11/05/24
April 16, 2004
Hedo Turkoglu is the best player in the NBA.: Thats what former Jeopardy champ Wayne Winston says. Is WINVAL really "Moneyball for the NBA"? warning: Mark Cuban & Jeff Sagarin are involved...
posted by lilnemo to basketball at 12:23 PM - 4 comments
This was a fascinating read. Thanks nemo. The only thing I really had a problem with was the whole "Najera and Nowitski are one of the most effective front lines". Well, maybe, but I think you also have to consider the quality of Najera's minutes. He usually only gets thrown in for either A) very specific matchups, or B) to finish cleaning up a team. I guess they're trying to resolve that via their "impact" ratings. This does explain a lot of the content on Cuban's blog though.
posted by Ufez Jones at 01:17 PM on April 16, 2004
While I think this sort of thing is useful, basketball is rather hard to break down. I suppose this makes up for the otherwise unaccountable, unobservable stats. There are certain players who just raise the energy level of the whole team, even if they don't contribute in the stats. You can always tell if you play the game yourself - if you start playing manic defense other people on your team will reach, move their feet, help out, dive on the floor, etc. You might only get 1 steal, but the whole team picks up... I imagine certain coaches, etc., like Isaiah, want to think that they intuitively can see these things happening on the floor and don't need stats to help them.
posted by BobbyC at 07:49 PM on April 18, 2004
I like the title of this post. I would have liked it better if it turned out to be someone like Wang Zhi Zhi.
posted by BobbyC at 07:50 PM on April 18, 2004
Earlier discussion on the subject.