With Jason Terry out of the lineup, his shot attempts had to go somewhere. He averages 13.7 FGA for the season, not to mention a notch under four FTAs a game. That’s a decent chunk of the Mavs’ possessions that wasn’t going to fade into nothingness; someone has to fill those possessions, either with shot attempts or turnovers.
Caron Butler seemed like a natural candidate to fill in some of Terry’s responsibilities, but he actually averaged more field goal attempts playing alongside Terry (14.8) than he did without him (13.4). Dirk averaged 18.4 attempts per game, which is just shy of his mark for the season (18.7). So where were all the possessions going?
Naturally, to two of the more unlikely Maverick candidates: Shawn Marion and Rodrigue Beaubois.
Marion, in all honesty, could be carrying more of the offensive load on a nightly basis. That’s just not his role on this particular team. Shawn’s asked to move within the sets, work on the offensive boards, set screens, and roll to the rim. And that’s exactly what he does. He can produce some that way but he’s not going to be the powerhouse he was in Phoenix because he isn’t always given the opportunities. Every run out on the break isn’t rewarded, because sometimes the best move is to slow things down.
With Terry shelved, though, the Mavs looked to Marion more than usual. He put up more shot attempts as he became a more central part of the Mavs’ offensive game plan, and the numbers — which were said to be a product of Steve Nash’s brilliance rather than Marion’s — bumped right back up to his career levels.
FGA (FG%)
FTA
TO
PPG
Five games without JET
16.2 (56.5%)
2.0
0.6
17.4
Season '09-'10
10.8 (50.7%)
1.8
1.3
11.9
The situation in Phoenix was ideal for Marion; the pace, point guard, and system all fit Shawn like a glove. But a situation like this one, where he’s among the foci of a well-constructed offensive system without the benefits of a fast pace (Dallas is 19th in the league this season), he’s still capable of performing at impressive levels. It’s not that Marion can’t perform like this on a near-nightly basis, it’s that the Mavs don’t necessarily need him to. It’s not the role he’s slotted to play, and though he has enough tricks to up his PPG to more standard levels, the offense doesn’t exactly accommodate him in doing so.
Beaubois also benefited from the increase in opportunity, but in a bit of a different way. Marion’s on the court for over 30 minutes a game, but just doesn’t have the ball in his hands enough to explode. Even if he wanted to go rogue and jack up 20 shots a game, he wouldn’t be able to. Roddy, on the other hand, has the ball in hand quite a bit, but has his stat line handcuffed by his minutes. His numbers project to 18.9 PPG, 3.8 APG, and 3.7 RPG over 36 minutes, which is pretty stellar for a player his age with his level of experience at his position.
When he was finally given a chance at starter’s minutes, it’s no surprise that Beaubois produced:
FGA (FG%)
FTA
TO
PPG
Five games without JET
13.2 (53.0%)
2.6
1.0
17.2
Season '09-'10
5.3 (50.9%)
0.9
1.1
6.8
The competition level wasn’t terrific over those five games and the sample size on Beaubois’ numbers this season is so small that it’s hard to extrapolate any clear meaning from this stretch. But the fact that the increase in minutes is translating to scale increases in production is indisputably positive. The worry with per-minute stats is that as usage increases, efficiency decreases. Not so with Roddy, who managed to not only put up points in impressive volume, but managed to be an even more efficient scorer in the process.
This is exactly what the Mavs need to see from Beaubois at this stage in his young career: patience, gradual improvement, and an ability to produce when given opportunities to do so. The state of the team isn’t going to allow that to happen on a nightly basis (at least it hasn’t of yet), if only because there are too many good veterans competing for minutes in the backcourt. Not every rookie guard needs to be Tyreke Evans, Brandon Jennings, or Steph Curry. It’s okay to just be Rodrigue Beaubois, whether in limited minutes or not.
