Better starting 5 poll.

[theNBAnerd]

Why doesn't this time count against the Wizards or the Bobcats?

it does, but my argument is that solid play in the clutch against the wizards isn't as valuable as solid play in the clutch against the lakers. the wizards game is a game we should be able to win anyway, so him going nuts in the final five minutes there is nice, but does little to impact the big pictures.

it's kind of like the expected value argument in relation to blocked shots. advanced metrics show that blocking a 20-footer isn't as valuable as blocking a layup because the layup had a much better chance of going in to begin with. helping us beat the bobcats? that's kind of like blocking a three-quarter court heave.

Confirmation bias.

pretty much already admitted to that, but ok. like i said, most of my opinions on al come from qualitative analysis... and then some of the quantitative data supports it while others fail to account for his weaknesses, like that he has never successfully defended a pick and roll in his life. that doesn't show up in his PER or his win shares.

 

[colton]

it does, but my argument is that solid play in the clutch against the wizards isn't as valuable as solid play in the clutch against the lakers. the wizards game is a game we should be able to win anyway, so him going nuts in the final five minutes there is nice, but does little to impact the big pictures.

Clutch Statistics: 4th quarter or overtime, less than 5 minutes left, neither team ahead by more than 5 points

I'm having trouble reconciling the two bolded statements.

 

[One Brow]

it does, but my argument is that solid play in the clutch against the wizards isn't as valuable as solid play in the clutch against the lakers. the wizards game is a game we should be able to win anyway, so him going nuts in the final five minutes there is nice, but does little to impact the big pictures.

it's kind of like the expected value argument in relation to blocked shots. advanced metrics show that blocking a 20-footer isn't as valuable as blocking a layup because the layup had a much better chance of going in to begin with. helping us beat the bobcats? that's kind of like blocking a three-quarter court heave.

I'm still confused. My understanding is that your opinion includes all the statements below. Do I have any of these points wrong?
1. The Jazz are a better team than the Wizards, and should be expected to win most of their games against them
2. In a particular game, the Wizards are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
3. The Jazz are a worse team than the Lakers, and should be expected to lose most of their games against them
4. In a particular game, the Lakers are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
5. In these games where the other team has been playing about as well as we have, it is more meaningful for Jefferson that he plays well against the Lakers than the Wizards

 

[theNBAnerd]

I'm having trouble reconciling the two bolded statements.

you think being up by 5 against the bobcats in the final minutes has the same "expected value" as being up by 5 against the mavs in the final minutes?

 

[One Brow]

I'm having trouble reconciling the two bolded statements.

I'm relieved to know I'm not the only one.

 

[One Brow]

you think being up by 5 against the bobcats in the final minutes has the same "expected value" as being up by 5 against the mavs in the final minutes?

I think the size of the difference in expected values is miniscule compared to the standard error in those values, rendering that comparison almost meaningless.

 

[theNBAnerd]

I'm still confused. My understanding is that your opinion includes all the statements below. Do I have any of these points wrong?
1. The Jazz are a better team than the Wizards, and should be expected to win most of their games against them
2. In a particular game, the Wizards are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
3. The Jazz are a worse team than the Lakers, and should be expected to lose most of their games against them
4. In a particular game, the Lakers are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
5. In these games where the other team has been playing about as well as we have, it is more meaningful for Jefferson that he plays well against the Lakers than the Wizards

there are many problems with those statements. first of all, the quality gap that separates the lakers from the jazz isn't as wide as the quality gap that separates the jazz from the wizards. but that's not even central to my argument; in fact, none of those five points are central to my argument.

my argument is this: there are games you will probably win and games you will probably lose. then there are games that are winnable, but you need solid performances to do it, especially from your supposed stars. if we looked at every game this year that the jazz lost where they had a realistic shot at winning in the 4th quarter, we'd find a common denominator: al coming up small. i know this for a fact because i researched it in late february, and up to that point, every game that fit into that category featured a big old fail by al. he shot 14% in the fourth quarters of those games. i never updated the study to include march and april, but if i did, i'm guessing we would find a bunch of times when al left us hanging in fourth quarters of winnable games against good teams.

and, for what it's worth, paul shot 52% in those same fourth quarters, while also getting to the line more and rebounding more. all of which begs the question -- when we're in a tight game in the fourth quarter, why aren't we just going to paul all the time?

 

[northeast]

some games are more important or more challenging than others

 

[theNBAnerd]

you think being up by 5 against the bobcats in the final minutes has the same "expected value" as being up by 5 against the mavs in the final minutes?

