We start by taking the top 390 players, out of about 450 players who played in the NBA in 2007-08, ranked according to gross or simple player rating, which is as follows: ADD THE FOLLOWING Points Rebounds 1.4 X Assists Steals 1.4 X Blocks Field Goals Made 0.5 X # of 3-Pointers Made 0.25 X # of Free Throws Made SUBTRACT THE FOLLOWING 0.7 X Turnovers 0.8 X # of Missed Field Goals 0.8 X # of Missed Free Throws Real Player Rating, the holy grail of player ratings, is then gross or simple player rating divided by minutes per game. This gives you the actual production per minute of each player, so you can now directly compare players with very different playing times. By discovering players who have high ratings, but low minutes, you can spot players who were underrated by their coaches. Among younger players, you can spot the promising ones and the ones who need more time to develop into full NBA players, time that in some cases may not be available, meaning that the player will end up playing in Europe or something. Then we eliminate any player who did not play in at least 16 games. Then we eliminate any player who did not play at least 7 minutes per game in the games he played in. Finally, we lop off the players with the lowest real player ratings from the bottom (36 players in this case) and take the top 330 NBA players to form the official Real Player Ratings list. The average team in the NBA will have 11 players from this list. If a player does not appear on the list, then one or more of the following is true: 1. The player was not among the top 390 out of 450 players for gross or simple real player rating. 2. His real player rating is very low, less than .536. 3. He played in fewer than 16 games. 4. His minutes per game were less than 7. In many cases, this would be a player who played mostly or only in garbage time. 5. The player is one of the best made you miss type of defenders in the NBA, but has very little offensive game. Since scores that a defender prevents is an unknown quantity, it is not accounted for by the Real Player Rating, and so it is possible for a player not to make the top 330 list despite being a valuable asset, albeit mostly on defense only. Bruce Bowen, the San Antonio small forward, is the most obvious example. His real player rating is only .370, yet he played over 30 minutes a game due to all the scores of the Spurs’ opponents he stops. ADJUSTMENTS FOR MADE THEM MISS DEFENDING Since shots that a defender stops from going in the basket, with no actual block, can not be known and are not kept track of, the Real Player Rating is not exactly perfect. But if you are very knowledgeable about the skills and efforts of players with respect to preventing scores, you can make your own adjustments based on your knowledge. In order to improve my coverage of the Denver Nuggets, I introduced in 2008 “adjustments for defending” to the Nuggets real player ratings. Although neither I nor anyone knows anywhere near exactly how many scores were prevented by the various Nuggets, since I was very familiar with the players and what they can and do accomplish on the court, I was able to rank the Nuggets with respect to made you miss defending. I decided that I would then assign an adjustment for made them miss defending to the real player ratings of each Nugget, in equal increments. Furthermore, I decided that the top half of the list of Nuggets according to made them miss defending would get positive adjustments, while the bottom half would get negative adjustments. The next step was to estimate how much the adjustments should be. After giving it my best thought, I decided that a +.130 adjustment would be the best estimate I can come up with for what the best made them miss defender the Nuggets have should get. So Kenyon Martins’s Real Player rating is .777, but his Real Player Rating adjusted for made them miss defending is .907. The equal increment adjustments were symmetric as to zero, so the best made them miss defender, as just discussed, received a +.130 adjustment, while the worst made them miss defender received a -.130 adjustment. Notice that this means that the best made them miss defender is a full .260 better than the worst made them miss defender, than the basic Real Player Ratings indicate. Since the Real Player Ratings of the entire list of 330 players range from .536 to 1.268, a range of .732, the .260 range for made them miss defending is, it seems clear to me, an adequate but not excessive correction of the fact that no one actually knows how many shots various players prevented from going in. So what you do, if you think you know about how good a player is in made them miss defending compared with other players, is to adjust that player’s Real Player Rating up or down, by as much as .130 up if the player is among the very best made them miss defenders among the 330 players rated, and by as much as .130 down if the player is among the very worst. Specifically, you estimate how the player would rank among the 330 players who are in the Real Player Ratings rankings, and then adjust that player’s rating according to the following guideline:. Top 12: +.130 13-24: +.120 25-36: +.110 37-48: +.100 49-60: +.090 61-72: +.080 73-84: +.070 85-96: +.060 97-108: +.050 109-120: +.040 121-132: +.030 133-144: +.020 145-156: +.010 157-174: 0 175-186: -.010 187-198: -.020 199-210: -.030 211-222: -.040 223-234: -.050 235-246: -.060 247-258: -.070 259-270: -.080 271-282: -.090 283-294: -.100 295-306: -.110 307-318: -.120 319-330: -.130 As another Nuggets example, and maybe I got carried away slightly with the hysteria regarding Carmelo Anthony’s defending, but I estimated Anthony would be ranked in the 259-270 range among the 330 players if all these players were ranked according to made them miss defending. So Anthony’s Real Player Rating, which is 1.091, becomes 1.011, when it is adjusted for made them miss defending. Remember that you can adjust only players you know very well as to their defending; it is most likely beyond anyone's capabilities to even approximately rank all 330 players, so there can be no full "Real Player Ratings Adjusted for Made Them Miss Defending". No one that I have found has attempted to do this anywhere on the internet! However, as I did with the Nuggets, I believe that you can calculate the adjusted ratings for a team, if you know the players on that team very well. SCALE FOR REAL PLAYER RATINGS All Time Historic Superstar Player 1.175 to Up Superstar Player 1.050 to 1.174 Star Player 0.925 to 1.049 Outstanding Player 0.825 to 0.924 Major Role Player 0.750 to 0.824 Role Player 0.675 to 0.749 Minor Role Player 0.600 to 0.674 Reserve Only Player 0.525 to 0.599 Marginal or Struggling Player 0.450 to 0.524 Bust Players (or Defense Only!) Lower to 0.449 2007-08 NBA REAL PLAYER RATINGS (Counting every on court production except for made them miss defending, as discussed.) 1 Amare Stoudemire, Pho C 1.268 2 LeBron James, Cle SF 1.255 3 Chris Paul, NO PG 1.186 4 Kobe Bryant, LAL SG 1.149 5 Kevin Garnett, Bos PF 1.134 6 Dirk Nowitzki, Dal PF 1.108 7 Tim Duncan, SA C 1.106 8 Carlos Boozer, Uta PF 1.103 9 Carmelo Anthony, Den SF 1.091 10 Steve Nash, Pho PG 1.079 11 Andrew Bynum, LAL C 1.063 12 Yao Ming, Hou C 1.059 13 Manu Ginobili, SA SG 1.055 14 Dwight Howard, Orl C 1.053 15 Al Jefferson, Min C 1.045 16 Chris Bosh, Tor PF 1.036 17 Dwyane Wade, Mia SG 1.024 18 Deron Williams, Uta PG 1.016 19 Pau Gasol, LAL PF 0.994 20 Baron Davis, GS PG 0.990 21 T.J. Ford, Ind PG 0.987 22 Allen Iverson, Den SG 0.978 23 Chauncey Billups, Det PG 0.963 24 Josh Smith, Atl PF 0.946 25 Zach Randolph, NY PF 0.942 26 