Spurs fans where are you?

[westkoast]

Interestingly - the spurs are terrible at forcing turnovers?  http://www.knickerblogger.net/stats/2010/o_oe.htm

They always have been.  Pop is more concerned with transition defense and non-gambling.  Funnel drivers to the baseline; chase shooters off the 3 point line; force the opponent into a contested jumper.

But a better metric is turnover differential.  And the Spurs are usually near the top in that category.

Ya they've never really had the type of guy like an Allen Iverson who shoots the gap.  I actually think that is why the defense tends to stay solid.  The shooting of gaps for steals often lead to people being out of position more than it does steals.

Ziggy you are in this thread and our resident stats man, how come there is such a big gap between what Lurker was seeing and what I am seeing?  I know it's because of how each site is calculating but there is such a large gap between being 4th and 12th that I am not sure who is calculating it right.

[westkoast]

I'll be in New Orleans in 2 weeks!

Have the Spurs ever been out of the top 10 in defense in the league since Duncan showed up?  I wanted to say 'They never slipped that low' but didn't want to be wrong.

Not sure where you are getting the outside the top ten defensively.

Per efficiency ratings they are 7th.  By scoring defense they are 5th.  By defensive fg% they are 10th.  By scoring differential they are tied for 4th.

Have a great time in the Big Easy!

From here  http://www.nba.com/statistics/sortable_team_statistics/sortable1.html

1
   L.A. Lakers
35
45.25
43.22
+2.02
5.22
4.51
+0.71
7.97
7.25
+0.71

2
   Chicago
33
45.03
42.45
+2.57
6.18
6.06
+0.12
6.63
7.57
-0.94

3
   Minnesota
36
44.00
43.50
+0.50
3.44
5.88
-2.44
7.55
8.75
-1.19

4
   Memphis
34
43.76
38.50
+5.26
4.47
5.61
-1.14
7.52
7.73
-0.20

5
   Dallas
35
43.54
43.25
+0.28
6.05
4.00
+2.05
7.40
7.20
+0.20

6
   Orlando
35
43.34
40.77
+2.57
5.25
3.48
+1.77
6.62
7.20
-0.57

7
   Oklahoma City
35
42.88
41.00
+1.88
5.85
4.71
+1.14
7.68
7.82
-0.14

8
   Indiana
34
42.67
45.82
-3.14
5.88
5.29
+0.58
6.70
8.76
-2.05

9
   Milwaukee
32
42.56
43.93
-1.37
4.21
5.59
-1.37
6.75
7.43
-0.68

10
   Sacramento
34
42.50
42.05
+0.44
4.41
5.44
-1.02
7.05
7.20
-0.14

11
   Cleveland
37
42.16
38.35
+3.81
5.75
4.13
+1.62
6.89
6.43
+0.46

12
   San Antonio
33
42.09
38.00
+4.09
4.87
5.12
-0.24
6.21
7.03
-0.81

They compare all the defensive stats the team posts and against their opponents.

I will def enjoy the Big Easy!  I find the people down there to be very nice and great to talk to. 

So you are using something that looks at rebounds, blocks and steals for the team and its opponents.  Default sort is rebounds per game.  If you click on rebound differential SA is #2.

GIGO.

PPG (including points differential), FG%, 3pt%,FT% (theres vs opp), APG (same)

[jemagee]

Offensive and Defensive efficiencies and rebounding percentages are better ways to determine who is 'good' or 'bad' I think...

[Lurker]

koast, try this site: http://www.dougstats.com/09-10Teams.html

[Lurker]

PPG (including points differential), FG%, 3pt%,FT% (theres vs opp), APG (same)

Again, what are you sorting on?  Default is ppg...Spurs are #9.

Opponents ppg Spurs are #5

Point differential Spurs are #5

Opponent FG% Spurs are #10

Opponent assist per game #2...assist differential #3

So not GIGO but operator error?

[Lurker]

Offensive and Defensive efficiencies and rebounding percentages are better ways to determine who is 'good' or 'bad' I think...

I prefer differentials along with the efficiencies.

