The debut and popularization of BPM

Home for all your discussion of basketball statistical analysis.
colts18
Posts: 313
Joined: Fri Aug 31, 2012 1:52 am

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by colts18 »

Some thoughts and questions on BPM for Dsmok1:

1. Have you looked into adding Games Played (% of teams games played to account for lockouts and the 2015 season) into the formula? How about Games started? Games started will tell you who coaches think are the best players plus its a good stat to use an opponent adjustment.

2. Guys like Steve Nash don't get much credit from BPM for their playmaking. Maybe you should add a variable that uses assist% with one or more of the following: Teammate efficiency, Teammate 3point rate, Teammate lack of turnovers, FTR to account for penetrators. Steve Nash increased his teammates efficiency but BPM actually punishes him for that. If his teammates shot lower %, Nash gets more credit from the TS%-team TS% variable even though he played worse. Obviously the TS%-team TS% variable is good for recognizing low TS% guys like McGrady and Iverson as good offensive players but it punishes PG's.
Crow
Posts: 10533
Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2011 11:10 pm

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by Crow »

Following logic of first suggestion, could also consider % of last 5 minutes of game.

Concern BPM doesn't give enough credit for assists? On surface I had opposite concern but haven't looked deeply at it.
permaximum
Posts: 416
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:04 pm

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by permaximum »

colts18 wrote: Obviously the TS%-team TS% variable is good for recognizing low TS% guys like McGrady and Iverson as good offensive players but it punishes PG's.
Low TS% guys like McGrady and Iverson? According to what? I calculated TS% in Iverson years including it's last two strongly declining years and it's 52.6%. Iverson's TS% is 51.8%. League average USG is around 18%. Iverson's USG is a lot more. League average TS% is a little bit higher in McGrady years but he can't be classified as low TS% guy either. His USG is a lot higher than league average too.
Mike G
Posts: 6144
Joined: Fri Apr 15, 2011 12:02 am
Location: Asheville, NC

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by Mike G »

colts18 wrote:2. Guys like Steve Nash don't get much credit from BPM for their playmaking. Maybe you should add a variable that uses assist% with one or more of the following: Teammate efficiency, Teammate 3point rate, Teammate lack of turnovers, FTR to account for penetrators. Steve Nash increased his teammates efficiency but BPM actually punishes him for that. ..
This is an area that we hoped plus-minus analysis would give insight. Did his teammates' shooting improve when he joined them? Does his backup have the same effect upon the same teammates? Such things aren't revealed by any boxscore analysis.

Ast% by itself really isn't that great a tool. Assisting on 50% of teammate scoring in a great offense, and doing the same in a very weak offense, aren't equal accomplishments.

Of course, Ast% * TmEfficiency is pretty much equivalent to Ast/100 poss.
http://bkref.com/tiny/D60gk

That is Steve Nash's first MVP season, 2005. That year, he ranked 15th in WS, 9th in WS/48, 18th in PER, 48th in VORP, 57th in BPM -- below luminaries like Bobby Simmons, Brian Cardinal, Greg Buckner, Damon Jones ...

In 2006, he was 16th in PER, 10th in WS/48 and WS, 22nd in VORP and BPM -- just behind Battier.

Apparently the BPM term (Usg*Ast) doesn't help much, and neither does (Reb*Ast).
permaximum
Posts: 416
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:04 pm

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by permaximum »

To support Mike on Steve Nash case;

He's ranked 4th in the single-year NPI-RAPM (vanilla RAPM) of 2005. The following season he's ranked 14th in JE's single-year NPI-RAPM and 41st in colts18's single-year NPI-RAPM. There's a strong decline but box-score metrics don't really reflect that. BTW, I don't know why J.E's and colts18's NPI-RAPM rankings are this different.
DSMok1
Posts: 1119
Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2011 11:18 pm
Location: Maine
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by DSMok1 »

Yes, we've talked about the Nash issue before with this model, over at Tom Tango's blog: http://tangotiger.com/index.php/site/co ... nus-in-nba

Basically: he is another extreme outlier. Generally, players with very few rebounds or steals or blocks are not very good, as those are the prime indicators of physical ability to play in the NBA. Assists and true shooting percentage indicate skills and awareness. The BPM regression showed quite strongly one must have both the physical ability and the skills in order to be valuable. There seem to be a few outlying cases, particularly Nash, where pure skill on the offensive end can outweigh the other factors.
Developer of Box Plus/Minus
APBRmetrics Forum Administrator
Twitter.com/DSMok1
Mike G
Posts: 6144
Joined: Fri Apr 15, 2011 12:02 am
Location: Asheville, NC

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by Mike G »

DSMok1, obviously it's water under the bridge now -- but does it make sense, in future perhaps, to discuss basketball stats at the premier basketball stats analysis website, rather than at a baseball blog?

