In writing about DeShawn Stevenson a while back I leaked my most top-secret player evaluation tool.
I had no idea what would happen after I leaked the information, but since that time at least one well-known writer has silently slipped the tool into his player-evaluation toolbox.
So now that the cat is out of the bag, I might as well go ahead a release the entire system.
It is called situational performance splits, or SPS.
SPS is the reason why I keep praising Baron Davis while others keep ripping him and why I had TJ Ford rated as my top free-agent point guard before I did away with the list.
Any good player evaluation system should look to find players who will lead their teams to championships.
And SPS does that by paying less attention to games which take place outside of championship environments and focusing more on players and how they perform against the best players and best teams and in the biggest games.
And if it involves the final two minutes of a one-possession game, that's even better.
Whenever I'm watching games and breaking down players I pay very close attention to the following things, which make up the essence of SPS.
INDIVIDUAL MATCHUP
After a team reaches the second round of the playoffs, you can pretty much bet that the teams are going to be loaded with the best players in the league.
In order to know if a guy can lead a team past this point, you have to know how he performs against the best players in the league at his position.
So whenever you're watching games, pay particular attention to specific matchups against top players. And at the very least you want to see specific matchups against very good players.
Some guys are better on one side of the court.
In these cases, for example, you would want to watch how a small forward plays on offense against Ron Artest and Tony Allen and on defense against Carmelo Anthony and Paul Pierce to get an idea of what he is capable of in big games.
Carmelo Anthony is someone who scores highly on my board.
For all of the stat-geek criticism, Anthony sports a 10-1 career record against Kevin Durant and a 9-4 career record against LeBron James.
And based on the swag and audacity Anthony plays with when he plays against James, I would never know James was the better player.
Anthony goes hard at James like James is some scrub in a pickup game at Rucker Park.
And that's what you look for in these individual matchups, guys who don't back down against the best competition.
And guys who are productive and win against the best competition and relish the opportunity to go against it rate highly in SPS.
It must also be pointed out that good performance is very much a product of good coaching and good teammates.
To find out why someone is underperforming you may have to look beyond his individual shortcomings and look at the coach he's playing for, the system he's playing in and the teammates he's playing with.
TEAM MATCHUP
The next thing you want to look at is team matchup.
Specifically, you want to see how someone does on offense against the best defensive teams and how they do on defense against the best offensive teams and how they do against the teams with the best records and coaches in the NBA.
All information against teams like Minnesota and New Jersey must be excluded.
Based on last year's coaches, rosters and records the following teams would be of best use: Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, Oklahoma City and San Antonio.
And of course, things change.
Denver, Memphis and Portland were all on fire toward the end of the season. And Oklahoma City played much better after Kendrick Perkins and Nazr Mohammed were integrated into the lineup.
So games against those teams during that time would be useful as well.
But I wouldn't go much further than that because you start getting into serious mediocrity at the coaching and/or talent levels after that point.
GAME MAGNITUDE
All games are not created equally. Some games are simply bigger than others.
And SPS looks to identify those big games and draw more conclusions from them than the other games on the schedule.
What is at stake here?
That is what you want to find out in determining the magnitude of a game.
Is it a NBA championship? A series? A division title or playoff berth? A reputation? Nothing?
It goes without saying that in order to win it all a team is going to have to win some big games, and at least some of them on the road.
And you can't win big games without big-game players.
As best as I could I built a list of the biggest games, in order of importance:
1. NBA Finals games
2. Conference finals games
3. Second round playoff games
4. First round playoff games
5. Elimination games
6. Playoff position games during the last few weeks of the season
7. Games after the All-Star break
8. Games against top teams and players
9. Playoff position games before the last few weeks of the season
10. Road games, especially those in hostile environments
11. Games during long winning streaks (in general, 10 or more wins)
12. Games on national television
Some of those categories blend into one another.
In short, what you're trying to do is turn the pressure, the intensity, the competition and the attention levels way up to get them to match what someone will face as he tries to win deeper in the playoffs.
And playoff games clearly get bigger the further you go into a series, with game seven of the NBA Finals being the biggest game possible.
Watching guys under these circumstances tells you all you need to know about them.
Coaches too.
GAME SITUATION
When I say game situation I am obviously talking about the clutch, the last two minutes of one-possession games.
Getting back to TJ Ford, he led Indiana to a win over the Lakers in Los Angeles six days after beating the Heat in Miami. And Baron Davis also has a few wins over the Lakers and Heat (one with the lowly Cavaliers) on his resume from last season.
Ford led the charge in Indiana's win over Los Angeles by flawlessly executing clutch plays down the stretch.
His play was what basketball is all about.
Let's take a look at the SPS factors and try to put some sort of value on the win.
There are some qualifiers.
Andrew Bynum didn't play. He was matched up individually against Steve Blake, who isn't a very good player. Although it clearly became a big game by the end, this wasn't a big game for Los Angeles coming in.
So you could say Indiana was able to sneak up on them and catch them by surprise with their strong play. And because it was so early in the season and the teams' records so far apart, there was very little at stake.
All that being said, this was still a significant accomplishment.
TJ Ford led lowly Indiana to a victory over the two-time defending world champion Los Angeles Lakers by outdueling Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol in the clutch, on their home floor.
I don't have a problem with that victory.
In addition, Ford led Texas to the Final Four in college and took Milwaukee and Toronto (Milwaukee and Toronto!) to the playoffs two times each.
And there is no doubt he would have helped Indiana to the playoffs with a much better record last season had he not been benched in the middle of the season for no good reason.
Mike Bibby is the only one who can match Ford's level of accomplishment among free-agent point guards, but Ford is younger than Bibby and significantly more athletic.
And that is my ultimate player evaluation tool, and it is the Holy Grail of player evaluation systems.
So when you read my work and see that I seem to be speaking a different language and operating on a different wavelength than others who cover the NBA, now you'll know why.
We are looking at two totally different things, at least.
I put little stock in 82-game performance. I put my stock in situational performance and try to pick the situations which most resemble championship caliber.
And I seek out and praise players who excel in those situations, among others.
Note: HBIQ is notorious for jinxing players and teams.
So now that I have big-upped Carmelo Anthony, Baron Davis and TJ Ford don't be surprised if they totally flame out and suck beyond all recognition for the rest of their careers.
But don't let that discourage you from using the system.
It works fine as long as I'm not the one issuing the praise.
Carmelo Anthony's career record against Kevin Durant was posted by Sarcastic on Inside Hoops. His records against Durant and LeBron James are from Basketball Reference.
And TJ Ford had Milwaukee in the playoffs during his rookie season before he got injured and missed the rest of the season. Milwaukee went on to make the playoffs without him.
I counted that in his favor because there is little doubt they would have done the same with him healthy and in the lineup.
Some of the additional Ford information I learned from Mark Medina.
To wrap it up, I would like to say that I am only one man and can't possibly keep track of all of this information by myself.
But I do the best I can with what I have.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Showing posts with label advanced statistics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label advanced statistics. Show all posts
Friday, August 19, 2011
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Advanced Passing Stats: The Nickel And More
It's been too long since the last time I brought out some advanced statistics.
But it's that time again.
Passing is the part of the game I've been working on most recently.
So I want to show everyone what I've been working on and get you all familiar with these concepts.
THE NICKEL
A nickel is when a guy makes a nice pass only to have his teammate (1) miss an open jumper, (2) get fouled, (3) turn the ball over or (4) miss a shot close to the rim.
