Kevin Draper on Stats Writing, the Warriors and David Lee

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Kevin Draper (@kevinmdraper) from the Diss is back to discuss his piece: Basketball Writing Is Dead, Long Live Basketball Writing, the future of the Warriors, and the value of David Lee.

4 Responses to "Kevin Draper on Stats Writing, the Warriors and David Lee"

Andrew says:

September 11, 2013 at 12:36 am

Grantland piece on shorten the minutes to 40 was interesting.

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9656369/the-case-40-minute-nba-game
Brian says:

September 11, 2013 at 1:19 am

Great article, great podcast.

I’ll play devil’s advocate about advanced stats pushing bad writers away from further discussion about an idea. Could stats just be a tool for them to be “right” in an argument and move forward too quickly, not the cause of it? Wouldn’t that type of writer just use insider information from coaches, players, or other league experts to “win” their argument instead of discussing it in detail in the absence of advanced stats?

In the spirit of this discussion, I’ll make a long argument on David Lee. He’s a good player still, even if he’s not as good as what he once was, and he’ll likely have a good season. All indications are that his injuries are 100% healed and it’s widely being reported he’s in the best shape of his career (cynics could say that’s PR fluff, of course, but could he have thrown down the sick reverse ally oop at 1:25 of this video from August 6th at Rucker http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnnYOBC4gp8? Ok, maybe he could have.) He’s even working on a three pointer, which could test Dre’s theory of having four three point shooters on the court at once.

The first argument against him is always his salary, and the important thing about it is that it’s left over from the old CBA. He’ll make even more than James Harden, a max player under the new CBA, for the next two years before Harden starts to benefit from the change:

Lee: $13,878,000 $15,012,000 $15,493,680
Harden: $13,701,250 $14,728,844 $15,756,438

The second is that his value is probably higher around the league than it really should be. He’s not seen as a good but not great player who is declining and has a huge contract, like he is around here. He’s an All-Star! Sure, he makes star money, but he’s a star and he’s worth it!! Smart GMs will see through that, but others will love his leadership, work ethic, veteran locker room presence, and positive, winning attitude.

The Lee for Kevin Love trade mentioned in the podcast is frequently brought up on fans forums, but even Minnesota probably wouldn’t fall for that one straight up. But what if you throw in Klay Thompson? He’s another overvalued guy, he’s still only 23 and could develop into a star, but I’d be surprised. He’s been above average at shooting threes (4% above the average SG), but is average to below average at everything else. They could keep Barnes at SF and let Iguodala play SG, Barnes is already a better all-around player than the three point specialist Klay, especially in rebounding, two point shooting and drawing fouls (http://www.thenbageek.com/players/compare?utf8=%E2%9C%93&player_ids%5B%5D=1269&player_ids%5B%5D=476) Barnes is also two years younger.

Lee won’t hurt the Warriors on the court, but his money could be spent better on other players, so may as well sell high on him.
Brian says:

September 11, 2013 at 1:33 am

Forgot to include the damning Lee salary stat:

Rank 510 in league in Arturo’s Win Delta (Wins Produced – Wins Paid for):
http://wagesofwins.com/2013/08/26/the-nba-offseason-list-part-4-the-last-dress-rehersal/

And no, that 510 isn’t because he plays in Alameda County, there are 509 guys that are a better value than he is.
HoopDon says:

September 11, 2013 at 3:50 pm

The small sample size discussion was great. It really is a pain to put the qualifier/warning in every piece, which makes for a “boring” read. I don’t bother anymore, because I assume the “statistically wise” readers KNOW to take the findings with a grain of salt, while the “regulars” won’t care either way.

I also think XRAPM got an unfair shake. Yes, it is a black-box, which is why you don’t want teams to use it for in-game adjustments or team construction, but it produces results. It’s the best predictive metric (which matters if you are worried about a metric capturing too much team interaction), and it has a past win correlation of 91% (At least for the years I checked 2011-2013). Not to mention its far-and-away the best metric for measuring individual defense.

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