Sports Reference Blog

With the 2015 NFL season kicking off this week, we thought we'd visit some storylines for this season as a way of introducing some of the research tools you can find on Pro-Football-Reference.com. Follow the hyperlinked historical notes to the queries on our site and see if you can re-create them. If you're wondering about how we did anything, just ask us!

Quarterbacks Chasing History

Peyton Manning

• Last season, Manning broke Brett Favre's record for career TD passes. In 2015, the future Hall of Famer needs just 2,148 yards to break Favre's career record for passing yardage. Manning has thrown for over 3,500 yards in every season in which he's played a game. In fact, last season he surpassed 2,148 yards by the eighth game of the season.
• Additionally, with 374 completions, Manning can break Favre's all-time record in that category. That race could come down to the wire, as Manning has averaged 370 completions per season in the 16 years in which he's taken the field.
• Another Favre record that Manning will take aim at this season is the all-time record for wins as a starting QB. Favre currently claims that record with 186, but Manning enters 2015 with 179 (in 42 fewer starts).

• We're certain Manning would prefer to be celebrating something else in early 2016, but he could become the first 15-time Pro Bowler in NFL history.

Drew Brees

• Brees needs just four more TD passes to join Peyton Manning, Brett Favre and Dan Marino as the only signal callers in NFL history to throw 400 TD passes. The man under center in New Orleans is a pretty safe bet to get there, considering that he's thrown for 30+ TD in an NFL-record 7 straight seasons.
• Brees also needs just 31 more completions to move past Hall-of-Famer Dan Marino for third place in NFL history.

Tom Brady

• Brady should quickly join Brees as a newly minted member of the 400-TD club, as he'll enter 2015 with 392 TDs through the air.
• If he's able to add a 30th playoff start to his resume in January, Brady can break his tie with Hall of Famer Jerry Rice and become the NFL's all-time leader in playoff starts.

Ben Roethlisberger

• Big Ben enters 2015 with a 106-52 regular-season record as a starting quarterback. Hall of Famer Terry Bradshaw also started 158 games at QB for the Steelers, posting a 107-51 record. With two more wins, Roethlisberger can surpass Bradshaw to become the winningest starting QB in Steelers history.

Aaron Rodgers

• Rodgers has posted a passer rating of 100+ in six straight seasons. Steve Young is the only other QB with such a streak over three seasons.

Russell Wilson

• His 36 wins as a starting QB through three seasons are the most in NFL history.

Andrew Luck

• Fellow class of 2012 QB Luck has won 33 games thus far (tied for 2nd most through three seasons with Dan Marino and Matt Ryan). Luck is the all-time leader in passing yards through three seasons, though, with 12,957 (surpassing Peyton Manning's old record).

Adrian Peterson Returns

It's been a year since Peterson last took the field in a 34-6 Week 1 win over the Rams last season. Few fans will be rooting for Peterson in 2015, but he'll likely continue to climb the record books.

• With six more rushing TDs, he'll vault past four Hall of Famers and into the Top 10 in NFL history. In fact, if he's able to run for pay dirt 14 times, he can become the ninth man in league history to run it in for six 100 times.
• Peterson enters 2014 averaging 98.0 rushing yards per game in his career. That's the third-highest figure in NFL history.

Golden Receivers

Throwing the football has never been more popular, and it has probably never been easier. Go ahead and check this list of the players with most receiving yards per game in NFL history. That right, the top five are all active players (or at least kind of active in the case of Josh Gordon). And this doesn't even include players like Odell Beckham, Jr. who don't yet have enough games played to qualify.

• Andre Johnson could find himself third in NFL history in career receptions if he snags 91+ catches this season.
• Despite some recent injury issues, Calvin Johnson has the second-most career receiving yards through eight seasons in NFL history. He'll need 1,460 receiving yards this season to be the all-time leader through nine seasons (currently Torry Holt).
• Demaryius Thomas is second to only Megatron in receiving yards over the last three seasons.
• Julio Jones has averaged 108.7 receiving yards per game over the last two seasons.
• Antonio Brown has caught 5+ balls in every game over the last two seasons. His 32-game streak with 5+ receptions is nearly twice as long as any other streak we have on record since 1981 (as far back as our full participation data goes).
• Dez Bryant has caught 41 TDs over the last three seasons. No one else has more than 35.
• DeSean Jackson, meanwhile, is neither a target magnet, nor much of a red zone threat. But few players are as dangerous in their own territory. Jackson's 20 career TD of 55+ yards are tied with HOFer Lance Alworth for most through Age 28. Jackson doesn't turn 29 until December.
• Last, but not least is Odell Beckham. He missed a quarter of the season, must still managed to become just the fourth rookie with 90+ receptions and the fourth rookie with 1,300+ receiving yards. Beckham led the NFL with 108.8 receiving YPG last season and averaged 9 receptions for 133 yards over his final nine games of the season. He enters 2015 on a 9-game streak with 90+ receiving yards. If he's able to extend the streak to ten games, it would be the longest such streak in our participation logs.