Nickels will generally be credited only for the fouls and turnovers which take place close to the rim.
And missed contested jumpers aren't nickels because there is no real expectation for a make on contested jumpers, and getting someone a contested shot isn't an indicator of strong passing ability.
Missed shots close to the rim which are contested will be judgment calls.
For misses where it is determined that the contest was a major factor in the miss, no nickel will be credited. For misses where it is determined that the contest didn't play a major factor in the miss, a nickel will be credited.
And when a player is fouled off of a nice pass and goes to the line and makes one free throw, the passer will get a nickel and a penny (or six cents); and when the player makes both free throws the passer will be given a nickel and two pennies (or seven cents).
To see this in action, let's look at Terrence Williams in his debut with the Houston Rockets.
Williams makes three nice passes here: plays starting at 1:42 to Patrick Patterson, 2:41 to Jared Jeffries and 3:08 to Courtney Lee.
But Patterson is fouled. Jeffries misses a layup. And Lee misses a three.
In these scenarios, Williams would be credited with three nickels plus the penny from Patterson's made free throw.
Looking at Williams' box score, you wouldn't think he did much of anything in this game. But the story from the ground paints an entirely different picture.
Looking at the game, you can see Williams was effective and made contributions to the team which the box score didn't capture.
And that is what the nickel is here to do, give what the box score doesn't and properly evaluate every player's passing skills.
THE TEAM ASSIST
This is an extension of the hockey assist, but it takes it a bit further to include not only the pass before the pass but all passes before the pass leading to a made basket.
Let's look at an imaginary scenario to see how it works.
Shaquille O'Neal passes the ball from the post out to Kobe Byrant, who swings it over to Rick Fox, who kicks it over to Ron Harper, who whips it over to Robert Horry for a three.
I know Kobe Bryant would fire up a shot the second the ball grazed his fingertips (I kid, LOL!). That's why I said this is an imaginary scenario.
In this case, here is how the assist would look: team assist: O'Neal-Bryant-Fox-Harper.
The last person listed in the assist string (Ron Harper) is the one who gets credit for the individual assist.
Looking at another imaginary play, let's say Kevin Love gets a rebound and zips an outlet pass to Ricky Rubio and three-quarter court.
Rubio throws a touch pass to Wes Johnson under the basket, and Johnson dishes a behind-the-back pass to Michael Beasley for a dunk.
The assist string would look like this: team assist: Love-Rubio-Johnson.
Calls will have to be made as to exactly where the assist string begins, but this is for rapid-succession passes which lead to made shots.
It's not for guys who catch a pass and hold it for five seconds, then dribble around and pass it to another guy who holds it for five seconds and dribbles it around some more.
It is for quick passes leading to buckets.
And it is designed to reward team play and give everyone credit for their contribution to the field goal.
THE EXTRA PASS
Extra passes create better team chemistry. And better team chemistry leads to wins.
An extra pass is when someone has an open shot and passes it up to give a teammate a shot.
Guys who make the extra pass are unselfish, team players who make offenses go and who everyone loves playing with.
And the camaraderie they bring with their unselfishness brings the team closer together and encourages others to do the same.
So I'll be looking at guys who make the extra pass and what impact it has on how their teams perform.
And it is well understood that you don't want to get too carried away with these extra passes to the point where it hurts the team.
As I say with all of my advanced statistics, I don't have anywhere near the resources or the manpower to track and log this information as I would like.
But I will track some games or parts of games from time to time.
Note: It took me years to come up with the name nickel for the concept of one-half of an assist.
It finally came from the realization that you need two things to get an assist, or a dime: (1) a pass and (2) a made shot. A pass and a missed shot is half of an assist, or half of a dime.
So I named it the nickel. Sounds simple but it was really hard.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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But it's that time again.
Passing is the part of the game I've been working on most recently.
So I want to show everyone what I've been working on and get you all familiar with these concepts.
THE NICKEL
A nickel is when a guy makes a nice pass only to have his teammate (1) miss an open jumper, (2) get fouled, (3) turn the ball over or (4) miss a shot close to the rim.
Nickels will generally be credited only for the fouls and turnovers which take place close to the rim.
And missed contested jumpers aren't nickels because there is no real expectation for a make on contested jumpers, and getting someone a contested shot isn't an indicator of strong passing ability.
Missed shots close to the rim which are contested will be judgment calls.
For misses where it is determined that the contest was a major factor in the miss, no nickel will be credited. For misses where it is determined that the contest didn't play a major factor in the miss, a nickel will be credited.
And when a player is fouled off of a nice pass and goes to the line and makes one free throw, the passer will get a nickel and a penny (or six cents); and when the player makes both free throws the passer will be given a nickel and two pennies (or seven cents).
To see this in action, let's look at Terrence Williams in his debut with the Houston Rockets.
Williams makes three nice passes here: plays starting at 1:42 to Patrick Patterson, 2:41 to Jared Jeffries and 3:08 to Courtney Lee.
But Patterson is fouled. Jeffries misses a layup. And Lee misses a three.
In these scenarios, Williams would be credited with three nickels plus the penny from Patterson's made free throw.
Looking at Williams' box score, you wouldn't think he did much of anything in this game. But the story from the ground paints an entirely different picture.
Looking at the game, you can see Williams was effective and made contributions to the team which the box score didn't capture.
And that is what the nickel is here to do, give what the box score doesn't and properly evaluate every player's passing skills.
THE TEAM ASSIST
This is an extension of the hockey assist, but it takes it a bit further to include not only the pass before the pass but all passes before the pass leading to a made basket.
Let's look at an imaginary scenario to see how it works.
Shaquille O'Neal passes the ball from the post out to Kobe Byrant, who swings it over to Rick Fox, who kicks it over to Ron Harper, who whips it over to Robert Horry for a three.
I know Kobe Bryant would fire up a shot the second the ball grazed his fingertips (I kid, LOL!). That's why I said this is an imaginary scenario.
In this case, here is how the assist would look: team assist: O'Neal-Bryant-Fox-Harper.
The last person listed in the assist string (Ron Harper) is the one who gets credit for the individual assist.
Looking at another imaginary play, let's say Kevin Love gets a rebound and zips an outlet pass to Ricky Rubio and three-quarter court.
Rubio throws a touch pass to Wes Johnson under the basket, and Johnson dishes a behind-the-back pass to Michael Beasley for a dunk.
The assist string would look like this: team assist: Love-Rubio-Johnson.
Calls will have to be made as to exactly where the assist string begins, but this is for rapid-succession passes which lead to made shots.
It's not for guys who catch a pass and hold it for five seconds, then dribble around and pass it to another guy who holds it for five seconds and dribbles it around some more.
It is for quick passes leading to buckets.
And it is designed to reward team play and give everyone credit for their contribution to the field goal.
THE EXTRA PASS
Extra passes create better team chemistry. And better team chemistry leads to wins.
An extra pass is when someone has an open shot and passes it up to give a teammate a shot.
Guys who make the extra pass are unselfish, team players who make offenses go and who everyone loves playing with.
And the camaraderie they bring with their unselfishness brings the team closer together and encourages others to do the same.
So I'll be looking at guys who make the extra pass and what impact it has on how their teams perform.
And it is well understood that you don't want to get too carried away with these extra passes to the point where it hurts the team.
As I say with all of my advanced statistics, I don't have anywhere near the resources or the manpower to track and log this information as I would like.
But I will track some games or parts of games from time to time.
