Is Tari playing his way out of Houston, financially?

Confirmation bias is a biased search of information that supports one's position, but ignoring contrary information. An example would be discrediting data that doesn't support one's position without providing any information on why the information is wrong other than attacking the pundit that used the information.

I typically use EPM as the objective measure not out of seeking data that supports my opinions, but as an unbiased objective metric. I am not picking and choosing the data for each specific event, player (i.e., definitely not confirmation bias). My experience has been EPM is typically better than a random fan's opinion as a large amount of random fans are biased.. EPM isn't perfect, but for an objective opinion (i.e., I prefer it to my eye ball test is better than your eyeball test arguments), it is top-notch. EPM typically does better with large amounts of data.

EPM may be off on Tari and Herb's exact value, but thinking one is significantly better than the other especially in the context of contract value going forward, I think it is fine data point that that may not be the case.

Umm, EPM takes into account all nine players on the court while a given player is on the court. EPM takes into account every minute of every game.

On the rest, I generally agree with your statements, but not the total value. Herb is a better point of attack defender than Tari. Tari is better at disruption. On the fouling 3-point shooters, this is specifically an event that, in my experience, frustrates fans, and typically things that frustrate fans cause fans to overvalue the adverse effect of the event. I think Herb is the better shooter and the better POA defender. Tari is a much better offensive rebounder than Herb which has become a way undervalued skill in my opinion. The Pelicans and Rockets were about as efficient at TS%, but the Rockets offense was slightly out of the top 10 while the Pelicans were near the bottom. This is mostly due to offensive rebounding and FVV not turning the ball over....two skills that just seem underrated very highly in fans' opinions (though 20 years ago, rebounding was so overrated). I think Tari's way more active on offense and with the offensive rebounding, makes him a better overall offensive player, but this could just be that I don't watch enough Pelicans. Herb just seems to be a shooter. Nothing wrong with that, other than it limits overall value. DFS is just a shooter as well.

Herb may be better than Tari. However, considering their age differences, I think Tari has a very good chance of being better going forward. I have not seen Herb as impactful as Tari was early last season. Perhaps Tari's leg never fully heals, but Tari has only had one injury, and all his absences were caused by playing through it and then playing through pain in most games during recovery. I'm not 100% sold on his injury status being as bad as most going forward. I think if he plays healthy. he's going to be much more impactful on two healthy legs than he been on just one these past two seasons. I personally may like Tari too much based on how good he looked early last season which is why I cited EPM (i.e., My opinion on Tari is higher than EPM's measurement as EPM is measuring every moment more or less equally while I think most of the data the past 2 seasons reflects how good an injured Tari is).

Caveat: I do like EPM as it generally is close to my opinion on Rockets players. I don't flip flop between stats (regarding what is an objective measure of a player's total ability, but I do use other stats to talk about particular details of a player's game), but if my memory serves, EPM is one of the lower all in one metrics on Tari when someone pasted a bunch of them early this year.

 

This is true. This does not make it worse than random fans' opinions, though.

If looking for an objective measurement, I'd put EPM as the top metric. I've heard good things about DARKO as well, but not seen a big difference.

 

I don't trust random fans' opinions either. But I'm not a random fan. I am me. So I trust my eye test. Just kidding.

Although there's no one metric I totally trust, I do think different numbers and even random fans' large sample opinions do give us some idea which players are good defenders and which are not, just can't precisely rank them.

Also, the fit factor plays an important role too. That's how coaches "hide" various players in their defensive schemes. I prefer to see it as ways of maximizing each player on the floor, similar to fitting players to maximize their impact on offense.

 

You misunderstood what I'm saying. Every single one of those "metrics" isn't a statistic. It's a convoluted calculation based on statistics that mostly just serves to push the narrative of the person who authored said metric. The weighting is never objective, it's always based entirely on the completely made up "authority" of the pundit defining the variables and which narrative they're pushing as the defining characteristic of "overall talent". They rarely hold up to real scrutiny. Neither do advanced stats for the most part, which is why the all-time PPG list looks more like the top scorers than the all-time TS% which looks like people who couldn't lick their boots...But the Morey crowd does love their numbers, even when they usually result in a load of ringless players being ranked higher than the actual greatest players of all time.

 

Yep, statisticians are in their lair pushing their narrative that counting how much impact a player has on +/ - as accurately as possible is a way to objectively measure a player. Teams must be evil as well for hiring these guys sometimes. Vegas definitely is evil for using these guys to help them make more money.

 

Nobody said there was any evil, bit weird, is that a religious thing? It's literally nerds arguing over who's "metric" is a more accurate indicator of overall talent, there's no objectivity, and your specific one isn't even based on anything particularly real. This is the description:


Estimated plus-minus (EPM) is a basketball statistic that estimates a player's overall impact on the game, going beyond basic box score statistics. It uses a statistical plus-minus (SPM) model to estimate a player's contribution per 100 possessions, combined with a regularized adjusted plus-minus (RAPM) calculation to capture broader impacts according to Reddit user r/nba. Essentially, it aims to provide a more comprehensive view of a player's value than traditional statistics.
Here's a breakdown of the key components:

• Statistical Plus-Minus (SPM):
  This component uses play-by-play and player-tracking data to estimate a player's impact on a per-possession basis. It often incorporates various box score stats like points, rebounds, assists, steals, and blocks.
• Regularized Adjusted Plus-Minus (RAPM):
  This component aims to capture aspects of a player's contribution that are not fully captured by SPM, such as team composition, defensive impact, and other less quantifiable factors. It uses a more sophisticated statistical model to estimate a player's impact on the team's scoring margin.

So it's an estimate based on estimates where these factors are weighted at the whims of the creator? And you think this is some accurate, know-all "statistic" seriously? It sounds clever at least, so I'm sure it dazzles a lot of people.

 

In comparison to fans' whims, statisticians trying to create a model to estimate a player's impact on +/-, and then throwing it into a mathematical model to remove the statistician's biases (mostly a limitation of data) and find value not measured by basic stats, as described in your snippet is about as objective as one can be.

Keep on thinking that fans opinions are objective, and statisticians metrics are inherently flawed.

 

I never said "fans opinions are objective." Seriously, show me where I said the things you're arguing against? I didn't, because you can't actually against the point I ACTUALLY ****ing made.

 

You've not explicitly said it. I'm sorry I misconstured your argument.

I'm sorry to all for using EPM as an attempt to avoid arguments to show Tari and Herb aren't that far apart in an objective manner and for it to backfire greatly. Even if Herb is better, I don't think it by some large margin.