Comments on: Who Would You Trade for Ron Artest?

By: ben B

ben B — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 01:21:58 +0000

I kno its a way late response and u mite not get this sean, but we wouldnt sign gasol this year. we would wait a few untill he’s bak in free agency. also, by then we will kno if he can play after injury. if he cant we could try to get some other pf/c that will be able to help out. also, i really think that mardy colins will be a very good guard. he’s an above average defender, and with experience will be better. he has a below average shot that will get to be good. and he has good enough passing and court vision. in a couple years that will be better too. another thing i left out of my team is what we will get from marbury, Q, Curry, Jamal, randolf, and if we could trade em, the two JJ’s. we would have lots of new draft picks comin in, and they would finally be ours.

By: retropkid

retropkid — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 12:46:53 +0000

kaseli, even worse is that those millionaires DO lose…. Starbury has to go — character matters, and when your “leader” just doesn’t have any character at all (his sneaker deal doesn’t impress me), and when his career record screams “loser” and when he can’t make his teammates better — the Knicks have a losing hand, time to shuffle the deck…

Of course, character is lacking from the owner to the coach to the star player…GO KNICKS!

By: kaseli

kaseli — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 12:46:38 +0000

I would have been in favor of getting Artest…until I heard the latest comments by Marbury about his buddy Vick. To me this is the last straw. The guy has got to be the stupidest player in the NBA. Has he not learned throughout his long career what to say and what not to say?
The guy is so bad for the Knicks reputation, you’ve got to be afraid for him to open his mouth.
Not enough that they’ve added Randolph to the mix which isn’t going to help in the matter…
But now people want Artest as well.
I know that this is about winning basketball games, but to be honest, if I can’t look forward to the games simply because there’s a bunch of disrespectful millionaires running around with an IQ that doesn’t exceed my dog’s, I would prefer losing.

By: Caleb

Caleb — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:52:00 +0000

Damn you write fast.

“the answer were bruce bowen an slightly better kelvin kato. [cATO] Yea kelvin I hardly played 20 mins this year Kato do we now see how stats are misleading”

Joba Chamberlain has an ERA of 0.00. 0.00. Does that make him the greatest pitcher of baseball history? Yes!!! He has the all-time record for the greatest ERA!!! Oh wait, he’s only pitched 7 innings. ERA must be totally misleading.

In reality, stats are extremely illuminating, if you look at them closely. Marbury scores a lot for a PG but his percentages are so-so, he doesn’t rebound and his defensive stats are poor. Balkman may not be the best defensive player in the league, but he was very good in limited minutes last year and everyone is excited to see if he can do it again. The sonicscentral link shows his numbers last year weren’t misleading – with the caveat that the sample size was pretty small (though a lot bigger than 20 minutes, or 7 innings).

As for Balkman’s position, most players who are athletic enough to make the NBA shift position when they get there. College is full of 6’7 power forwards and 6’4, 6’5 small forwards. Except for a handful of freaks like Marion or Charles Barkley or young Garnett, they’re all playing smaller positions in the NBA.

Did Richard Jefferson play any PF, or is that my bad memory? Dave?

By: Owen

Owen — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:46:02 +0000

Sean – the Gabe Farkas comment you just cited was the one that was debunked. The thread is sort of complicated, I have seen it before, but the consensus seemed to be that Balkman played a lot of minutes with and against lineups that had a majority of starters on the floor.

And Bruce Bowen was the only player in the league with a better defensive differential than Balkman, as the admin noted in his comment on the thread.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:41:50 +0000

“Balkman has a long way to go offensively, but he has only played one year in the league. It?s not crazy to see that potential in him. And even if he doesn?t reach that potential, i.e. if he just does what he did last year but playing 2800 minutes, he will be a pretty great player for us.” at least we can agree on that

By: Owen

Owen — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:40:20 +0000

Sean – The best offensive unit of all time was the 2002 Dallas Mavericks. See Basketball on Paper by Dean Oliver, p. 32.

I compared Balkman’s non-scoring stats to Marion’s, after your “poor man’s raja bell” comment. With an improvement in scoring rate (from 15.1 p40 to 22.4) and shooting efficiency (from 53.1 ts% to 59.4 ts%), Balkman and Marion would actually have very similar statistics. That probably could only happen “if (Balkman) had a jump shot,” but if it did, Balkman would be one of the best players in the NBA, just like Shawn Marion is now.

Balkman has a long way to go offensively, but he has only played one year in the league. It’s not crazy to see that potential in him. And even if he doesn’t reach that potential, i.e. if he just does what he did last year but playing 2800 minutes, he will be a pretty great player for us.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:37:30 +0000

” think you guys are overthinking it, really. MOST of his PT was in garbage time, against lesser players. Not all, but most. He’s probably better than most garbage players in the league, but is just trapped near the end of the Knicks’ rotation.” says gabefarkas

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:30:19 +0000

Also when the administrator was asked?
Was there a player in the NBA who had a better defensive differential than Balkman?

the answer were bruce bowen an slightly better kelvin kato
Yea kelvin I hardly played 20 mins this year Kato do we now see how stats are misleading

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 18:26:58 +0000

When to teh link an I found this post interesting please read carefully what it says.
First of all, a reality check. According to 82games, Balkman was on the court for 2075/1.03 = 2015 defensive possessions. If we assume that NY opponents scored at the same rate on their scoring possessions when Balkman was on the court or off (2.2 pts/ScorPoss), that means NY opponents scored on 48% of their possessions with Balkman on the court, with a 95% confidence interval of 45-50%. Without Balkman on the court, opponents scored on 52% of their possessions, with a CI of 51-53%. This is a statistically significant difference, but you can see that Balkman’s 1063 minutes leaves plenty of room for uncertainty.

Generally, the standard error for 100*pts/poss can be estimated as 250/sqrt(poss).