Statistical Trivia

[Mike G]

In 2016, James Harden became the first player to lead the league in minutes, with less than 3000 minutes, since the season went to 82 games in the mid '60s.
Not counting seasons shortened by lockouts or pandemic.

Mikal Bridges has (post pandemic) led the league with <3000 minutes the last 2 seasons. "Load management" has cut into player minutes all down the line.
An every-10th season survey of 1st, 10th, etc most minutes thru the eras:

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year     Min.#1           10             20              30              40
2023   2963 Bridges   2693 Murray    2535 VanVleet   2432 Mitchell   2380 Washington
2013   3167 Lillard   2926 Holiday   2807 Batum      2685 Vasquez    2598 Griffin
2003   3485 Iverson   3226 Jamison   3044 R Lewis    2879 Jefferson  2747 Stackhouse
1993   3323 L Johnson 3098 Schrempf  2970 R Harper   2833 Bogues     2741 Sprewell
1983   3093 Thomas    2914 Nance     2811 Roundfield 2722 Banks      2602 Leavell
1973   3681 Archibald 3254 Kareem    3079 J Walker   2998 Bradley    2846 Guokas
1963   3806 Wilt      2712 Guerin    2544 Barnett    2294 Dischinger 1975 Cousy

Bridges' minutes this year would not have even made the top 30 in 1973 -- when there were many fewer teams.
Dejounte Murray's 10th place would be 30th just 10 years ago.
VanVleet #20 wouldn't have been top 40 until recently.

[Crow]

Russell Westbrook (and usage)

Had only regular season in 15 year career above 56% ts% this time, with career lowest usage. Most of career it was below league average on high to extremely high usage.

Had only playoffs above 56% ts% with career lowest usage... as a rookie. TS% in this playoffs was under 51% and in line with career average, which was well below league average.

[Mike G]

Well, he shot better with the Clippers, but for the whole season his TS% was just .513
Even 2017, when he led the league in almost everything, his % was nothing special.

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RS      TS%    nba    diff
2017   .554   .552    .002
2023   .513   .581   -.068
         
PO      TS%    nba    diff
2017   .511   .563   -.052
2023   .509   .565   -.056

[Crow]

Age is a stat... for coaches.

Popovich, 74.

Thibodeau is 65. Haven't heard that mentioned but it will probably come up in next few years. Casey retired at 66.

Carlisle pushing 64. Clifford going on 62. Same for Rivers. Does he get another Head Coaching job in NBA? He might not. McMillian at almost 59 probably doesn't. Donovan at 58, might.

Kerr at almost 58 certainly can stay in the league a lot longer if he wants.

Snyder at almost 57 is somewhat surpringly the next oldest.

The median is close to 50. Only 4 are below 40.




Other coaching age related trivia: 7 early era NBA coaches were born in 19th century. Only 1 of these 7 coached more than 2 years. Eddie Gottlieb was the exception, coaching 9 seasons. Won the first title of BAA. That increased both interest and ability to stick around.

[Crow]

By Darko projection, only 5 sophomores are estimated at above neutral. Troy Murphy and Herb Jones are tied for first at +1.0.

Scottie Barnes, the untouchable, at 0.



Last season rookies, only 1 projected at above 0 and only 8 over -1.


But youth in chosen top draft picks will continue to excess.

[Crow]

18 man rosters instead of 17 make a 1000 lineup season somewhat more likely going forward. Spurs and Thunder likely again as the main contenders for nearest that total next season but perhaps other will also compete for largest / most absurd number.

[Crow]

Celtics and Lakers won more than 50% of league titles thru 2010.

Just 1 in last 13 years. Could be the new normal, though diehards want way more and may still expect more.

[Crow]

Michael Jordan as majority owners fails to get a playoff series win and absent from the proceedings the last 7 years and 10 of 13 years.

Tried just 2 Coaches. Presumably low paid, probably relatively meh.

Did not show much visible effort or much success. Next.

[Crow]

MLS trivia

No team averages fully 2 goals per match. The lowest is at 0.7. Roughly 25% of matches are draws. Only 1 player in league barely averages more than 0.5 goals per match.

On average there is a score less often than every 35 minutes of match time.

Different world. Not for me.

[Crow]

Daryl Morey's teams, so far:

16 seasons.
13 playoff appearances.
11 series won (under 0.7 per season, under 0.8 per appearance).
2 conference finals (0.125 per season)but no Finals appearances or wins.
At least 6 guys who will end up in hall of fame, maybe 7 or more.


Ahead of Presti on playoff appearances by 3 and series won by 1. Close on Hall of Famers. Behind on conference finals and Finals appearances by 1 each. (Presti's teams at 0.1875 conference finals appearances per season.)

(Simple uninformed mean probability of conference final appearance would be 0.133. Morey's team % is below that. 6 teams exceeded the Thunder on this during the period.)


Teams of 11 GMs won titles during these 16 years, with 3 winning multiple.

