What these stats show me is that the Rockets had the best "The Rest" rating in the whole list, meaning that the Rockets' other players--besides Yao, Battier, and Hayes--scored more wins than anyone else in the league. Which tells me that the Rockets are a balanced team with the least reliance on a "big three." Regardless, I am skeptical of using these stats this way. You might say they reflect who has the most unbalanced team or the shortest rotation.
Several of the top trios ahead of the Rockets were on teams that didn't even make the playoffs. Stats are nice but they can never capture all the abilities and impact of a player or a team. It is interesting to see though how much of an impact Deke had during the last two seasons according to these wp48 stats.
Once a tool, always a too. If Charley Rosen compliments the Rockets for once, the media has become a mormone group.
"Houston should win more than 50 games"? What? If that's the best prediction you can make, it might be time to tweak your system. And no, these stats are likely nothing like what Morey uses. Morey is in the business of putting together an actual team, not making neat lists and producing hits on a web site.
I have respect for his stats but its based on a level of team success, if the team wins less games then those players that stand out get more credit for the level of success they do achieve, which is why you see Kaman ranked higher. For the most part he does have a point, the Rockets were able to win without Yao or Mac because the strength of the supporting cast, achieving this without Tmac dominating in stretches has to have implications on his stats. After all if hes not doing the work someone else must be, and after Tmac having one of the worst years of his career its no surprise hes credited for creating less wins. The numbers could end up rating this trio among the best in the league by this time next year and youll see him writing up an article about how improved they were from one year to the next and he will undoubtably be right but that just gos to show how little predictive powers these numbers have. If the players perform the same way they did last year, THIS YEAR then they wont be a ELITE trio. I think the answer is somewhere in the middle.
