Scoring decline and possible NBA response

[Crow]

Scoring is down about 5 pts compared to end of season stats last season. Not sure about compared to scoring about one month in last season but probably still down at least 2-3 pts from that. Will the competition committee change any rules in March? Will the refs be instructed to change how they are calling games during this season or the playoffs? I'd expect some response but don't know when or how it will come.

[EvanZ]

It must be that Kevin Martin isn't getting to the line as much. Dragging down the entire NBA scoring.

[Mike G]

The other lockout year, 1999, was also very bad for offenses. Apparently exhaustion favors defense.
Turnovers are up, shooting% are down: 3FG% is the lowest it's been since 1994 (before the short arc), FT% lowest of this century. FTA (23.1 per game) are lowest in history.

I've been noticing the league's point guards are not well distributed. Some teams have nobody effective at the position: Det (Stuckey?), GSW (Ellis?), NYK (Douglas?), Sac (Tyreke?), Was (Wall). Several more have no decent backup.

At the same time, some other teams have an embarrassment of riches at PG. The Clipps were using a 3-guard rotation of Paul, Billups, and Mo Williams; now two are injured. Cavs have Irving and Sessions; Mavs have Kidd, West, and Beaubois. Nuggs have Lawson, 'Dre, and Fernandez. Wolves have Rubio and Ridnour. The Nets have Williams, Farmar, and Gaines. Sixers Jrue and Lou.

It's not that there aren't plenty of starting-quality PG's in the league, it's just that they aren't where they're most needed. I expect to see some of these guys being traded.

[kjb]

Mild defense of Wall -- I don't know who could be an effective distributor with the schlubs he has around him. It also doesn't help that he can't make jump shots, which means teams just play him to drive. Makes the old "drive and kick" thing a bit tougher.

I also was struck at how similar this season is to the last lockout season. It seems like conditioning, less intense offseason workouts, not working on skills, exhaustion would affect defense as much as offense. But perhaps not.

[Mike G]

Exactly: On a team without decent scorers, the PG isn't effective if he isn't a scoring threat.

Offense vs defense:
At one extreme, a mob of kids with no skills, the ball almost never goes in the basket.
At the other end, an all-star game, lots of points are scored.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/allstar/

Not sure what this implies, but there's a strong correlation between league FT% and 3pt%:

Code: Select all

.yr     3fg%   2fg%   FT%
2012   .339   .472   .744
2011   .358   .486   .763
2010   .355   .492   .759
2009   .367   .486   .771
2008   .362   .484   .755

2007   .358   .484   .752
2006   .358   .478   .745
2005   .356   .470   .756
2004   .347   .459   .752
2003   .349   .463   .758

2002   .354   .465   .752
2001   .354   .462   .748
2000   .353   .468   .750
1999   .339   .457   .728
1998   .346   .470   .737

corr   .756   .575   

The modern 3-point era, since the shortened-arc experiment.
There is a correlation between FT% and 2pt%, but it's stronger with 3pt%.
Both FT and 3's peaked in 2009.

[EvanZ]

We're almost 1/4 into the season and the league average ORTG is still hovering at 102 (102.3 to be exact). Should we still expect it to move up to the typical 107 or 108 of the last several seasons? It seems less and less likely.

[Crow]

It was 102.7 10 days to 2 weeks ago so it is not headed up yet. Treading water at best, actually down a bit.

[wilq]

Scoring is down about 5 pts compared to end of season stats last season. Not sure about compared to scoring about one month in last season but probably still down at least 2-3 pts from that.

http://weaksideawareness.wordpress.com/ ... gh-season/

Will the competition committee change any rules in March? Will the refs be instructed to change how they are calling games during this season or the playoffs? I'd expect some response but don't know when or how it will come.

IMHO you are overreacting, every typical season starts slow-ish and this one is far from typical.
When next year we will see huge decline on offense then they will have to at least talk about it.

[Crow]

You've done interesting work. It responds to part (the long term part) of what I wondered about in this thread http://www.apbr.org/metrics/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=7856 A line that averaged the years might be nice to see on its own. Hypothetically these graphs could be done by position, experience, salary or quality quartiles, etc.

The graph that DSMok1 posted at your site suggests that full season offensive rating will be 2 to 2.5 points higher than what it is earlier in the season, in line with what I suggested.

If league average offensive rating ends up at 105 that will the lowest level in 30+ years except for the defensive epoch of 1998-2004... that lead to rule changes.

I agree that they will probably will wait a year to change the rules, but they might not wait to instruct or hint to the officials to make some changes in referee practice before the playoffs. They probably don't want a ugly and / or defensive biased playoffs. That is why they changed the rules after 2004.

[EvanZ]

Crow, why do you think a rule change is needed? I assume that the decrease in offense is due to the contracted season, and nothing else.

[Crow]

It probably is mainly the contracted season but if you look here http://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/stats.html offensive rating is on a multi-year decline with this season being an exaggerated case but the third straight year to year decline. They might want to nip the problem now rather than possibly continuing to lose more than a half point a year if the trend continued.

[agentkirb]

I think it's all a product of how they are calling certain things now. Evans joked about Kevin Martin not getting to the free throw line, but it's absolutely true. They aren't calling the foul he used to get where he would drive to the basket, lean into a player and get free throws. I imagine it's kind of the same thing across the league for players that used to make a living driving to the basket and getting to the line.

I'm a Rockets fan and I actually approve of this change. It's been getting a little old watching games where the FTA would commonly climb into the 25-30 range. I wish they would move more towards more non-shooting fouls. It would still allow you to "punish" teams that are too physical without the game becoming a free throw shooting contest.

[EvanZ]

Evans joked about Kevin Martin not getting to the free throw line, but it's absolutely true. They aren't calling the foul he used to get where he would drive to the basket, lean into a player and get free throws. I imagine it's kind of the same thing across the league for players that used to make a living driving to the basket and getting to the line.

Actually, I wasn't joking about that one, in terms of Kevin Martin. He's definitely being affected. But do you think that's the main reason for the decrease in ORTG?

[mystic]

But do you think that's the main reason for the decrease in ORTG?

The FTA/FGA ratio is 0.29, last season it was 0.3. The difference in ORtg due to this is 0.9 points per 100 possessions. That is hardly the lone reason for the 4.9 drop per 100 possessions. The players just missing more often open shots (even FT% is down from 76.3 to 74.5), they are turning it over more often.

There are still enough games with more 25+ FTA, in fact 205 times that happen in this season so far out of 512 possibilities, 40%, last season it was 46.7% with a slightly higher pace.

The drop in eFG% is responsible for 3.2 points per 100 possessions, leaving us with 0.9 points per 100 possessions due to more turnovers.

[EvanZ]

This seems obvious, but a lack of pre-season probably plays a role. Also, aren't there a lot of new coaches this season? Not sure if it's more than normal, but maybe. New coaches + little pre-season could contribute.