Note: It took me years to come up with the name nickel for the concept of one-half of an assist.
It finally came from the realization that you need two things to get an assist, or a dime: (1) a pass and (2) a made shot. A pass and a missed shot is half of an assist, or half of a dime.
So I named it the nickel. Sounds simple but it was really hard.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Saturday, December 18, 2010
NBA Advanced Defensive Statistics
I've been working on some new defensive statistics which I need to introduce to the public.
Some of this builds on work developed by Dean Oliver. The rest I came up with on my own.
One of my biggest problems with statistics in general is that they are extremely biased in favor of offense. And advanced basketball statistics are no different.
I've been on a mission to create a statistic for everything a basketball player does to help his team win, or lose, and credit it accurately to improve player and team evaluation.
And these defensive statistics are another step in that direction.
I must again tell you that this article is about to get really nerdy right now, talking about the minute details of various basketball scenarios, so consider yourself warned.
INDIVIDUAL STATS
The first defensive concept is the stall.
A stall is mainly when an offensive player tries to score on a defensive player, but the defensive player prevents the scoring attempt, usually forcing the offensive player to pass the basketball.
It is a stall and not a stop because there was no shot attempt; the defender didn't prevent a score; he only delayed a scoring opportunity due to the possession being still alive with the ball in the hands of the offense.
Like almost everything else, some of these will be judgment calls; but you can usually tell when an offensive player is trying to score.
I'll stick with Oliver's language on this next one and go with forced miss.
A forced miss is when a defensive player forces an offensive player to miss a shot. He can do this by either contesting the shot or by blocking the path of the offensive player and forcing him shoot farther away from the basket than he could have without the path block.
Forced misses which are not contested and don't involve a path block will be credited to the team.
A forced miss plus a rebound equals a stop.
When the same player who forced the miss gets the rebound, he will be credited with a full stop.
A stop can also be defined more broadly as anything a defensive player or team does to create a change of possession without any points being scored by the offense.
So drawing charges, getting steals, forcing shot-clock violations and a wide variety of other things will be counted as stops as well.
And as Dean Oliver pointed out, fouling a player who goes to the line and misses both free throws will be counted as a stop, assuming the defense secures the rebound after the second free-throw miss.
½ Stops. When one player forces a miss and a different player gets the rebound, the stop will be divided into two equal halves, the forced miss half and the rebound half.
And each player will be given ½ stop.
¼ Stops. When two players force a miss or two players combine for a rebound, the ½ stop for the forced miss or rebound will be split in half and each player given ¼ stop.
Let's say two defensive players double-team a player in the post and force him to miss a shot, and a third defensive player gets the rebound.
The forced-miss half of the stop will be divided in two, and the two players will be given ¼ stop each for forcing the miss.
Since only one player got the rebound, he will be credited with his regular ½ stop.
¼ stops for the rebound half are for plays when one defensive player deflects the rebound, and a second recovers it.
Let's get really complicated and look at one more scenario.
A player dribbles the ball across half court and is immediately double-teamed.
The ball pressure from the trap forces him into a bad pass which is deflected by a third defender and recovered by a fourth for a steal.
This stop would be split into two equal halves, the ball-pressure half and the steal half.
The two trapping players would be given ¼ stop each for the ball-pressure half, and the players who got the steal would be given ¼ stop each for their combined play on the steal half.
Because these fractions can get out of hand, whenever more than two players combine for ½ of a stop, it will be credited to the team.
TEAM STATS
Now let's move over and look at some team defensive statistics.
The best way to stop a team from scoring is to not let them shoot the basketball.
You can't score without shooting, right?
So one of the things which will be tracked is the percentage of no-shot stops a defensive team gets, meaning they did something to change possession and get the ball back from the offense before the offense had the opportunity to attempt a field goal.
For a team which can't get a no-shot stop, a one-shot stop is the next best thing. That obviously means that the offense came down and missed one shot, and the defense got the rebound and ended the possession.
And the percentage of times a defense does that will be logged as well.
No-shot stops may be called "none-and-dones" and one-shot stops "one-and-dones."
Another thing is that not all stops are created equally.
Live-ball stops are the best because they give the team the opportunity to get fast-break points. So teams will be measured on their field goal percentages after live-ball stops, dead-ball stops and after made baskets for comparison.
These statistics can also be used for offense.
One of the biggest problems for Golden State is that they have too many no-shot possessions on offense. It absolutely killed them in road games at the Lakers and at Oklahoma City this year.
Finally, I'll be looking at dunks and layups.
I'm sure we can all agree that the two easiest shots to make in basketball are an uncontested dunk and an uncontested layup.
Field goals allowed will be looked at to see what percentage were uncontested dunks and layups and what impact this had on the field goal percentage allowed by the defense.
As I wrote before, I don't have nearly the resources or the manpower to track this information on a large scale but will do some games from time to time.
UPDATE: 1/31/2011
Here are some other situations where a player will be credited with a stall: (1) when he deflects a ball out of bounds, (2) when he deflects a ball which gets recovered by the offense, (3) when the offense is trying to pass to his man but his ball denial doesn't allow the pass attempt, (4) when his ball pressure on the passer forces the offense away from who it was trying to pass the ball to, (5) when he forces a jump ball and the offense maintains possession, (6*) when he bumps or blocks off an offensive player moving without the ball and disrupts the play, (7*) when he blocks the path of a dribbler not attempting to score and disrupts the play.
*UPDATE: 5/26/2011, 5:00 AM
It should also be noted that stalls can and will be divided into ½ stalls and ¼ stalls just like stops, and when more than two players combine for ½ of a stall it will be credited to the team.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Some of this builds on work developed by Dean Oliver. The rest I came up with on my own.
One of my biggest problems with statistics in general is that they are extremely biased in favor of offense. And advanced basketball statistics are no different.
I've been on a mission to create a statistic for everything a basketball player does to help his team win, or lose, and credit it accurately to improve player and team evaluation.
And these defensive statistics are another step in that direction.
I must again tell you that this article is about to get really nerdy right now, talking about the minute details of various basketball scenarios, so consider yourself warned.
INDIVIDUAL STATS
The first defensive concept is the stall.
A stall is mainly when an offensive player tries to score on a defensive player, but the defensive player prevents the scoring attempt, usually forcing the offensive player to pass the basketball.
It is a stall and not a stop because there was no shot attempt; the defender didn't prevent a score; he only delayed a scoring opportunity due to the possession being still alive with the ball in the hands of the offense.
Like almost everything else, some of these will be judgment calls; but you can usually tell when an offensive player is trying to score.
I'll stick with Oliver's language on this next one and go with forced miss.
A forced miss is when a defensive player forces an offensive player to miss a shot. He can do this by either contesting the shot or by blocking the path of the offensive player and forcing him shoot farther away from the basket than he could have without the path block.
Forced misses which are not contested and don't involve a path block will be credited to the team.
A forced miss plus a rebound equals a stop.
When the same player who forced the miss gets the rebound, he will be credited with a full stop.
A stop can also be defined more broadly as anything a defensive player or team does to create a change of possession without any points being scored by the offense.
So drawing charges, getting steals, forcing shot-clock violations and a wide variety of other things will be counted as stops as well.
And as Dean Oliver pointed out, fouling a player who goes to the line and misses both free throws will be counted as a stop, assuming the defense secures the rebound after the second free-throw miss.
½ Stops. When one player forces a miss and a different player gets the rebound, the stop will be divided into two equal halves, the forced miss half and the rebound half.
