Quick thoughts: 2011 NBA Draft

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I’ll offer more in-depth coverage shortly, but here are my quick thoughts on the 2011 NBA draft. If you need more draft data in the meantime, take a look at my full draft prospects preview.

Fake Trades: Jazz Edition

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Short post today.

For shits and giggles, I was playing around on the ESPN NBA Trade Machine, which is what happens when your favourite team has been out of the playoff picture since December. Unfortunately, now isn't the best time to be fiddling around with it - as many contracts can't be traded at the moment - but it's still fun.

I was looking at the Jazz as a trading partner for the Raptors. Why? Well, since the Deron Williams trade, it looks like the Jazz are trying to move in a new direction (aka blow it all up). They still have plenty of good players, including some up-and-comers, and thus are ripe for the picking.

The Regend and the Ninja: A Response (part II)

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On Saturday, Tom Liston of Raptors Republic - TrueHoop's Raptors' affiliate - wrote a column about Reggie Evans and James Johnson. In his column, Tom mentions that he has some problems with Wins Produced and my analysis of Evans and Johnson in the past. Specifically, Tom's main issues seem to be:

• Evans' WP48 is near the top of the league (currently at 0.356), but Reggie doesn't seem to belong with the other players (Kevin Love, Dwight Howard, Chris Paul, LeBron James, Dwayne Wade) at the top.
• If Wins Produced doesn't overvalue rebounds, and the only thing Evans' does well is rebound, why is Evans' WP48 so high?
• James Johnson is playing well in Toronto - "he’s pretty much exactly the same player" as he was during his rookie season. So why did I say that he probably wouldn't be a good player when Toronto traded for him?
• Wins Produced is one measure of player productivity among several, and one should "never rely on one metric to draw conclusions".

The other day I responded to these first two points. Today I'm going to tackle the last two.

The Regend and the Ninja: A Response (part I)

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Yesterday, Tom Liston of Raptors Republic - TrueHoop's Raptors' affiliate - wrote a column about Reggie Evans and James Johnson. In his column, Tom mentions that he has some problems with Wins Produced and my analysis of Evans and Johnson in the past. Specifically, Tom's main issues seem to be:

• Evans' WP48 is near the top of the league (currently at 0.356), but Reggie doesn't seem to belong with the other players (Kevin Love, Dwight Howard, Chris Paul, LeBron James, Dwayne Wade) at the top.
• If Wins Produced doesn't overvalue rebounds, and the only thing Evans' does well is rebound, why is Evans' WP48 so high?
• James Johnson is playing well in Toronto - "he’s pretty much exactly the same player" as he was  during his rookie season. So why did I say that he probably wouldn't be a good player when Toronto traded for him?
• Wins Produced is one measure of player productivity among several, and one should "never rely on one metric to draw conclusions".

Let's start with Reggie.

No, no, no: DeMar DeRozan is not the MIP

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During the Raptors’ blowout loss at the hands of the Nuggets, I listened in disbelief as the commentators - Matt Devlin and Jack Armstrong - made the case that DeMar DeRozan should be in the running for the Most Improved Player (MIP) award. Now, I’ve already written about this in the past, but the fact that this idea is still out there means that I need to keep addressing this topic.


The argument for DeRozan as the MIP

During the game, the stat used to back up this argument was...drumroll...PPG increase from last season. Here were the names that they included on the graphic that popped up onto the screen:

WOW Network Podcast for 03/13/11

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On Friday - along with David Berri of the Wages of Wins Journal, Arturo Galletti of Arturo's Silly Little Stats, and Mosi Platt of the Miami Heat Index - I participated in a WOW network podcast, which you can listen to here. We talked about "Small Market Teams" and "Super Teams", the NBA draft, and the NFL labour (yes, that word is spelt with a 'u') issue.

Dave also has a short little summary of the podcast on his site.

Raptor Trivia: Pound for Pound

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Last week I asked a question about players who were capable of getting triple-doubles. Today I want to ask a question based on a term that is often thrown around in sports: 'pound for pound'.

Back in the day, we used to hear about how Allen Iverson was, 'pound for pound', the "best scorer in the league" (of course, I beg to differ on that one). Frequently, boxers (the athletes, not the undergarments) are referred to as the best 'pound for pound' fighters. So, given my interest in basketball and the Toronto Raptors, what I want to know is, pound for pound, who are the most productive players in the history of the franchise?