David West, NO PF 0.939 27 J.R. Smith, Den SG 0.938 28 Tracy McGrady, Hou SG 0.924 29 Leon Powe, Bos PF 0.924 30 Vince Carter, NJ SG 0.923 31 Andris Biedrins, GS C 0.923 32 Chris Kaman, LAC C 0.922 33 Tony Parker, SA PG 0.919 34 Paul Pierce, Bos SF 0.919 35 Caron Butler, Was SF 0.917 36 Shaquille O'Neal, Pho C 0.916 37 Marcus Camby, Den C 0.914 38 Jose Calderon, Tor PG 0.914 39 Shawn Marion, Mia PF 0.910 40 Kevin Martin, Sac SG 0.909 41 Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Cle C 0.908 42 Antawn Jamison, Was PF 0.905 43 Carl Landry, Hou PF 0.905 44 Nick Fazekas, LAC PF 0.903 45 Hedo Turkoglu, Orl SF 0.900 46 Corey Maggette, GS SF 0.899 47 Ike Diogu, Por PF 0.893 48 Monta Ellis, GS SG 0.884 49 Jason Richardson, Cha SG 0.883 50 Jason Kidd, Dal PG 0.879 51 Ron Artest, Sac SF 0.879 52 Brandon Roy, Por SG 0.870 53 Mike Dunleavy, Ind SG 0.869 54 Danny Granger, Ind SF 0.869 55 Jermaine O'Neal, Tor C 0.868 56 Josh Howard, Dal SF 0.865 57 Michael Redd, Mil SG 0.864 58 Andrew Bogut, Mil C 0.860 59 LaMarcus Aldridge, Por PF 0.860 60 Andre Miller, Phi PG 0.858 61 Andre Iguodala, Phi SF 0.854 62 Rudy Gay, Mem SF 0.854 63 Brad Miller, Sac C 0.851 64 Joe Johnson, Atl SG 0.850 65 Emeka Okafor, Cha PF 0.849 66 Mo Williams, Mil PG 0.847 67 Lamar Odom, LAL PF 0.847 68 Troy Murphy, Ind PF 0.847 69 Devin Harris, NJ PG 0.839 70 Gerald Wallace, Cha SF 0.836 71 Ben Gordon, Chi SG 0.836 72 Richard Hamilton, Det SG 0.833 73 Chris Wilcox, Okc PF 0.833 74 Al Harrington, GS PF 0.833 75 Kevin Durant, Sea SF 0.832 76 Amir Johnson, Det PF 0.831 77 Luol Deng, Chi SF 0.828 78 Mike Miller, Min SG 0.825 79 Rasheed Wallace, Det PF 0.823 80 Richard Jefferson, Mil SF 0.823 81 Sam Cassell, Bos PG 0.823 82 Ramon Sessions, Mil PG 0.822 83 Brandan Wright, GS PF 0.818 84 Paul Millsap, Uta PF 0.812 85 Craig Smith, Min PF 0.811 86 Leandro Barbosa, Pho SG 0.810 87 Aaron Gray, Chi C 0.810 88 Charlie Villanueva, Mil PF 0.809 89 Nazr Mohammed, Cha C 0.806 90 David Lee, NY PF 0.804 91 Jameer Nelson, Orl PG 0.803 92 Mike Harris, Hou F 0.798 93 Andres Nocioni, Chi SF 0.793 94 Nick Collison, Okc PF 0.793 95 Rashad McCants, Min SG 0.793 96 Mehmet Okur, Uta C 0.792 97 Andrei Kirilenko, Uta SF 0.792 98 Earl Watson, Okc PG 0.791 99 Joe Smith, Cle PF 0.790 100 Andray Blatche, Was C 0.790 101 Luis Scola, Hou PF 0.789 102 Tyrus Thomas, Chi PF 0.788 103 Ronny Turiaf, LAL C 0.786 104 Jordan Farmar, LAL PG 0.786 105 Brendan Haywood, Was C 0.784 106 Jason Terry, Dal PG 0.784 107 Grant Hill, Pho SF 0.783 108 Stephen Jackson, GS SF 0.783 109 Kris Humphries, Tor C 0.782 110 Tyson Chandler, NO C 0.782 111 Jamaal Tinsley, Ind PG 0.781 112 Mike Bibby, Atl PG 0.780 113 Stromile Swift, NJ C 0.780 114 Rashard Lewis, Orl PF 0.779 115 Louis Williams, Phi PG 0.778 116 Kenyon Martin, Den PF 0.777 117 Steve Novak, Hou PF 0.776 118 Rasho Nesterovic, Ind C 0.775 119 Hakim Warrick, Mem PF 0.774 120 Travis Outlaw, Por SF 0.771 121 Nate Robinson, NY PG 0.770 122 Alonzo Mourning, Mia C 0.769 123 Jeff Foster, Ind C 0.767 124 Channing Frye, Por PF 0.767 125 Rajon Rondo, Bos PG 0.763 126 Linas Kleiza, Den SF 0.762 127 Jamal Crawford, NY SG 0.759 128 Ray Allen, Bos SG 0.758 129 Brandon Bass, Dal PF 0.756 130 Al Horford, Atl C 0.754 131 Sasha Vujacic, LAL SG 0.753 132 Francisco Garcia, Sac SF 0.751 133 Samuel Dalembert, Phi C 0.750 134 Shawne Williams, Ind SF 0.750 135 Matt Barnes, GS PF 0.746 136 Ronnie Brewer, Uta SG 0.745 137 Ronald Murray, Ind PG 0.745 138 Kurt Thomas, SA C 0.743 139 Drew Gooden, Chi PF 0.740 140 Bonzi Wells, NO SF 0.735 141 Matt Harpring, Uta SF 0.735 142 Kirk Hinrich, Chi PG 0.735 143 Ryan Gomes, Min SF 0.734 144 Eddy Curry, NY C 0.734 145 Joakim Noah, Chi C 0.734 146 Trevor Ariza, LAL SF 0.732 147 Austin Croshere, GS PF 0.731 148 Jason Maxiell, Det PF 0.730 149 C.J. Miles, Uta SG 0.730 150 Sean Williams, NJ C 