Prediction: would McHale still running Harden ISO?

1.) We don't run many isolation plays.
2.) We have a top rated offense with the system we do run.
3.) Basketball was not meant to be something.

 

It's almost impossible to compete for and or win championships in the NBA without having players that can run some form of isolation plays. This is not high school or college ball. San Antonio and Miami made it to the finals and both teams ran heavy isolation plays all throughout the playoffs. The difference between them and the Rockets is that those teams have players who move without the ball when the player with the ball isolates, Rockets players stand around for the most part.

 

It is not about your impression. It is about the stats. The numbers. Your gut instincts mean nothing. Do you think that Morey ever relies on impressions? And just to be perfectly clear - numbers do not lie. 26/6 and you are b****ing? Me? I am hitching my cart to that horse every game.

 

No he is not the minority, you are. Almost everyone here knows what an iso is. And if you think iso's are supposed to be unpredictable, you really have no idea what you are talking about. Please share with all of us how opposing teams become ready for iso's? and how were they "rarely productive" when most of the stats show otherwise.

 

Melo's ISO took thecKnicks to the playoffs too

Does it mean ISO = great?

 

on a side not from this iso debacle, Morey has talked about how stats are relied on but never replace the eye test. stats compliment the eye test so the FO and coaches have more data/information to make more informed roster and coaching decisions. how do you think impressions/opinions are formed? through the eye test. so yes, Morey essentially does rely both on stats AND impressions.

 

Auto-correct.

 

You need to show the stat on the production (or lack of production as you state) of the isolation play. Show how many points are produced out of Harden, Parsons, and Lin running isolation plays and comparison to the other plays. If you can't do that then you can't really state someone else's opinion is wrong when you have NO PROOF to show how your opinion is right.

I don't have any stats but I've seen Olajuwon win two rings running isolation plays, Jordan won 6, Kobe won 5, Wade won one with Shaq and two with LeBron, San Antonio has rings running isolation with Manu, and do you remember Magic Johnson... But you say isolation is what basketball isn't meant to be. History says your wrong.

 

I don't think he will run a lot of Harden ISO since Dwight is on the team.

 

In some fans' mind, ISO-Harden mean Harden taking the ball into a crowd 1-on-4 turning it over instead of passing it to the open guys, or dribble-dribble-dribble-dribble-dribble until there's only 2 secs left on the shot clock before passing it. Those are the ugly ones that make the deepest impression and the ones that the fans disapprove.

Most of the other ISO-Harden plays are fine.

 

You do know what put Morey ahead of everyone else in the first place is because he placed heavy emphasis on a stat based approach to find the best output out of the least amount of input right?

And for your information, stats are not available for everyone, whereas eyeball tests are. Do you think Morey and co. uses FG% and TS% to measure how good of a scorer a player is? They come up with their own measurements and data collection that is not available to anyone else in the league.

 

If its working then fine but if not then to hell with hero ball

 

Eye test? Yours or serious NBA basketball types like McHale and his coaching staff? Do you and I or Morey understand the NBA game? Yes to some degree. But it is not the same degree of understanding that NBA coaches have of the game. And when Morey is talking about the eye test he is not talking about impressions. He is talking about full Sabremetric data. Acceleration, speed, cut velocity, elbow angle on jump shots, jump quickness, reaction times, off ball movement etc. The stuff that casual fans never have access to. That analysis is competent NBA GM's eye test. It, along with stats and coaching input is how GM's like Morey make decisions.

We both could do the about the same thing if we had a multi-million dollar budget to employ a NBA quality coaching and scout staff, buy gigabytes of data and hire MIT data analysts. A degree in statistics and an MBA wouldn't hurt either. Being the sharpest tool in the shed is also a requirement.

 

Seriously? What book is that? If you ask all the 29 GM's in the league to tell you what stats have the most value, you'll probably get 29 different answers.

 

This is nothing but a thread by LOD's who don't understand basketball. Harden's PPP on ISO plays is absurd, off course your gonna run that some.

 

That would be off the court qualities, those matter too. But one of the reason Morey is successful because the statistics and the modeling of its dataset which hes been using are different from the ones available to public.

 

First of all, to the bolded part, absolutely. That's literally one of the biggest advantage with stats because they tell you which units are the most productive. I'm surprised you are not aware of how prevalent stats are in determining synergy between players.

And second of all, those things are irrelevant. You are talking about factors outside of their play on the court. Also, those are not determined by just eyeball tests.... at all... I have no idea what you are even trying to get at.

 

I would also bet dollars against doughnuts that Morey hires the finest psychologists and psychiatrists to do a thorough analysis. I would.