<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">Numbers were what Dean Oliver studied as a kid, memorizing his trading cards. They were the language he spoke fluently in high school when he scored a perfect 800 on the math portion of his SAT test and went to Cal Tech. And, at age 35, it's numbers that have brought Oliver to the NBA as the Sonics' statistics consultant, his first full-time crack at a lifelong pursuit. For years, he has traded his statistical studies to NBA teams for free tickets. He published a book on it last year, "Basketball on Paper." This season, it's a full-time job after he took a 75-percent pay cut from the six-figure salary he earned in environmental engineering last year to study chemistry on the basketball court for Seattle this season. "I dream about dunking," Oliver said. "I never quite got there, but I enjoy this." Call him the Sonics' super scientist, who watches most games from two states away, though he was in Seattle over the past two weeks. His Bay Area loft has a television perched on a desk with a video recorder right next to it, his one-man analysis station as Seattle takes its swing at bringing to basketball the stats-centric thinking that's so en vogue in baseball. It's not a novelty act, and it's not necessarily new. Sonics president Wally Walker has an MBA from Stanford and loves numbers. He oversaw the development of the Sonics' own player-rating software when he was general manager and paid for outside analysis last season. Adding Oliver as a full-time, exclusive consultant this season is just another step in that direction. Oliver advocates no secret formula, no recipe that he has concocted to rank NBA players Nos. 1 through 300. Rather, what Oliver studies is efficiency, both on the small scale of a single game and the larger scale of seasons and careers. His measurements are based on points per 100 possessions, his foundation for rating team offense, team defense and individual players. What types of players are compatible? What types of skills must a team have to be successful? How rare is Ray Allen's smooth-shooting stroke, which helps inform how much he's worth? Which players get less efficient the more they shoot and which ones need more shots to be effective? Is Vladimir Radmanovic a unique mismatch who changes the nature of a game or a shooting specialist? Oliver isn't the only one eyeballing those questions for Seattle, but he is a new voice in the Sonics chorus. The idea is to get a fresh perspective in a sport ingrained with old-salt scouting embodied by general manager Rick Sund, who believes conclusions on chemistry are best drawn from the gut. Trying a different tack by using stats can lead to insights. In baseball, it helped the Oakland A's identify the talents and skills that were undervalued and those that were overpriced. It allowed the A's to remain competitive despite a much smaller budget than most major league baseball teams, an approach chronicled in Michael Lewis' book "Moneyball." It's not so all encompassing in Seattle where Oliver's day-to-day contribution is subtler. After Seattle's 30-point, season-opening loss, Oliver found proof that a first-game blowout didn't always forecast doom. In 1994, Orlando lost its season-opener and played in the NBA Finals the following summer. This summer, Oliver found other point guards who had rookie seasons similar to Luke Ridnour, who was inconsistent both in performance and playing time. The list wasn't entirely encouraging because it included players like Terrence Stansbury. But Steve Nash was on the list of comparable rookies, though it was Sam Cassell whose first season more closely resembled Ridnour's. The idea was that by identifying similar players, the Sonics could find what ultimately made Cassell successful, and steer Ridnour in that direction while helping him avoid the potholes that sunk Stansbury.</div> <font size="1">Full Story courtesy of Danny O'Neil and the Seattle PI.</font> First I've heard of this guy, but it's something I really like. It seems that management will do anything that might give us a slight edge in the league, and from what I've read there it's something that could be beneficial. Thoughts?
As much as I'm in favor of anything that will improve the team, this seems a bit outrageous. Personally, I'm not a stats guy. I would rather watch the game and get a feel for what is happening as opposed to comparing everything to stats. The stat that I look at the most is what percentages we are holding opponents to from the field and rebounding margin. When I coach I try my best not to get caught up in stats. If a player is taking good shots and is missing I can live w/ it as long as he is bringing it defensively and on the backboard. If certain guys are freezing each other out I take a look at that too. When watching the Sonics I've noticed that Jerome James doesn't get any post touches from anybody really other than Ridnour. Daniels doesn't like passing to Flip. Daniels really is dependant on ball screens (especially from Fortson) to create avenues for penetration. Flip isn't a quick starter, he plays better when he gets into the groove of a game. Nick Collison works best when he is getting important minutes. Ray Allen can't consistently get past his man w/o a screen. Vlad Radmanovic penetrates only when guys are running at him. Lewis plays better when he works inside out. Little things that I've noticed that aren't going to come up in the stat sheet. I don't think that this "scientist" is necessary but at the same time he probably is making some type of contribution that will only help the coaching staff and upper management. I just hope that McMillian doesn't turn into a stats freak. It's more important that people get a feel for what's going on.
That's an interesting perspective Shieky, although IMO you're taking the 'stats' thing a bit too literally. From reading the article, I got the impression that the things you outlined are the sorts of things he does focus on - in what sort of situations Nick plays his best ball, what sort of defenders Vlad excels against etc. While that's generally the role of the coach, it's also nice to have someone who not only is amazingly switched on, but is a big basketball fan to, as a means of extra opinion. The sort of things he'd be doing would be what sort of line-ups have statistically produced the most for the Sonics, which players do the best around certain teammates and certain types of defenders, etc. I think if you have a guy who can provide you with that sort of information, it's only going to make Nate's job easier when he needs to make a tough decision of what line-up to go with or what player to put into a game at a certain time. Obviously, it's mainly off his own head and instincts, but it helps to have tidbits of information available IMO. That said, you're the coach, I'm the fan, maybe I'm way off.