Something to keep an eye on in the coming weeks, though: now that Marion and Beaubois have each had a taste of what they don’t have, will they still be as inclined to buy into their roles? I’ve been incredibly impressed with Marion’s willingness to play along with the team’s plans for him, and equally so with Beaubois’ maturity and patience in dealing with incredibly inconsistent opportunities for playing time. But both had gone cold turkey, and likely accepted their fate and the role. Does the sudden bump in shot attempts suddenly make Marion a bit more shot happy? You wouldn’t think so, but having control of a basketball does strange things to men. Beaubois’ curse could be a bit more complex. Does having an increase in minutes suddenly make Beaubois even more assertive in the limited minutes he does get? Or less so? Or maybe Roddy just plays like Roddy always has, and though everything changed for a period of five games, nothing really has at all?
Both of these guys have bought into the system enough to respect it, and though they’ve had their run with Terry out, it’s business time. It’s a treat to watch Marion and Beaubois have their day, but things are shifting back to normal. The dream hasn’t died, but it’s faded back into the realm of what could be.
I’m a little burned-out on this Hollinger thing, but his new column (Insider) certainly warrants an addendum to my previous post.
Namely, that I think biggest flaw of his system (and one he readily acknowledged, as I noted last time), the lack of recognition and adjustment for significant roster changes, significantly damages his predictive analysis beyond simply the power rankings.
It’s just a difference in opinion, really, and I completely understand that not everyone who watches, thinks, reads, and writes about the game is going to share my appraisal of this Mavericks team. But in justifying his latest power rankings (which have Dallas ranked at 13th), Hollinger takes the data a bit too far. He blurbs each of the top 12 teams to analyze which factors place them ahead of the Mavs and whether or not Dallas could beat said team in a seven-game series at a neutral site. The former is definitely an analysis that needed to be done, and I think should help clarify the Mavs’ low ranking in the same way that I attempted to. But the latter…well…yeah. By Hollinger’s measure, the only teams in the top 12 that Dallas would best would be the San Antonio Spurs and the Boston Celtics. He says that a match-up between the Mavs and Hawks would be a toss-up. But apart from those three teams, the remaining nine — the Magic, Jazz, Cavs, Lakers, Suns, Nuggets, Thunder, Blazers, and Bucks — would top Dallas in seven games.
Some of those selections you live with; the Lakers are the class of the West, Denver is on-par with Dallas in my mind, the Magic are the hottest team in basketball (yes, even hotter than the Mavs), and the Cavaliers could be the best team in the league when healthy. I frown at the idea that Utah would beat Dallas, but we can’t all agree. Oklahoma City, Portland, and Milwaukee, though…come on, John.
I understand that the regular season match-ups play a significant role here, and they should. Dallas hasn’t played particularly well against any of those teams this season, and wouldn’t deserve to be an overwhelming favorite. But they’d still be the favorite. A playoff series between the Mavs and the Thunder would be a ton of fun and incredibly competitive. But Dallas has improved defensively since the trade, and they already boasted one of the best defenders of the Durantula in Shawn Marion. Plus, how does Butler’s impact offensively not help Dallas substantially against OKC’s defense?
No disrespect to the Blazers, who punked the Mavs with Andre Miller and Juwan Howard, or the Bucks, who are on a hell of a tear right now, but it’s the same story against each of those three opponents: Butler and Haywood make a huge difference. Not only in terms of the production that they provide, but how they bolster the Mavs’ depth and shift the match-ups as well. The team’s disposition has changed, and their season’s outlook should change accordingly.
I fully understand that Hollinger and his ratings have been completely under fire from Mavs Nation during the win streak, and the natural reaction is to stand behind the findings of the system. Perhaps John has done that and then some, overcompensating for the fervor of Maverick fans by swimming further and further towards the deep end. Maybe that’s exactly what this conversation needed. But statistical system or not, that opinion will never be popular when isolated on its own, provided the Mavs continue to win games.
But for now, there’s no reason to really argue who might beat who to any unreasonable extent. The playoffs are still a lifetime away, and none of this will really matter until then. I mean, a month ago, no one would have objected to the Mavs being ranked 13th in the league; Dallas was coming off an embarrassingly huge loss to Denver and had dropped a game against the Timberwolves a few days prior. So before we squabble too much about rankings and match-ups, let’s let the games play out, see how the Mavs improve (or don’t), and base our discussion on something a bit more tangible.
