Myth: "Up-tempo" basketball is/was taking over the NBA

It would be interesting to see if it is a myth. Do you have the numbers from 5 years ago to compare it too?

DD

 

what site are you getting the pace factor stats from?

 

I looked at correlation between pace and win% for the last 5 years in a post a while back. It changes season to season, but overall it was just 0.005 (practically nothing). There's nothing inherently advantageous in playing at a slow or fast pace.

My hunch, however, is slow paced teams that are used to executing in the half court will fare better in the playoffs when they are matched up against superior defensive teams that limit transition opportunities.

 

as far as comebacks, that would be true, but for the whole game, in theory, the more efficient you are the more possessions you should want, to magnify the efficiency differential. now, in practice, and as durvasa's correlation shows, it probably doesn't really matter and efficiency rules over pace. that might be b/c the difference in pace is only about 8% b/t the fastest and slowest teams so you can't really be fast enough to make that much difference (whereas if teams went from 50 to 100 pace factors, it could matter).


one thing that surprised me was looking at the 2003 season on bballreference and seeing that pace factors weren't really different from today, and in fact might have been slightly higher (i was just scanning). that was before the rule changes and phoenix copycats when the game seemed to be the most plodding it had ever been but pace was pretty much the same. surprising i thought.

also i just randomly clicked on 1989 and only the pistons had a slower pace than the suns this year. amazing. as much as people have lauded the past players for all of their shooting and passing and offense and such and railed on current players, the main difference in scoring over the years was almost solely pace, not efficiency (that didn't change until '98).

edit: it looks like 1990 was the turning point. in '89 14 teams had a 100 pace factor, only 7 in 1990. down to 4 by 1991 and 2 by 1992. i guess it was the bad boy effect. kind of funny. one detroit team turned basketball into a slow it down brawlfest, and about 13 years later another detroit team took it to such an extreme that they finally changed the rules to stop it. so they both ruined (in some people's eyes) and saved the game.

 

Yall are lookin at stats and mumbo jumbo waaaaay too much. Stop playing Darryl Morey. Its simple. Teams like the Suns have yet to win a title. EVER. Miami, Detroit, Lakers, Spurs, Rockets, Bulls, etc... Case closed.

 

You are so wrong. If you ever watched NBA games in the 80's you would know that almost every team played at the same pace as the Suns and the Showtime Lakers played at an even faster pace. Whats even more interesting is the bad boys of detroit played at the same pace as the current Suns team.

I feel so old when I have to bring up these facts. You kids don't realize what you missed in the 80's.

 

of course that's b/c detroit's opponents played at an 80's pace of 100+ and phoenix's play at just over 90, and that obviously accounts for half of the pace factor. independently i'm sure phoenix plays a much quicker pace. although when you watch 80s games on espn classic it rarely feels like anyone but the lakers gets it up and down the court like phoenix does today so it kind of seems hard to believe the numbers. i guess just the fact that more teams walk it up and more teams play defense once you cross halfcourt just has an effect that you don't feel while watching the game.

 

You aren't old I am well aware of the 80's style. But that era died, the Pistons, Bulls, and Knicks buried it. Since then half courts sets and defense have yet to be dethroned as the prime ingredients for championship teams. Until that style actually wins then I feel it is gimmicky and outdated.

 

So you are saying that you would only use a style somebody else has proven successful? If everybody think that way, nobody would ever try new methods. That's the kind of mentality that stifles innovations.

Everybody said that you couldn't win a championship without a true superstar. Detroit proved that wrong. So what?

If up-tempo teams truly can't win in the playoffs, you have to find out why.

 

Half court pace in the NBA :: the running game in the NFL

 

Phoenix has been the one truly successful team with up-tempo b-ball. Dallas had up-tempo ball with Don Nelson there but I think a lot of how Dallas got viewed was from the excitement brought on by Mark Cuban and them having so many good players. It seemed (and still seems or is) there's a guy coming at you from any position on the floor. And they have good ball movement and it gets confused with up-tempo ball when its more just the team being good. I'm not looking at stats though...

Chicago and Washington would be the teams that give up-tempo ball some validity because they've been mostly atrocious the past decade. Until they adapted a style (and got players) to win ball games with.

On the entertainment side of up-tempo ball - Everyone keeps saying how the NBA is more slow and sluggish, grind-it-out slugfest ball now and difficult to watch. I say while its true NBA's slowed down, in no WAY should it mean its become unwatchable. Compared with other major sports the NBA is way out in front with fast action. It takes darn near a minute per play in football, and baseball it might take a couple minutes of pitching before a hitter puts it in play. (Don't watch hockey). In basketball, the ball's almost constantly moving as well as the players. And there's more on-court strategy in a game when the teams are playing solid D. It can slow down 20 pace points and still be on top.

 

That went over my head... Is this because Adelman coached the TrailBlazers 13 years ago?

Because it seems like you're just saying, "Hey, it could be worse! We could have the offense of a team that's 10 games below .500!"