http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/051130
Gotta' love Simmons -- he combines knowledge with a great sense of humor. You need both if you are going to follow the NBA. Its funny stuff.
Regarding Cleveland, Simmons got some things right and some things wrong. He is right that in the Indiana game, combined with the San Antonio loss, we do have the beginnings of a disturbing trend. But would we feel any better if we had gotten blown out by a lousy team? Indiana did just that, getting hammered at Charlotte. Then they lost at home to Atlanta! Those are the two worst teams in the league. But Simmons overstates the Cavaliers situation. The Indiana game, embarrassing as it was, was just one game -- just one bad game, on the road, against what many people think could be the top Eastern team. And Hughes was sick. As I saw it, we were flat that night, and shot poorly, while Indiana hit everything. Indiana is a tough match up for us anyway, what with Artest being able to guard our all-world player. Lebron did not handle it well. He was trying to post Artest up all game, instead of attacking the basket and PASSING. And the Cavs have to get the ball to Z when we are forced into half-court sets. That's why we have him. Its part of what will eventually make the team great.
Simmons's comparison to the late-80's Bulls is very interesting, but just a bit flawed. This is actually a much better team now than the Bulls had in '88, but with much less playoff experience. The result, however, might end up being the same. From 1985-1987, MJ's first three years in the league, the Bulls made the playoffs three times, despite never winning more than 40 games (so I don't want to hear about how bad the league is, Doc. Remember, the NBA has always thrived on dynasties come playoff time, and never had anything resembling parity during the season. If anything, the Association as a whole is more competitive this year than ever before). In 1988, the Bulls finally won 50 games, and handed the Cavs a first round exit before losing to Detroit in the conference semis. In 1989, the Bulls slipped to 47 wins, but still beat out the Cavs (the better team at the time), then Knicks, finally losing to eventual champion Detroit. A 55 win season (89-90) led to the same result in 1990. The Bulls then went on to win three championships from 1991-1993.
What did the Bulls do to improve over that span? Not as much as you might think. Basically from 1985-1987, they had MJ and a collection of old stiffs. They didn't have a winning record in any of those years, despite playing against terrible talent. Despite having the best young player in the league, this was a bad team, making the playoffs one year with a 32-50 record.
In 1988, they were a bit better team and actually won 50 games. They had gotten rid of some of the old guys and had acquired two first round draft picks, Horace Grant (5) and Scottie Pippen (10). Pippen played some significant minutes, but only averaged about 8 points a game. Grant sat the pine behind Charles Oakley and averaged about 7 points. They beat the up and coming Cavaliers in round one, just after the Nance trade.
1989 saw the emergence of Pippen and Grant, and Oakley was gone. Also, the Bulls acquired veteran center Bill Cartwright from the Knicks, relegating stiff David Corzine to the bench. Cartwright, for some reason, has received credit as a defense difference-maker on that Bulls team despite the fact that he was never a significant shot blocker and was only an average rebounder. During his best years he actually put up some pretty good offensive numbers, averaging 15-17 ppg as a Knick. Mainly, though, he was an upgrade over Corzine, and wasn't quite as likely to get abused on the defensive end against the likes of Ewing and Daugherty. That year the Bulls dropped to 47 wins, but made it into the conference semi's before losing to the Pistons.
1990 the Bulls made little changes, save for newcomer Stacey King. They also had a rookie named B.J. Armstrong who looked promising, but played little. The team got a little better as Grant and Pippen continued to improve and the teamed learned to play together. The Bulls won 55 games and lost again to the Pistons in the conference finals.
The 1991 team finally beat the Pistons and went on to beat an ailing Lakers team in the finals. The biggest change the Bulls saw that year was the development of Armstrong as a key player, relegating the likes of Craig Hodges and John Paxson to the bench. Ditto for 1992-1993 championship years. Cartwright continued to fade, but newcomers like Scott Williams picked up the slack.
So which Bulls team was Simmons referring to? The closest team I can see is that 47-win (1988-)1989 team just after they got Cartwright. That was their "big" free agent signing that year. The Cavs, though, already have a better center in Z and our "Pippen," Hughes, is farther along in his development than the actual Pippen was. Gooden looks a lot like Grant did -- a rebounder with nice offensive skills. The bench, once ours gets healthy, looks very similar. That Bulls team made it to the conference finals and lost to the eventual champions. I'd take that outcome, although I think we will will 50 games.
So, how did the Bulls finally win it all? It was simple. They developed young talent every year, and slowly pushed starters into bench roles as the talent got a little better. This allowed for a deep team, with 10-12 players able to play significant minutes. And they had Phil Jackson who knew how to use these players. The infusion of young talent also allowed for great defensive effort. The team knew who the scorers were, and everyone played defense. They made only a few timely free-agent signings, for role players. And then, the core spent a few years learning to play together. And of course, Michael Jordan got better every year too. People forget that Jordan was in his 7th year before he won a championship, his fourth year before he even played on a winning team. Clearly the Cavs are ahead of this curve, winning 42 games in LBJ's second year.
So, what are the keys for the Cavaliers to get to the next level? One could argue that it will be the development of players like Pavlovic, Jackson, and Varejao, along with drafting a point guard at some point in the very near future (he would be our Armstrong). We already have the rest in place. Damon Jones will be our Paxson, and Snow will be the backup point (Hodges?) in years 3-4. Marshall will come off the bench as a Livingston-type player, only better.
1) Draft a point guard. I am in favor of trading someone some package of bench players at the end of the year to move up a few notches in draft position.
2) Keep Gooden at the end of the year. Match any reasonable offer for this guy. He is still only 25 years old and getting better.
3) Don't forget to develop the youngsters. This was both Lenny Wilkins' and Fratello's fatal flaw.
4) Don't do too much (don't trade Ron Harper!). This has the makings of a very good team, potentially better than the Bulls ever were. Mainly they just need time for the core to learn to play together. By next year the Cavs should be serious championship contenders with a good chance to win it all in 2008.