I’ve received a handful of emails and comments over the last week or so asking me to chime in on the Mavs’ surprisingly low standing in John Hollinger’s power rankings. For the most part I’ve stayed away from it, and for two reasons:
They’re power rankings. No offense to John or Marc Stein or anyone else who compiles power rankings anywhere on the internet, but they just don’t interest me. They’re arbitrary descriptors of how teams have done over the last week or so with emphasis on ranking rather than analysis. There’s just not much you can do with a short blurb that’s going to shed much light on a team’s success. If you dig power rankings, then by all means. I just don’t like getting too caught up in which team is put where.
Unlike other power rankings, Hollinger’s are completely transparent. He spells out his methods explicitly, even giving you the exact formula by which his rankings are calculated, and the reasoning behind the weighting of each of the factors. He also explains why he chose specific measures over others, and the whole process is based on plugging numerical data into Hollinger’s equation.
Given those two things, I’m not exactly sure what all of the fuss is about. The Mavs have been winning games, but not all of the wins have been convincing. Nail-biters over teams like the Wolves and the Heat are not going to boost the Mavs’ standing in a data-centric ranking system, unless it’s completely dependent on win-loss record. Hollinger’s rankings are not, and he tells us as such in his explanation.
Instead, he looks to point differential, which just about any source will tell you is a better indicator of future success than overall win-loss record. Although talent and performance are definitely factors, close games are more likely to be influenced by luck; a bounce of the ball here or there can completely shift the balance, and though it’s certainly impressive that the Mavs are able to execute in high-pressure situations, it’s not necessarily all that indicative of the Mavs being a dominant team. Cue Kevin Pelton of Basketball Prospectus:
Better teams definitely tend to win more close games than weak ones, but the relationship is hardly perfect. The correlation is just .454 (a correlation of 1 or -1 means two variables are perfectly in sync, while a correlation of 0 means no relationship whatsoever). There are two extreme schools of thought on close games–those that believe they are primarily decided by luck and those that feel they are primarily decided by teams and demonstrate their true ability. Neither position is supported by the data.
Instead, what the results tend to show is that the difference between good teams and bad teams is mitigated in close games. Look at the best-fit regression line on the chart. The slope is nowhere near 1, and the difference between the expected record in close games for the very best teams (about .600) and the very worst teams (about .400) is much smaller than the difference between them in games that are not decided down the stretch.
When you think about it, this makes perfect sense. Say you were coaching (or cheering on, if you prefer) an underdog team playing a powerful opponent. If I gave you the opportunity to advance directly to the final five minutes of a close game, even if you were trailing by a couple of points, you would take that scenario because anything could happen over the shorter period. The same logic can be applied to explain why we see more upsets in the one-and-done NCAA Tournament than in the NBA’s best-of-seven postseason. The smaller sample draws all teams toward .500.
The data just doesn’t support the idea that better teams perform better in close games in any kind of conclusive fashion, for exactly the reasons that Pelton describes. It’s still bloody impressive that the Mavs have been able to win 12 games in a row, but it would obviously be more impressive if every win came by way of a double-digit margin.
As you well know, they haven’t. Most have been competitive well into the fourth quarter if not until the very end, and that certainly doesn’t reflect well on the Mavs.
Even given their recent tear, the Mavs’ point differential isn’t receiving any kind of considerable bump. Wins are obviously more helpful than losses in that regard, but it’s not as if a six-point win over the Bulls or a five-point win over the Bobcats is going to make some kind of profound impact on their overall standing. Dallas has overtaken Denver and is headed towards L.A. in terms of win-loss, but they very nearly snatched the record for consecutive wins by an unimpressive margin.
