Stat Talk

Let's have a look at a few statistically important categories for any team, college or pro. As you will see, one player jumps off the stat sheet.

THREE-POINT PERCENTAGE: The threshold is 30%. If you're not hitting 30%, you're hurting the team. In this category we are doing fine; everybody is over 30% except for Josh Bannan. He's shooting a dismal two for 19. I'd say, Josh, stop shooting three's! Meantime, Cameron Parker is hitting 50% (but on only 14 attempts) while the star here is Josh Vazquez, hitting 17 of 35 for 48.5%. That is a terrific stat. I hope he always has the green light.

ASSISTS: Parker is living up to his reputation, leading the team with 44 assists. But at the same time he's committed 28 turnovers, leaving an assist to turnover ratio of 1.57 to one. This is not good. You want your point guard to be at thee or better; and the leaders among NCAA point guards are up there at six. So while Parker is a clever passer, he too often leaps into the air before knowing where the pass is going. Elsewhere, Robbie Beasely is excellent at 3.5, though on only seven assists, while Brandon Whitney, with 22 assists but 21 turnovers, is not putting up good numbers. The team's best? You guessed it: Josh Vazquez, right at three, with 21 assists and only seven turnovers. One other note: Bannan and Steadman are struggling in this category, each with 24 turnovers, more than any of our point guards. On that many turnovers, Steadman has handed out only three assists, and Bannan 12. Not good.

FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%.

VALEDICTORIAN: Josh Vazquez. Little wonder the Arizona announcers were so complimentary of his game. The stats prove it.

HONOR SOCIETY: Kyle Owens, our leading scorer and rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter at 79%. Josh Bannan, second leading rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter. Eddie Egun, shooting over 40% from three and a thousand percent from the free throw line (though both on limited attempts) and rebounding well (two per eleven minutes) from the guard line.

citay said:

Let's have a look at a few statistically important categories for any team, college or pro. As you will see, one player jumps off the stat sheet.

THREE-POINT PERCENTAGE: The threshold is 30%. If you're not hitting 30%, you're hurting the team. In this category we are doing fine; everybody is over 30% except for Josh Bannan. He's shooting a dismal two for 19. I'd say, Josh, stop shooting three's! Meantime, Cameron Parker is hitting 50% (but on only 14 attempts) while the star here is Josh Vazquez, hitting 17 of 35 for 48.5%. That is a terrific stat. I hope he always has the green light.

ASSISTS: Parker is living up to his reputation, leading the team with 44 assists. But at the same time he's committed 28 turnovers, leaving an assist to turnover ratio of 1.57 to one. This is not good. You want your point guard to be at thee or better; and the leaders among NCAA point guards are up there at six. So while Parker is a clever passer, he too often leaps into the air before knowing where the pass is going. Elsewhere, Robbie Beasely is excellent at 3.5, though on only seven assists, while Brandon Whitney, with 22 assists but 21 turnovers, is not putting up good numbers. The team's best? You guessed it: Josh Vazquez, right at three, with 21 assists and only seven turnovers. One other note: Bannan and Steadman are struggling in this category, each with 24 turnovers, more than any of our point guards. On that many turnovers, Steadman has handed out only three assists, and Bannan 12. Not good.

FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%.

VALEDICTORIAN: Josh Vazquez. Little wonder the Arizona announcers were so complimentary of his game. The stats prove it.

HONOR SOCIETY: Kyle Owens, our leading scorer and rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter at 79%. Josh Bannan, second leading rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter. Eddie Egun, shooting over 40% from three and a thousand percent from the free throw line (though both on limited attempts) and rebounding well (two per eleven minutes) from the guard line.

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Good analysis overall,as usual citay, BUT Bannon doesn't have enough of a history to decide here and now for him to quit shooting 3's. He has a smooth stroke and I believe will improve that %.

Zirg said:

citay said:

Let's have a look at a few statistically important categories for any team, college or pro. As you will see, one player jumps off the stat sheet.

