Tag Archives: Kevin Love

Why Melo has no place in the All-Star game

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Last years numbers are from the Wins Produced Section of this site. 2012 numbers come courtesy of the NBA Geek!

The All-Star game starters were recently released. In a perfect world fans would be rational and analyze what made certain players contribute to their team successes. However, we live in an irrational world where Amare Stoudemire gets MVP votes thanks to Landry Fields’ play and Melo is considered All-NBA while greats such as Marcus Camby and Andre Miller are bounced from team to team. I decided to take a closer look at who should have been selected for the All-Star game if fans were more rational.

Last year matters

All-Star voting is open from the start of the season. This season was also condensed so certainly last’s years performance has some impact on who belongs in the game this season. Let’s do a quick rundown of our All-Star candidates based on how they ended last season.

West All-Star Worthy Guards (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
Chris Paul 2865 0.309 18.5
Steve Nash 2497 0.244 12.7
Jason Kidd 2653 0.213 11.8
Manu Ginobili 2426 0.204 10.3
Andre Miller 2650 0.174 9.6
East All-Star Worthy Guards (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
Dwyane Wade 2824 0.253 14.9
Landry Fields 2541 0.237 12.5
Rajon Rondo 2527 0.235 12.4
Ray Allen 2890 0.204 12.3
Derrick Rose 3026 0.161 10.2

Here’s how our forwards looked.

West All-Star Worthy Forwards (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
Kevin Love 2611 0.335 18.2
Pau Gasol 3037 0.234 14.8
Zach Randolph 2724 0.212 12.1
Lamar Odom 2639 0.212 11.6
Gerald Wallace 2693 0.177 9.91
East All-Star Worthy Forwards (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
LeBron James 3063 0.270 17.2
Paul Pierce 2774 0.195 11.3
Kris Humphries 2061 0.254 10.9
Andre Iguodala 2469 0.212 10.9
Kevin Garnett 2220 0.226 10.4

And finally here’s how our centers looked:

West All-Star Worthy Centers (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
Tyson Chandler 2059 0.268 11.5
Nene Hilario 2291 0.208 9.9
Chuck Hayes 2079 0.206 8.9
East All-Star Worthy Centers (2011)
Player MP WP48 WP
 Dwight Howard 2935 0.301 18.4
 Al Horford 2704 0.203 11.5
 Greg Monroe 2222 0.192 8.9

This year’s stars

Let’s compare our crop from last year with who was on top this season. Numbers from The NBA Geek through February 3rd 2012

West All-Star Worthy Guards (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
James Harden 673 0.269 3.8
Chris Paul 539 0.323 3.6
Ricky Rubio 797 0.215 3.6
Kyle Lowry 740 0.230 3.6
Steve Nash 620 0.263 3.4
East All-Star Worthy Guards (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
Jose Calderon 808 0.207 3.5
Landry Fields 733 0.215 3.3
Ray Allen 597 0.259 3.2
Derrick Rose 749 0.179 2.8
Jeff Teague 758 0.168 2.7

Our forwards (Shawn Marion can thank commenter OaL for noticing that our writer mistakenly left him out on his first draft.):

West All-Star Worthy Forwards (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
Kevin Love 908 0.256 4.8
Kevin Durant 824 0.236 4.0
Paul Millsap 662 0.251 3.5
Gerald Wallace 756 0.209 3.3
Shawn Marion 704 0.213 3.1
East All-Star Worthy Forwards  (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
LeBron James 825 0.375 6.5
Andre Iguodala 799 0.284 4.7
Ryan Anderson 666 0.264 3.7
Marvin Williams 480 0.273 2.7
Kris Humphries 751 0.170 2.7

and our centers:

West All-Star Worthy Centers (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
 Marc Gasol 779 0.218 4.0
 Samuel Dalembert 565 0.264 3.1
 DeAndre Jordan 621 0.236 3.1
East All-Star Worthy Centers (2012)
Player MP WP48 WP
 Tyson Chandler 783 0.359 5.9
Dwight Howard 865 0.244 4.4
Anderson Varejao 879 0.245 3.4

Who got in

Here’s a brief reminder of who was voted in courtesy of nba.com.

