BEST SHOOTING GUARDS
Joe Lawson
With all the controversy about Sprewell being named to the 1st All-NBA team,
I decided to compare him to some other shooting guards in the league. I
wanted to see how productive each player was based on the minutes he played.
(i.e a player with 15 pts in 22 minutes is more productive than a player with
15 points in 38 minutes, in terms of scoring). Several stats such as points,
assists, steals, rebounds and blocks were each divided by the amount of
minutes played. The per minute stats came out like this:
Name L.Sprewell R.Harper K.Gill S.Smith M.Richmond
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Points .486 .528 .456 .484 .629
Rebounds .113 .161 .110 .126 .098
Steals .050 .050 .062 .030 .035
Assists .108 .120 .112 .141 .108
Blocks .021 .018 .013 .012 .005
Notice how Gill and Sprewell's numbers are very similiar? If Gill played
the same amount of time, he'd probably match Spree's stats. Ironically,
Ron Harper (the poor mans Jordan) beat out Sprewell in almost every category.
While this analysis of course doesn't take defense into consideration, it
lets you see who's doing what. Mitch Richmond by far is the most productive
in terms of points per min, but lacking in an overall game compared to the
others. Steve Smith is the best assist man of the group while Kendall Gill is
the best pick pocket. A couple other things, Dell Curry was very productive
overall and so was Clyde Drexler. Nate McMillian was superior to Gary Payton
in every category except for points per minute, the stats he put up in
limited action were incredible. (i.e. leading the league in steals when only
playing about 25 minutes per game, Pippen was second and played about 38
minutes per game!). I'm going to catch alot of grief by saying that Harper
was more productive than Sprewell but the facts speak for themselves.
Sprewell is a much better defender than Harper, so that of course has to be
taken into consideration but his overall numbers are not spectacular, given
the 43 minutes per game he averaged. Your comments will be greatly
appreciated but I must say that I am not a Sonic, Warrior, Clipper, King or
Heat fan. I'm not secretly campaigning that Ron Harper be made to the
All-NBA team.
... Last week.. messed around, had a triple double...
* Evaluation copy of Silver Xpress. Day # 27
* Silver Xpress V4.00
Champ91917
(Joe Lawson) writes:
Why do people always try to break the game down into numbers???
William Albert Matzen
On Wed, 28 Sep 1994, Joe Lawson wrote:
>
> With all the controversy about Sprewell being named to the 1st All-NBA team,
> I decided to compare him to some other shooting guards in the league. I
> wanted to see how productive each player was based on the minutes he played.
> (i.e a player with 15 pts in 22 minutes is more productive than a player with
> 15 points in 38 minutes, in terms of scoring). Several stats such as points,
> assists, steals, rebounds and blocks were each divided by the amount of
> minutes played. The per minute stats came out like this:
>
> Name L.Sprewell R.Harper K.Gill S.Smith M.Richmond
> -------------------------------------------------------------------
> Points .486 .528 .456 .484 .629
> Rebounds .113 .161 .110 .126 .098
> Steals .050 .050 .062 .030 .035
> Assists .108 .120 .112 .141 .108
> Blocks .021 .018 .013 .012 .005
>
> Some people want to dismiss Clyde Drexler as a has been because of his
injuries in the past two seasons, well he may not be runner up to Jordan
anymore as MVP, but he's better than most of the above...
I also wrote the ranking of his stat/minute to the others on THIS LIST
Name C. Drexler
> -----------------------
Points .558 #2
Rebounds .191 #1
Steals .042 #4
Assists .143 #1
Blocks .015 #3
Not bad for an old timer...
Oh ya, honorable mention for Dumars, he's put his time in and is a
great scorer and better defender.
John Dowding
Champ91917> Why do people always try to break the game down into
Champ91917> numbers???
Because they like to ruin all the fun of arguing over intangibles.
--
John Dowding
dow...@ai.sri.com
D. Schwab
: With all the controversy about Sprewell being named to the 1st All-NBA team,
: I decided to compare him to some other shooting guards in the league. I
: wanted to see how productive each player was based on the minutes he played.