Sustained Success

The Patriots posted their 12th straight double-digit win season in 2014. That's the 2nd-longest such streak in NFL history. Only the 49ers (from 1983-98) have posted a longer streak. If head coach Bill Belichick can get his team to repeat, he could become the first head coach to win five Super Bowls.

 

New Extra Point Rules

If you send your kicking team out for extra points, you'll now have to snap the ball from the 15, rather than 2. Curious how this impacts strategy? Check out our Game Player Finder to find all FGAs with the LOS at the 15 over the last 5 seasons. You can also use this tool to search for 2-point conversion tries over the same span. Which approach is the better bet?

Track History All Season Long

Bookmark our NFL Milestone Watch page and check every week for which records might fall.

As you explore Baseball-Reference, you may notice a bit of a re-imagining of how we are now presenting non-MLB statistics on the site. Where we once had fragmented sections for player stats in various non-Major leagues (minors, Japan, Cuba, etc), we have now combined everything into a single page showing the player's professional history. This new page presents all of a player's career statistics on one page and makes it easier than ever to track a player's career trajectory and journey in one place. On player pages where is used to say "minors" it now lists a variety of levels at which the player played (like in the below image from Minnie Minoso's page). Clicking that link will lead you to a listing of that player's career at every level of play.

 

Through these pages, you can now find statistics for the following levels of play:

• MLB since 1871
• Complete affiliated Minor Leagues back to 1877
• Negro Leagues from 1902-1960
• Japanese baseball from 1936 to present
• KBO baseball since 1982
• Cuban National Series from 1961-2014
• Arizona Fall League since 1992
• Coverage of various Winter Leagues back to 2003 (and also 2000, 1999 and 1997)
• Various independent leagues as far back at the late 19th century

As an example of how this all works, let's take a look at the all-levels career of the well-traveled Minnie Minoso: As you can see, the stat tables look like the ones you've grown comfortable with on our site. But instead of just being for a specific level of play, you can see Minoso's stats from MLB, the minors, the Negro Leagues, foreign leagues and independent leagues. Using the "show/hide" buttons atop the stats table, you can isolate or exclude statistics from various levels of play. Additionally, levels at which Minoso played more than one season will be summed beneath the table (as well as his all-level totals). Below you will see an abbreviated version of the table layout, displaying Minoso's long career. If you're wondering what some of the columns represent, hold your mouse over the column header and a description will pop up.

 

Minoso provides a good example due to the variety of levels he played at. You'll also notice that for more obscure leagues there are sometimes empty rows of data. These are instances where we know a player was on a team in a given season, but we simply don't have the statistics. As a result, incomplete totals will be underlined in the tables (or just left blank when there is no data).

While the most obvious change may be to the player pages as demonstrated above, we've also created a new Professional Baseball History landing page, which will provide navigation to a wealth of non-MLB content. On this page, you'll see the left side of the page is dedicated to minor league data, while the center column directs to Japanese leagues and the right column contains links for Negro Leagues, Cuban National Series and the Korean Baseball Organization. Underneath this section you'll also find quick links to many of the minor leagues (broken down by level), as well as various fall/winter leagues and independent leagues.

We hope you find this new layout helpful. Please let us know if you have any questions or feedback.

