A Statistical Comparison: Yao, Hakeem, Moses, and Ralph.

Too much time on my hands........
Too much time on my hands........
I've got too much time on my hands...

T't't't'tickin' away!!!

 

Oh, good thread though.

 

Nice analysis - but I personally hate the "per 48 minutes" stats.

I'll say this, Yao is only scratching the surface of his potential. Whether or not he taps it completely is an unknown, but he certainly has the tools to become a HOF player.

Evan

 

Great post. Would loved to have seen Yao play b4 zone defense was legalized. The zone is definitely limiting his opportunities in my opinion.

But I agree endurance seems to be his biggest issue to date, esp as it relates to his rebounding.

 

You could have summarized most of that post by saying:
Yao shoots a high % but not a high #.

 

the less you play the better your 48 mpg stats look, the problem is that hakeem, ralph, and moses avg. 20 ppg and 10 rpg with out the help of 48 mpg stats.

 

Kelvin Cato is the MVP of the per 48 minute league...

 

Are you ignoring the obvious correlation between FGA and FG%? I mean, I could draw up a numbers analysis demonstrating that Otis Thorpe was the greatest player to ever play with the Rockets if I ignored that relationship. Yao presumably is taking the shots he is most comfortable with right now, and passing when he is not comfortable. Hakeem and Moses shot the ball in sitations where Yao passes, instead (double teams, for instance). An increase in his shot attempts would of necessity come out of those situations where he feels less comfortable taking the shot. His shooting percentage would certainly be reduced if he took more shots.

 

I think if Hakeem/Moses/Ralph really wanted to they could have averaged 30 points a game. They just seemed have more control over their own fate. If they were determined to score 40 points one game, they were going to score 40 points. It doesn’t matter what the defense threw at them, they were going to do what they set out to do.

With Yao, it’s completely the opposite. The defense totally controls how well Yao is going to do. If they decide to single cover him or not front him, then they have decided to let Yao try and beat them by himself. If they decide Yao is not going to shoot any more than 5 shots tonight, that's exactly whats going to happen. It doesn’t matter how determined Yao is or how determine his teammates are at getting him the ball.

It is totally up to the defensive shcemes teams throw at Yao that decides how well he's going to do.

 

Guys, Macbeth isn't purposely including or ignoring certain aspects of the debate...he is only pointing out what is factualy evident. It is impossible to say, for example, if Yao's current efffectiveness level would continue at the same rate pro rata on a 48 mpg basis. That is speculation.

Given that we know it is highly unlikely that he would continue to perform at the same effectiveness rate, we can conclude that it is somewhere between where he is and where MacBeth has caclulated, if Yao were to play 48 mpg.

If it was up to me, I'd say assume he can play 40 mpg, and then assume the extra 10 mpg or so he plays he is only 80% as effective as he currently is. Then, you can additionally assume some sort of increase in shot attempts to mimick what the past centers got, or at least get him closer to a level where Francis has been the past few seasons, and then you may be looking at a number that would be a good comparison of what kind of player Yao actually could be if he got 40 mpg and shot the ball more.

 

I generally don't like the per 48 min stat either, especially considering that endurance is one of Yao's greatest weaknesses. Of course, there is no easy way to quantify that which is a largely qualitative observation (layman's translation: you'll believe what you see with your own eyes before you believe manipulated numbers).

Still, if it helps people to view numbers, a good compromise is the per 24 minute stat. Though still far from perfect, the range of spread in the numbers is narrowed to a slightly more probable and comparable range and still helps MacBeth make his argument. Since none of the players play less than 20 minutes per game, this doesn't get schewed as badly as garbage time players that look phenomenal in per 48 minutes. So ...

Per 24 minutes, Hakeem averaged 14.7 pts, 7.9 rebounds, and 2.0 blocks in his first 2 seasons. He took 11.0 shots ( making 5.8) and 4.9 free throws (3.1) per 24.

Moses Malone averaged 11.6 pts, 10.2 rebounds, and 1.4 blks. He took 8.5 shots( 4.2) and 4.6 (3.3) free throws.

Ralph Sampson averaged 14.7 pts, 7.4 rebounds and 1.1 blocks. He took 11.9 shots (6.1) and 3.7 free throws( 2.5).

Yao Ming has averaged 11.6 pts, 6.8 rebounds, and 1.4 blocks per 48 minutes. He has taken 8.2 shots ( 4.3) and 3.9 (3.1) free throws.

Of course, most of MacBeth's observations are still apparent in the per 24 minute stat, but the effect size is much smaller.

 

While I also agree that "per 48" stats aren't reliable, I also think you're missing some other factors into this comparison.

1. You need to look at what's the league scoring average for team scoring during the times Hakeem, Moses, and Ralph played. This way, you can get an idea of just how much each point is "worth" relative to the league. After all, if you can score 20 pts when teams only score 80, it's more impressive than scoring 20 pts when teams are scoring 100.

2. This correlates with the first factor. That is, what percentage of points is Yao putting up relative to the Rockets, relative to his predecessors? Van Gundy runs a ridiculously slow-paced offense. So Yao's points and rebounds should be higher in a higher paced game, where he gets more opportunities to get them.

3. Take into consideration the fact that Yao's a foreigner. Looking at the non-American stars in the NBA, they all tend to have a fairly long learning curve. None of them, as far as I know, began to dominate until a few years in. This, in contrast with many college players who has dominated from the start.

 

Yao shoots more when teams don't double him.

 

MacBeth - Good stuff, thanks.

My 2 cents...
48 mpg is an effective measurement to place two disimilar stats into a proportion. You could just as easily take Dreams, or Moses or Ralph's stats/minute and multiply them by the number of minutes Yao plays.

IMO, most people get so hung up on "but nobody could do that for 48 minutes" that the fail to recognize that it's only a proportionality. Player A puts up 15 points playing 32 mpg. Player B puts up more points...18 ppg, but he does it in 38.5 mpg. Player A is more productive on a per minutes bases and that's what the 48 mpg demonstrates.

 

another intangible to consider...did any of the aforementioned houston centers join a team with established scorers like Yao did? Was Calvin there before Moses? Although, I suspect Calvin was willing to defer...