|
|
|
"...Freakonomics meets ESPN." —Alan
Schwarz, author, The Numbers Game
Taking Measure of the Many Myths
in Modern Sport
|
|
|
|
Reviews | What's Inside | Where to Order | Stanford University Press |
|
|
|
|
|
Chapter
Excerpts
|
|
Chapter Ten: Scoring to Score from The Instruments of
Rationality, pp. 214-215 Sports
are a zero-sum game, which means the number of winners equal the number of
losers. Regardless of what methods teams use to evaluate talent, half the
teams will win, half will lose. At the end of the season, one team will still
be crowned champion. Every year the champions confirm that the basic approach
used in the NBA is correct. Let’s
put it this way. Imagine that every team believed it needed to play its
mascot to win basketball games. If this were each team’s approach, half the
teams would win with their mascots, the other half would lose. At the end of
the season, one team with its mascot would be crowned champion, confirming
the need to play your mascot. Following
this analogy, scorers are the mascots of the NBA. We have shown that scoring
by itself does not create wins. Yet many scorers, despite not offering many
wins, are paid the most by their respective teams and are considered the key
to whatever wins the team actually achieves. Sometimes this is not a problem.
When the Spurs think their leading scorer, Tim Duncan, is their best player,
they are right. When the Lakers thought that their two leading scorers, Shaq
and Kobe, were their best players, they were right. When the 76ers, though,
think their leading scorer, Allen Iverson, is their best player, the data
tell a different story. Unfortunately, every year a team wins a title thinking
their leading scorer is their best player; therefore, this particular
mistake, without some statistical analysis, is quite difficult to see. We
would note that the focus on scoring may just be a way of simplifying the
complex information talent evaluators face. The same
abilities that allow a person to score in the NBA would also allow a player
to rebound, generate steals, and create assists. Players like Jordan,
Garnett, and Kobe are not just great scorers, but have athletic abilities
that allow these players to accumulate rebounds and assists. So when people
see an athlete who can score, a leap of faith might be made. If the player
can score, he probably can do all the other things a team needs to win, and
consequently significant scoring ability is seen as evidence that the player
helps a team accumulate many wins. Unfortunately
there are clear exceptions to this simplification. When scorers do not
actually contribute significantly to wins, teams often end up losing.
Consequently, teams have turned to other explanations for why losses
accumulate. Teams talk about the importance of coaching and team chemistry.
And they add and subtract players, hoping to find the combination that works.
Every year, one team hits the jackpot, while others keep searching.
Unfortunately, without the proper statistical tools, many teams are left in
the dark. And
this is a point we wish to emphasize. Without statistical analysis, one
cannot see how the actions the players take on the court translate into wins.
One can play basketball. One can watch basketball. One can both play and
watch basketball for a thousand years. If you do not systematically track
what the players do, and then uncover the statistical relationship between
these actions and wins, you will never know why teams win and why they lose.
Staring at these players play is not a method that will ever yield the
answers that the proper analysis of statistics will yield. And this is true
if you stare for one day, or as we said, if you
stare for a thousand years. Excerpts (c) 2006 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland
Stanford Jr. University. No further
use, reproduction or distribution of this material is allowed without the
written permission of the publisher. |
|
|
|
|
