…scratch that last one.

I’ll go more in-depth about these decade-perspective rankings next week, including a look at how rookies have fared over the past decade (spoiler alert: not very well). Until then, feel free to dig around the entire list of 2,159 qualifying players by clicking here. You can send me any insights or queries on Twitter @Knaus_RW.

Bonus usage-rate table showing the highest usage rates for qualifying players over the past 10 years:

Let’s block ads! (Why?)