That may be enough to score brownie points with the likes of you, I, and Stein, but the numbers aren’t so kind. Hollinger warns us of that very thing in the explanation of his methods:
Since this is an entirely automated ranking, you’ll notice certain “human” factors missing. It doesn’t know which players are about to come back from injury or which teams have been playing without their best players for the past 10 games. Along the same lines, it doesn’t take into account injuries, trades, controversial calls or any other variables — just the scores, please. Nonetheless, it can be very useful because it allows us to see what the landscape looks like when we remove our usual filters. [Ed. note: Emphasis mine]
It’s not accounting for the fact that Erick Dampier has been out of the lineup, that Brendan Haywood has missed games due to injury, that Jason Terry underwent facial surgery, and that all the while, Caron Butler and Haywood are still integrating themselves into the system. Those aren’t critiques of Hollinger or his work, merely the system. They’re limitations he doesn’t try to hide or obscure in any way, just things that can’t really be taken into account mathematically.
Plus, looking to the methods again:
…I weigh a team’s full-season results by two-thirds and its most recent games by another one-third, so the overall ranking gives greater weight to recent games. You’re probably wondering at this point what I mean by “recent.” It varies depending on where we are in the season. For the first 40 games of the season, it means a team’s past 10 games. From that point forward, however, it means the most recent 25 percent of a team’s schedule. The net result is that, after the first 40 games, a team’s most recent 25 percent of its schedule will account for 40 percent of its ranking. [Ed. note: Again, emphasis mine.]
The last 25% of the Mavs’ games are more heavily weighted for the purposes of the rankings, and that’s a big part of the reason why Dallas is ranked so low. You’d think that the winning streak would off-set the rest of that 25% sample, but it just doesn’t. Dallas is 10th in point differential (+3.06) over that stretch, but the real kicker may be their strength of schedule: the winning percentage of the Mavs’ opponents over the last 25% of games is just .467, which ranks 23rd in the league. Given the weakness in Dallas’ point differential (10th) and strength of schedule (12th) overall, what did everyone honestly expect would happen in the midst of a 12-game winning streak in which all but one win have been by 10 points or fewer?
The Mavs are still a work in progress. We don’t yet have an accurate grasp of how the defense will perform with two healthy centers, or what kind of rhythm the offense can get into with all hands on deck. So the fact that Dallas is 9th in offensive efficiency and 12th in defensive efficiency, while hardly heart-warming, doesn’t really distress me. We likely won’t have an accurate macro statistical picture of this team going into the playoffs, because the data from earlier in the season is practically defunct given the roster moves, and the game data available offers a pretty small sample size.
These Mavs are contenders. They’re not on the level of the Lakers and are probably only on equal footing with the Nuggets, but that puts them in a position to do serious damage. I guess that’s where my views really diverge from Hollinger’s…or at least his views from about a week ago. All of the Mavs’ problems haven’t miraculously disappeared nor have all of their weakness morphed into strengths. But I think they’re good enough to beat the Nuggets in a seven game series, and good enough to give the Lakers a run for their money. If that’s not contending in the West, then what is?
Sometimes it’s hard to get coaches, managers, and owners to speak up concerning the current goings-on of the team. Everything is played so close to the chest, and it’s almost like the media and the team stand diametrically opposed at times. Consumers of sports media want to know how things work — what went into making this decision, why this guy and not that guy, etc. — and ask the almighty “Why?” But the members of the team itself are also somewhat reliant on keeping that information internal. After all, you never know who might hear what, and specifics are, in this case at least, a team’s worst enemy.
But I applauded Mark Cuban’s willingness to talk about some of the Mavs’ decisions in the past, if only because it helps those of us on the outside to fill in the gaps. It’s nice to know why this or that was done, even if it’s a year or two later. And then again, sometimes when talking about decisions from the past, guys like Cuban still tip their hand a bit (perhaps intentionally). Read as much into this quote from Cuban as you’d like:
Sometimes [the players] need prompting [to figure out the best play], and the ones who don’t figure it out…I mean it’s true that’s a great point theres a subset of players that don’t figure it out, that cant figure it out, that don’t think. Those are the ones that are so blessed talent-wise that you try to make it work — like we had Gerald Green. [To the Celtics' Mike Zarren] You guys have had Gerald Green.