Friday, December 2, 2005
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
The NBA's new math
Tonights game against Washington should be a good test for the Cavaliers. The Wizards lost Larry Hughes, but managed to pick up three other good players. Like Milwaukee, Washington was able to make some money-smart moves to put them in the playoff hunt this year. Supposedly, Washington offered to best the Cavaliers offer for Hughes, but by then it was too late -- Hughes was sold on playing with Lebron, all else being relatively equal. Losing Hughes was a shot for the Wizards, but they got three good players through free-agency and will compete all year. In the end, Washington may be a better team this year than last, but of course those moves would not have been made had they kept Hughes.
I had intended to post my NBA preview a few weeks back, but a) I was way too busy and b) nobody was interested (not that this has ever stopped me before). In any case, one of the points I wanted to make was that in all the preseason power rankings I thought that the Nets were unbelievably over-rated, and the retooled Milwaukee Bucks extremely under rated. The Bucks will make the playoffs, you can print the tickets. And I thought this was probably true BEFORE they traded for Magloire. In fact, I think that all five central teams will make the playoffs. That leaves only three spots from the other two Eastern divisions. Those spots will likely be filled by Miami, Washington and the winner of the Atlantic division, likely the Nets. My only other thought is that we should never count out a team coached by Larry Brown. Its a long season, and there is plenty of time for him to right that ship, even if the Knicks don't really have the right kind of talent. If the Knicks or another Atlantic team steps up, Chicago will be the odd team out.
Here is an article from SI Extra which should be of interest:
Hank
Measure of Success
Those stat guys are at it again, and now the Moneyball math of baseball has come to the NBA. Armed with dazzling equations, NBA front offices are finding entirely new ways to quantify a player's talent and judge his real value.
By Chris Ballard
If Dean Oliver and his peers are right, then you are wrong. Wrong if you think Michael Redd is a very good player, wrong if you think Jason Collins is a bad one and wrong if you believe Shane Battier is just another Dukie with a so-so NBA career.
Oliver is a Cal Tech grad with an engineering Ph.D. who works as a paid consultant to the Seattle SuperSonics. He is also part of a small but growing movement, comprising both league insiders and outsiders, that sees its sport through a statistical prism similar to that of the young, laptop-toting generation of baseball executives made famous in Moneyball, Michael Lewis's best-selling book about Billy Beane and the Oakland A's. The teams at the forefront of the movement have hired math whizzes such as Oliver, 36, or former Rhodes scholar candidates such as Sam Presti, 29, the Spurs' assistant general manager, or Stanford MBAs such as Sam Hinkie, 27, a special assistant to Rockets G.M. Carroll Dawson. Joining forces with a burgeoning cult of independent statheads and academics, these new insiders have the same goals as their more celebrated baseball brethren: to identify, through complex statistical analysis, trends, talent and value that no one else sees. By looking deeper than traditional measures of success like ppg, rpg and FG%, they are challenging conventional NBA wisdom and changing, if at first incrementally, how players are evaluated and teams are scouted.
Take, for example, the case of Collins, the fifth-year center for the Nets. To the casual fan Collins is rather unimpressive. He rarely scores, doesn't block many shots for a center and has an embarrassing habit of laying in balls that, at 7 feet tall, he should be dunking. He is the type of player who could go his entire career and never make a SportsCenter highlight, an anonymity reinforced by his career stats (5.6 points, 4.9 rebounds, 0.6 blocks). But what if one were to dig deeper and measure other aspects of his game? The number of charges taken. The positioning on rebounds. The efficiency of picks set. The fouls not committed.
Perhaps then one would come to the same conclusion as Oliver's compatriot Dan Rosenbaum, a 35-year-old UNC Greensboro economics professor, occasional correspondent of Mavericks owner Mark Cuban and originator of a respected player-rating system. According to Rosenbaum's calculations, Collins is not a stiff at all but one of the NBA's premier defensive centers: the fourth-most effective in the league over the last three seasons, behind only Ben Wallace, Dikembe Mutombo and Theo Ratliff. The methodology is complex but at its core his system measures how New Jersey performs when Collins is on the floor versus when he's off it. Think of it as basketball's version of hockey's plus-minus ratio with a few esoteric twists. The upshot: Over the last three seasons the Nets have been remarkably more effective at the defensive end with Collins in the lineup; they foul less, allow fewer free throws, rebound better and allow fewer points. "He's very consistent and consistently very good," says Rosenbaum, "meaning he's either the luckiest center alive and teams just fall apart when he's on the court, or he's doing something."
On the other hand, Rosenbaum argues that Redd is, statistically, a defensive disaster, his worst-rated two guard in the league by a wide margin. Not even the Bucks guard's scoring ability (23.0 points per game in 2004-05) can counterbalance his defensive flaws. Over the course of any given 100 possessions, the Bucks are 4.5 points worse on defense with Redd in the game -- and only 2.5 points better on offense. As for Battier, by Rosenbaum's calculations he was the best defensive small forward in the league last season. Memphis was 6.3 points better (per 48 minutes) than its opponent with Battier on the floor and 4.8 points worse with him on the bench.
This approach is far from an exact science, a point that even the statheads emphatically make. For one, unlike baseball, in which individual performance can be easily isolated, the success of a basketball player is influenced by nine others. Still, coaches such as the Rockets' Jeff Van Gundy and the Spurs' Gregg Popovich and front office executives such as the Sonics' Wally Walker are keeping an open mind about their sport's new math. Says Walker, "In the bigger picture it is helpful. It does allow us to do apples-to-apples comparisons of players and combinations. Data points you can add to the old-fashioned [measures]."
Today franchises -- and, for that matter, anyone with a computer -- have access to countless complex statistics that are disseminated through the Internet, most notably by the game-charters at 82games.com, a website that provides a staggering amount of data, sliced and diced in hundreds of different ways. This season Roland Beech, a 36-year-old suburban dad who runs the site out of his Northern California home, will have more than 100 volunteers charting games and tracking everything from contested shots to off-the-ball player movement. Not surprisingly, among the most avid visitors to the site are NBA front-office personnel, one of whom asked in a recent e-mail, "Can you add rebound of own shot percent to the rebounding stats?"