: (i.e a player with 15 pts in 22 minutes is more productive than a player with
: 15 points in 38 minutes, in terms of scoring). Several stats such as points,
: assists, steals, rebounds and blocks were each divided by the amount of
: minutes played. The per minute stats came out like this:
: Name L.Sprewell R.Harper K.Gill S.Smith M.Richmond
: -------------------------------------------------------------------
: Points .486 .528 .456 .484 .629
: Rebounds .113 .161 .110 .126 .098
: Steals .050 .050 .062 .030 .035
: Assists .108 .120 .112 .141 .108
: Blocks .021 .018 .013 .012 .005
: Notice how Gill and Sprewell's numbers are very similiar? If Gill played
: the same amount of time, he'd probably match Spree's stats. Ironically,
: Ron Harper (the poor mans Jordan) beat out Sprewell in almost every category.
: While this analysis of course doesn't take defense into consideration, it
You are failing to take into consideration the fact that because
Sprewell plays so many minutes, the Warriors are getting much higher
production out of the #2 than any other team. Also, per-minute stats
as a the sole means of comparing talent is misleading. Vinnie Johnson
would be in the hall of fame if they only used his per-minute stats.
The most glaring weakness, as you mentioned, is the failure to
incorporate defensive play. Of the guards mentioned, Gill is right
there with Sprewell, the others way behind.
I guess some people have acute difficulties in dealing with
the idea that people who spend there lives watching and studying
the NBA might no more about the level of talent and can evaluate
and rate that talent better than them. If you have to knock Sprewell
down, you couldn't reasonably place him lower than 2nd. So, you
have a player who is in the *top two* for his position on the
entire planet! Why nitpick? Also, as this guy has only played
organized ball for 8 years, there is considerable room for improvement.
Lastly, of the 8 years he has played basketbal, just 4 of them have
involved him playing with his back to the basket (post man in high
school and two years of j.c). Four years as a guard, and already
at the front of the line, look for continued development the next
few years...
"time wounds all heels"
--Lennon
Dennis
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-Dennis
production on the court for the Warriors at that position
: Heat fan. I'm not secretly campaigning that Ron Harper be made to the
: All-NBA team.
You cannot make an accurate comparisons of players based soley
on their per/minute stats. If you did, Vinnie Johnson probably would
have been one of the top-rated guards in the league when he was playing.
What you overlooked is the fact that Sprewell is playing minutes
You are failing to take into consideration that Sprewell is on the
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: ... Last week.. messed around, had a triple double...
T-Bone
>Why do people always try to break the game down into numbers???
Because they don't understand it, but they want to act like they do, so they
drag out stats.
T-Bone
Edward Ouellette
Good theory, but I have a better one: if you have the right numbers you can
learn a lot more about a player than if you see him play a couple times a
year. People who whine about stats not telling the story are usually pretty
sure of their "knowledge" of the game, but by ignoring the numbers altogether
you might be missing something. Certain stats, of course, are worthless, but
to throw them all out is misguided.
Ed O.
Theodore J Kury
[Shooting guards stats/minute deleted]
> I'm going to catch alot of grief by saying that Harper
>was more productive than Sprewell but the facts speak for themselves.
> Sprewell is a much better defender than Harper, so that of course has to be
>taken into consideration but his overall numbers are not spectacular, given
>the 43 minutes per game he averaged. Your comments will be greatly
>appreciated but I must say that I am not a Sonic, Warrior, Clipper, King or
>Heat fan. I'm not secretly campaigning that Ron Harper be made to the
>All-NBA team.
One thing that's missing here (IMO), is that the 43 minutes per game Sprewell
plays IS relevant. Not everyone can do that. Do you realize what it must take
to play an average of 43 minutes every night ? Sprewell ends up being penalized
because other players can rest while he's out on the floor busting his butt.
Nate McMillan can afford to go all out on defense because he doesn't do squat
on offense and he only plays 25 minutes a night. Sprewell would be killed
playing all out 43 per. The fact is, with Hardaway gone, Sprewell tired is
a damn sight better than Jennings or Houston fully rested, so Sprewell plays.
Now, I realize he gets tired, but he should then know not to take so many
shots. I'd want a shooting guard that shoots a little better on my NBA 1st
team. Top 3 SGs ? Nope. But Top 5 for certain.
Oh, and to all the dazzling followups about breaking things down into numbers ?
Last I heard, the Rockets took the championship because they made higher
numbers on their side of the scoreboard than the Knicks in four of the games.
There's no crime in trying to figure out what makes those numbers go up.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ted Kury | "Motel 30 is a desperate shout, and if you check in then
SUNY at Buffalo | you'll never check out. You feel like a hound though you
Dept. of Economics | look like a pup, and if you let it get you down, then
| you'll never get up." - Lowest of the Low
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Bobby Davis
>This numbers analysis is fascinating, but the game of basketball is an art
>form of living humans, not computers. Let's not forget the human factor in
>all this number crunching.