And each player will be given ½ stop.
¼ Stops. When two players force a miss or two players combine for a rebound, the ½ stop for the forced miss or rebound will be split in half and each player given ¼ stop.
Let's say two defensive players double-team a player in the post and force him to miss a shot, and a third defensive player gets the rebound.
The forced-miss half of the stop will be divided in two, and the two players will be given ¼ stop each for forcing the miss.
Since only one player got the rebound, he will be credited with his regular ½ stop.
¼ stops for the rebound half are for plays when one defensive player deflects the rebound, and a second recovers it.
Let's get really complicated and look at one more scenario.
A player dribbles the ball across half court and is immediately double-teamed.
The ball pressure from the trap forces him into a bad pass which is deflected by a third defender and recovered by a fourth for a steal.
This stop would be split into two equal halves, the ball-pressure half and the steal half.
The two trapping players would be given ¼ stop each for the ball-pressure half, and the players who got the steal would be given ¼ stop each for their combined play on the steal half.
Because these fractions can get out of hand, whenever more than two players combine for ½ of a stop, it will be credited to the team.
TEAM STATS
Now let's move over and look at some team defensive statistics.
The best way to stop a team from scoring is to not let them shoot the basketball.
You can't score without shooting, right?
So one of the things which will be tracked is the percentage of no-shot stops a defensive team gets, meaning they did something to change possession and get the ball back from the offense before the offense had the opportunity to attempt a field goal.
For a team which can't get a no-shot stop, a one-shot stop is the next best thing. That obviously means that the offense came down and missed one shot, and the defense got the rebound and ended the possession.
And the percentage of times a defense does that will be logged as well.
No-shot stops may be called "none-and-dones" and one-shot stops "one-and-dones."
Another thing is that not all stops are created equally.
Live-ball stops are the best because they give the team the opportunity to get fast-break points. So teams will be measured on their field goal percentages after live-ball stops, dead-ball stops and after made baskets for comparison.
These statistics can also be used for offense.
One of the biggest problems for Golden State is that they have too many no-shot possessions on offense. It absolutely killed them in road games at the Lakers and at Oklahoma City this year.
Finally, I'll be looking at dunks and layups.
I'm sure we can all agree that the two easiest shots to make in basketball are an uncontested dunk and an uncontested layup.
Field goals allowed will be looked at to see what percentage were uncontested dunks and layups and what impact this had on the field goal percentage allowed by the defense.
As I wrote before, I don't have nearly the resources or the manpower to track this information on a large scale but will do some games from time to time.
UPDATE: 1/31/2011
Here are some other situations where a player will be credited with a stall: (1) when he deflects a ball out of bounds, (2) when he deflects a ball which gets recovered by the offense, (3) when the offense is trying to pass to his man but his ball denial doesn't allow the pass attempt, (4) when his ball pressure on the passer forces the offense away from who it was trying to pass the ball to, (5) when he forces a jump ball and the offense maintains possession, (6*) when he bumps or blocks off an offensive player moving without the ball and disrupts the play, (7*) when he blocks the path of a dribbler not attempting to score and disrupts the play.
*UPDATE: 5/26/2011, 5:00 AM
It should also be noted that stalls can and will be divided into ½ stalls and ¼ stalls just like stops, and when more than two players combine for ½ of a stall it will be credited to the team.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Saturday, December 4, 2010
Around The Association
This was LeBron Week, so I guess it's time to chime in and say something about the Miami Heat.
The media have swooped down on Miami like vultures on a fresh carcass and done everything from fire the coach to trade one of the team's key players.
It has become really cool all of a sudden, like wearing a leather jacket and smoking cigarettes in the '70s, to say something bad about LeBron James or the Miami Heat.
DON'T SPEAK TOO SOON
Part of this hysteria is really nothing but overreaction.
Dan Patrick had the greatest observation of this phenomenon. He often talks about how football fans and reporters overreact and think they are going to the Super Bowl or think the season is over after their team wins or loses the first game or two of the season.
It is unfair to judge Miami at this point due to the number of players who have not been available.
Mario Chalmers battled an ankle injury and didn't play 20 minutes in any game until November 27 and has done so only four times so far this season.
Miami is 3-1 in those games.
I saw Chalmers play for about five minutes in the second half against Washington, his second game playing at least 20 minutes. There was more ball movement for Miami in those five minutes than there had been all season combined without Chalmers on the floor.
The Heat also obviously misses Mike Miller.
My only criticism of Erik Spoelstra is the limited playing time he has given Joel Anthony. For what it's worth, Miami is 7-1 when Anthony plays at least 20 minutes.
It probably has something to do with the fact that he leads the team with 1.2 blocks per game despite averaging only 18 minutes.
To those shoveling dirt on Miami's grave, you may want to tone down the rhetoric, unless you want to look really stupid in a few weeks.
BEATING A DEAD HORSE
The impact that injuries are having on this season can't be emphasized enough.
Golden State is the latest team to be bitten by the injury bug.
Golden State started the season as one of the best teams in the league at 6-2. Then David Lee injured his elbow and missed eight games.
The Warriors lost one of Lee's backups (Brandan Wright) to a back injury two games after Lee went out. They were already playing without top pick Ekpe Udoh, who hasn't played all season due to a wrist injury.
The result has been an incredibly thin front line which has seen the team limp to a 2-9 record in its last 11 games (1-7 without Lee).
It got so bad that Keith Smart had to resort to starting Vladimir Radmanovic at power forward for a few games before he ditched the idea and went back to Dan Gadzuric.
Neither idea worked, and the team is now struggling to find itself.
THE DEFINITION OF CLUTCH
There has been a change in how clutch will be defined when games are analyzed.
Clutch will now be defined as the last two minutes of the game or overtime when no team is ahead by more than three points.
It was changed from the last five minutes because the five-minute mark just doesn't feel big enough or important enough when watching close games and because it is much easier to track the last two minutes of a game as compared to the last five minutes.
Players who make shots during this time will be judged based on whether their team is behind, tied or leading with the following priority:
(1.) Trailing
(2.) Tied
(3.) Leading
Priority will also be given based on the time the shot takes place, with the following order of importance:
(1.) 0-10 seconds
(2.) 10.1-24 seconds
(3.) 24.1-30 seconds
(4.) 30.1-1:00 minute
(5.) 1:01-1:30 seconds
(6.) 1:31-2:00 minutes
So a player who hits a go-ahead shot with two minutes left won't be considered as clutch as a player who hits one with 10 seconds remaining.
Game-winners will be defined as shots with 10 seconds or less in the fourth quarter or overtime which give a team the lead for good. This matches how Elias Sports Bureau defines and tracks game-winners.
Game-winning shots will be prioritized in the following order:
(1.) Lead-changing game-winners
(2.) Game-winners
(3.) Game-clinchers
Game-clinchers or icers or daggers aren't really game-winners because they come when the team is already ahead. But something had to be created for players who put games away like this.
Lead-changing game-winners are defined as the most clutch due to the player having so much on the line.
For a player who misses a shot with the score tied, the worst which can happen is that the game goes into overtime.
But a player who misses a shot when his team is behind loses the game. He then has to answer all of the questions about what happened and live for a minimum of 24 hours with the fact that he let his team down.
It is such a pressurized situation that players who step up to the challenge deserve more credit when they pull it off.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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The media have swooped down on Miami like vultures on a fresh carcass and done everything from fire the coach to trade one of the team's key players.