The growing appetite NBA front offices have for this outsider-generated data has, in turn, created a market for hiring these statheads on staff. They're employed largely as advisers, not decision-makers, but it's not far-fetched to think that they'll be pulling the strings in the near future. Among the most promising from this group is Celtics senior vice president for operations Daryl Morey, 31, who graduated from MIT's Sloan School of Management and considers Bill James, the patron saint of quantitative analysis in sports, to be his role model. While Morey by no means ignores points per game, rebounds per game and other statistics popularly held up as benchmarks of success, he also recognizes that those numbers can inflate (or deflate) a player's value. Instead he is constantly looking for other, more obscure indicators of success such as turnover ratios, eFG% (a weighted field goal percentage that takes into account the added value of three-pointers) and productivity per possession. Yet all of these apparent abstractions have a clear bottom line. "It's the same principle," says Morey of the comparisons with Moneyball. "Generate wins for less dollars."
That has led Morey and the Celtics to such players as Dan Dickau, whom the Celtics acquired in a sign-and-trade this summer from the Hornets for a second-round draft pick. During his first two years in the league, the 6-foot point guard was renowned more for his moppish hair than his skills. After being traded from the Mavericks to the Hornets last season, he was, for the first time in his young career, given a chance to play significant minutes, and he averaged 13.2 points and 5.2 assists. But those statistics told only part of the story. What attracted the Celtics to Dickau were some less-heralded numbers. His ratio of 4.7 assists last season for every bad pass is on par with the 4.8 average of Steve Nash, widely considered to be the game's premier pure point guard. One can reasonably surmise that playing with better players, Dickau would have had a higher ratio. This is not to suggest that Dickau is a Nash-caliber player, only that, at the price of $7.5 million over three years, Dickau might have been undervalued by the market.
The new math is not just for evaluating individual player value. It's also a useful tool in scouting team tendencies. During the postseason Oliver -- who is best known for his book, Basketball on Paper, which is full of sprawling equations and includes chapters addressing such vexing questions as "The Significance of Derrick Coleman's Insignificance" -- focuses on Seattle's opponents. Using a program he created called Roboscout, which draws on box scores, shot chart data from 82games.com and play-by-play information, he seeks tendencies that a more traditional scout might not notice.
Last spring, for example, as the Sonics prepared to face the Spurs in the second round of the playoffs, Oliver turned up evidence that while San Antonio was a dominant defensive team, particularly in the paint, it was not bulletproof. "When you go at the midrange, there was a big hole," he explains. "Compared to the rest of the league, the Spurs are 30-35 percent less vulnerable than the rest of the league from three-point land but 30 percent more vulnerable from midrange." So, partly on Oliver's advice, the Sonics pulled up for 15- to 18-foot jumper after jumper. In the end Seattle increased its midrange shooting more than any other Spurs opponent and surprised many people by taking a superior San Antonio team to six games. "If you have a good midrange game against us, you have a better chance," confirms Spurs assistant Mike Budenholzer. "And with the Sonics, since we wanted to keep them off the three-point line, that left us weaker in the midrange game."
As one can imagine, not all basketball people buy into the concept that some geek with a computer can tell them how to play the game. Still, one doesn't find the generational divide or the hostility between traditionalist and stathead that's so pervasive in baseball. This is, in part, because the NBA numbers spit out by the computers of Oliver, Hinkie and Morey often reinforce the beliefs of old-schoolers rather than refute them. In fact, the number crunchers have found some unlikely allies within basketball's old school. Del Harris is not young (he's 68), mathematically inclined ("I can't even remember my phone number") or high-tech (rather than a tablet PC or laptop, he carries around thick blue binders of stats, marked "offense" and "defense"). Regardless, the Mavericks assistant has long been one of the coaches most open to statistical analysis, dating to his days as coach of the Rockets, Bucks and Lakers. As a result, he has cred with both crowds.
For years the Mavericks have worked with Jeff Sagarin (of Sagarin football ratings fame) and Indiana University professor Wayne Winston. The duo, who created a system called WINVAL in 2000 -- a precursor to Rosenbaum's adjusted plus-minus formula -- sends regular updates throughout the season to Cuban, Harris and coach Avery Johnson. "Some of the conclusions," says Harris, who parses the data, "make you laugh, like when they take data from a few games and tell us one of our best defenders is actually our worst." Still, there is plenty of promising data to consider.
Last year, after Game 5 of Dallas's second-round playoff series against Phoenix, Winston sent an e-mail that broke down how different Mavs combinations fared against various Phoenix lineups. The correspondence highlighted a recurrent postseason theme. As Winston wrote, in scenario after scenario, "Daniels Stack horrible," "Daniels and Stack a disaster," "Stack and Daniels a killer." In each situation the team fared poorly -- a minus-13 point differential here, a minus-15 point differential there -- when Marquis Daniels and Jerry Stackhouse play together. Harris discussed the findings with Johnson, who took them into account in substitution patterns (he didn't even play Daniels in Game 6), even if they weren't easily explained. "It didn't make sense to us why," says Harris. "Both are good players, and both do well with other combinations. But together, it didn't work out."
As for the players themselves, most have no idea that they've been reduced to living, dribbling equations. Sonics forward Nick Collison, for example, is unfamiliar with the new math, even though Oliver works for his team. "I've heard about what he does, seen him at practice," says Collison, "but I'm not sure how it works." When he was informed that according to Oliver, he is one of the NBA's more effective reserves (opposing teams shot about 3% worse when the Sonics sub was in the game), Collison brightens up. "Good," he says. "Then he's a genius."
THE ROLAND RATING
One of the simplest measures of a player's worth is his value to his team when he's on the court versus when he's off it. At 82games.com this is called the Roland Rating, which measures a team's net points, per 48 minutes, with each player on the floor. Though Roland admits it isn't perfect -- substitution patterns and the quality of a player's teammates must be taken into account -- it's a good place to start.