0.726 151 Josh Childress, Atl SF 0.726 152 Aaron Brooks, Hou PG 0.725 153 Thaddeus Young, Phi SF 0.724 154 Nene Hilario, Den PF 0.723 155 Brent Barry, SA SG 0.721 156 Wally Szczerbiak, Cle SF 0.720 157 Raymond Felton, Cha PG 0.719 158 Erick Dampier, Dal C 0.713 159 Rodney Stuckey, Det SG 0.711 160 Spencer Hawes, Sac C 0.710 161 Beno Udrih, Sac PG 0.709 162 Tayshaun Prince, Det SF 0.708 163 Jamario Moon, Tor SF 0.705 164 Anthony Carter, Den PG 0.704 165 Josh Boone, NJ PF 0.704 166 Marcus Banks, Mia PG 0.703 167 Kyle Lowry, Mem PG 0.702 168 Rafer Alston, Hou PG 0.701 169 John Salmons, Sac SG 0.700 170 Andre Brown, Mem PF 0.698 171 Tim Thomas, LAC PF 0.698 172 Al Thornton, LAC SF 0.697 173 Marvin Williams, Atl SF 0.697 174 Julian Wright, NO SF 0.696 175 Peja Stojakovic, NO SF 0.694 176 Carlos Delfino, Tor SG 0.694 177 Antonio McDyess, Det C 0.693 178 Randy Foye, Min PG 0.693 179 Derek Fisher, LAL PG 0.693 180 Kelenna Azubuike, GS SG 0.692 181 Boris Diaw, Pho PF 0.691 182 Kendrick Perkins, Bos C 0.690 183 Juan Dixon, Det SG 0.690 184 Ronnie Price, Uta PG 0.688 185 Keyon Dooling, Orl PG 0.686 186 Bostjan Nachbar, NJ SF 0.685 187 Eddie House, Bos PG 0.684 188 Matt Bonner, SA PF 0.683 189 Bobby Jackson, Hou SG 0.682 190 Brian Skinner, Pho C 0.680 191 Mickael Pietrus, Orl SF 0.680 192 Jannero Pargo, NO PG 0.679 193 Marcus Williams, NJ PG 0.679 194 J.J. Redick, Orl SG 0.679 195 Dorell Wright, Mia SF 0.677 196 Willie Green, Phi SG 0.677 197 Jose Juan Barea, Dal PG 0.676 198 Carlos Arroyo, Orl PG 0.676 199 Anthony Parker, Tor SG 0.676 200 Jerry Stackhouse, Dal SG 0.675 201 Vladimir Radmanovic, LAL PF 0.675 202 Travis Diener, Ind PG 0.673 203 Delonte West, Cle SG 0.673 204 Luther Head, Hou SG 0.672 205 Kyle Korver, Uta SF 0.671 206 Luke Walton, LAL SF 0.671 207 Mike Conley, Mem PG 0.670 208 Luke Ridnour, Okc PG 0.670 209 Jarvis Hayes, Det SF 0.669 210 Dan Dickau, LAC PG 0.667 211 Stephon Marbury, NY PG 0.667 212 Nick Young, Was SG 0.662 213 Roger Mason, Was PG 0.662 214 Darko Milicic, Mem C 0.660 215 Marquis Daniels, Ind SG 0.660 216 Johan Petro, Okc C 0.659 217 Kirk Snyder, Min SG 0.659 218 Jarrett Jack, Ind SG 0.658 219 Walter Herrmann, Det SF 0.655 220 Dahntay Jones, Sac SG 0.655 221 Joey Graham, Tor SF 0.655 222 Joel Przybilla, Por C 0.653 223 Chris Quinn, Mia PG 0.652 224 Dikembe Mutombo, Hou C 0.652 225 Fabricio Oberto, SA PF 0.650 226 Thabo Sefolosha, Chi SG 0.649 227 Udonis Haslem, Mia PF 0.649 228 Andrea Bargnani, Tor PF 0.647 229 Shelden Williams, Sac C 0.645 230 Nenad Krstic, NJ PF 0.644 231 Wilson Chandler, NY SF 0.643 232 Larry Hughes, Chi SG 0.643 233 Maurice Evans, Orl SG 0.642 234 Gerald Green, Dal SF 0.642 235 Ricky Davis, Mia SF 0.640 236 Darius Songaila, Was PF 0.639 237 Antoine Walker, Mem PF 0.639 238 Zaza Pachulia, Atl C 0.638 239 Eduardo Najera, Den PF 0.636 240 Jermareo Davidson, Cha PF 0.635 241 Juan Carlos Navarro, Mem SG 0.633 242 Javaris Crittenton, Mem PG 0.632 243 Gordan Giricek, Pho SG 0.628 244 Jared Dudley, Cha SF 0.626 245 Yi Jianlian, NJ PF 0.624 246 Anderson Varejao, Cle C 0.624 247 Jason Williams, Mia PG 0.623 248 DJ Mbenga, LAL C 0.623 249 Tyronn Lue, Dal PG 0.622 250 Derek Anderson, Cha SG 0.621 251 Damien Wilkins, Okc SG 0.621 252 Salim Stoudamire, Atl SG 0.621 253 Awvee Storey, Mil SF 0.620 254 Theo Ratliff, Det C 0.617 255 Josh Powell, LAC PF 0.615 256 James Posey, Bos SF 0.614 257 Jake Voskuhl, Mil C 0.614 258 Mickael Gelabale, Okc SG 0.613 259 Jeff Green, Okc PF 0.612 260 Devin Brown, Cle SF 0.611 261 Marko Jaric, Mem PG 0.610 262 Dan Gadzuric, Mil C 0.610 263 Tony Allen, Bos SG 0.609 264 Desmond Mason, Mil SF 0.609 265 Mark Blount, Mia C 0.607 266 Glen Davis, Bos C 0.606 267 DeSagana Diop, Dal C 0.606 268 Kwame Brown, Mem C 0.606 269 Antonio Daniels, Was PG 0.605 270 Mikki Moore, Sac PF 0.605 271 Brian Cook, Orl PF 0.605 272 David