Minnesota Sports Forum

Carlos Danger wrote:

thedoper wrote:https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612750/players-traditional/?sort=PLUS_MINUS&dir=1

As a base stat, our average + - has been abysmal for the year. Everyone is negative this year. That being said, McDaniels and KAT have been top of the heap. Logic compels us to believe that anyone playing with these two players for the majority of their minutes has had their metric brought up. Same with Net Rating, where KAT and McDaniels lead the team at negative contributions and the rest of the team get successively worse:

https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612750/players-advanced/?sort=NET_RATING&dir=1

From both of these stats in isolation, you can't really even make a statistical distinction between the contributions of Rubio and Rookie Anthony Edwards.

One huge issue that I have noticed is the inconsistency of lineups. There is only one lineup with over 10 games played (11) that has averaged more than 5 minutes of gameplay together (9.6). That is Rubio, Towns, Beasley, Edwards, and McDaniels.

https://www.nba.com/stats/team/1610612750/lineups-traditional/?CF=GP*GE*10&Season=2020-21&SeasonType=Regular%20Season

Injuries and Saunders' merry go round of substitutions have made it really challenging to establish any sort of consistency with this team or develop any statistical model to say anything of merit about this team other than collectively they stink.

FYI - I really like it when guys provide links to their data as you have done here. Sometimes I see stats quoted and wonder "where the F are you pulling that sh*t from?" Not the basic stats obviously, but the heavily filtered/split data. I mostly look at Basketball Reference, but I assume many here get stuff from other sources since half the time I can't find what they found on BR.

When I post lineup data I use cleaningtheglass.com

kekgeek1 wrote:
When I post lineup data I use cleaningtheglass.com

I'm going to need your login and password. I'm not paying $5/month for the Timberwolves.

Carlos Danger wrote:

kekgeek1 wrote:
When I post lineup data I use cleaningtheglass.com

I'm going to need your login and password. I'm not paying $5/month for the Timberwolves.

The info I use is free stuff. You do to stats. Type in the played name, then click lineups

As I have said previously, I look at both straight-up net rating (points per 100 possessions scored while player is on the floor minus points per 100 possessions given up while player is on the floor) and net on/off rating (net rating while player is on the floor minus net rating of team while player is off the floor).

And yes, you need large data sets with raw +/- and on/off numbers. But after 4 or more years of data and a general pattern develops, I believe you can make certain observations about a player's overall team impact that are fairly valid.

Zach LaVine has been the poster child of how divergent box score stats can be from actual team impact, although his offense might be getting to be so good and efficient at this point that it eventually overcomes his horrible defense and poor decision making. Still, he's never had a season where his team had a positive net rating with him on the floor. But the real kicker is that in six seasons out of seven, his team has been better with him on the bench. When there are seven years of data like that, it says something about him as a player. Does it mean he's terrible and belongs in the G-league? Of course not. But may be it means he's not as good as his box score stats would suggest.

Alternatively, KAT has also been on horrible teams (except for the one full season with Butler) and his net on/off rating is positive every single year. In other words, there has never been a season where the team performed better with him off the floor, unlike Zach.

I won't go into DLO's #s, but let's just say he trends more toward Zach than KAT. Hopefully that changes.

It's peculiar how all 30 NBA teams have access to the all-knowing and all-powerful plus-minus and on/off data and yet they continue to give minutes to these guys that grade out poorly in the aforementioned stats that they have on their teams. Why do so if they just make your team worse, which is what those numbers indicate? This multi-billion dollar business that is professional sports predicates itself on teams doing everything in their power to win. If it's as simple as not playing players that plus-minus doesn't reflect favorably on or straight up removing them from their teams, then why don't we see that happening? How does a Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, or D'Angelo Russell even have a job? Either the stat is simply unreliable and has holes in its composition or every front office compiled of experts and statistical know-it-alls are failing at their jobs year after year.

Yikes.

I can't answer Cam's question with certainty, but I'll take a shot. GMs and coaches are not infallible. Why was Andrew wiggins given a max contract? Because even a highly rated guy like thibs is not infallible. But I have to agree with what Q says...ignoring obvious trends in on/off numbers over an entire season, or even more significantly, over an entire career, is a prescription for disaster. It's far from the only relevant stat to be sure. But if a player's team consistently performs better when he is off the court than when he is on, it's malpractice to ignore that. Especially when the players who rank near the top in on/off (LeBron, Gobert, giannis) make their teams better by any measure.

I will add that one might conclude that GMs are looking closely at DLOs on/off numbers, and that is why he has been traded 3 times already in his short career. I'm guessing that each GM who traded for him recognized his raw talent and presumed previous coaches just hadn't brought it out. It's a decent bet to make given his young age and ability to score. I might also suggest that the reason Kenny Atkinson benched DLO in some close 4th quarters is because he was acutely aware of the on/off stats.

I'm with everyone here that I want DLO to turn things around and become a net positive player, but I'm approaching the rest of the season with a healthy dose of skepticism. We will likely find out by the end of the year if his net contribution will more resemble the Kings' game or the Pacers' game. Hope springs eternal as we hope for the former.