With the 2015 college football season upon us, just a few reminders on where to find info for this season:

• The full 2015 FBS schedule can be found here. This page also contains links to game previews, which will turn into box scores as the games are completed.
• Individual school schedules are available on that school's season page, which is accessible from this index. These pages will also track team/player statistics and contain links to box scores and previews. We also display an injury report for injuries and suspensions that will appear at the top of the team pages.
• If you'd just like to see box scores for a given day, they are available here.
• Any information on the 2015 season can be accessed from the Season Summary page. This page features a comparison of the conferences, an AP Poll summary and also national statistical leaders. Furthermore, this page provides navigation to standings, ratings and every AP Poll (and CFB Playoff standings once they begin their release). You can also access a larger selection of national statistical leaders.
• For deeper dives into our statistical offerings, we recommend utilizing our Play Index. This is a series of tools offering unique access to our database, which allows users to create custom leaderboards. For instance, the most TD passes in a game since 2000 or the most games in a season with 4+ TD passes since 2000, which can be found via the Player Game Finder. The School Game Finder can tell you things like the most bowl wins since 2000 or most points in a conference championship game since 2000. The School Streak Finder can give you the longest losing streaks in major bowl games since 1869 or the most consecutive 40-point games. Finally, the Rivalry Finder will provide you with a detailed series history between any two schools you choose.

If you have any questions about where to find something or if you encounter any issues, please let us know here.

If I can be honest with you for a moment, I think my approach to fantasy football could use some work. Each year, I agree to join a friend's league and promptly forget about it until the hour before the draft, at which point, I binge read every draft kit and fantasy guide that I can put in front of my face. No matter what, it always ends the same way: me panicking in the 7th round and trying to draft Tshimanga Biakabutuka.

This year will be different. Why? Because this year, we're going to use Pro Football Reference. No more fighting for the same 5 sleepers everyone else wants or drafting Brandon Marshall three rounds too early because you forgot that he got traded to the Jets. We're going to get through this together, you guys.

This year, we've ramped up fantasy coverage on PFR, adding a lot of red zone and matchup data to give you all the info you need. So from the draft, to setting your lineup, to dominating the waiver wire, here's seven ways that PFR will lead you to fantasy glory.

1. We Have Fantasy Points!

That's right, we keep track of fantasy points, based on standard scoring systems (read the details in the glossary). That means that, if you're considering drafting a player, you can pull up his page and see a chart like this:

 

Those are DeMarco Murray's fantasy numbers. In addition to the raw fantasy points, we also have a number called VBD, which subtracts a player's overall fantasy score from the “baseline” score, which is the score of the 12^th-ranked QB, 24^th-ranked RB, 30^th-ranked WR, or 12^th-ranked TE, giving you a number that's roughly fantasy football's cousin to Runs Above Average. Lastly, you can see both his overall rank vs the baseline and positional rank.

VBD is how we determine the overall rank; it lets us see the players who most outperformed the baseline for their position and gave players the biggest advantage over the competition. By VBD, here's the top performers since 2012:

As you can see RBs have an advantage, coming in first all three years (2011's leader was Aaron Rodgers). However, there does tend to be a non-RB player in the top 5. All in all, last year's Top 20 included 8 RBs, 9 WRs, 2 QBs, and 1 Gronk.

However, we're just scratching the surface of the data. In the grey bar towards the top of a player's profile, you'll see a fantasy section. If you click on it, you can get a table like this:

 

Those are DeMarco Murray's game-by-game fantasy stats for 2014. You can see his points, snap counts, and red zone data (hold that thought on the last one).

2. The Season Finder is Rad...

Of course, having fantasy stats is one thing, but actually harnessing them is another. That's where the Play Index comes in. Just like how you can use the Season Finder to sort through traditional season stats like passing yards and receiving TDs, you can also sift through fantasy points. For example, here's the 2014 fantasy point leaders:

 

Torn between a RB or a QB with a late first round pick? This can help you strategize. Depending on who is still on the board, you can use the season finder to compare the dropoff from the top QB to one further down the list and see if it would be higher than, say, the dropoff from the 6^th or 7^th RB. But the Season Finder may be more useful in making decisions within a position. For example, here's the top 15 WRs in Fantasy Points since 2012:

 

While we may want to believe that a Larry Fitzgerald bounceback is coming, he's only been the 27th highest ranked WR over the last three years. On the other hand, while Andre Johnson's numbers lagged a little last year, over the last three seasons he's been a Top 10 WR, and he's upgrading at QB from Ryan Fitzpatrick to Andrew Luck. ESPN has him going 25^th among WR, meaning you could be buying low on a nice rebound candidate.

3. ...But the Game Finder May Be Better

Of course, unless you're in a somewhat unusual league, these season numbers will only do so much. Most of us play fantasy football week-to-week, game-to-game. If only there were some tool that let you search individual games the same way the Season Finder does with seasons...wait, there is!

