# Paxson is looking to move Rose (merged)



## ChiBullsFan (May 30, 2002)

*Paxson is looking to move Rose*

I am becoming more and more convinced that Pax intends to move Rose before the season.

While it would set back our rebuilding effort a bit, I think it would probably be a great move for the long term direction of the franchise.

Pax is generally very straightforward when he speaks about his players, but the ONLY thing I've heard him say about Jalen was that he was going to talk to him about leadership expectations for next season. Jalen's absence at the Berto suggests he turned a deaf ear to Pax. It just sounds fishy to me that whenever Pax talks about the future, Jalen doesn't seem to factor into his plans. He has been very coy in his exclusion of Jalen.

Ultimately, I think Pax realizes that Jalen is our biggest detriment to having a strong defensive unit and probably a strong TEAM. He just simply doesn't try out there on D, he complains, and he's not setting the example he needs to be setting.

Jalen's defensive shortcomings made the Jay/Jamal and now Jamal/KH backcourt less feasible. If we could get the right tough, intense, defensive minded SF in compensation for Jalen, I think a trigger might be pulled.

Does anyone have any ideas of possible Jalen destinations? Maybe the Jailblazers? The Pistons? Or better yet, the T-Wolves? I know a lot of fans think that the Cassell signing shuts the door on Jalen, but it's not like Cassell has a big salary plus they traded away equal value anyway. Minnesota getting Jalen is still very economically feasible. I think by signing Cassell Minnesota is signalling their readiness to make a strong playoff run. Cassell alone won't do that. But having two strong vets with playoff experience would make them top contenders.

Also, I get the feeling they wish they hadn't committed long term to Wally. Maybe a proposal centering around Brandon/Wally for Rose/Erob would work? ERob is not a desirable contract, but it is short term compared to Wally and he has shown he can be a good playoff player in the right circumstance (i.e. on a veteran team). They would be getting an all-star calibre player for nothing, and someone who would help them take that step they NEED to take. They would also remain economically viable long term.

In the end, the Bulls would get Wally and would clear cap space with Brandon in order to make a couple good signings. Sign Maggette and Newble and we're all set?

I can't really think of any other rational proposals, but something tells me Pax has something up his sleeve. I've got a strong gut feeling that Jalen is out the door. Anyone else get that feeling?


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## Siouxperior (Jan 15, 2003)

*Re: Paxson is looking to move Rose*



> Originally posted by <b>ChiBullsFan</b>!
> I am becoming more and more convinced that Pax intends to move Rose before the season.
> 
> While it would set back our rebuilding effort a bit, I think it would probably be a great move for the long term direction of the franchise.
> ...


I don't think so, nobody is stupid enough to take on his grossly overpaid contract. Steve Patterson is looking to improve team image, and cut down on the cap..... exactly the opposite in bringing in Jalen Rose. Maybe you can ship him off to Minny for Brandon


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## blizzaw665 (May 23, 2003)

You could be right, but everyone thought Krause had something up his sleeve when he drafted Fizer, as Brand was the best player on the team. So, I think he is examining his options and ERob/ Rose are at the top of the list to go, but I am not sure that he has a real blockbuster trade in mind.


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## LoaKhoet (Aug 20, 2002)

I odn't think Paxson wants to trade Rose just to trade Rose. Although he is making a lot of money, he at least produces on the court. The young Bulls seem to have a pretty good relationship with him on the court. As a team, we always need a veteran go-to guy and certainly Rose can be that kind of players. I think Rose compliments our youngies very well. Yes defensively, he doesn't fit the bill. But we can improve other areas to hide this weakness.


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## Kismet (Mar 1, 2003)

Lets imagine Jalen Rose as a member of the Bulls teams of the '90s. What do you think the chances are that Jordan would have tolerated JR's approach to playing defense and his constant whining to the officials? I think we got an inkling of how much respect Jordan has for Rose last season during one of the Bulls-Wizards games.

Now, if you agree that Jordan doesn't seem to hold Rose in very high regard as a basketball player, isn't it very possible that John Paxson feels similarly? Jordon and Paxson have remained friends for quite a while. Paxson was Jordan's first choice to coach the Wizards when he became their GM. To say that Jordon and Paxson hold similar views on the type of players they want on their teams may be an understatement.

Yes, I do think that Paxson would very much like to send Jalen Rose packing. I also think JR is very aware of Paxson's sentiments towards him and that may have something to do with his complete absence from the Berto Center.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kismet</b>!
> Lets imagine Jalen Rose as a member of the Bulls teams of the '90s. What do you think the chances are that Jordan would have tolerated JR's approach to playing defense and his constant whining to the officials? I think we got an inkling of how much respect Jordan has for Rose last season during one of the Bulls-Wizards games.
> 
> Now, if you agree that Jordan doesn't seem to hold Rose in very high regard as a basketball player, isn't it very possible that John Paxson feels similarly? Jordon and Paxson have remained friends for quite a while. Paxson was Jordan's first choice to coach the Wizards when he became their GM. To say that Jordon and Paxson hold similar views on the type of players they want on their teams may be an understatement.
> ...


Or maybe its that 10 year veteran max salary players don't hang out all summer in chicago playing with the baby bulls. it just does not happen in the NBA. and its silly for paxson to think its going to.

that being said... he could lead much better by example on D. that does not make him a bad player... he's still our best player... and one of the best players in the league.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kismet</b>!
> Now, if you agree that Jordan doesn't seem to hold Rose in very high regard as a basketball player, isn't it very possible that John Paxson feels similarly?


Jordan is the greatest player ever. Jordan is also a jerk. He does not hold hardly anyone in high regard. He punched steve kerr of all people. When he started the jumpman logo... he picked eddie jones... so i guess he likes him. but... eddie jones is very much like jalen on the NBA totem pole... so jordan's regard does not matter that much.


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## Louie (Jun 13, 2002)

> Does anyone have any ideas of possible Jalen destinations? Maybe the Jailblazers? The Pistons? Or better yet, the T-Wolves?


Or, how about the Nets? Check this out:
Link


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

The reason Krause drafted Fizer was so he could trade him to the Trailblazers for Jermaine Oneal, but then the Pacers offerred them Dale Davis and the Blazers took the Pacers offer.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

*Re: Re: Paxson is looking to move Rose*



> Originally posted by <b>Siouxperior</b>!
> I don't think so, nobody is stupid enough to take on his grossly overpaid contract. Steve Patterson is looking to improve team image, and cut down on the cap..... exactly the opposite in bringing in Jalen Rose. Maybe you can ship him off to Minny for Brandon


Teams who view Rose as the final piece to push them over the top into championship contention might. But I agree, the financial landscape does not lend itself well to making Rose easy to trade.

I agree with ChiBullsFan... Pax might just take that Brandon offer if he can't get anything better.


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## Benny the Bull (Jul 25, 2002)

I can't see Rose getting traded this offseason. If we want to make the playoffs, we need him here. Also, after we see who we can get in free agency, the improvement of Crawford, Curry and Chandler, plus how well Hinrich and to a lesser extent Mason Jr, who didn't play much last year, adjust to the NBA, it will give Paxson a better idea if we can survive without Rose. If we are going to trade Rose, I wouldn't think it would happen until the trade deadline.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>kukoc4ever</b>!
> Or maybe its that 10 year veteran max salary players don't hang out all summer in chicago playing with the baby bulls. it just does not happen in the NBA. and its silly for paxson to think its going to.
> 
> that being said... he could lead much better by example on D. that does not make him a bad player... he's still our best player... and one of the best players in the league.


And I didn't realize you had more NBA experience than John Paxson that would give you a better idea than he of what to expect.

I don't necessarily expect Rose to be hanging out at the Berto Center all summer. But I do expect him to be working on his game-- and judging from past off-seasons, he is clearly not doing that.

All I remember is the year MJ came back and the Bulls lost to Orlando in the playoffs, that following summer MJ _worked his *** off_ to get himself in better shape and improve his game-- that was the year he came back with the deadly turnround jumper in the post if I'm not mistaken. He accomplished most of this work on a specially built basketball facility he had contructed on the set of the movie he was making. So one can see that working on one's game doesn't necessarily have to be accomplished at the Berto Center (although if Pax specifically asked Rose to show up there it would be nice if he did so). But there is no excuse, IMO, for a player with clear weaknesses in his game not to be spending significant time in the off season improving those weaknesses. It's what separates the truly great players from the very good.

As for Jalen being one of the best players in the league... it's just one measure of course, and you can give it whatever weight you see fit (I happen to believe it is a fairly accurate indicator of a player's production), but Jalen was 59th in the league in PPI (or NBA efficiency). That means that if all good players were distrubuted evenly across each team in the league, Jalen would be the third best player on his team. And given that PPI or any other statistical measure doesn't really reflect a player's defensive ability-- a commonly held weakness of Jalen's game-- that would tend to indicate that Jalen is not even as good as 59th.

So let's please not delude ourselves into believing that Jalen Rose is better than he actually is.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> 
> 
> So let's please not delude ourselves into believing that Jalen Rose is better than he actually is.


The reverse is true.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> The reverse is true.


Unless you'd care to offer up some kind of argument, I guess we'll agree to disagree.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> 
> And I didn't realize you had more NBA experience than John Paxson that would give you a better idea than he of what to expect.
> 
> ...


No, but I have as much experience being a GM as Paxson does.... he has some exp now... but you know what I mean. Not to say I should be the GM  ... Pax knows much more about hoops than I ever will. 

The NBA is a players league. You don't expect 10 year vets to be hanging out all summer shooting jump shots with the tykes. It does not happen on other NBA teams. Why should it happen here. The Bulls are the anomaly if they expect that.... not Jalen. 

As for the MJ reference.... yes... Jalen is not Michael Jordan. But he is a solid pro.

I feel that Jalen's stats dropped b/c he had to carry so much of the load last season.... causing his FG% to drop and his TOs to go up. I don't know your calculation... but those are usually negatives in any hoops performance metric. I wonder where he would finish if you put in last year's numbers with his career FG% and career TOs per game? Would be interesting to see.

I think that if EC and JC start contributing on offense... Jalen won't have to do EVERYTHING and his numbers will revert back to what they used to be... but we'll see.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>kukoc4ever</b>!
> No, but I have as much experience being a GM as Paxson does....


Touché! 

But I specifically didn't say GM experience-- I said NBA experience. Pax has been around NBA players almost constantly since 1983. I would think he might have a good idea of what to expect from players in the off-season and in general.



> The NBA is a players league. You don't expect 10 year vets to be hanging out all summer shooting jump shots with the tykes. It does not happen on other NBA teams. Why should it happen here. The Bulls are the anomaly if they expect that.... not Jalen.


Just to clarify-- it's not me or any other poster here who has set this standard of showing up at the Berto Center. It's John Paxson who has. And it's he who has expressed his disappointment in players who have not followed his "suggestion."



> As for the MJ reference.... yes... Jalen is not Michael Jordan. But he is a solid pro.


Your opinion.



> I feel that Jalen's stats dropped b/c he had to carry so much of the load last season.... causing his FG% to drop and his TOs to go up. I don't know your calculation... but those are usually negatives in any hoops performance metric. I wonder where he would finish if you put in last year's numbers with his career FG% and career TOs per game? Would be interesting to see.


That sword cuts both ways. If you are a player who plays a larger role on your team, you have greater opportunity to miss shots and turn the ball over, but you also have greater opportunity to make shots and make assists and grab rebounts-- all the positive factors in the PPI metric.

But you got my curiosity up, and since I have the league stats in a database which I can manipulate, it was fairly easy to plug in Jalen's career numbers for FG% and TO. Doing so bumped him up to 35th in the league. And again, this is "softening" his negatives only while allowing him to keep his increased scoring and assists (due to his increased role with the Bulls).



> I think that if EC and JC start contributing on offense... Jalen won't have to do EVERYTHING and his numbers will revert back to what they used to be... but we'll see.


Which will still be very sub-par for a max contract player.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> 
> Unless you'd care to offer up some kind of argument, I guess we'll agree to disagree.


NBA.COM "Efficiency" rating:
Jalen Rose #49 (not 59).

NBA.COM doesn't show individual positions, just G, F, and C, so I got these players-by-positions from Yahoo!. Rose is listed as G/F.

G/F Rank by NBA.COM "Efficiency":
1. Michael Finley
2. Rickey Davis
3. Jerry Stackhouse
<B>4. Jalen Rose</B>

Using your logic, if you distributed the G/F evenly across all teams, only 3 teams would have a better one, based upon PPI.

SG Rank by NBA.COM "Efficiency":
1. TMac
2. Kobe
3. Pierce
4. Allen
<B>5. Jalen Rose</B>

Likewise, distribute SG across all teams, Rose is 5th best.

SF Rank by NBA.COM "Efficiency":
1. Garnett
2. Marion
3. Mashburn
4. Jamison
5. Jordan
6. Stojakovic
7. Lewis
8. Jefferson
<B>9. Jalen Rose</B>

PG Rank by NBA.COM "Efficiency":
1. Kidd
2. Francis
3. Payton
4. Cassell
5. Nash
6. Terry
7. Arenas
<B>8. Jalen Rose</B>


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> NBA.COM "Efficiency" rating:
> Jalen Rose #49 (not 59).


For the record, the discrepancy is due to the slight difference in formulas between NBA Efficiency and PPI (which is what I was using). PPI includes personal fouls as a negative factor whereas NBA Efficiency does not.

Otherwise, good post, DaBullz. I admit I come down hard on Jalen because I believe he is a great talent who has underachieved his entire career.

And it still doesn't change my belief that Pax is looking to move Jalen.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

I might add:

Rose had more 30+ point games last season than the rest of the team combined. By a factor of 4x.

Rose is the first player, aside from Jordan/Pippen to average 20+ for the Bulls in a season since 1985-86 (Woolridge).