Eastern Conference
F — Carmelo Anthony, New York
F — LeBron James, Miami
C — Dwight Howard, Orlando
G — Derrick Rose, Chicago
G — Dwyane Wade, Miami

Western Conference 
F — Blake Griffin, L.A. Clippers
F — Kevin Durant, Oklahoma City
C — Andrew Bynum, L.A. Lakers
G — Kobe Bryant, L.A. Lakers
G — Chris Paul, L.A. Clippers

The fans got it right

Let’s start out east. James and Howard were easily the right call by using both last year and this year. Out west Chris Paul was an easy pick and Durant bounced back from a slightly off year and is playing outstanding. I give full kudos to the voters.

The fans have a possible case for

Derrick Rose was by no means a bad pick. I’d be a little irked if I was Landry Fields or Ray Allen though. To be fair Landry Fields did have a slow start to the season and with a shortened voting period that’s a killer (let’s be honest though, he never had a chance.) Wade is having a slow start thanks to injury. However given his sublime play last season and the fact that he seems to be reverting back to his old form I’m fine with him starting as well.

Last season Andrew Bynum put up the second best per minute stats of any center right behind Dwight Howard. This season he’s in the top ten for centers and that’s with him missing four games due to suspension. He’s still not the top center out west, at least not yet. Still he’s about as good as the alternatives, so the fans are fine here. (Thanks Patrick for catching a silly writer’s mistake in thinking Tyson Chandler was still out west)

Last season Kobe was simply not an elite player. He does have one edge though. The west is fairly weak when it comes to shooting guards. Last season I’d rank him 5th behind Manu Ginobili, Arron Afflalo, Thabo Sefolosha and James Harden. This season his play has improved and with Ginobili being out with injury and Arron Afflalo not playing like he did last season then Kobe is actually the second best shooting guard out west. So IF the fans wanted a correct backcourt (a point guard and a shooting guard) and if they underrated Harden (which is easy to believe) and they give Kobe some legacy credit then he earns his spot. I’d still say Nash, who is playing amazing for his age, should have gotten the start but I’m not too mad about it.

The fans are dead wrong

Last season Melo ranked 100th in the league in Wins Produced right behind Grant Hill. That’s right, Grant Hill in his 30s played better than Melo in his prime last season. Not only that, Melo put up 0.088 Wins per 48 minutes, which is below average. This season Melo is still playing below average with a WP48 of 0.067. Melo simply has no place on an All-Star and given New York’s woes and all of the flack Melo is getting I’m amazed he was voted in.

I am a big fan of Blake Griffin. He had an amazing rookie season and is playing well this season (although he is appearing to have a sophomore slump) In either case the reason I put Griffin on this list is that there is no way Kevin Love should not be starting the All-Star game. When we compare Love and Griffin there are only two places Griffin comes out ahead: assists and blocks. I’ll grant you that Griffin’s baskets may look more impressive but the fact is that the ugly baskets count too. Even if Love weren’t around the fact is Paul Millsap is also having a killer year and Gerald Wallace has been a top five forward in the west for the last two seasons. Griffin is a good player but the west is chocked full of great forwards and Griffin is not better than any of them (at least not yet)

Summing up

When the All-Star game comes up a popular opinion is that the fans should get to vote who they want in. I won’t even dispute this as those are, in fact, the rules. When we look at what drives attendance in sports the answer is winning. It is possible fans do not fully understand what is causing their teams to win. It is also possible I suppose that fans would prefer to see Melo chuck up shots and lose the game, but I would certainly hope not.

-Dre

Which teams did best in terms of extensions

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Zach Lowe has a great piece over at the Point Forward summing up which teams extended their draft picks from the 2008 draft, exercised their options on 2009 draftees and which players’ contracts were put on the back burner. I decided to add some Wages of Wins Analysis. I’ll go over some of the good and bad decision of yesterday.