Harrison, Ind C 0.605 273 Steve Blake, Por PG 0.605 274 Kareem Rush, Ind SG 0.604 275 Rodney Carney, Min SG 0.604 276 Chris Mihm, LAL C 0.603 277 Ime Udoka, SA SF 0.602 278 Melvin Ely, NO C 0.600 279 Anthony Johnson, Sac PG 0.599 280 Martell Webster, Por SF 0.599 281 Sebastian Telfair, Min PG 0.599 282 Ruben Patterson, LAC SF 0.599 283 Earl Barron, Mia C 0.598 284 Darius Washington, SA PG 0.598 285 Cuttino Mobley, LAC SG 0.597 286 DeShawn Stevenson, Was SG 0.596 287 Damon Stoudamire, SA PG 0.595 288 Jason Smith, Phi PF 0.593 289 Bobby Jones, Den SG 0.593 290 Brevin Knight, LAC PG 0.593 291 Malik Allen, Dal PF 0.593 292 Charlie Bell, Mil SG 0.588 293 Quincy Douby, Sac PG 0.588 294 Andre Owens, Ind PG 0.587 295 James Jones, Mia PF 0.586 296 Bobby Simmons, NJ SF 0.581 297 Sergio Rodriguez, Por PG 0.580 298 Chris Duhon, NY PG 0.580 299 P.J. Brown, Bos FC 0.578 300 Chuck Hayes, Hou PF 0.578 301 Aaron Williams, LAC C 0.576 302 Oleksiy Pecherov, Was PF 0.576 303 Chucky Atkins, Den PG 0.575 304 Michael Finley, SA SF 0.574 305 Malik Rose, NY PF 0.574 306 Ryan Hollins, Cha C 0.573 307 Daniel Gibson, Cle PG 0.570 308 Raja Bell, Pho SG 0.569 309 Reggie Evans, Phi PF 0.569 310 Renaldo Balkman, NY SF 0.568 311 Donyell Marshall, Okc PF 0.568 312 Adonal Foyle, Orl C 0.568 313 Paul Davis, LAC C 0.567 314 Jason Kapono, Tor SF 0.561 315 C.J. Watson, GS G 0.561 316 Earl Boykins, Cha PG 0.560 317 Matt Carroll, Cha SG 0.558 318 Shannon Brown, Chi SG 0.557 319 Stephane Lasme, Mia F 0.553 320 Fred Jones, NY SG 0.552 321 Dwayne Jones, Cle C 0.548 322 Ben Wallace, Cle C 0.547 323 Mike James, NO PG 0.541 324 Shane Battier, Hou SF 0.540 325 Keith Bogans, Orl SG 0.539 326 Daequan Cook, Mia SG 0.539 327 Jason Hart, Uta PG 0.538 328 Brian Cardinal, Min PF 0.538 329 Morris Peterson, NO SG 0.538 330 Michael Ruffin, Mil C 0.536
can't be that great of a stat, you got 3 Nuggets rated so high and they can't even get out of the 1st round. there's something to be said for intangibles and chemistry, yes/no?
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Celtic Fan @ Jul 12 2008, 04:25 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>can't be that great of a stat, you got 3 Nuggets rated so high and they can't even get out of the 1st round. there's something to be said for intangibles and chemistry, yes/no?</div> How good each player is is on each player. How good the players are form the building blocks for a team, and which building blocks are available is the responsibility of the front office and, to some degree, the owner. What is built or not built with the building blocks is entirely the responsibility of the coaching staff. So if the Nuggets are chock loaded with talented players, thanks to those players efforts, and thanks to the front office and owner getting them, it is a total scandal that they can not win a playoff series, and a humiliation that they could not win a single playoff game. Scandal and humiliation against who now? The coaches, because they had as good or better a set of building blocks than any other coaches did, yet could not do anything with them other than get their full share of obvious regular season wins against lessor and middle level teams. I don't have the time to do it now, but I would wager I could easily prove the same with any reasonable combination player measurement: that the Nuggets are chock loaded with high performing players. The more I have worked with this measure, the more I have realized that, even though it is no where near as complicated as the Hollinger per, it is somewhere between slightly and substantially better than it is. I am particularly impressed with the 1.4 factors installed for assists and blocks, which adjusts these critical things so that they are closer in value to a 2-point score than if you just counted them straight up.
