NBA Basketball 2004-2005 thread

Allen Iverson will be alot happier it seems.
LA will get him next season for no trade. He's a free agent and his friend Vlade is rumored to retire and be in the front office.

I agree with Kirk T.'s take on the Webber deal:


More from ESPN's Marc Stein. He praises the Sixers for pulling this off without giving up "any of [their] prized youngsters: Samuel Dalembert, Kyle Korver and Willie Green." I'm surprised he didn't mention the first name I thought of in that context, Andre Iguodala.

Rockets just squeezed in a deal with the Bucks for Mike James. Not a *huge* deal in terms of league impact but it's encouraging because the Rockets completely fell apart the past two games without Bob Sura and getting James for almost nothing means they can jettison Rod Strickland. Maurice Taylor, alas, remains on the team. Guess they'll have to try and sucker someone into taking him during the offseason

EDIT: Spoke too soon! Taylor traded to the Knicks for Moochie Norris, Vin Baker, and a 2nd round pick. They get rid of Taylor and don't even have to give up their first round pick. Cool!

The Hawks just shipped off Antoine Walker to the Celtics (again), for 3 players (Gary Payton, Michael Stewart and Tom Gugliotta). Dammit! The Hawks are playing for ping pong balls in the lottery!

In other news, Shaq appears to have only sprained his knee, which is good news for the Heat.

Houston got a very solid player in Mike James. He was an excellent player off the bench for the Pistons last season during their championship run. I actually thought Detroit missed him more than the other bench players they lost -- Corliss Williamson and Mehmut Okur. The Pistons bench struggled this season without James until adding Carlos Arroyo a month or so ago.

While I'm no Shaq fan, I'm glad to see his injury is not that serious. I didn't want to see the Pistons win the Eastern Conference with a Shaq-less Miami and listen to comments about how they only won because Shaq was hurt.

Sounds like Payton is going to be cut and re-sign with Celtics too. Glad to Walkaah, employee numbah 8, back.

This just in: Dallas trades Calvin Booth and Alan Henderson to Milwaukee for Keith Van Horn. Bad news for the Mavericks is that they were playing as well as anyone (at least anyone not named the Spurs) before the break and Henderson was a key part of the rotation (especially with Dampier hurt). Henderson was a pretty good defensive player in the middle and rebounded well. The good news is that Van Horn is a scorer—but then does Dallas really need more offense?

The Bucks unload a ton of cap next season.

It remains to be seen if this is good or bad.

And he Spurs got rid of Malik Rose's oversize contract (I'll never understand why they signed Rose to that contract, since literally from the day they signed it they've been trying to trade him) and picked up a decent backup center, a bench warmer, and some cap space. I'll miss Rose a lot, I was a big fan of his, but he was overpaid, and despite his energy and tenacity his lack of size was a weakness. How he managed to guard Shaq as well as he did at his size is a mystery I'll never understand. I liked the guy a lot, but I think the Spurs had to make this move.

There is an interesting article in ESPN about how Reggie Evans is having a terrific rebounding year. Instead of looking at just the raw number of rebounds, they created a formula called the "rebounding rate" that essentially tells you what percentage of a game's rebounds a player grabbed. All things being equal, each player would have a rate of 10, meaning each of the 10 players on the court should get 10% of the rebounds (adjusted for minutes played, of course).

The amazing thing is that since 1970, Dennis Rodman holds the seven highest seasons of any player. His numbers for some of those seasons are are staggering 29%, which means he took down three times as many rebounds as he would be expected to. Kudos to the Worm! This year, Reggie Evans might possibly break Rodman's seventh best year at 25.4%.

This discussion got me thinking about basketball stats again, and how I wish there were a "Bill James" of basketball, to give the same kind of thoughtful analysis that baseball has benefited from.

I've long been a critic of Allen Iverson, primarily due to his horrific shooting percentage. Over his career, he's barely made 40% of his shots, and is almost dead last in the NBA at his position. In fact, it's even worse when you look at adjusted FG%, which gives extra credit for 3-point FG% (after all, someone who shoots 33% from 3-point land is as productive as someone shooting 50% from within the line). How people can claim that he's the best player in the league, or even one of the best, is beyond me. It's not like his other stats are that good. I will acknowledge that he can be exciting to watch, but purely from a statistical viewpoint, I maintain he hurts his team by taking too many poor shots.

He's going to win the scoring title this year, which will only fuel his supporters. Yet the only reason he will win is that he takes way more shots than anyone else. Funny how baseball's batting champ is the leader in batting average, not hits, but basketball's scoring champ is based on total points. I think there needs to be a combined stat to factor in both points and FG%, but I'm afraid it would be something like the NFL's quarterback rating, which is really not an intuitive stat to explain or discuss.