Kevin Love signs a three year max deal with a fourth year player option

  • Player rating: A+
  • Contract decision rating: D+
Kevin Love career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
Kevin Love 2009 2048 0.16 6.8 81 11.1
Kevin Love 2010 1714 0.251 9.0 60 14
Kevin Love 2011 2611 0.335 18.2 73 20.2
Kevin Love 2012 714 0.24 3.6 18 25.3

Patrick over at the NBA Geek has a great piece summing this up. Kevin Love is an amazing player and getting him re-signed is a major victory for a pretty terrible franchise. However there were some major flaws. As Patrick aptly sums it up, the Wolves had Kevin Love completely outmaneuvered negotiation wise and they messed it up. As Patrick aptly explains:

Basically, Taylor tried to play hardball with Kevin Love and got swindled in a huge way. And all for “future flexibility”. Wait, so you didn’t want to lock up a franchise player so that you could later, maybe…lock up…a…different…franchise player?

and then of course the real punch line:

The Timberwolves had Kevin Love in a bad negotiating spot…They were definitely playing hardball. And playing hardball is fine. But you should know what the hell your homerun scenario is when you are playing hardball. And your homerun scenario is most definitely not ’Our franchise player will be an unrestricted free agent just as he enters his prime years.’

So despite getting one of the best players in basketball the Timberwolves still managed to mess it up. That sounds familiar right?

The Orlando Magic do not offer an extension to Ryan Anderson

  • Player rating: A
  • Decision rating: D
Ryan Anderson career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
Ryan Anderson 2008-2009 1312 0.087 2.4 66 7.4
Ryan Anderson 2009-2010 910 0.129 2.4 63 7.7
Ryan Anderson 2010-2011 1424 0.211 6.3 64 10.6
Ryan Anderson 2011-2012 517 0.267 2.9 17 16.8

Oh wow what another terrible move by this franchise. The reasoning real boils down to the fact that until they know what is happening with Dwight they don’t want to make any major moves. The issue is that Howard is a great player and not only that he’s great via conventional wisdom. His points per game have increased every season. Guess what? In the NBA talented scoring bigs are valuable! So by not even attempting to lock him up they run the risk of another team inflating his price in the offseason. They are essentially saying instead of dealing with locking up a good player they’d rather wait until their roster is more in shambles and his price could be higher. There’s a reason this franchise is the Wages of Wins Network reigning “Worst Management of the Year” winner.

The Wizards don’t offer an extension to JaVale McGee

  • Player rating: B
  • Decision rating: B
JaVale McGee’s career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
JaVale McGee 2008-2009 113 0.050 1.2 75 6.5
JaVale McGee 2009-2010 968 0.098 2.0 60 6.4
JaVale McGee 2010-2011 2193 0.164 7.5 79 10.1
JaVale McGee 2011-2012 523 0.159 1.7 18 10.9

Alright I know I just went off on Orlando for not locking up a talented big, so why does Washington (who we’ve been less than kind to) get a pass? Well it turns out McGee isn’t a fantastic scorer. At 10 points per game his market value is not likely to be huge. When “role players” are restricted free agents in the offseason then teams are tentative about approaching them. So basically the Wizards are saying they think they can get a bargain come the offseason. At least, that’s the reasoning for their grade.

The Nuggets re-signed Danilo Gallinari to a four-year, $42 million deal.

  • Player grade: B
  • Decision rating: B
Danilo Gallinari’s career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
Danilo Gallinari 2008-2009 412 0.122 1.1 28 6.1
Danilo Gallinari 2009-2010 2747 0.066 3.8 81 15.1
Danilo Gallinari 2010-2011 2104 0.096 4.2 62 15.6
Danilo Gallinari 2011-2012 616 0.172 2.2 18 17.7

As a Nuggets fan I’m very excited about the potential of Gallinari. That said, he’s been around average for his first few seasons. To be fair, he did have some injury issues and both the Knicks and Nuggets have been playing him out of position. This move is definitely better than the alternative and if Gallinari keeps progressing then I will be happy to admit I graded too harshly.