I just look at him and think ‘Oh my God!’ There are things that he’ll show you that are just ‘Oh my God!’ and then he just doesn’t understand the game of basketball and hopefully he’ll figure it out someday but you just keep giving him those chances. He ran out of chances (so far) this last time.
On its own, I think he’s just talking about the hyper-athletic Gerald Green and players of his ilk. But this topic was a recurring theme for Cuban in many of his panels: a guy that just can’t figure it out, that doesn’t think on the court, that isn’t a smart basketball player. Now, I could be mistaken here, but I seem to remember a lot of similar criticism being lobbed at a guy who played for the Mavs not too long ago. It would be completely unfair of Mark to take explicit pot shots at Josh Howard through media channels, but would I put it past him to perhaps offer a veiled criticism of Josh’s game? Not at all.
I’m not sure if Cuban was looking to send a message or just got stuck on a particular topic at multiple panels. But that doesn’t stop Green’s story from being any less of a condensed caricature of Howard’s career. I wouldn’t dare play team psychologist here, but from where I’m sitting, Howard’s troubles always seemed to be more mental than physical. It’s undeniable that he faced a lot in rehabbing and returning from various injuries, but the game within the game has always been to keep Josh on the same page as everyone else. He was fed shot attempts early in the first quarter, and there’s absolutely no doubt that he was treated differently than other players. That’s what it took to keep him functioning as a member of the team, and so its what the Mavericks did.
They hoped he would figure it out someday but they just kept giving him those chances. Josh just ran out of chances this last time.
Before this season began, I had the pleasure of chatting a bit with the Mavericks’ newly-christened stat head, Roland Beech. We haven’t had the opportunity to check in with him since, but Mark Cuban provided us with an update at the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. Marc Stein asked Cuban about Beech specifically during the keynote basketball panel, entitled “Basketball Analytics,” and here was Cuban’s response:
If we were going to get to the point where we were able to collect more data and integrate the coaching staff more fully into using it, as opposed to just getting daily reports that we could sit down and review with the coaching staff, I wanted to have somebody there…on site that they could talk to at any time. Even during the game.
He talks to the players, don’t get me wrong — Dirk will give [Roland] as much of a hard time about his haircut as he gives anyone else. But that’s the type of thing where you don’t want too many voices. So we work back through the coaches.
Beech is officially a member of the Mavericks’ coaching staff, and he sits near the bench, often alongside Cuban, during the games. But even more important than the capacity in which Beech is working with the team is the note that Cubes touched on at the end, and one that was prevalent throughout the entire conference. Having the right statistics is one thing, and finding the right way to utilize them is something else entirely. You can’t just hammer raw data into a player’s head through their ear, it needs to be broken down. It needs to be analyzed.
Mike Zarren, Assistant GM and Team Counsel for the Celtics, hammered that point home perfectly:
I don’t know what it would mean to a player to tell him that “Some guy’s adjusted plus-minus is plus four.” I mean, how does that change what he does on a particular night? It doesn’t mean anything.
The most important thing to remember with advanced stats in basketball is that everything is contextual. That’s where the power lies. It’s the decoder that translates measures of all kinds into something usable, something real. It’s what separates those with an understanding of how to use the data — those who classify statistics as tools and never assume any metric to be omnipotent — from those who do not. The measures provided are simply descriptors of what we’ve seen on the floor. There are assigned values, calculations, and analysis that go along with those measures, but that’s simply another way to make sense of the information available.
But somewhere between that “adjusted plus-minus [of] plus four,” and the players on the court is a process. It involves the aforementioned decoding, it involves lineup analysis, and it involves evaluation of situational effectiveness. And it certainly involves Beech, the man working behind the scenes to ensure that the Mavs don’t miss a beat in the statistical revolution. Dallas is among the first franchises to not only embrace analytical research, but to have a full-time advisor on hand. Take pride, Mavs fans, because while franchises around the league are cavemen that run in fear of fire, your team, and more specifically your owner, realizes the value and application of it.
