Agreed, but I think this year he will be able to pass it off as well...to Kmart, Yao, Luis, Budinger....other shooters once AB draws the double teams. DD
I wonder how an all offense line-up of AB, KM, CB, LS and YM would look.... Will they burn the opposing team for more points or get burned for more points... :grin:
For all the complaining of his lack of defense. How many players in the league have any offensive game near his. On top of that how many of those guys have dominate or even decent D. His pros outweigh the cons big time.
I am not sure if you understood my question. Let me restate. Why is a possession with 2 minutes left more important than a possession with 12 minutes left? If the game is tied, the likelihood of winning is the same no matter how much time is left. If you are behind, the less time you have, the less likely you are to come back, and the opposite is true if you are ahead. In other words, the less time remains, the less important a possession is because the closer to the end of the game, the less likely the lead would change (so-called garbage time). This seems to go against the psychological importance of clutchness. It is more important to do well earlier than later in the game.
There is no better time to do well. Your two points always counts the same. If I am a magical wizard and I go to Kevin Martin and say "Kevin, you are going to play all 48 minutes tonight and score exactly 30 points no matter what, but I will let you choose when they are scored" It doesnt matter, in any number of infinite scenarios of point allocation, the game outcome will ALWAYS be the same. Either the sum of all points scored is greater than the other team or it isn't.
When I talk about the importance of a possession, I'm referring to the advantage gained from a successful possession versus a failed possession.
Each possession is equal in importance, but players do not treat them as such, they clearly do not play as hard in the first quarter as they do in the last one. Thus defense tightens up, and those possessions gain a greater perception of importance. DD
It counts the same towards the final point differential. But when you say "no better time", that assumes the only relevant factor is how you affect point differential. That is not correct. Whether you lose by 15 or 20, its still a loss. What matters is how you improve (or worsen) your chances of winning the game. And that absolutely does depend on game clock.
No one is looking or paying lee to be a cluth player or big time scorer, thats not his deal, but when you have a guy with the rep of being a scorer and he disappears in a tight game in the 4th, then thats a problem. You mentioned the kiss of death before in a post, but if look at how the team was involved, then hakeem would take over, there is a difference. See, really good players can always get a good shot and if you consider martin a good player then you woul think he is included. Well, martin isn't the kind of good player who can generate good shots for himself or teammates in the 4th quarter. Thats why you see the players who can create either for themselves off the dribble or for someone with the ball in the 4th quarter. Personally, there isn't a difference between martin and maggette except maggette is better at creating a shot vs martin who is better off the ball. Thats why it was funny when DD was calling for maggette last season and posters were calling him crazy, but the same posters were jumping for joy with the martin trade. They're the same players.
All metrics currently employed by teams, at least ones leaked to the public, as well as statheads in the media are based on game totals. Not separated by quarters, or other methods that tends to split up scoring. Daryl Morey has spoken on multiple occasions that he feels scoring at any time is good. Because whether you go up by 10 and then lose your lead and win by 2, or going down by 6, come back in the clutch and win by 2, you still win by 2. The road to the result is meaningless compared to the result itself. The most basic metric that try to measure team dominance, as a way of predicting future success in both basketball and baseball, is the idea of point-differential. If 2 teams have similar records, the team that's been blowing out opponents would be more likely to maintain or exceed their pace. While the team that has been scraping by with close games tend to dip in the rankings. Even if there does exist the concept of a clutch player, in general that extra boost is nowhere near significant enough to matter. In the end, by far the most relevant predictor of future success is how much you're able to outscore your opponent. Of course, I realize this is really getting off-topic. IMO, the whole "4th quarter play" as a predictor of playoff success, even if true, seems infinitesimal compared matchups and overall talent. Overwhelming talent and/or overwhelming match up nightmares are what matters in 7 games series. And Kevin Martin has overwhelming talent. How he matches up with our playoff opponents is yet to be seen though. If this is true, wouldn't it be more efficient to try and score when the opponents are lax on defense? I'm not sure if the Rockets try to do this, but it would make more sense to play at a higher pace when the opponents are not giving 100% on defense. And when crunch time rolls around, play more management style basketball(ala JVG style) and minimize possessions during that stretch. This would actually mean that a player who gets his baskets before 4th quarter is actively trying to maximize team scoring efficiency to take advantage of opponent's weakness.
Maggette will be 31 this season, Martin will be 27. Not to mention, If Jamal freaking Crawford calls you a selfish player, you are in trouble. Corey Maggette gets to the line alright, but I far prefer Kevin Martin's spacing and selection when combined with Yao (Still by far our best player). Mag does play better defense, though.
CM and KM are two completely different players with two completely different playing styles, comfort areas, positions, etc. The only thing even remotely similar about them is their ability to get to the line. Really bad example.
Have you competed in sports at any level? If you haven't, then i understand how you can just look at the simplistic results of a game, but if you have ever played even in high school, you can understand the ebbs and flows of games. No player plays 100% all the time. Just like a car can't stay at 100mph all the time. I'm a results person as well, but there are peaks and valleys through the game and some players can play better when more pulling and tugging is going on than others.
Very similar players on the court. Maggette plays off the ball well also and attacks the rim more whereas martin has more range on his shot. Both are scorers and neither does alot when they don't score. Maggette is more physical on both side and probably competes harder, but they are the same player.
The fact that you wrote this 2 posts down from the "Kevin Martin = Corey Maggette" post leaves me pretty speechless. I'm so shocked I really have no response. I take back everything I say. You win.