The Bobcats picked up Gerald Henderson’s $3.1 million team option.

  • Player rating: D
  • Decision rating: C
Gerald Henderson’s career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
Gerald Henderon 2009-2010 355 0.073 0.5 43 2.6
Gerald Henderon 2010-2011 1661 0.083 2.9 68 9.6
Gerald Henderon 2011-2012 629 0.052 0.7 18 15.4

It’s not like Gerald Henderson has been a particularly bad player. The thing to remember is that Charlotte is a smaller market so players are actually more expensive. When Jordan and company chose to gut their franchise they oddly chose to get rid of all of their good players. This move is keeping a mediocre to bad player around. As a small market if you want to compete you can’t really rely on players like this to help you through. It’s not as if I’m surprised though and if we grade using the Bobcats front office as the standard then this really ranks closer to a B+.

The Hornets and Grizzlies luck out with Eric Gordon and O.J. Mayo

  • Player ratings: C
  • Decision ratings: A (via luck)
Eric Gordon’s career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
Eric Gordon 2008-2009 2677 0.098 5.5 78 16.1
Eric Gordon 2009-2010 2229 0.073 3.4 62 16.9
Eric Gordon 2010-2011 2112 0.110 4.9 56 22.3
Eric Gordon 2011-2012 78 0.035 0.1 2 21.0
O.J. Mayo’s career stats
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG
O.J. Mayo 2008-2009 3120 0.041 2.7 82 18.5
O.J. Mayo 2009-2010 3113 0.093 6 82 17.5
O.J. Mayo 2010-2011 1869 0.038 1.5 71 11.3
O.J. Mayo 2011-2012 420 0.100 0.9 17 11.8

The Grizzlies decided against extending an offer to O.J. in large part because they already have a lot of salary commited thanks mostly to Marc Gasol (worth it), Zach Randolph (worth it when healthy) and Rudy Gay (not worth it). However, O.J. hasn’t been much more than average thus far in his career. He does score points though, so his salary will probably be above his production. The Grizzlies are actually lucky they may not be able to re-sign him. In fact an identical story can pretty much be told for…

Eric Gordon declined the offer put forth by the Hornets (allegedly it was a four year high salary deal). Eric Gordon is an average player. New Orleans is a small market and thanks to Gordon’s high points per game his salary demands were apparently similar to Kevin Love’s. The Hornets may still make the mistake of signing Gordon is they chose to match in the offseason. For now though they’ve avoided a bad mistake.

And the rest!

Those were the highlights for me. I know I left some names out as I wan’t too thrilled one way or the other. However, if you want to see the stats for the rest of the players with extension statuses I’ve listed them below. Enjoy!

