Orlando Magic News for March 18th: Championship Hopes, Transition Defense, and More

If Dwight plays like the way he did in last years playoffs, we’re looking pretty good. I really hope VC’s usage rate goes up in the playoffs but only if he maintains february and march’s effeciency.

The Hardwood Paroxysm one doesn’t take into account the team’s play style. Of course Nelson mostly gets assists to dunks and 3s – those are the primary shots for the Magic, since they’re high value. I would imagine most “close shots” are generated by passing to a cutter, which we mostly do with a big in the post, rather than from the point. The greatest benefit comes on long 2s, which are the most inefficient shot. In a perverse manner, the potential assists reward a player for helping his teammates make bad shooting decisions.

For weighted assists (where the assist is valued based on the probability of the shot going in), there’s a double-counting problem. Assume a player dishes 10 passes to shooters that all take a shot with a 60% chance of falling. On average, he’ll have six assists, because 6 shots will fall and 4 won’t. Using weighted assists, he’ll have 3.6 assists, because 6 shots will fall, and they’re each only worth .6 because only 60% should fall. Essentially, the assist stat has a weight built into it in that the assist only counts if the shot falls.

If you’re going to measure assists in a “new” way, I feel it would be better to do it based on either points per assist or points per potential assist. If you’re passing to guys taking long twos, OK, you’re boosting their shooting percentage by a lot, but it’s still the least efficient shot on the court. Instead of making a crappy shot less crappy, make a good shot a little better. The goal of the game is to put the ball in the bucket, so measure whether the player’s contributions do that in the simplest way possible – does their play lead to points.

Which is great, by the way. Anyways, it’s done and my TV goes to “1st and 10”, coincidentally with them talking about Dwight’s blog. Now, this is hilarious… Skip Bayless said, with a straight face, that Gortat was a better overall player than Dwight. Swin Cash almost got out of her chair and hit Bayless after that remark. Or maybe that was just my imagination running wild.

Still, everyone remember that these are the people that we’re asking for respect from? I’d much, much rather not have someone so ignorant/sensationalistic on the Magic’s side.

Isn’t the stat something like 59% league-wide TS% on transition shots and 47% on non-transition shots? If so, think what a swing that is… every time you get back and make the other team half-court, you’re cutting their scoring by 20% right there.