Where is your mathematical proof that this is the, in your words, holy grail of player ratings? What is the statistical basis for using the multipliers that you have used?
you dont need numbers to prove the nuggets coaching staff is a bunch of jackasses. On top of that, they just let go of Najera who was the only player that made an attempt at defense, and was a true glue guy for this team. I think the key to this year will be AI and Anthony leading the team in having a defensive mindset (if thats even possible) followed by Smith and Kleiza leading by example off the bench. I know its a stretch, but this is the most talented team in the league. and if they WANT to they can be the best team too.
So Amare Stoudimire is better than Lebron James, Chris Paul, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, and everyone else in the NBA... Okay, you don't need to look any further than player #1 to figure out these ratings mean absolutely nothing.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (cpawfan @ Jul 13 2008, 01:20 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Where is your mathematical proof that this is the, in your words, holy grail of player ratings? What is the statistical basis for using the multipliers that you have used?</div> The reason its the holy grail is that there is nothing better I have seen. Most statistics, whether or not weighted, are just counts without giving you the per time measure. The statistics that do give you per time measures are generally one variable, as if everyone is embarrassed to combine items when doing per time. What is there to be afraid of? The statistical basis is that these are the ESPN factors, and I don't yet believe I have the computer wherewithal to tweak the factors and make my own underlying measure. Right now, my technological capability is such that it would take me 40-100 hours of work to produce this if I tweaked the numbers and made my own statistic, whereas I can do the whole thing, lock, stock, and barrel, in about 5 hours while starting with ESPN. Yet my tweaks would only be moving players up or down, by at the very most, 10 ranks or so. But I could be grossly underestimating what I could do database wise, since I have never made a full scale effort as of yet, only partial efforts. If only there was a place on the internet where you could simply operate a database without being a veteran database programmer. There probably is, but I have not found it yet! If and when I get "full database capability," which is one of a few major computer things I am still green on, I would tweak as follows. The main remaining shortcoming with the Real Player Rating is that it underweights defense to some extent, and it underweights made them miss defending severely, because it does not count it at all. Since made them miss defending can not be exactly measured statistically, and so is left out by literally everyone, the last thing you should do is have relatively small weights on any defensive factors that you can count, so one of the most important tweaks I would do would be to upgrade steals to 1.5. I would also upgrade blocks and assists very slightly to 1.5. I would bump up turnovers from .7 to between 1.0 and 1.2, because they so often lead to easy scores, and so they are a defensive liabilty. And I would bump up the miss shot subtractions from .8 to 1.0. As it stand now, the total points awarded for a field goal is 3: the points plus 1.0 per made shot. The points awarded for a three is 3.5: the three points plus .5 for the made three. I see the rationale for the bonuses, but I don't see the rationale for the different bonus amounts, so I would make both of them .7 or .8. All of these tweaks, as I said, would change player ranks by, at the most, about 10 positions. You can tweak to your heart's content, but you are not going to change your view of reality very much, as long as your initial, basic approach is comprehensive and smart. Finally, if I was really on a perfection binge, I would attempt to do the near impossible, by installing some kind of adjustment for made them miss defending. One approach I could take would be to start with the pace adjusted defensive efficiency of each team, and normalize that so that the resulting impact on the Real Player Ratings would be up or down by, at the most 10%, relative to the median Real Player Rating, which is about .700. For example, all of the Nuggets would immediately suffer a 4-8% hit on their ratings, lol. After I did that, I could then profit from putting players into just one of 3 categories: above average made them miss defender, average, and below average. Then the players would get both the team adjustment and the adjustment for their category, which would be about another 8% up, zero, and 8% down. But if I could ever find any assistance at all on the internet on rating made them miss defending, I could increase the number of categories in which players could go, increasing the accuracy. I am already using a 38% total adjustment range when I adjust the ratings for the Nuggets, up to 19% up and up to 19% down. Another approach to tackling the near impossible, if I was attempting to do the entire NBA, while ignoring the team defense measure, would be to simply divide players into 5 categories. The highest adjustments I could confidently do, with no assistance from anywhere, would be: up 10%, up 5%, no change, down 5%, and down 10%. So in summary, there are two long term projects planned for the Real Player Rating: 1. Conversion to use of my database and custom formula. (Target: 2009-2010) 2. Addition of carefully estimated made them miss defending adjustments. (Target: 2010-2011) Right now, it's as good or better than anything out there. These two projects would make it close to perfect.