It has become really cool all of a sudden, like wearing a leather jacket and smoking cigarettes in the '70s, to say something bad about LeBron James or the Miami Heat.
DON'T SPEAK TOO SOON
Part of this hysteria is really nothing but overreaction.
Dan Patrick had the greatest observation of this phenomenon. He often talks about how football fans and reporters overreact and think they are going to the Super Bowl or think the season is over after their team wins or loses the first game or two of the season.
It is unfair to judge Miami at this point due to the number of players who have not been available.
Mario Chalmers battled an ankle injury and didn't play 20 minutes in any game until November 27 and has done so only four times so far this season.
Miami is 3-1 in those games.
I saw Chalmers play for about five minutes in the second half against Washington, his second game playing at least 20 minutes. There was more ball movement for Miami in those five minutes than there had been all season combined without Chalmers on the floor.
The Heat also obviously misses Mike Miller.
My only criticism of Erik Spoelstra is the limited playing time he has given Joel Anthony. For what it's worth, Miami is 7-1 when Anthony plays at least 20 minutes.
It probably has something to do with the fact that he leads the team with 1.2 blocks per game despite averaging only 18 minutes.
To those shoveling dirt on Miami's grave, you may want to tone down the rhetoric, unless you want to look really stupid in a few weeks.
BEATING A DEAD HORSE
The impact that injuries are having on this season can't be emphasized enough.
Golden State is the latest team to be bitten by the injury bug.
Golden State started the season as one of the best teams in the league at 6-2. Then David Lee injured his elbow and missed eight games.
The Warriors lost one of Lee's backups (Brandan Wright) to a back injury two games after Lee went out. They were already playing without top pick Ekpe Udoh, who hasn't played all season due to a wrist injury.
The result has been an incredibly thin front line which has seen the team limp to a 2-9 record in its last 11 games (1-7 without Lee).
It got so bad that Keith Smart had to resort to starting Vladimir Radmanovic at power forward for a few games before he ditched the idea and went back to Dan Gadzuric.
Neither idea worked, and the team is now struggling to find itself.
THE DEFINITION OF CLUTCH
There has been a change in how clutch will be defined when games are analyzed.
Clutch will now be defined as the last two minutes of the game or overtime when no team is ahead by more than three points.
It was changed from the last five minutes because the five-minute mark just doesn't feel big enough or important enough when watching close games and because it is much easier to track the last two minutes of a game as compared to the last five minutes.
Players who make shots during this time will be judged based on whether their team is behind, tied or leading with the following priority:
(1.) Trailing
(2.) Tied
(3.) Leading
Priority will also be given based on the time the shot takes place, with the following order of importance:
(1.) 0-10 seconds
(2.) 10.1-24 seconds
(3.) 24.1-30 seconds
(4.) 30.1-1:00 minute
(5.) 1:01-1:30 seconds
(6.) 1:31-2:00 minutes
So a player who hits a go-ahead shot with two minutes left won't be considered as clutch as a player who hits one with 10 seconds remaining.
Game-winners will be defined as shots with 10 seconds or less in the fourth quarter or overtime which give a team the lead for good. This matches how Elias Sports Bureau defines and tracks game-winners.
Game-winning shots will be prioritized in the following order:
(1.) Lead-changing game-winners
(2.) Game-winners
(3.) Game-clinchers
Game-clinchers or icers or daggers aren't really game-winners because they come when the team is already ahead. But something had to be created for players who put games away like this.
Lead-changing game-winners are defined as the most clutch due to the player having so much on the line.
For a player who misses a shot with the score tied, the worst which can happen is that the game goes into overtime.
But a player who misses a shot when his team is behind loses the game. He then has to answer all of the questions about what happened and live for a minimum of 24 hours with the fact that he let his team down.
It is such a pressurized situation that players who step up to the challenge deserve more credit when they pull it off.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Saturday, August 21, 2010
More NBA Advanced Statistics
Before we begin, I have to first introduce a NBA floor chart which I have been working on.
Everything that will be talked about when it comes to advanced statistics revolves around this floor chart.
Here is the mid-court area of the chart. Notice how the chart flips and reverses itself once the half-court line is crossed.
This was going to be called a "shot chart," but it hit me that this chart can track much more than shooting.
I use it mostly for defense. It can show where a player gets most of his blocks, his rebounds and where he gives up the most points.
Although it is free for anyone to use, for convenience it will be called the "High Basketball IQ Floor Chart."
It is not perfect and not accurate to the exact dimensions of a NBA court; it was created to the best of my limited engineering abilities just to have a visual representation of what I am writing about.
Also, a player a step or two outside of the high post, for example, may be labeled as being in the high post; it won't be an accurate description of where the player is to the exact inch, but you'll get my point.
Another great use of the floor chart is to show players who do or don't get rebounds outside of their area.
You can look at where the players are when the ball goes in the air, where they are when it hits the rim and where they are when the rebound is secured.
Who moved? And who didn't? And how far did they move? It's great for hustle stats.
Ideally, I would like to use this floor chart to track the movement of the ball and every player for every minute of every game.
But since I don't have anywhere near the resources or the manpower to pull that off, I'll do what I can from in front of my computer.
It should be noted that this article is about to get really nerdy right now, talking about the minute details of various NBA games, so consider yourself warned.
Deflections will be covered first.
A deflection is when a player tips the ball, usually sending it in a different direction.
There are all kinds of deflections, pass deflections, rebound deflections, dribble deflections, you name it.
This is a hustle stat which needs to be accurately tracked because it is a play which a player makes to help his team.
In short, that is what we are shooting for here, the tracking of anything (anything!) which a player does on a basketball court to help his team win.
Sister to the deflection is the recovery.
Either the player who deflected the ball or another player recovers it.
When one player deflects the ball and another player recovers it, each must be given credit for the part they contributed to the play in order to accurately determine the value of each player and the overall ability of the team.
Like deflections, there are many types of recoveries.
There are blocked shot recoveries, saved ball recoveries, rebound deflection recoveries, pass deflection recoveries and many more.
And all should be tracked and recorded so that each player's value to the team can be accurately measured and because every possession counts.
Let's look at a play from the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat game from last season (3:50).
There are 21.9 seconds left in the game. Kobe Bryant drives and misses a layup.
Although what follows looks like nothing more than a wild scrum with no identifiable parts, that is the furthest thing from the truth.
The play's individual parts are actually highly identifiable.
Here is how I would score the play; the best angle is at 4:14:
Missed Layup: Kobe Bryant
Rebound Deflection: Kobe Bryant (O) & Pau Gasol (O) & Udonis Haslem (D)
Missed Rebound: Kobe Bryant
Rebound: Dwyane Wade (D)
Baseline Save: Dwyane Wade
Saved Ball Deflection: Mario Chalmers
Saved Ball Recovery: Pau Gasol
Foul: Quentin Richardson on Pau Gasol.
The scoring format comes from the "Play-By-Play" section of the box scores on NBA.com.
Also, this is being scored as best I can on a computer screen. More details would be seen on a full television screen and might change the scoring some.
Pau Gasol went to the foul line and made both free throws.
The Lakers won the game by one point on a running three-pointer by Kobe Bryant.
Without the hustle and deflections of Pau Gasol and Kobe Bryant saving this possession for the Lakers, they might have lost the game; but we would never know that because there are no statistics for plays like this.
Steals also need to be more specific.
Against the New York Knicks, Kobe Bryant deflects the ball away from Chris Duhon (1:04); and Ron Artest recovers it.
