For those who love stats... NCAA Player Success Rates

Well well well...

As arguably the biggest Brewer supporter on this board, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't glad to see this. Very interesting. I hope it's true, and just as importantly, I hope the Rockets take him.

 

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You got me on that one. . I really hope Rockets will pick Brewer.

 

discuss!!!

 

We better not mess around and trade down on a gamble that this guy will still be there.

just take him at #8. he will definitely be there.

also, maybe darius washington would make a good pick at #32?

 

I agree. It's starting to look like the #8 pick is still in the money in this draft. I think the difference between what we could get at 8 and what we could get at 11 is too uncertain to take the chance.

 

Aldrigde similar to Rasheed Wallace?? And wow Reddick only got 4%!

 

I would had liked to have seen how his data was laid out. Things aren't usually as cut and dry in analysis so it would have been nice to see how he made his conclusions. That being said, the analysis is pretty interesting. I'm wondering if Darryl Morey is doing similar types of analysis as additional data points for the 2006 Draft for the Rockets.

 

I would not mind Brewer or Redick....I can't wait for the draft.

DD

 

If Morey uses the same equation to evaluate players, he's fired. Effective immediately. (I'm sure he doesn't )

That was one of the worst analysis I've seen. You've got to do more than put some numbers down. If you went with the tallest, heaviest player that played the most minutes you'd probably be on the same level as this guys analysis. Okay, that's too harsh, but it was still lame and wouldn't hold water if it had to.

 

I don't know. Take a closer look at his analysis. I would like to have seen it laid out in more detail but can understand why he might have avoided it because if you don't lay it out the right way anyone would get lost trying to understand it.

The weight and height stats were only used for a similarity comparison purposes to try and find players the draftees are similar to.

The process he seems to to have followed is this:

(1) use the stats listed to come up with similarity scores to group similar NBA players together.

(2) take players that were deemed "similar" in the analysis above then ranked them in terms of production MPG and PER stats (range of 0,.25,.5,.75, 1)

(3) come up with a quality index / success-rate score that looked like some probability (%) of being successful

That didn't look too bad too me. What I didn't get though is how he ran the draft prospects comparatively against the NBA players profiled.

 

He sure picks some odd stats to see who has the highest similarity score.
1. Height
2. Weight
3. Age
4. Minutes per Game
5. Total Games Played
6. Three-Point Efficiency
7. Free-Throw Efficiency
8. Two-Point Efficiency
9. Assist Rate
10. Turnover Rate
11. Rebound per 48 Minutes
12. Blocks per 48 Minutes
13. Steals per 48 Minutes
14. Personal Fouls per 48 Minutes
Notable for its omission, any measure of scoring. Apparently it doesn't make any difference what role you play in college. On the other hand, total games played is factored in. So, if a guy had an injury in college but was otherwise just like another player, he would be considered less similar than someone that scored 20ppg more but played in the same number of games. In fact, this metric seems to have been devised with the purpose of lumping Redick in with Langdon.

As evidence that this system has big problems, he has Sheldon Williams grouped with Othella Harrington, Malik Rose, and Alonzo Mourning??? Leaving aside whether or not Williams is similar to those three, they are not even similar to each other. No one would confuse Alonzo Mouning with Malik Rose or Othella Harrington. He also groups Jason Kidd with Eric Snow, Rasheed Wallace with Samaki Walker, and Steve Nash with Tyronne Lue. This is beyond worthless.

 

There are too many factors that aren't even being considered, and most can't even be properly tallied in a statistical format.

The team system that a player is going into
-If JJ was on the Suns team, do you not think that Nash would turn him into a 18ppg 3pt threat? Put him on a team like Atlanta, and he would have to spend more time getting his own shot.

Heart/Determination
-Most players have the skills and athletic ability, but have no passion for the game. Just look at any list of the most overrated players in the league, and almost all of them will fit in this category.

-This will also show in how a player improves his game. Brewer might not have a great shot now, but he seems like a player who understands what it takes to excel, so I can see him trying to perfect his akward shot.

BB IQ
-Look at Swift. I think the 8 year olds the have do litte drills for prizes during half time have more basketball smarts than Swift.

I think the closest thing that this formula can show is how under or overrated a player is. I think JJ is a little overrated, but I still think he will be able to find a nitch in the league.

 

So, for calculating the similarity score, he's comparing to the college numbers of recent NBA players, or the NBA numbers of recent NBA players? Obviously, it makes more sense to do the former. Beyond that, his explanation for calculating success rate didn't make much sense to me.

I've been intrigued by Ronnie Brewer since February, precisely because I thought his versatile skillset would translate well to the NBA. Looks like this intuition is confirmed here; Brewer's statistical profile does indicate he'll probably be a successful NBA player. Key word is "probably".

 

I believe he's comparing to their college stats. Could be wrong, but that makes more sense than comparing to their NBA stats.

The idea if to look at which NBA players had the most similar college career to the draftee, and using their NBA careers as a "best guess" of how the draftee's career will end up like.

Good catch on the omission of scoring. Seems like it should be important. Maybe points scored isn't as accurate an indicator in college as it is in the pros? Still, couldn't have hurt to put it in there.

 

I know he is comparing to their college stats. My point is, whatever methodology he is using obviously doesn't work very well. If you used the same methodology in 1997 it would tell you to draft Othella Harrington because he was going to be like Alonzo Mourning. It didn't quite work out that way though.

 

You're wrongly assuming that all or most of the comparables for Othella in 1997 would have been all-star caliber. Just because Zo had a similar statistical profile in college, that doesn't automatically mean that we should expect Othetlla to turn out like Alonzo. But if the vast majority of those players that have a similar profile in college to Othella became stars, then of course it makes sense to think that Othella has a good chance of being a star as well.

 

Ah, the power of statistics...
Well, if some of you disagree with the methodology of the 82 games site, you can bet our Morey probably has calculated and factored in hundreds of different categories with some supersweet MIT formula. We got the math on our side, rest assured. Stats FTW!