THREE-POINT PERCENTAGE: The threshold is 30%. If you're not hitting 30%, you're hurting the team. In this category we are doing fine; everybody is over 30% except for Josh Bannan. He's shooting a dismal two for 19. I'd say, Josh, stop shooting three's! Meantime, Cameron Parker is hitting 50% (but on only 14 attempts) while the star here is Josh Vazquez, hitting 17 of 35 for 48.5%. That is a terrific stat. I hope he always has the green light.

ASSISTS: Parker is living up to his reputation, leading the team with 44 assists. But at the same time he's committed 28 turnovers, leaving an assist to turnover ratio of 1.57 to one. This is not good. You want your point guard to be at thee or better; and the leaders among NCAA point guards are up there at six. So while Parker is a clever passer, he too often leaps into the air before knowing where the pass is going. Elsewhere, Robbie Beasely is excellent at 3.5, though on only seven assists, while Brandon Whitney, with 22 assists but 21 turnovers, is not putting up good numbers. The team's best? You guessed it: Josh Vazquez, right at three, with 21 assists and only seven turnovers. One other note: Bannan and Steadman are struggling in this category, each with 24 turnovers, more than any of our point guards. On that many turnovers, Steadman has handed out only three assists, and Bannan 12. Not good.

FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%.

VALEDICTORIAN: Josh Vazquez. Little wonder the Arizona announcers were so complimentary of his game. The stats prove it.

HONOR SOCIETY: Kyle Owens, our leading scorer and rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter at 79%. Josh Bannan, second leading rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter. Eddie Egun, shooting over 40% from three and a thousand percent from the free throw line (though both on limited attempts) and rebounding well (two per eleven minutes) from the guard line.

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Good analysis overall,as usual citay, BUT Bannon doesn't have enough of a history to decide here and now for him to quit shooting 3's. He has a smooth stroke and I believe will improve that %.

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Also, Steadman touches the ball on the low-post exclusively. If he gets the ball down there, he's supposed to take it to the hole most times. That's his role. He's not gonna dish many assists from there. Bannon moves all around, so he will get far more assists. Overall, we have committed too many turnovers, no question, including Parker's jump-in-air with no clear plan what to do move. He IS a good ball-handler/passer, but that move needs to be culled from his repertoire. I agree,

I seem to recall a discussion here when Parker announced his commitment regarding his gaudy assist #'s and his A/TO ratio....and it wasn't a positive one then either....

AZGrizFan said:

I seem to recall a discussion here when Parker announced his commitment regarding his gaudy assist #'s and his A/TO ratio....and it wasn't a positive one then either....

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Yes there was (and it is worth re-visiting) and I was the (only) one who pointed out his TO ratio wasn't great despite the story glorifying his 1 incredible 25? assist game.

AZGrizFan said:

I seem to recall a discussion here when Parker announced his commitment regarding his gaudy assist #'s and his A/TO ratio....and it wasn't a positive one then either....

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I don't know how to link it, but search "New Griz" for said article. I just re-read a few posts from it. The 24 assist game was a 58 pts win over a d3 team and Parker played 36 minutes, so I found that stat garbage and pointed out that his stats vs D1 opponents-only weren't that great, and I took much grief for that. lol

Zirg said:

Zirg said:

Good analysis overall,as usual citay, BUT Bannon doesn't have enough of a history to decide here and now for him to quit shooting 3's. He has a smooth stroke and I believe will improve that %.

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Also, Steadman touches the ball on the low-post exclusively. If he gets the ball down there, he's supposed to take it to the hole most times. That's his role. He's not gonna dish many assists from there. Bannon moves all around, so he will get far more assists. Overall, we have committed too many turnovers, no question, including Parker's jump-in-air with no clear plan what to do move. He IS a good ball-handler/passer, but that move needs to be culled from his repertoire. I agree,

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Gotta disagree a bit. Passing from the post is important, especially the kick-outs to three-point shooters. In the history of basketball there have been some very good post-passing big men. I still think that three assists through, what, nine games, is extremely poor for a post player.

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

Zirg said:

citay said:

Let's have a look at a few statistically important categories for any team, college or pro. As you will see, one player jumps off the stat sheet.

