This Whole Shooting at the End of the Shotclock Thing

[Kathoro]

What about the players who purposely dribble out the shot clock only to force their team into a late shot clock shot attempt (Lebron)? Wouldn't it be unfair to give these players more value for taking the tough shot at the end of the clock? In fact, they should be punished for forcing their team into the late shot clock attempt and voiding a potentially better shot opportunity. This effect would seem to be very difficult to isolate without the use of synergy or whatever.

[Mike G]

Welcome to APBRMetrics!

Has someone suggested a player should get more credit for a tougher shot?
A player who regularly makes his shots tougher has a lower shooting%, he scores fewer points, etc. His coach may reduce his minutes. His productions drop, so he's statistically punished.

I haven't seen LeBron wasting time in order to force his team into a tougher shot, and it's kind of hard to imagine anyone does this regularly. But I don't watch a lot of ball.

[Kathoro]

Yes it has been suggested that there is value in a player being capable of being able to handle the load of shooting at the end of the shot clock when a possession breaks down due to the innability of teammates to create a viable shot opportunity. So a "star" player may shoot a high fraction of shots at the end of the clock, these generally being inefficient shots, which decreases the appearance of their stats on the surface. However, their stats at the end of the clock may greatly exceed what would fill that void if the said "star" player did not take it upon himself to handle the end of the shot clock when the possession breaks down.

[EvanZ]

I haven't seen LeBron wasting time in order to force his team into a tougher shot, and it's kind of hard to imagine anyone does this regularly. But I don't watch a lot of ball.

Monta Ellis did this countless times with the Warriors.

[mystic]

If such a behaviour is diametral to the team success, it should show up in +/- based numbers. For a guy like Monta Ellis that behaviour did not lead to a better overall team performance, for James it does.

A pretty good example would be Adrian Dantley. He did used up a lot of the shot clock, but he actually didn't take the tough shot. His scoring efficiency was high, but the team offensive performance did not improve by that in a way as expected. His teammates had to take those tough shots instead and their scoring efficiency suffered. Something anyone should keep in mind when using high scoring efficiency and Dantley in the same breath. In a sense Dantley cheated and his teammates paid the price.

Kathoro, one aspect you have to take into account is the opportunity costs. When James is not handling the ball, someone else might need to do that. That actually leads to less efficiency offensively, which shows up in the team offensive efficiency with James on the court in comparison to without him on the court. Too many of those highly valued role players are passing up relatively open shooting opportunities. The theory suggest that the first open shot should be taken, if that shot lies within the range of that player. Many role players are padding their efficiency stats by not taking those shots.

[LeeRichardon2013]

I think a cool stat that could represent this would be "time with with ball." So you could measure how long each player has the ball on each possession, sort of like a more detailed version of the usage rate. That way players who do not pass the ball as much would be revealed!

[Mike G]

That's a good idea.

[Kathoro]

Yeah and I believe 82games.com has this study where they tracked the team points per possession as a function of team "touches per second." From this study, it could be estimated how a player is affecting the points per possession of his team's offense by how he is influencing the touches per second rate.

Here it is:
http://www.82games.com/dribbles.htm

[EvanZ]

I think a cool stat that could represent this would be "time with with ball." So you could measure how long each player has the ball on each possession, sort of like a more detailed version of the usage rate. That way players who do not pass the ball as much would be revealed!

It's surely being done right now with the optical tracking data.

[Crow]

Yes I assume so. And they probably could track amount of time standing still vs advancing vertically or moving horizontally, the speeds, the locations, etc. Potentially who was open based on distance between teammate and nearest defender, etc.

[xkonk]

A related point came up on TrueHoop not too long ago; someone (I think a coach or former coach) noted that by dribbling at the end of a quarter or half you also control what the other team gets to do by running the clock out on their potential next possession. The offensive team is probably sacrificing some efficiency by not running a typical offense, but they're also depriving their opponent of a full possession.

[Metsox]

True Hoop just had a post. It's an interview with Morey talking about the importance of exactly that...

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_ ... -hero-ball

[mcoughlin]

Is optical tracking data essentially just for NBA team use only? I.e. do independent researchers have access / are using it?

[EvanZ]

It's not publicly available.

[greyberger]

With play by play data with timestamps couldn't you get team (or x's teammates') fg% by time left on the shot clock, while player x is on/off court? If ellis and lebron are guilty of this their late clock usage would have to be lower, seems to be the opposite for lebron this year ref:82games.com