In depth starting lineup analysis

I agree with this. Bev "fits", because Harden is the PG in the starting lineup. lol. Thats basically the reason. Of course Bev gives a higher net "+" rating because Lin and Harden are just battling with usage of the ball. Lin as 6th man doesn't have Harden always starting the play up top. It really doesnt help that Dwight doesn't run the PnR and keeps asking for the post feed from all our PGs, including Harden. You've got Lin and Harden who can run the PnR and you keep feeding him in the post. Mchale hasn't developed anything in Dwight in the post, and he can run the PnR real well. Then we have DMO who we put on the floor who can post pretty decently and we never do it. lol

 

Thanks OP for the analysis. Analyzing BB data is not a simple task to do as it is difficult to put a proper confidence interval on the numbers.

how do we know whether the difference we see is due to randomly fluctuations or a reflection of actual difference?

A first step to the right direction is to put a measure of variation do the stats we are looking at.

For example, consider an example where player A scores 10, 20, 5, 8, 2 in five games and player B scores 12, 8, 5, 5, 10 in five games. Can we say who is better? On average player A scores 9 pts per game and player B 8 points per game. However, if we remove one game from the stats, we will get a completely different picture. If we remove game 2, then A on average scores 6.25 pts and B 8 pts while if we remove game 5 then A 10.6 while B 7.5.

The point here is that how do we know whether we can say A or B is better? A simple way to compute a measure of variation is to do the leave-one-out exercise. Randomly remove one game from the data and compute the average. If we do the exercise for the above data, A's average after removing game 1-5 are 8.75, 6.25, 8, 9.25, 10.6. You can see the large spread of this average estimate. In another words, the difference between A and b is not statistically significant: if we randomly leave one game out of the sample then the conclusion will change dramatically.

back go OP's analysis, if we repeat the same exercise on the number OP is posting on the offensive PPP, we will see the conclusion will vary a lot as to whether Lin or Bev is the better player offensively. The average number OP posted varies about 0.01 more than 50 percentage do the time and the difference between 1.058 and 1.068 is NOT significant enough to say that we are not just looking at random noise here.

The same applies to defensive PPP and so on. In summary, we simply do not have enough data to tell with status ally significant whether Lin and Bev are different. Not that the conclusion is NOT that they are the same but rather we do NOT have enough data.

Take away message: to make sure we are not looking for something in the noise, we need to out a measure of variation on the numbers we calculated. One way to do this is called leave-one-out method.

Thank you for OP for posting the numbers. unfortunately there is simply not enough data to draw the conclusions OP are trying to reach.

 

My ipad autocorrection is killing me. I made some corrections to the typos below. Sorry about that.

 

Further corrections

 

Harden PNR >>>>> Lin PNR

 

#1 The reason that it seems that Lin is being "benched" for making mistakes is because he is the least secure "starter" on the team with Beverly coming back and the emergence of Jones. Further, he isn't being "benched" all the time as he is playing 31 minutes a game.

#2 As far as McHale goes, he has NOTHING to do with Lin. It is a red herring. As far as "McHale not developing players", you have NO basis for it. Dwight Howard hasn't gotten better? You mean a 10 year veteran did not improve withing 6 months of signing with the Rockets? Really????? Here is some names for you...... Chandler Parsons and Terrance Jones..... hell using your criteria, then Asik improved greatly under McHale since leaving Chicago as well.

The McHale angle has become a convenient excuse for Lin fans.... McHale and Morey are trying to keep Lin down.... it is a fallacy.

 

Per Jonathan Feigen:

Rockets 9-4 with Howard/Jones/Parsons/Harden/Beverley
Rockets 7-3 with Howard/Jones/Parsons/Harden/Lin (15-7 overall)

Make your own conclusions.

 

In response to your #1, I talked about last year not, this year nook. You dont remember Lin getting yanked a lot? I point out that Lin does get out of control, and he should be benched as a result, but letting your player play through mistakes is one thing. But it was pretty obvious McHale never stuck with Lin through the 4th a lot last year. Keep in mind im talking about last year. Now look into this year, coaching is always involved in developing young players and all Lin has ever improved on was his shooting, and that regressed. How long did parker and nash take to develop? And look at the coaches they stuck with. I'm not saying Lin will turn into anywhere the level that these guys played at, but you just told your starting PG last year to drop back to 6th man role, completely different. Thats not development, thats two role changes. First when Harden came in Lin clearly wasn't the main focus anymore, (and rightly so, Harden is a beast) and now hes a 6th man. Which I am not opposed too Lin being a 6th man, just make it clear with what you want to do with a player.