I think the size of the difference in expected values is miniscule compared to the standard error in those values, rendering that comparison almost meaningless.

c'mon, you really believe that?? i mean, statistics and standard and error and whatever aside, we're talking about the bobcats. they won 7 total games last season, including ONE game where they came back from being down entering the fourth quarter (by 1). in 5 of their 7 wins, they won despite being outscored in the 4th, often by double figures. in other words, being up by 5 points on the bobcats with less than 5 minutes to play is essentially being guaranteed a win.

sure, it counts in al's clutch statistics (and paul's, and devin's, etc.) but there's no way you can really believe that there's not a different expected outcome when you're in the position against the bobcats as opposed to mavericks.

 

[gregbroncs]

I'm still confused. My understanding is that your opinion includes all the statements below. Do I have any of these points wrong?
1. The Jazz are a better team than the Wizards, and should be expected to win most of their games against them
2. In a particular game, the Wizards are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
3. The Jazz are a worse team than the Lakers, and should be expected to lose most of their games against them
4. In a particular game, the Lakers are within a handful of points late in the game (presumably having played as about as well as the Jazz up to that point)
5. In these games where the other team has been playing about as well as we have, it is more meaningful for Jefferson that he plays well against the Lakers than the Wizards

He pretty much stated that he wants to use the stats when the benefit his argument and chooses to ignore them when they don't. That's the point at which I stopped arguing and decided that it is pointless.

 

[theNBAnerd]

He pretty much stated that he wants to use the stats when the benefit his argument and chooses to ignore them when they don't. That's the point at which I stopped arguing and decided that it is pointless.

yes, precisely.

in all seriousness, i don't think it's a stretch to say that al is not as good as his stats. it's not like i'm the only person saying such a thing. look around to what national people and scouts say about the jazz: they pretty much all say that al puts up great numbers but leaves a lot of intangibles on the table. that's exactly what i'm saying here, and why given the choice between a favors/al future or a favors/paul future, i take favors/paul every single time.

 

[billyshelby]

I'm not sure any study of Al's clutch value would be valid if it didn't specifically isolate his stats in, just to pick a number, the last 5 minutes of a game within, just to pick a number, 5 points.

Plenty of games are within 5 points either way to start the 4th. But not all those games are close down the stretch.

 

[billyshelby]

well first of all i disagree with the premise that we have to run the offense that way. the offensive philosophy of "dump the ball into the low post and then watch that one guy do all the work" is not the most effective one. when you have two skilled bigs who can score down low but also have different strengths out to 15 feet (or beyond, in millsap's case), you can run some high-post/low-post motion stuff that gives you a ton of possibilities for those two guys and everyone else playing off them. it's the kind of system we ran when booz and memo were starters, but we've gone away from it the last two seasons so we can watch al jefferson use the same up-and-under move 20 times per game.

This argument is a pet peeve of mine. The offense was never a 'dump the ball into the low post offense.' It looked like that at times because we had incompetent wings who couldn't cut, and it looked worse because Ty ran virtually no PnR. But even with those failures, we still had the 7th ranked offense in the league. And the guys contributing most of that offense were Al and Sap.

 

[theNBAnerd]

This argument is a pet peeve of mine. The offense was never a 'dump the ball into the low post offense.' It looked like that at times because we had incompetent wings who couldn't cut, and it looked worse because Ty ran virtually no PnR. But even with those failures, we still had the 7th ranked offense in the league. And the guys contributing most of that offense were Al and Sap.

well sorta. the guys contributing most of that offensive VOLUME were al and sap. but in terms of who contributed the offensive efficiency, i'm not sure you can count al. for every possession that ends in an al jefferson attempt (FGA + FTA*0.44) , the jazz get 1.04 points. since the jazz's 7th-best offensive efficiency you're referring to is 1.037 points per possession, al is not leading the way or carrying the team... he's essentially middle-of-the-pack in terms of providing offensive efficiency.

meanwhile, we get 1.09 points for every possession that ends in a paul attempt, 1.074 when it's favors.

(and, by the way, i used points per "attempt" instead of points per shot so i could compare it to team efficiency, even though PPA forgives al's inability to make it to the free throw line. if we used PPS it looks even worse: 1.116 for al, 1.232 for paul, 1.281 for derrick. in other words, if you took 100 of al's shots and gave them to paul and derrick, you'd get 12-17 additional points.)

short version: we're not the 7th most efficient offensive team because of al jefferson.

 

[billyshelby]

well sorta. the guys contributing most of that offensive VOLUME were al and sap. but in terms of who contributed the offensive efficiency, i'm not sure you can count al. for every possession that ends in an al jefferson attempt (FGA + FTA*0.44) , the jazz get 1.04 points. since the jazz's 7th-best offensive efficiency you're referring to is 1.037 points per possession, al is not leading the way or carrying the team... he's essentially middle-of-the-pack in terms of providing offensive efficiency.

meanwhile, we get 1.09 points for every possession that ends in a paul attempt, 1.074 when it's favors.