see this is the problem with relying on stats, they just do not tell the whole story. does the guy getting say 20 ppg do it within the framework of the team? Or does he do it in spite of teamwork and 'get his' and is more concerned about that. does a guy average 20 ppg bu turn the ball over, play horrid D forcing team mates to slide of on help D thus stopping the first players man, but having the man they left score on them? you can only observe such things by watching games. Stats are a great way to help evaluate a player but having seen how they achieve such stats are what determines a players worth. It's like bill simmons says about drafting players. Why do GM's ignore a players playing resume for some drills and athletic measurements? Why look at just stats? It doesn't tell the entire story.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Thrilla @ Jul 13 2008, 01:38 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Leon Powe is a top 30 NBA player! I had no idea...</div> As long as he stops his share of shots from going in, he was in fact a top 30 NBA player in 2007-08. There ended up being a lot more forwards than guards with very high ratings, but low minutes. There were 7 forwards and 1 guard among the top 100 players, who did not play at least 20 minutes per game. This is a strong clue that the guard positions are tougher to excel in than are the forward positions, and/or that there are currently more really good forwards in the NBA than really good guards. It's really two sides of the same coin. Among the top 100 players, there was a grand total of one guard who did not get to play at least 20 minutes per game: JR Smith. This makes Karl's decision making even more wrong, and it was already just about as wrong as you can get! Thanks though, for getting me to check this, because when it comes to criticizing this coach, I will never be finished until he is gone, or until I switch to the Raptors or something.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Celtic Fan @ Jul 13 2008, 02:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>see this is the problem with relying on stats, they just do not tell the whole story. does the guy getting say 20 ppg do it within the framework of the team? Or does he do it in spite of teamwork and 'get his' and is more concerned about that. does a guy average 20 ppg bu turn the ball over, play horrid D forcing team mates to slide of on help D thus stopping the first players man, but having the man they left score on them? you can only observe such things by watching games. Stats are a great way to help evaluate a player but having seen how they achieve such stats are what determines a players worth. It's like bill simmons says about drafting players. Why do GM's ignore a players playing resume for some drills and athletic measurements? Why look at just stats? It doesn't tell the entire story.</div> If a player has coaches who don't really know what they are doing, there is no chance for him or anyone on his team to become an optimized team player, so if that player ends up, in effect, concentrating as much or more on his personal production than on optimizing his team's offense or defense, whether unconsciously or consciously, than how much can you blame him? What else is there for him to do? Players are payed to play, and coaches are payed to coach. Coaching is more complicated than playing, but being able to play at the NBA level is more rare than being smart enough to coach a team correctly. There are many thousands of people who are smart enough to coach the Nuggets better than they are coached, but no where near as many who can play as well as Anthony, Iverson, Smith, Camby, and Martin. Players can not be expected to coach themselves, though smart, veteran players can do it to some extent. But it is almost ridiculous to say: "Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith, you did not have a clue as to making sure the Nuggets optimized and played like a team, so you are not really good basketball players." No, they are still great players who, by the way, never graduated from college, so they probably could not if they wanted to figure out how to coach the Nuggets. On the other hand, as I said, great players with a huge amount of experience, such as the Celtics big three this year, are able to instinctively coach themselves to some extent, which reduced the Laker's coaching advantage over the Celtics, which in turn allowed the Celtics to win the series in just 6 games.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Answer_AI03 @ Jul 13 2008, 01:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>you dont need numbers to prove the nuggets coaching staff is a bunch of jackasses. On top of that, they just let go of Najera who was the only player that made an attempt at defense, and was a true glue guy for this team. I think the key to this year will be AI and Anthony leading the team in having a defensive mindset (if thats even possible) followed by Smith and Kleiza leading by example off the bench. I know its a stretch, but this is the most talented team in the league. and if they WANT to they can be the best team too.</div> True that. The Nuggets are lacking only perimeter defense, they have interior defense down. They are the worst perimeter defense team in the NBA! It's time for the Nuggets to overcompensate: they need to gamble a little more on defense, go for steals and get right in the face of the 3-point shooters, even at the risk of a few 3-point fouls. How can you lose from gambling when you are the worst perimeter defense team in the NBA? You can't lose. George Karl should be encouraging AI and JR to gamble, within reason, not cringing and biting his nails over violations of his style book. The Nuggets need to spend damn near half of their practice time on how to defend the outside in general and the perimeter in particular, including, obviously, how to cover and rotate out to the perimeter, to cut down on open threes. If Marcus Camby is hell bent on getting 20 rebounds, then let him do it, and don't be afraid of Kenyon Martin and/or Carmelo Anthony going way out to contest a three. The three point shot was instituted not only to award the extra skill needed to make a longer shot, but also to penalize teams who try to play defense on the cheap, by loading up the interior defense. The Nuggets need to realize this obvious reality, and refocus their defense, or continue to be burned by outside shooting. The Nuggets need to surrender a few more points on the inside, so that they can cut down on what they give up, by a greater number of points, what they surrender on the outside. The defense is badly unbalanced, so job one is to refocus it. Putting in more defensive effort without refocusing it isn't going to work.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Brian @ Jul 13 2008, 03:10 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>So Leon Powe is a better player than Paul Pierce? Amare Stoudimire is the best player in the league?</div> Stoudemire and LeBron James were essentially tied as the best players in the NBA. Why Steve Kerr thought the Suns had to have O'Neal to win it all, over Shawn Marion, is beyond me. They already had enough on that team to win it all. And they had a coach who could do it, too. Powe was essentially tied with Pierce; the .005 difference is miniscule. Of course, Pierce played more than twice as much as Powe, so he was much more important to the Celtics than Powe was. And if you know that Powe would have fallen off if given more burn, then you know that Pierce is really better. But this tells you that Powe was virtually a star in his role as a reserve. He deserves to be where he is at. I think my base formula tweaks would put Pierce ahead of Powe by a little, but I simply don't know who is the better made them miss defender. If Powe is a slightly better made them miss defender than Pierce is, then they could be tied again. Now if you want to determine who is really better between closely ranked players, simply ask yourself, who is the better made them miss defender? Because the tweaks are small potatoes compared to the made them miss defending adjustment that you can make. How many shots did each player prevent from going in the hoop per 12 minutes (or whatever period of time you want)? And how good are these players at being in position to try to prevent a shot from going in in the first place?
