P
Pace
Guest
So you don't like the way I express my opinion? Ok. I'm sure that's why you're getting on me.....
Pace is Irrelevant, So What DOES Make Us Win?
- Thread starter Bricklayer
- Start date
Rule #1 around here is don't be a jerk. Since you've arrived, you've pretty much done everything you could to antagonize the members. That's pretty much the textbook definition of Rule #1.
twslam07 said:
You would be well served to heed his words.
Hey, remember that time when we gave up 27 points off 20 turnovers against the Mavs and lost by 4?
Good times.
Good times.
steelevt
All-Star
Malone gave up another lead? No other coach would do that. Fire him now!! Wait, what?
randymoss1881
Starter
Malone gave up another lead? No other coach would do that. Fire him now!! Wait, what?
Malone costing us games even after we fired that bum.
In the ultimate irony, PDA fired him because he knew this would happen. Can't have a guy around who's going to cost us games in the future, you know.
Ron
Starter
...
D-Will W/L mins: 14.3/18.2
And so -
D-Will W/L per game points: 4.9 / 8.1
(Oh my! Almost twice the contribution in L!)
D-Will W/L per 36min points: 12.3 / 15.9
(Hmmm, it's not that far apart after all...)
Padrino
All-Star
soooooo... given that the kings are statistically more likely to shoot poorly from three on a game-to-game basis than they are to light it up from downtown, you're still advocating that they should be shooting more of them... in a game they lost by four points... when simply hitting one more free throw or turning the ball over just a bit less would have kept the game from going into overtime in the first place? i'm not seeing the logic in yet another bricked three leading to a win in last night's close game...
i get it: the three point shot has become a much larger part of contemporary nba offensive schemes, and it's mesmerizing to those who find the analytics movement to be more compelling than i do, but asking these kings to shoot more threes when they are below average from beyond the arc hardly strikes me as any kind of panacea worth pursuing. if pete d'allesandro manages to acquire some legitimate three-point shooting talent, i'm happy to revisit my remarks, but i don't need a series of advanced "data points" to tell me the following: if you have good three-point shooters on your team, perhaps you should shoot more of them. if you have bad three-point shooters on your team, perhaps you should shoot less of them...
it's as if analytics has hypnotized some of you away from what your eyes should very plainly be able to see; there is no hidden formula, no mathematical analysis that will make this particular kings team shoot threes better. they can certainly shoot more of them, but when has volume jump-shooting ever created efficiency in the nba when the jump shooters aren't skilled enough to justify an increase in volume? d'allesandro talked about adding three-point shooting in the offseason, but here is the simple truth of the matter: he absolutely failed to do so. drafting a rookie who is lauded for his outside shooting does little to create immediate contribution, and a guy like ramon sessions has been inconsistent from three his entire career. darren collison is typically competent from beyond the arc, but primarily from the corner--a shot that nba defenses have calibrated themselves to defend much more strongly...
i don't dispute that three-point shooting is important (particularly in freeing up big cuz in the post a little bit), but i do take issue with the notion that the presently-configured kings should shoot more of them, especially when their gm seems to seriously overestimate the skill of the players he has gathered in sacramento. anthony morrow (career 43% from three) was available as a free agent in the offseason, but i didn't hear his name once attached to the kings in the myriad rumors they were involved in, despite PDA's stated desire to add three-point shooting. and simply wishing that darren collison could shoot like anthony morrow or that nik stauskas could morph into kyle korver doesn't make it so. we saw some in-house gains from ben mclemore early in the season, but the shaky second-year player's confidence appears shot in the wake of the malone firing...
so, until PDA brings in a veteran threat from three, this kings team will very rarely find much success beyond the arc. "grit and grind" was working for this team because it overlooked three-point shooting. it wasn't trendy, but it also didn't attempt to shove square pegs into round holes. you can win in the contemporary nba with a dominant defense, dominant rebounding, and dominant low-post play, especially when you get to the free throw line as often as the kings do. does it mean that the kings would have made the playoffs this season with that style of play, or that they would be able to advance deep into the playoffs in the coming seasons without adequate three-point shooting? certainly not. but it was working and it was sustainable. three-point shooting represents neither for this kings team today...
Or, you know, considering how much we suck at shooting threes, taking 2 fewer threes might have gotten us a win without having to go to OT.
But you're going on the assumption that we're going to miss every three we take, which isn't the case. In fact, given our current team shooting percentage from three (.336), the probability that we hit less than 2 when taking 16 shots is only 1.3%. That means if you replay the game we just had, and have everything happen exactly the same except for we re-roll the cosmic dice on all of our threes, we win the game in regulation 98.7% of the time.
The point is that the number of threes we took wasn't a problem. The fact that we missed so many *was* a problem, but we missed a very unusually high number. Very bad luck today shouldn't change our strategy tomorrow, because tomorrow you will almost certainly not have very bad luck - by definition of bad luck.