THREE-POINT PERCENTAGE: The threshold is 30%. If you're not hitting 30%, you're hurting the team. In this category we are doing fine; everybody is over 30% except for Josh Bannan. He's shooting a dismal two for 19. I'd say, Josh, stop shooting three's! Meantime, Cameron Parker is hitting 50% (but on only 14 attempts) while the star here is Josh Vazquez, hitting 17 of 35 for 48.5%. That is a terrific stat. I hope he always has the green light.

ASSISTS: Parker is living up to his reputation, leading the team with 44 assists. But at the same time he's committed 28 turnovers, leaving an assist to turnover ratio of 1.57 to one. This is not good. You want your point guard to be at thee or better; and the leaders among NCAA point guards are up there at six. So while Parker is a clever passer, he too often leaps into the air before knowing where the pass is going. Elsewhere, Robbie Beasely is excellent at 3.5, though on only seven assists, while Brandon Whitney, with 22 assists but 21 turnovers, is not putting up good numbers. The team's best? You guessed it: Josh Vazquez, right at three, with 21 assists and only seven turnovers. One other note: Bannan and Steadman are struggling in this category, each with 24 turnovers, more than any of our point guards. On that many turnovers, Steadman has handed out only three assists, and Bannan 12. Not good.

FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%.

VALEDICTORIAN: Josh Vazquez. Little wonder the Arizona announcers were so complimentary of his game. The stats prove it.

HONOR SOCIETY: Kyle Owens, our leading scorer and rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter at 79%. Josh Bannan, second leading rebounder and excellent free-throw shooter. Eddie Egun, shooting over 40% from three and a thousand percent from the free throw line (though both on limited attempts) and rebounding well (two per eleven minutes) from the guard line.

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Good analysis overall,as usual citay, BUT Bannon doesn't have enough of a history to decide here and now for him to quit shooting 3's. He has a smooth stroke and I believe will improve that %.

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Word from practice is Bannon is a solid 3pt shooter and I think its still to early to say he is bad from 3. More importantly though having a big like that that can nock down some 3s is sooo useful, think Samuelson, and I think that more than anything this team needs Bannon to develop that skill because right now he for whatever reason seems to generate a pretty healthy volume of really good looks from 3pt range each game and basically I just want him to keep shooting till he learns to make that shot.
Parker I would also say is not a good passer...he has far to many passes that show horrible anticipation like how did you not see that guy was going to jump that passing lane?? And if not bad anticipation just weak like if you are going to make that pass you better drive it in there or its going to get picked off. Finally, this might be him just passing where he is supposed to, but a lot of his passes dont seem to set anything up, just passes for the sake of passing. That said I think surprisingly with his smaller size and slender build and lack of speed he is our best driver...in terms of consistently getting all the way to the rim under control and getting of a clean shot...he has been really darn good!

GrizBall said:

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

Click to expand...

Curious whos keeping these advanced stats. Is someone going over film?

Hoops watcher said:

GrizBall said:

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

Click to expand...

Curious whos keeping these advanced stats. Is someone going over film?

Click to expand...

https://evanmiya.com/#tab-5757-3
Go to Team Breakdown tool.

Other great analytics sites are KenPom.com and Synergy.com if you are willing to pay a little.

Also if you look around hard enough you can get boxscores like this:

https://twitter.com/chris_fetters/status/1339452505181151239?s=21

In addition, I looked at the 6 D-1 games the current starting line-up has started (SUU#2, UNC (2), Arizona, UW and Georgia). The line-up started both halves. What I found is that the line-up “lost” 8 out the twelve halves in terms of what the +\- was when first Griz sub came in. This covered approximately 38 minutes of playing time and they were -11. Anybody curious can do the same by looking at the play-by-play on GoGriz.com under schedule and boxscore (there is a dropdown box for play-by-play) I didn’t approach like my job depended on it so I could be off, and also I didn’t bother to look at how the line-up performed later in halves because that would be too way too difficult and quite frankly somewhat insane. So I have no idea what the starters do after the first initial subs, but a small sampling seemed to validate the numbers that I see.

