John Keating: There’s a time for daring and there’s a time for caution, and a wise man understands which is called for.
-Dead Poets Society
As I sit here watching the games and killing time waiting for the box scores to come up, as I often do when killing time I am reading my twitter feed.
One tweet in particular caught my attention.
MIA_Heat_Index #DeadBasketballPoetsSociety RT @NerdNumbers: And now 4 test as 2 if anyone will call a 4-18 shooting performance clutch in their game recap.
Two fellow WOW bloggers complaining about the way the pundits talk about basketball (and of course Derrick Rose is involved). They focus on the micro on the daring and fail to understand consistency of excellence.
It’s too easy to focus on the daring acts and forget the actual net result.
I’ve said this before but basketball is a game that is built on small decisions. Shoot or Pass. Drive or pull. Go for the rebound or go back on D. The ability to make these snap descions is what make a good player. Throw in talent and you have an all-timer.
Right guys?
It’s not about scoring. It’s about scoring efficiently.
Much like in the NFL it’s not about yards but yards per carry/throw/catch, in the NBA it’s about points per play.
Let’s talk a little about the top 10:
Dirk is ridiculous and this probably explains why the Mavs fell apart without him. Kevin Martin makes sense as does Nene. Chandler is a surprise on this list to me. Durant, Pierce, Ray are not surprises. Peja is effective in limited minutes. Ryan Anderson was good in the regular season (not so good in the playoffs so far). Finally James Jones is the beneficiary of many open looks.
As for the bottom ten?
Rookies (Wall,Cousins), Wizards and Twolves oh my! I feel for my man Kevin Love.
For Rajon Rondo, Dr. Arturo recommends moving in with Ray and his momma in the offseason.
Box Scores come later tonight.
Some Dude
04/22/2011
So, are you saying WP48 underrates Dirk’s value?
Chandler is the beneficiary of a lot of alley-oops. Think that would explain it. If you remove assisted points, things would change.
arturogalletti
04/22/2011
SD,
Looks like it. It has to do with the way the Mavs are built and his insane scoring efficiency (independent of usage).
I’ve got some numbers around this I’ll put up when we have a lull in the playoff action.
EntityAbyss
04/24/2011
Well, Dirk has a true shooting percentage of 61.2 and only averages 2 turnovers per 36 minutes. After that though, as a power forward, he doesn’t really add much. Just wondering. How does win produced underrate his performance, if he’s mainly just scoring and lack of turnovers?
Fred Bush
04/22/2011
Does seem like a lot of young players at the bottom of the lists. Do you think inefficient scorers
(a) get better at scoring as they get older
(b) get more fouls called their way as they get older
(c) wash out of the league before they get older
?
arturogalletti
04/22/2011
Fred,
Experience leading to smarter decision making and better efficiency sounds like a very reasonable assumption.
I’ve got some ideas on how to test it.
Crow
04/22/2011
Scoring efficiency is an important criteria for ranking players but it would also be valuable to look at it in the context of team offensive rebounding. Inefficient scorers are less harmful on strong offensive rebounding teams and vice versa. Rondo’s scoring efficiency weakness is compounded by the Celtics 28th ranking on offensive rebounding. The rankings of players on the net impact of their scoring efficiency in the context of team offensive rebounding could be significantly different than by scoring efficiency alone. If the focus is on team performance, I’d also want to see it displayed that way. The impact of Derrick Rose in the context of the best by far offensive rebounding team in the league is much much better net than his scoring efficiency in isolation. It is not all Derrick Rose, but it is a fuller measure of the impact of the plays he uses. There is a place for valuing actions separately and a place for looking at sequences.
arturogalletti
04/22/2011
Crow,
Different facets of the game though. Ideally you want to optimize each.