Comments on: Danilo Gallinari giveth and he taketh away in New York’s win over the Pistons

By: Dan Feldman

Dan Feldman — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 10:33:33 +0000

Frankie, a quick explanation of Synergy: The service designates every play in every game into one of these categories:

Isolation
P&R ball handler
Post-up
P&R roll man
Spot-up
Off screen
Hand off
Cut
Offensive rebound
Transition
All other plays

Whether for a team or a player, you can see stats for each type of play, offensively and defensively. Like any stat, a human decides how it should be counted. Occasionally, I've seen a play that I would have put into a category other than the one it's listed as. But in a large majority of plays, I think they're labeled correctly.

By: frankie d

frankie d — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 21:05:25 +0000

mike,
the great thing about the festival is that the portland transit trains literally stop right at the square where the festival happens. so you just hop off the train, walk about 20 yards, grab your glass and start drinking.
i usually bike down in decent weather or just hop on the max – the train – if it’s raining, and don’t worry about a car. i’d say most folks end up taking transit and it makes for a very relaxed time for all.
it’s about a half mile walk from my house to the max stop, but it is definitely worth it to go down and be worry-free about indulging.
and just to give you an idea about what is going to be offered, here’s the beer list link:
http://holidayale.com/mitem-2010-beer-lists/standard-release.html?db4cc88de6a33bf999c840e985dfcf51=5fbdce4f2dc64b4d9dedf747a481d57b
it is truly a great time, a break from the rain, with some of the biggest and best beers brewed in the nation.
this is the one beer i’m really looking forward to:
“Block 15 Restaurant & Brewery • Figgy Pudding, Olde Stock
Brandy Barrel-Aged Strong Ale [Strong Ale] • ABV: 11.0% • IBUs: 44
This haunting Strong Ale is brewed with English pale and specialty malts and molasses, then matured in freshly emptied brandy barrels and conditioned with mission figs. It’s gently spiced with Ceylon cinnamon and whole nutmeg and further aged with English stock wild yeast.”
it’s a great little brewpub down in corvallis, the college town where oregon state is, and they do some of the best beers around. the owner and his brewing partner do some amazing stuff.
quality stuff.
life in beervana is good for beer drinkers. took the day off for the first day cause they always bring out a few surprises that aren’t listed.

By: Mike Payne

Mike Payne — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 20:54:34 +0000

@frankie d:
Basketbarguments aside, I am absolutely 100% jealous of you in that regard. That sounds amazing, an event that would single-handedly empty my bank account and get me tossed in the slammer.
Fortunately, there’s a beer bar opening a block away from my house with a 500+ bottle menu and more taps than I can count. I could crawl home if I had to. My lady, on the other hand, is a wine lover. Fortunately for her, the restaurant with the world’s largest wine cellar is a few blocks south. 500,000 bottles of wine, some over a century old. It’s fair to say I’m in a pretty great spot. :)
Have fun at the holiday ale fest, that sounds truly amazing. I’ll make it there one day!

By: frankie d

frankie d — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 19:51:29 +0000

btw, i think i understand the antipathy towards me.
mike payne is jealous.
mike payne, a self-described beer snob, is PO’d that i live in Beervana, AKA, portland, oregon, home to more craft beer establishments in the world.
just to make him even more jealous, tomorrow, portland’s holiday ale festival starts. it’s a 5 day fest – in an indoor tent set up in the downtown square – that features very heavy duty, winter ales. barley wines, olde english ales, double imperial stouts, double and triple imperial ales, double dark cascadian ales (otherwise known as black IPAs) and just a treasure trove of some of the best beers made anywhere in the country. and this festival specializes in ales that range from about 7%abv on the low scale to upwards to 13-15% at the high end of the abv scale. truly outrageous, delicious stuff that will be served up for 5 straight days.
all the best breweries are there: stone brewing, hair of the dog, dogfish head, pelican, full sail, bridgport…local faves like block 15 and ninkasi and walking man and double mountain.
so many beers, so little drinking time.
any beer snob would think they’d died and gone to heaven at this fest.