Among players who can play 1/2/3, Rose is ranked #1 by Efficiency rating ;-)

And FWIW, I think both PPI and Efficiency ratings are bogus measures. By Efficiency rating, 7 of the top 10 on NBA.COM are PF/C types. Both ratings overly penalize guys for FGA outside 6 feet and are weighted heavily towards rebounds and assists.

Here's a list of players on NBA.COM's top 50 list above Rose I wouldn't consider trading for, even up, and if there were no issue about the guy we get being the starter or CBA issues:

1. Brian Grant
2. Ricky Davis
3. Zydrunas Ilgauskas
4. Kurt Thomas
5. Troy Murphy
6. Jerry Stackhouse (though this is probably a very even deal)
7. Rashard Lewis
8. Donyell Marshall
9. Matt Harpring
10. Glenn Robinson
11. Gilbert Arenas
12. Juwan Howard
13. PJ Brown
14. Antoine Jamison
15. Sam Cassell
16. Ray Allen
17. Gary Payton
18. Shareef Abdur-Rahim
19. Pau Gasol
20. Elton Brand
21. Karl Malone (because of age only)
22. Mashburn
23. Brad Miller
24. Jason Terry

That would leave (guys I would trade for):
1. Garnett
2. Duncan
3. O'Neal
4. TMac
5. Kobe
6. Nowitzki
7. Webber
8. Marion
9. O'Neal
10. Pierce
11. Wallace
12. Kidd
13. Francis
14. Iverson
15. Marbury
16. Nash
17. Wallace
18. Jordan
19. Stojakovic
20. K. Martin
21. Ming
22. Finley
23. A. Walker

So, I'd rank him #24 in the NBA. That would be among about 450 players, or in the top ~5%.

Your milage may vary.


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## Lizzy (May 28, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kismet</b>!
> Lets imagine Jalen Rose as a member of the Bulls teams of the '90s. What do you think the chances are that Jordan would have tolerated JR's approach to playing defense and* his constant whining to the officials?* I think we got an inkling of how much respect Jordan has for Rose last season during one of the Bulls-Wizards games.


That's hilarious! :laugh: 

Jordan invented whining to the officials. Teams didn't complain to officials until MJ came along.


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## superdave (Jul 16, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Lizzy</b>!
> 
> 
> That's hilarious! :laugh:
> ...


Lizzy, the difference being MJ pouted and actually ran back for defense. Jalen never gets back past half court


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## Lizzy (May 28, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Vin Diesel</b>!
> 
> 
> Lizzy, the difference being MJ pouted and actually ran back for defense. Jalen never gets back past half court


That's what Bill Walton said during the Portland/Lakers game. Both teams were yelling at the officials all game. Walton said the Lakers were ok because they ran while they complained.

Is this what bias has come to? Defending the way people complain?


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

*guys who make what jalen makes*

A.	Hardaway	$12,375,000 2005-06
Ray	Allen	$12,375,000 2004-05
Z.	Ilgauskas	$12,224,086 2004-05
S.	Marbury	$12,224,086 2004-05
Keith	Van Horn	$12,072,500	2005-06
*Jalen	Rose	$12,072,500 2006-07*
Grant	Hill	$12,072,500 2006-07
Tracy	McGrady	$12,072,500 2006-07
Tim	Duncan	$12,072,500 2003-04
Reggie	Miller	$12,046,473 2002-03
Antonio	Davis	$12,000,000 2005-06
Michael	Finley	$11,953,125 2005-06
Latrell	Sprewell	$11,937,500 2004-05
Vlade	Divac	$11,248,076 2003-04
Eddie	Jones	$11,200,000 2006-07
Brian	Grant	$11,121,875 2006-07
Tom	Gugliotta	$10,890,930 2003-04
Tim	Thomas	$10,750,000 2005-06
David	Robinson	$10,500,000 2002-03
Terrell	Brandon	$10,175,000 2004-05

All these guys are 'max' players or close to it.... so I guess the question is... are we getting what we paid for? I'd contend for the most part that we are. I feel that jalen is _slightly_ overpaid but not so much so that its even worth harping about. How about we compare NBA efficiency calculation with how much these guys are paid and see where he stacks up? I don't have the eff stats or else i'd do it myself.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

http://www.nba.com/statistics/default_regular_season_leaders/LeagueLeadersEFFQuery.html

Efficiency stats.

Have at it.

BTW, I think you're RIGHT ON THE MONEY here. ;-)


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Lizzy</b>!
> 
> 
> That's what Bill Walton said during the Portland/Lakers game. Both teams were yelling at the officials all game. Walton said the Lakers were ok because they ran while they complained.
> ...


Jalen is an average defensive player. He does play defense... he does not just stand still... but he is not a hound dog out there.

Honestly, I think that people don't like the way he whines to the officials and the fact that he does not dive for loose balls and that turns them off...... making them more likely to jump all over him. He does many things very, very well out there on the court. There are not many guys in the league that can match his skill-set.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>kukoc4ever</b>!
> 
> 
> Jalen is an average defensive player. He does play defense... he does not just stand still... but he is not a hound dog out there.
> ...


Hehehe

Tony Kukoc would be one player who does match his skill set ;-)


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> I might add:
> 
> Rose had more 30+ point games last season than the rest of the team combined. By a factor of 4x.
> ...


Yes, but Rose also took over 600 more shots (1,583 total) than any other Bulls player.

And since 1984 only Michael Jordan has taken more shots per game than Rose.

But we've debated this in previous threads. Jalen obviously sees his role as a scorer, yet many fans here see that resulting in poor ball movement, poor shot selection and poor FG shooting. And that contributes to losing basketball.



> And FWIW, I think both PPI and Efficiency ratings are bogus measures.


For someone who things these measures are bogus, you sure are making good use of them in your arguments. 

Seriously, I realize you're no great fan of them. They're a statistical-based method only-- certainly no substitute for watching players. But it does provide a somewhat objective method of evaulating players. Do you have a better objective alternative?

I think it's important to include personal fouls in the formula because that boosts the position of perimeter players somewhat.

My PPI top 10 from last season were: KG, Duncan, T-Mac, Shaq, Kobe, Dirk, C-Webb, Marion, Kidd, and Brand. That's 4 post players (Duncan, Shaq, Webber, and Brand), 2 tall hybrid types (KG, Dirk), and 4 perimeter players (McGrady, Kobe, Marion, Kidd). What's so unbalanced about that?


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> Hehehe
> ...


yah right... tall... multi-talened... suspect D... i'm a sucker for these dudes


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> http://www.nba.com/statistics/default_regular_season_leaders/LeagueLeadersEFFQuery.html
> 
> Efficiency stats.
> ...


awesome... i'm not going to have time to do this until after work... but i'll post something later unless someone beats me to it!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

Here's the Efficiency Forumla (for the record):

((PTS + REB + AST + STL + BLK) - ((FGA - FGM) + (FTA - FTM) + TO)) / G

Clearly, 3PT shooting/scoring is missing. A 33% shooter is as efficient a scorer as a 50% 2PT shooter. Yet the (FGA-FGM) term is a HUGE penalty against that 3PT scorer. Consider Rose shot a ton of 3's and hit ~38% of them. His Efficiency rating is hugely distorted.

The (FGA-FGM) term simply overly favors PF/C types. I've said this before, but if I were an NBA player getting paid for PPI, I'd not shoot at all, unless it was a dunk.

Let's do some algebra here.

Player A scores 20PPG, on 10-20 FG. He has ZERO rebounds, zero assists, 0 steals, 0 blocks.

Efficiency = 20 - (20-10) = 10

Player B scores 0 PPG on 0-0FG, but he grabs 10 RPG (zero everything else):
Efficiency = 10 - 0 = 10

I do not agree that Player A and Player B are equal. Player A is superior. Player A would be an Allan Houston type of player. Player B would be a Shawn Bradley type of player. I wouldn't trade Houston for Bradley. Not a chance.

Now look at SG types vs. C types:

Player A scores 20 PPG on 10-20 FG and has 4 reb and 4 assists. Those are darned good numbers:

Efficiency = 20+4+4 - 10 = 18

Player B scores 20 PPG on 10-16 shooting, but grabs 10 rebounds and dishes out 2 assists:

Efficiency = 20 + 10 + 2 - 6 = 26

The SG would have to put up numbers like 20/8/8 to be rated similarly:

Efficiency = 20 + 8 + 8 - 10 = 26

No player in the NBA did 20/8/8 last season, so consider it a near impossible thing to achieve.

I am not impressed with 10 rebounds from a PF/C type. They should grab that many rebounds because of their size and where they're pretty much standing most of the time on defense (under the basket).

I hope this makes things a little clearer.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> Here's the Efficiency Forumla (for the record):
> 
> ((PTS + REB + AST + STL + BLK) - ((FGA - FGM) + (FTA - FTM) + TO)) / G
> ...


No it's not. Rose gets 3 points instead of 2 for every 3-pointer he makes.

As for rebounds being over-valued, I guess guys like Ben Wallace and Dennis Rodman aren't/weren't worth anything, not to mention the likes of Bill Russell.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

Here's a list of the ~20/10 guys (pts/reb) and how they rank in the Efficiency list:

Garnett 23/13.4 = 1st
Duncan 23.3/12.9 = 2nd
O'Neal 27.5/11.1 = 3rd
Nowitzky 25/9.9 = 6th
Webber 23.0/10.5 = 7th
Brand 18.8/11.3 = 8th
Marion 21.2/9.5 = 9th
O'Neal 20.8/10.3 = 10th

The only two non PF/C that make the top 10 were the only two who scored 30+ PPG.

You still don't see it?

20/10 are more plentiful than 30PPG scorers for a reason.

The rule is 20/10 or lead the league in scoring.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

It's interesting that you feel the PPI/Efficiency index is slanted towards rebounders. Someone (I think it might have been Lizzy?) recently pointed out that they felt it was slanted towards scorers.

Oftentimes 30 point scorers are "gunners" who contribute little to a team other than scoring. And in their efforts to put up that many points, they often (not always) take ill-advised shots which lead to poor shooting percentages. This is not winning basketball, and such players deserve to be ranked accordingly.

But since 1977, there have been 24 occasions where a player has averaged 30 ppg for a season. Here is where each player ranked in that year's PPI scale:

<table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Year</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Player</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">PPI Rank</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td rowspan="2"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">79-80</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">World B. Free</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">21</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">George Gervin</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">4</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">80-81</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Adrian Dantley</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">4</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td rowspan="3"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">81-82</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Adrian Dantley</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">4</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">George Gervin</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">11</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Moses Malone</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">1</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">82-83</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Adrian Dantley</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">3</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">83-84</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Adrian Dantley</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">3</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">84-85</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Bernard King</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">6</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">85-86</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Dominique Wilkins</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">5</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">86-87</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">4</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td rowspan="2"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">87-88</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">2</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Dominique Wilkins</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">12</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">88-89</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">1</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td rowspan="2"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">89-90</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">1</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Karl Malone</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">2</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">90-91</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">2</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">91-92</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">2</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">92-93</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">3</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">95-96</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Michael Jordan</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">3</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">00-01</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Allen Iverson</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">15</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">01-02</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Allen Iverson</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">12</font></td> </tr> <tr valign="top"> <td rowspan="2"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">02-03</font></td> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Kobe Bryant</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">5</font></td> </tr> <tr> <td><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">Tracy McGrady</font></td> <td align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">3</font></td> </tr></table>

Maybe I'm missing your point, but I don't see how the index is biased against 30 point scorers.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> http://www.nba.com/statistics/default_regular_season_leaders/LeagueLeadersEFFQuery.html
> 
> Efficiency stats.
> ...


well... this only gives me the top 50... i'll have to get a database of NBA stats and calculate it myself... (sigh)


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

According to my rating system, Rose was #42 this year, just after Eric Snow and ahead of Chauncy Billups 

In 2001-2002 he was #41, after Rashard Lewis and before Eddie Jones

In 2000-2001 he was #31, after Sam Cassell and just ahead of Antwan Jamison

In 1999-2000 he was #35, after Derrick Coleman and before Jerry Stackhouse

In 1998-1999 he was #152, behind Chris Childs and ahead of Muggsy Bogues

Long story short, since he's been a full time starter he's been a very good player, but if you divvied up the league's best players (according to my measure  ) evenly, he wouldn't be the best player on any team.

He is, however, in the range of being the second best player on a hypothetical average team.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> It's interesting that you feel the PPI/Efficiency index is slanted towards rebounders. Someone (I think it might have been Lizzy?) recently pointed out that they felt it was slanted towards scorers.
> 
> Oftentimes 30 point scorers are "gunners" who contribute little to a team other than scoring. And in their efforts to put up that many points, they often (not always) take ill-advised shots which lead to poor shooting percentages. This is not winning basketball, and such players deserve to be ranked accordingly.
> ...


It's biased against 20 PPG scorers who don't get 10 rebounds.

As I pointed out in the algebra post, a 20/10 guy who hits 55% of his FG is the same as a 20/8/8 (pts/reb/ast) guy, of which there are NONE. There are several 20/10/55% guys, because they are PF/C types and simply shoot from very close to the basket (and rebound because they play near the basket all the time).

The only way to make the top 10 (this season) is to score 30+.

It's tough to score 30+, but if you do, you do make it. I didn't say it was biased against those guys.

What I did point out is there's fewer 30+ PPG guys than there are 20/10 guys. And 8 of the top 10 are 20/10 guys. The other 2 are 30+ guys.

Come to think of it, a 20/10 (Pts/assists) guy is the same as a 20/10 (pts/reb) guy. Yet there have been maybe 2-3 of these guys in the past 20 years. So it's stacked against point guards, too.

Peace!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

BTW, you now might go look at the 20/10 guys over the same period and see how many of them make the top 10. Or better yet, guys who average 15 RPG, regardless of their other stats.

The real point behind this exercise is twofold.

1) The Efficiency rating is bogus. PPI is tweaking a bogus forumla, so it isn't going to be much better. No offense intended.

