Wayne Winston gives his take on the Rockets chances of making the playoffs. He analyzes performance of Rockets lineups and describes, also, an "Impact Rating". David Andersen, by his analysis, rates very positively. From an exchange I had with the maintainer of Hoop Numbers some weeks ago, I knew Andersen rated very favorably by this sort of analysis. It is still a surprise, but as he says it is in "limited time". Andersen gets most of his minutes at the start of the 2nd quarter when Lowry and Landry are feasting on opposing team's second units. It could be that in the limited time these ratings can't yet separate their impact from Andersen's. But I do feel, despite his lackluster shooting, the threat of his outside shot from the 5 position opens up the floor quite a bit for the second unit. That's how I would rationalize it. The "Impact Rating" is interesting in concept. Instead of estimating how much the player increases the team's point differential (which is what conventional adjusted +/- does), it estimates the average percent increase in likehood of winning the game when the player is on the floor. By this measure, Scola leads the team. He increases the Rockets chances of winning by 34% on average when he's on the floor, according to Winston's model. http://waynewinston.com/wordpress/?p=382 [rquoter] The Rockets top 9 players are (by Adjusted +/- ratings) very close in ability. In limited time we have Andersen (+5 rating) as their best player (on a per minute basis) and the disapointing Ariza (-3 rating) as the worst of their rotation players. We have another measure of player ability called Impact Rating. Impact rating works like Adjusted +/- except we look at how a team’s chance of winning the game changes when a pkayer is in and out of the game. To see the difference between a rating based on points and a rating based on chance of winning a game, suppose the Rockets are dowm by 20 points with 3 minutes to go and cut the lead to 5 points. This comeback would really help the Adjusted +/- of the players on the court for the Rockets, but would have little influence on their Impact rating. This is because the chance of the Rockets winning the game changed from say 2% to 0% in this 3 minutes spurt. When we look at the Impact Ratings for the Rockets it becomes clear who drives the Rockets success and failure on the court. Scola 34% Impact, Landry +19%, and Andersen +27% drive the Rockets success. Ariza -18% and Hayes -18% drive their lack of success. We can also look at the Rockets key Impact players during the last 7 games: Scola, Landry and Andersen’s Impact ratings are virtually the same as their full season ratings. Hayes -45% has had much worse Impact while Lowry has had a -35% Impact. Ariza has a -25% Impact. [/rquoter] And here are some miscellaneous lineup observations from him: [rquoter] With Lowry and Brooks as the backcourt the Rockets play 5 points per game better than an average NBA team. The rest of the time the Rockets play like an average NBA team, In 29 minutes the trio of Hayes Lowry and Budinger filled out with a choice from Landry Scola, Battier and Ariza has played an amazing: 57 points better than average per 48 minutes (in 29 minutes.) These combos certainly deserve more time. Andersen has been great in his limited minutes. The Rockets should experiment to see if he can maintain his effectiveness over a few more minutes. Andersen +14 Adjusted +/- Rating in 4th quarter has been great in 4th quarter while Hayes (-13 Adjusted 4th Quarter +/-) has played poorly. To the Rockets credit Andersen plays more in 4th quarter than any other quarter and Hayes plays less in 4th quarter than any other quarter. Interestingly, Budinger is great in the 1st and 3rd quarters but mediocre in the 2nd and 4th quarters. Landry, on the other hand plays his best in 1st and 4th quarters , but poorly in the 2nd and 3rd quarters. [/rquoter]
d, does impact rating take into consideration the competition? Is it a +/- hybrid? I'm not really understanding what he's describing.
this season's rockets are really interesting because the team does not have the talent spectrum that most teams do. because they are all average to above average players earning average to above average $ and playing average to above average minutes, i feel like the +/- and other derivative metrics for this team are all out of whack. i believe that you could reverse the roles of the starters and the bench, with minimal impact to the scoreboard (barring matchup specific moves) and see the metrics for the players reverse equivalently. then again, i haven't been able to pay attention the numbers this season like i usually do. what are your thoughts about that durvasa? am i totally off base here?
By my understanding, it is sort of like an adjusted +/-, that adjusts further for the "high leverage moments", to use Daryl Morey's phrase. In other words, it takes into account not just how the score changes with particular player combos on the floor, but also what the game situation is. So, Hayes rates very good by the standard adjusted +/-, but Winston's Impact Rating model also takes into account that Chuck's rating is better in the 1st quarter than the 4th quarter. Since possessions become more important in the final quarter (and I know Easy will disagree), Chuck's "Impact Rating" takes a hit. Here's another way of putting it. Instead of measuring how point differential changes as the lineup changes (that's adjusted +/-), Impact Rating measures how probability of winning the game changes with the lineup changes.
What about the refs +/- against the Rockets? There has to be a stat about win loss count on Referee-Team.