THE BEST (2004-05)
1. Tim Duncan +16.6
2. Jason Kidd +16.0
3. Manu Ginobili +15.5
4. Dirk Nowitzki +15.3
5. Steve Nash +15.0
THE WORST*
1. Alan Henderson -17.6
2. Leandro Barbosa -12.6
3. Rodney Buford -10.8
4. Andres Nocioni -10.6
5. Devin Harris -10.2
*Minimum 1,000 minutes
Issue date: October 24, 2005
I had intended to post my NBA preview a few weeks back, but a) I was way too busy and b) nobody was interested (not that this has ever stopped me before). In any case, one of the points I wanted to make was that in all the preseason power rankings I thought that the Nets were unbelievably over-rated, and the retooled Milwaukee Bucks extremely under rated. The Bucks will make the playoffs, you can print the tickets. And I thought this was probably true BEFORE they traded for Magloire. In fact, I think that all five central teams will make the playoffs. That leaves only three spots from the other two Eastern divisions. Those spots will likely be filled by Miami, Washington and the winner of the Atlantic division, likely the Nets. My only other thought is that we should never count out a team coached by Larry Brown. Its a long season, and there is plenty of time for him to right that ship, even if the Knicks don't really have the right kind of talent. If the Knicks or another Atlantic team steps up, Chicago will be the odd team out.
Here is an article from SI Extra which should be of interest:
Hank
Measure of Success
Those stat guys are at it again, and now the Moneyball math of baseball has come to the NBA. Armed with dazzling equations, NBA front offices are finding entirely new ways to quantify a player's talent and judge his real value.
By Chris Ballard
If Dean Oliver and his peers are right, then you are wrong. Wrong if you think Michael Redd is a very good player, wrong if you think Jason Collins is a bad one and wrong if you believe Shane Battier is just another Dukie with a so-so NBA career.
Oliver is a Cal Tech grad with an engineering Ph.D. who works as a paid consultant to the Seattle SuperSonics. He is also part of a small but growing movement, comprising both league insiders and outsiders, that sees its sport through a statistical prism similar to that of the young, laptop-toting generation of baseball executives made famous in Moneyball, Michael Lewis's best-selling book about Billy Beane and the Oakland A's. The teams at the forefront of the movement have hired math whizzes such as Oliver, 36, or former Rhodes scholar candidates such as Sam Presti, 29, the Spurs' assistant general manager, or Stanford MBAs such as Sam Hinkie, 27, a special assistant to Rockets G.M. Carroll Dawson. Joining forces with a burgeoning cult of independent statheads and academics, these new insiders have the same goals as their more celebrated baseball brethren: to identify, through complex statistical analysis, trends, talent and value that no one else sees. By looking deeper than traditional measures of success like ppg, rpg and FG%, they are challenging conventional NBA wisdom and changing, if at first incrementally, how players are evaluated and teams are scouted.
Take, for example, the case of Collins, the fifth-year center for the Nets. To the casual fan Collins is rather unimpressive. He rarely scores, doesn't block many shots for a center and has an embarrassing habit of laying in balls that, at 7 feet tall, he should be dunking. He is the type of player who could go his entire career and never make a SportsCenter highlight, an anonymity reinforced by his career stats (5.6 points, 4.9 rebounds, 0.6 blocks). But what if one were to dig deeper and measure other aspects of his game? The number of charges taken. The positioning on rebounds. The efficiency of picks set. The fouls not committed.
Perhaps then one would come to the same conclusion as Oliver's compatriot Dan Rosenbaum, a 35-year-old UNC Greensboro economics professor, occasional correspondent of Mavericks owner Mark Cuban and originator of a respected player-rating system. According to Rosenbaum's calculations, Collins is not a stiff at all but one of the NBA's premier defensive centers: the fourth-most effective in the league over the last three seasons, behind only Ben Wallace, Dikembe Mutombo and Theo Ratliff. The methodology is complex but at its core his system measures how New Jersey performs when Collins is on the floor versus when he's off it. Think of it as basketball's version of hockey's plus-minus ratio with a few esoteric twists. The upshot: Over the last three seasons the Nets have been remarkably more effective at the defensive end with Collins in the lineup; they foul less, allow fewer free throws, rebound better and allow fewer points. "He's very consistent and consistently very good," says Rosenbaum, "meaning he's either the luckiest center alive and teams just fall apart when he's on the court, or he's doing something."
On the other hand, Rosenbaum argues that Redd is, statistically, a defensive disaster, his worst-rated two guard in the league by a wide margin. Not even the Bucks guard's scoring ability (23.0 points per game in 2004-05) can counterbalance his defensive flaws. Over the course of any given 100 possessions, the Bucks are 4.5 points worse on defense with Redd in the game -- and only 2.5 points better on offense. As for Battier, by Rosenbaum's calculations he was the best defensive small forward in the league last season. Memphis was 6.3 points better (per 48 minutes) than its opponent with Battier on the floor and 4.8 points worse with him on the bench.
This approach is far from an exact science, a point that even the statheads emphatically make. For one, unlike baseball, in which individual performance can be easily isolated, the success of a basketball player is influenced by nine others. Still, coaches such as the Rockets' Jeff Van Gundy and the Spurs' Gregg Popovich and front office executives such as the Sonics' Wally Walker are keeping an open mind about their sport's new math. Says Walker, "In the bigger picture it is helpful. It does allow us to do apples-to-apples comparisons of players and combinations. Data points you can add to the old-fashioned [measures]."
Today franchises -- and, for that matter, anyone with a computer -- have access to countless complex statistics that are disseminated through the Internet, most notably by the game-charters at 82games.com, a website that provides a staggering amount of data, sliced and diced in hundreds of different ways. This season Roland Beech, a 36-year-old suburban dad who runs the site out of his Northern California home, will have more than 100 volunteers charting games and tracking everything from contested shots to off-the-ball player movement. Not surprisingly, among the most avid visitors to the site are NBA front-office personnel, one of whom asked in a recent e-mail, "Can you add rebound of own shot percent to the rebounding stats?"
The growing appetite NBA front offices have for this outsider-generated data has, in turn, created a market for hiring these statheads on staff. They're employed largely as advisers, not decision-makers, but it's not far-fetched to think that they'll be pulling the strings in the near future. Among the most promising from this group is Celtics senior vice president for operations Daryl Morey, 31, who graduated from MIT's Sloan School of Management and considers Bill James, the patron saint of quantitative analysis in sports, to be his role model. While Morey by no means ignores points per game, rebounds per game and other statistics popularly held up as benchmarks of success, he also recognizes that those numbers can inflate (or deflate) a player's value. Instead he is constantly looking for other, more obscure indicators of success such as turnover ratios, eFG% (a weighted field goal percentage that takes into account the added value of three-pointers) and productivity per possession. Yet all of these apparent abstractions have a clear bottom line. "It's the same principle," says Morey of the comparisons with Moneyball. "Generate wins for less dollars."