Camden0916 wrote:It's peculiar how all 30 NBA teams have access to the all-knowing and all-powerful plus-minus and on/off data and yet they continue to give minutes to these guys that grade out poorly in the aforementioned stats that they have on their teams. Why do so if they just make your team worse, which is what those numbers indicate? This multi-billion dollar business that is professional sports predicates itself on teams doing everything in their power to win. If it's as simple as not playing players that plus-minus doesn't reflect favorably on or straight up removing them from their teams, then why don't we see that happening? How does a Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, or D'Angelo Russell even have a job? Either the stat is simply unreliable and has holes in its composition or every front office compiled of experts and statistical know-it-alls are failing at their jobs year after year.

Yikes.

I believe that is beacuse there are enough good coaches that dont use these stats in assessment of individual players. Both Steve Kerr and Rick Carlise have said as much in podcasts I have listened to. Or maybe some team is going to give Donte Divencenso a max contract.

Camden wrote:It's peculiar how all 30 NBA teams have access to the all-knowing and all-powerful plus-minus and on/off data and yet they continue to give minutes to these guys that grade out poorly in the aforementioned stats that they have on their teams. Why do so if they just make your team worse, which is what those numbers indicate? This multi-billion dollar business that is professional sports predicates itself on teams doing everything in their power to win. If it's as simple as not playing players that plus-minus doesn't reflect favorably on or straight up removing them from their teams, then why don't we see that happening? How does a Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, or D'Angelo Russell even have a job? Either the stat is simply unreliable and has holes in its composition or every front office compiled of experts and statistical know-it-alls are failing at their jobs year after year.

Yikes.

You continue to mis-interpret and skew how I interpret the data. No where do I say that DLO and LaVine are bad basketball players that should not be given NBA minutes. My belief is that their box score prowess has led to a mis-allocation of capital (i.e. salary). In other words, they are overpaid for what value they bring to a franchise. Zach may be closing that gap this year, but certainly DLO hasn't.

I've had this similar problem with Abe previously, where my argument is skewed to an extreme in order to fit a narrative that I ONLY rely on plus-minus and heaven-forbid that there may be nuance to my argument.

Camden wrote:It's peculiar how all 30 NBA teams have access to the all-knowing and all-powerful plus-minus and on/off data and yet they continue to give minutes to these guys that grade out poorly in the aforementioned stats that they have on their teams. Why do so if they just make your team worse, which is what those numbers indicate? This multi-billion dollar business that is professional sports predicates itself on teams doing everything in their power to win. If it's as simple as not playing players that plus-minus doesn't reflect favorably on or straight up removing them from their teams, then why don't we see that happening? How does a Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, or D'Angelo Russell even have a job? Either the stat is simply unreliable and has holes in its composition or every front office compiled of experts and statistical know-it-alls are failing at their jobs year after year.

Yikes.

There are lots of teams who don't employ those type of players. So maybe they are doing something right? Number of finals appearances between Derozan, Lavine, and DLO = Zero

Q12543 wrote:

Camden wrote:It's peculiar how all 30 NBA teams have access to the all-knowing and all-powerful plus-minus and on/off data and yet they continue to give minutes to these guys that grade out poorly in the aforementioned stats that they have on their teams. Why do so if they just make your team worse, which is what those numbers indicate? This multi-billion dollar business that is professional sports predicates itself on teams doing everything in their power to win. If it's as simple as not playing players that plus-minus doesn't reflect favorably on or straight up removing them from their teams, then why don't we see that happening? How does a Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, or D'Angelo Russell even have a job? Either the stat is simply unreliable and has holes in its composition or every front office compiled of experts and statistical know-it-alls are failing at their jobs year after year.

Yikes.

You continue to mis-interpret and skew how I interpret the data. No where do I say that DLO and LaVine are bad basketball players that should not be given NBA minutes. My belief is that their box score prowess has led to a mis-allocation of capital (i.e. salary). In other words, they are overpaid for what value they bring to a franchise. Zach may be closing that gap this year, but certainly DLO hasn't.

I've had this similar problem with Abe previously, where my argument is skewed to an extreme in order to fit a narrative that I ONLY rely on plus-minus and heaven-forbid that there may be nuance to my argument.

Okay, so they are overpaid players based on these metrics and in turn are an inefficient use of a team's resources. Understood. I will rephrase my question to accommodate. Why would any of these 30 NBA teams allocate even a percentage of their salary caps to players that do not perform well in these statistics since they are only hurting the team's performance when they are on the floor? From a max contract to a veteran's minimum contract, if these metrics indicate that a particular player is clearly a negative contributor when he's checking into games, then why sign him in the first place? Why give him a rotation spot? Why give him any minutes at all? Shouldn't these teams be focusing on only signing/playing those that perform well in these statistical areas?

There are hundreds of intellectually competent front office members and statisticians spread across all 30 teams and all should be aware of plus-minus and on/off data. Either they just aren't using it and should be dismissed from their roles immediately or the metrics in question just aren't reliable indicators of a player's value on their own.