That level of analysis is the future of professional basketball. As teams accumulate more and more data, the advantages will become even clearer. There’s just so much that a coach can do when they know what Rick Carlisle knows. If basketball really is a game of match-ups, then the Mavs’ brain trust gives them a huge match-up advantage almost every night out; few teams are as progressive as your Dallas Mavericks, and that’s something to hang your hat on.
First a programming note. Not a lot of regular content this weekend, because I’m currently attending the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston. I’ll be updating periodically on the deliciously stat-based presentations here, at Hardwood Paroxysm, and on Twitter (@robmahoney), but the blog will probably be light on game-specific content until next week.
I haven’t been shy in singing Brendan Haywood’s praises, particularly since his trade to the Mavs. But as good as Haywood is, and as invaluable he’s been with Erick Dampier sidelined, he’s not without his flaws.
There’s the obvious — the lack of range, not a great ball-handler, certainly not a high-volume scorer — and then there’s the covert. John Huizinga in presenting his paper entitled “The value of a blocked shot in the NBA: From Tim Duncan to Dwight Howard” stumbled upon an interesting piece of such data. According to Huizinga’s analysis, the most valuable blocked shots are — shocker, I know — blocks of non-jumper attempts. If an opposing player is shooting a jump shot, the likelihood of the possession ending in points is significantly lower than, say a layup or a dunk. It seems obvious. But as such, the blocks that make the least impact are blocked jumpers.
A neat stat, to be sure, but even more relevant given the Mavs’ latest man in the middle. Brendan Haywood, according to Huizinga’s data going back to ‘03-’04, has a greater percentage of his total blocks come on jump shots than any other player in the league. Are those blocks still valuable? You’re damn right they are. But does it mean that Haywood’s blocks are on the same level as Tim Duncan’s? Though the natural inclination is to deem it so, a block is not a block.
Duncan was far and away the most effective long-term shot blocker over the course of Huizinga’s study, and while he was trumped easily by Dwight Howard’s incredible shot-blocking volume, Duncan’s overall shot-blocking was more beneficial for his team. In Howard’s case, the downfall was his incredible tendency to goaltend (24% of Dwight’s “block chances” were goaltends. Or put another way, Howard was called for one goaltend for every three blocks). But in Haywood’s, it’s simply totaling most of his blocks on less effective shot attempts. Still beneficial and still effective, but all blocks are not created equal.
I’m a guy who believes in success based in merit. Call it a bit of sweeping Americanism in me; if you work hard and deserve something, you’re bound to get it. It’s the reason I’m sickened every time a former NBA player is handed a coaching or managing job he doesn’t deserve, or every time a player is given a roster spot or a role based on name and not on play.
But in this case, I can hardly afford to be so reasonable, and if you’ve been a fan of the Mavs for more than a decade, you should probably feel the same way.
Michael Finley, through some bizarre overestimation of his basketball value at his advanced age, asked to be released from the Spurs and was granted his wish. I’m not precisely sure what Fin thinks he can offer a team considering his career-lows in almost every, single category based on every, single standard, but Mike is on the hunt for a contending teams looking for his services. The Celtics are rumored to be interested in signing Finley for the rest of the season, and I’m sure that Fin will draw at least cursory interest elsewhere.
But should the other contending teams take a look and pass on Finley, the Mavs should do an old friend a favor.
There would be no reason for him to play, and in that regard I’m sure Mike would be disappointed. The whole point of this endeavor into free agency was to find an opportunity to contribute to a team, not just ride coattails. I’m just not sure that Fin’s capable of that anymore, and unless a team desperate for wing depth sincerely thinks otherwise, it’s entirely possible that Mike will only have playoff also-rans to choose from.
