115 replies to this topic

[Mason Khamvilay]

 I really do not understand your dogmatic stance. you say it isn't, but it is.

I don't understand this. Elaborate. 

[miketheodio]

I don't understand this. Elaborate. 

 

they guard/team doesnt need to incorporate the short-mid range game (the "MUST" part). it seems like you wouldn't mind a shot or 2, but actually incorporating it into the offense, for lets say 10% of the possession, sounds like heresy.

 

i agree with you from a theoretical stance, but in practice, the mid range (NOT LONG 2) has to be there to disrupt the defense, open up opportunities, and exploit what the defense is giving you. if there isn't a concerted effort to develop that part of the game, then it won't be effective. 

 

I mean what do you say when the 3 ball isn't going in and defenses are handling the offense that night? there needs to be a plan B. you know, grind it out games. i don't want to end up like the GSW who are depended on shots going in.

 

what do you see the offense developing into as the team progresses?

[Mason Khamvilay]

the mid range (NOT LONG 2) has to be there to disrupt the defense

I agree that a mid-range shot will help give us another option, but I don't believe a mid-range shot is a pre-requisite of "disrupting the defense" like you do.

 

what do you see the offense developing into as the team progresses?

I believe we already overachieved by being a top 6 offense, and we can become the best offense in the league by doing what we're already doing but better. Here's how we can do it better (roughly in order with what will help the most being at the top):

 

Another go-to option. Out of all the best offenses in the league, we have the least amount of talent/stars.

Ball movement. Sometimes our ball movement is great, but like McHale says sometimes we get "sticky".

Less turnovers. I understand that a fast pace means more turnovers, but alot of our turnovers are just coming from careless mistakes.

Better defense. It will give our fast breaks a boost if we weren't taking the ball out the bottom of the net so often.

Better outside shooting. 35% is okay, but I think we have the talent to get it to 38%

 

 

Mid-range shot. It's not necessary, but it's nice to have this in the arsenal. Sort of like how you don't need to jump high to grab a lot of rebounds, but it can help. 

[thejohnnygold]

Check out this page from www.hoopdata.com

 

This page has loads of data.  Looking at the shot locations chart you can click on the headers at the top of each list to sort the stats according to that column.  Clicking on the 16-23 ft fg% column shows that the top 5 teams shooting these shots were: BOS, MIA, DAL, SAS, and OKC.  Now, that's 3 of the NBA's "championship caliber" teams (I'm counting OKC in that group).  It is interesting to note that the teams with higher %'s from this area also have a higher assist % on those shots.  This indicates that the shots they are taking are more often going to be "open" shots.

[miketheodio]

ok so what do you do if 3s aren't going in and there is a good rim defender? this is the plan B aspect.
 
is there no advantage to getting a defender on the block coming up to defend the short mid range jumper?
 
keep in mind these stats are an overview for the entire season. you have to incorporate terrible defense and the other extreme. same with offense.
 
i dunno just seems too theoretical to me with little nuance for practical applications. it's a good philosophy i just think you have to be more like water my friend.

 

 

[Mason Khamvilay]

Check out this page from www.hoopdata.com

 

This page has loads of data.  Looking at the shot locations chart you can click on the headers at the top of each list to sort the stats according to that column.  Clicking on the 16-23 ft fg% column shows that the top 5 teams shooting these shots were: BOS, MIA, DAL, SAS, and OKC.  Now, that's 3 of the NBA's "championship caliber" teams (I'm counting OKC in that group).  It is interesting to note that the teams with higher %'s from this area also have a higher assist % on those shots.  This indicates that the shots they are taking are more often going to be "open" shots.

I feel like you're being very misleading. Miami and SA both are among the bottom 7 in shots taken from that range. If you're looking for a correlation, it's much less misleading if you look at it the way mentioned in this article: 

 

http://hoopcityblog....n-team-offense/

[thejohnnygold]

I feel like you're being very misleading. Miami and SA both are among the bottom 7 in shots taken from that range. If you're looking for a correlation, it's much less misleading if you look at it the way mentioned in this article: 

 

http://hoopcityblog....n-team-offense/

Dude, I'm not misleading anything.  I said that three of the NBA's championship contending teams shoot well from there.  You should look again, Miami is 11th.  SAS, at 7th, shoot 16.5 attempts per game.  Miami shoots 17.3 per game.  Houston shoots 9.8/game.  You can read it how you like.  I'm saying good teams take good shots and they go in more often....even if 16-17 of them are long 2's.

