[BizRadio 1110] Wages of Wins David Berri Thursday Morning at 7:20

A lot of people in the basketball stats community strongly disagree with Berri's approach to statistical analysis. I wonder how much the Rockets value his work.

I never read his book and I don't pay much attention to his blog either. All I know is that he seems to overrate rebounders, and underrate playmakers. At least relative to the general public or even John Hollinger's PER.

 

Well hey, it turns out Dr. David Berri can blow me.

 

And he watches the sport? Are we sure?

Edit: I am off to listen now.

 

1110 am? uh....pass.

 

Okay I am going to comment on this as I listen.

First thing I disagree with:

This is absolutely not true. Yes you have extra hands at that position, but that's what we wanted! Shane isn't going to have an issue with coming off the bench. So play Artest to start and bring in Shane as the second line of defense.

This not only gives us a chance to give Tmac more rest when necessary, by playing Shane together with Ron, but it also gives us flexibility in what position those three play. And I refuse to believe that Ron Ron can't play the PF position against the likes of David West, Carlos Boozer and such.

He harped on this subject a bit more basically saying you play someone in the position they have the skill set for, which we all know Adelman is master at. I give you the gist of it in the quote.

On the Mavs

Give me a freaking break. A win is a win a loss is a loss. Point Differential takes care of this. Saying that the Mavs was one of the best teams that lost on luck is bunch of hokey. They had a point differential of 4.5 ours was 4.7 and they only lost 4 games more than us. However their point differential after Kidd got there probably brought them down rather than up. I will have to check the stats tonight to verify it, but I feel like they were losing by more after he got there than before.

I can see them getting better than they were at the end of the season with J Kidd, but they haven't improved significantly with their roster moves. Plus they have to get used to a new coach.

Okay they went to a break (I could care less about Brett Favre).

Edit: I have no comment on the rest of it. He just talked about efficiency over quantity of shots and value of a player versus salary.

 

I wonder what his stats would have said RIGHT AFTER Yao went down. He said it was largely the supporting cast in the aftermath which is true but he likely couldn't have known they would perform that way before it happened. I'm sure he would have predicted a lot worse than continuing on to a 22-game win streak. He probably would have subscribed to my theory of "Playoffs? No way!" Statistical analysis has limitations just like gut feelings and other non-statistical evaluations.

His stats would have likely told you that the Lakers would beat the Pistons in 03-04 and that the Mavs would win in 05-06. His stats likely have some significance but they are far from gospel. I'm sure that Morey has far better methodologies for analyzing players and teams given that he's been doing this stuff for a much longer period of time.

 

I just listened to the pod. The dude makes the same argument he made on his website about this move. He says that because T-Mac, Battier and Artest all play the same position, one of them WILL HAVE TO move to PF. Then he deduces that because that is not their natural position and that all 3 of them lack the necessary skillset to be effective PFs, the Rockets will take a hit in the rebounding department.

Wow, what a genius! Lemme go buy that book, ASAP.

First of all, that is a major assumption that T-Mac, Artest or Battier will be playing PF. I've heard some say that they "hear" Adelman is planning on playing Artest at PF. If Adelman chooses to do that, I have to believe it will be for limited minutes and only when the matchup is right. The guy apparently doesn't even consider any other alternative ways of using Artest. He jumps on one assumption and that goes out in public with his theories based on that single assumption. Nice, in-depth research their, Professor DingleBerri.

The guy doesn't even consider the possibility that Artest or Battier will come off the bench at their natural position and, instead of hurting us as a starter playing out of position, actually improve our bench depth.

The guy is an Associate at a no-name university. I'll take MIT Morey's evaultion over his ten times out of ten. If Morey wanted Artest, I have little doubt it was a good move and that it improves our chances next season.