The 50 greatest NBA players of all-time

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Given the team's record right now, Raptor news is a bit boring these days; eventually I will take another look at how the individual players have been playing, but Nerd Numbers is down (and the Game Splits tool - which I had just started to rely on for my weekly player evaluations - has been down for a while now). So today I will write about a topic that is barely even tangentially related to the Raptors - my version of the NBA's 50 greatest players.

Kevin Love to the Raps!

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According to Doug Smith of the Toronto Star, Kevin Love loves playing under Raptor head coach Jay Triano. Said Love:

“I loved him. I loved having him as coach. He lets his players play, he is definitely a players’ coach. He is a guy that I would love to play for and he is a lot of fun to be around. I enjoyed him.”

How could the Raps get him? If I was in charge of the team, I would be open to trading away any assets - even the team's upcoming first round draft pick - if I could get my hands on Love. Here are some scenarios that could make it happen:

Champions and Drafted Players

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I've been away for a while, so I've been writing a bunch of new posts in the short term. Today I'd like to revisit a classic topic: NBA champions and the draft.

Congraturation!

I've already shown that securing a top tree draft selection is generally not the ideal position to be in for an NBA team. To recap, I found that:

• in the lottery era (1985-present), 60% of teams that have ended up with a top three draft pick haven't made it past the first round of the NBA playoffs during their draftee's first four years in the league.
• to put it another way, only 40% of teams with a top three draft selection managed to advance past the first round in one or more of their draftees' first four years.
• during the lottery era - only four (Duncan, Robinson, Sean Elliott, who was traded away and then reacquired, and Darko Milicic, who shouldn't count because he didn't really play) out of the 78 players (5%) taken with a top three pick have won a championship with the team that drafted them.
• all that makes sense, as top three draft picks generally start their careers on bad teams. The Spurs lucked out with Duncan because, rather than being a bad team, they were a good team that had injury problems. The Pistons "lucked out" with Milicic because the Grizzlies were dumb enough to trade away their 2003 1st round pick in exchange for Otis Thorpe. Robinson and Elliott won their championships well after they were drafted, and Elliott was actually traded away and reacquired before he got his.
• top three picks fared a little bit better in the pre-lottery era - ten players (Jordan, Olajuwon, Worthy, Thomas, McHale, Magic, Walton, Kareem, Unseld, and Cazzie Russell) out of the 57 top three draftees (17.5%) eventually won with the team that drafted them, and only 28% of teams couldn't make it past the first round in their draftee's first four years.
• this also makes sense, as there were fewer teams in the pre-lottery days, which gave each team a better chance of moving up in the standings.

All-Raptor teams

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I haven't been around very much over these holidays - I'll have the Week 9 numbers up tomorrow (hopefully) - but today I have a year-end type of post ready: the All-Raptor teams.

Basically, my All-Raptor teams are just like the yearly All-NBA teams; there is an All-Raptor First team, a Second team, and a Third team. The only difference between the All-Raptor teams and the All-NBA teams is that, whereas the All-NBA teams are a yearly affair, my All-Raptor teams are of the all-time variety. I've already (thanks to Andres) used Wins Produced to determine the top Raptors of all-time, so all that remains is to use positions to slot everyone into three teams. Every player must have spent some time at a given position to be eligible for said position, and both absolute production and rate of production have been taken into account. Here is the list, with brief explanations to follow:



1st Team:

C - Chris Bosh
Bosh is the franchise leader in several categories, including minutes, blocks, rebounds, points, and wins. Given the paucity of great Raptors' centres - and the fact that Bosh spent some time at the position - Bosh is the best option here.

PF - Donyell Marshall
According to my informal research, Donyell Marshall is the most under-appreciated Raptor of all-time. In terms of both raw productivity and WP48, Marshall is the most productive player to ever don a Raptors uniform; despite this, few fans seem to recall how good he was (as evidenced by the results of my various unscientific Sporcle quizzes). An easy choice.

