Monthly Archives: September 2011

Team Stats from Eurobasket 2011 (part I)

Posted on by
5

The previous two posts I wrote about the Eurobasket were about the MVP, but now I’d like to take a quick look at some team stats:

  • Rank
  • Win-loss record
  • Estimated Wins
  • Estimated Wins per 40 minutes (EWP40)
  • Team MVP
  • Team LVP

This post will contain the teams that finished in the top 12, and the next will contain the teams that finished ranked 13-24.

Spain

Rank: 1st
Record: 10-1
EWP40: 0.204
Estimated Wins: 11.25
MVP: P. Gasol (Est. Wins: 3.40)
LVP: S. Lull (Est. Wins: -0.39)
.
.
.
.

France

Rank 2nd
Record 9-2
EWP40 0.121
Estimated Wins 6.75
MVP N. Batum (Est. Wins: 2.04)
LVP S. Tchicamboud (Est. Wins: -0.36)

.

Russia

Rank 3rd
Record 10-1
EWP40 0.171
Estimated Wins 9.35
MVP A. Kirilenko (Est. Wins: 2.32)
LVP D. Khvostov (Est. Wins: -0.16)

.

.

Macedonia

Rank 4th
Record 7-4
EWP40 0.095
Estimated Wins 5.30
MVP B. McCalebb (Est. Wins: 2.48)
LVP D. Sokolov (Est. Wins: -0.34)

.

.

.

Lithuania

Rank 5th
Record 8-3
EWP40 0.149
Estimated Wins 8.20
MVP S. Jasaitis (Est. Wins: 1.98)
LVP T. Delininkaitis (Est. Wins: -0.16)

.

Greece

Rank 6th
Record 7-4
EWP40 0.135
Estimated Wins 7.45
MVP A. Fostis (Est. Wins: 2.55)
LVP D. Mavroeidis (Est. Wins: -0.30)

.

.

Slovenia

Rank 7th
Record 6-5
EWP40 0.104
Estimated Wins 5.71
MVP M. Begic (Est. Wins: 1.88)
LVP G. Jagodnik (Est. Wins: -0.37)
.
.
.
.
.
.

Serbia

Rank 8th
Record 5-6
EWP40 0.087
Estimated Wins 4.87
MVP M. Macvan (Est. Wins: 1.04)
LVP B. Marjanovic (Est. Wins: -0.18)

.

Germany

Rank 9th
Record 4-4
EWP40 0.107
Estimated Wins 4.27
MVP D. Nowitzki (Est. Wins: 1.58)
LVP S. Schultze (Est. Wins: -0.51)

.

Finland

Rank 9th
Record 3-5
EWP40 0.054
Estimated Wins 2.14
MVP T. Kotti (Est. Wins: 0.97)
LVP H. Möttölä (Est. Wins: -0.38)

.

.

.

Turkey

Rank 11th
Record 3-5
EWP40 0.125
Estimated Wins 5.01
MVP E. Preldzic (Est. Wins: 1.21)
LVP K. Tunçeri (Est. Wins: -0.51)

.

.

Georgia

Rank 11th
Record 2-6
EWP40 0.100
Estimated Wins 4.00
MVP V. Sanikidze (Est. Wins: 1.68)
LVP A. Boisa (Est. Wins: -0.07)

.

- Devin

Devin Dignam (of NBeh? “fame”) is the Toronto Raptors writer for the Wages of Wins Network. His background with the Raptors gives him unique insight into many areas including the draft, overpaid players and overrated players.

Quick Takes: Gasol v Navarro II

Posted on by
3

How about any of the above for MVP?

A quick follow up on the Pau Gasol vs Juan Carlos Navarro for MVP debate.

Something that FIBA Europe did for each game during the Eurobasket was to assign a “top performer” from each team. Now, very shortly I will be doing some more research how these top performers were determined, but in light of yesterday’s article (where I wrote that Gasol was more deserving than Navarro) I thought it would be interesting to take a look at the number of times each of these players were given the “top performer” honours on the official Eurobasket website:

Player

Games Played

# of “Top Performer” awards

Pau Gasol

10

7

Serge Ibaka

11

2

Marc Gasol

11

1

Rudy Fernandez

11

1

Juan Carlos Navarro

11

0

Interesting. According to FIBA’s own website, Gasol was Spain’s top performer in seven of the ten games he participated in – including the final against France. And Navarro was never deemed Spain’s “top performer”, despite the fact that he played in all eleven games. Why did FIBA Europe decide to contradict all their previous efforts at determining the most productive Spanish player?

Well…we know why, but still, that knowledge doesn’t make the MVP decision any more palatable or more just. Gasol deserved that MVP!

And just in case you are someone who is skeptical about everything we say here at the Wages of Wins Journal,  I’m not the only one who thinks that way.

- Devin

Devin Dignam (of NBeh? “fame”) is the Toronto Raptors writer for the Wages of Wins Network. His background with the Raptors gives him unique insight into many areas including the draft, overpaid players and overrated players.