Riley's teams with 7 conference finals, 5 Finals appearances and 2 titles in these last 16 years.

Myers' teams with 6 Final appearances and 4 titles.

Lakers with 3 titles combined.

Based on this playoff performance data, there is clear tier 1, a tier 2 and a tier 3 (with Morey and Presti). Regular season tiering might be different, if one cares about that. Probably top 10 for career but arguable whether should be placed over any titlewinner. Maybe a few.

[Crow]

WNBA all-time leaders:

Games 580 Sue Bird (Taursi 526)
Points 10888 and counting Diana Taursi
(over 33% lead on #2) Also 35% lead on 3ptrs made over Bird
Rebounds, efg% and ts%- Sylvia Fowles
Assists Bird
3pt fg% Jennifer Azzi at almost 46% (in short WNBA career)
Winshares Tamika Catchings by over 25%

[Mike G]

"Lillard leaves Portland after 11 seasons in which he made seven All-Star and All-NBA teams ..."

Only 7 ASG in 11 years. He missed the cut in 2016 and '17, partly due to a HOF logjam of guards in the West:

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2016 Western Guards
player   AS  tm    WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP   PER
Curry    *  GSW   17.9  .318  11.9   9.5   31.5
Harden   *  Hou   13.3  .204   6.6   6.8   25.3
Westbrook * OKC   14.0  .245   7.8   6.8   27.6
Paul     *  LAC   12.7  .253   7.9   6.0   26.2
Lillard     Por    9.2  .165   4.4   4.3   22.2
Thompson *  GSW    8.0  .144   1.8   2.5   18.6
...
Kobe     *  LAL   -0.4 -.010  -1.6    .2   14.9

2017
player   AS  tm    WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP   PER
Westbrook * OKC   13.1  .224  11.1   9.3   30.6
Harden    * Hou   15.0  .245   8.7   8.0   27.4
Curry     * GSW   12.6  .229   6.9   5.9   24.6
Paul        LAC   10.6  .264   8.7   5.2   26.2
Conley      Mem   10.0  .209   6.8   5.1   23.2
Lillard     Por   10.4  .185   5.0   4.8   24.1
Bledsoe     Phx    5.3  .118   3.6   3.1   20.5
McCollum    Por    7.6  .131   2.0   2.8   19.9
G Hill      Uta    5.9  .182   3.8   2.3   19.3
Thompson  * GSW    7.1  .129   0.8   1.9   17.4

The 2016 selections look as if they tried to get all the most deserving in. But Klay Thompson had to be in; and that Kobe guy.
In 2017 a few guys could have been guard #4 or 5; again Klay, because the Dubs had to have 3 guys in it.

The 2016 all-NBA guards included only Kyle Lowry from the East (3rd team). Harden was out, Lillard was in, and of course Klay.

[Crow]

Voting is hard but too easy / casual / conditioned for some or many.

[Mike G]

On the b-r.com Leaders pages, we can see the 250 top season statistical performances in a number of stats.
For most players, Usage% and Offensive Rating are inversely related: LeBron's highest O-Rtg (2013) came with one of his lowest Usg%; and he is among the vast majority who never made both top-250's in the same season.
These guys have done it, since 1974 when the stats begin:

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Usg:ORtg  yr    Usg%   ORtg    uRk   oRk   aRk
Jordan   1991   32.9   125.4    98   130   114
Jordan   1996   33.3   123.5    76   232   154
Curry    2016   32.6   124.6   112   170   141
Curry    2018   31.0   124.6   226   167   197
Lillard  2021   31.4   125.2   195   143   169
Giannis  2022   34.9   123.6    42   224   133
Jokić    2022   31.9   125.6   157   114   136
Lillard  2023   33.8   126.3    62    92    77
Shai G-A 2023   32.8   124.9   102   154   128
Curry    2023   31.0   123.4   221   242   232
Embiid   2023   37.1   124.1    13   192   103
Embiid * 2024   37.5   123.6    10   222   116
Jokić  * 2024   33.1   129.3    84    51    68

* = incomplete season (9-10 games)
https://www.basketball-reference.com/le ... eason.html
https://www.basketball-reference.com/le ... eason.html
31 of the top 250 ORtg seasons shown are from this year, as are 14 of the highest Usg%

Last column is the avg of the Rank of the 2 stats. Only Dame last year has been top 100 in both for a season.

[Mike G]

Just Another Holiday --

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2022-23
Holiday  PER  WS/48  BPM
Aaron    9.4  .053  -2.0
Jrue    19.2  .148   3.1
Justin   6.6  .008  -3.9

2023-24
Holiday  PER  WS/48  BPM
Aaron   13.6  .154   0.7
Jrue    12.8  .103   1.0
Justin  13.2  .150   0.3

Last season, they totaled 7.7 Win Shares and 2.5 VORP
After ~1/4 of a season, the 3 are more than 1/3 of the way to those totals.