2) You can use the Efficiency rating across all players at all positions and make a bogus argument. It particularly looks bad that you don't like Rose and you have a convenient formula to make him look worse than he is ;-)

But when I used Efficiency (or you can try PPI) to compare players at the same position, issues like where a guy plays (under the basket vs. outside) mostly go away. But I'm still unconvinced that PPI or Efficiency is true; that Rose is the #4 best G/F in the league, for example.

Here's something else to consider. I happen to think the world of Ben Wallace. I don't remember any player in recent memory who has the kind of defensive impact on an entire opposing team that he does. But if you had 5x Wallace playing 5x Brand, Brand would win. What 5x Wallace would do is hold Brand to much less than his normal scoring, but they'd still score more than 5x Wallace. And more points = victory.

When I look at PPI or Efficiency rating, I would get rid of the FGA-FGM term altogether (and FTA-FTM, too). I would use a term like min(reb-9,0) and min(ast-5,0). Or something like that. And maybe min(pts-20,0) too. I might even base the terms on position. Like min(ast-5,0) for guards and min(ast-2,0) for F/C.

I think FG% is nowhere near the big deal that these formula make them out to be. I'd take a guy who scores 120PPG on 20% FG every day of the week over a guy who grabs 50 RPG. That's about 5x 24PPG and 5x 10RPG.

Sometimes it does help to look at such extreme examples.

And sometimes it helps to use zeros for some of the terms in the equations to see the effect of the other terms.



This is for MikeDC:

I posted a few posts back a list of the top Efficiency guys I wouldn't trade Rose for, even up, with no other (salary/position) considerations.

There are ~23 players I'd take over Rose. That would put Rose exactly where he is IN REALITY. The best player on some team somewhere. And better than the best player on 5 teams. That seems about right. You can call it DaBullz' sphincter test.

The issues with devising a numerical rating system based upon the stats are manyfold. It's a painfully iterative process. You should rate every NBA player as I did Rose and then tweak your formula so the numbers work out. But you should also do it for historical data, if you want it to be historically accurate. And that makes the job way more tedius. It can be set up to be done by computer, but the setup time is long.

You also may not want to use the DaBullz' sphincter test. You might want to do a survey of coaches or even board posters here, to get a better/averaged sphincter test.

This illustrates a second of the issues. The numbers are just not a good enough quantifier of a player's ability. If you wanted to rank players by defensive ability, it'd have to be entirely subjective and not objective. There are a lot of other intangibles, too. Like, count the number of games Jordan won with an amazing last second shot, and you appreciate him more than just for his stats ;-)

Consider ERA for pitchers as an example of a stat that doesn't tell the whole story. You can have a guy who starts 40 games, gives up 120 runs in one game and pitches 39 no-hitters. His ERA will be good, but his actual performance was beyond belief incredible for 39/40 of the time. ERA is far from a useless stat, though, if you take it into context with W/L (in this case 39-1), or count the no-hitters (39). 

You might look at data that is unusual as an indicator of some greatness. Like, a guy who does 20/8/8 (Jordan did it once, Magic may have done it at least once) as not only being by far the best player for a season, but among the very best ever. Or Wilt's 50.4PPG average for a season. Or Oscar Robertson's full season of averaging a triple-double. Along these lines, Rose's ~ 22/5/5 season borders on spectacular. IMO. That is looking at the numbers in context. 

Peace!


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## bullet (Jul 1, 2003)

*celtics*

give rose+? get antoine walker+whatever


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## uracornball (Nov 13, 2002)

The list that you gave of players that ranked above Rose that you wouldnt trade for seems flawed. There are several players on that list that perform much better than Jalen Rose. There are also players that would fit better on Chicago than Jalen Rose. Jamal Mashburn is better than Jalen Rose at every aspect of basketball, this is a perfect example of how ranking players can become biased.


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## genex (Apr 17, 2003)

Jalen is a better player than Antoine is an even worse defender and shooter than Jalen. Antoine is LAZY. He could post up with his size but he doesn't like the contact. He has all the tools at a higher level but he is so streaky, he make Jalen look like Hornecek for steadiness. As for Mashburn, I agree that he is superior to Jalen. Mashburn however is very injury prone while Jalen plays that low to the ground floor game that keeps him in one piece. Jalen is NOT A LEADER (he is too busy thinking about his next guest appreance in a Ludacris video, or the size of his SUV) OR THE LEADING SCORER ON A GOOD TEAM. He must become a facilitator and 2nd offensive option. Curry's offensive growth can only help Jalen's field goal percentage as he won't have to force so many shots anymore. I think he will come to terms with this this year.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>uracornball</b>!
> The list that you gave of players that ranked above Rose that you wouldnt trade for seems flawed. There are several players on that list that perform much better than Jalen Rose. There are also players that would fit better on Chicago than Jalen Rose. Jamal Mashburn is better than Jalen Rose at every aspect of basketball, this is a perfect example of how ranking players can become biased.


This is why I said you would want to use a poll. A poll would at least average the bias out.

I think Mashburn is a very good player. I think he's only a slight improvement over Rose, and he would not make the team any different/better than it is now. The difference between the two is in the caliber of their teammates... Rose got to play alongside 3 40% shooters.


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## chitownz finest (Jun 19, 2003)

*Why is everyone down on Rose?*

Rose to the bulls is an older brother bringing the up and coming Bulls back to the winning tradition. There are certain things that we all get fed up wit his whinning to the refs and his lousy defense and his contract that takes away alot of cap space. But other than that he is one of the team leaders if not the team leader right?


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## Kramer (Jul 5, 2002)

*Re: Why is everyone down on Rose?*



> Originally posted by <b>chitownz finest</b>!
> Rose to the bulls is an older brother bringing the up and coming Bulls back to the winning tradition. There are certain things that we all get fed up wit *his whinning to the refs and his lousy defense and his contract that takes away alot of cap space.* But other than that he is one of the team leaders if not the team leader right?


I think you answered your own question.


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## Showtyme (Jun 24, 2002)

Quality thread, yall.

Stats never tell the whole story. There's more than a handful of examples of players that are capable of much more than their stats can tell. For instance, Ron Harper scored 20.1 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 4.6 apg, and 1.92 spg his last year at the Clips before he came to Chicago. That's freaky good. They are Jamal Mashburn numbers with more steals, or Antawn Jamison numbers with almost as many boards, a little less scoring, a lot more assists and a lot more steals.

Or Jalen Rose numbers, with a little less scoring and a lot more defense.

The next year, Ron Harper was 6.9 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 2.0 apg, and 1.26 steals, in about half the minutes. I'll bet you Ron's PPI wasn't so high that year. 

Or more simple examples of how efficiency isn't necessarily the qualification of a "good player". Let's say you are putting together a team. Would you rather have Ricky Davis (20.6 ppg, 5 rpg, 5.5 apg, 1.6 spg), or Sam Cassell (19.7 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 5.8 apg, 1.13 spg)? For most, it's not a hard decision. Davis is a better player than he showed this season, and his sadly low FG% was more a result of carrying a bad team, rather than bad shooting. For some of us, it's kind of a tough call. One can make an argument for Cassell too, a tremendously underrated scoring point guard (who happens to look like a dinosaur).

The point: Davis efficiency rating (nba.com) = 17.1, good for 45th in the NBA. Cassell? 20.19, good for 22nd in the NBA.

The stats don't say a whole lot about a player's worth. It might say something about how effective he is at producing numbers, and usually that's in the direction of being a good thing. But factors that are unquantifiable yet EXTREMELY referenced ("potential", team defender, smart plays, rugged loose-ball-diving play, leadership, other intangibles) are important enough to let us know that stats can't be a good evaluation of a player.

Rose is not among the 35-45th best player in the league. He's in the top 25, and I think that most coaches would agree.


That having been said, if Paxson wants to move him, I think I'd survive. He's not a particularly spectacular player. But I've been promoting this for a long time, during the Krause days: Rose needs to change the way he plays, not change the team he plays for. It's not about leadership, IMO. It's about his floor production.

And wherever they trade him, he won't really help them there either unless he simply changes the way he plays. If he goes to Minnesota and is the starting PG for the team, he'll have to understand that KG is the main dog, and that they have other smart role players that he can utilize. And Jalen is smart enough to know how to do that. Someone just needs to convince him that the team around him is improving enough to let him trust them more often. More passing, more defense, more high-percentage shots. More dishing the ball in pressure opportunities. We lost a LOT of close games, but I remember Rose being the only man to take the last shot in most of them. While it's good for the best player to take the GW shot, smart players know that the open man is the higher percentage shot. MJ demonstrated it many a time, including this past year with the Wiz.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Showtyme</b>!
> Stats never tell the whole story. There's more than a handful of examples of players that are capable of much more than their stats can tell. For instance, Ron Harper scored 20.1 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 4.6 apg, and 1.92 spg his last year at the Clips before he came to Chicago. That's freaky good. They are Jamal Mashburn numbers with more steals, or Antawn Jamison numbers with almost as many boards, a little less scoring, a lot more assists and a lot more steals.
> 
> Or Jalen Rose numbers, with a little less scoring and a lot more defense.
> ...


I agree wholeheartedly that stats never tell the whole story. However I believe they are one of many tools that can be used in evaluating players.

Your Harper example is not the best one as to the best of my recollection Harper stunk up the joint his first year in a Bulls uni. In fact, there were many who feared that Krause has been snookered into signing damaged goods. Turns out, Harp was mostly just way out of shape (and also had a difficult time adjusting to the triangle). The next season, he worked his butt off in the off season and reported to camp a different player.

As for Davis vs. Cassell... I refuse to use as an excuse the fact that a player plays on a poor team and jacks up poor shots in an attempt to "carry" his team. Exactly what did Davis carry the Cavs to? The worst record in the league, that's what.



> The stats don't say a whole lot about a player's worth. It might say something about how effective he is at producing numbers, and usually that's in the direction of being a good thing. But factors that are unquantifiable yet EXTREMELY referenced ("potential", team defender, smart plays, rugged loose-ball-diving play, leadership, other intangibles) are important enough to let us know that stats can't be a good evaluation of a player.


I agree with all this. But it turns out that, except for rare cases, stats do give a pretty accurate indication of how productive a player is. You can argue that Duncan should be #1 over KG or other minutia like that, but the fact is both players stats show them both to be two of the top players in the league.



> Rose is not among the 35-45th best player in the league. He's in the top 25, and I think that most coaches would agree.


It would be intersting to take such a poll. I think in general coaches like efficient players who hustle and play defense-- all things which Jalen is not. I think you'd have better luck with a poll of fans ranking Jalen in the top 25.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

DaBullz, I've mulled over your latest posts for a while now in a sincere effort to understand where you're coming from, and I confess I just don't follow your line of thought.



> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> It's biased against 20 PPG scorers who don't get 10 rebounds.


How so? If you mean players who score 20 ppg and do get 10 rpg are going to be ranked higher than players who just score 20 ppg, how else would you have it be?



> As I pointed out in the algebra post, a 20/10 guy who hits 55% of his FG is the same as a 20/8/8 (pts/reb/ast) guy, of which there are NONE. There are several 20/10/55% guys, because they are PF/C types and simply shoot from very close to the basket (and rebound because they play near the basket all the time).


??? What is your point here?



> The only way to make the top 10 (this season) is to score 30+.


???



> What I did point out is there's fewer 30+ PPG guys than there are 20/10 guys. And 8 of the top 10 are 20/10 guys. The other 2 are 30+ guys.


How is this relevant?



> Come to think of it, a 20/10 (Pts/assists) guy is the same as a 20/10 (pts/reb) guy. Yet there have been maybe 2-3 of these guys in the past 20 years. So it's stacked against point guards, too.


There have actually been just 7 in the entire history of the NBA (Michael Adams, Nate Archibald, Tim Hardaway, Magic Johnson, Kevin Johnson, Oscar Robertson, and Isiah Thomas).

But again, I ask how is this relevant? You're setting these arbitrary plateus for no apparent reason, and then saying that those players are somehow excluded.

And again, just to clarify, I would never claim that these statistical rankings are the end all and be all. I would not advocate, for example, automatically trading the #30 player for the #25 player just based on that ranking alone. But, from what I have seen, these rankings do tend to show which players historically are good performers vs. thost that are not as good-- sort of showing the cream rising to the top as it were. If you look at rankings such as this over the course of NBA history, you'll see that just about all the greats are right near the top as one would expect.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> As for Davis vs. Cassell... I refuse to use as an excuse the fact that a player plays on a poor team and jacks up poor shots in an attempt to "carry" his team. Exactly what did Davis carry the Cavs to? The worst record in the league, that's what.


But that's the way it is, according to my experience playing just pick up games and tournaments. When you are the best player on a team of crappy players, you are forced to do more... take shots that you would not usually take... deal with the best defensive person on the other team guarding you and dealing with double teams. Next thing you know your FG% is down. If your team NEEDS you to score the bulk of the points because nobody else can, you are going to usually take more and tougher shots. If you have to handle the ball most of the time.... and your teammates are not good... then your turnovers can easily go up since you are forcing things.

Basketball is a team game.... so looking at individual statistics and coming up with a formula does not tell the whole story. The role a player plays on the team can make him a more efficient player.

Take Marshall for instance.... he's rated higher than Jalen using NBA.com efficiency. But, there is no way he can be a go-to guy on a team. He does not have the skill set. When he does do... he does very well. He converts at a high percentage close to the bucket. He can drain open jump shots. He gets rebounds. The efficiency metric loves that. But, if he were the best player, the "go-to" player on a NBA team.... his could not be able to pick his spots like he does now. If he's the man that has to take the tough shots, his FG% and his TOs go up since he'll be forcing things and he won't be "efficiant" anymore.

When Jalen came here, there was nobody who could put the ball in the hole. He had to be "the man" He had to take shots that he was not taking before. I read people on this board taking writing "jalen only cares about his stats"... but if you look at his career, he's never been a "gunner" until he came here.... and its because its what the team NEEDED. His turnovers went up over 3 a game the second he became a Bull. Do you think all of a sudden he became a different player in the middle of a season? No. His role changed.