What's up with all the stats, just play the freaking game. I understand we're in the high-tech era and we have way more opportunities to analyse the game and whatever, but in the NBA (America) they are going overboard. I know even players like Battier study a whole freaking casefile of his opponent, like Kobe, before he plays him which is ridiculous to me. A guy like Vernon Maxwell or Mario Elie wouldn't need that, they would just play hard. I am getting a bit concerned because Morey is a moron and a geek who probably got Ariza because of his stats. If you look at the stats you would take Ariza over Artest anyday, just look at the numbers last year, but based on their play I would choose Artest all the way.
Thanks! That helps. Can I just say.. I still want to see more of Chuck and DA together on the court. For some reason that combination intrigues me and coach won't test it out unless he's forced to... even then it wasn't for very many minutes. The combination of players and scores in this analysis seems like defense is not important... observed by Kyle and Chuck having low "Impact Rating". I am wondering if they have some sort of baseline percentage of what their impact rating is for each of the 40 minutes during a game. Meaning that the minutes that Chuck plays (beginning of the first and third quarters) have less impact and decreasing his number exponentially and increasing Andersens for that same reason.
I'm sure you'll earn a lot of friends on this forum by calling DM a moron. Though I'm also pretty sure you're not here to make friends. Am I right? So I can respect your honesty. At any rate, there's no need for you to pay attention to stats. However, if players or GMs want to increase their own success, they pay attention to the numbers. Ellie and Maxwell played hard and had success without putting as much thought into how to best guard their opponents or how best to score around them as Battier does today. Now imagine how much more successful they would have been if they had analyzed the numbers. Stats aren't for everyone. And stats aren't the end-all-be-all in basketball success. And no one is suggesting that only stats should be used to figure out what a good team should look like. Stats are used in conjunction with players that play hard and smart. It's difficult to play smart if you lack all the information you need to make smart decisions. You do your best, but you're only going to play as smart as the data in front of you (in your case, what you can remember by watching the game). So stats are used to enhance the team's decision making by finding those angles and making those observations that aren't always so easy to find while only observing the game in action. Why is that ridiculous?
I wouldn't look at it that way. Its not about saying one player is better than the other. Can't make a blanket statement like that. Winston thinks the existing lineup evidence suggests the Rockets benefit more from what Andersen does well (mainly, spacing the floor on offense) compared to what Chuck does well (mainly, solid post defense and overall team defense). The results are very role-dependent too. Perhaps Adelman has found a combination that just meshes really well with Lowry, Landry, and Andersen.
That is interesting. It would be interesting to know if "Impact Rating" correlates more positively with offensive players vs defensive players. That would be hugely important to know, if that's the case. Teams that can consistently outperform opponents in the big, game-swinging moments would have an incredible advantage.
Oh, I didn't mean who's overall better...I don't believe any stat can tell you that. Maybe I should have been more specific. Andersen's positive impact on the Houston Rockets > Hayes' positive impact on the Houston Rockets ? Mainly asking if you and others think the bolded part of what I have quoted to be true.
I wouldn't have guessed it from what I've seen. But its possible I'm allowing my preexisting biases (huge Chuck Hayes fan, not so much a fan of lead-footed defensive stiffs that get pushed around easily) get in the way of a "bigger picture" assessment.
It might be that Andersen has more of positive impact IN THE MINUTES HE PLAYS than Chuck does IN THE MINUTE HE PLAYS. Andersen if being used selectively right now-- if the opposing bigs starts killing him, or if he's generally not doing well, he gets pulled. The only somewhat "regular" thing about his minutes is that he generally plays quite a bit in the 2nd quarter, which is when teams play a lot of their bench guys. Chuck probably is given a longer leash and left in there longer even with unfavorable matchups. In a limited role, it's easier to amplify one's strength and hides one's weaknesses, but if Andersen had to play, say, 30 minutes a game or start every game (meaning you get a good chunk of time vs. opposing starters, whether the matchup is good or bad and whether you (or the 5 on the floor) is doing well or not), his weaknesses will likely get exploited more. So, what does this mean? Not that Andersen is better or worse than Chuck, but that he's being used in a pretty effective way right now. We don't know, however, whether he'll be similarly effective in an expanded role.
No! the way Adelman is coaching right now is scorers > defenders. Hayes is unappreciated on this team and they need to run more plays for him. His offense is also underrated . I dont undertand why they put battier on the elite guards like he can guard any of them.
Good points. Perhaps for role players who get less consistent playing time, like Andersen, it makes more sense to weight performance in each game equally rather each 5-on-5 time segment he is a part of.
Does this stat account for the Impact Rating of the opposition and your teammates' Impact Rating? EDIT: Maybe it's just me but the chart in the link seems really difficult to read.
Yes, enough with analyzing stats and trends. They are useless. We need to judge our teams and players more based on how fun they are to watch and use gut feelings. Obviously Battier would be better off against Kobe with no study at all. Signed, Matt Maloney Shandon Anderson Mo Taylor Moochie Norris Kelvin Cato Steve Francis The '99-'06 Rockets
