I would think that with the egg we have come out and laid that people would be willing to try anything at this point. I can't fathom how people could possibly be arguing for keeping what we are currently doing. I mean its 45 games in and we have beaten what, 3 good teams all year? Yet still people obsess over Lowry like he is the second coming. I can understand people being down on Brooks because he hasnt been good, but the KL love fest is out of control.
Lowry had a rough stretch during that 5 game losing streak. But in the 9 games since then, we've only been outscored twice when he's been on the floor. He's averaged 14.7 ppg, 5.4 apg, only 1.7 tpg, and he's scored the ball efficiently (57.5 TS%), including 46% shooting from the field. Played 32 mpg in that stretch. Only 2 games in which he shot under 40% from the field. Just to compare, we've been outscored 7 times in the last 9 games with Brooks on the floor. Per 32 minutes, he's averaged 18.0 points, 4.3 assists, 2.1 turnovers, and he's scored inefficiently (50.4 TS%), including 37% shooting from the field. He's shot under 40% from the field in 5 straight games. In terms of the Game Score rating (composite stat that incorporates the entire boxscore), Lowry's average over the last 9 was 12.6 in 32 mpg, and AB's was 10.5 per 32 minutes played. And the Game Score rating, like PER, is biased towards towards high scorers.
^ Why would you give us a bunch of averages but exlude the five poor games though? That doesn't make sense to me.
Firstly, because Brooks has played in the last 9 games. I wanted the comparison to be more apples to apples. Secondly, its the 9 most recent games. Not like I filtered out his 5 worst games in the last 14. Thirdly, DD was arguing that Lowry has played poorly since his hot shooting in December. I would say that he played poorly during that losing streak, which happened 10 games ago. Since then, he's played well.
League Ranks in two important categories for a PG AST/TO Lowry - 9th Brooks - 55th Assist Ratio(% of possessions that end with an assist) Lowry - 10th(6th if you take out the 4 players directly ahead of him who all average less than 17.5 mpg(Watson, duhon, jeter, ish) Brooks - 88th...worse than battier and hayes And believe it or not these are improvements from last years numbers for Brooks. Bottom line Lowry runs our offense more efficiently. He gets the ball in our scorers hands. Pretty much exactly what you want from a PG. All the while playing better(not great) defense than AB. Its nice that AB can score, and last year we really needed that in our starting back court, but Martin does that job better than brooks ever could now. If Brooks would just accept the 6th man role and get his head back in the game there is no doubt he could flourish as our spark plug. But you aren't watching the games if you continue to believe that Brooks is better than Lowry as our starting PG.
Actually Shroopy it doesn't support the +/- at all. Kmart is the league's most efficient scorer. If he was neutral defensively he should have had a large + stat instead of neutral. Anyway my opinion on this is that the sample size is way too small to determine anything about this. For one thing, this just averages the +/- of the last few games the players have had. We're a mediocre team this season due to playing a 6'6 dude at the C spot and the coach being a mediocre in-game decision maker. Those factors impact the +/- a lot, as you can by courtney Lee having a horrible +/- stat even if he's a solid defender and an efficient scorer. I guess as a personal note out of all the metrics I dislike +/- the most. The concept of basing a player's worth on how his team performs with him in or out of the lineup seems so logical however once you start thinking about it there are too many factors involved for it to be useful (ie. quality of opponent, level of your backup, whom you play with etc.). I personally don't bother looking at +/- at all.
Really? You honestly 100% can't see whats going on with this? I am one of the most neutral fans on this board. But all of a sudden I am an AB lover and a KL hater because I have a different opinion on how the team best functions as a group. I don't like one guy more than the other, I am a fan of both. I would love to keep both or trade both if it makes the team better. People are fans of Lowry, they want good things for him. They perceive the starting role as some sort of prize he deserves. In order to justify putting him there, people start to demonize Brooks. FFS he is one of our guys and people are actively rooting for him to fail. Its sickening.