[Mason Khamvilay]

ok so what do you do if 3s aren't going in

We shoot 39% from 10-15 feet, and 36% from 16-23 feet. In order to be less efficient than 39% from 10-15 feet, we would need to shoot below 27% from 3's--how often will that happen? I'll take my chances. 

[miketheodio]

your sig is extremely ironic.

 

no one is saying the rockets need to become the bulls or the grizzlies.

[thejohnnygold]

I feel like you're being very misleading. Miami and SA both are among the bottom 7 in shots taken from that range. If you're looking for a correlation, it's much less misleading if you look at it the way mentioned in this article: 

 

http://hoopcityblog....n-team-offense/

This is a cool chart--not sure what to take from it.  Seems scattered and inconclusive to me...what do you see?

[Steven]

Any shot that is taking outside the paint (and its paint distance along the baseline) that is inside the three point line is bad judgement shot. 12' inside or behind the three point line. That's it.

[Mason Khamvilay]

I see a correlation between shots taken from 16-23 feet and offensive efficiency. I'm starting to repeat myself now and that usually means the discussion has come to and end, there's not much more to say. I respect everyone's opinion. Good discussion. 

[thejohnnygold]

I saw that two of the teams with the lowest scores are still in the playoffs.  Agree, done here.  This was a short lived thread.

[Mason Khamvilay]

Well I think we can branch out into other stat based discussions, there have been so many interesting stat based articles I've read besides the mid-range philosophy. For example, some people overrated Oscar Robertson because he averaged a triple double for 6 straight seasons. The main problem with taking his numbers at face value is that teams in his era played at an extremely fast pace which gave his team at least 30 more possessions than today's average paced team. Our Houston Rockets would look like a "walk it up" team in comparison.

 

In you plug Big O's best numbers into today's average pace, they numbers would come out 26/6/7--still impressive but worth noting. If you plug Lebron's numbers into Oscar Robertson's pace you would get 40/10/10.

 

Here's an article written by John Hollinger in 2011--back when he was just a writer and not yet the VP of the Memphis Grizzlies: 

 

30.8. 

12.5. 

11.4. 

Together, those three numbers -- the points, rebounds and assists Oscar Robertson averaged in 1961-62 for the Cincinnati Royals -- comprise one of the most hallowed marks in basketball history. That season the Big O became the only player in league history to average a triple-double for a season, and in the years since few players have even come close. 

But this year, two players appear poised to make a stab at it. The first is no stranger to the triple-double -- Jason Kidd of the Nets. Though New Jersey's point guard is getting up in years at 34, he came as close to Robertson's feat as anyone in a long time last season, averaging 13.0 points, 9.2 assists and 8.2 rebounds. This season he's making an even stronger run at the triple-double, averaging 11.6 points, 10.7 assists and 8.6 rebounds through New Jersey's first 17 games. 

The other is LeBron James. While his per-game numbers recently took a step back when he checked out after 19 minutes against Detroit, his stats though 16 games still look reminiscent of Oscar's: 30.7 points, 8.1 rebounds and 7.6 assists. He had triple-doubles on back-to-back nights in November and has four on the season. None of them were cheapies, either -- he scored at least 30 points in all of them. 

Since both players are chasing history, it's time to take a closer look at the phenomenon of averaging a triple-double for an entire season. 


Why hasn't it been done in so long?

Because the game slowed down, basically. This is a phenomenon of Oscar's triple-double that still isn't commonly understood. The late '50s and early '60s in general, and the 1961-62 season in particular, were played at such a phenomenally fast pace that it's hard to draw a parallel in today's game. Let's just say the Golden State Warriors would be considered staid slowpokes in 1961-62; the average team scored 118.8 points per game that season. 

This is even more amazing when you consider all the bricks that were fired up that season. The league shooting percentage was 42.6 percent, and the true shooting mark was 47.9 percent. For offenses around the league, it was a case of quantity over quality. 

Robertson benefited, especially in the rebounding category. Remember, you can get a rebound only if somebody misses a shot. With so many more missed shots to gather, there were nearly 70 percent more chances for a rebound than there are today. With teams shooting early in the clock and mostly missing, four different players averaged over 18 rebounds a game that season -- in an eight-team league! 