Consider how stupid it was for Karl to have pressured, over the past couple of seasons, C Anthony to get more rebounds, calling it one of the most important things he must do to be a full success. You have on the Nuggets Marcus Camby, the ultmate rebounding machine, and Kenyon Martin, no rebounding slouch either. You also had, at the time Karl concocted his orders to Melo, Nene, an excellent rebounder, and you also had (until now) Najera, who everyone keeps emphasizing is a defensive oriented player, with defensive rebounding a part of being a good defensive player. You also had and still do have Linas Kleiza, a surprisingly good forward who is certainly good enough to get some rebounds. Why in the hell would anyone think that it would be good for the Nuggets if Carmelo Anthony hangs close to the hoop to get more defensive rebounds? Remember the spectacle of Camby and Melo fighting over rebounds? What was that all about? It was Camby in effect saying, what the hell are you doing in here, buddy? By telling Anthony to do this, you are indirectly excusing him in advance for relatively open and wide open midrange and longer twos, and of course threes. How can he learn how to get where he needs to be to be able to contest shots when he is honing in on rebounds? So is it any wonder that the Nuggets became the worst outside defensive team in the NBA, easily victimized by good passing, good assisting, and good outside shooting? You had guards who desperately needed defensive help and you told Carmelo Anthony to go for more rebounds instead of telling him to help out the guards! I'm not saying he shouldn't go for more rebounds if Nene is out, or if Camby is off, or whatever, but for the Coach to make it a seasons long project for Anthony to get more rebounds was stupid from the Nuggets point of view. If Karl was coaching a bad rebounding team, it would be another story, but he was not. At the time he ordered Melo to get more rebounds or be considered a partial failure as a player, Nene and several other great rebounders were fully available. So it was a coaching error, pure and simple. But Melo's next team, if it is not that good of a rebounding team, will be very thankful for Melo being able to rebound more, even though it actually hurt the Nuggets for him to learn how to do that.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (tremaine @ Jul 13 2008, 04:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Pierce played more than twice as much as Powe, so he was much more important to the Celtics than Powe was.</div> effect->cause? Pierce is much more important than Powe is to the Celtics, so he played more than twice as him.
^^^ Maybe Karl was just trying to get Carmelo into the top 10 in the Real Player Ratings, which was accomplished by him getting more rebounds. Remember that made them miss defending gets you nothing in this or any other rating. lol.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (GMJigga @ Jul 13 2008, 04:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (tremaine @ Jul 13 2008, 04:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Pierce played more than twice as much as Powe, so he was much more important to the Celtics than Powe was.</div> effect->cause? Pierce is much more important than Powe is to the Celtics, so he played more than twice as him. </div> How about this for a shock: as long as Powe and Pierce are about equal in being where they need to be to try to force missed shots, and in actually forcing missed shots, and assuming that Powe has the stamina and energy needed, than the Celtics would have been about as good had the playing times been reversed. I know that is shocking and unbelievable to many. But this is one of the main reasons I do the Real Player Ratings: to uncover surprising but true things about the players and the teams, such as this. And the shock factor is precisely why ESPN itself would never do a statistic such as this, because zillions of people would be claiming that the statistic was wack, either because they didn't really understand the per time concept, or because they did understand it and refused to believe it has any merit.
Ah yes, the ever important truth. So do you think the Celtics would be just as good if they only played Paul Pierce 14 minutes? What if they then gave Leon Powe 36?
Just to be clear, we have a mathematically unproven base model taken to a per-minute level and then a subjective determination of defense added as a component.