Wayne Winston is the Mavs stat guru (and a professor at the University of Indiana). He's a fan of adjusted +/-. He really seems to talk a lot of sense. And there's no bullshit. Comments? (Fun facts: Cleveland lost to Orlando by a POINT A MINUTE when Ben Wallace was on the floor. When he wasn't, they won handily. Devin Harris owns Tony Parker. Anthony Parker is really good. So is Ben Gordon. So is Andre Iguodala (who is the leader in minutes played in the entire NBA over the last three seasons). Amare Stoudemire is not. Kevin Garnett is the player of the decade.) Another fun fact: Pritchard handed out copies of Winston's book Mathletics to various Blazer staffers (didn't he? I remember reading that).
Interesting read ... especially the "There really aren't any positions" [paraphrased] statement in the second half of the interview. In some ways it appears KP has gone out and gotten a bunch of guys who can play 2 or 3 positions
It can be, so long as the players that are put on the floor can defend the other team properly. Being a 'tweener is really only a problem if you lack the quickness to defend the smaller position that you can play and the strength/size to defend the larger position that you can play.
Generally speaking, if you are a "tweener" it means you're stuck between two positions and are substandard as a starter in either, if you can play more than one position at a high level you're "versatile." LaMarcus being able to play the 4 or the 5 competently makes him versatile, Travis being neither quick enough laterally to defend 3s nor strong enough to guard 4s makes him a tweener.
I understand what the guy is trying to accomplish...but I have my doubts. First, there is the issue of sample size. Second, there are too many other variables involved. The game is never just player "A" vs player "Z". There are 8 other guys out there, and the potential combinations run into the hundreds.
I hear what you are saying, but adjusted +/- is probably the only stat out there (publicly available at least) right now that reasonably predicts and accounts for a player's defensive and offensive contributions in a single metric. The bottom line is that you combine a lot of different statistics together when you are evaluating a player's impact on the court.
He seems to really like Iguodala and Garnett. The recurring theme between those two guys? They've spent a lot of time on really, really bad teams, that were mostly less bad because they were on it. So of course Iguadala is going to have a better +/- rating if the guy who subs in for him is Willie Green. Obviously, both guys are really good. I just think +/- overrates them. It's a really interesting read, though. There's a lot to it, even though I sound skeptical. I've always thought Amare was the most overrated big man of this decade.
You're talking about regular +/-. Adjusted +/- attempts to adjust for quality of teammates, especially the quality of the teammate replacing the player in question. How successfully it does so, I'm not certain, since I don't have the wherewithal to plow through the formula. But Adjusted +/- is pretty well-regarded among statistical types.
About the Blazers: http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop...ban-s-Stats-Expert-Isn-t-Bashful--Part-3.html Interestingly - if you look at the win% last year based on 82games.com - Oden's win% is higher than Joel's - this shows you that when someone was able to get Greg the ball in the post (and Rudy was the best at this task last year) - we did pretty well...
From the same article where he talks about the Blazers: I KNEW somebody should've gone harder after Lamar Odom. Damn you Memphis! The good news: that dynamite lineup that only played 50 minutes probably won't play much more than that again unless Artest gets injured.
Wayne Winston responds to Durant-lover, Oden-hater Bill Simmons (scroll down past the pointless Football stuff). Incidentally, Winston's comments about Tim Thomas with the Knicks might apply to James Jones with the Blazers.