The question is not about whether we are worse at shooting threes than another team. The question is whether when we take a three is it a more efficient shot than the alternative. Right now our raw efficiency on threes is 1.01 points per shot, while our raw efficiency on twos is 0.98 points per shot. Now, you can't stop there, because it doesn't take into account free throws, and most of our free throws are going to come on two-point shots. So if you try to parcel out the free throws (I don't have any data here, so I guessed we've been fouled on about 15 threes this season, with a handful (5) of and-1s...that doesn't seem excessive) between three point shots and two-point shots, the numbers will change. Super rough estimate is that we're at about 1.06 points per shot on threes and about 1.10 points per shot on twos once you take FTs into account. There are still some mitigating factors - this doesn't subtract three-point heaves out of the equation (and those shouldn't be counted) and it doesn't take into account technical free throws or intentional fouls (which probably should not be credited to the two-point shot) so things might be a bit closer than that. But yes, the numbers suggest we should be a bit more selective in our threes. Given the current numbers, we would be breaking even at about .350 (which is coincidentally about league average) rather than .336. So should we be a bit more selective? Sure. But it's not going to take much selectivity to boost the percentage.
Anyway, my point is that the above is a better way to think about it than just saying that we're below average, so don't shoot them. I should note that with our very large number of FT attempts and very good FT% (Cousins is certainly a major factor in both of these numbers) we are well above league average efficiency from two. Given that we'd have to be about a league-average 3PT% team to break even on 3PT efficiency, that suggests that most teams will actually be more efficient from three than from two and should be taking more threes.
LPKingsFan
All-Star
Most of the attempts that I remember seeing last night occured exactly when you want someone to take a three. Cousins would get the double and make the pass to the open guy on the perimiter, who missed. Collison and McLemore just weren't hitting them like they have been all season.
I'm not sure how you build an offense around Cousins without perimiter shooting, unless you want him barreling into triple teams every play.
Edit to elaborate: to me, the breaking point of the game wasn't Cousins' "foul" or Corbins' ill-advised decision not to foul then to foul, but a sequence with about two or three minutes left: Cousins got doubled and passed out to someone (I think it was Collison) who had a good look at a three that would have put the Kings up by eight or so (and given Boogie the triple double). He missed, though, and the Mavs scored on the other end to make it a one possession game. The game would have looked a lot different had that shot gone in.
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Bricklayer
Don't Make Me Use The Bat
The thing is, like all shots, the more you take, the more your accuracy is likely to go down. We're barely adequate right now while guys are mostly taking just easy ones. Its not like we're running around passing up open threes. We take those, and we barely make them.
Meanwhile Ben is in a terrible shooting slump (3 for his last 25 from three) DC has never shot this many before, and last night you could just see the problems as he was too scared to take anymore from the angles, which is not his natural spot, and then went ahead and missed them from the corners, which is. Rudy's in his 8th year, old dogs and all that. Nik just refuses to come around. You just can't wave a wand and make these guys into major shooters. You can of course force up more threes, but when you're no good at it that's just dumb. We have better options, things we are good at. We get Kyle Korver next year, we can revisit.
Meanwhile Ben is in a terrible shooting slump (3 for his last 25 from three) DC has never shot this many before, and last night you could just see the problems as he was too scared to take anymore from the angles, which is not his natural spot, and then went ahead and missed them from the corners, which is. Rudy's in his 8th year, old dogs and all that. Nik just refuses to come around. You just can't wave a wand and make these guys into major shooters. You can of course force up more threes, but when you're no good at it that's just dumb. We have better options, things we are good at. We get Kyle Korver next year, we can revisit.
twslam07
All-Star
Along with free throws, you need to factor in the ability to put your team in the penalty quicker and putting the other team in foul trouble (thus forcing them to play weaker players).
But what difference does it make to Kings Fans what's more efficient for 'most' teams, when we are not most teams? Why should we give a **** what's more efficient for the Atlanta Hawks? We don't have their personnel. A three-point shot may be more efficient for Kyle Korver, but Ben McLemore can't shoot like Kyle Korver, which makes that information largely irrelevant to us.
We actually agree. I don't know where you all got the notion that I think we should start chucking 3s with reckless abandon ALA, the Houston Rockets, but I what I took issue with in this thread is the statement that 3pt shooting isn't important to wins, which is it's own little section in Brick's OP. My comment was slightly snarky, but on a normal 3pt shooting night for us, we hit 5 or 6 3s when taking 16 attempts. Last night was an example of bad luck with shooting and not near the norm of our talent level with floor spacing.
And it's also a matter of taking what shots the defense gives us. What's the better shot: Nik Stauskas open 3 or DeMarcus trying to beat a double team in the post? You can't just stop shooting because guys are struggling from that distance. Good shots, no matter who's taking them (unless you're name is Reggie Evans) should be the goal of every offensive possession, no matter where it's shot from or who takes them.
An open shot is only a good shot if you can hit said shot. Let's not pretend that Reggie Evans is the only guy on the Kings who can't hit open shots; we seem to have plenty of those to go around.