None of the "number crunchers" I know forget the human factor, so I'm not
sure exactly who this is directed at. I do think that in the face of any
overwhelming important numbers, though, the "human factor" argument becomes
a tenuous one at best. That said...
>Let me ask all of you this question: Who would you most like to have the
>ball in crunch time? Ron Harper? Please. Mitch Richmond can not only take
>over an entire game, he is indefensible in the clutch...
Have you seen anyone suggest that Harper is better than Richmond? I must
have missed that post. If someone is crunching numbers to make this claim
they should have their "official number crunching license" revoked, because
they must not know which numbers are meaningful and which are not. There is
a difference between throwing a bunch of numbers around versus actually
figuring out which numbers matter and which ones don't. The former is an
exercise in futility. The latter is damn interesting.
>Comments?
You asked for 'em, you got 'em.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Bob "The Glide" Davis Clarence Weatherspoon Update: Led the Sixers in |
| r...@flash.ece.uc.edu minutes, rebounds, blocks, and points. Spoon! |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trung Tan Tran
form of living humans, not computers. Let's not forget the human factor in
you most like to have the ball in crunch time? Ron Harper? Please. Mitch
Richmond can not only take over an entire game, he is indefensible in the
regulary or shoot the three. The only problem is he is in that basketball
cesspool, Sacramento. Comments?
Thomas True
tt0...@uhura.cc.rochester.edu
Barz
to _make the last shot_, that is if you can get it
to him. A good outside shooter, he could make the
3-pointer or 20 footer to win.
Robert Barz
rb...@mines.colorado.edu
Bill Matzen
On 24 Oct 1994, Anthony D. Rems wrote:
> tt0...@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Trung Tan Tran) writes:
>
> over a game, period. As for clutch shots, no one made more of
> them last year than Spree and that was only his second year.
>
> -Tony
>
>Are you sure about that clutch thing. Try Vernon Maxwell. He is ice in
clutch time. I'm not sure the exact number but he made about 10 game
winning shots for their team duringthe regular season. Remember the one
that kept their winning streak going. I believe it was the 15th game, he
had less than a second to get the shot off. He got the ball facing away
from the
basket and about 5 feet beyond the three point line and nailed it with a
couple defenders in his face. I would call him the best clutch player,
but not in the top ten in shooting guards.
Bill
Jack Yee-Chieh Chu
Bill Matzen <bma...@paul.spu.edu> wrote:
>
>>Are you sure about that clutch thing. Try Vernon Maxwell. He is ice in
>clutch time. I'm not sure the exact number but he made about 10 game
>winning shots for their team duringthe regular season. Remember the one
>that kept their winning streak going. I believe it was the 15th game, he
>had less than a second to get the shot off. He got the ball facing away
>from the
>basket and about 5 feet beyond the three point line and nailed it with a
>couple defenders in his face. I would call him the best clutch player,
>but not in the top ten in shooting guards.
Agreed on Maxwell being out of the top 10 SGs in the NBA. But I completely
disagree with you on the clutch issue. The only reason why he is perceived
as a "clutch" shooter is that he makes several game-winning shots over the
course of a season. To extrapolate a label of "clutch shooter" from a few
isolated incidents is simply unjustified.
If he had any semblance of a shot selection and could make 45% of his FGA,
the Rockets would be in a position where they wouldn't need to come back
from a huge deficit, or would be way out in front.
Clutch shooting is a completely overrated, if not mythical attribute. Why
does it matter how a player does in the last two minutes of a game if he's
hurting his team by playing like crap in the first 46?
So even if Maxwell "wins" a few games for the Rockets every season, he is
losing games for Houston several times more by having nights of 3-13 and
6-19 shooting.
No thanks, I'll take Reggie Miller.
Jack
--
ahbo...@delphi.com
>Being a Warriors fan and a huge Mitch Richmond fan, I would take
>Sprewell over him in a heartbeat. Spree plays both sides of the
>floor, and he is one of the only SGs in the league who can take
>over a game, period. As for clutch shots, no one made more of
>them last year than Spree and that was only his second year.
>
I wish you peace and l;ong life forever. The only thing
that you said wrong is that you called him a kid. He's
done too much for the Warriors to be considered a kid.
He's a, no he is THE MAN.