damnit...
* completely no pertinence to the piece...

Dear god... thank you for asserting which category you fall into.

Adam? Read the sentence again. No-one stated LeBron did have anything to do with Jackson.

Gotcha on the rankings - completely no to the piece at all. Sorry, why are they there then?
The example is intentionally misleading and doesn't fit as you (again, I'm guessing intentionally) chose a .1 difference in rating between positions - yet again bearing no reflection on a Miami/LA match-up.
Yes, hypothetically, team A might be better than team B in their hypothetical match-up in their hypothetical universe. Relevance to the very real Miami/LA?
As far as player-v-player... as I stated before: "inherently flawed in basketball". But I getcha that it's *fun*/interesting.
So tell me - why did you go half-way there in evaluating the match-ups, then on the final page abandon said evaluations completely?

Of a Miami/LA match-up, which player do you think the opponent would have the most difficulty matching up with?
Hint: answer isn't one of your favourite athletes...

At least you recognise the futility in even attempting to assert a numeric value. Only in video games.

How does LeBron have anything to do with Jackson?

As for the purely hypothetical Team A/Team B rankings, those weren't meant to apply directly to Miami and L.A., nor did I ever claim that they did.

The point was to show that the numbers (assuming you can even quantify a player's value into one single number) don't tell the whole story. A team can win four of five hypothetical matchups—have the overall advantage if the numbers are averaged—and still be at a disadvantage. The numbers I chose weren't meant to apply to the two teams in question, just to serve as an extreme example of that concept.

Here's how it does apply:

I gave the Lakers 4 of the 5 matchups between the two teams. That doesn't mean they're still favored.

That's all it meant. Player vs. player matchups are fun and interesting to look at, but you can't use them as gospel in evaluating teams.

I still have no idea why this is such a problem.

Fair call on Jackson. But gee. I guess that would just mean that you're one helluva LeBron fanboy if you think his impact is that great.

But really? It "works"?
In what way does it work Adam? Life's not a video game - you can't designate randomly assign ratings to a team and just arbitrarily assign a "gee-it-works" conclusion.

"Purely hypothetical"? Is that an admission that it had no relation to either team and was just an absolutely unrelated example of how "stuff might work out"?
And in what way, shape or form are the ratings you gave applicable? I mean, come on: neither "team A/B" is at all an accurate example of either Miami or Los Angeles.
So... either you agree that it isn't an accurate example of either team - and thus it's a failure as an analogy... OR you think it does accurately represent Miami/LA - which would mean that you don't really watch basketball.

Come on Adam - you seem like a relatively smart guy. Surely these things are evident. Good writers learn from the errors they make in pieces, and improve. Bad writers pedantically stick to their narrow points of view... and stay the same bad writers.

Phil Jackson did coach other places than L.A.

Also, the ratings example both works and is applicable. It was just purely hypothetical and was meant to make clear exactly what your last penultimate paragraph fails to grasp.

Saw that, and had a laugh.
However, given within your profile you list "LeBron James" as one of your favourite athletes, and "anyone but Phil Jackson" as your favourite coach, it's a reasonable assumption.

Didn't like the way you closed that piece either. The "ratings example" you gave at the end is neither applicable, nor works as an example.

Additionally, the premise - go for a man-to-man match-up (which is inherently flawed in basketball)... where you declares the Lakers to win at PG/SG/PF/C, gives Miami SF (of course!), bench and coach (just)... yet comes out with Miami are better. Umm...come on - I mean, I don't care at all who you pick - but that math doesn't add up.

But thanks for dropping by...

I love how I get accused of being a Lakers fan one day, then a Lakers hater the next.

I'm an NBA writer though, not a Lakers writer. If the Lakers are the hot topic, that's just the subject du jour.