I don't see how it's possible to have a Bill James of basketball. The game just doesn't have all the inherent structure built into baseball. When Bryant comes crashing down and leaves the court in the first quarter, his scoring average still counts that as one game, and his average is disproportionately brought down. But how else could it really work? Points per minute? Points per time touching the ball? Points per team possession? All of these still face difficulties in deciding who the "best scorer" is.

Yeah, anything beyond points per game would be tough to get your mind around in a simple way. While baseball stat-heads these days look more at things like OPS (on-base + slugging), there are some player-efficiency-type formulas for basketball, but I don't think there's much agreement on how to calculate it, i.e. how to weight all the different factors.

Rebounding rate is indeed an interesting stat (and a very simple one), which goes a long way towards justifying the talk about Rodman in the mid '90s about how he was the "best rebounder ever." Rebounding stats for Chamberlain and Russell, for instance, were far higher than Rodman's ever were in terms of sheer number of rebounds, but of course teams were taking far more shots back then. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone has rebound-rate stats for those guys--the explanation I've seen is that they didn't have stats on how many rebounds the opposing teams got until the early '70s (as Brian explained, calculating rebound rate involves knowing how many boards everyone on the floor was getting). Seems a little weird to me, since if you have all the box scores, you could enter total rebounds that way and figure it all out. Maybe a daunting task with the sheer volume of data you'd have to figure out, but if someone has all the box scores from the beginning entered into a computer (maybe that's the problem, but it seems reasonable to guess that the league does have that available), I would think that some decent database programming would make it pretty straightforward.

Edit: Here's the article Brian was referring to, by John Hollinger. It's marked as an Insider article for paid subscribers only, but I guess it's available free for now. He says this about how far back the stat can be calculated:



That's the explanation I was remembering for why they could only go back that far with rebound rate. Like I said above, I would think it's reasonably feasible to get the needed data from available box scores, but I'm assuming John Hollinger has thought of this on his own without my brilliant insight being necessary. Maybe I'll e-mail him and ask.

Don Nelson surprised everyone with his sudden retirement announcement yesterday. It is too early to know if he had just decided that life had other priorities (he recently missed a few games because he wanted to be with his wife during surgery—and earlier this year missed several others after his own rotator cuff surgery) or if he was nudged upstairs.

As widely expected Avery Johnson was named as his replacement and is now Dallas’ head coach—no longer an assistant.

Prior to this, local speculation was if Nellie would retire at season’s end. The fear was that if he did not, Avery would be offered jobs elsewhere.

From me, Oct 20th
No kidding.

And done.

I guess Kobe got his wish -- he showed everyone who the driving force behind the Lakers titles was. Here's clue...

...not him.

What's going on with LeBron and the Cavs? If James wants to be considered with the game's elite, he's going to have to make the playoffs. Period. For the second straight year, Carmelo Anthony is leading the Nuggets to a playoff berth in the West while James and the Cavs do another nosedive. Looks as though GM Paxson may be the fall guy.

To be somewhat fair to Lebron, look at the cast around him and the cast around Carmelo. Not exactly apples and apples.

I definitely agree with Shane, and also consider the coaching change in Denver that turned their season around, when they brought Karl on board. LeBron is still one of the best players in the league, and anyone who'd take Carmelo over him right now is smoking something.

I'm not saying that, but I think LeBron's supporting cast is better than Carmelo's. (Ilgauskas has been an All-Star and Drew Gooden is pretty darn good.) What I am saying is that if LeBron fails to make the playoffs, he should not be mentioned in the same breath as Jordan or Magic. Jordan never missed the playoffs, despite playing with a bunch of stiffs his first few years.

I don't think LeBron's supporting cast is better. I'll take Kenyon, Andre, Camby, and Boykins over Big Z, Gooden, and McInnis (as a collective supporting cast, that is). But of course you're right about any Jordan/Magic comparisons--while he clearly has the potential to be one of the best ever, anyone who seriously makes those comparisons at this point is definitely smoking something.

The season has nearly played itself out, with only a few minor issues left to be decided: a few first-round matchups, such as will the Kings or the Rockets play the Mavericks or Sonics in the first round, will Cleveland, New Jersey or Philadelphia be the first round sacrifice to Miami, and will the fourth seed in the West actually wind up with a better overall record than the East champion?

There are many, non-record open questions however: will Duncan return seamlessly to the Spurs, making them favorites in the West; will the magic season of the Suns disappear in the playoffs, as good offensive teams often do; has Miami merely rested Shaq and with no real injury the Heat remain a major threat to win it all; can the Pistons repeat last year's run; and finally has the change in coaching in Dallas actually made the Mavs a playoff threat (now that they appear to play at both ends of the floor)?