That has led Morey and the Celtics to such players as Dan Dickau, whom the Celtics acquired in a sign-and-trade this summer from the Hornets for a second-round draft pick. During his first two years in the league, the 6-foot point guard was renowned more for his moppish hair than his skills. After being traded from the Mavericks to the Hornets last season, he was, for the first time in his young career, given a chance to play significant minutes, and he averaged 13.2 points and 5.2 assists. But those statistics told only part of the story. What attracted the Celtics to Dickau were some less-heralded numbers. His ratio of 4.7 assists last season for every bad pass is on par with the 4.8 average of Steve Nash, widely considered to be the game's premier pure point guard. One can reasonably surmise that playing with better players, Dickau would have had a higher ratio. This is not to suggest that Dickau is a Nash-caliber player, only that, at the price of $7.5 million over three years, Dickau might have been undervalued by the market.
The new math is not just for evaluating individual player value. It's also a useful tool in scouting team tendencies. During the postseason Oliver -- who is best known for his book, Basketball on Paper, which is full of sprawling equations and includes chapters addressing such vexing questions as "The Significance of Derrick Coleman's Insignificance" -- focuses on Seattle's opponents. Using a program he created called Roboscout, which draws on box scores, shot chart data from 82games.com and play-by-play information, he seeks tendencies that a more traditional scout might not notice.
Last spring, for example, as the Sonics prepared to face the Spurs in the second round of the playoffs, Oliver turned up evidence that while San Antonio was a dominant defensive team, particularly in the paint, it was not bulletproof. "When you go at the midrange, there was a big hole," he explains. "Compared to the rest of the league, the Spurs are 30-35 percent less vulnerable than the rest of the league from three-point land but 30 percent more vulnerable from midrange." So, partly on Oliver's advice, the Sonics pulled up for 15- to 18-foot jumper after jumper. In the end Seattle increased its midrange shooting more than any other Spurs opponent and surprised many people by taking a superior San Antonio team to six games. "If you have a good midrange game against us, you have a better chance," confirms Spurs assistant Mike Budenholzer. "And with the Sonics, since we wanted to keep them off the three-point line, that left us weaker in the midrange game."
As one can imagine, not all basketball people buy into the concept that some geek with a computer can tell them how to play the game. Still, one doesn't find the generational divide or the hostility between traditionalist and stathead that's so pervasive in baseball. This is, in part, because the NBA numbers spit out by the computers of Oliver, Hinkie and Morey often reinforce the beliefs of old-schoolers rather than refute them. In fact, the number crunchers have found some unlikely allies within basketball's old school. Del Harris is not young (he's 68), mathematically inclined ("I can't even remember my phone number") or high-tech (rather than a tablet PC or laptop, he carries around thick blue binders of stats, marked "offense" and "defense"). Regardless, the Mavericks assistant has long been one of the coaches most open to statistical analysis, dating to his days as coach of the Rockets, Bucks and Lakers. As a result, he has cred with both crowds.
For years the Mavericks have worked with Jeff Sagarin (of Sagarin football ratings fame) and Indiana University professor Wayne Winston. The duo, who created a system called WINVAL in 2000 -- a precursor to Rosenbaum's adjusted plus-minus formula -- sends regular updates throughout the season to Cuban, Harris and coach Avery Johnson. "Some of the conclusions," says Harris, who parses the data, "make you laugh, like when they take data from a few games and tell us one of our best defenders is actually our worst." Still, there is plenty of promising data to consider.
Last year, after Game 5 of Dallas's second-round playoff series against Phoenix, Winston sent an e-mail that broke down how different Mavs combinations fared against various Phoenix lineups. The correspondence highlighted a recurrent postseason theme. As Winston wrote, in scenario after scenario, "Daniels Stack horrible," "Daniels and Stack a disaster," "Stack and Daniels a killer." In each situation the team fared poorly -- a minus-13 point differential here, a minus-15 point differential there -- when Marquis Daniels and Jerry Stackhouse play together. Harris discussed the findings with Johnson, who took them into account in substitution patterns (he didn't even play Daniels in Game 6), even if they weren't easily explained. "It didn't make sense to us why," says Harris. "Both are good players, and both do well with other combinations. But together, it didn't work out."
As for the players themselves, most have no idea that they've been reduced to living, dribbling equations. Sonics forward Nick Collison, for example, is unfamiliar with the new math, even though Oliver works for his team. "I've heard about what he does, seen him at practice," says Collison, "but I'm not sure how it works." When he was informed that according to Oliver, he is one of the NBA's more effective reserves (opposing teams shot about 3% worse when the Sonics sub was in the game), Collison brightens up. "Good," he says. "Then he's a genius."
THE ROLAND RATING
One of the simplest measures of a player's worth is his value to his team when he's on the court versus when he's off it. At 82games.com this is called the Roland Rating, which measures a team's net points, per 48 minutes, with each player on the floor. Though Roland admits it isn't perfect -- substitution patterns and the quality of a player's teammates must be taken into account -- it's a good place to start.
THE BEST (2004-05)
1. Tim Duncan +16.6
2. Jason Kidd +16.0
3. Manu Ginobili +15.5
4. Dirk Nowitzki +15.3
5. Steve Nash +15.0
THE WORST*
1. Alan Henderson -17.6
2. Leandro Barbosa -12.6
3. Rodney Buford -10.8
4. Andres Nocioni -10.6
5. Devin Harris -10.2
*Minimum 1,000 minutes
Issue date: October 24, 2005
Thursday, September 8, 2005
More Damon Jones
The Cavaliers seem to have picked up a very nice addition to the team at a somewhat reasonable pice.