The synergy site is actually: https://www.synergysportstech.com/synergy/

Hoops watcher said:

GrizBall said:

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

Click to expand...

Curious whos keeping these advanced stats. Is someone going over film?

Click to expand...

I assume the Stats program does it automatically. It always knows who's on the court, and what the score is.

"FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%."

Beasley is 18-18. 5 games. Sometimes the team just goes down the court, and lets him shoot. I'd guess he is deadly from the line. Vasquez is 14-15. Egun has only 5 FT, but has made all of them.

GrizBall said:

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

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I look at this last stat, the +/- stat, with some skepticism. For a couple of reasons:

1. Any time you're on the court, you're one of five players out there, or 20% of the production of your team. Maybe the other guys got hot. Maybe somebody else committed a bunch of turnovers. Maybe you never saw the ball. It's tough to fix responsibility when you're one of five guys.

2. Circumstances. What if it's garbage time? What if your minutes come against weaker teams? What if you happen to be in when your team gets hot? Or goes through a prolonged scoring drought?

3. Look no further than the stats above to see how fallacious this stat can be.

Example one: Josh Vazquez has the second worst +/- on the team; Parker the best. In the first two games against Power Five teams--USC and Georgia--Parker was on the floor for 50 minutes versus 31 for Vazquez. Yet in the second two games against Power 5 teams--Washington and Arizona--Vazquez was on the floor for 62 minutes versus 48 for Parker. Clearly, the coaches are placing more value on Vazquez's outstanding individual stats than on Parker's +/-.

Example two: Josh Bannan. The worst +/-, yet how many of us want him on the bench? He's our second-best rebounder and foul shooter, and made the clutch shot that won us our first BIg Sky game.

Conclusion: Take the +/- with a grain of salt. Or wash it down with a shot of whisky.

PlayerRep said:

"FREE-THROW PERCENTAGE: Gold starts all around. We are now 12th in the country by percentage at 78.9% (The Bobcats rank high here too, at 26th in the country.) The worst of the regulars is Steadman at just over 68%, which is not super-horrible. The best? Ah, once again, Josh Vazquez, shooting a Steph Curry-like 93%. A bow here to Bannan as well, shooting at 83%--very good. The worst on the team? I say Mack Anderson, though he's really not had enough attempts to qualify. Still, five of nine puts you in Clunkerville, where that population shoots 50%."

Beasley is 18-18. 5 games. Sometimes the team just goes down the court, and lets him shoot. I'd guess he is deadly from the line. Vasquez is 14-15. Egun has only 5 FT, but has made all of them.

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FT% is a somewhat overrated stat. Case in point (8 D-1 games):

Vasquez 9/9 =100%
Whitney 19/27 = 70%

Whose contribution from the FT line is more valuable?

FT Rate (FTA/FGA) gives you a greater probability of winning than FT%.


Rotation player FT Rates (D-1 games):

Beasley 73.7
Whitney 55.1
DCH 52.6
Owens 44.7
Parker 36.7
Bannan 25.0
Vasquez 21.4
Egun 20.0
Stead 17.1

All these stats.........feel like I'm listening to a random 1 minute clip of Riley Corcoran during a live game broadcast.......maybe 30 seconds!

I was going to write this elsewhere as a part of a blog, but I might as well put much of it out into the world here. Just haven't had time to finish it.

I think it is hard with depth issues at the wing with DCH's injury problems and the departures of key players, not to have someone with length at the 3 position which is why Travis seems to prefer the 3 wing/post combo of Bannan, Steadman and Owens with two guards. I think it has caused offensive efficiency issues and created some rotation issues defensively.

Bannans analytics are brutal. He's a different player than we have had in that flex post role in a while, and he clearly isn't offensively efficient in the way we have been used to when Pridgett and a smattering of others have filled that role. He takes a lot more shots and makes fewer, he hasn't been a great offensive facilitator (not the best pick and roll guy) and turns the ball over a bit more than you'd like. He's a freshman and is playing like one. If Bannan could find some level efficiency the offense would vastly improve.

