Comments on: Knicks Morning News (2018.02.05)

By: slovene knick

slovene knick — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 10:33:48 +0000

First I thought that nets and Pels did some kind of a trade, but then I saw it’s Emeka Okafor playing NBA basketball. Again. Was inactive for four years. Neck hernia. A minor miracle.

By: Knick fan not in NJ at this time

Knick fan not in NJ at this time — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 08:15:26 +0000

Based on that article, what about a trade of Lance Thomas for Mo Harkless. That would save the Trail Blazers from the luxury tax, and it works in the trade machine. We’d get a younger power forward and they might give us a future second round pick for our trouble.

By: Knick fan not in NJ at this time

Knick fan not in NJ at this time — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 07:59:12 +0000

Good article on the state of the trade market.

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/22336760/zach-lowe-2018-nba-trade-deadline-preview-cavaliers-deandre-jordan-more

By: Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada

Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:46:57 +0000

Sorry I stopped reading at “And”

By: Aten

Aten — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:44:54 +0000

And I am saying that you, sir, are a charlatan.

By: Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada

Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:43:29 +0000

No, I’m saying that the whole conception of productivity that WP forwards is completely, utterly erroneous, with zero basis in the reality of nba basketball. It is a bad metric, functionally useless, with zero to recommend to it. There’s no possible context in which WP is a useful advanced stat for evaluating productivity unless you want to make that year’s all rebounding team. In which case, you’d be better off with TRB%

By: Aten

Aten — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:38:19 +0000

@113

One more time, slowly. They. Aren’t. Rankings. Nobody says there aren’t reasons Salah Mejri doesn’t play more despite his per-minute productivity. Nobody says field a lineup with five centers because they have high WP48. Nobody says actively ignore context. Except you, but you kind of have to with where you’re at on this.

By: The Glass Half Rebuilt

The Glass Half Rebuilt — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:38:06 +0000

Jevon Carter had 8 assists and 6 steals tonight against Trae Young and Oklahoma. I really like the idea of him as a 2nd round pick. If he gets that shooting efficiency to a decent level, you’ve got yourself a stud on defense who isn’t unplayable offensively.

By: Z-man

Z-man — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:25:14 +0000

Everybody understands that a list of a given season’s passing yardage totals isn’t the same thing as a qualitative ranking of quarterbacks, and isn’t supposed to be. I don’t really get why this is different.

I agree that conclusions drawn from WP48 are about as valid as those drawn from passing yardage totals.

I am a relative novice at this…

I agree with this as well.

Is it possible that 8 of the top 10 players in wins produced being bigs is the result of tall people being good at doing things that win basketball games rather than of a purported failure of the model to account for diminishing returns on rebounds?

It’s a false dichotomy. What is much more likely is that the WP model captures (and exaggerates) some of the things that win basketball, and egregiously diminishes or completely ignores others.

@109, very well said, although I would argue that WP has always grossly exaggerated the value of rebounding relative to other variables, as Kanter’s and Monroe’s high numbers would suggest. Kanter is a WP48 wet dream…high-volume efficient scoring with high-volume rebounding and SUPER high-volume offensive rebounding. Yet any serious defensive analysis would conclude that he gives back much of what he gets due to his defensive ineptitude, and that this has become far more of an issue in today’s 7SoL-spinoff world. Although I would argue that in any era, Harden would produce more wins than Kanter in the sense that just about any team would win more games (i.e. produce more wins) with Harden (or Durant, Or LeBron, Or Steph) than with Kanter, all else being equal.

By: Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada

Silky Johnson, Fleet Admiral of the Tank Armada — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 04:18:27 +0000

@112

So WP does track player productivity in the form of contributing to wins? Or does it not? Make up your mind. Enes Kanter is a stand in for all the batshit insane results of WP, this list a case in point:

https://www.boxscoregeeks.com/players?sort=per48_wins_produced&direction=desc&minimum=true

And do you understand what a plus minus metric is? If you dont, there’s no point in me reexplaining everything I just explained to you in terms you’ll understand. The fact that other metrics fit to data better and don’t have Salah fucking Mejri (a good player but not top 10 material on any rational reconstruction of the data) in their top 10 for their rankings should be enough to dissuade you from using WP. You’d literally be better off using MPG to form a winning team, that’s how comically bad WP is.