It was just a note. While the current numbers suggest that we would be better served by being a bit more selective in our three-point attempts, that isn't an indictment on threes as a whole - for many teams it is possible to be shooting under league average from three but it would still make sense to take more. I would guess that there are some Kings fans who are interested in general principles of the sport as a whole on top of only what will help the Kings, so I mentioned it.
Sure, but obviously that can't be done for a quick-and-dirty calculation. Qualitatively we can say that both of those factors would increase the relative efficiency of the two-pointer, while the factors I remarked on in my comment (heaves, intentional fouls, techs) would increase the relative efficiency of the three-pointer. Do they cancel out? Who knows. In any case they should all be relatively small effects, but how to quantitatively determine them? I wouldn't even know where to start, much less do it in the ten minutes of typing out a post.
But I will say that it's that level of analysis (and higher) that makes it relatively imperative that teams have analytics departments. These are the kind of difficult-to-answer questions that if answered correctly can give you an edge over the course of a season.
kupman
Starter
Here is another factor/question to consider. Do missed 3's equate to more offensive rebounds than missed 2's given that longer shots often result in longer rebounds? Could taking more 3's lead to more shots overall in the game given more 2nd and even 3 chance opportunties? Does an offesnive possesion have a higher efficiency if it starts with a 3 rather than a 2 due to the rebounding factor?
I don't know the answer to these questions.
twslam07
All-Star
Good point, or if you have a dominant offensive rebounder who often times gets great positioning, would you rather a shorter shot be put up in order to give him a better chance to get said offensive rebound with his positioning?
The funny thing about this stuff is it can be spun in so many different directions.
LPKingsFan
All-Star
I forget where, maybe on Grantland, but someone half jokingly created a stat for seemingly intentinoal missed shots that led to easy offensive rebounds and putbacks. Made me think of Cousins (moreso in years past, not as much this year).
You have to assume (or, at the very least, hope) that the teams have acess to sufficient data points (a loaded term, I know) these to make informed conclusions on questions like this, not just spin. I'd think you could run all the potential scenarios through some sort of model and get something that says, at the end of the day, we're better off doing X than Y.
twslam07
All-Star
I agree, but for our sake, we don't have access to that data so we just rely on spin and assumptions. That's all I was saying.
I'm sure some sort of multivariate model could be a useful tool, but the problem is trying to account for all the variability. Something like basketball can be very, very difficult to quantify. There are so many variables that can influence an outcome, and there are so many variables that cannot be quantified.
My experience as a Kings Fan does not support this guess overmuch, unless you're working with a much more fluid definition of 'some'. I mean, if by 'some', you mean, 'more than one' then, sure, you're obviously right. But that's not the definition of 'some' that I'm working with.
Maybe I'm just being obtuse, but it never would have occurred to me that a thread created in Kings Rap was ever intended to be a discussion about what's relevant to the NBA as a whole. People wanting to discuss topics that have a broader reach than the Kings, specifically, are the reason why this message board has more than one forum. We kinda like compartmentalization around here; that's why KF doesn't look like the Bleacher Mob.
I'm not inclined to argue over whether your definition of "some" is more valid than mine, sorry.
Seriously? You and I had a long discussion in this very thread about statistical topics that were more properly relevant to the NBA as a whole than to the Kings in particular. You didn't object then. I mean, seriously, discussion of the impact of three point shots was a specific topic in the original post of the thread. It's not like I've tried to change the subject of the thread to make it about the latest Britney Spears concert or something.
Are you sure you aren't think of some other thread? Because I just re-read every post in this thread, and I did no such thing. Maybe you were, but I wasn't. AFAIK, that's where the disconnect is coming from. I was never not talking about the Kings as it pertains to pace/three-pointers/whatever in this thread. If I didn't articulate that properly, then I'll take the hit on that, but I didn't take the "big picture" view in this thread, and that's something that I'm disinclined to do in Kings Rap, anyway.
EDIT - I just re-read every post I've made to this thread a second time, and I still don't see how you came to the conclusion that I was ever talking about any team other than the Kings in this thread.
You can't stop taking those shots. The alternative is to let Boogie try and beat double and triple teams in the post or have Rudy break down a clogged paint defense. Which are far worse options are far more likely to lead TO's, offensive fouls, etc. It's simply a forgone conclusion: if we ever want to be a good team offensively, we got to start making those open looks from the perimeter after the defense gets broken down from Boogie or Cuz.
It's back to my original point. We were 1-16 from 3pt land last night and lost by 4. If we shoot how we normally we do, we're 5-16 from 3pt land last night. I'm not saying bombs away from 3pt land. But you can't deny 3pt shooting has a significant impact on winning and losing games.
I'm not inclined to argue over whether your definition of "some" is more valid than mine, sorry.
Seriously? You and I had a long discussion in this very thread about statistical topics that were more properly relevant to the NBA as a whole than to the Kings in particular. You didn't object then. I mean, seriously, discussion of the impact of three point shots was a specific topic in the original post of the thread. It's not like I've tried to change the subject of the thread to make it about the latest Britney Spears concert or something.
Maybe you guys should just get your own sub-forum where you can argue about something different every day and the rest of us can just check in on an occasional basis?
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