Finley deserves better. And should he come into that position, Donnie Nelson should sincerely rethink his stance on standing pat with his current roster. It has less to do with “mess[ing] with what [the Mavs] have,” or giving Finley actual minutes. But if Michael is faced with the reality of settling for a fringe playoff team that could use a veteran or free agent limbo, what’s the harm in using the final roster spot to bring Finley along for the ride? Nelson has already made it clear that he has no interest in signing D-League standout Dwayne Jones, or Timberwolves castoff Mark Blount. That’s fine, provided Nelson believes this team honestly has enough depth at center. But if the last roster spot is to remain open going into the playoffs, picking up Fin could be a nice gesture toward a franchise savior.
It would be filling out the roster by way of relatively useless spending, but this is Michael Finley. He helped to rescue the Mavericks from the dredges of the league and push them into the playoffs. He was an integral part of some of the most important Mavs teams of all time, and dropped countless memories along the way. He was a true professional, and though stepping aside to allow Dirk Nowitzki and Steve Nash take more prominent roles was never easy for him, his attitude was never the problem.
Mark Cuban cut Finley loose as a way of saving money with the one-time, Allan Houston exception. He went to the surest team to win a title, which at the time was the San Antonio Spurs. Since then, he’s hit shots, been booed in Dallas, been punched in the groin, won a ring, and now, has been cut loose to hopefully get the chance to win another. Should another opportunity present itself, that chance should come with the Mavs. Not because of an obligation or foolish notion that Finley can still produce on an NBA-level, but as a nod to one of the greatest stars this franchise has ever seen.
Of all the perspectives regarding Jason Kidd’s unorthodox technical foul draw on Mike Woodson that I’ve seen, I found Brett Pollakoff’s to be the most interesting. Namely, this passage:
If you’re in favor of Kidd forcing the refs to make a call there, then (whether you know it or not) you’re in favor of plays that guys like Anderson Varejao have become famous for: flopping. It’s the same thing — pretending you got fouled in hopes that the official will make a call is just what Kidd did here.
The problem I have is that neither play has anything to do with playing the game of basketball. In both instances, players are not scoring, passing, or doing their best to defend within the rules — they’re simply trying to work the system.
Thus, the argument isn’t necessarily about whether Kidd’s contact with Woodson was legal or not (though Pollakoff does hit on that topic as well), but what that type of contact means. What does it say about Jason Kidd that he would seek out that kind of situation? What does it say about the current state of the game that the referees, after much conferring and deliberation, were willing to assess Woodson a technical foul? And what does it say about those who supported and praised Kidd’s move (myself included) that we would advocate a play that’s only tangentially related to the game of basketball?
All interesting questions raised out of a particularly interesting sequence.
As for whether or not Kidd’s play is akin to flopping: I completely agree. Kidd intentionally sought out contact that was completely unnatural to the game of basketball, and unlike anything I’ve seen at any level. But before this conversation turns into a high and mighty judgment concerning that ever problematic F-word, think about all of the things that go on in a basketball game that are barely related to the game, if at all. There are dozens of plays made that aren’t “basketball plays,” but they’re perfectly legal within the way the rules are currently framed and they give one team or another a competitive advantage. Just a few:
Anytime an NBA player (and by NBA player, I pretty much mean Kobe Bryant or Kevin Durant) exploits an opponent’s hand-check to draw a completely unnatural shooting foul. The player is going out of their way to exaggerate incidental contact, and creating a situation where the ref is obligated to call a foul when they otherwise wouldn’t be.
Hack-a-Shaq. It’s one thing to incidentally foul Shaq while he’s fighting for position without the ball, but another entirely to purposely throw defensive possessions in favor of Shaq shooting free throws. Not exactly “doing their best to defend within the rules.”
Intentionally fouling to protect a three-point lead with the game on the line. Again, nothing basketball-related about it. Just playing the odds and protecting a lead, with little respect for the integrity of the game.
Anytime a coach instructs a team to drive to the basket so that they can get to the free throw line. Free throws are intended to be a penalty for overly aggressive defenders, not as a tool of the offense. James Naismith shakes his head at you for your blatant disregard for the game he once loved.