None of which addresses the primary imponderable: where is Seth Paxton and why has he not written page after page of NBA insight, analysis and criticism?

Careful what you wish for, Lew.

Come on, Saturday! I'm jonesing for the playoffs. Should be great, especially once the second round rolls around, although there are plenty of interesting stories for the first round. No disrespect to Sacto and Houston fans, but I'm drooling over the potential Dallas vs. Phoenix second round matchup.

This is already clinched. The Rockets are #5 thanks to having the tie-breaker over Sacramento, so that means they get Dallas while the Kings get Seattle. Since the Rockets play better on the road than at home, I'm trying to figure out if I should be happy that they won't have any home-court advantage

Thanks Andy--I had no idea who had the tie-break advantage. Actually both the Mavs and Rockets play the same on the road as at home, the Mavs are 28-12 both at home and on the road (with both one home and away game left), while Houston is 25-15 at home and 25-16 on the road, their remaining game against Seattle at home.

And both teams are among the hottest in the leauge right now, one reason that this should be a fine series.

True, although IIRC Yao and McGrady's road stats are significantly higher in road games than at home. Or maybe it's just McGrady...I know McGrady has said a few times that he feeds off the booing on the road more than home cheers (kind of a veiled shot at the lackluster crowds in Houston). And I think the trend is that the Rockets got a lot better on the road after their poor start, but their home performance never really picked up to match their road success.

I think I'm pulling for Detroit in the East. Aside from Dallas/Houston, I think I'm most intrigued by Sacramento vs. Seattle simply because both teams are wounded.

One way to know that it is playoff time, is by the number of injuries to the Kings.

Although it really makes no difference, as no matter what happens in the first round to the Kings, Mavs, Rockets and Sonics the winners will have to play the Suns or the Spurs next, it is almost unfair to Houston that by playing well and getting the fourth seed instead of the third, they also wind up playing a (very probably) better team.

I´m looking forward to the series also, although I had thought for the last month that it would be yet another first-round matchup between the Kings and Mavs.

While it's impossible to know the answer to this yet, Detroit is in almost the exact same position at the start of the playoffs as they were last season. They do not have home court over their biggest obstacle in the conference, have almost the same record as last season, and are playing their best heading into the playoffs (they have the NBA's best record since January 1st).

The East is a two team race (Miami and Detroit) with one possible spoiler team -- Indiana, who finally looks to be playing quality ball and have O'Neal back.

Agreed, Scott, I feel pretty good about how we look at this point, considering the parallels with last season. Of course, let's not forget that the toughest series then turned out to be 2nd round against New Jersey, with the must-win Game 6 on the road after the insane triple-OT loss at home in Game 5. I'm gonna be rather nervous if either of their first two series ends up being that close.

Haggai, if things play out as expected, the Pistons will get Indiana in the second round, so expect another very tough 2nd round series. The Pacers are the only team other than Miami who can beat Detroit four out of seven in the East, IMO.

Yeah, that's true. Stupid heart-stopping playoff series (plural).

Rggie Miller's final regular-season home game is tonight. And as a lifelong Pacer-fan (being originaly from Indy) I just want to say thanks for all the memories.

I have met Uncle Reggie a handful of times (some work-related and some fan-related) and each time I was more amazed at the class and friendliness he showed towards me and everyone else there to see him.

Some buddies and I actually drove from Indy to Orlando for Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals in 1995. Before the game, we were down on the court being interviewed by an Indianapolis TV station about our road trip to see the Pacers...during our live interview...Reggie actually came over and interrupted the broadcast to thank us (I think it was pre-arranged with the reporter though - but still - it was very cool!).

The Pacers got blasted by like 22 points in that game but we stayed around after the game as long as we could. Reggie came out after the game and personally thanked us again for coming all the way down there to cheer them on.

This guy could have left Indy years ago and probably won one or two rings somewhere else (LA), but he chose to stay loyal to his fans and teammates in Indy. Highly commendable.

Up until the Artest ordeal this year, that was a good move. It's a shame all this happened in Reggie's final year. I truly wish he would stay one more season - but I don't see it happening, unfortunately.

This is still one of my all-time favorite pictures:



Thanks for the memories Uncle Reggie! Didn't mean to write so much...but it all just came to me. NBA Basketball won't be the same from now on - for me anyway.

The game is on ESPN tonight if anyone cares....

I still think the Pacers can make some noise in the playoffs though...and if they happen to lose tonight...guess where they play come saturday...in DETROIT