SF - Tracy McGrady
T-Mac is an interesting case; while he was an efficient player, he didn't play in Toronto for very long, and he actually got better when he left. In fact, once McGrady left for Orlando, he put up some of the very best seasons of the last 20 years. Still, he was very good in Toronto, and his main competition at SF is Jamario Moon. Moon's raw productivity was actually better, but Moon spent a bunch of time playing PF, and T-Mac played more minutes and created more wins. Really, it's a toss-up between Moon and McGrady, but given their ages and subsequent seasons, I'm going with T-Mac.

SG - Vince Carter
Arguably the most famous Raptor ever, Carter actually struggled to best Doug Christie and barely made it onto the first team. While Christie had a better WP48, Carter had both a very slight edge in raw productivity as well as a huge edge in minutes played. Then there is the matter that the tail-end of his numbers with the Raptors are somewhat tainted by his intentional poor play - a fact that could either help or hurt his cause, depending on your viewpoint. Everything considered, I'm going with Vince.

PG - Jose Calderon
With the second most wins produced of any Raptor and the franchise leader in assists (and still adding to his totals), Calderon is hands down the best point guard the Raps have ever had.


2nd Team

C - Antonio Davis
Davis too was more of a power forward than a centre, but spent most of his time as a Raptor in the centre position. Although he was not an above-average player for most of his career, he was quite serviceable and - for a Raptor - relatively long-serving.

PF - Jerome Williams
The Junk Yard Dog is the second best Raptor power forward of all-time. Unfortunately for him, JYD played the same position as Marshall, so unless I engage in some suspect position arrangements (like putting Marshall at SF) he's stuck on the second team.

SF - Jamario Moon
Although he entered the league as an undrafted 27 year-old, Moon played quite well for the Raptors across three seasons. Although best known for his Super Jamario dunks, he was also good at rebounding, blocking shots and avoiding turnovers. Another unappreciated Raptor.

SG - Doug Christie
Mr. Christie does more than just make good cookies! He's fourth in wins produced, behind only Bosh, Calderon, and Carter. For a long time Christie was the one who carried the team, which a lot of people seem to forget.

PG - Damon Stoudamire
Despite all the fanfare, the much heralded Mighty Mouse was about average during his time in Toronto. He scored a lot and racked up the assists, but his shooting wasn't very efficient. Although there have been point guards who were more efficient than him, Stoudamire played more minutes and racked up more total wins, so he manages to make it onto the second team.


3rd Team

C - Keon Clark
After Bosh and Davis, I'm sad to report that the next-best centre is none other than Keon Clark. My favourite memory of Clark is when he sucked the gravity right out of the building and dunked over everyone's target of choice, Shawn Bradley. While Clark was above-average during his time in Toronto, he didn't last very long, and once he left he quickly succumbed to drug problems and couldn't stick in the league.

PF - Charles Oakley
Oak was solid during his Raptor years, but clearly a shadow of the player who grabbed 35 rebounds in one game while in Chicago. He was acquired in a trade with the Knicks that cost the team Marcus Camby (who - as Andres has noted - hadn't been very successful in Toronto but went on to become very productive).

SF - Morris Peterson
While he hovered around average over his 7 seasons with the team, Mo Pete played the most games and the second most minutes of any Raptor. Ideally he'd be slotted in at shooting guard, but I put him here in order to fit in the next two players.

SG - Anthony Parker
Parker was a brilliant signing by Brian Collangelo - while he was drafted by the Nets in '97, he didn't last in the NBA for very long and went overseas. Eventually, when Maccabi Tel Aviv became the first European team to beat an NBA in North America, Parker was the one who hit the game winning shot, and he was signed by the Raps shortly after. While he's showing his age right now in Cleveland, he was above-average in Toronto and helped to contribute a significant number of wins to the Division-winning '06-'07 team.

PG - Alvin Williams
Williams was kind of similar to Antonio Davis, in that he was not an above-average player for most of his career but was relatively long-serving. He also played a lot of minutes while he was injured, which eventually took its toll and forced him into retirement. Williams was acquired in the trade that sent the disgruntled Stoudamire to Portland.


I suspect that the All-Raptor third team would not stack up well with the third teams of most other NBA teams - something that I'd chalk up to the young age of the Raptors. Although I'm sure that these three teams would beat the three teams offered by the Bobcats or the Grizzlies.

 - Devin

More all-star ballot fun

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A while back I posted who I thought should be on this year's all-star ballot. Recently Ian Levy has written a post about the East's all-star ballot - who is on the list, who should be on the list, but isn't, and who shouldn't be on the list, but is - and several Raptors feature prominently.