On the other hand, even with all the high scoring, Robertson had to earn his assists -- scorers were far less lenient in awarding them in those days, with the result that the Big O was the only player that season to average more than eight assists per game. 



Still, the pace as a whole gave him an enormous advantage in the triple-double quest, because at the league's 2006-07 pace he'd be looking at averaging 7.4 assists per game rather than 11.4. Similarly, his scoring average would lose some of its mojo, dropping to 27.6 per game. 


What would it take for LeBron to average a triple-double?

Based on the previous discussion, your first instinct is to say, "Increase the pace!" 

Not so fast. 

Think about what would really be required to ramp up the pace for the Cavs. Basically, they'd need a jackrabbit point guard who was constantly pushing it up court looking for early opportunities. That would help King James's scoring stats and probably his rebounds, too. 

But he doesn't need more points in his triple-double chase. And it would likely starve him of assists -- the one category where James is most likely to struggle reaching double figures -- with Mr. Jackrabbit now pulling in a bunch of them. 

The fact is, you can play only so fast if you're running every play through a 6-foot-8, 240-pound forward. So it's unlikely that increasing the tempo would do as much for LeBron's hopes as it did for the Big O's. 

Instead, he would need two events that would increase both his rates of assists and rebounds. Right now he's averaging about one per five minutes in both categories; quick math will tell you that even if he plays every minute of a 48-minute game, he won't get to double figures in either. I should point out that he's unlikely to hit either threshold this year, but since James is only 22 and still improving, he figures to have several more shots at Oscar's mark. 

The easier obstacle is increasing his rebounds, which would probably require the same phenomenon Kidd is experiencing in New Jersey -- being surrounded by big guys who can't rebound. Kidd's big guys are poor rebounders, so there are a lot of defensive boards available for him to swoop in and grab; James doesn't have the same benefit. Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Drew Gooden are among the best rebounding frontcourt combos in basketball, so there aren't a lot of leftover scraps for LeBron. If one or both of them were to get injured/traded/benched, it might create enough of a void to push the King's rebounding average into double figures. 

Averaging double figures in assists is also problematic. The issue here, basically, is that James is too good. You can't assist a basket to yourself, and with James pouring in over 30 a game, that takes away an awful lot of opportunities for assists. (This is also why Michael Jordan, for instance, never hit double figures in assists). 

Probably the best chance for James would be if the Cavs surrounded him with a bunch of deadly jump shooters who can't score off the dribble. That way, nearly all their baskets would be assisted, because most of them would come as a catch-and-shoot straight off a pass. More often than not, the man delivering those passes would be James. 

The Cavs actually employ several players of this type already, except they aren't of nearly high enough quality. As a result, too many of those jumpers off passes from LeBron rim out, depriving him off that extra assist or two a night he needs to hit the triple-double mark. 

For this season, rebounding seems his biggest obstacle to the triple-double mark, because Z and Gooden are going to take a lot of boards away. But as I mentioned above, he probably won't make it in assists, either, and long-term that seems the bigger problem. He needs better players around him who require him to score less, and he needs them to be of a certain type -- something along the lines of four Peja Stojakovics would be the ideal. 


What about Kidd?

For this season, Jason Kidd has a much better chance of averaging a triple-double than James. I say that for a couple reasons. First, obviously, his averages are higher. Kidd is over the threshold in assists and close to it in rebounds.

Second, Kidd isn't under any pressure to take over games as a scorer. The points hurdle is the easiest requirement, by far, so a player like Kidd might actually be more likely to break the triple-double barrier than one like James, simply because he can focus more on the assists part of the equation. 

There's another factor involving Kidd, too, and I'm conflicted as to whether it works for him or against him: The fact that most of his teammates stink. Yes, he has Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson, but the Nets also have a starting center who scores once every lunar eclipse and precious little else in reserve, and that has some serious implications for a guy who's trying to average double figures in assists. 

On the one hand, having offensively challenged teammates means they can't convert as many of his passes into baskets, which tends to keep Kidd's assist numbers down. On the other, it also means they rarely score on their own, which means they depend on a pass from Kidd to get a bucket, which tends to push his assist numbers up. 