Although both players combined for the steal, Ron Artest got no credit for his contribution to the play.
Is this fair?
Is it an accurate reflection of each player's contribution to the team?
Without Artest picking up the ball, a Knick could have gotten it; then there wouldn't have been any steal at all. What Artest did was very important.
Add up all of these uncredited plays over the course of a season, and it becomes extremely significant. And what about over the course of a career?
When two players combine like this on a steal, they should be given ½ steal (the deflection ½ and the recovery ½) each.
Here is how it should look:
STEALS: K. Bryant: FULL (0); DFL ½ (1); RCR ½ (0); TOTAL (½)
R. Artest: FULL (0); DFL ½ (0); RCR ½ (1); TOTAL (½)
"DFL" is short for deflection, "RCR" short for recovery. A "FULL" steal is when one player completes the entire steal by himself.
Now it is time to get really technical.
Steals would also be divided into type.
There are three types of steals: passed ball steals, dribbled ball steals and held ball steals.
Wouldn't it be important to know going into a game against a team which uses its small forward to bring the ball up the court that you have a point guard who can steal dribbles but not passes?
You think his steals might be down that night?
Let's throw in the floor chart and look at one more play, a steal by Jordan Farmar against the Orlando Magic (2:49).
Here is how I would score the play:
Pass Steal: Jordan Farmar, straightaway three-point line (ORL) deflection and right mid-court (LAL) recovery of Jameer Nelson pass from top-right three-point area (ORL) to Ryan Anderson at top-left three-point area (ORL).
Deep Right Paint (LAL) Foul: Ryan Anderson on Jordan Farmar.
The ORL and LAL tell on which offensive half of the court the play takes place.
This scoring method is technical and highly-detailed, but it gives credit where credit is due and gives an accurate accounting of every player's contribution to the team's success, or failure.
In a prior post I wrote that the NBA was in the Stone Ages when it comes to advanced statistics. It looks like that may not be entirely true.
Some of this information is being tracked; it is just not publicly available.
Bill Simmons tried to get some details and wrote a great story on what he would like to know and his journey to find out. Some of the things he asks about are the very same things I am trying to log and account for: winning plays.
Note: I got the idea to use numbers instead of words on my floor chart from this chart on 82games.com. When I went to add the names to the areas of my chart, the names were too long to fit into those tiny little spaces.
Floor chart updated September 2012.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
Tweet
Everything that will be talked about when it comes to advanced statistics revolves around this floor chart.
Here is the mid-court area of the chart. Notice how the chart flips and reverses itself once the half-court line is crossed.
This was going to be called a "shot chart," but it hit me that this chart can track much more than shooting.
I use it mostly for defense. It can show where a player gets most of his blocks, his rebounds and where he gives up the most points.
Although it is free for anyone to use, for convenience it will be called the "High Basketball IQ Floor Chart."
It is not perfect and not accurate to the exact dimensions of a NBA court; it was created to the best of my limited engineering abilities just to have a visual representation of what I am writing about.
Also, a player a step or two outside of the high post, for example, may be labeled as being in the high post; it won't be an accurate description of where the player is to the exact inch, but you'll get my point.
Another great use of the floor chart is to show players who do or don't get rebounds outside of their area.
You can look at where the players are when the ball goes in the air, where they are when it hits the rim and where they are when the rebound is secured.
Who moved? And who didn't? And how far did they move? It's great for hustle stats.
Ideally, I would like to use this floor chart to track the movement of the ball and every player for every minute of every game.
But since I don't have anywhere near the resources or the manpower to pull that off, I'll do what I can from in front of my computer.
It should be noted that this article is about to get really nerdy right now, talking about the minute details of various NBA games, so consider yourself warned.
Deflections will be covered first.
A deflection is when a player tips the ball, usually sending it in a different direction.
There are all kinds of deflections, pass deflections, rebound deflections, dribble deflections, you name it.
This is a hustle stat which needs to be accurately tracked because it is a play which a player makes to help his team.
In short, that is what we are shooting for here, the tracking of anything (anything!) which a player does on a basketball court to help his team win.
Sister to the deflection is the recovery.
Either the player who deflected the ball or another player recovers it.
When one player deflects the ball and another player recovers it, each must be given credit for the part they contributed to the play in order to accurately determine the value of each player and the overall ability of the team.
Like deflections, there are many types of recoveries.
There are blocked shot recoveries, saved ball recoveries, rebound deflection recoveries, pass deflection recoveries and many more.
And all should be tracked and recorded so that each player's value to the team can be accurately measured and because every possession counts.
Let's look at a play from the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat game from last season (3:50).
There are 21.9 seconds left in the game. Kobe Bryant drives and misses a layup.
Although what follows looks like nothing more than a wild scrum with no identifiable parts, that is the furthest thing from the truth.
The play's individual parts are actually highly identifiable.
Here is how I would score the play; the best angle is at 4:14:
Missed Layup: Kobe Bryant
Rebound Deflection: Kobe Bryant (O) & Pau Gasol (O) & Udonis Haslem (D)
Missed Rebound: Kobe Bryant
Rebound: Dwyane Wade (D)
Baseline Save: Dwyane Wade
Saved Ball Deflection: Mario Chalmers
Saved Ball Recovery: Pau Gasol
Foul: Quentin Richardson on Pau Gasol.
The scoring format comes from the "Play-By-Play" section of the box scores on NBA.com.
Also, this is being scored as best I can on a computer screen. More details would be seen on a full television screen and might change the scoring some.
Pau Gasol went to the foul line and made both free throws.
The Lakers won the game by one point on a running three-pointer by Kobe Bryant.
Without the hustle and deflections of Pau Gasol and Kobe Bryant saving this possession for the Lakers, they might have lost the game; but we would never know that because there are no statistics for plays like this.
Steals also need to be more specific.
Against the New York Knicks, Kobe Bryant deflects the ball away from Chris Duhon (1:04); and Ron Artest recovers it.
Although both players combined for the steal, Ron Artest got no credit for his contribution to the play.
Is this fair?
Is it an accurate reflection of each player's contribution to the team?
Without Artest picking up the ball, a Knick could have gotten it; then there wouldn't have been any steal at all. What Artest did was very important.
Add up all of these uncredited plays over the course of a season, and it becomes extremely significant. And what about over the course of a career?
When two players combine like this on a steal, they should be given ½ steal (the deflection ½ and the recovery ½) each.
Here is how it should look:
STEALS: K. Bryant: FULL (0); DFL ½ (1); RCR ½ (0); TOTAL (½)
R. Artest: FULL (0); DFL ½ (0); RCR ½ (1); TOTAL (½)
"DFL" is short for deflection, "RCR" short for recovery. A "FULL" steal is when one player completes the entire steal by himself.
Now it is time to get really technical.
Steals would also be divided into type.
There are three types of steals: passed ball steals, dribbled ball steals and held ball steals.
Wouldn't it be important to know going into a game against a team which uses its small forward to bring the ball up the court that you have a point guard who can steal dribbles but not passes?
You think his steals might be down that night?
Let's throw in the floor chart and look at one more play, a steal by Jordan Farmar against the Orlando Magic (2:49).
Here is how I would score the play:
Pass Steal: Jordan Farmar, straightaway three-point line (ORL) deflection and right mid-court (LAL) recovery of Jameer Nelson pass from top-right three-point area (ORL) to Ryan Anderson at top-left three-point area (ORL).
Deep Right Paint (LAL) Foul: Ryan Anderson on Jordan Farmar.