This season... as Curry and Crawford become more consistent scoring options, some of the load will be off Jalen and I think that his TO and FG% numbers will revert back to the way they used to be... but we will see.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

This URL talks about tendex, a similar kind of ranking system to PPI. A lot more complicated a formula. However, they both acknowledge and address the points I raise to you.



> http://www.tendexhoops.com/whatis.htm
> 
> The result is a three-digit numerical rating, not unlike a batting average in baseball. This is then given a plus or minus rating <B>comparing the player's rating to the average rating for that particular postion</B>. The best players are the ones whose ratings are highest above the positional average.
> 
> ...


I address your points/questions directly below.

1. PPI/Efficiency are biased against 20 PPG scorers who don't get rebounds. That would be SGs. Your PPI and NBA's Efficiency have the same problem as Tendex. Average ratings for centers are much higher than for shooting guards.

2. Algebra. When you use raw PPI or Efficiency to compare a C/PF with an SG or PG, it so heavily favors the C/PF that the comparison is absurd. The algebra shows how a 20/10 (pts/reb) guy is going to dominate your top X player rankings. You do weight Reb and Ast identically in your PPI, and you have found just a handful of 20/10 pts/ast guys and there are surely 10 or more 20/10 pts/reb guys EVERY season. This should be a red flag to you! 20/10 pts/ast is freakishly amazing. 20/10 pts/reb is hohum.

That said, 20/10 pts/reb for a PG is amazing. 

Thus you have to compare PG with PG and not PG vs. C.

3. 30+ PPG. These guys are much rarer than 20/10 pts/reb guys. Just two last season. About 10 20/10 guys. It is just as obvious as the nose on your face that your formula biases heavily against guys who score 29PPG or less. 29PPG is still amazing.

4. 8/10 guys in PPI top 10 are PF/C types. If you're going to try to come up with a formula to compare PF/C with SG types, then 2/10 guys should be PG, 2/10 guys should be SG, 2/10 should be C, 2/10 PF, and 2/10 SF.

5. 20/10 reb/pts vs. 20/10 assists. The 10 reb is almost trivial to achieve for a PF/C. The 20/10 pts/assists is near impossible (just 7 in the history of the NBA) for a PG. The WEIGHT of AST and REB in your formula is identical. PG is nowhere near the basket to get rebounds. PF/C stand under the basket most of the time and the ball falls in their hands. They get FREEBIE PPI points. PG have little chance to have similar overall ranking. Thus you cannot compare a PG with a C.


Now, I've demonstrated to you that when you compare Rose as SG with other SGs, he's quite good. Same when you compare him with SF and PG and F/G types. There's a good reason:

Look at the tendex explaination again, 
"Average ratings are 
.470 for centers, 
.450 for power forwards, 
.390 for small forwards, 
.350 for point guards and 
.340 for shooting guards."

Your PPI and NBA.COM's Efficiency have the 
.340 vs .470
<B>BIAS</B>
built in.

I have two suggestions for you.

1) Multiply Rose's PPI by .470/.340 and use that value to compare against C types, by .450/.340 to compare against PF types, etc.

2) Take your PPI ratings and compute averages for each position: PG, SG, SF, PF, and C. Then see if you don't get numbers similar to above (.470 for C, .340 for SG). Use the appropriate ratio based upon your data.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

*ricky davis*

There are some selfish players that do just care about their stats and don't care about the team. Ricky Davis seems like this kind of player.

From the games I've watched, I don't think Jalen is that way. For instance, the last game of the regular season against the sixers... Crawford and Eddy are going off.... just abusing Philly. At one point in the second half Eddy is dominating and the crowd is going nuts... chanting "eddy... eddy.... eddy!!!".... and what is Jalen doing... he has a huge smile on his face and his waving his arms up and down... whooping the crowd up. Once he has some teammates that can play... he's a solid team player.

The Pacers didn't get to the finals with him as their top scorer by him being a selfish guy who only cares about his stats.


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## Da Grinch (Aug 17, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>kukoc4ever</b>!
> 
> 
> But that's the way it is, according to my experience playing just pick up games and tournaments. When you are the best player on a team of crappy players, you are forced to do more... take shots that you would not usually take... deal with the best defensive person on the other team guarding you and dealing with double teams. Next thing you know your FG% is down. If your team NEEDS you to score the bulk of the points because nobody else can, you are going to usually take more and tougher shots. If you have to handle the ball most of the time.... and your teammates are not good... then your turnovers can easily go up since you are forcing things.
> ...


great post I couldn't agree more


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> Here's the Efficiency Forumla (for the record):
> 
> ((PTS + REB + AST + STL + BLK) - ((FGA - FGM) + (FTA - FTM) + TO)) / G
> ...


DaBullz is right here. Compare the following two players.

*Suppose that Mr. Three Point has the following statistics.*

3-6 from 2 point, 4-12 from 3 point, 3-4 from free throw line, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 block, 2 steals, and 2 turnovers.

Mr. Three Point would end up with an "efficiency" score of 20, which would rank him #23 in the NBA last year (between Cassell and Mashburn).

*Suppose that Mr. Two Point has the following statistics. *

9-18 from 2 point, 0-0 from 3 point, 3-4 from free throw line, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 block, 2 steals, and 2 turnovers.

Mr. Two Point would end up with an "efficiency" score of 22, which would rank him #15 in the NBA last year (between Gasol and Malone).

*So even though both players score the same number of points on the same number of shots (and their other statistics are the same), Mr. Two Point is rated a fair bit higher than Mr. Three Point.* If anything, I would rate Mr. Three Point a bit higher, since he generates two extra offensive rebounding opportunities per game.

However, Mr. Three Point has nothing to complain about versus Mr. Free Throw.

*Suppose that Mr. Free Throw has the following statistics.* 

5-10 from 2 point, 0-0 from 3 point, 11-22 from free throw line, 5 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 block, 2 steals, and 2 turnovers.

(Suppose two of these free throw attempts are three-point opportunities.)

Mr. Free Throw would end up with an "efficiency" score of 17, which would rank him #47 in the NBA last year (between Jefferson and Walker).

*So even though Mr. Free Throw generates the same number of points in the same number of possessions (and their other statistics are the same), he is rated much, much lower than the other players.* I would rate him higher than the other players, because he is generating lots of fouls on the other team, putting my team in the bonus earlier and potentially putting good offensive players on the opposing squad on the bench.

*Granted, these examples are a bit extreme, but the "efficiency" rating does tend to overpenalize three point shooters and guys who get to line a lot (and miss).*


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

DaBullz,

Thanks for elaborating further... it seems clear to me now where our disagreement lies.

If we are debating the relative merits of Jalen Rose as a player, then I agree with you that it is correct to compare him only against players who play his same position. So on that point I concede-- statistically Jalen stacks up against the other SG's in the league.

But when it comes to the various player evaluation formulas out there, what you obviously feel is some sort of built-in bias against smaller players, I feel is a natural valuation of big players in the game of basketball. Basketball is a big man's game. NBA teams tend to draft big players over small for a reason-- they are considered to be more valuable.

If you asked all 29 GM's in the league which position they would fill first (given their choice of great players), I bet all 29 would say center.

And for the record, PPI is certainly not "my forumula". I'm not sure where it first originated, but I'm sure it dates back quite a ways. It was first brought to my attention by Jammer a couple of years ago when I first joined Real GM. And I full well realize there are variations of the basic formula that weight the various factors differently. Throughout this past season, what I posted as "my" PPI rankings were actually a composite of the "basic" PPI formula along with 3 different "tweaked" rating systems as devised by Jammer, NCBullsFan, and Doug Steel.

I have played around with developing my own index, but I feel that the various variations really don't produce significantly different results. Oh, they might have any given player ranked 5 to 10 spots higher or lower. But I tend to not concern myself with such differences. As you have pointed out, these statistical tools only go so far in accurately evaluating players, so I feel why obsess with overly complex forumulas? The "basic" forumula gives me the overall statistical picture I'm looking for.

My intention is not to get into a tit-for-tat debate, but since you obviously took the time to type out your well thought out response, I feel I owe you the courtesy of addressing each of your points:



> 1. PPI/Efficiency are biased against 20 PPG scorers who don't get rebounds. That would be SGs. Your PPI and NBA's Efficiency have the same problem as Tendex. Average ratings for centers are much higher than for shooting guards.


In my opinion, 20 ppg scorers who don't get rebounds are not as valuable to a team as 20 ppg scorers who also grab 10 rpg.



> 2. Algebra. When you use raw PPI or Efficiency to compare a C/PF with an SG or PG, it so heavily favors the C/PF that the comparison is absurd. The algebra shows how a 20/10 (pts/reb) guy is going to dominate your top X player rankings. You do weight Reb and Ast identically in your PPI, and you have found just a handful of 20/10 pts/ast guys and there are surely 10 or more 20/10 pts/reb guys EVERY season. This should be a red flag to you! 20/10 pts/ast is freakishly amazing. 20/10 pts/reb is hohum.
> 
> That said, 20/10 pts/reb for a PG is amazing.
> 
> Thus you have to compare PG with PG and not PG vs. C.


Same response as to point #1-- I think centers and inside players are generally valued more highly than perimeter players. Even still, though, I previously listed the top 10 players from last season according to PPI index and pointed out that it included 4 post players, 2 tall hybrids, and 4 perimeter players. I fail to see how this is favoring one position over another.



> 3. 30+ PPG. These guys are much rarer than 20/10 pts/reb guys. Just two last season. About 10 20/10 guys. It is just as obvious as the nose on your face that your formula biases heavily against guys who score 29PPG or less. 29PPG is still amazing.


You're losing me here. So there were only 2 30 ppg scorers last season. There weren't any 20 rpg guys, or 15 apg guys. How does any formula bias against guys who score 29 ppg or less?



> 4. 8/10 guys in PPI top 10 are PF/C types. If you're going to try to come up with a formula to compare PF/C with SG types, then 2/10 guys should be PG, 2/10 guys should be SG, 2/10 should be C, 2/10 PF, and 2/10 SF.


Your opinion, which, while I respect, I do not share.



> 5. 20/10 reb/pts vs. 20/10 assists. The 10 reb is almost trivial to achieve for a PF/C. The 20/10 pts/assists is near impossible (just 7 in the history of the NBA) for a PG. The WEIGHT of AST and REB in your formula is identical. PG is nowhere near the basket to get rebounds. PF/C stand under the basket most of the time and the ball falls in their hands. They get FREEBIE PPI points. PG have little chance to have similar overall ranking. Thus you cannot compare a PG with a C.


Once again, I am valuing any rebound or any assist equally regardless of which position on the floor gets them. Jason Kidd is highly ranked in large part because he gets a larger than usual number of rebounds. Kevin Garnett is likewise very highly ranked because he gets more assists than any big man in the game.


----------



## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> (Suppose two of these free throw attempts are three-point opportunities.)


I don't think this assumption is very realistic. Without it, the efficentcy number, 19, is very close to the 3pt shooter, 20.

Quoting Kneepad, " these rankings do tend to show which players historically are good performers vs. thost that are not as good-""

Someone should rework Jalen's numbers converting all of his 3pts into 2 pts and see how far this would move him up the rankings. I bet he doesn't move much.


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

In 22 free throw attempts, I would expect at least two to be free throw attempts after a made basket. (I wasn't referring to fouls on a three point shot.)


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

I'm going to go a little off topic here, but this little brainteaser illustrates the point. Here goes:

Three travelling salesmen stop at a motel to spend the night. The guy behind the desk tells them, "we have only one room left, you guys can share it. It will cost you $30."

The three guys agree, so they each cough up $10.

The man behind the desk calls the bellboy and instructs him to take the salesmen to their room.

The bellboy carries the three guys' luggage up 3 flights of stairs. He's kinda miffed that he doesn't get a tip.

When he returns to the desk, the man behind the desk tells him, "I just looked at the price book, and we're having a special on that room today. The price is $25, not $30." So he gives the bellboy $5 in singles and instructs him to go back to the room and give the guys their refund.

The bellboy gets halfway up the stairs and is still upset he didn't get a tip. He realizes the salesmen will never know if he pockets some of the refund. So he takes $2 and puts it in his wallet.

The bellboy knocks on the door and gives them the remaining $3, which they split evenly. $1 each.

So...

Each guy paid $10 and got a $1 refund. That means they paid $9. $9 x 3 = $27. And the bellboy has $2 in his pocket.

$27 + $2 = $29.

WHERE IS THE MISSING DOLLAR?

I will explain the answer after a few people try to get it right.

Peace!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> DaBullz,
> 
> Once again, I am valuing any rebound or any assist equally regardless of which position on the floor gets them. Jason Kidd is highly ranked in large part because he gets a larger than usual number of rebounds. Kevin Garnett is likewise very highly ranked because he gets more assists than any big man in the game.


This is the flaw in your logic, my friend.

A rebound is not a rebound. A rebound by a PF has less value than a rebound by a G. That's why Kidd is so awesome; guards aren't supposed to rebound like he does.

Here's an example.

Eddie Curry grabs 6 reb/game.

Kidd grabs 6 reb/game.

Curry is a lousy rebounder. Kidd is an awesome rebounder.

Hence the terms I was suggesting, like min(rpg-8,0) for C types and min(rpg-4,0) for G types.

On the other hand, an assist is not an assist. An assist by a PF has way more value than an assist by a PG.

If Kidd averages 5 APG, he's just so-so.

If Curry averages 5 APG, he's an awesome passer.

Hence the terms I was suggesting, like min(apg-6,0) for G types, and min(apg-2,0) for PF types.


----------



## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> In 22 free throw attempts, I would expect at least two to be free throw attempts after a made basket. (I wasn't referring to fouls on a three point shot.)


Ok, this still begs the question of how many guys in the league over the course of a season would average 2x as many FTs as FGs. And then this type of player would still need to have a mediocre to bad FT% to effect things greatly. 

I looked at http://www.nba.com/statistics/index.html

the playoff leading scorers. No one shot 2X or more FT than FGs out of the leaders.