Miami would have had to take the entire salary out of their mid-level exception (you can't combine exceptions, and Miami's wanted to use the "Non-Bird Exception" for Non-Qualifying Veteran Free Agents to sign Jones for $3 million). Had they matched our offer for Jones, Miami would have theoretically only had 1.4 million left out of their MLE to sign a swingman (and don't think Ferry didn't know this). So, Miami just couldn't justify paying Jones after the J-Will trade. I personally think "White Chocolate" sucks, but I could see someone thinking that was an upgrade for them. Its a pretty marginal upgrade, though, for that price, but they did get 'Toine in the deal too, and I'm sure that was the prime mover.
Amazing how close I was in the final details of Jones' deal. Essentially DJ got the Alston deal, age adjusted (4 years/16 million, starting with 3.6 million his first year). Seems like we paid exactly market value for Jones, though I am not sure how many suitors he really had. There is no doubt, though, that Jones could have gotten a bigger deal if he had been willing to sign early with a bad team. Aside from McInnis, none of the most coveted free agent point guards have more experience starting in the NBA than Damon Jones. Jaric and Watson essentially got the $5 million MLE in five year deals averaging 6 million per year. Jasikevicious got about 4 million per year (not sure what his first year will be) over 3 years. McInnis signed for 7 million over two years (the Nets probably got the best deal value-wise). Brevin Knight got a 3 year deal, but I'm not sure of the total. No matter, he wasn't on our radar and ended up re-signing with Charlotte.
It looks like the Cavs had a strict policy in place that said that their free agent aquisitions would either be able to play solid defense, or shoot the ball well, or preferably both. Really Jaric was the only guy on the market (at PG) that could do both, though he is getting paid an awful lot for a guy who is always injured and has never started on a regular basis. Antonio Daniels can shoot and plays a bit of D, but he is in the over 30 club and has never been a starter. His deal was ridiculous, but look at where he is playing. Waston also got a sweet deal, especially considering he doesn't shoot all that well. Knight can't shoot OR play D (though he is a good playmaker). Ditto for McInnis, though J-Mac can score and handles the rock reasonably well.
So, in the end we got a top 10 free-agent point man. Considering our needs (and wants), though, we got one of the 3 or 4 best guys available. Not bad for a team that spent most of its money re-signing its All-Star center and significantly upgrading the 2 and the 4 spot. Jones will be a nice complement to Snow, and I wouldn't mind at all if he came off the bench as a third guard (his price allows for this). Turns out Ferry is the Cavs secret weapon after all!
If not for Varejao's injury I would be jubilant. Now we have to hope we can pick up some forward/center depth at or just above the league minimum. I can't blame Ferry, though, for not wanting to spend a bunch of money on a guy who will be pretty far down the depth chart once Wild Thing comes back. It wouldn't surprise me if we made a trade at this point. Between Newble, Pavlovic, and Jackson, someone is going to ride some serious pine. Now we have to ask if we would be willing to trade one of the younger guys for a big stiff. Ironicly, Miami is looking for a swingman who can shoot, and is willing to trade their 3rd string center. I'm not holding my breath.
Miami would have had to take the entire salary out of their mid-level exception (you can't combine exceptions, and Miami's wanted to use the "Non-Bird Exception" for Non-Qualifying Veteran Free Agents to sign Jones for $3 million). Had they matched our offer for Jones, Miami would have theoretically only had 1.4 million left out of their MLE to sign a swingman (and don't think Ferry didn't know this). So, Miami just couldn't justify paying Jones after the J-Will trade. I personally think "White Chocolate" sucks, but I could see someone thinking that was an upgrade for them. Its a pretty marginal upgrade, though, for that price, but they did get 'Toine in the deal too, and I'm sure that was the prime mover.
Amazing how close I was in the final details of Jones' deal. Essentially DJ got the Alston deal, age adjusted (4 years/16 million, starting with 3.6 million his first year). Seems like we paid exactly market value for Jones, though I am not sure how many suitors he really had. There is no doubt, though, that Jones could have gotten a bigger deal if he had been willing to sign early with a bad team. Aside from McInnis, none of the most coveted free agent point guards have more experience starting in the NBA than Damon Jones. Jaric and Watson essentially got the $5 million MLE in five year deals averaging 6 million per year. Jasikevicious got about 4 million per year (not sure what his first year will be) over 3 years. McInnis signed for 7 million over two years (the Nets probably got the best deal value-wise). Brevin Knight got a 3 year deal, but I'm not sure of the total. No matter, he wasn't on our radar and ended up re-signing with Charlotte.
It looks like the Cavs had a strict policy in place that said that their free agent aquisitions would either be able to play solid defense, or shoot the ball well, or preferably both. Really Jaric was the only guy on the market (at PG) that could do both, though he is getting paid an awful lot for a guy who is always injured and has never started on a regular basis. Antonio Daniels can shoot and plays a bit of D, but he is in the over 30 club and has never been a starter. His deal was ridiculous, but look at where he is playing. Waston also got a sweet deal, especially considering he doesn't shoot all that well. Knight can't shoot OR play D (though he is a good playmaker). Ditto for McInnis, though J-Mac can score and handles the rock reasonably well.
So, in the end we got a top 10 free-agent point man. Considering our needs (and wants), though, we got one of the 3 or 4 best guys available. Not bad for a team that spent most of its money re-signing its All-Star center and significantly upgrading the 2 and the 4 spot. Jones will be a nice complement to Snow, and I wouldn't mind at all if he came off the bench as a third guard (his price allows for this). Turns out Ferry is the Cavs secret weapon after all!
If not for Varejao's injury I would be jubilant. Now we have to hope we can pick up some forward/center depth at or just above the league minimum. I can't blame Ferry, though, for not wanting to spend a bunch of money on a guy who will be pretty far down the depth chart once Wild Thing comes back. It wouldn't surprise me if we made a trade at this point. Between Newble, Pavlovic, and Jackson, someone is going to ride some serious pine. Now we have to ask if we would be willing to trade one of the younger guys for a big stiff. Ironicly, Miami is looking for a swingman who can shoot, and is willing to trade their 3rd string center. I'm not holding my breath.