Players with extension/option status changes at deadline
Player Season MP WP48 WP G PPG Status
Hasheem Thabeet 2009-2010 883 0.128 2.4 68 3.1 Not extended
Hasheem Thabeet 2010-2011 373 -0.052 -0.4 47 1.1 Not extended
Hasheem Thabeet 2011-2012 11 0.444 0.1 2 3.1 Not extended
Roy Hibbert 2008-2009 1009 -0.04 -0.8 70 7.1 Not extended
Roy Hibbert 2009-2010 2035 0.028 1.2 81 11.7 Not extended
Roy Hibbert 2010-2011 2244 0.021 1.0 81 12.7 Not extended
Roy Hibbert 2011-2012 502 0.198 1.5 17 14.4 Not extended
Brook Lopez 2008-2009 2501 0.097 5.1 82 13.0 Not extended
Brook Lopez 2009-2010 3027 0.095 6.0 82 18.8 Not extended
Brook Lopez 2010-2011 2889 -0.003 -0.2 82 20.4 Not extended
Brook Lopez 2011-2012 0 0.000 0.0 0 0.0 Not extended
Jonny Flynn 2009-2010 2339 -0.021 -1.0 81 13.5 Not extended
Jonny Flynn 2010-2011 983 -0.08 -1.6 53 5.3 Not extended
Jonny Flynn 2011-2012 70 -0.028 0.0 5 3.6 Not extended
Terrence Williams 2009-2010 1764 -0.006 -0.2 78 8.4 Not extended
Terrence Williams 2010-2011 290 -0.133 -0.8 21 5.0 Not extended
Terrence Williams 2011-2012 138 0.023 0.1 7 6.4 Not extended
Courtney Lee 2008-2009 1939 0.116 4.7 77 8.4 Not extended
Courtney Lee 2009-2010 2375 0.106 5.2 71 12.5 Not extended
Courtney Lee 2010-2011 1723 0.102 3.7 81 8.3 Not extended
Courtney Lee 2011-2012 224 0.111 0.5 10 9.0 Not extended
George Hill 2008-2009 1270 0.046 1.2 77 5.7 Negotiations fell apart
George Hill 2009-2010 2276 0.113 5.3 78 12.4 Negotiations fell apart
George Hill 2010-2011 2148 0.124 5.6 76 11.6 Negotiations fell apart
George Hill 2011-2012 398 0.186 1.5 16 9.5 Negotiations fell apart
Nicolas Batum 2008-2009 1454 0.161 4.9 79 5.4 Negotiations fell apart
Nicolas Batum 2009-2010 918 0.230 4.4 37 10.1 Negotiations fell apart
Nicolas Batum 2010-2011 2522 0.111 5.9 80 12.4 Negotiations fell apart
Nicolas Batum 2011-2012 470 0.221 2.2 19 11.1 Negotiations fell apart
Toney Douglas 2009-2010 1087 0.107 2.4 56 8.6 $2.1 million option exercised
Toney Douglas 2010-2011 1971 0.116 4.8 81 10.6 $2.1 million option exercised
Toney Douglas 2011-2012 411 -0.135 -1.2 18 8.7 $2.1 million option exercised

The 2011-2012 NBA Wins Produced Cheat Sheet

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I was born not knowing and have had only a little time to change that here and there.

Richard Feynman, Letter to Armando Garcia J, December 11, 1985

The New Kings

At the end of last season, I was arrogant. I was at the top of my game. I felt I had an answer or a model for every possible scenario the NBA could throw at me.

Then everything changed.

First, we didn’t know if we would have a season.Then we didn’t know where Chris Paul and Dwight Howard would end up. We still don’t know who’s going to be playing where exactly. Never mind the fact that the schedule for the season is so strange that Vegas refused to post over/unders for wins for the season.

But I wasn’t worried, All I had to do was adapt all my existing models slightly to account for the variation right?

Yeah, about that…

One of the projects that we had been working on is on improving the Wins Produced model . The Lockout gave us a great opportunity to do so and we did. This is a very good thing.

Except that it means that the world changed. Up is not quite down but it’s not exactly up anymore. The value and contribution of each player has changed and it’s going to take a while to adjust to the new reality.

It’s easy for anyone to be confused.

Luckily, I’m here to help you with that and I’ve been in the lab working on the problem. To start, I decided to come up with a nice little cheat sheet for the New Wins Produced model. It features every veteran currently on an active roster and it’s sorted by team and by the players Wins Produced for the 2010-2011 season. It has basic information for each player, totals for the last five years, each players average year and the numbers for the 2010-11 season.

Hopefully, that will help everyone involved.

-Arturo

Wins Produced comes back better and stronger!

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Editor’s Note (i.e. Dre): The following is from Dave Berri, who is now too lazy to post his own stuff.

A New Wins Produced and A New Win Score
Find the new Wins Produced numbers at Wins Produced, which you’ll notice is on the navigation bar right above you!

Wins Produced was introduced and explained (not “more or less” explained, but explained in detail in the text and many tedious little end notes) in The Wages of Wins in 2006.  It was then discussed (with more math) in an article published in 2008, as well as in Stumbling on Wins (and in other places as well).