Turnover differential - teams that consistently have lower turnovers than their opponents usually win

Assist differential - helps identify teams that play a lot of 1 on 1; ball movement is harder to defend

FG% differential - doesn't do any good to shoot 50% if your opponent regularly shoots 55%

[jemagee]

I've always thought the 'assist' didn't get enough attention in general in analysis

The differentials are nice as well that you indicated, just wasn't all that interested in rebounding differential.

How do you factor FT's in to defensive analysis or do you just ignore it?

[westkoast]

PPG (including points differential), FG%, 3pt%,FT% (theres vs opp), APG (same)

Again, what are you sorting on?  Default is ppg...Spurs are #9.

Opponents ppg Spurs are #5

Point differential Spurs are #5

Opponent FG% Spurs are #10

Opponent assist per game #2...assist differential #3

So not GIGO but operator error?

I clicked 'defense' and it sorted them that way automatically.  You can only pick 'offense' or 'defense' on the drop down so no, not an operator error.   Don't hate on the poster, hate on the website my friend 

And ya I was confused a bit by the FT%.  To me all that says is your players really talk well while standing around waiting for the players to shoot or your team is just very ugly, both of which causes the other squads FT% to drop LOL!

Im with Jem on the assists part.  Feel like if a team is racking up a bunch of assists on you then you are not doing a good job of disrupting their offense.  Also, it can point to the fact they are getting a lot of easy buckets.  If a team has a high amount of assists in the game it's not mainly because of assists on jump shots, at least most of the time.

[jemagee]

I clicked 'defense' and it sorted them that way automatically.  You can only pick 'offense' or 'defense' on the drop down so no, not an operator error.   Don't hate on the poster, hate on the website my friend 


Usually on sites like that you can click on the individual stat - ppg or point differential columns and it will 're sort' them...

[jemagee]

Im with Jem on the assists part.  Feel like if a team is racking up a bunch of assists on you then you are not doing a good job of disrupting their offense

I also think that teams that have a better 'A:FG' ratio - more assisted field goals are going to work better as well...

[Lurker]

I've always thought the 'assist' didn't get enough attention in general in analysis

The differentials are nice as well that you indicated, just wasn't all that interested in rebounding differential.

How do you factor FT's in to defensive analysis or do you just ignore it?

Basically I ignore it.  The site I listed ranks teams by fouls (less fouls = less FT).  But the difference between the #1 team (19.20) and #17 (21.11) is too small to matter.  And if you look down the list there is no correlation to the standings.

That site is a good one for basic analysis.  I like the info provided on the team ranking page.  The main page has standings with team links and those pages have detailed info on each player.  Combined with ESPN and NBA (just have to be careful of the sort), you can get a good read on the NBA.  For more in depth analysis 82games.com is good.

And this site: http://www.eskimo.com/~pbender/index.html has some interesting info.  It is run by a Mavs fan but has full rosters, ages, contracts, awards winners, draft results, etc. in easy reading format.  Most of it going back to 95-96.

[Lurker]

I clicked 'defense' and it sorted them that way automatically.  You can only pick 'offense' or 'defense' on the drop down so no, not an operator error.   Don't hate on the poster, hate on the website my friend 


Usually on sites like that you can click on the individual stat - ppg or point differential columns and it will 're sort' them...

jem has it...so it was operator error.   

[jemagee]

knickerblogger.net is excellent for a quick look at how teams rank in advanced metrics

[westkoast]

Rebouding 12th (They are second to last in RPG differential as well)

BPG 14th (They are 13th in BPG differential)

SPG 28th (25th in steals differential)

I think maybe you are not aware your teams defense is slipping Lurker.  This isn't 2002 anymore.  There are a number of teams not having problems scoring on the Spurs like in years past and a number of teams who are playing better defense against the Spurs than they are playing themselves.  Any team that is solid offensively is sticking it to the Spurs.  Even ones who are not exactly offensive power houses are scoring 113 points.  The losses to Utah, Portland (3 and 2 respectively) point to that.  Utah is not exactly an offensive powerhouse in this league and they've beat the Spurs 3 times scoring over 100 points twice.  Team like Minnesota and the Kings  should not be scoring 99-103 points on the Spurs.  They wouldn't in years past.  The defense is slipping.

[jemagee]

4th in defensive rebounding percentage - not how many rebounds they grab but percentage of the available rebounds they grab...