If you don't believe me, check out the Nets' team numbers on the season, because they're ridiculous. The team is dead last in field goals per game at 31.4, with more than two fewer than any other team. Yet the Nets are ninth in assists! 

Think about that for a second ... you can't get an assist unless somebody makes a basket, and the Nets make far fewer of them than anyone. For them to be in the upper half in assists tells you they must be scoring nearly all their baskets as a result of a pass. And in fact, they are, with a league-leading 71.7 percent of their buckets coming off an assist. 

While Kidd looks to be in decent shape in this category, to stay over the 10-assist threshold, he needs the Nets to remain an assist-dependent bunch or, alternatively, for them to start knocking down more shots. 

Kidd's other big advantage is that both starting frontcourt players are allergic to rebounds. If he does break through and average a triple-double this season, he should remember to thank Jason Collins and Malik Allen. The fact that both are such poor rebounders leaves a lot more defensive boards available for Kidd to yank down; conversely, if the Nets somehow traded for Reggie Evans, Kidd's hopes would be dashed pretty quickly. 

More realistically, an increase in playing time for Sean Williams and Josh Boone at the expense of Allen and the ridiculous Collins (seriously, 4.6 rebounds per 40 minutes from a starting NBA center?) could start taking rebounds off Kidd's plate. And he needs every rebound he can get; even now, he's 1.4 rebounds per game short of double figures. Given the near-perfect conditions he's already in, it's hard to think of what else could improve his situation here. 

But if Kidd can boost his rebounding numbers still further, he'll need a couple of other things could push him over the top. For starters, lots of close games. The Nets have been blown out of the gym a few times already, and those games hurt Kidd's minutes, which in turn hurt his averages. For instance, he played only 24 minutes in the 106-69 loss to Toronto and finished with two points, six assists and three rebounds; and he played 27 minutes and went 2-8-2 in a 27-point loss to Utah. 

Some overtime games would be nice, too. Those are "free" minutes available for padding stats; if the Nets were to have several of these, some of which went to double or triple OT, that would be a welcome development for Kidd's quest. 

Even so, it seems awfully likely he won't get enough rebounds to make it -- even with a much higher rebound rate than the Big O's. This underscores just how much Robertson benefited from the fast pace in this category. 


What's a triple-double really worth?

The other part of the discussion here is what it would mean if one of these players broke the triple-double barrier. By comparing the scoring averages of Kidd and James, one thing that immediately becomes obvious is that not all triple-doubles are created equal. Kidd often limps just over the threshold with 10 or 11 points, while James, as I mentioned above, has posted nothing but 30-plus efforts this season. In fact, Kidd's PER this season is much lower than in previous ones because he's scoring so much less. 

This stems from the fact that the triple-double itself is a contrived stat. In fact, if you wanted to compare somebody's ability to be a triple threat, there's a far better statistic out there, and it's something I call "versatility index." 

Inspired by the power-speed number Bill James created for baseball, the versatility index multiplies points, rebounds and assists and takes the cube root of the result. I know that "cube root" part sounds scary to the mathophobes, but trust me, it's relatively painless. We end up with one number that provides a composite average of the player's numbers in the three categories. 

The catch is that by multiplying instead of adding, we reward players who are strong in all three categories and penalize those who are weak in one. For instance, a player who averages 10 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists gets a 10.0 versatility index; but one who averages 20 points, 10 rebounds and one assist earns just a 5.8. You'll see that immediately in the chart:

Versatility Index, 2006-07 leaders

This chart shows how much more impressive James' triple-crown stats are than anyone else's in basketball. Despite Kidd's being slightly ahead of him in the triple-double quest, James' 12.4 versatility index dwarfs that of the others in the league. Kidd, on the other hand, actually trails another player (Baron Davis of Golden State) who isn't as strong in rebounds and assists but has double the scoring average. 

If you're wondering, the Big O's number for his 1961-62 season comes in at an absurd 16.4. Even if we let the air out of his points and rebounds to adjust for the breakneck pace of the early 1960s by putting his season in a 2006-07 environment, he still outpaces the field by a comfortable margin at 13.3. Looking at that score makes it clear that Robertson's era isn't the only reason he put up such huge numbers. Yes, he benefited from playing at the right time, but his achievement was still extraordinary. 