It's called the Game Finder and it's incredible. You can get info on a game-by-game level, which means that you can actually break down the numbers to the basic unit of a fantasy season. And, of course, the Game Finder has Fantasy Points like the Season Finder. So, for example, if you care about consistency, you can see who has the most 18+ point games since 2012:

 

Some of these bets seem like safer ones than others (Hi, RG3), but if you're picking between Big Ben (ranked 6 among QBs by ESPN) or Cam (ranked 8th), this can be one factor you keep in mind. On the other hand, if you prefer a high ceiling, you can set the parameters higher. For example, these are the players with 30 point games last year:

 

A good fantasy team will balance risky players with high ceilings and consistent players with low floors. With the Game Finder, you can get both.

4. Check the Red Zone

Remember that DeMarco Murray chart I showed you earlier. Well, it shows off one of our newest features: red zone data. We can track targets, carries, yards, and TDs on plays that start within the 20 and within the 10:

 

This gives you a lot of info. Not only can you see how many times someone scored, but you can also see how many times the team tried to score with them. In theory, someone with more targets could see their TD numbers go up if he keeps getting the same opportunities. On the other hand, you may want to bet on the high-efficiency players who convert more of their targets into scores (click to enlarge):

We track these numbers for rushing and passing, as well as receiving. More importantly, we'll be keeping tabs on these in 2015 too. Just click over to any 2015 NFL season page and hover over fantasy on the grey menu bar. Once the season starts, we'll have all the data you need to win on the waiver wire, as well as in your draft.

5. Know Your Advanced Stats

Anybody can look at passing yards or TDs for a quarterback, but our database goes deeper, with per attempt numbers and index stats.

For quarterbacks, we track yards per attempt, but also advanced stats like Adjusted Yards per Attempt (AY/A) and Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt (ANY/A). If you're a basketball fan, you can think of it as something similar to TS%. If you're not a basketball fan or don't know that stat, these numbers adjust a player's yardage per attempt to give them additional credit for TDs and blame for INTs. To decide which one to use, you'll want to know if your league penalizes QBs for sacks. If so, you'll want to use ANY/A, which accounts for sacks. If not, stick with AY/A, which only covers passing yards, TDs, and INTs. Looking at the AY/A leaders with at least 200 attempts last year, here's what you get:

 

Because this is a rate state, and fantasy is a game of bulk, a top scorer like Andrew Luck may be a little lower than where you'd take him in a draft. However, it can alert you to potential warning signs or point out potential sleepers. If the Saints try to run more this year, per rumors, Drew Brees may lose a lot of his value, since his AY/A is already low and his bulk production would also go down (on the other hand, perhaps a more balanced attack would make him more efficient). Meanwhile, guys like Roethlisberger or Tony Romo could be good value picks if you wait on a QB. Or maybe just take Aaron Rodgers and don't overthink it.

With new advanced stats, it can sometimes be tough to tell who is better than whom, and by how much. That's why I like looking at index stats. An index stat will be familiar to anyone whose ever seen ERA+ or OPS+ in baseball. We have index stats for pretty much all the important passing numbers, so rather than looking at just Passing TD%, something like TD%+ might be easier to digest.

With an index stat, it will always be indicated by a + or - (for these passing stats, you'll only need to worry about the +). A score of 100 means that the player's number was average for that season. If it's higher than that, it means they were that percentage better than average. Lower, and it means they were that much worse:

 

Tony Romo's 138 means that his TD% was 38% better than average, meaning, again, he could be a sneaky play. Or you could go with Rodgers or Luck and know you'll have an elite TD-slinging QB.

Putting it all together, here's a scatter plot showing the Top 16 fantasy QBs (plus Ryan Fitzpatrick, who grades out surprisingly well by these metrics). On one axis, we have Y/A, giving us an idea of their efficiency and yardage totals. On the other, we have TD%+, for their scoring. The size of the circles reflects the number of pass attempts, giving us some idea of bulk (click on the picture to enlarge):

6. Play the Matchups

The draft is just the start of your season, and we'll be there to help as you navigate the endless lineup tinkering that comes with the fantasy season. In order to win, you'll be spending a lot of time researching the teams that your players are facing. Fortunately, we keep tables with all sorts of team defensive data.

Remember AY/A? I mean, we were just talking about it. Well, not only can you see it for the QBs, but you can check team's AY/A against, to get a look at how their defense has fared beyond simple points and yards allowed:

 

Even though Washington was merely a bottom 10 team by passing yards allowed, their AY/A shows that they got pummeled through the air. Of course, defense is not always consistent from year-to-year, so you'll want to pay close attention to how the 2015 numbers start to shake out early.