The ORL and LAL tell on which offensive half of the court the play takes place.
This scoring method is technical and highly-detailed, but it gives credit where credit is due and gives an accurate accounting of every player's contribution to the team's success, or failure.
In a prior post I wrote that the NBA was in the Stone Ages when it comes to advanced statistics. It looks like that may not be entirely true.
Some of this information is being tracked; it is just not publicly available.
Bill Simmons tried to get some details and wrote a great story on what he would like to know and his journey to find out. Some of the things he asks about are the very same things I am trying to log and account for: winning plays.
Note: I got the idea to use numbers instead of words on my floor chart from this chart on 82games.com. When I went to add the names to the areas of my chart, the names were too long to fit into those tiny little spaces.
Floor chart updated September 2012.
Comment or e-mail: thenbaoutsider@yahoo.com
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Saturday, August 14, 2010
Dissecting Pacers vs Lakers And Darren Collison
The Indiana Pacers acquired point guard Darren Collison from the New Orleans Hornets this week.
There have been so many things written this off-season about the Pacers and their need for a point guard that I almost started to believe it.
Then I went back and looked at the game tape.
Since the Los Angeles Lakers have been the best team in the NBA for the past two seasons, and there isn't much video of other teams available, why not start there?
What better way to measure yourself than against the best, right?
The Pacers played the Lakers in Los Angeles on March 2, 2010, and were crushed 122-99. They were also punished at home on January 27, 118-96.
Only the game at Los Angeles will be used, but for those who want to continue dissecting on their own, here is the game at Indiana.
THE FUN BEGINS (:38 on the video player)
UPDATE: 6/10/2011, 12:35 PM
The original video used for this analysis has been removed by the user. You can still see many of the same plays described below but at different times on the video player.
Looking at Dahntay Jones' box score, you would think he had a pretty good game. Looking at the game, you would know otherwise. At :38, the Pacers are ahead 24-20.
Jones allows Kobe Bryant to beat him off the dribble. This forces Troy Murphy to have to come over and help, which leaves Murphy's man Pau Gasol in position to tip in the offensive rebound.
Jones then drives to the basket against Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol and gets his shot blocked. This leads to a transition three-pointer by Jordan Farmar.
After that, while paying too much attention to Bryant being defended by Earl Watson, Jones loses track of his man Farmar, who cuts to the basket and gets a bucket off of a Bryant pass.
Not done yet, Jones then allows Lakers guard Shannon Brown to beat him off the dribble for a runner off the glass. Bryant beating Jones off the dribble could be written off as the best player in the NBA, but how do you explain this?
At 1:12, Jones has the ball taken from him by Shannon Brown. This leads to a fast-break layup by Adam Morrison. The score is now 33-30, Los Angeles.
So the Lakers went on a 13-6 run, and 11 of the 13 points Indiana allowed were directly caused by Dahntay Jones' mistakes. Dahntay Jones does not play point guard.
NEXT UP: COACH JIM O'BRIEN (1:44)
Indiana coach Jim O'Brien foolishly tries to defend Andrew Bynum with Troy Murphy. The result? A catch-and-finish reverse-layup and a back-down dunk. Don't mean to laugh, but this is really funny, literally a comedy of errors.
BRANDON RUSH TAKES HIS TURN (2:04)
Determined to get in on the act, Pacer Brandon Rush gets backed into the paint by Bryant for a left-handed jump-hook. He then commits a turnover which leads to a transition three-pointer by Derek Fisher. At 2:43, Rush again allows Bryant to take him to the basket for two.
DANNY GRANGER TOO (2:49)
Team star Danny Granger actually started his mistakes a while ago. At :20, he gets beaten for a dunk by Ron Artest on a cut to the basket and runs into Earl Watson, who came over to double Pau Gasol, in the process. Again, I don't mean to laugh.
Granger's series of mistakes starts at 2:49. He gets beaten off the dribble by Ron Artest for a layup. At 3:07, Granger holds the ball in front of Artest like Artest hasn't been the best perimeter defender in the NBA for the past decade or more.
As expected, Artest swipes the ball from him. On the play, Kobe Bryant is fouled on a fast-break dunk attempt and makes both free throws. In between the prior two plays, Josh McRoberts proves he can't guard Andrew Bynum either and gets dunked on just like Troy Murphy did.
At 3:28, Dahntay Jones is back again, allowing a turn-around by Ron Artest before Shannon Brown hits a three-pointer on him at 3:46. Danny Granger then again forgets who Ron Artest is and has the ball taken from him and passed to Farmar for an open-court dunk.
DIDIER ILUNGA-MBENGA (4:11)
To put the icing on the cake, Roy Hibbert allows Didier Ilunga-Mbenga to hit a turn-around jumper on him, not Pau Gasol, not Andrew Bynum, not Lamar Odom, Didier Ilunga-Mbenga.
There have been so many things written this off-season about the Pacers and their need for a point guard that I almost started to believe it.
Then I went back and looked at the game tape.
Since the Los Angeles Lakers have been the best team in the NBA for the past two seasons, and there isn't much video of other teams available, why not start there?
What better way to measure yourself than against the best, right?
The Pacers played the Lakers in Los Angeles on March 2, 2010, and were crushed 122-99. They were also punished at home on January 27, 118-96.
Only the game at Los Angeles will be used, but for those who want to continue dissecting on their own, here is the game at Indiana.
THE FUN BEGINS (:38 on the video player)
UPDATE: 6/10/2011, 12:35 PM
The original video used for this analysis has been removed by the user. You can still see many of the same plays described below but at different times on the video player.
Looking at Dahntay Jones' box score, you would think he had a pretty good game. Looking at the game, you would know otherwise. At :38, the Pacers are ahead 24-20.
Jones allows Kobe Bryant to beat him off the dribble. This forces Troy Murphy to have to come over and help, which leaves Murphy's man Pau Gasol in position to tip in the offensive rebound.
Jones then drives to the basket against Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol and gets his shot blocked. This leads to a transition three-pointer by Jordan Farmar.
After that, while paying too much attention to Bryant being defended by Earl Watson, Jones loses track of his man Farmar, who cuts to the basket and gets a bucket off of a Bryant pass.
Not done yet, Jones then allows Lakers guard Shannon Brown to beat him off the dribble for a runner off the glass. Bryant beating Jones off the dribble could be written off as the best player in the NBA, but how do you explain this?
At 1:12, Jones has the ball taken from him by Shannon Brown. This leads to a fast-break layup by Adam Morrison. The score is now 33-30, Los Angeles.
So the Lakers went on a 13-6 run, and 11 of the 13 points Indiana allowed were directly caused by Dahntay Jones' mistakes. Dahntay Jones does not play point guard.
NEXT UP: COACH JIM O'BRIEN (1:44)
Indiana coach Jim O'Brien foolishly tries to defend Andrew Bynum with Troy Murphy. The result? A catch-and-finish reverse-layup and a back-down dunk. Don't mean to laugh, but this is really funny, literally a comedy of errors.
BRANDON RUSH TAKES HIS TURN (2:04)
Determined to get in on the act, Pacer Brandon Rush gets backed into the paint by Bryant for a left-handed jump-hook. He then commits a turnover which leads to a transition three-pointer by Derek Fisher. At 2:43, Rush again allows Bryant to take him to the basket for two.
DANNY GRANGER TOO (2:49)
Team star Danny Granger actually started his mistakes a while ago. At :20, he gets beaten for a dunk by Ron Artest on a cut to the basket and runs into Earl Watson, who came over to double Pau Gasol, in the process. Again, I don't mean to laugh.