You've been bugging out man, you couldn't give an accurate response to durvasa for a reason. To do it for you, only one poster in this thread overhyped Lowry (I'm facepalming and looking at you... trugoy) THE REST OF US ARE ONLY STATING THAT HE IS A COMPENTENT PLAYER who overall gives a positive output to this team.
Hold on. You said you don't have a problem with people being unhappy with Brooks' performance, but you think they are obsessing over Lowry. Now you're saying the obsession is evidenced by them demonizing Brooks. People may be going overboard with the Brooks hate, but where is this Lowry love fest you are talking about? That was my question. Who is pumping him up to be anything more than a good PG who is a solid starter and is earning the contract he got in the offseason? That's a pretty tame opinion, in comparison to how some were inflating Brooks' worth last year (one prolific poster, not to be named, called him a top 5 PG).
Yup, nobody is saying Lowry is an All-Star PG or the next great thing. Most are simply stating that he is the best option we have and he rightfully so should be starting ahead of Brooks.
Showing average over last 5 games is a compromise between overly volatile game-by-game +/- and a full schedule +/- that obscures the trends and ups-and-downs that occur over the course of the season. I actually think it works pretty well. All the other factors you talked about need to be understood implicitly by anyone who's trying to draw conclusions from +/- information. That goes without saying. Specifically regarding Courtney Lee, he doesn't play very much with Hayes and I don't know why Adelman's decision making would disproportionately affect him compared to others. Something else is going on there, and it may not be his fault. But its good to know that for some reason the Rockets have not played well when Lee is on the floor. The next step is finding out why.
Relax champ, Brooks has inferior plus minus dating back through last year...starting, bench, whatever - it doesn't matter.
The Adjusted plus-minus is the best stat they have. It just proves what a lot of posters on this board can't appreciate, stats often lie. People just watch the ball, but a lot of the most important action happens away from the ball. People associate dunks and PPG to mean good player, rarely the case. The most effective players have been Hayes, Battier, Lowry, and Budinger(yes seriously) And Jordan hill is a disaster that needs to be replaced.
Sport, as Durvasa showed earlier this week, the net +/- of the two together was higher in the positions they held last year vs this year. If you place any relevance on +/-, and are a fan of the team rather than an individual player, then you should advocate the combination which gives the highest net rating.
I should make a correction in those stats I cited last time. I accidentally put down On/Off for each player instead of +/-. This is what it should have been: 09-10 Brooks (82 games starting): -0.33 Lowry (68 games, 0 starting): +2.54 10-11 Brooks (22 games, 7 starting): -6.83 Lowry (42 games, 32 starting): +4.15 The reason I listed those numbers was because, in the other thread, you said that both players thrived in their role last year, but neither have played near as well in their switched roles this year. I thought that was unfair to Lowry. The starting lineup is playing significantly better this season than they did last season. You could attribute that to Martin instead of Ariza, or maybe Hayes's improvement. But I think Lowry has been a major factor as well, and from what I've read and heard the organization feels the same way. In comparison, Brooks has struggled a lot, and I'm not at all surprised or perturbed that Adelman is reluctant to return him to his original role. Its not so simple that they swap places and all of a sudden AB and Lowry are back to being the same player they were last year. Players change, teammates change, chemistry changes. All that said, I'm not pushing one player as a starter ahead of the other, and I really never have. Brooks has unique skills on this team, and if Adelman feels he's ready or that putting him back in the starting lineup is what he needs to get his mojo back, then I accept it. He gave Brooks extended fourth quarter minutes in Minnesota, so maybe he's planning on increasing his minutes and eventually putting him back with the starters.
I am done advocating either way, the major point was: there are people on this board who go out of thier way to find every tiny little thing Lowry does and proclaim it as greatness, while looking at every little thing Brooks does and place all the blame on him. The combination of those two things irritates the hell out of me.
Do you understand the role of the PG in our offense? Or offensive system is conducive for total team assists rather than high individual assists...
This is so ironic.....lol......that is exactly why I think it is important that we have a PG that can shoot. Thank you for coming on board...toot toot !!! Hammer meet nail. It is almost completely worthless as a tool for figuring out who the better player is.... DD