This year, our database goes even deeper, with matchup data by position. For instance, here's how every team's defense fared against TEs in 2014:

 

As if Gronk weren't valuable enough, he also gets 4 games this season against teams who were in the Top 5 for easiest matchups against TEs. Of course, he'll also be playing 3 against the 2 toughest TE matchups in the league. Just like with the red zone data, we'll be updating matchup data for 2015 in the fantasy section, so check these tables every week and adjust your lineup accordingly

7. Don't Worry, We Didn't Forget About Daily Fantasy

If you're using a Daily Fantasy site to play fantasy football without putting too much strain on your attention span, don't worry. We've got both FanDuel and DraftKings numbers in the database too. So all those nifty searches I showed you in the Season Finder and Game Finder? You can do those with Daily Fantasy points too! Here, for example, is every player with 8 or more games worth 20 points or more in DraftKings:

 

Not only that, but our matchup data includes FanDuel and DraftKings points, as well as standard fantasy, meaning you can pore over those tables and search for the player who makes you a millionaire. Don't forget to check the red zone numbers too!

With Pro Football Reference, and the powerful search tools of the Play Index, you basically have your own front office and scouts. See, I told you we were going to get through this together. Unless you're in my league; in that case, everything I just said is a complete lie and you should draft Tebow first overall.

What is your favorite kind of baseball play? I imagine a lot of people would go with a classic like the dinger. Or perhaps you prefer the swinging strikeout? I imagine Red Sox fans who were in Fenway for Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS may be partial to the stolen base. No matter what it is, I'm very jealous of you, because your favorite play has an easily understood definition and mine does not: Read the rest of this entry

Jonah Gardner joined the Sports Reference crew (working out of Philly) a few weeks ago as our Social Media Coordinator bringing SR's head count to seven full-time staff. Jonah brings experience working in social media for The Human Solution in Austin and also for several musical acts and record labels. He's an Atlanta Braves fan, backs Everton FC (the Braves of the EPL), and is a big NBA fan (see his Kevin Garnett Trade Voltron). Jonah will be leading our change on social media for Sports Reference and you'll see us on much more active on twitter and joining additional platforms in the near future.

It's been a long six months, but this weekend the NFL is back in our lives. However, while the Hall of Fame Game is always a fun spectacle to start the preseason, we're just as excited for the Hall of Fame Induction. In order to celebrate this year's inductees, we combed through our database to find some interesting or unique accomplishments. This post is by no means comprehensive, but here are the charts, graphs, and tables that begin to scratch the surface of the greatness of the Hall of Fame Class of 2015. Read the rest of this entry

Last year we rolled out many new play-by-play based statistics and features to player pages on Hockey-Reference. A Team Advanced Stats Finder was created to allow users to sort through team-level statistics. We're now thrilled to announce a player stat companion to this: The Player Advanced Stats Finder.

This tool works like the others in our Play Index, allowing users to create custom queries back to 2007-08 by using the below search form:

As you can see, the tool allows for single-season search, combined season search or total season search. Additionally, there are several filters and criteria that can be applied to your search, as well as several different "sort by" options for your report. To give you a better idea of what the tool is capable, let's fire it up and show you some sample searches:

• Peter Holland led all players with 18 short-handed takeaways in 2014-15
• Joe Thornton leads all players with 218 giveaways in 5-on-5 tied situations since 2007-08
• Among players with 300 games played since 2007-08, Pavel Datsyuk leads the way with a 59.1% even strength Corsi For %
• Among players with 40 games in a season since 2007-08, Justin Williams in 2012-13 owns the best Relative Corsi per 60 minutes in 5-on-5 close situations
• Zenon Konopka has the most seasons since 2007-08 with 100+ faceoff wins and a faceoff % over 60%
• Alex Ovechkin led all forwards with 4.3 minutes per game on the ice in power play situations
• And it's no surprise that Ovi dominates a leaderboard combining hits and shots

Of course, these are just a few quick examples. Some other statistics in a variety of situations that are now searchable/sortable are Fenwick, PDO, blocks, offensive/defensive zone start % and many more. We encourage you to play around with this new tool and let us know what you think!

And if you're confused about what any of these statistics mean, don't forget to check out our updated glossary!

The 2015 MLB Trade Deadline was July 31st, 4pm ET.

Here we've collected all of the team trades in the run-up to the non-waiver trade deadline.

