Are "Money-ball" teams prone to long winning streaks---and what does that mean for the Rockets?

Uh, small sample size. If Yao and Tracy were both healthy the entire season we won 22 games in a row, we might have a few more championship rings by now.

 

playing high % basketball increases your chances of succeeding on a day to day basis, so yeah it would.

Playoffs is a h2h/adjustments game, so it's not going to transfer there in a similar fashion.

 

Interesting idea. Remember, the Mavs were a championship team a couple years back, after taking out the Heat. They are certainly a money-ball team. They had success in the playoffs and undoubtedly performed against tough opponents.

 

Interesting thought. Does anyone know what our record has been against non-playoff teams since Morey took over, and how that compares to our record against playoff teams?

 

Not going to go too far with PPat and MMorris at the 4. Never was a fan of them ever since they were drafted.

If DD was still here, he'd go all out on Donuts. And he would be right.

 

What does this have to do with a 22-game winning streak? Is anyone saying that we only played non-playoff teams during that 22-game winning streak?

There is no correlation between being a "moneyball team" (whatever exactly that is supposed to be) and 20+ game winning streaks.

 

Pulling up play off teams would take some finessing as the play off seedings move around constantly. Also, it would be skewed as the East has play off teams that wouldn't even sniff the 10th seed in the West.

However, there are some easy to get stats on vs .500+ teams.

http://www.nba.com/standings/team_record_comparison/conferenceNew_Mrg_Div.html

Houston
vs .500+ teams - 13-9
vs sub .500 teams - 8-8

Let's keep in mind that our numbers are somewhat skewed by the proportion of road vs home games, as well as our distribution of WC vs EC games.

Not sure I would say we perform worse against play off teams (with the exceptions of SAS and OKC). And we have had some unexpected losses against sub par teams.

Really, the sampling is still too small to say with any certainty how "money ball" is faring. We'd probably need to let a season or two play out.

Still, I doubt any system with players as young, inexperienced, and with as much turnover would have done much against truly elite teams like OKC or SAS.

 

did you just say Mark Cuban is a money-ball guy?

 

The Dallas Mavericks are one of 4 teams that piloted the SportsVu advanced analytics system, a comprehensive system of in game cameras and computer modelling.

They're also one of the teams with significant analytics operations.

http://industrialengineertools.blogspot.ca/2011/06/analytics-geeks-win-nba-championships.html

So yes, the Mavs are at the leading edge of Analytics along with Houston, OKC, and the Spurs. They were the first four to implement the SportsVu system.

The next year Boston and the Golden State Warriors installed the system.

The NBA now has 10 teams total with the additions of Milwaukee, Minnesota, New York and Washington this year.

http://espn.go.com/blog/playbook/tech/post/_/id/492/492

So, Dallas, Houston, the Spurs and OKC have had the most time with the system, implementing internal protocols and building their internal analytics departments.

So yes, Moneyball has already won a championship, and is arguably a significant part of building some of the youngest and fastest building teams in OKC, GSW and Houston. I also wouldn't be surprised if it's contributing to the ability of the Spurs to continue building and maintaining their roster.

Analytics is spreading faster and more deeply than people realize.

 

hold on, just because you installed SportsVu doesn't make you a moneyball team. How is Vince Carter a moneyball acquisition? How is paying Eric Dampier $12m, the year before their title, moneyball? Caron Butler $11m the year of the title. Lamar Odom $9m the year after to not show up. Brendon Haywood $7m for 20mpg?

Cuban's MO is to spend as much as he can to get stars. He's not a moneyball owner. They won the title because their star player went En Fuego and because Cuban was willing to spend a lot of money to surround him with good enough players to win.

 

Money ball isn't about being cheap, although for Beane it had to be.

A money ball roster with 120m to spend is always going to turn out better than a money ball roster with 45 (see the Red Sox).

What throws the nba in a loop is that they not only have rookie scale, but max scale, lebron james would be the most underpaid player in professional sports, that enforced salary rule is what makes him the nba's #1 moneyball player.

 

Analytics isn't about getting the cheapest players, it's about maximizing your team success with the dollars you have.

That can include finding gems in the rough, it can ALSO include making decisions about team fit, or even higher paid contracts that are underappreciated by their current teams.

Billy Beane had to be cheap, but that's not what analytics is about. Finding bargains is only PART of the benefit of analytics.

And analytics doesn't make you infallible, it just gives you another tool and edge when playing the odds.

 

We need to focus on winning streaks during the playoffs.

 

I'm awesome like that!

 

I thought moneyball plays to the law of averages, meaning wins/losses are more likely to be evenly distributed (with smaller streaks)

 

My statistics tell me Omer needs to make more FTs.

 

When we win it next year, will we be the first moneyball team to win a 'ship?

 

Negative. Read the Witches book. It's all about the probability of success.