Charles is dumb. Most NBA players are dumb. Is this a surprise? He actually spoke well of the Rockets and Houston before the game, though.
What was Boston's payroll compared to Oakland? Also, his theory of no dedicated closer was very interesting.... Baseball and Basketball are 2 different sports... So stop trying to compare apples to oranges... T_Man
Who is it, exactly, who is arguing that analytics>talent? It's not Morey. He goes hard after every talented guy on the market. Barkley's argument is a Straw Man. For those that don't know what that is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man Analytics is not a replacement for talent, it's another tool to get the most out of talent. This is something the NBA has always done. For example, every team has several "coaches". Their entire job is to get the best out of the teams talent. I wonder, does Charles also believe coaching is "crap"?
I'm commenting on all these talking heads today turning this into a "debate" of "analytics vs. old school"... Jon Barry was on Mike and Mike this morning agreeing with Barkley, the ESPN article posted above has Ramona Shelburn quoting an NBA coach who says analytics aren't the end-all/be-all and the Rockets aren't doing anything special. Morey made one tweet in response to an innacurate statement, that is all. He definitely didn't go on some crusade last night denouncing "old school" subjective analysis... but somehow that's the narrative today.
THIS! I am most anxious to see over just how Harden's game will fare when defenses are setup to stop him and slow games down into a half court slug fest. That is if Harden even makes it to the playoffs because he's playing some very heavy minutes and I find that troubling.
Have you ever seen that guy on court, named James Harden? You're telling me that we don't have a mid-range game? Wondering why DM still wants a third superstar? Pounding 'the big 3 model'? Superstars have talent and a high basketball IQ ... IQ and analytics do make the game soooooo much easier. Just saying ...
The thing is, there's a great amount of people out there that are just as clueless as him, so they support his idiocy. Do you really think people understand the concept of "if you're not informed on something, just keep quiet"? Because they don't, in this day & age everyone wants to feel like the belong in every conversation, even if they don't know what in the **** they're talking about. He looks like a fool to some people, but then again there's also the aspect that the Rockets are one of the most hated teams, so people just decide to ride his bandwagon because they think Rockets fans are overreacting. Doesn't help that idiots like Jon Barry agree with him on national tv.
LOL at all you tears and crying over a former player said on an entertainment show. That's as soft as toilet paper. When he made the same type of stupid and ignorant comments against other team, you people will just said he is the greatest ever and say it as is, but when he said the same against the Rockets, now you all cried. Get over it, if you can not embrace the villain image of the Rockets in this league, go find a wall to hug.
Jon Barry is more of a joke as an analyst than Barkley. He has dementia on top of no clue of what he's saying most of the time. Ramona Shelburn if I'm correct of who she is (the Lakers crazy lady)has an agenda against the Rockets and the "anonymous nba coach" she interviewed is 100% Byron Scott who sucks as a coach ,is one of the few remaining coaches against analytics in the league and has become a joke of how he coaches. He was hired as a tank commander. What matters what some joke of "experts" say when the reality is that every serious team has embraced analytics and use them as a TOOL to discover - trade for- evaluate- and coach talent.
You realize the only reason we don't have a mid range game is because we don't have players good at shooting it at a great clip right.... This is literally the biggest misconception about this team is that we don't shoot mid range jumpers because they are bad. We don't shoot them much because we don't have people good at shooting them very well outside of maybe Harden.
IMHO, I think we go to far with analytics and don't look at team chemistry. I know some of you may have the analytics for the back to back champs. I don't think that team would have existed. I have an MBA, CPA, and CFP so I do believe in numbers, but not to the exent for NBA purposes. The analytics seem more offensive focused instead of defense, which wins you championships. This also doesn't take into account the quality of our coaching staff. Last night was a comical error on the defensive end. Charles is funny and those that take the geek comments to heart should look internally and not Charles.
I know all that... doesn't change the fact that Morey did nothing to "escalate" this into the story/narrative it is now. This entire thread has become "analytics vs. old school", when that was never the goal of Morey's tweet. This whole debate could have been had at any point over the season... this is simply due to Barkley's biased comments and even more biased response that people like Morey don't deserve to have jobs in the NBA.
Truth is Morey is a stats nerd and analytics aren't everything. They are something but not everything. Chuck is an entertainer anyway. He is doing exaclty what is required of him. Viewership goes up and clicks go up. More people talking about this story than Harden's 40 in the NBA world PROFIT
I'd say that Ariza, Brewer and Beverly haven't been all that good with the wide open 3 either... and perhaps they need to be focusing more on getting shots they can make at a higher percentage (which is why you see plays being run for Brewer where he gets elbow jumpers off screens).
I just watched the segment on First Take.. Stephen A. Smith, like Barkley, seems to believe that talent and analytics are competing against each other. Skip mentioned that the Spurs have been using analytics for years, and Stephen A. Smith said well it doesn't matter because they have Tim Duncan. He also dismissed Houston because they have Harden. But he gives the Grizzlies credit because they don't have a "superstar" player. These morons seem to think analytics is building a team with a bunch of nobodies like Billy Beane did with the Oakland Athletics. They are just so ignorant hat it's mind-blowing.