Eurobasket 2011: Navarro steals Gasol’s MVP

Posted on by
9

Spain won the 2011 Eurobasket today, and unlike the U19 FIBA World Championships, this time I was keeping up with the games. Consequently, I have the Estimated Wins Produced stats from all 90 games ready to go, only hours after the final whistle!

Who should have won the MVP?

"I'll let you have this one"

Following his 27 points in the final, Juan Carlos Navarro was named the MVP of the tournament. Did he deserve it? Here is the list of the top 15 players in the Eurobasket tournament, as ranked by Estimated Wins Produced:

Table 1: Eurobasket Players ranked by Estimated Wins

Player Country EWP40 EW
Pau Gasol Spain 0.519 3.4
Antonis Fotsis Greece 0.343 2.55
Bo McCalebb Macedonia 0.261 2.48
Andrei Kirilenko Russia 0.285 2.32
Nicolas Batum France 0.236 2.04
Simas Jasaitis Lithuania 0.264 1.98
Tony Parker France 0.216 1.89
Mirza Begic Slovenia 0.345 1.88
Juan Carlos Navarro Spain 0.239 1.78
Vitaliy Fridzon Russia 0.306 1.78
Viktor Sanikidze Georgia 0.261 1.68
Vojdan Stojanovski Macedonia 0.216 1.59
Dirk Nowitzki Germany 0.265 1.58
Chris Kaman Germany 0.27 1.51
Zoran Dragic Slovenia 0.222 1.48
  • Note: players in bold were named to the all-tournament team

Navarro’s teammate Pau Gasol was clearly the best player in the tournament. In addition to being tops in terms of total wins, Gasol was also the most efficient player (as measured by EWP/40) in the entire tournament. The fact that Gasol lost out to his teammate is a travesty. But overall, the all-tournament team did pretty well. Of the five selections, the only one I have an issue with is Navarro. Which isn’t too bad – it’s not like he won the MVP or anything.

What would cause someone to put Navarro on the all-tournament team? If we rank all players by total points scored, we may find out:

Table 2: Eurobasket Players ranked by total points.

Player Country EW Points
Bo McCalebb Macedonia 2.48 235
Tony Parker France 1.89 221
Juan Carlos Navarro Spain 1.78 206
Pau Gasol Spain 3.4 201
Andrei Kirilenko Russia 2.32 164
Dirk Nowitzki Germany 1.58 156
Nenad Krstic Serbia 0.43 155
Nicolas Batum France 2.04 152
Dusko Savanovic Serbia 0.66 147
Marc Gasol Spain 1.3 146
Antonis Fotsis Greece 2.55 130
Goran Dragic Slovenia 1.01 129
Pero Antic Macedonia 1.1 128
Ioannis Bourousis Greece 1.06 128
Chris Kaman Germany 1.51 124
  • Note: players in bold were named to the all-tournament team

Wow, that code was pretty easy to crack. In order to be named to the all-tournament team, all you had to do was score the most total points. The MVP was going to come from someone who played on the winning team – which was Spain – so McCalebb and Parker were out of the running (had France won the final, you’d better believe that Parker would’ve won the MVP). The reason that Navarro got the nod over Gasol seems to be that Navarro scored a gargantuan five more points! Rather incredible, isn’t it?

WoW All-tournament team

Given that I disagree with Navarro’s MVP and all-tournament team selection, a new all-tournament team is in order. In order to determine the WoW all-tournament team, all I did was choose the top players (in terms of Estimated Wins) at each position. That gives us the following list:

Table 3: Devin’s All-Tournament Team

Player Country Position EWP40 Estimated Wins
Pau Gasol Spain F/C 0.519 3.4
Antonis Fotsis Greece F 0.343 2.55
Andrei Kirilenko Russia F/C 0.285 2.32
Bo McCalebb Macedonia G 0.264 2.48
Nicolas Batum France G/F 0.236 2.04
Mirza Begic Slovenia C 0.345 1.88
Simas Jasaitis Lithuania F 0.264 1.98
Tony Parker France G 0.216 1.89
  • Note: players in bold were named to the all-tournament team

As usual, I’ve cheated and added three backups. But even with the three backups, Navarro still doesn’t make the team, let alone win the MVP.

- Devin

Devin Dignam (of NBeh? “fame”) is the Toronto Raptors writer for the Wages of Wins Network. His background with the Raptors gives him unique insight into many areas including the draft, overpaid players and overrated players.

How NBA Owners Spend their Money

Posted on by
5

Paul Allen spends his money well. . . mostly

The owners want us to believe that they’ve been doing terrible since the last CBA. Let’s take a look at how the ownerships have been spending their money. I’ve left off teams that changed hands since 2006, and only included teams that had the same owners since 2005-2006.

