OBW Catch-All Thread

[uvm4life20]

i think hazel offense is bad enough to negate how good he is on defense. like Scotty Jones.

[LittleMike]

Originally Posted by Quickdraw62

Agree! Scoring is the most obvious part of the game, but if a player is just a scorer, what happens when their shot is off? Do they contribute on defense? Can they rebound or pass? Hazel is the type of guy winning teams have; Partin will be replaced next year by Papale, who is a least as good a pure shooter. Replacing Hazel, IMO, may be harder for BU.

A breath of fresh air!!!! Thank you Quickdraw62 for understanding the contribution and value of a defensive minded player like Hazel. These players are way tougher to replace than any pure shooter. Like someone mentioned previously, the average fan mentality of "When did he ever score 25?" to gauge a players contribution is mind-boggling.

[Air Holland]

Originally Posted by uvm4life20

air hollard- i just dont like any system that rewards players for somebody else rebounding there miss. There is a lot of things that dont get factored in to how good somebody is on offense. Players like Marqus who get double teamed and get plenty of hockey assist have huge impact on games but it doesnt always show in the stat column

What... I don't even... huh?

If Player A misses a shot and Player B rebounds it, Offensive Rating certainly doesn't reward Player A. Player A's ORtg goes down regardless of whether Player B rebounds the ball or not. But ORtg will reward Player B for grabbing the offensive rebound.

In re: Hazel, he was actually a fairly effective offensive player last year once you account for the fact that he was the 4th or 5th option. He'd be much more dangerous if he was even a Blakely-caliber free throw shooter, but even as it is he's not a guy you can completely ignore. Double-team? No. But you do at least have to guard him.

We don't have any stats that account for double-teams, etc. That doesn't invalidate the numbers, it just means you need to look at them in context.

[Quickdraw62]

Originally Posted by Air Holland

What... I don't even... huh?

If Player A misses a shot and Player B rebounds it, Offensive Rating certainly doesn't reward Player A. Player A's ORtg goes down regardless of whether Player B rebounds the ball or not. But ORtg will reward Player B for grabbing the offensive rebound.

In re: Hazel, he was actually a fairly effective offensive player last year once you account for the fact that he was the 4th or 5th option. He'd be much more dangerous if he was even a Blakely-caliber free throw shooter, but even as it is he's not a guy you can completely ignore. Double-team? No. But you do at least have to guard him.

We don't have any stats that account for double-teams, etc. That doesn't invalidate the numbers, it just means you need to look at them in context.

Air, your points are correct, well reasoned, and probably only for those who actually understand the game. Although fairly new to this board, I'm beginning to understand who I can and cannot intelligently discuss hoops with. Btw, I really enjoy your site, and look forward to more of your opinions....Although I may not always agree, that's what makes it so much fun. Keep up the good work.

[UVM Hoop Cat]

Originally Posted by LittleMike

There is more to the game of basketball than scoring. Patrick Hazel was an impact player on the defensive end. His rebounding, shot blocking and defensive presence was the difference maker for the Terriers last year. Without Hazel, BU doesn't win it - end of story.

UVM Hoop Cat, I will say this repectfully because I don't want to get into a fight but sometimes you act like someone who is merely an average fan and not someone who played the game. In comparing Partin with Hazel, it seems like you are rating Partin as more of an impact player because Hazel never scored 30.

O'brien was out, Pelage was limited due to injurues and Hazel was the work horse on this team, he carried the inside load basically all by himself. He was a defensive force and in my opinion more valuable to the team than DP who did nothing else but score.

Just my opinion.

Where to begin...first, with all due respect I don't really need an explanation on the game of basketball from you.

Second, I did attribute Hazel's impact on defense in my post. I didn't make him sound quite like Alonzo Mourning or David Robinson the way you are, but I certainly recognize Hazel's importance to BU defensively on the interior.

Third, you were the one that said Hazel was going to be the conference's next Marqus Blakely and was a freakish athlete. I can only surmise you were joking, because if not the joke is on you. Based on that, and coming from the Big East, I was expecting much more from Hazel than simply being BU's best post defender. Truth is, as it turns out he has very limited offensive ability and he has maybe average athleticism. To be a player like Marqus, obviously you need both elements of offense and defense. Don't get me wrong- I really like Hazel as a defender- but he's nothing special overall.


Fourth, the reason I even made the comparison is because Hazel had a good amount of hype transferring from Marquette, and Konan has a good amount of hype. Both players have similar size and project to play the same position. They may be completely different players, which is why I asked the question. For Konan to be picked second team by One Bid Wonders, he's going to have to have some scoring punch because fair or unfair the coaches won't pick a player for second team unless they can score a little bit. Hazel isn't going to come close to making anyone's all-conference teams.

It's not about just scoring 30pts. Partin put BU on his back and hit big shots- shots that Holland was unable to make and when he was struggling, which was a lot last year, especially early on- multiple times last season. I saw Partin single-handedly win multiple games for BU last season, where if it wasn't for his scoring BU would most certainly have lost the game. If it wasn't for his play against Cornell for example, that would be have been an 8-12 pt loss rather than a win. BU also wouldn't have been able to defeat UVM in the important first meeting sans-Partin as well.

Both players certainly make a big impact for BU at their strengths- I'd just prefer Partin personally because 6-6 shooting guards destroy in this league.

[UVM Hoop Cat]

Originally Posted by Quickdraw62

Partin will be replaced next year by Papale, who is a least as good a pure shooter. Replacing Hazel, IMO, may be harder for BU.

Maybe-but you're talking about too players with completely different heights/size.