You can also find trades between any two teams in our Franchise-to-Franchise Trade Histories.

July 31:

Tigers trade Yoenis Cespedes to the Mets for Michael Fulmer and Luis Cessa.

Orioles trade Tommy Hunter to the Cubs for Junior Lake.

Mariners trade J.A. Happ to the Pirates for Adrian Sampson.

Marlins trade Dan Haren and cash to the Cubs for Ivan Pineyro and Elliot Soto.

Phillies trade Ben Revere and cash to the Blue Jays for Jimmy Cordero and Alberto Tirado.

Rays trade Kevin Jepsen to the Twins for Chih-Wei Hu and Alexis Tapia.

Mariners trade Mark Lowe to the Blue Jays for Jake Brentz, Nick Wells and Rob Rasmussen.

Brewers trade Gerardo Parra to the Orioles for Zach Davies.

Brewers trade Jonathan Broxton and cash to the Cardinals for Malik Collymore.

July 30:

Pirates trade Justin Sellers to the White Sox for player to be named later or cash.

Mariners trade Dustin Ackley to the Yankees for Ramon Flores and Jose Ramirez.

Astros trade Josh Hader, Adrian Houser, Brett Phillips and Domingo Santana to the Brewers for Mike Fiers, Carlos Gomez and cash.

As part of 3-team trade Braves send Jose Peraza, Bronson Arroyo, Luis Avilan, Jim Johnson and Alex Wood to the Dodgers. Dodgers send Paco Rodriguez, Zachary Bird and Hector Olivera to the Braves. Dodgers send Victor Araujo and Jeff Brigham and Kevin Guzman to the Marlins. Marlins send Mat Latos, Mike Morse to the Dodgers. Marlins send 2016 competitive balance round A pick to the Braves.

Tigers trade David Price to the Blue Jays for Daniel Norris, Matt Boyd and Jairo Labourt.

Tigers trade Joakim Soria to the Pirates for JaCoby Jones.

Indians trade Brandon Moss to the Cardinals for Rob Kaminsky.

Reds trade Mike Leake to the Giants for Keury Mella and Adam Duvall .

July 29:

Phillies trade Cole Hamels, Jake Diekman and cash to the Rangers for Matt Harrison, Jorge Alfaro, Alec Asher, Jerad Eickhoff, Jake Thompson and Nick Williams.

Royals trade Joe Blanton to the Pirates for cash.

Pirates trade Jayson Aquino to the Indians for cash.

July 28:

Phillies trade Jonathan Papelbon and cash to the Nationals for Nick Pivetta.

A's trade Ben Zobrist and cash to the Royals for Aaron Brooks and Sean Manaea.

Rays trade David DeJesus and to the Angels for Eduar Lopez.

Indians trade David Murphy to the Angels for Eric Stamets.

Rockies trade Troy Tulowitzki and LaTroy Hawkins to the Blue Jays for Jose Reyes, Miguel Castro, Jeff Hoffman, and Jesus Tinoco.

July 27:

Red Sox trade Shane Victorino and cash to the Angels for Josh Rutledge.

A's trade Tyler Clippard and $1MM to the Mets for Casey Meisner.

July 26:

Reds trade Johnny Cueto to the Royals for John Lamb, and Cody Reed.

July 24:

Braves trade Juan Uribe and Kelly Johnson to the Mets for John Gant and Rob Whalen.

July 23:

Brewers trade Aramis Ramirez to the Pirates for Yhonathan Barrios.

A's trade Scott Kazmir to the Astros for Daniel Mengden and Jacob Nottingham.

Today is the 8th anniversary of the Kevin Garnett trade. Of course, there have now been 3 Kevin Garnett trades, but you know the one I'm talking about. In 2007, the Minnesota Timberwolves changed NBA history by sending KG to Boston in exchange for Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Gerald Green, Sebastian Telfair, Theo Ratliff, and the picks that would be come Wayne Ellington and Jonny Flynn.

As you know, that trade went much better for Boston and KG than it did for the Timberwolves, who haven't been to the playoffs since. It's easy to criticize this trade, but Minnesota was in a difficult position for two reasons. First, Kevin Garnett is a once-in-a-generation talent, so almost no trade could have brought back a fair return. And, second, they couldn't build a Voltron out of the players they received in the trade.

While there's nothing we can do about the former, we decided to celebrate the anniversary of the trade by doing the latter. I give you, the Kevin Garnett Trade Voltron: Read the rest of this entry