Monday, August 15, 2005
More on Damon Jones
Just wanted to follow up my previous message regarding whether the Cavs should want to give a large, multi-year deal to someone like Damon Jones. I did a bit of research, and here's what I came up with:
a) According to CBS SportLine.com, Damon Jones ranked as the 17th best point guard in the league last year, solidly in the bottom half of NBA starting point guards (though more than a few teams used a two-headed monster approach, including Cleveland, and, notably, Memphis with J-Will and Earl "Randy" Watson). Here are the players surrounding Jones on the list with 2004-2005 salaries (in millions, of course):
14) Rafer Alston 3.5
15) Chucky Atkins 4.2
16) Jason Terry 7.5
17) Damon Jones 2.5
18) Gary Payton 5.4
19) Jeff McInnis 3.6
20) Luke Ridnour 1.5
The average salary of these players was about 4 million last year. For an even better look at what a player of this caliber makes we can lop off the high and low outliers, giving us an average salary of 3.84 million. So, here again, the Cavaliers would be in the ballpark offering him around 3.5 million. Granted, CBS Sportsline is not the be all/end all for rating players, but I am merely using it as a place to start. Now comes the really fun part:
http://www.basketballreference.com/players/playerpage.htm?ilkid=JONESDA01
http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/j/jonesda01.html
Using these two sites, I decided to see what NBA players Damon Jones stacked up to career-wise. I checked both for active players (for 2005-2006 contract comparison) and all players (for long-term contract value). Here's what I see:
On the first site, which measures career stats, the most similar current player is Pat Garrity (age 29), a forward, making about $2.9 million. The most similar current GUARD is Rafer Alston(also age 29), who last year signed a five year deal worth $21 million (with a club option for a sixth year at an additional $7 million). So, Alston, a slightly better player by the numbers, will get paid somewhere between $3.5 and 4 million next season. This doesn't take into account current market value variation but, more or less, we have our price range, do we not?
The second site is overall a better site, though it merely gives us the "most similar season at age" comparison, which isn't quite as useful, since there are many individual seasons that don't reflect a player's career path and potential very well at all. For example, DJ's last season was very similar statistically to Danny Ainge's at age 28. Except that Ainge had already had a nice little career up until that point (averaging double-figures in scoring for 4 straight seasons), while DJ is coming off a career year (his ONLY year averaging double-digits) Those other guys on the list are mostly role players (I especially liked Lucious Harris).
Now, you need those types of players on playoff/championship caliber teams, but are they the guys you give multi-million/multi-year deals to? I guess it depends on the player and the need, but for the most part I say no way, mostly because they are probably not the long-term answer at that position. Two or three year deals is preferable. Four if you are being generous, five if you are completely desperate. Now, we are slightly desperate, so I would think something slightly less than Alston's deal would be both appropriate and negotiable for Jones(age adjusted since Alston signed his deal last year, at age 28). So, four years escalating from 3.2 - 4 million per year, with a club option for a fifth year. That way if you make a trade for a better PG at some point, you have a slightly over-priced, but very capable backup/3rd guard (which is what DJ really is). Until then, you have perhaps a slightly underpaid, undersized (under talented) starter, which is fine when you have Eric Snow and four or five legit offensive weapons (LeBron, Z, Hughes, Gooden, Marshall).
Hopefully, the right situation will present itself and the Cavs will be able to find a young point guard out there, but he really wasn't there this year. The closest players out there were Earl Watson, a defensive player, and not exactly a superstar (but he's only 26, which is huge) and Jaric (also 26 and also not a superstar). Minnesota was able to land Jaric in a sign and trade because they had a very good point guard to give and draft picks. We had neither draft picks nor a very good point guard (Neither of which is Ferry's fault) What we have is the overpaid Eric Snow, who was given a 4 year/$25.6 million contract extension at age 30 ( essentially giving him six years starting at age 28 -- yes, we have him for those four extra years starting THIS YEAR!), despite never being much more than a marginal starter/excellent backup. Is this a situation you would want Ferry to repeat?
a) According to CBS SportLine.com, Damon Jones ranked as the 17th best point guard in the league last year, solidly in the bottom half of NBA starting point guards (though more than a few teams used a two-headed monster approach, including Cleveland, and, notably, Memphis with J-Will and Earl "Randy" Watson). Here are the players surrounding Jones on the list with 2004-2005 salaries (in millions, of course):
14) Rafer Alston 3.5
15) Chucky Atkins 4.2
16) Jason Terry 7.5
17) Damon Jones 2.5
18) Gary Payton 5.4
19) Jeff McInnis 3.6
20) Luke Ridnour 1.5
The average salary of these players was about 4 million last year. For an even better look at what a player of this caliber makes we can lop off the high and low outliers, giving us an average salary of 3.84 million. So, here again, the Cavaliers would be in the ballpark offering him around 3.5 million. Granted, CBS Sportsline is not the be all/end all for rating players, but I am merely using it as a place to start. Now comes the really fun part:
http://www.basketballreference.com/players/playerpage.htm?ilkid=JONESDA01
http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/j/jonesda01.html
Using these two sites, I decided to see what NBA players Damon Jones stacked up to career-wise. I checked both for active players (for 2005-2006 contract comparison) and all players (for long-term contract value). Here's what I see:
On the first site, which measures career stats, the most similar current player is Pat Garrity (age 29), a forward, making about $2.9 million. The most similar current GUARD is Rafer Alston(also age 29), who last year signed a five year deal worth $21 million (with a club option for a sixth year at an additional $7 million). So, Alston, a slightly better player by the numbers, will get paid somewhere between $3.5 and 4 million next season. This doesn't take into account current market value variation but, more or less, we have our price range, do we not?
The second site is overall a better site, though it merely gives us the "most similar season at age" comparison, which isn't quite as useful, since there are many individual seasons that don't reflect a player's career path and potential very well at all. For example, DJ's last season was very similar statistically to Danny Ainge's at age 28. Except that Ainge had already had a nice little career up until that point (averaging double-figures in scoring for 4 straight seasons), while DJ is coming off a career year (his ONLY year averaging double-digits) Those other guys on the list are mostly role players (I especially liked Lucious Harris).