Go check it out!


 - Devin.

Top 3 draft picks (part II)

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As a follow-up to the last post about top three draft picks, I've made some modifications to my first table (new spreadsheet still here):



Certain people were blinded by some big numbers, so I added some new parts. The first, "title teams without own top 3 draft pick," is pretty self-explanatory, but I figure I'd better explain it anyways. That counts the number of teams that won a championship without having a player on their roster that said team drafted in the top three slots. Any difference between the numbers in this new category and the previous number of 88.9% (40/45) can be explained by trades or free agency. That means that only 29 teams - 64.4% - of teams that won a championship won it with a player that they themselves took with a top three selection. Not as rosy a number, is it?

It's still a rather large number, but as with John McCain, it gets worse (sorry Canadian readers, you'll have to go to the Comedy Network site instead...trust me, I hate it too). The last category explains the number of top three picks that won one or more championships with the team that drafted them. Of the 135 top three picks taken from 1966-2010, only 13 (not 16 as it says in the table, because Baylor, West, and Barry were drafted before 1966) managed to win a championship with the team that drafted them. Between them, these 13 players have managed to win 27 championships. Who are these players, and how many titles did they win with the team that drafted them?

• Michael Jordan, 6
• Magic Johnson, 5
• Tim Duncan, 4
• Kevin McHale, 3
• Hakeem Olajuwon, 2
• David Robinson, 2
• Isiah Thomas, 2
• Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 1
• Bill Walton, 1
• Wes Unseld, 1
• Sean Elliott, 1
• Darko Milicic, 1
• Cazzie Russell, 1

Of these players, most are all-time greats. Jordan, Johnson, Duncan, McHale, Olajuwon, Abdul-Jabbar, Walton, Unseld, and Robinson fall into this category. Sean Elliott and Isiah Thomas were over-rated scorers - occasionally good players who weren't the real driving forces behind their teams (and Elliott was traded away and then re-acquired prior to winning a title with the team that drafted him). Cazzie Russell played most of his career before turnovers were tracked, but I suspect that he'd fall into the same category as Elliott and Thomas (or worse). And then we have Milicic (no comment necessary, I hope).

The fact is that very few teams that have a top three pick will celebrate a championship with the player they draft; only 9.6% of teams have managed to win a championship with a top three pick that they've drafted (from 1966-2010). In order to be successful, teams need to have several good players and at least one superstar player. Most rookies aren't superstar players, and most top three picks don't play with good teammates. All of this leads me to say (again) that the Raptors need to build a good team, ditch bad contracts, learn how to draft, and stop worrying about tanking.


Next time I talk about top three picks, I'm going to compare championship teams to non-championship teams. Originally I was going to include that analysis in this post, but it's going to take a lot of work and be rather long, so this'll have to tide you over for now.

 - Devin

Raptors most and least efficient players (2000s)

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A week ago I posted the Raptors wins leaders for the 2000-01 to the 2010-11 seasons. I also created some Sporcle quizzes out of them to make things more interesting.

Today I have two more quizzes for you: the Raptors' most and least efficient players for the seasons from 2000-01 to 2010-11. To qualify for these lists, players also had to have played at least 400 minutes as a Raptor. Some of the answers may surprise you; others should not (the least efficient Raptor is someone I identified years ago as a terrible player, but you'd have to be a very dedicated Raptor fan - like me - to remember him).


I love Sporcle, so if you find some nice NBA quizzes on there, let me know in a comment. Of course, chances are that I've already played the quiz, but give it a shot anyways!

 - Devin

Raptors top win producers from 2000-2011

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I'm going to be traveling for the next few days, so unfortunately I won't be updating the auto WP numbers for the Raptors until next week. To make up for that, I've put together a spreadsheet that counts the total wins produced of each player (while they were wearing a Raptor uniform) from the 2000-01 season up to and including the current 2010-11 season. The regular, boring list is here, but I've also made it more interactive by turning it into some Sporcle Quizzes. Here they are:

Toronto Raptors Wins Leaders (2000's)

Toronto Raptors Fewest Wins (2000's)

Hope you enjoy them! The fewest wins one is pretty hard!

 - Devin