[unluckyseventeen]

Originally Posted by Diophantos

No, this isn't what he does. He does often take a bunch of statistics and blends them together into one number, but it's only to make things easier on us, as humans, to process the information. The way the stats are synthesized DO have reasoning behind them, quite a bit. PER for example, is a far superior "overall stat" to something like NBA efficiency (which just adds everything up) because it makes an attempt to logically reason out which stats should be added together in what way, which ones are more important for others, adjusts for minutes, pace, and league strength, considers value of possession, etc. It's not perfect, and it's certainly no substitute for an in-depth analysis of a player's game with all the numbers and game footage, but it's a good way of putting together a bunch of information in a meaningful way for comparison.

Yeah, but see that's still what you either are not acknowledging or have never noticed. The weight of each of the factors he chucks in there is still totally subjective. Anybody else could find all of the factors that he uses and balance them according to their own opinion regarding importance, and then conceive this one manufactured number to measure a very broad thing. Who's to say the value a rebound holds, or a steal, or a 3-pointer? Basketball is way too complex to just say "OK, this is the exact value in relation to win/loss or being good/bad". That's why I can't respect these number regurgitations.

There's no way to accurately boil HUGE aspects of basketball (like how good a team is) down to one single number. There's no way. Same with player skill or whatever he's trying to measure. It's still all subjective somewhere along the lines and I just find it far less helpful as far as analysis is concerned. Me just seeing some insanely complicated number assigned to a team or a player does absolutely nothing for me. The importance of each stat in comparison to how good a team/player is will always be subjective. Subjectivity in statistics is actually about the worst thing you could ever have if you want to make a mathematically reliable system.


So, like I said before, actual basketball and player analysis is a hundred times more valuable to me than any number. If somebody shows me a play, a concept, a strategy, a player's weakness or strength, I enjoy basketball and understand it much better than just looking at a list of numbers. Apparently, nobody is into that anymore. And then again, people wonder why fundamentals of the game and old school basketball is going out the window... the media is constantly numbers, numbers, numbers.

Anyway.. I think I've made my point.

[JNice]

Originally Posted by unluckyseventeen

Stein and Bucher are wankers, yeah... come to think of it, just about all of ESPN's writers are wankers, but you can't get worse than Hollinger. The guy tries to boil the entire NBA down to a math formula and has written the most laughable NBA articles to my recollection.

I was moreso stunned not to hear that he is their best NBA writer (maybe only because their whole staff sucks), but you also said you were a big fan of his work. That, itself, is worthy of a .

What are the most laughable articles you recollect?

I don't see the problem with Hollinger. I think he's one of the best basketball writers i've seen. You have to take the statistical numbers put together with a grain of salt and I'm sure Hollinger would say the same. But many of the numbers he comes up with are very good for reference.

[LameR]

Do you not understand what that is? It's just a simulator that runs through the rest of the season something like 1000 times. Then he posts the results. He's not claiming that the Jazz have a 1/4 shot at winning it all. He's saying that under this simulation program, which doesn't take into account recent injuries and acquisitions, that's what would happen. Let's have a thread about this every time something weird happens so we can go over it all again.

[giordun]

Hollinger needs to look like he's an expert by not choosing the obvious.

[Pimped Out]

I would rank the Jazz's chances of making it out the west better than the Suns, Hornets, or Mavs. The Lakers are an unknown to me and it's an even year so i'm ruling the spurs out

[Dre™]

Originally Posted by Pimped Out

I would rank the Jazz's chances of making it out the west better than the Suns, Hornets, or Mavs. The Lakers are an unknown to me and it's an even year so i'm ruling the spurs out

Better than the Mavericks? And the Spurs who beat them last year?

[afobisme]

i think mavs and suns have a better chance... utah is still a 2nd tier type of team.

[Dre™]

I don't know what exactly the problem is, but Memo isn't performing like he did last year.

[Brandname]

Originally Posted by unluckyseventeen

Stein and Bucher are wankers, yeah... come to think of it, just about all of ESPN's writers are wankers, but you can't get worse than Hollinger. The guy tries to boil the entire NBA down to a math formula and has written the most laughable NBA articles to my recollection.

I was moreso stunned not to hear that he is their best NBA writer (maybe only because their whole staff sucks), but you also said you were a big fan of his work. That, itself, is worthy of a .

Hollinger is indeed the best basketball writer that ESPN has.

The reason why is because he's always looking for new sources of information. He tries to use the numbers to gain insight/knowledge on stuff that he doesn't already know. He doesn't write based on his 'feelings' or biases (in general). All of the other writers for ESPN write based on a perspective they've already formed. Hollinger is constantly trying to change his perspective.

Does he miss the mark sometimes? Yeah, he does. But he's a good statistician with a very good grasp on what his statistics entail. He understands the flaws and limitations of his statistics, which is something that message board posters just cannot seem to understand (this isn't directed at you). When he says point blank, "PER does not measure things like defensive rotations and other defensive/offensive intangibles, and so should not be a final say in the totality of a player's contributions" people still rail on him for his stat being unable to account for these things.

My only criticism of him in fact is that he tends to value his own statistic a little heavily. I do concede that it's a good statistic however.

Some of his methodology produces inaccurate results on occasion. One such case is the daily power rankings. Heavily favored into these completely mathematical rankings is total point differential per game. He uses it because it's traditionally one of the strongest indicators of how good a team will fare in the postseason, even better than team record. However, one example where this fails is this year, when the Cavs are 26-20 and able to compete with any team in the league when Lebron plays. However, he's missed 7 games, and almost every one has been a 20+ point blowout, heavily skewing their point differential such that it's -0.6 right now. This is an example of a number that doesn't accurately reflect the quality of the team because of those skewed games, and here his methodology fails. I am sure he is aware of this, however.

Appreciate that Hollinger is constantly trying to learn. He may not always be right, but he's trying to gain information.

[Jizzy]

lakers, phoenix, san antonio, dallas, maybe even denver and portland are all better then the jazz