Television timeouts. Breaks in the game that can provide a real disadvantage for a team building momentum, or a clear advantage for a team that’s either low on timeouts or against the ropes. Much to do with the business of basketball, but nothing whatsoever to do with the game.
Taking a charge. Good basketball positioning is not about being in a spot to take contact and force a turnover. It’s about making an opponent’s shot attempt more difficult by denying lanes to the basket. Thus, anyone that steps outside the circle with the intent to take a charge is just milking the rules for all they’re worth at the sake of the explicit purpose of defensive fundamentals.
The enforcer mentality/fouling to prevent easy buckets. Already addressed above, but fouling should never be a mechanism through which the fouling team gains an advantage.
If you really broke down an NBA game to a micro level, I’m sure you could find dozens more examples of non-basketball plays that regularly take place in games. Some of them are frowned upon if not outright scorned, but others are accepted as a part of the game. There’s also an odd term applied to many of the aforementioned moves: strategy. Jason Kidd creating contact with Mike Woodson MUST be something insidious and detrimental to the game, but a coach calling for an intentional foul in a late game situation to protect a lead is just sound game management?
Group Kidd’s move with flopping if you must, but I don’t see a drastic difference between the motive and function of that particular play and countless other events that fly under the radar during a typical NBA game, much less a season. Whether Woodson was actually in bounds is one thing, but arguing that Kidd’s play is somehow damaging to the game is flat-out ridiculous. Working the system has become a part of the system, and though I’m all for protecting the sanctity of the game, I won’t for a second pretend that everything within it is a perfect manifestation of the spirit of the game.
The Mavs’ big man search is back to square one. Dallas was close to signing D-League All-Star Dwayne Jones to a 10-day contract to provide depth at center, but the Mavs were apparently left unimpressed by his workout today with the team. Marc Stein notes that Jake Voskuhl could be Jones’ replacement, a move which I find to be a bit uninspired and plenty underwhelming. We know what Voskuhl can do, and we know plenty about what he can’t do. But Jones deserves a legit shot at the pro level, and I think his unassuming, low-maintenance game would have been a nice addition for Dallas off the bench.
Apparently it wasn’t meant to be. But Stein also reports that the Mavs still plan on signing Von Wafer to a 10-day and will possibly put pen to paper tomorrow.
In terms of the Dallas Mavericks folklore, there are few figures of greater intrigue than Holger Geschwindner. We know that he’s a mentor and close friend to Dirk Nowitzki, and depending on exactly how familiar you are with Dirk’s basketball origin story, you may know a bit more than that. Geschwindner essentially manufactured Nowitzki’s NBA career by teaching him skills, showcasing his talents, and putting him in situations to showcase his abilities (like the now famous Nike Hoop Summit that Dirk obliterated, with 33 points, 14 rebounds, and a win over the American prospects). But aside from those legends, what do we really know about Holger Geschwindner, the man more responsible for bringing Dirk to the NBA than anyone aside from Nowitzki himself?
Well, after you read this interview with him by SLAM’s Nima Zarrabi, you’ll know quite a bit. Not just about how he built the path for Nowitzki’s stardom, but also plenty about Geschwindner. Most of the Dirk narrative is well-documented, but to learn a bit about the man behind The Man is a pretty unique thing. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that Geschwindner is every bit the old wizard I hoped he’d be:
SLAM: What did you love about the game? HG: What attracted me the most was that the sport was theoretically constructed. There was an idea. It’s not like soccer where the ball is rolling out and everybody is trying to kick it. It’s a sport that goes in three dimensions. Most of the other sports had a pretty natural basis. If something’s rolling on the floor, you kick it. But hanging up a big construction 10 feet above the ground and to try and shoot a ball, it was strange. It was a challenge.
SLAM: The sport challenged your mind? HG: Yes. I like music a lot and when I looked into the basketball rules it made sense. You only get two steps with the ball—there are limitations. High art has strict limitations or strict rules. Take dances for instance, like the waltz. Basketball was attractive to me. It’s the No. 1 sport for me. I love the game.
Be the First to Comment 