(and, by the way, i used points per "attempt" instead of points per shot so i could compare it to team efficiency, even though PPA forgives al's inability to make it to the free throw line. if we used PPS it looks even worse: 1.116 for al, 1.232 for paul, 1.281 for derrick. in other words, if you took 100 of al's shots and gave them to paul and derrick, you'd get 12-17 additional points.)

short version: we're not the 7th most efficient offensive team because of al jefferson.

Didn't you just have a post about the fact certain guys can be inefficient and yet a team is more efficient with them on the floor? My point really had nothing to do with volume. And it goes back to my other opinion that a Sap/Favors frontcourt would likely be very challenged to score. A couple points:

1) Al doesn't score at a gross level of inefficiency. He's just more inefficient, although most guys couldn't match his efficiency with the same attempts.
2) Al's scoring obviously helped our offense a great deal unless you think his absence would have resulted in us being better than 7th.
3) Al's presence very likely makes our whole offense better. You can scheme all kinds of offenses for Sap and Favors, but the high/lows you were talking about requires somebody who is a threat to drive. We don't have that. The key difference between Al and Sap/Favors is he doesn't need to be set up while they do. There's a value in that you're completely underestimating.

 

[theNBAnerd]

1) Al doesn't score at a gross level of inefficiency. He's just more inefficient, although most guys couldn't match his efficiency with the same attempts.

you don't know that. paul is significantly more efficient on three fewer attempts. paul is also a lot more versatile offensively.

2) Al's scoring obviously helped our offense a great deal unless you think his absence would have resulted in us being better than 7th.

numerically, you could remove al's scoring and we would have virtually the same offensive efficiency. al's possessions are neither more fruitful nor less fruitful than the average jazz possession. 1.04 versus 1.037.

3) Al's presence very likely makes our whole offense better. You can scheme all kinds of offenses for Sap and Favors, but the high/lows you were talking about requires somebody who is a threat to drive. We don't have that. The key difference between Al and Sap/Favors is he doesn't need to be set up while they do. There's a value in that you're completely underestimating.

i'm not underestimating it, i'm disagreeing with it. paul can create for himself, and he can do so without ignoring the other 4 players on the floor. he can also do it from various spots and angles, where al is only effective at creating for himself on the low left block. i also think you're wrong about nobody on this team being a threat to drive. but again, we'll never know as long as al is putting up 18-20 attempts per game with a single-digit assist rating.

 

[One Brow]

c'mon, you really believe that?? i mean, statistics and standard and error and whatever aside, we're talking about the bobcats. they won 7 total games last season, including ONE game where they came back from being down entering the fourth quarter (by 1). in 5 of their 7 wins, they won despite being outscored in the 4th, often by double figures. in other words, being up by 5 points on the bobcats with less than 5 minutes to play is essentially being guaranteed a win.

Nothing like the benefit of hindsight. when you are actually in the game, I'd wager you feel just as much urgency in the Bobcats game as in the Lakers. In the standings, every game counts equally. Any team can be hot for the next five minutes of play, even the Bobcats.

 

[One Brow]

for every possession that ends in an al jefferson attempt (FGA + FTA*0.44) , the jazz get 1.04 points. ...meanwhile, we get 1.09 points for every possession that ends in a paul attempt, 1.074 when it's favors.

Isn't that what you typically expect when comparing a primary offensive option to a secondary offensive option? When was the last year Bryant led the Lakers in PPA? When Duncan led the Spurs?

 

[theNBAnerd]

Isn't that what you typically expect when comparing a primary offensive option to a secondary offensive option? When was the last year Bryant led the Lakers in PPA? When Duncan led the Spurs?

now you're changing the argument, and you're wrong anyway.

first your argument was "the jazz are efficient because of al." which they're not. al doesn't bring up team efficiency at all, he's a perfectly average player relative to team efficiency. so then you pivoted the argument to "oh other stars don't do that either." and you're wrong on that, btw. kobe's possessions net 1.11 points, compared to 1.03 on average for the lakers. lebron's possessions net 1.21 points compared to miami's 1.04. durant is at 1.22 compared to OKC's 1.07. you're right about TD (1.06 compared to 1.085), but that's why TD is no longer their #1 offensive option. if you go back to just about any season before 09-10, when his attempts, scoring and minutes all dropped, you'll see the same trend -- like 1.10 in 08-09 when his team was at 1.06.

so yeah, most team's supposed "best players" do actually move the needle UP in terms of efficiency.

 

[northeast]

OneB has been Nerded hard!