Both books argued that inefficient scorers in the NBA are overvalued and players that help in ways other than scoring are under-valued.  In other words, many players people think are great (or not great) are really not helping (or really are helping quite a bit).

Such an attack on “conventional wisdom” – a term introduced by the late John Kenneth Galbraith – didn’t make everyone happy.*  As Galbraith once noted, “Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof.”

The “proof” some people constructed focused on the value of rebounds.  Because Wins Produced argues that non-scorers who grab many rebounds are quite valuable – and conventional wisdom argues that non-scorers are simply not that valuable – it must be the case that Wins Produced overvalues rebounds.

A variety of arguments have been offered in response to this critique.  Many of these were detailed in the Frequently Asked Question page. For example, it was noted that

  • although diminishing returns – as detailed in Stumbling on Wins — certainly exists for defensive rebounds (but not for offensive rebounds), the size of the effect is “small”.
  • to illustrate, when the impact of diminishing returns with respect to defensive rebounds is accounted for, the ranking of the players doesn’t seem to change much (a point made on the FAQ page).

As a consequence, Wins Produced has historically ignored this issue.

As the lockout dragged on and on, though, I began to think that maybe it might be better to just incorporate this effect into the measure we post at the WoW Journal.  After all, the effect has been measured and it can be included. So why not just make the adjustment and therefore remove the argument “Wins Produced overvalues rebounds” from the discussion.

So that is what I have done.  The specific calculations – which are somewhat more complicated than what was posted before — are detailed at the new “Calculating Wins Produced” website.

In addition, the measurements from 1999-00 to 2010-11 have also been posted.  Again, the results are quite similar.  There is a 0.98 correlation between Wins Produced as it was calculated before and the new measure that adjusts for what we see with respect to defensive rebounds.  In other words, the players who ranked towards the top of the league before still rank towards the top now.  And the same story is seen for the players ranked at the bottom.

To illustrated, here are the top 25 players once we adjust for the impact of defensive rebounds.

Rank Name Team Position Adj.P48 WP48 Wins
Produced		 Rank
Classic		 WP48
Classic		 Wins
Produced
Classic
1 Chris Paul New Orleans 1.00 0.401 0.309 18.4 3 0.335 20.0
2 Dwight Howard Orlando 5.00 0.498 0.301 18.4 2 0.374 22.9
3 Kevin Love Minnesota 4.22 0.500 0.335 18.2 1 0.457 24.9
4 LeBron James Miami 3.19 0.370 0.270 17.2 4 0.307 19.6
5 Dwyane Wade Miami 2.00 0.311 0.253 14.9 5 0.278 16.3
6 Pau Gasol LA Lakers 4.79 0.422 0.234 14.8 7 0.243 15.4
7 Steve Nash Phoenix 1.00 0.336 0.244 12.7 11 0.265 13.8
8 Landry Fields New York 2.00 0.295 0.237 12.5 6 0.304 16.1
9 Rajon Rondo Boston 1.00 0.327 0.235 12.4 18 0.243 12.8
10 Ray Allen Boston 2.00 0.263 0.204 12.3 22 0.185 11.2
11 Zach Randolph Memphis 4.31 0.381 0.212 12.1 9 0.263 14.9
12 Jason Kidd Dallas 1.00 0.305 0.213 11.8 14 0.247 13.6
13 Lamar Odom LA Lakers 4.00 0.368 0.212 11.6 13 0.249 13.7
14 Tyson Chandler Dallas 5.00 0.465 0.268 11.5 15 0.311 13.3
15 Al Horford Atlanta 4.75 0.390 0.203 11.4 16 0.230 12.9
16 Paul Pierce Boston 3.13 0.290 0.195 11.3 19 0.212 12.2
17 Kris Humphries New Jersey 4.00 0.411 0.254 10.9 8 0.353 15.1
18 Andre Iguodala Philadelphia 3.00 0.298 0.212 10.9 20 0.232 12.0
19 Kevin Garnett Boston 4.00 0.382 0.226 10.4 10 0.302 14.0
20 Manu Ginobili San Antonio 2.62 0.280 0.204 10.3 25 0.202 10.2
21 Derrick Rose Chicago 1.00 0.253 0.161 10.2 31 0.151 9.5
22 Nene Hilario Denver 5.00 0.405 0.208 9.9 28 0.208 9.9
23 Gerald Wallace Charlotte-Portland 3.00 0.263 0.177 9.9 17 0.230 12.9
24 Kevin Durant Oklahoma City 3.08 0.247 0.155 9.8 21 0.182 11.5
25 Blake Griffin LA Clippers 4.30 0.317 0.148 9.6 12 0.212 13.7