On the defensive end, he clearly needs some help from positioning. He isn't an atrocious defender, but more a victim of a slight incompatibility with who he's on the floor with. At least from my perspective he's not nearly as adept as a post defender or as at home there as Steadman is, nor is he completely in tune in that flex wing/post defender that has had in spades over the past five or six years in Pridgett or Moorehead. He and Owens occupy the same space as defenders with I think Bannan being slightly better on the perimeter/wing than Owens.

I think there is some nuance to Bannans low +/- numbers, and I think his and the teams offense numbers improve if DCH can get back to full health. He's the wing guy Travis is missing defensively right now and the one taller guy capable of being a face up offensive guy. Just my two cents.

Grizfan-24 said:

I was going to write this elsewhere as a part of a blog, but I might as well put much of it out into the world here. Just haven't had time to finish it.

I think it is hard with depth issues at the wing with DCH's injury problems and the departures of key players, not to have someone with length at the 3 position which is why Travis seems to prefer the 3 wing/post combo of Bannan, Steadman and Owens with two guards. I think it has caused offensive efficiency issues and created some rotation issues defensively.

Bannans analytics are brutal. He's a different player than we have had in that flex post role in a while, and he clearly isn't offensively efficient in the way we have been used to when Pridgett and a smattering of others have filled that role. He takes a lot more shots and makes fewer, he hasn't been a great offensive facilitator (not the best pick and roll guy) and turns the ball over a bit more than you'd like. He's a freshman and is playing like one. If Bannan could find some level efficiency the offense would vastly improve.

On the defensive end, he clearly needs some help from positioning. He isn't an atrocious defender, but more a victim of a slight incompatibility with who he's on the floor with. At least from my perspective he's not nearly as adept as a post defender or as at home there as Steadman is, nor is he completely in tune in that flex wing/post defender that has had in spades over the past five or six years in Pridgett or Moorehead. He and Owens occupy the same space as defenders with I think Bannan being slightly better on the perimeter/wing than Owens.

I think there is some nuance to Bannans low +/- numbers, and I think his and the teams offense numbers improve if DCH can get back to full health. He's the wing guy Travis is missing defensively right now and the one taller guy capable of being a face up offensive guy. Just my two cents.

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Well said.

citay said:

GrizBall said:

For what it is worth, when NBA scouts look at college players that may not have good 3Pt percentages, they look to the FT% and if it is high they don't worry about the 3pt% as much.

This is interesting because everyone has stats that they look at and think are important. So at the risk of earning another "dumbest use of a stat in the history of eGriz" award, here is what I think is important:

1. Five man lineup analysis. This looks at how particular lineups perform on the court together. Below is the Adj Efficiency margin for the 3 most common line-ups the Griz play. This only includes D-1 games so none of the line-ups include DCH or Beasley because they haven't played enough D-1 games with the same line-ups. The efficiency margin basically shows how much a lineup outscores or gets outscored when they are on the court together per 100 possessions:

Bannan/Owens/Steadman/Vasquez/Whitney -35
Egun/Owens/Parker/Steadman/Whitney +34
Bannan/Owens/Parker/Vasquez/Whitney +10


2 . +/-: Number of points scored for the player's team with him on the court, minus the number of points scored by the opponent with him on the court.

Parker +16
Beasley -1
Egun -4
DCH -4
Owens -9
Whitney -13
Stead -18
Vasquez -18
Bannan -35

And before someone asks if I am suggesting not playing Bannan or any of the lower number players, the answer is no I am not suggesting that. Bannan to me has the most upside of anyone on this team. He and others can play the same amount of minutes, but it is just finding the combinations that work the best.

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I look at this last stat, the +/- stat, with some skepticism. For a couple of reasons:

1. Any time you're on the court, you're one of five players out there, or 20% of the production of your team. Maybe the other guys got hot. Maybe somebody else committed a bunch of turnovers. Maybe you never saw the ball. It's tough to fix responsibility when you're one of five guys.

