An Analytical Approach to the Rockets 2013-2014 season

The poster-child for this approach: Greg Smith. Likely a fairly solid/average player considering the good (finishing around the basket, good man defender in the post) and the bad (limited range, no rim protection) but the Oliver/BR model makes him look stellar.

 

May I please speak in defense of JC Denton, I know that he will not defend himself. His entire post is in the nature of banter and is being misinterpreted. Is it not obvious from his last sentence that he is being facetious? Yes, he has a thing for graphs and graphics, and that's been a running joke on ClutchFans for years. The pretended complaining about the lack of graphics was a bit of self-deprecating humor, and I certainly laughed when I read it. I never saw anything in the post besides a backhanded compliment for the original post coupled with a slight dig at the tone of succeeding posts, and a light-hearted mock rant in which Mr. Denton poked as much fun at himself as he did at jtr. I'm sure that he's stunned that anybody took him seriously. I know that I am.

 

Chris Andersen was a more believable surprisingly elite player in limited minutes (like Dikembe Mutombo was during his time in Houston, especially the earlier years) than Greg Smith was.

Birdman's limited minutes can be explained by 1) his age, 2) the fact that he was just coming back after a long absence from the NBA and 3) Miami was already dominating the regular season and didn't need to burn old vets like him in the regular season. The guy brings the kind of length and energy to the game that no other Miami big really can. His team was also significantly better with him on the floor both in the season and during the playoffs. And by the way, Anderson does really well under the Bball-reference WS method, too. In fact, Amdersen's WS per 48 minutes is the 4th best in the league and for some reason this doesn't taint WS as a measurement for you but him being 11th on RAPM somehow makes you think RAPM is questionable?

http://www.basketball-reference.com...comp=gt&c6mult=1.0&c6stat=&order_by=ws_per_48


Smith, on the other hand, could not save his team from sucking defensively without Asik on the floor. He also didn't consistently outplay a cast of PFs that were average to below average (worse after the trade deadline). After a 11 game stint as starting PF his team decided they were better off playing SGs Harden and Delfino at the PF spot for 48 minutes per game.

RAPM can indeed be misused, most of all by people who don't understand the concept of margin for error. With any kind of stats derived from a sample, a player's actual ability to make an impact may be somewhat more or less than he showed during his minutes simply as a matter of luck-- much like a players true ability to hit free throws may be better or worse than his season FT% suggests. Specifically, the fact that Birdman is ranked 11th overall in RAPM doesn't mean he must be better than #12 and #13 and worse than #10 on the RAPM list. It's really a rough range. His true ability to help his team may be somewhat better or worse than his RAPM shows, but chances are he's pretty good and is in the conversation for a place among the most impactful guys-- among them are excellent defensive bigs like Asik, Larry Sanders, etc.

 

In today's NBA,

until there are rules changes,

a 5 man who is a negative on the defensive end is useless...no matter how many point he puts in the hole.

A 5 in today's NBA has to be able to defend and board above average to be worth having on the floor. Hence Birdman's value over Greg Smith's.

That is a principle that is in play right now that analytics only verifies.

 

Lol. Please do share the resume that "uniquely" qualifies you to speak about "advanced statistical analysis" in basketball.



Plenty of people here have had meaningful discussions on the topic and many understand and can explain the relevant concepts more clearly and meaningfully than you.

 

Hmm. I can't figure out why people are giving you 3 star threads. Must be lost in the advanced statistics.

 

So what particular basketball-related statistical qualifications do you have?

 

So many alleged resume items. Yet so little evidence of actual ability to explain the statistical analysis at hand. Interesting.

 

You may be peeved, but that is an unfair question. Aside from people employed by professional basketball teams, basketball-related statistics is generally a hobbyist sport; there are no basketball-related statistical qualifications to have.

 

Let the work you do speak for itself; you are going to get under peoples skin if you speak about yourself instead of about the statistics you are working on.