Granger's series of mistakes starts at 2:49. He gets beaten off the dribble by Ron Artest for a layup. At 3:07, Granger holds the ball in front of Artest like Artest hasn't been the best perimeter defender in the NBA for the past decade or more.
As expected, Artest swipes the ball from him. On the play, Kobe Bryant is fouled on a fast-break dunk attempt and makes both free throws. In between the prior two plays, Josh McRoberts proves he can't guard Andrew Bynum either and gets dunked on just like Troy Murphy did.
At 3:28, Dahntay Jones is back again, allowing a turn-around by Ron Artest before Shannon Brown hits a three-pointer on him at 3:46. Danny Granger then again forgets who Ron Artest is and has the ball taken from him and passed to Farmar for an open-court dunk.
DIDIER ILUNGA-MBENGA (4:11)
To put the icing on the cake, Roy Hibbert allows Didier Ilunga-Mbenga to hit a turn-around jumper on him, not Pau Gasol, not Andrew Bynum, not Lamar Odom, Didier Ilunga-Mbenga.
INDIVIDUAL PLUS/MINUS OR IPM
The Pacers lost this game by 23 points. Let's add up the individual plus/minuses and see what happens.
Dahntay Jones, -16: Gasol offensive rebound (-2); Farmar three-pointer (-3); Farmar cut to basket (-2); Shannon Brown runner (-2); Morrison layup (-2); Artest turn-around (-2); Brown three-pointer (-3).
Troy Murphy, -4; Josh McRoberts, -2; or Jim O'Brien and/or Larry Bird, -6: Bynum reverse-layup (-2); Bynum dunk (-2); Bynum dunk (-2).
It looks like coach O'Brien didn't have a choice but to defend Bynum with Murphy and McRoberts with Hibbert in foul trouble. The Pacers don't have the big men to defend the Lakers, blame who you want.
Brandon Rush, -7: Bryant jump-hook (-2); Fisher three-pointer (-3); Bryant drive (-2).
Danny Granger, -8: Artest dunk (-2); Artest layup (-2); Artest steal leading to Bryant free throws (-2); Artest steal leading to Farmar dunk (-2).
Roy Hibbert, -2: Mbenga turn-around (-2).
As you can plainly see, not one of the errors in this comedy of errors was committed by a point guard, although I am certain they made their fair share of mistakes too.
You have to win with the team you have, so the fact that the Pacers don't have the big men to match up with the Lakers is no excuse. Miami and Charlotte didn't have the big men either, but they went 2-2 against Los Angeles.
Indiana could have won this game by simply eliminating mistakes. Dahntay Jones alone accounts for almost the entire point differential (-16 for him to -23 for the game).
So instead of blaming the point guard or blaming the big men, the Pacers could (1) play better defense, (2) play Jones fewer minutes or cut him, (3) make sure Danny Granger gets and/or pays attention to and/or remembers a good scouting report and (4) take better care of the basketball.
This also is the perfect example of why I support plus/minus based on individual and not five-man-unit performance when evaluating individual players.*
It is not the fault of the other Pacers on the court with Dahntay Jones that he made so many mistakes. Why should they have their ratings dragged down by his play?
And why should anyone other than Danny Granger lose two plus/minus points because he had the ball stolen from him by Ron Artest? Contrary to what the Indiana Pacers bloggers and sportswriters will tell you, it wasn't Earl Watson's fault; he was all the way on the other side of the court.
So all of you Pacers fans and others celebrating the trade for Darren Collison, you better wake up and smell the coffee. When Larry Bird says he's note done, he means it! And he better not be done, not with this team.
I picked Indiana to be one of the most improved teams this year and will stick to it. This was before they got Darren Collison. Collison helps because every good team needs two point guards, but he is no savior.
The Pacers' only hope right now is No. 10 pick Paul George. The Pacers better hope and pray he is as good as advertised, otherwise ... more Shakespearean (writer of The Comedy of Errors) theater.
Note: It is understood that these are Lakers highlights and don't tell the full story of the game. It is also fully understood that scoring games is subjective; one man's base hit is another man's error. But as the old saying goes, I call them like I see them. Finally, I tried to include only the most obvious errors and mistakes; so you may see something which I didn't include.
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The Pacers lost this game by 23 points. Let's add up the individual plus/minuses and see what happens.
Dahntay Jones, -16: Gasol offensive rebound (-2); Farmar three-pointer (-3); Farmar cut to basket (-2); Shannon Brown runner (-2); Morrison layup (-2); Artest turn-around (-2); Brown three-pointer (-3).
Troy Murphy, -4; Josh McRoberts, -2; or Jim O'Brien and/or Larry Bird, -6: Bynum reverse-layup (-2); Bynum dunk (-2); Bynum dunk (-2).
It looks like coach O'Brien didn't have a choice but to defend Bynum with Murphy and McRoberts with Hibbert in foul trouble. The Pacers don't have the big men to defend the Lakers, blame who you want.
Brandon Rush, -7: Bryant jump-hook (-2); Fisher three-pointer (-3); Bryant drive (-2).
Danny Granger, -8: Artest dunk (-2); Artest layup (-2); Artest steal leading to Bryant free throws (-2); Artest steal leading to Farmar dunk (-2).
Roy Hibbert, -2: Mbenga turn-around (-2).
As you can plainly see, not one of the errors in this comedy of errors was committed by a point guard, although I am certain they made their fair share of mistakes too.
You have to win with the team you have, so the fact that the Pacers don't have the big men to match up with the Lakers is no excuse. Miami and Charlotte didn't have the big men either, but they went 2-2 against Los Angeles.
Indiana could have won this game by simply eliminating mistakes. Dahntay Jones alone accounts for almost the entire point differential (-16 for him to -23 for the game).
So instead of blaming the point guard or blaming the big men, the Pacers could (1) play better defense, (2) play Jones fewer minutes or cut him, (3) make sure Danny Granger gets and/or pays attention to and/or remembers a good scouting report and (4) take better care of the basketball.
This also is the perfect example of why I support plus/minus based on individual and not five-man-unit performance when evaluating individual players.*
It is not the fault of the other Pacers on the court with Dahntay Jones that he made so many mistakes. Why should they have their ratings dragged down by his play?
And why should anyone other than Danny Granger lose two plus/minus points because he had the ball stolen from him by Ron Artest? Contrary to what the Indiana Pacers bloggers and sportswriters will tell you, it wasn't Earl Watson's fault; he was all the way on the other side of the court.
So all of you Pacers fans and others celebrating the trade for Darren Collison, you better wake up and smell the coffee. When Larry Bird says he's note done, he means it! And he better not be done, not with this team.
I picked Indiana to be one of the most improved teams this year and will stick to it. This was before they got Darren Collison. Collison helps because every good team needs two point guards, but he is no savior.
The Pacers' only hope right now is No. 10 pick Paul George. The Pacers better hope and pray he is as good as advertised, otherwise ... more Shakespearean (writer of The Comedy of Errors) theater.
Note: It is understood that these are Lakers highlights and don't tell the full story of the game. It is also fully understood that scoring games is subjective; one man's base hit is another man's error. But as the old saying goes, I call them like I see them. Finally, I tried to include only the most obvious errors and mistakes; so you may see something which I didn't include.
*Updated 2-16-2012, 8:40 AM to add the words "when evaluating individual players."
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