And only a handful of guys had more FTs than FGs. And Pierce and Snow and Maglorie all shot their FTs well.

Maybe the effeciency rating is not so bad.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

I want to follow up on a couple of things for Kneepad.

1) KG is clearly the best player, statistically in the league. I think any VALID rating system would put him at the top.

2) The ONLY correlation I actually see between EFficiency and who makes the top 10 is HEIGHT. You can almost ignore the formula and sort the players by height ;-)

1. Garnett 6'11"
2. Duncan 7'0"
3. Shaq 7'1"
4. TMac 6'8"
5. Kobe 6'8"
6. Nowitzky 7'0"
7. Webber 6'10"
8. Brand 6'8"
9. Marion 6'7"
10. O'Neal 6'11"


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## RetroDreams (Jun 9, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> This is the flaw in your logic, my friend.
> ...


I don't want to butt heads, but how is Kidd an awesome rebounder when he averages 2x the playing time

Curry averaged 4.4 rebounds per game while playing 19.4 minutes while Kidd averaged 6.3 rebounds while playing 42.6mpg. 

While I understand your logic, what is taken in account for the fact that Kidd plays 2x as much as Curry?


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> I want to follow up on a couple of things for Kneepad.
> 
> 1) KG is clearly the best player, statistically in the league. I think any VALID rating system would put him at the top.
> ...


Subjectively, who do you feel belongs in the top 5 that is not there? Top 7? Top 10? 

Pierce had an off-year. One could make a case for Kidd. 

The top 7 of that list looks pretty darn good to me.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> 
> 
> DaBullz is right here. Compare the following two players.
> ...


Hmm, I see the point about Mr. Three point, and agree with it. In the rating system I worked out a while back (but haven't done much of a job of updating), I actually concluded that a made three point attempt should add like 1.35 to the player's rating, rather than the intuitive notion it should add one additional point.

Coupling that with rewarding assists more than rebounds, you wipe out some of the "statistical bias" you have towards interior players. 

Player Rating System 

As far as Mr. Free Throw, I somewhat disagree there. Yes he's scored the same number of points in the same number of possessions, but I have (maybe) a perverse view of rewarding someone who gets to the free throw line. That is, I think they should be punished if they get there and miss their shots. Hell, they're uncontested... and that's where the notion of efficiency comes in, I guess. Mr. Free Throw shouldn't be downgraded that much, but I also don't think he should be rewarded much because he's in effect blowing a scoring possession every time he misses a free throw.

Under my rating criteria
Mr3: 24.5
Mr2: 23.1
MrFT: 22.6

I would note, though, that if Mr. Free Throw was a good free throw shooter, he'd be comfortably ahead of both Mr3 and Mr2. If he was even a passable 77% shooter (17/22), he's rate at 28.6 instead of 22.6 - a pretty tangible difference.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> So...
> 
> ...


That equation makes no sense, since the $2 is part of the $27. You'd need to subtract instead of add. Instead, it's: 

$27(amount paid) - $2(amount "tipped") = $25 (amount for room)

Of the original $30, the other $3 is back in their pockets....

Is there something I'm missing?


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> This is the flaw in your logic, my friend. A rebound is not a rebound.


If we can't agree on this, then I fear there is little hope for us to agree on much of what we're discussing.

You're saying Jason Kidd should get more credit for each rebound he gets simply because of what position he plays or how tall he is?

When comparing Kidd to Curry (aside from the issue of playing time which has already been brought to your attention), there is the issue of you pulling out one of the factors of the overall index and isolating it. I agree that, when factoring in the size of each player, Jason Kidd is a great rebounder and Eddy Curry is a mediocre rebounder. I guess by that same logic Eddy Curry must a better ball handler than Kidd since Curry averaged 1.69 turnovers/game vs. Kidd's 3.7?

We can agree to disagree on this.

EDITED LATER: Mikedc said in his reply what I was trying to say in a far clearer manner.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> This is the flaw in your logic, my friend.
> ...


There's some truth in what you're saying here, I think, but I think you're going about it the wrong way. A rebound is still a rebound should be considered equally no matter who gets it.

This isn't a problem because when you consider the total quality of a player (using stats), the fact that Curry is a lousy rebounder for a center will cause a proportionately greater effect on his stats because he doesn't accumulate as many stats in other categories. Curry will accumulate points, rebounds, and maybe blocks but not a huge amount in the way of three pointers, steals or assists.

Kidd, on the other hand, can be expected to accumulate fewer overall rebounds, but this is made up for in that he'll likely get more threes, assists and steals. There is a question of whether (and how much) you need to weight statistical categories to make the comparison valid, but I'd argue that's a much safer approach to doing things than trying to say a rebound for a PF is worth less than a rebound for a guard.


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## Kneepad (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 2) The ONLY correlation I actually see between EFficiency and who makes the top 10 is HEIGHT. You can almost ignore the formula and sort the players by height ;-)
> 
> 1. Garnett 6'11"
> ...


Small point perhaps, but for the record the PPI index top 10 are as follows:

1. Garnett
2. Duncan
3. TMac
4. Shaq
5. Kobe
6. Dirk
7. CWebb
8. Marion
9. Kidd
10. Brand

And if you want to go 10 more, you'll find more guards:

11. Ben Wallace
12. Jermaine O'Neal
13. Pierce
14. Karl Malone
15. Iverson
16. Gasol
17. Payton
18. Brent Barry
19. Francis
20. Marbury


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

:topic: :topic: :topic:

Just want to interject that I am greatly enjoying the discussion in this thread. Kudos to all of you for the time and effort you put into each of these posts. These are the reason BBB.net has been my web site of choice to get my fix of the Bull and NBA in general.

Thanks, guys. It's a great read.

:topic: :topic: :topic:


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>RetroDreams</b>!
> 
> 
> I don't want to butt heads, but how is Kidd an awesome rebounder when he averages 2x the playing time
> ...


Forget about the 2x minutes. Assume the same minutes. I just picked two names at random.

Curry is an awful rebounder.

Kidd is awesome.

The reason is that you don't expect the C to get just 6, and you rarely expect a PG to get 6.

This is because a rebound isn't the same as a rebound.

To Bill Gates, $100 is chump change. To me, it's real money. Because he (like a PF) has so much more money (like rebounds), the money has a different value. This is true for rebounds for guards vs. pf/c types.

As the Tendex article describes, they give an SG .470/.340 x rebounds and .470/.470 x rebounds to Centers. This makes the rebounds worth the same to both positions. To not do so is a HUGE flaw.

The terms I suggested are roughly equivalent to giving the SG .470/.340 for rebounds.

And, FWIW, we aren't bumping heads here. I am convinced that you are going to get it. It will be all of a sudden that the lightbulb goes off over your head. Think about how NCBFan showed I was right about the 3Pt penalty. I'm just as right here.

Trust me ;-)

In the end, you WILL have an awesome version of PPI that you can call your own (it is your own already, since you have altered the formula). And when you use Rose's PPI to compare with KG's, it will actually be meaningful. And WORTH IT. It isn't about me being right, it's about YOU being right. OK?

Regarding the brainteaser. It has the very same problem with the math that PPI does regarding 3PT shooting. That's a hint. The lightbulb will go off on the brainteaser solution, too.

And to answer your 2nd post, any answer I give you will be DaBullz' sphincter rating. Either one of us can come up with the true(er) and (more) accurate top ten. There's two ways, which I desribed before.

1) Use the .470/.340 x PPI for SG, etc. Then sort on those results. This is close enough for govt. work, since I assume that the Tendex people have both been doing this for a long time with a LOT of data. 

2) Go calculate PPI for every player, then find the AVERAGE for each position. Then use the ratio:
<DD> AVG_FOR_CENTER/AVG_FOR_SG
for SG's. And so on.

Sort the list, and you get the answer. The answer I would guess is a 1,000,000% improvement over comparing raw PPI numbers.

Now... If I had to guess, Iverson is going to make the top 10. So is Kidd. And I think that is quite realistic.


Peace!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Mikedc</b>!
> 
> 
> There's some truth in what you're saying here, I think, but I think you're going about it the wrong way. A rebound is still a rebound should be considered equally no matter who gets it.
> ...


Hehehe

Here goes.

Go sum the rebounds for the entire league. Go sum the assists.

If there are 2x more rebounds than assists, then any position player who relies on assists to get PPI or Efficiency ratng points is at 2:1 disadvantage. I don't know what the ratio is, but it's clearly going to be a huge difference in favor of rebounds.

WHERE THE PLAYER STANDS ON THE COURT IS THE HUGEST FACTOR, with the equations as they are being used.

The safest thing to do is exactly what Tendex does.

They compare guards to guards and centers to centers. Absolutely in a scientific manner. They can say with 100% surety that .470 is the average for C and .340 is the average for SG. They ran it through a spreadsheet, statistical analysis program, whatever. It's guaranteed (at least for Tendex) to be 100% accurate.

Do you or do you not see that if you play C, you are .470 higher statistically than the .340 for a SG? The SG's PPI/Efficiency rating/unadjusted tendex is going to be about 3/4 what it should be for SGs. 

This is what the "algebra" example was all about. For the SG to overcome that 4/3 advantage, he has to put up ridiculously abnormal stats. Like the kind of stats that happen only 7 times in the HISTORY of the NBA.

<B>Using the ratios gets you 100% accurate values for REB for G and for C.</B> It's automatic and mathematically correct. Not only that, it gets the AST right (worth more to C than to PG) right, too.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Kneepad</b>!
> 
> If we can't agree on this, then I fear there is little hope for us to agree on much of what we're discussing.
> 
> ...


To determine if Curry is a good ballhandler or not, you dont compare him to Kidd, you compare him to Shaq. And other centers.

The reason Curry's a bad rebounder, at the mythical 6/game (playing time irrelevent), is that makes him one of the WORST Centers at rebounding.

Kidd's 6 RPG is awesome because it makes him among the best PGs in the league (if not the very best).

The deviation from the norm or expected is the critical factor.

Even though both Curry and Kidd get 6 RPG, Kidd is the superior rebounder. I mean REALLY superior.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

Another slightly off-topic post.

There is a woman named Marylin Vos Savant. She is in the Guiness Book of World Records with the highest IQ in the known universe. She is clearly a Mensa member.

She writes a column for Parade Magazine called "Ask Marylin."

One day, she got a letter that read:



> Suppose you're on a game show, and you're given the choice of three doors. Behind one door is a car, behind the others, goats. You pick a door, say number 1, and the host, who knows what's behind the doors, opens another door, say number 3, which has a goat. He says to you, "Do you want to pick door number 2?" Is it to your advantage to switch your choice of doors?
> 
> Craig. F. Whitaker
> Columbia, MD


The answer, of course, is ALWAYS switch. 

Now, a huge number of people do not get it. They look at the problem and figure that there's a 50-50 chance of getting the right door, so it doesn't matter if you switch or not. The truth is, the odds are 1/3 your door is right and 2/3 the other two are right. Just because Monte Hall shows you one of the other doors doesn't change the odds. In fact, the odds on the other door that you should switch to are 2/3.

This has been proven over and over with computer simulations. 67% of the time, every time.

Yet, there was a big stink over this. People started writing her telling her she was wrong. Not just average people on the street, but PhD in mathematics at MIT and Cal Tech and Berkley. They ALL said she was wrong.

She took great glee in publishing their letters to her in her column.

Finally, someone ran the computer simulations and some PhDs did figure it out. They started writing to her that she was right. It was months later.

No matter how many different ways she tried to explain it, people had some sort of logic block that prevented them from seeing the truth.

To this day, there are WWW sites dedicated to proving her wrong. They've taken the approach of saying that her math is right but her assumptions are wrong. Silly people. She is right ;-)

...

I feel like I'm in the same boat she was. There's some REALLY smart people here that aren't getting it. But they will.


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Mikedc</b>!
> Hmm, I see the point about Mr. Three point, and agree with it.
> 
> As far as Mr. Free Throw, I somewhat disagree there. Yes he's scored the same number of points in the same number of possessions, but I have (maybe) a perverse view of rewarding someone who gets to the free throw line. That is, *I think they should be punished if they get there and miss their shots. Hell, they're uncontested... and that's where the notion of efficiency comes in, I guess.* Mr. Free Throw shouldn't be downgraded that much, but I also don't think he should be rewarded much because he's in effect blowing a scoring possession every time he misses a free throw.


Yeah, I get annoyed watching guys miss free throws, but the miss already is being penalized. Now if we wanted to add in "style points," then by all means take off two or three points for each missed free throw, one point for every outside jumper that Eddie Robinson and Fred Hoiberg take (they are so ugly - even when they go in), and at least ten points from Dennis Johnson for every time the camera shows his face close up. (I know he's a coach now, but somebody has got to pay.)

The way I account for scoring is the following.

1.5*POINTS - 1*FIELD GOAL ATTEMPTS - 0.45*FREE THROW ATTEMPTS

The 0.45 in front of free throw attempts acknowledges that some free throw attempts are free throws after a made basket or the third shot after a foul on a three point attempt. 

And Johnston797, I said my examples were a bit extreme, but I was trying to make a point. So yes, I agree in the whole scheme of things, this is not a big deal, since it takes really extreme examples to make a big difference.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> Another slightly off-topic post.
> 
> There is a woman named Marylin Vos Savant. She is in the Guiness Book of World Records with the highest IQ in the known universe. She is clearly a Mensa member.
> ...


The problem with this example, as with any computer simulation, is that they make predictions based on statistical samples of large numbers, not of single instances. No matter what the statistical probability, the fact is there is a 50/50 chance that you have the correct door.

Some of the models may have forgotten to calculate that 1/3 of the time Monte Hall will not give you the chance to change doors, because you will already have chosen the car.

Now, I'm guessing that Monte Hall may know which door actually holds the car. If you have guessed the right door, Monte should always give you a chance to change your mind. After all -- the show needs to improve it's profit margin, no?