By: frankie d

frankie d — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 17:49:23 +0000

don’t be ridiculous.
some things can be measured by statistical analysis and others cannot.
for instance, the manner in which detroit plays defense when mcgrady is in the game. that can only be determined by watching the games.
(btw, i will say that that manner has changed quite a bit since the beginning of the year. initially, the team went to that 3-2 zone every time he was in the game. if they could settle into their half-court defense, that is what they set up in. in transition or when the defense had not had the chance to set up, then mcgrady might find himself on the perimeter, guarding someone. that changed about 3 or 4 games into the season. it still happens, but just not as exclusively as it did before.)
nba coaches hate to acknowledge that they play zone. and nba zones, especially, are often very fluid varieties of something like that old jud heathcote match-up zone which combines lots of man-to-man principles with a basic zone concept.
that is what happened at the beginning of the year, because mcgrady was simply incapable of playing defense on the perimeter. so incapable, the he was – and is still – incapable of getting rebounds that are not right within his reach. at the beginning of the year – it may have been in that first game, in fact – there was an embarrassing moment when a rebound came off the boards, was just a half-step away from him, but mcgrady was so incapable of moving quickly that the offensive rebounder basically took the ball away from him like an adult taking an ice cream cone away from a baby and scored on the offensive rebound.
anyone who’s watched the games cannot help but recall that moment and it was emblematic of mcgrady’s lack of movement. fortunately, he has improved somewhat, but he still cannot make the kind of rapid change of direction that excellent defenders make, which is why it is absurd to describe him as a top-notch defender.
so you can ask the coach how often the pistons play zone defense, but you will likely get a dishonest answer as is the norm when nba coaches talk about zone defenses.
(btw, i’ve seen not a single article by the local press about the pistons’ use of a zone. just another example of how the local press treats its readers like dummies who are more interested in people magazine style fluff articles rather than real BB articles. that issue would probably be an interesting one for an enterprising local sports journalist to discuss with coach k.)
but it is simple. all you have to do is watch the games. and when mcgrady and ben wallace – or whoever is playing center – are standing near the blocks in the lane, guarding whoever comes into their area, while the 3 other guys guard the perimeter, they are playing some variety of a 3-2 zone.
it happened a lot in the first few games. it is happening less as the season goes forward.
so, if i did not qualify my statement about the use of a zone, i’ll do so now. no biggie.
but is that the type of thing that one can measure? i guess if one had an archive of every game and looked at each play, sure, but i certainly don’t have that resource and it is not the type of stat that is readily available.
demanding that type of extraordinary endeavor is a far cry from simply asking that a blogger who has made certain statements based on stats simply provide the criteria upon which those stats were based.
it is truly odd that anyone who has relied on a stat would be resistant to simply saying, here is the criteria, this is how they came to their conclusions, have fun with it.
john hollinger is one of my favorite sports journalists. one of the go-to guys i read. his PERs are one of the most accurate ways to measure a player’s value, imho.
and when you go to hollinger’s page he gives very detailed explanations about what his ratings are and how he has come to those numbers and conclusions.
he obviously has confidence in what he is doing and offering.
again, cutting and pasting something that is readily available – or should be – in order to provide your readers with relevant and important information. if one has real confidence in what one is arguing.
the only reason someone would not do so is out of pique or because someone was afraid to reveal the basis for their conclusions.
it’s pretty simple.
btw, this entire discussion began because of YOUR post which i responded to. a colleague made certain statements which i contested, and for whatever reason, you’ve seen fit to jump in and defend those statements.
fine. no problem.
but, under those circumstances, it is clear which party has the burden of producing information to back up their claims. i’ve not made the claim that certain stats assert a specific claim. you have.
i am contesting that assertion and i cited a specific instance – korver – and other anecdotal evidence – the statements of your own colleague, dan feldman which were consistent with my view, statements you have chosen to ignore by simply stating that you don’t agree with mr. feldman on many issues – to make my point.
by the way, i never said that i’ve watched every minute or every game that mcgrady has played and it is not necessary that i have done so.
my claim is that i have seen instances that do are not consistent with the statistical claim made, and whether i needed to see one game or 2 games or 5 games in order to come up with those instances is irrelevant and immaterial.
if i had claimed that mcgrady has played this way in every game in every moment that is another matter, but i’ve made no such assertion.
if you are afraid to reveal the methodology – by simply cutting and pasting words – behind the stats you’ve used, the reason is obvious to anyone who cares to think about it.

By: Patrick Hayes

Patrick Hayes — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 13:45:46 +0000

I will take the time to cut and paste when you take the time to provide even one specific instance of the general statements you’ve made on this topic.
I’m done with interactions with you until you do that. You say things like “the Pistons always play 3-2 zone when McGrady is in the game.”
What are you citing when you make that statement? Have you watched every minute McGrady has played this year? Have you documented yourself that they have done this? Or are you just basing it on how you remember it happening?
Because if it’s the latter, no offense, but I don’t trust your judgment.
When you’ve said that McGrady’s men just “walk right around him” and go to the basket, what data, other than, “I saw it!” are you citing? Because again, I don’t trust your eyes. I don’t trust that you’ve watched every game, every minute McGrady has played this season.
You’re the one who is not providing sufficient evidence in this and every discussion you are a part of. You shout the loudest, you type the most words (other than maybe Laser, who invented and has the patent on wordiness around here, buddy), but you don’t present anything remotely disguised as data.
It’s all circumstantial. All based on your opinion of what’s happening when you’ve watched games and never backed up with any kind of stat or measure to say “this is what I saw, and here’s how I can actually prove that what I saw is accurate.”

By: frankie d

frankie d — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 08:43:21 +0000

you’ve got to be kidding.
i’m sure synergy has a more detailed explanation of how they complled their stats and the specific definitions used.
for instance…how do they define an iso or whatever term they use. that word is so inexact that it could mean any number of things.
is it an iso if someone comes over to help?
is it an iso if it is a play where the player catches and shoots before the defender can get to him?
is it an iso if the defender simply cannot catch up to the shooter and ends up trailing him through one or two picks?
a simple cut and paste would suffice.
you make it out to be rocket science. it isn’t. just reproduce what synergy has to say about their methods and then let your readers decide just how much credibility they want to give certain stats. it’s not that hard. any other way requires that readers simply take your word about how the numbers were gotten to.