#2 your right, Dwight is a 10 year veteran, and 6 months with Mchale wont change anything. But hes been working Hakeem for how long before Dwight came to houston? Play the PnR for christs sake, thats what Dwight was elite at. As for terrence jones, I think Mchale should have played him a lot sooner. What TJ is doing now is what he could have done last year, but Mchale didnt play him. Sent him down to D-league. I honestly think TJ would have been just as good last year as he is breaking out this year. As for Chandler Parsons, Mchale had nothing to do with CP being good, he just put him on the court and Chandler showed what he was capable of. And your comment about Asik, it was morey who made the poison pill contract for Asik, because he saw and believed that Asik could be a starter. Everyone, was questioning MOREY, NOT MCHALE, about the siging of Asik and look at him after last year. one of the top centers in the league who proved he can be a starter.

And now for your last genius comment:

"The McHale angle has become a convenient excuse for Lin fans.... McHale and Morey are trying to keep Lin down.... it is a fallacy."

Like some veterans and trolls with new join dates you lump me in with the LOF angle, not once did I offer Mchale as an excuse for Lins play. I am simply pointing out the coaching staff hasnt shown it can improve players, my argument is that the players that have brreakout games in the past or this year (Beverly, TJ, Parsons), the skill was already there they just just needed a chance I never said Morey was keeping anyone down, I said Morey is looking to trade Lin for something better. Thats a fact, not an opinon, not a commentary on how he hates Lin. I never said Mchale is keeping Lin down, i've pointed out in the past that he didnt let lin play through his mistakes last year. This year is different, and im pointing out that Lin is still making some mistakes he should have learned last year. Maybe he will take a couple years to learn, maybe he never will. But dont lump me in with LOFs and say stupid things like the "Mchale angle". Your elitism showing, and its really not helping in the discussion.

 

Thank you larsv8 for responding without throwing terms like LOF or "your making an excuse for Lin", like some posters. thank you for just addressing my points. And you are right, i looked at the data and parsons and lin are battling for usage. But this is a legitmate question to you, in terms of Dwight getting fed in the post, do you believe its better if we just ran more PnR with dwight?? Doesnt matter if its Bev, harden, lin or parsons. Maybe pick and choose specific situations where the post might work? I just dont see why their refusing to run PnR when Dwight is elite at it!!

 

Also to add, I know they run PnR with Dwight, but it seems like they prefer to push for feeding him in the post a lot more than just PnR Dwight with all the players on the court. Everyone in the lineup can run PnR with Dwight, it doesnt have to be just Harden, Lin, Parsons, and somtimes Bev.

 

I thought the narrative was that Dwight preferred being fed in the post to PNR. That was the recurring complaint from his LA days, anyway.

 

Actually that is incorrect.
Lin's playingtime coming off the bench is 27.3 minutes per game. As a starter he played 32.5 minutes per game.
Lin has been a starter for 22 games and coming off the bench for 10 games.
As a starter Lin is 15-7, coming from the bench 6-4.
Lin and Bev have played 15 games together. 10W-5L

Not trying to prove a point here, just showing some little facts.

 

yes he's said he wants to play a more traditional post up on the low block role. but I also think if we're winning and he's putting up 20+ points a game, he won't bring it up. It's when things are going poorly that he starts saying "Hey, why don't we start posting me up more ?"

great post OP. Glad to see something with more facts than opinion.

now for some opinion: I personally like Lin in the 6th man role. I think he's a young player who will continue to develop and he's on fair contract at an average of 8 mil a season. I hope he shows enough after the allstar break that we can bring harden's minutes down and let Lin take some of that burden so that they're both ready for a playoff push.

 

yep pretty much

 

First, Jeremy Lin got 33 minutes a game LAST year and 31 minutes this year... that does not sound like someone that is being unnecessarily yanked a lot. Concerning becoming a 6th man limiting Lin's development, I am not buying it. Kevin McHale did it and his game developed quite a bit.

Lin is not Nash or Parker. By the time Parker was Lin's age, he was getting nearly 20 points a game, with a PER of over 20.

This is all baseless opinion. The FACTS are that if you are going to make the argument that McHale has not developed players, Jones and Parsons are exhibit "A" and "B" for player improvement. As far as Asik goes, he went from a bench player to one of the best defensive players in the NBA.

You agenda is obvious, only someone that has an agenda would seriously argue that the Rockets coaching staff has not helped the development of young players.

You are a LOF and that is fine, just own it.

 

Are you trying to say that McHale is an exceptional trainer? That all big men wants to come to Houston because of him? Didn't think so. McHale allows a lot of freedom for the team to do their thing because he is not a hands-on X and O guy. How would the Pacers play if he was coaching them now? Same sort of mess I'd gather. What about the Knicks? Can he deal with all the egos on that team? He can barely manage the roster on OUR team.

 

LIN sucks balls stop blaming the coach