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Wynn</b>!
> 
> 
> The problem with this example, as with any computer simulation, is that they make predictions based on statistical samples of large numbers, not of single instances. No matter what the statistical probability, the fact is there is a 50/50 chance that you have the correct door.
> ...


Now this is fun. ;-)

None of the models forgot to calculate 1/3 the time you choose the right door in the first place. You only win 2/3 of the time if you switch. The 1/3 you lose is the times you choose the right door right off the bat.

There is ABSOLUTELY no 50/50 chance you have the right door.

Door A 33% chance
Door B 33% chance
Door C 33% chance

You choose door A. 33% chance.

Doors B+C = 33%+33% = 67%

He shows you door B. Goat

You get to switch to Doors B+C (67% chance), knowing that B is a goat. Door C has a 67% chance, because you are really choosing both doors.

All Monty has done is given you more information. He hasn't (and physically can't) change the odds.

Note: Monte can ALWAYS show you a goat behind one of the other two doors.

Peace!


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> Hehehe
> ...


That's not precisely the case for two reasons.

1. Even if it there were twice as many rebounds as assists, the actual difference would be smaller based on the fact (I'm assuming this, but I can't imagine it's not accurate) that the average guard will probably haul down more rebounds than the average center will dish out assists. Even though rebounds are more common than assists, they are more distributed (across the positions) too.

2. It begs the question of whether a rebound or an assist should be "worth the same amount" in trying to capture a player's worth. Insofar as the PPI and Efficiency ratings consider them equal, I agree with you that the scales are tipped towards taller, interior players. However, it could very well be that they are equal in value (WRT Winning!) and hence the fact that tall interior players consistently do better is because tall interior players are consistently more valuable players.

_(As it happens, I don't really buy into this, and the rating system I put together puts a higher premium on perimeter skills such as three point shooting, assists and steals). It seems that although we're using somewhat different weights, NC has generally the same idea. The question to me, then, becomes whether it's more useful to simply weight the statistics based on my perception (which was somewhat developed statistically) of their worth, or whether stats should only be considered amongst players who play the same position... and then modified by some position factor, as TENDEX is doing_.



> WHERE THE PLAYER STANDS ON THE COURT IS THE HUGEST FACTOR, with the equations as they are being used.
> 
> The safest thing to do is exactly what Tendex does.


Perhaps I'm biased () but I disagree. What TENDEX is doing is neither safe nor accurate. They'd be better off developing a system like I have, that weights the relative values of each statistical variable....



> They compare guards to guards and centers to centers. Absolutely in a scientific manner. They can say with 100% surety that .470 is the average for C and .340 is the average for SG. They ran it through a spreadsheet, statistical analysis program, whatever. It's guaranteed (at least for Tendex) to be 100% accurate.


.... because there is no way to "scientifically" assign players to categories. Tim Duncan was the PF last year but he might be the center next year for the Spurs. In either case, the offense runs through him a lot, so in some sick kind of way, he's the PG. So what category does he go into? Or which would MJ or Scottie go into?

At some point, positions become judgement calls, just as a weighting of individual statistics (e.g. .8 points for every rebound, 1.2 points for every assist) is. In the long run, however, I would say that it would actually be easier and more accurate to validate the latter approach. I've actually worked on this a bit, and I don't have the data sources (or knowledge- yet) to really do it right, but theoretically you could take those basic statistics (and opponents statistics) regress them on #wins, (find the correlation between these statistics and wins), standardize everything to a "per game/per player" friendly metric and obtain the proper weights for each statistical category.

This method would, as a matter of course, wipe out positional differences _insofar as they should be wiped out- which is an entirely different argument._



> Do you or do you not see that if you play C, you are .470 higher statistically than the .340 for a SG? The SG's PPI/Efficiency rating/unadjusted tendex is going to be about 3/4 what it should be for SGs.
> 
> This is what the "algebra" example was all about. For the SG to overcome that 4/3 advantage, he has to put up ridiculously abnormal stats. Like the kind of stats that happen only 7 times in the HISTORY of the NBA.
> 
> <B>Using the ratios gets you 100% accurate values for REB for G and for C.</B> It's automatic and mathematically correct. Not only that, it gets the AST right (worth more to C than to PG) right, too.


I see it, but I also see that ultimately that system isn't as useful as it could be because it arbitrarily defines roles for players that don't always reflect what they do on the court. As a general rule, sure, it will get most stuff right. But when you starting getting down to more details, you'll stop noticing the lipstick and start noticing the fact it's on a pig


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

MikeDC,

1. Look at the extreme. 1M rebounds and 1 assist. For the league. Doesn't really matter how that 1 assist gets dished out among the players at different positions. If it's 2:1 or 1M:1, it still is a massive advantage to the PF types.

2. No, it comes down to whether a C should get 1.5 points for an assist vs. a PG who should get 1 point. It matters what position you play. My gripe isn't with the 1 pt for assist and 1 pt for rebound. That's a useful formula for comparing PG vs. PG and SG vs. SG, etc. It just holds no logic when used to compare an SG with a C. But please do note that by doing the .470/.340 ratio, you are giving the 1.5 points for guards' rebounds, properly. Well, that's not exactly true. It's taking into account the average C is .470 and the average SG is .340. By using the ratio, you are normalizing the result so the comparison is valid.

(Both you and NCB have the same problem. You can't fix the formula with some tweaking to weights and use the same formula for every player at all positions. Weighting the formula towards reb/blk/stl vs. pts/ast is a non-issue to me. It is just that the results are only meaningful PG vs. PG, etc.)

Please note that I at least tried to address it, before coming across the tendex site, by using the min() forumla based upon position. And also note that when you do compare PPI or Efficiency or MikeDC's rating or whatever, for Rose vs. all SGs, he's going to be right near the top. If you compare him against PF and C's, the comparison is just not meaningful.

About Tendex. They are REMOVING THEIR BIAS. Do realize that using Tendex or MikeDC's or PPI or NCB rating, the AVERAGE C is going to be .470/.340 higher than the average SG. If you want to compare apples/apples (or pigs with lipstick to pigs with lipstick), the average SG has to have the same rating as the average PG as the average C as the average PF, etc.

3. About guessing positions. If you try hard enough to be fair about it, I have 99.9% confidence in your results. The reason? Take Garnett and make him a PG. He's only going to add a little noise to the calculation. Take a PF with 17RPG and add him to 100PG's data, you get .17 error.

Or do as I do and let some "expert" source choose... like Yahoo! or Stats Inc.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> Now this is fun. ;-)
> ...


These arguments are true for large numbers, but never specific incidences.

If your argument were true, then my mother would be the proud parent of a beautiful 5'11" (or so) baby boy...... boy is she disappointed!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Wynn</b>!
> 
> 
> These arguments are true for large numbers, but never specific incidences.
> ...


Odds are odds. If you play them, you have the best chance to win. That's what it's all about.

If you flip a coin 10 times and it comes up heads ten straight times, the odds are still 50-50 it'll come up tails the next flip.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> Door A 33% chance
> Door B 33% chance
> ...


Actually, I chose door B. So switching my choice to door A will lower the possibility that I win the car.

BTW -- I happen to be a big fan of goats, and would be very satisfied with either prize.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> Odds are odds. If you play them, you have the best chance to win. That's what it's all about.
> ...


Though not according to your Monte Hall argument....


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> Do realize that using Tendex or MikeDC's or PPI or NCB rating, the AVERAGE C is going to be .470/.340 higher than the average SG. If you want to compare apples/apples (or pigs with lipstick to pigs with lipstick), the average SG has to have the same rating as the average PG as the average C as the average PF, etc.


DaBullz, this might be true for TENDEX, but it is not true for all indexes. Using last year's data, I get the following ratio for three different statistics. (I don't know MikeDC's and cannot compute the complete TENDEX.)

RATIO FOR AVERAGE CENTER VERSUS AVERAGE SHOOTING GUARD:

PPI: 1.136
Jammer: 1.129
NCBullsFan: 1.010

All of these are far less than the 1.382 ratio that you keep insisting on.

And perhaps more importantly, in a regression framework, when controlling for statistics (which implicitly equates the value of a rebound, point, assist across all positions), centers tend to be paid more, controlling for these statistics.

In other words, if salaries are a good guide (and it is hard to imagine a better guide for NBA value unless most GMs are complete idiots), then what this means is that according to most GMs, statistics _undervalue_ centers relative to other positions - completely the opposite of what you are arguing.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

Choose door B.

Odds are 1/3 you're right.

He gives you in that case a choice to switch to A+C. 

It's still A+C = 67% chance.

What is throwing you off is that he's showing you one of A+C. The odds don't change, you just get to see what's behind one of those two doors.

Now, the odds on flipping a coin 10 times and getting 10 straight heads is 1 in 1024. It can happen. But I'd rather bet my life savings on the 50:50 bet (heads/tails) than on 10 heads in a row.


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## peak_junkie (Jul 2, 2003)

> Originally posted by <b>Wynn</b>!
> 
> 
> Though not according to your Monte Hall argument....


Having nothing useful to contribute about basketball, I'm finally prompted to switch out of lurker mode for this.

The Monte Hall argument is that the two doors you haven't selected have a 67% chance of one of them containing the car. In that 67% case, since Monte always opens one of the two unchosen doors, when he reveals the door with the goat, you would always win by switching to the unopened door. In the 33% case, where you guessed right to begin with, you'd always lose. So switching gives you a 67% chance of winning, vs. your original odds of 33%.

This type of Bayesian reasoning is completely separate from the coin flip question.

BTW, the Monte Hall problem was a Stanford EE PhD qualifying exam question a year or two ago. It subsequently appeared on the first homework in one of my signal processing courses; I'm glad I didn't see it for the first time on my quals. It only becomes intuitive with quite a bit of thinking.

Back to lurk mode.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> 
> 
> DaBullz, this might be true for TENDEX, but it is not true for all indexes. Using last year's data, I get the following ratio for three different statistics. (I don't know MikeDC's and cannot compute the complete TENDEX.)
> ...


The only reason I say use .470/.340 is that someone else has done the hard work. I did suggest you do the work for your particular favorite formula.

You still have to do the ratios for ALL positions to get the relevent ratios and then normalize to do proper comparisons.

You should also consider that if your formula turns into just PPG, or pts/minute, or something really close to that, then you are just doing top scorers.

As far as what GMs use, and salaries being a good guide, you might want to go back and review the DaBullz unit-production ratings in a previous post on this thread.

A short summary.

The formula I use is:
<DD> salary/(pts+reb+ast+blk+stl+minutes)

Hassell is the best bang/buck at $179.61 per unit of production.
Bagaric is the worst at $6,647.58
ERob is 4th worst and Rose is 5th.
Baxter is #2 best value
and Crawford is #3 best value

However, using this fomula:
<DD> (pts+reb+ast+blk+stl+minutes)/game

Rose #1 73.27
Marshall #2 56.87
JWill #3 44.30
Crawford #4 43.35
Chandler #5 41.86
Fizer #6 41.86
Curry #7 35.68

That ranking of players amazingly close to how I viewed the team last season.

Note that I don't think the salary/production is that meaningful. It just says how cheap a guy was (salarywise). Or what a bargain he was.

You may also want to consider that some idiot GM gave ERob way too big a contract. (Bagaric, too).


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>peak_junkie</b>!
> 
> 
> Having nothing useful to contribute about basketball, I'm finally prompted to switch out of lurker mode for this.


Its very funny that this thread as turned into a debate of the monte hall problem. I feel like i'm in my undergrad probability course again. 

To maybe get us back on topic.... what do you think Jalen Rose would do when confronted with the Monte Hall problem?

I say he says.... "i don't need your car little man, i'm jalen rose" and walks off the set.


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## Louie (Jun 13, 2002)

> However, using this fomula:
> 
> (pts+reb+ast+blk+stl+minutes)/game
> 
> ...


DaBullz, that formula does not take into account shooting %- I guarantee that if it did, Rose would be lower and Curry and Chandler would be higher.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Louie</b>!
> 
> DaBullz, that formula does not take into account shooting %- I guarantee that if it did, Rose would be lower and Curry and Chandler would be higher.


You can sort the players by FG% if you like. Then you'll be happy Curry is #1 by far.

Rose's numbers are as much as (close to) Curry+Chandler combined. You'd have to have a REALLY big FG% bonus/penalty for Rose to drop lower than Curry.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

One more thing, NCB...

~1.13 adjustment is pretty significant.

13% error is 13% error.

You'd need to see if you haven't over adjusted your numbers so PGs are over penalized, too.

Peace.

I'll check in later to see if you post more details.


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> One more thing, NCB...
> 
> ~1.13 adjustment is pretty significant.
> ...


DaBullz, it is hard to discuss something with you when you don't really read what I wrote.

First of all, for my index the difference between centers and shooting guards, point guards, and small forwards ranges between -0.002 and +0.04 standard deviations. This is really tiny and statistically insignificant in all cases.

There is a bigger difference between power forwards and everyone else - about one quarter of a standard deviation.

But given the preponderance of great power forwards playing today (Duncan, Nowitski, Brand, Malone, J O'Neal, R Wallace, etc.), it is not hard to believe that power forwards as a group are 0.25 standard deviations better than players at other positions.

But what you never responded to was the following. Using my statistical index (and other statistical indexes that folks have used), teams pay more for big guys with the same statistical index value as little guys.

*What that means is that GMs who have money and their jobs at stake think that statistical indexes like mine are biased against big guys.*

So it is not really the folks at TENDEX or me or MikeDC you are arguing with, you in essence are saying that the collective wisdom of GMs over the past couple decades are wrong. Having good big guys is not nearly as important as they think it is.

You may be right, but you need a more persuasive argument than simply stating that centers should be paid less than shooting guards with a similar statistical index value simply because the average value of centers has to be the same as the average value of shooting guards.


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## Showtyme (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> 
> 
> Odds are odds. If you play them, you have the best chance to win. That's what it's all about.
> ...