2. Circumstances. What if it's garbage time? What if your minutes come against weaker teams? What if you happen to be in when your team gets hot? Or goes through a prolonged scoring drought?

3. Look no further than the stats above to see how fallacious this stat can be.

Example one: Josh Vazquez has the second worst +/- on the team; Parker the best. In the first two games against Power Five teams--USC and Georgia--Parker was on the floor for 50 minutes versus 31 for Vazquez. Yet in the second two games against Power 5 teams--Washington and Arizona--Vazquez was on the floor for 62 minutes versus 48 for Parker. Clearly, the coaches are placing more value on Vazquez's outstanding individual stats than on Parker's +/-.

Example two: Josh Bannan. The worst +/-, yet how many of us want him on the bench? He's our second-best rebounder and foul shooter, and made the clutch shot that won us our first BIg Sky game.

Conclusion: Take the +/- with a grain of salt. Or wash it down with a shot of whisky.

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The thing I don’t like about message boards is that a lot of the dialogue seems like personal attacks. I want to 100% assure you that I am not arguing with you and respect your thoughtfulness and contributions to the board.

First, Your comments on +/- are spot on. I would never rely on +/- for players that play very little or not in quality situations. However over time, if you are on the floor when your team is getting consistently outscored at some point it is a You issue. The odds of you always being on or off the court when your team gets “hot” is actually very low. I actually believe the Adjusted Efficiency Margin is the most concerning. The term “adjusted” means adjusted for the for quality of the opponent players faced in the lineup. There are some problems there that are troubling and just with the eyeball test there is some correlation between the AEM and the +/-. Certainly nothing wrong with taking the +/- with a grain of salt.

Second, as I said in another post, stating that Bannan and Vasquez are two of the best FT shooters is technically correct in terms of percentage but in my opinion not in terms of winning. In D-1 games:

Owens 30-38 (79%)
Whitney 19-27 (70%)
Parker 13-18 (72%)
Bannan 12-15 (80%)
Vasquez 9-9 (100%)

When you throw in Beasley’s 14-14, you can make the argument that in terms of pushing the team towards winning D-1 games that Bannan and Vasquez are our 5th and 6th best contributors from the FT line. Just a difference of opinion, I commend their high FT% as it shows an incredible amount of skill and work. If you think FT% is super important that’s your perception and opinion. Nothing wrong with that. I just personally prefer the points and attempts as a metric more than the percentage.

Third, in my post, I actually said BEFORE anyone thinks I am advocating for less playing time for Bannan, I clarified that I was not. Quote: “it is finding the right combinations that work best.”

And finally, Vasquez is a very good player, always plays hard and is great kid to root for, but I don’t think he has “outstanding individual stats.” I already gave you my opinion why I believe FT% is vastly overrated. And while he is the best 3Pt shooter on the team and is shooting a fantastic (10-23) 43.5% in D-1 games , he makes just 1.25 a game. In addition, while his A/TO ratio may be 3.0 overall (and a very commendable 2.2 against D-1 teams) the key stat is that he averages only 1.4apg against D-1 teams. The A/TO ratio for someone who averages 1.4apg is not relevant to me (unless there is something extreme about the TOs), but again just a difference of opinion.

His averages against D-1 teams are 6.6p/2.6r/1.4a. Solid numbers but again in my personal opinion not close to “outstanding.” In addition, clearly Vasquez is getting more time than Parker (and Egun for that matter) which does indeed mean the coaches are placing more value on him, but this team is 2-6 and 1-3 in conference (with three 2pt losses in very winnable games). Vasquez has played 20 more minutes than Parker in conference play and I would challenge anyone to come up with any analysis that shows Vasquez is outplaying Parker in conference (not saying Parker should be playing more or less but just offering a difference of opinion that has a ton of statistical evidence to support). Are you 100% confident that the coaches are pushing the right lineup buttons? Regardless, I have a tremendous amount of confidence in this staff and believe there are good things coming.

Again, the beauty of this board is the ability to disagree with each other and not make it personal (although some clearly do). I enjoy reading everyone’s opinions.