The two players meeting Tuesday night, Kidd and James, exemplify what a huge challenge it is to match Robertson's mark. As well as they've filled up the stat sheets, both are likely to fall short. Kidd has as good a shot as anybody has had in a while to match it this season, but it appears he'll still lose out in rebounds. Long-term, James is the league's best hope to hit this mark, but he faces some serious barriers, as well, and likely would need his team's dynamics to change considerably. 

Overall, there's a darn good reason nobody has matched Robertson's feat in the past 45 years -- it was incredible. And unless the pace of the game goes through the roof again, it may be another 45 years before we see it equaled.

 

http://insider.espn....eDoubles-071204

 

interesting right? 

[Steven]

What does Hollinger know? It's not like his team is still in the playoffs or anything.

[miketheodio]

i wonder how many TO's robinson had.

[Mason Khamvilay]

Good question. The nba didn't start tracking turnovers until 1978--Pistol Pete led the league that year with 5 per game.

[Mario Peña]

This is a very interesting discussion you all have going here and I was interested to know what you all thought about the chances of integrating a post player into this scheme as a top 3 option. I wonder if the best big option will be more of a pick and roller, jump shooter, a post up player or a clean up guy (I guess we have that in Asik presently). I guess more than likely he will be a combination thereof. I guess aside from dunks and picks leading to wide open looks how do you breakdown efficiency for bigs?

 

 

(By the way, sorry that my first post was filled with so many errors, I had sent that from my phone with my son trying to wrestle with me and I meant to go back an clean it up which I just did.)

[Mason Khamvilay]

I think the most important role for a 5 is defense and rebounds, the biggest player who is always in the paint has that responsibility. Offensively you just take what you can get from your 5, the pick n roll is nice because big men set huge screens, and if he can do more than that it's a luxury but it's not expected because all to rounded 5s are so rare.

Post ups from big men are overrated, the main reason you want that is to suck defenses in then kick it out for open looks, but guards can create to same effect by driving and kicking. Miami and OKC have the best offenses in the league but hardly post. Grizzlies offense suck but all they do is post.

[BenQueens]

Check out this page from www.hoopdata.com
 
This page has loads of data.  Looking at the shot locations chart you can click on the headers at the top of each list to sort the stats according to that column.  Clicking on the 16-23 ft fg% column shows that the top 5 teams shooting these shots were: BOS, MIA, DAL, SAS, and OKC.  Now, that's 3 of the NBA's "championship caliber" teams (I'm counting OKC in that group).  It is interesting to note that the teams with higher %'s from this area also have a higher assist % on those shots.  This indicates that the shots they are taking are more often going to be "open" shots.

but it's also interesting to note that, if you sort by attempts in that range rather than %, the league's strongest teams are all further down the list (though not at the bottom, which is also-rans like us and Brooklyn). Just a quick list of the teams listed in descending order of attempts from 16-23 ft, with their pace-adjusted offense rank:
LA --- OR
01 PHI 25
02 PHO 18
03 WAS 30
04 CHI 21
05 UTH 11
06 BOS 20
07 GSW 09
08 MIN 22
09 MIL 27
10 CHA 26
11 TOR 12
12 MEM 16
13 ORL 23
14 POR 13
15 ATL 14
16 IND 29
17 CLE 28
18 LAC 04
19 DAL 24
20 MIA 03
21 SAC 15
22 OKC 01
23 NYK 02
24 SAS 08
25 NOR 18
26 DET 17
27 LAL 06
28 BKN 10
29 DEN 08
30 HOU 07

shows that there's some correlation there. I think it means that you guys are basically all talking about the same phenomenon: The contending teams aren't looking for shots in that area, but they are taking open shots if they're there. MEM looks like an outlier as far as "contendability" and not being in the bottom half, but there are a couple of eye-test things that are confirmed if you look at the player stats:
1. Sometimes MEM's offense is horrible, but it seems like Marc Gasol, this giant with great hands, bails their perimeter players out by catching some lame passes up in the elbow area and knocking them down. Sure enough, he's second on their team in attempts there, and hitting 47% of them.
2. Ok, not really an eye test thing: Rudy Gay took 161 shots from that area (168 at the rim), and hit 35%. Worse than all the starters but Tony Allen. So maybe not so surprising a trade.