To Wynn and others that don't buy Monte Hall's conclusion:

Picking a door is NOT an independent event. When you flip a coin 10 times, or roll the dice at Vegas, you can get 10 consecutive heads or roll a 7 10 times in a row.

But in this example, there is only one prize hidden in three doors. So you CANNOT open door A and get the prize, then open door B and also get the prize.

Independent variation does not work in this example.

Another way to think of it is, there is a 33% chance that the prize IS in the door that the host shows you. So, when there's a 67% chance of winning in the switch, the 33% chance of LOSING in the switch falls in the domain that the door originally shown is the one with the prize.

Shall we draw a Venn diagram? =)

By the way, yeah. Rose leaving doesn't disturb me too much.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

Maybe a more visual example will help

1 / 2 / 3 
33 / 33/ 33

1 / 2 3
33 / 67

:| / :| :dead: 
33 / 67

1 / 2
33 / 67


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> 
> 
> DaBullz, it is hard to discuss something with you when you don't really read what I wrote.
> ...


<B>I have NEVER said that big men should be paid less than smaller guys. Or C's should be paid less than a PG (or more than a PG).</B>

All I have said is, "if I were being paid for PPI, I wouldn't shoot unless it was a dunk."

The issue is solely that an argument along these lines, offered by two people already, is BOGUS because the comparison is meaningless:

I paraphrase:
"By my PPI, Jalen Rose is 59th best player in the league. Therefore, if you distribute all the players uniformly across all the teams, Rose would be the 3rd BEST player on his team."

PPI doesn't determine the best player, because the data doesn't measure the best player. It measures the best rebounders and the guys who shoot closest to the basket. The NORMALIZATION of the data is critical if you are going to distribute, likewise normally, the players across all teams... AND then try to make this argument.

If you want to use the "what GMs are willing to pay" argument, then TWO GMs were willing to pay Rose MAX dollars and one was willing to pay 3 Bulls' starters to get him.

I think you make a false correlation between PPI (or an index like yours) and payroll. The rules for paying players are arcane and have much more to do with seniority than anything else. And, as you said in a previous post, GMs can be complete idiots. Like the one who paid ERob and the one who paid Bryant Reeves. Or the two that bid Juwan Howard's contract into the stratosphere.

On the other hand, there is a stronger correlation between paycheck and (at some point in a guy's career) how much better the player is perceived to be THAN OTHERS AT HIS POSITION.

I'll leave you with something to think about. I remember reading about Tendex when I was in high school. That would have been over 30 years ago, so it's been around a long time. I haven't followed it, though I've run across it occaisionally, like when someone posted about it yesterday. Anyhow, if I remember right, a key element of it was the ability to use it to compare players from different seasons, even eras. This would imply that the .470 figure would include centers from the old days, like Wilt, who might grab 25 rebounds and score 50 pts, per game.... or at least grab 25 boards...


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## Showtyme (Jun 24, 2002)

Just to throw this in:

I honestly am not a fan of stat crunching, but I am willing to look at what it offers. I tend not to speak on stats with the assumption that everyone knows that any statement based on them has leeway for flaw.

Having said that, Kneepad, NCBulls, Mikedc, and the other notable stat keepers on this board are pretty crafty at what they point to. I appreciate their data and I'm willing to look at what conclusions they point to, then evaluate that against what I observe, as well as what the coaching staff and other qualified persons around the league observe.

In an effort to practice my duties as a moderator, I must attempt to bring the discussion back on topic. The question of whether stat-based analysis favors big men or assist guys or what have you... it is rooted in analyzing whether or not Rose is in the top tier of elite players in the league, or falls rather in the category of very solid starter.

I theorize that if stats are to be more trustworthy, they MUST become far more intricate. Mathematics would have to have a party for me to be satisfied. 

A few months ago, there was a thread about these two guys from MIT (I think) who run all sorts of regressions on NBA stats. Their main creative factor: the effectiveness of certain lineups on the floor. They were pretty brilliant, and I can't seem to get a hold of the thread or find the article on google (pretty frustrating cuz I pride myself on web research). But anyway, the stats they produced incorporated, in essence, the statistic of chemistry.

Here are some factors I would like to see included as far as an individual's efforts:

- Successful playoff experience. It would be weighed a certain percentage of the stat (maybe about 10?). The stat would probably take some measure like this:

# of minutes played in playoff games won (measured in minutes played so that Mark Madsen doesn't take some huge jump in front of Elton Brand somehow) x depth of game factor (multiplier = 2 for 1st round, 2.5 for conference semis, 3 for conference finals, 4 for finals)...

all that divided by # of seasons played in the league. That way, Austin Croshere and Raja Bell don't get unfairly weighted.

This would be called the *PLAYOFF experience factor*.

- Number of technical fouls and games suspended. This would be called the *CITIZENSHIP factor*. 

- Somehow incorporate the injuries sustained. Maybe this doesn't seem fair, as many injuries aren't the fault of the player, but somehow you have to incorporate this factor, known as the *INJURY-PRONE factor*.

- Number of points scored against by opposing players, normalized across the league by position (i.e., if Trenton Hassell has 960 points scored on him in the course of a season, that figure would be compared to the number of average points scored in a season for an average shooting guard. If we want to be REALLY exact, we would multiply the positions by the fraction of minutes played in defense of that position. So if Hassell played 800 minutes defending SG, and 400 minutes defending SF, then we'd multiply his defensive quotient by 2/3 of the SG averaging factor and 1/3 of the SF averaging factor. Complicated? We have to take into account that good defenders rarely defend only one position.) Zone defenses will receive some kind of constant here, depending on the effectiveness of the team. This will be called *DEFENSIVE EFFECTIVENESS factor*. Sadly, too much emphasis is placed on the STEALS or BLOCKS column in assessing a player's defensive ability.

- Clutch factor. This is a statistic that is interestingly followed by the Nestle Crunch! Time stat on NBA.com's page. It identifies certain players in the amount of points they score in the closing minutes of very tight games that eventually chalk up the win for their team. This is the *CLUTCH factor*.

- Finally, a factor that incorporates the team's overall quality as compared to the average NBA team. This will do more than normalize a player's worth in relation to what place the team finished out of 29, but rather, it would normalize each category of the team and attribute that to the particular category of the player. If a team like the Warriors is in the top 5 in scoring, that should be attributed to that player's offensive ability. This will be the *TEAM INFLUENCING factor*. Also incorporated here would be how the team performs when that player is and is not on the floor (this is similar to that enigmatic thread/article that I can't remember).

This is a lot to think about, no doubt, and I could come up with many other categories. It would be a major statistical project to undertake, but when all is said and done, I think that it would really produce a much more accurate ranking of players in accordance with their true qualities.

The only real way to evaluate a player is to consider each of those categories SEPERATELY and weigh them against your team's needs, just like we do with today's stats. If you need a wing scorer and you've already got Tim Duncan and Ben Wallace on your team, then picking up a guy like Rip Hamilton might be a better move than picking up an Elton Brand, even if Brand is ranked higher. 

But with all the extra factors, I think Jalen would be elevated over many other players in the league.


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## Dan Rosenbaum (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>Showtyme</b>!
> Just to throw this in:
> 
> I honestly am not a fan of stat crunching, but I am willing to look at what it offers. I tend not to speak on stats with the assumption that everyone knows that any statement based on them has leeway for flaw.
> ...


Very interesting post.

Here are two articles about the statistical method that Winston and Sagarin developed.

http://idsnews.com/story.php?id=3169
http://suntimes.com/output/slezak/cst-spt-carol06.html

Here is the previous thread on this topic.

http://www.basketballboards.net/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28878&highlight=winston+sagarin

I really like what Winston and Sagarin are doing, since it is a 180 degree different approach than what everyone else, including me, does. But it requires an intensive data collection effort, so for now it is not something that I can replicate.

However, I am about 95% certain that I know the general method that they use. The reason being is that Sagarin posts his computer ratings for numerous sports, including NBA basketball. 

http://www.kiva.net/~jsagarin/sports/sports.html

Well. one night last Fall when I a little bored, I finally figured out (in general) how Sagarin computes his computer rankings. (Remember he is part of the BCS and the NCAA basketball selection process.) Using data from Doug Steele's site (http://www.rmi.net/~doug/), I was pretty much able to replicate the Sagarin ratings.

(I don't get it exactly right, because I suspect that the regression methodology that Sagarin uses is a little different than the simple method that I use. And the differences between just aren't significant enough to justify worrying about what methodology he is using.) 

What they are doing with individual players most likely is similar, but requires data that would be a bear to collect. (Basically, we need to know the outcome and what players are in the game during every second of every game during the entire season.)

The great advantage of this techique is that is holds the promise of capturing all of those factors, such as good defense, good screens, good spacing that quantifiable statistics just don't measure well. That said, without someone really good to interpret when the results from this technique are liikely to be reliable and when they are pretty much garbage, I am not sure this technique has much value.

(This is generally true about all statistical inference - and it the main reason why statistics sometimes just aren't that useful.)

So back to your post.

A lot of the statistical measures that you propose are quite interesting, but some would require a lot of data collection effort.

The thing that I think makes most statistical indexes problematic is that most teams have players that are given the ball when the offense breaks down. For a player trying to maximize his PPI, getting the ball in those situations is a bad thing, because the player is forced to put up a low-percentage shot attempt.

In other words, the bailout player protects the PPI of his teammates by being willing to take those low percentage end of possession shots.

Perimeter players are more likely to get the ball in these situations, and thus that is one reason why these statistical indexes might be biased against them.

During much of the season, Rose was put in this position a disprortionate share of the time. At times, it looked like the ball was a hot potato, and the only player willing to hold on to it was Jalen Rose. And the result was that Rose was constantly bailing the Bulls out of bad possessions.

So yes, his field goal percentage was low, but with the shot clock running low, it is possible that he still was the highest percentage option for the Bulls.

I know a lot of you like to blame this all of Jalen (he is a shot jacker), but when I watched the games, there were so many times where I thought the rest of the Bulls would rather kiss Rose's behind rather than take a shot at the end of a possession.

Now this isn't the only problem with these statistical indices (your list gets us part of the way there in terms of thinking about the problems), but I think this is one of the biggest problems.


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>peak_junkie</b>!
> 
> 
> Having nothing useful to contribute about basketball, I'm finally prompted to switch out of lurker mode for this.


And if this discussion were worth nothing else, I am pleased to have prompted <b>peak_junkie!</b> to make himself known!

Welcome!

BTW -- I am a stat junkie, because I don't watch TV, but love to follow the Bull on sites such as this an Bulls.com. I believe, however, that stats should be used to confirm or deny what you can discern with your own observations...... not be the sole determining factor in any decisions. A lot of this number crunching is Monte Hall to me -- an intellectual excercise. There are so many other factors to consider that this particular factor plays only a very small part.

Also, no matter what statistical reasoning you use, there is no way you will ever convince me that A & B don't have the same probability...... numbers may say it's so, but my own common sense refutes it. 

If the formulas confirm it, then the formulas are in error.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

This is some awesome stuff Showtyme. I'll just throw out a few ideas that came to mind



> Originally posted by <b>Showtyme</b>!
> Just to throw this in:
> 
> I honestly am not a fan of stat crunching, but I am willing to look at what it offers. I tend not to speak on stats with the assumption that everyone knows that any statement based on them has leeway for flaw.
> ...


Yeah, I always take it with a grain of salt despite my number crunching 



> In an effort to practice my duties as a moderator, I must attempt to bring the discussion back on topic. The question of whether stat-based analysis favors big men or assist guys or what have you... it is rooted in analyzing whether or not Rose is in the top tier of elite players in the league, or falls rather in the category of very solid starter.
> 
> ...
> 
> Here are some factors I would like to see included as far as an individual's efforts:


So let's look at these and how they might affect Jalen



> - Successful playoff experience. It would be weighed a certain percentage of the stat (maybe about 10?). The stat would probably take some measure like this:
> 
> # of minutes played in playoff games won (measured in minutes played so that Mark Madsen doesn't take some huge jump in front of Elton Brand somehow) x depth of game factor (multiplier = 2 for 1st round, 2.5 for conference semis, 3 for conference finals, 4 for finals)...
> 
> ...


I might still give some points for games lost in the conference finals and finals at least. Someone like Jason Kidd, for example, who's been in 10 finals games but only won 2 still looks like he'd get some benefit.

Of course, how much benefit and how long does it last? Are we still relying on the fact that Jalen is a playoff tested vet?



> - Number of technical fouls and games suspended. This would be called the *CITIZENSHIP factor*.


Doug Steele's site actually has the number of techs... I played around with it and noticed it actually has a positive correlation with winning games. Clearly this is because you have to be a good player to continue to be played despite accumulating a lot of techs, so things are kind of misleading. Nonetheless, it's one of those little statistical anomalies that one would have to address and clear up.

How does Jalen whine so much and yet not get a lot of techs?



> - Somehow incorporate the injuries sustained. Maybe this doesn't seem fair, as many injuries aren't the fault of the player, but somehow you have to incorporate this factor, known as the *INJURY-PRONE factor*.


I'd think they're already penalized by this by not producing any stats in games they miss.



> - Number of points scored against by opposing players, normalized across the league by position (i.e., if Trenton Hassell has 960 points scored on him in the course of a season, that figure would be compared to the number of average points scored in a season for an average shooting guard. If we want to be REALLY exact, we would multiply the positions by the fraction of minutes played in defense of that position. So if Hassell played 800 minutes defending SG, and 400 minutes defending SF, then we'd multiply his defensive quotient by 2/3 of the SG averaging factor and 1/3 of the SF averaging factor. Complicated? We have to take into account that good defenders rarely defend only one position.) Zone defenses will receive some kind of constant here, depending on the effectiveness of the team. This will be called *DEFENSIVE EFFECTIVENESS factor*. Sadly, too much emphasis is placed on the STEALS or BLOCKS column in assessing a player's defensive ability.