Now, you need those types of players on playoff/championship caliber teams, but are they the guys you give multi-million/multi-year deals to? I guess it depends on the player and the need, but for the most part I say no way, mostly because they are probably not the long-term answer at that position. Two or three year deals is preferable. Four if you are being generous, five if you are completely desperate. Now, we are slightly desperate, so I would think something slightly less than Alston's deal would be both appropriate and negotiable for Jones(age adjusted since Alston signed his deal last year, at age 28). So, four years escalating from 3.2 - 4 million per year, with a club option for a fifth year. That way if you make a trade for a better PG at some point, you have a slightly over-priced, but very capable backup/3rd guard (which is what DJ really is). Until then, you have perhaps a slightly underpaid, undersized (under talented) starter, which is fine when you have Eric Snow and four or five legit offensive weapons (LeBron, Z, Hughes, Gooden, Marshall).
Hopefully, the right situation will present itself and the Cavs will be able to find a young point guard out there, but he really wasn't there this year. The closest players out there were Earl Watson, a defensive player, and not exactly a superstar (but he's only 26, which is huge) and Jaric (also 26 and also not a superstar). Minnesota was able to land Jaric in a sign and trade because they had a very good point guard to give and draft picks. We had neither draft picks nor a very good point guard (Neither of which is Ferry's fault) What we have is the overpaid Eric Snow, who was given a 4 year/$25.6 million contract extension at age 30 ( essentially giving him six years starting at age 28 -- yes, we have him for those four extra years starting THIS YEAR!), despite never being much more than a marginal starter/excellent backup. Is this a situation you would want Ferry to repeat?
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Letter to Roger Brown
Saturday, August 13, 2005 1:28 AM
Roger,
I was disappointed at what a one-sided view you took on the Cavaliers efforts to sign a point guard. You used the "average salary" to make a point regarding Damon Jones' free agent value. The average salary is irrelevant, because it skews toward the high end because of a few star (often overpaid) players (this would be like using the average salary of all MLB shortstops after A-Rod signed his historic deal. Who cares what the AVERAGE salary is?). Perhaps the MEDIAN salary would have have been a better statistic? You're better than this, man.
I happen to think that Damon Jones would be a nice fit in a Cavaliers uniform, but at what cost? Any objective measure shows Jones to be a similar caliber player to last year's Cavaliers point man, Jeff McInnis (Jones averaged slightly fewer points and assists in about 3 less minutes per game). Like McInnis, Jones is consider a suspect defender, and both are considered to be 2nd tier (at best) starting NBA point guards. McInnis just signed a contract for two years and 7 million with the Nets. Assuming that the Cavaliers offered the full 3.7 million available under the cap, it seems that the Cavaliers made a fair offer. Granted, McInnis is a few years older, but at 29, Jones is no spring chicken. Along those lines, I have also heard that a major sticking point for the Cavaliers and Jones is the length of the contract, not just the annual salary demand. It should also be noted that Sarunas Jasikevicious (also 29), a more highly sought-after player, signed a deal for 3 years at 4 million per year. Again, this puts DJ's appropriate value in perspective. While a desperate team might offer a player like Antonio Daniels 6 million per year, and the top-rated free agent point guard, Jaric, may ASK for the mid-level, that doesn't mean they are worth the money in the long run. And it certainly doesn't mean that Jones is worth more than 3.7 million. Jones may get mid-level type money to play for a non-contender, but I credit Ferry for not risking the team's future on a non-premier player.
Perhaps your real point is that the Cavaliers clearly did not save enough money after signing Z, Hughes, and Marshall, to land a top-level PG. In truth, this was a very thin year at the point guard position, so there wasn't much quality to choose from anyway (the best proven player was an aging Stoudamire!). I think this is why Ferry was willing to spend at the other positions first and hope that one of the second tier guys would look at coming this way as a good opportunity to start on a playoff caliber team and advance their careers. Or, perhaps Ferry looked at the free-agent talent and decided that our best shot at a quality point guard was through a trade (hence the Jaric meeting).
Roger,
I was disappointed at what a one-sided view you took on the Cavaliers efforts to sign a point guard. You used the "average salary" to make a point regarding Damon Jones' free agent value. The average salary is irrelevant, because it skews toward the high end because of a few star (often overpaid) players (this would be like using the average salary of all MLB shortstops after A-Rod signed his historic deal. Who cares what the AVERAGE salary is?). Perhaps the MEDIAN salary would have have been a better statistic? You're better than this, man.
I happen to think that Damon Jones would be a nice fit in a Cavaliers uniform, but at what cost? Any objective measure shows Jones to be a similar caliber player to last year's Cavaliers point man, Jeff McInnis (Jones averaged slightly fewer points and assists in about 3 less minutes per game). Like McInnis, Jones is consider a suspect defender, and both are considered to be 2nd tier (at best) starting NBA point guards. McInnis just signed a contract for two years and 7 million with the Nets. Assuming that the Cavaliers offered the full 3.7 million available under the cap, it seems that the Cavaliers made a fair offer. Granted, McInnis is a few years older, but at 29, Jones is no spring chicken. Along those lines, I have also heard that a major sticking point for the Cavaliers and Jones is the length of the contract, not just the annual salary demand. It should also be noted that Sarunas Jasikevicious (also 29), a more highly sought-after player, signed a deal for 3 years at 4 million per year. Again, this puts DJ's appropriate value in perspective. While a desperate team might offer a player like Antonio Daniels 6 million per year, and the top-rated free agent point guard, Jaric, may ASK for the mid-level, that doesn't mean they are worth the money in the long run. And it certainly doesn't mean that Jones is worth more than 3.7 million. Jones may get mid-level type money to play for a non-contender, but I credit Ferry for not risking the team's future on a non-premier player.
Perhaps your real point is that the Cavaliers clearly did not save enough money after signing Z, Hughes, and Marshall, to land a top-level PG. In truth, this was a very thin year at the point guard position, so there wasn't much quality to choose from anyway (the best proven player was an aging Stoudamire!). I think this is why Ferry was willing to spend at the other positions first and hope that one of the second tier guys would look at coming this way as a good opportunity to start on a playoff caliber team and advance their careers. Or, perhaps Ferry looked at the free-agent talent and decided that our best shot at a quality point guard was through a trade (hence the Jaric meeting).
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