Previously the top player according to Wins Produced was Kevin Love.  Once we consider the defensive rebounds we estimate Love took from his teammates, Love is now ranked 3rd in the NBA.  Again, the two evaluations have a 0.98 correlation.  So although there is indeed a difference in the rankings, the difference isn’t very large.

Once this adjustment is made, though, we do need a new Win Score.  Previously each defensive rebound had the same value as a point, steal, offensive rebound, etc… .  Because we are taking into account how a player will take some defensive rebounds from teammates, the value of a defensive rebound will now be lower.  To ascertain how much lower, a model was estimated where a player’s WP48 was regressed on the following per 48 minute statistics (adjusted for position played): Points, Offensive Rebounds, Defensive Rebounds, Steals, Blocked Shots, Assists, Turnovers, Personal Fouls, Field Goal Attempts, and Free Throw Attempts.  From this regression we see that 98% of the variation in WP48 was explained by these statistics.**  Furthermore, the estimated weights yield the following Win Score model.

Win Score =             PTS + STL + ORB + 0.5*DRB + 0.5*AST + 0.5*BLK – TOV – FGA –                             0.5*FTA – 0.5*PF

Yes, the only real change is the value of defensive rebounds.  For 2010-11, the position averages for Win Score per 48 minutes are as follows:

  • Centers: 7.846
  • Power Forwards: 6.956
  • Small Forwards: 4.835
  • Shooting Guards: 4.104
  • Point Guards: 4.851
  • Overall Average: 5.729

If you wish to estimate WP48 for a player – and you don’t want to go through all the steps noted above (which are a bit more complicated than they were before) – one can take the following steps:

  • Calculate Win Score per 48 minutes for the player.
  • Subtract the position average noted above and add back in 5.729 (the overall average).  This gives you Relative Win Score per 48 minutes.
  • Estimate WP48 with the following formula: -0.07898 + 0.031888*Relative Win Score per 48 minutes

Of course, these steps aren’t necessary if you make it a point to keep visiting the Wages of Wins Journal.  Once the season starts we plan to have continuously updated values of Wins Produced and WP48 for each player.

- DJ

* – One should note that the argument that conventional wisdom in the NBA is incorrect is not unique to Wins Produced. As I argued four years ago, Win Shares and Adjusted Plus-Minus also argue that some scorers are overrated.  Not sure I recall anyone being that troubled by this aspect of Win Shares and Adjusted Plus-Minus.  One suspects that this is because the on-line stats community doesn’t devote much effort critiquing the models generated by members of the on-line stats community.

** – Using data from 2009-10, Win Shares per 48 minute was regressed on per minute values of Points, Offensive Rebounds, Defensive Rebounds, Steals, Blocked Shots, Assists, Turnovers, Personal Fouls, Field Goal Attempts, and Free Throw Attempts.  This regression revealed that 86% of the variation in Win Shares per 48 minutes was explained by the player statistics. That tells us that Win Shares has a much larger adjustment for team statistics.  Again, not sure I have ever seen anyone troubled by this feature of Win Shares.  Again, one suspects that this is because the on-line stats community doesn’t devote much effort critiquing the models generated by members of the on-line stats community.