In our previous post we tackled, at length, how John Hollinger’s Player Efficiency Rating (PER) is calculated and identified how different aspects of a player’s game is weighted. This leads us to question certain components of PER. Should I prefer a scorer or a rebounder? How do these terms interact? What about team affiliation? In…
Back in 2012, on the heels of my PhD in nonparametric Bayesian density estimation, I developed a methodology that constructs a nonparametric Bayesian density and teases out a nice spatio-temporal decomposition of movement on a space of interest. Pointing this at NBA SportVu data, the decomposition kindly identified player tendency in specific types of offenses…
A common methodology for NBA analysts to develop a metric that quantifies scoring ability of a player through the position a player is put in when taking a shot, and the association of a closest defender when the shot is taken. Some such metrics are kernel density plots of field goal percentages on the court, assist adjacency matrices, measure…
A possession is defined by the NBA as Section XVIII-Team Possession A team is in possession when a player is holding, dribbling or passing the ball. Team possession ends when the defensive team gains possession or there is a field goal attempt. There is a little change to that definition even, as a field goal…
Over the past couple decades, we have heard effectively the same complaint that the NBA’s Western Conference is simply too tough and that the Eastern Conference teams have it relatively easy. During the last decade, it’s the primary reason that people dismiss LeBron James’ run through seven consecutive NBA finals as a result of the…
Recalling my playing days in the NCAA, our coach would have us run two- and three-minute drills to replicate clutch scenarios. “Down five with two-minutes to go” would be the most common of these drills. Our top player, one practice, proclaimed that he should always get the ball because he’s the top scorer and “always…
In two days, we will find out who is the NBA MVP: James Harden, Kawhi Leonard, and Russell Westbrook. Each player has their pros and cons, and have been heavily debated over the past month since the finalists have been listed. Despite Leonard leading the Spurs into the second best record in the league (61-21)…
With the NBA Draft 22 days away, we would like to take a moment to show the impact of the previous 23 NBA Draft lotteries and show if whether draft position really truly matters. Hint: it does, but only to an extent. We’ll explain below. We focus on all draft picks since 1994, and not…
“The New York Knicks, with their first pick, select Patrick Ewing of Georgetown,” called out David Stern in the 1985 NBA draft. A draft that has since been heavily debated for three-plus decades as being the epitome of the NBA draft being “rigged” or fixed. Discussion about bent corners of envelopes, all the way to…
In a previous post, we took a look into some spatio-temporal data obtained through SportVU technology for the NBA and identified how to use that data to perform basic tasks such as building convex hulls to illustrate offense and defense coverage on a court; as well as provide basic Python code for the reader to…
Squared Statistics: Understanding Basketball Analytics 