A little Allen a lot of Cuban

Table 1: NBA Teams by total salary spent from 2006-2011

Team WP Record Salary $ Per Win
Portland 233.5 (246-164) $308,949,068 $1,323,211
Minnesota 156.1 (143-267) $324,588,198 $2,079,081
Memphis 212.1 (203-207) $327,918,604 $1,545,876
L.A. Clippers 179.8 (190-220) $335,095,511 $1,863,520
Chicago 267.1 (267-143) $340,690,237 $1,275,531
Sacramento 189.5 (181-229) $342,056,690 $1,805,241
Toronto 218.5 (210-200) $363,096,075 $1,661,531
Houston 282.1 (279-131) $366,208,145 $1,297,994
Philadelphia 226.9 (222-188) $368,293,141 $1,622,890
Milwaukee 213.6 (209-201) $368,904,571 $1,727,390
Indiana 226.1 (217-193) $382,254,754 $1,690,449
Utah 280.6 (286-124) $389,934,574 $1,389,870
Phoenix 309.4 (310-100) $390,383,177 $1,261,776
Miami 257.8 (259-151) $404,442,320 $1,568,957
Denver 291.5 (296-114) $406,974,315 $1,396,051
San Antonio 337.1 (342-68) $412,494,658 $1,223,532
Boston 303.7 (291-119) $415,706,337 $1,368,805
Cleveland 277.2 (291-119) $417,559,424 $1,506,578
Orlando 310.5 (298-112) $420,989,394 $1,355,726
L.A. Lakers 320.7 (323-87) $447,899,384 $1,396,564
New York 188.5 (182-228) $455,481,555 $2,415,784
Dallas 316.6 (340-70) $481,846,051 $1,521,963
  • Salary data from Basketball-Reference

I was surprised to see Portland at the bottom, given all of the talk that Paul Allen just buys whatever he wants. I was certainly not surprised to see Dallas at the very top.

One key observation… in the last six years if you were willing to spend over $400 million your team won at least 250 games and a trip to the conference finals, except for New York.

Buy two Spurs for one Knick

Here’s another way of looking at the same data.

Table 2: NBA Teams by dollars per win from 2006-2011

Team WP Record Salary $ Per Win
San Antonio 337.1 (342-68) $412,494,658 $1,223,532
Phoenix 309.4 (310-100) $390,383,177 $1,261,776
Chicago 267.1 (267-143) $340,690,237 $1,275,531
Houston 282.1 (279-131) $366,208,145 $1,297,994
Portland 233.5 (246-164) $308,949,068 $1,323,211
Orlando 310.5 (298-112) $420,989,394 $1,355,726
Boston 303.7 (291-119) $415,706,337 $1,368,805
Utah 280.6 (286-124) $389,934,574 $1,389,870
Denver 291.5 (296-114) $406,974,315 $1,396,051
L.A. Lakers 320.7 (323-87) $447,899,384 $1,396,564
Cleveland 277.2 (291-119) $417,559,424 $1,506,578
Dallas 316.6 (340-70) $481,846,051 $1,521,963
Memphis 212.1 (203-207) $327,918,604 $1,545,876
Miami 257.8 (259-151) $404,442,320 $1,568,957
Philadelphia 226.9 (222-188) $368,293,141 $1,622,890
Toronto 218.5 (210-200) $363,096,075 $1,661,531
Indiana 226.1 (217-193) $382,254,754 $1,690,449
Milwaukee 213.6 (209-201) $368,904,571 $1,727,390
Sacramento 189.5 (181-229) $342,056,690 $1,805,241
L.A. Clippers 179.8 (190-220) $335,095,511 $1,863,520
Minnesota 156.1 (143-267) $324,588,198 $2,079,081
New York 188.5 (182-228) $455,481,555 $2,415,784
  • Salary data from Basketball-Reference

When we look at how effectively each team spent their money things change a bit. With the exception of an unlucky Houston and Portland, all the teams that spent their money well (less than $1.5 million a win) made a conference finals. Other teams were able to spend their money less effectively and still enjoy success (Cleveland, Dallas, Memphis, Miami). Some teams spent their money terribly and enjoyed years of misery (Sacramento, the Clippers, Minnesota and New York).

-Dre

Wages of Wins Podcast: The Owners are still lying

Posted on by
2

Ask an Economist.

Dave was nice enough to hop on for a quick podcast before starting his weekend. You can listen to the whole thing here:

Wages of Wins Podcast 09/16/2011 – The Owners Are Still Lying

Dave appreciates his new staff of writers. He still chips in to brag about his “home teams”

Size does matter! The Difference between the NFL lockout and the NBA proves an old point. The NFL union has 1700+ members many of which with shorter careers. This means they cave quickly. The NBA has fewer members but this may not keep them from caving.

The NBA Owners refuse to show us their books. Given the background, it’s hard to believe them when they say they’re losing money. If they are, it is probably their fault as they are reckless in their spending.

We kept it short as the weekend was fast approaching but we hope you enjoy it!

-Dre