Yeah. It's just way too hard, I think, to capture just who's guarding who. :| At best, I think you'd have to do it on a team based factor- Did your team hold the opposing team under its average? Did your team win? What % of the minutes for your team did you play? Stuff like that. Of course, that could end up with bad defenders getting fairly good ratings if they still play a lot on an otherwise good defensive team :|



> - Clutch factor. This is a statistic that is interestingly followed by the Nestle Crunch! Time stat on NBA.com's page. It identifies certain players in the amount of points they score in the closing minutes of very tight games that eventually chalk up the win for their team. This is the *CLUTCH factor*.


I like this one, and it'd definitely help guys like Jalen. Of course, it's also very closely related to the TEAM INFLUENCING factor below. 



> - Finally, a factor that incorporates the team's overall quality as compared to the average NBA team. This will do more than normalize a player's worth in relation to what place the team finished out of 29, but rather, it would normalize each category of the team and attribute that to the particular category of the player. If a team like the Warriors is in the top 5 in scoring, that should be attributed to that player's offensive ability. This will be the *TEAM INFLUENCING factor*. Also incorporated here would be how the team performs when that player is and is not on the floor (this is similar to that enigmatic thread/article that I can't remember).
> 
> This is a lot to think about, no doubt, and I could come up with many other categories. It would be a major statistical project to undertake, but when all is said and done, I think that it would really produce a much more accurate ranking of players in accordance with their true qualities.
> 
> ...


When all is said and done though, I doubt it would go up a lot. He'll get props for his playoff experience and being the best player on a bad team, but at the same time I'm thinking that, if he were on a good team, he'd have slightly smaller stat totals... things might end up canceling each other out. 

Of course, under the new stat measures though, things are more complimentary to Jalen, because under the current one his low shooting percentage, etc (which is due in part to being on a crappy team) looks like a negative. But if you read the stats correctly, you know it's really not that big of a negative in the first place (kind of a chicken and egg argument, huh?).


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

I thought I should let you guys know what I do with statistics, which is also 180 degrees from the kind of statistical analysis that these efficiency ratings represent.

About 30 years ago at the University of Illinois, I used NBA statistics to develop a basketball simulation for a graduate class I took. I had been using computers to do these kinds of simulations for various sports before I even went to college, including Hockey, Baseball, and Boxing. FWIW, Baseball is actually my first love.

I cannot count the number of hours I have spent in libraries looking at microfilm of old newspapers for box scores and articles about sporting events. Sitting there with a pad of graph paper tabulating statistics by hand. Or the number of hours I spent at Wrigley Field not only keeping score for the games, but tracking things like count in the batting order, where balls were hit, etc. And compiling all that into spreadsheets and reports of various types.

When I watch NBA games, I often keep score (not as much as I used to), and I count things like "touches" and "passed up shot opportunities," "turnovers attributed to other players," and so on.

Simulation is a combination of statistics and probability. You use statistics to develop a set of probabilities for certain events and then you use random numbers to determine a sequence of events.

For example, a FG% is a probability that a player, when he shoots, will make a basket. If a player's FG% is .431, you can pick a random number between 1 and 1000 and if it is 431 or less, you have a made field goal. This is a simplistic example, as the objective of simulations are to do more than simulate field goals. For example, if a player's FG% is .431, but he is being guarded by Michael Jordan, what does that do to the results? Or if the player has Michael Jordan as a teammate, does he pass up shots to let MJ shoot? Or how does a player shoot on the road vs. at home?

The process of building a simulation is tuning and fine tuning the model, with the goal of yielding accurate results. My simulations start by simulating a game between two teams. Once you can simulate a game, you then simulate a season, an 82 game schedule for all teams. From there you run the season simulation a large number of times (1 Million, for example). 

You collect the resulting data (tabulated stats for 1M seasons) and run that data through statstical analysis programs. The goal is to achieve accurate results to within a certain level of error, one measure of which is standard deviation.

The models I developed are quite complex. They involve a coaching algoritm to simulate the substitution of players into the game, and they do account for the combination of 5 players from the team's roster that are on the floor at any one time (you could just look at the whole roster and simulate at a higher level). The trick to a coaching algorithm is to make substitutions heuristically based upon the players on the roster, and not through some rote mechanical system (such as a table: substitute player A at this time in the 2nd quarter, etc.). 

My simulations also take into account injuries and trades. The trades aren't done heuristically (for reasons I'm about to get into), but the injuries are. For example, Marcus Fizer was injured last season, and played in 37/82 games. In running 1M simulations of last year's NBA season, Fizer might actually play in 82 games for some of them.

Once I had my working simulation to within a degree of accuracy I was comfortable with, I then ran 1M simulations on data from previous seasons. For example, the original simulation was "proven" accurate for the 1973 season, so I then ran it on the 1972 season (1M times) and then the 1971 season, etc. This iterative process was repeated until the error for all seasons was acceptable. I was quite surprised that formulae I developed that worked for one season failed miserably for others.

While the act of developing the simulation was a lot of fun, and a lot of work, the real valueof it is the ability to play "what if" games with the model.

For example, "what would happen if the Bulls trade Rose for Antoine Walker?" Easy. Run the simulation 1M times with Rose on the Celtics and Walker on the Bulls. The simulation spits out W-L records for both teams, along with box scores of every game and final season stats. (This ability to do "what if" is why the trades aren't heuristic, you want to control it rigidly).

Or "what happens if you play the 95-96 Bulls against the 85-86 Lakers 1M times?"

FWIW, the stats.basketballboards.net site (see "stats" button at the top of the WWW page) is built from a subset of the statistics I used for my last simulation.

I hope this long post gives you some insight into how I look at statistics, these efficiency rating formulae, some of the suggestions I've made for improving them, and my passion for discussing them.

Peace!


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

The solution to the missing dollar brainteaser.

There is no dollar missing, obviously. It is a mathematical equation described in words. The equation has parenthesis in it. Thus the associative principle of math applies. The wording of the question goes "backwards" through the calculation, which produces the erroneous result.

This is exactly why NCB was able to show how 3PT shooters are penalized by NBA.COM's Efficiency rating.

When you look at the formula, you reason it out "backwards" so it looks like the formula accounts for 3Pt attempts fairly. But when you go through the math forwards, as NCB did, the real results are revealed.

Peace!


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## superdave (Jul 16, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>DaBullz</b>!
> About 30 years ago at the University of Illinois, I used NBA statistics to develop a basketball simulation for a graduate class I took. I had been using computers to do these kinds of simulations for various sports before I even went to college, including Hockey, Baseball, and Boxing. FWIW, Baseball is actually my first love.


OT:
DaBullz, I didn't know you went to U of I?!!! Nice 

OT, again:
Props to DaBullz, NCB, MikeDC and others. This is truly a 5 star thread!!!


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## Showtyme (Jun 24, 2002)

> Originally posted by <b>NCBullsFan</b>!
> 
> A lot of the statistical measures that you propose are quite interesting, but some would require a lot of data collection effort.


If they could rally all the players on the roster to sacrifice about .2% of their salaries (on the average team, it comes out to about $90,000), it would cover the cost to dub a copy of the game and send it to me and about four friends, say about $100 per game. Then they can pay me and each one of my friends about $200 per game to go over the film and keep track of the categories. I think if each one of us just kept track of one of the five players on the floor, we could put together the stats required.

A simple computer algorithm can keep track of the players on the floor, the scoring runs that correlate with each substitution, etc. Heck, I think we could make it so that it feeds off of the info coming into the live-updates on the web.

But anyway. 



> The thing that I think makes most statistical indexes problematic is that most teams have players that are given the ball when the offense breaks down. For a player trying to maximize his PPI, getting the ball in those situations is a bad thing, because the player is forced to put up a low-percentage shot attempt.
> 
> In other words, the bailout player protects the PPI of his teammates by being willing to take those low percentage end of possession shots.
> 
> ...


This makes a lot of sense. Most will agree that players like Shareef Abdur-Rahim are not better than Allen Iverson, but PPI-wise, Iverson is pretty low. And the Sixers aren't even that bad a team. 

Those factors I made up, they were just off the top of my head, and much of it nonsense. But I certainly think that there could be more that we can keep track of that would give coaches and fans a better idea of who is actually effective on the team that they have.

I'd like to somehow see that a great player that plays below his maximum statistic potential but in a way that most promotes his team's winning record gets that incorporated numerically. I think it's possible.

DaBullz, that's impressive what you've been up to. I'm U of I alum too, although about 30 years after you. =) Bachelor's in Science in Computer Science, with a minor in English, now rendered virtually moot since I have plans to go to law school in the fall. The stats on BBB.net are excellent, a valuable resource.

Props for the thread to all.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

Showtyme,

heh.. when I went to UofI, I was programming in Fortran on punched cards. The basketball simulation was 2 full boxes of cards, or about 4,000 total.

Now for some fun with PPI and other indecies.

It has long been debated whether Jordan or Wilt is the greatest player ever.

So let's look at stats.basketballboards.net and find each of their best seasons.

Wilt
1961-62
80 games
1597 FGM
3159 FGA (that's just a .506 FG%)
835 FTM
1363 FTA (.613 FT %)
2052 reb (25.7/game)
192 ast (2.4/game)
4029 pts (50.4/game)

The NBA did not keep steals, turnovers, and blocked shots in those days.

Jordan
1988-89
81 games
966 FGM
1795 FGA (.538 FG%)
674 FTM
793 FTA (.850 FT%)
652 reb (8.0/game)
650 ast (8.0/game)
2633 pts (32.5/game)

NBA.COM:
Efficiency Formula: ((PTS + REB + AST + STL + BLK) - ((FGA - FGM) + (FTA - FTM) + TO)) / G

Wilt:
((4029+2052+192+0+0) - ((3159-1597) + (1363-835) + 0)) / 80
=((6273) - ((1562)+(528)+0))/80
= (6273 - 2090) / 80
= 52.2875

Jordan:
((2633+652+650+0+0) = ((1795-966) + (793-674) + 0)) / 81
= ((3935) - ((829)+119)+0)/81
= (3935-940)/81
= 36.975


Looks like Wilt was 1.414 x better the player.

I suspect that Jordan had maybe 2 seasons in his career where his Efficiency rating would be higher than Garnett's last season.

Peace!


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

OT... but mark me down as another U of I CS grad.... kinda scary having all these geeks around


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

*FYI*

http://teamrankings.com/nba/


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## Wild Wild West (Jun 30, 2003)

There has been alot of good discussion on this board about statistical measuring techniques and the value of Jalen Rose.
I first want to remind people, however, that we should view Rose's value in the context of the existing team, how it will change, and what he has done in the past.

If Rose duplicates seasons he has had in the past, he would be much more valuable than he was last year. If you look at his per minute statistics for everything except for points last year, vs. his career averages you will find he was way below career averages accross the board. Lower on rebounds, assists, steals, blocked shots, assist/turnover ratio etc. Considering his shooting percentage was way down you could certainly make a case for his scoring being worse too when factoring in the percentage.

I have three thoughts regarding his statistics last year. First he played too many minutes and could improve all his per/minute statistics if he came down to 36 or so minutes per game. Second we relied on him too much as the go-to guy, certainly by the end of the season. Third I believe some of Rose's drop in FG percentage was too to more minutes from Curry and Chandler up front, and two very young PG's.

The second two factors should lead to improvement this year. Curry lead the league in FG percentage. Going into this season he should now be the first option on offense, with others like Crawford, Fizer, Marshall and maybe Chandler skilled enough that while Rose might still be the first red zone option, he can defer more often to others this year, particularly if they have a better matchup. Going to Curry early in a possession (if he learns when to kick it out) can result in a higher percentage of shots from Rose and for that matter Crawford, Hinrich etc. being open perimeter jumpers, because many teams will have to double Curry. With the experience of the team growing Rose can get more of his offense within the flow, and not have to take as many bail out shots.

If Rose could score 17-18 points a game in 36 minutes, with a FG percentage around 44-45%, with an increase in the other statistics he will be a very good player for us. Really it is just asking him to take a few less shots, play a few less minutes so he can maximize effort in other areas, and just be the same kind of player he has been in many other seasons.

When I get time I will post again regarding the statistical analysis
because like many others I have my own way of measuring players performance, but clearly the efficiency rating has some flaws (no consideration for minutes played per game, values a missed FT the same as a missed FG, and no inclusion of personal fouls in the mix.) Also regarding the tendex calculations I think you can conclude that any measurement were the average center rates much higher than the average point guard suggests
that the small man skills(assists, assist/to ratio, steals and FT%) may be improperly underweighted compared to big man skills (blocked shots, rebounds, FG%).


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

For about 30 games, two seasons ago, Rose played alongside a small/fast PG named Travis Best. His numbers were a lot better than last season, playing alongside a small/fast PG named JWill. Rose also had good seasons playing alongside Best and Mark Jackson in Indy. Or when he played PG in Indy.

As Crawford gets better, I assume Rose's numbers will look more like his more usual ones. Though I think his scoring will actually go up with a higher FG%. His numbers would improve with JWill, uninjured, as he improved, too.

In LA, where they have a dominant inside scoring option, who shoots in the high 50% range and who scores in the mid-to-high 20's per game, he isn't the primary offensive option. In each of the last three seasons, Kobe shot 10% more shots (per minute/game/whatever).

This would indicate to me that we do want a balance between inside offense and outside offense. Take the inside offense when it's there, but the better our outside game, the better off we'll be. 

In football, an offense will "set up" the pass by running a few plays. Or set up the run by passing a few plays. Or by running a few times and then using a play action pass. If teams don't do this, then the defense will play 8 men on the line against a running team, or 6 defensive backs against a passing team. 

In the case of basketball, the defense will collapse around the post if it's constantly used and there's no outside threat to worry about. 

It would also help if Curry could develop a complimentary outside game, like Hakeem or Ewing had. By moving out of the lane along the baseline or to the free throw line, and making shots from there if the defender doesn't come out to cover, opens the lane for guys like Crawford, Rose, Fizer, and Marshall to drive and not have to contend with at least one big player trying to stop them.

If you score inside with Curry, or score inside with Fizer, it's still a high percentage shot.


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