By: Laser

Laser — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 23:30:22 +0000

@pcb: “inane??” 2 assists in 43 minutes for a notional starting PG?? your jab would bother me if you had a leg to stand on or made sense half the time. though i guess DEL is right that you thought i meant one assist in each overtime, but i didn’t. so, uh, yeah you get it. be careful throwing around insults.

@hayes: you know how i feel about numbers, but assists are certainly an important stat for a point guard. stuckey has all these physical tools, but he’s a dud with decisions. catch the consecutive drives that got blocked at the end of the game, by chance? he has no vision, no instincts, no passing ability. he does one thing well, and that’s score. so he shouldn’t be our point guard. i could care less how many points he scores in losses. we have plenty of guys who can score. stuckey’s supposed to help them get easier baskets. he has made improvements in some areas, but not where we need him: running the offense, making plays. i could care less about his shooting percentage right now. in three of the last four games he collected six assists. six. over three games. he’s a dud. get him out of here while he’s on his rookie contract and worth a decent return OR make room for him to just focus on scoring. i want to root for him, i really do. but he’s a dud of a PG. an absolute dud.

By: Patrick Hayes

Patrick Hayes — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 22:50:08 +0000

Geez. I just went back to read Mike's posts. Here were some things I gleaned:

"So far this season, Synergy has documented 10 iso play attempts against McGrady this season, only 2 of those 10 converted."

"I just watched every single video of McGrady guarding a player in isolation on the perimeter. The videos include McGrady guarding Brandon Roy, Gerald Wallace, Stephen Jackson, Paul Pierce, Kevin Durant and Travis Outlaw. Of those, only Paul Pierce scored, and the only other player that was able to create a line to the basket was Stephen Jackson who McGrady forced into Ben Wallace who took the charge."

Those both sound like very reasonable explanations of the methods used for the stat Mike cited. What are you confused about? What is not transparent about how this data was collected?

Conversely, here was the crux of your argument in that thread:

"i have no idea how that stat is compiled, but it bears no relation to what this fan has seen on the court."

You're basing the entire argument on what you, personally, saw. I'm not hating on you for that, we all do that. Everyone's view of things is different and affected by about a million individual biases or frames of reference.

But that's what stats are for. Mike stats show that when McGrady has been isolated one-on-one against an individual player, that has rarely led to a basket for the other team this season.

If you disagree with the stat, that's fine. But you're bringing no contrary data to the table. Using your example above, what if Tracy McGrady was on death row for being accused of poor defense.

Mike Payne is his defense attorney, arguing that in the 10 possessions this season that T-Mac has been isolated against an offensive player with the ball, eight times he's prevented his man from scoring. His data includes video clips of each play.

Then you, the crucial witness for the prosecution, get on the stand. "Mr. D, why does T-Mac deserve the chair for his bad defense?"

Mr. D: "Because he lets virtually every player walk around him to the basket."

Defense: "Do you have data to show how often McGrady's man has got to the basket and scored this season?"

Mr. D: "My eyes are all the data I need."

Defense: "You say that the Pistons always go into a 3-2 zone when McGrady comes into the game. Do you have data or a percentage to say how often this has occurred?"

Mr. D: "I saw it. With my EYES."

Judge: "Guilty!"

It's fine that you're skeptical of Mike's stats. But he's at least basing his statements on some tangible data. There's no possible way to evaluate your contention because you are not saying, "In x number of possessions, Kyle Korver scored and it was totally T-Mac's fault." You're the one who is not presenting transparent data that is easy for people to make a determination about its merit.

By: frankie d

frankie d — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 22:12:12 +0000

“…since I was so wrong to question one dude’s opinion with, ya know, recorded data.”
look, i’ve questioned expert witnesses on the stand and the only thing that makes their opinion – something that can send someone to their death – worth a darn is when and if they reveal the way that their recorded data was evaluated and based on.
the idea that anyone can simply come up with numbers that are compiled in god knows what way and expect that someone should accept those numbers is ridiculous.
what was the criteria?
what instances were looked at?
how were the definitions used arrived at?
those are some of the most basic questions anyone who looks at data has to ask.
i’ve seen you produce none of that information, but instead simply fall back on the idea that these stats are valid and should be accepted, without explaining why they are comprehensive or valid at all.
and when i point out a specific instance that apparently was not included in your sample, all of a sudden a new definition comes into play. kyle korver’s torching of mcgrady somehow didn’t qualify because of…
whatever.
like i said, i’ve questioned guys for a freaking living whose job it is to come up with numbers to make their arguments. i have no problem with relying on numbers to make an argument. but such an argument is only valid if EVERYONE has access to the manner in which those numbers were arrived at. to expect anything else is to expect people to accept information based on faith, like religions do.