So, I just read Adam Hoff's very interesting article on what he calls the "Iverson Factor" on WIS (link to your right) and felt the need to comment so I'll do it here for lack of a better space.
I just want to make a few brief points in response:
1. Iverson is overrated. I just had to get that off my chest to start with and will be happy to eplain exactly why some other time.
2. I agree that things like the good miss off penetration, the pass to the passer, the timeliness of a shot, are all things that can not be quantified, but matter as much as any stat. My hope is that people finally realize this and stop throwing around numbers in sports arguments as if they prove every point. Stats lie in every aspect of life and there is nowhere that they are less valuable than sports. John Hollinger's PER is a bad thing ver everyone. And this is coming from a stats nut who can't get enough of fantasy sports, but I've been watching the games enough to know, that while they may be fun, stats lie.
3. Combining these two points with Adam's story, I have to make one other point here. Sometimes, as much as things like a good miss get overlooked because of our love of stats, a "good" stat sometimes gets too much credit. The ultimate example is "points scored" in basketball, but that's too easy and the rise in popularity of various shooting percentages has mitigated that some. But what about the assist?
It drives me crazy when I hear people describe a player (such as Iverson) as unselfish because, "look at all his assists." But there is a huge difference between when Kidd gets 10 assists and when Iverson or Kobe does it. The important thing is not passing the ball that leads to a made FG. The important thing is getting your teamates involved in the game and then putting them in a place where they can succeed.
If Iverson scraps the playbook, shoots 10 times in a row, but manages to finally find an open teammate out of the tripple-team and that guy makes the shot, AI gets the assist and maybe he does that on enough possessions to pad his stat sheet. Meanwhile, no one on his team has found a rhythm or knows when they might see the ball or how the offense is going to run, so in the 4th quarter, now AI and Kobe HAVE to shoot every time, because their teammates have never been brought into the game.
This does not make them unselfish, but rather the opposite. Assist stats lie. Making your teammates better (the definition of a great player), is not about assists, but about getting them involved. Big assist numbers might make you a good passer, but it doesn't (alone) make you a good player.
I just want to make a few brief points in response:
1. Iverson is overrated. I just had to get that off my chest to start with and will be happy to eplain exactly why some other time.
2. I agree that things like the good miss off penetration, the pass to the passer, the timeliness of a shot, are all things that can not be quantified, but matter as much as any stat. My hope is that people finally realize this and stop throwing around numbers in sports arguments as if they prove every point. Stats lie in every aspect of life and there is nowhere that they are less valuable than sports. John Hollinger's PER is a bad thing ver everyone. And this is coming from a stats nut who can't get enough of fantasy sports, but I've been watching the games enough to know, that while they may be fun, stats lie.
3. Combining these two points with Adam's story, I have to make one other point here. Sometimes, as much as things like a good miss get overlooked because of our love of stats, a "good" stat sometimes gets too much credit. The ultimate example is "points scored" in basketball, but that's too easy and the rise in popularity of various shooting percentages has mitigated that some. But what about the assist?
It drives me crazy when I hear people describe a player (such as Iverson) as unselfish because, "look at all his assists." But there is a huge difference between when Kidd gets 10 assists and when Iverson or Kobe does it. The important thing is not passing the ball that leads to a made FG. The important thing is getting your teamates involved in the game and then putting them in a place where they can succeed.
If Iverson scraps the playbook, shoots 10 times in a row, but manages to finally find an open teammate out of the tripple-team and that guy makes the shot, AI gets the assist and maybe he does that on enough possessions to pad his stat sheet. Meanwhile, no one on his team has found a rhythm or knows when they might see the ball or how the offense is going to run, so in the 4th quarter, now AI and Kobe HAVE to shoot every time, because their teammates have never been brought into the game.
This does not make them unselfish, but rather the opposite. Assist stats lie. Making your teammates better (the definition of a great player), is not about assists, but about getting them involved. Big assist numbers might make you a good passer, but it doesn't (alone) make you a good player.
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