Will Papale be able to get into the lane and have the mid-range game off the dribble that Partin has now? Will Papale be able to shoot over defenders in the paint with ease the way Partin can? Will Papale be able to score off the dribble right away? Because all those are things Partin does now- which makes him a tough player to guard.

[UVM Hoop Cat]

My final thoughts on this is you certainly can't underrate defense, that is an obvious criteria to winning- but you most certainly can't underrate shot-makers, and Partin is a shot-maker. Stony Brook had the best defense in the league last season and was #3 prior but 0 NCAA appearances because teams with superior offenses- Vermont and BU- made it.

Just look at what Lowe and Holland did to SBU the last two years in the tournament.

[uvm4life20]

air holland-......... you ready for this............. Individual possessions are the sum of a player's scoring possessions (field goals, free throws, plus partial credit for assists), missed field goals and free throws that the defense rebounds, and turnovers.

missed field goals and free throws that the defense rebounds!!! that means if a player misses a shot and his teammate rebounds the ball he doesnt get charged with an individual possesion and that makes his offensive rating higher. your welcome for your lesson.

[uvm4life20]

Originally Posted by Quickdraw62

Air, your points are correct, well reasoned, and probably only for those who actually understand the game. Although fairly new to this board, I'm beginning to understand who I can and cannot intelligently discuss hoops with. Btw, I really enjoy your site, and look forward to more of your opinions....Although I may not always agree, that's what makes it so much fun. Keep up the good work.

quickdraw- You were wrong on this too. His points were not all correct, well reasoned, and not probably only for those who actually understand the game.

air holland- i also was just pointing out that no offensive rating system is perfect by mentioning that there are a lot of things that dont show up on the stat sheet. a lot of people like to throw out some numbers like they are the end all be all. TS% is the best way to see how efficiently a player scores but it doesnt show his playmaking ability or floor spacing ability or anything like that. as far as judging two scorers i use TS% for the most part.

[Air Holland]

Originally Posted by uvm4life20

air holland-......... you ready for this............. Individual possessions are the sum of a player's scoring possessions (field goals, free throws, plus partial credit for assists), missed field goals and free throws that the defense rebounds, and turnovers.

missed field goals and free throws that the defense rebounds!!! that means if a player misses a shot and his teammate rebounds the ball he doesnt get charged with an individual possesion and that makes his offensive rating higher. your welcome for your lesson.

And the stupid continues.

When you look at the raw data that's used to calculate Offensive Rating, the missed field goals and free throws aren't separated into "results in offensive rebound" and "results in defensive rebound" buckets. Instead an assumption is made that a certain percentage of missed shots are recovered by the offense. This allows people to calculate offensive rating without full play-by-play data.

So again, when Player A misses a shot, his offensive rating doesn't magically improve if Player B secures the offensive rebound, because the data sets that are used to calculate offensive rating don't include that information. And even if the data sets did include that information, Dean Oliver wouldn't have designed offensive rating the way you're describing it, because Dean Oliver isn't stupid. Shooting is a skill, and offensive rebounding is a skill, but missing shots in such a way that your teammates can secure the rebound is not a repeatable skill - yet another reason why offensive rating couldn't care less whether your missed shot resulted in an offensive rebound, unless you rebounded your own miss.

Please don't try to lecture people about things you don't know anything about.

[uvm4life20]

everywhere i've read says different

[Air Holland]

Originally Posted by uvm4life20

everywhere i've read says different

Then everywhere you've read is wrong

If you're not convinced, consider this:

Darryl Partin missed 250 field goal attempts last year. How many of them resulted in offensive rebounds? If you can't answer that question, you can't reward Partin for all the times his teammates rebounded his missed shots. And the only way to answer that question is with play-by-play data.

You're right that Offensive Rating uses "possessions" as the denominator, but "possessions" for an individual player is an approximation.

[LittleMike]

Originally Posted by UVM Hoop Cat

Third, you were the one that said Hazel was going to be the conference's next Marqus Blakely and was a freakish athlete. I can only surmise you were joking, because if not the joke is on you. Based on that, and coming from the Big East, I was expecting much more from Hazel than simply being BU's best post defender. Truth is, as it turns out he has very limited offensive ability and he has maybe average athleticism. To be a player like Marqus, obviously you need both elements of offense and defense. Don't get me wrong- I really like Hazel as a defender- but he's nothing special overall.

Hazel may be nothing special to you but to us BU fans, he is a champion - more than I can say for Trimboli who for all his hype never performed in the clutch.

[uvm84]

Speaking of stupidity, apparently it isn't just restricted to UVM fans, Little Mike's comment proves BU fans can be just as stupid.

So Little Mike I guess this means Corey Lowe was highly overrated too then, right.

[Air Holland]

Originally Posted by uvm84

Speaking of stupidity, apparently it isn't just restricted to UVM fans, Little Mike's comment proves BU fans can be just as stupid.

So Little Mike I guess this means Corey Lowe was highly overrated too then, right.

I don't necessarily agree with LittleMike's take, but the idea that Corey Lowe was not a clutch performer is so far off I don't even know where to start.

Corey Lowe's performance in the 2010 tournament was incredible - BU doesn't win the semifinal without him, and the championship game at Vermont would have been a laugher without Lowe's contributions.

The only reason people don't highlight Lowe's 33-point performance in the 2009 AE quarterfinal is because a legitimate POY candidate (Darryl Proctor) had the game of his life.

The fact that BU didn't make it to the NCAAs during Lowe's career has nothing to do with Lowe and everything to do with his supporting cast. Congratulations on choosing the one player from that era of BU basketball who least deserves the "overrated" label.

And on a separate note, I find it curious that you'd choose this opportunity to make your first (misguided) post on this board - unless, of course, this isn't your first post. Something about your sentence structure reminds me of a potential alter-ego...