I still wonder if the notion of minimum wage players winning 20% of their games is perhaps tied to a baseball environment, with the equivalent of `27 possessions per team per game; and that you might find that to be the case after about 15 minutes (or 27 poss) of a basketball game.
DSMok1
Posts: 1119
Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2011 11:18 pm
Location: Maine
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by DSMok1 »

Mike G wrote:DSMok1, obviously it's water under the bridge now -- but does it make sense, in future perhaps, to discuss basketball stats at the premier basketball stats analysis website, rather than at a baseball blog?

I still wonder if the notion of minimum wage players winning 20% of their games is perhaps tied to a baseball environment, with the equivalent of `27 possessions per team per game; and that you might find that to be the case after about 15 minutes (or 27 poss) of a basketball game.

Tom Tango's blog is where many of the best sports statistics minds post, across many disciplines/sports. Many discussions that are not restricted to baseball, focused on the larger statistics and modeling questions. It's where I learned sports statistics, largely...
Developer of Box Plus/Minus
APBRmetrics Forum Administrator
Twitter.com/DSMok1
AcrossTheCourt
Posts: 237
Joined: Sat Feb 16, 2013 11:56 am

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by AcrossTheCourt »

colts18 wrote:Am I reading the stat correctly?

AST% is a massive negative according to the formula. Thats probably why it seems like the stat is not high on John Stockton. Its interesting that Stockton never had a positive in defensive BPM in his career despite having a ton of steals (which the stat loves) and playing on some really good defensive teams.

You would think AST% would be a positive because PG's rate pretty well in Offensive RAPM.

Also Personal fouls aren't in the stat even though they are a box score stat.
That's odd because by "pure" RAPM Stockton rated really well defensively in the late 90's/early 00's, I believe, and of course he has a great reputation for defense.

I think the versatility term (the assist/rebound thing) really hurts some point guards -- the ones who don't rebound. A lot of point guards derive their value from distributing, and if that term is attached to rebounding it hurts them more than others.
J.E.
Posts: 852
Joined: Fri Apr 15, 2011 8:28 am

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by J.E. »

Neil, I'm sorry to say this but you're doing this community a giant disservice by acting like your way of testing metrics - computing error on the same data that was actually used to fit these models - is a valid test.

Everyone, for the love of god, please get a better sense of what constitues in-sample and out-of-sample data and why it's important to not mix these up. Maybe take part in a kaggle.com competition or two to get a sense of what out-of-sample really means, and how these kind of competitions are set up in a correct way
mystic
Posts: 470
Joined: Mon Apr 18, 2011 10:09 am
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by mystic »

J.E. wrote:Neil, I'm sorry to say this but you're doing this community a giant disservice by acting like your way of testing metrics - computing error on the same data that was actually used to fit these models - is a valid test.
Isn't that only true for BPM values going from 2001 to 2013? Meaning, any BPM values derived from 2000 and before and then subsequentially tested for the performance in the +1, +2, etc. season don't fit your critique, right?

In that sense, it is not a question of the method used by Neil, but rather that this method is not applicable for all metrics in all years. Other than that I agree, that testing the 2001 to 2013 BPM values in that fashion is not a out-of-sample test. So, not including such years in the test would be the appropiate way.
mystic
Posts: 470
Joined: Mon Apr 18, 2011 10:09 am
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by mystic »

AcrossTheCourt wrote:I think the versatility term (the assist/rebound thing) really hurts some point guards -- the ones who don't rebound. A lot of point guards derive their value from distributing, and if that term is attached to rebounding it hurts them more than others.
I think I found a somewhat good solution for that issue, just that the method itself needs to be tested out of sample, before really declaring that as a "solution". Right now the numbers I get for players with a certain numbers of assists looks like this (an improved version of my previously posted numbers in this thread):

Code: Select all

Player                      OV       DV      OV+DV     O/U
LeBron James               7.21     2.09     9.30     0.46
Manu Ginobili              4.93     1.25     6.18     0.11
Chris Paul                 5.66     0.40     6.06     -0.12
Jason Kidd                 2.96     2.73     5.69     0.94
Dwyane Wade                5.21     0.48     5.69     0.37
John Stockton              4.12     0.90     5.02     0.78
Stephen Curry              4.56     0.37     4.93     0.95
Russell Westbrook          3.00     1.19     4.19     0.26
Deron Williams             5.03     -1.06    3.97     0.95
Baron Davis                3.39     0.25     3.64     -0.43
Steve Nash                 5.98     -2.52    3.46     -0.68
Ricky Rubio                0.96     2.17     3.13     -0.18
Chauncey Billups           4.11     -1.20    2.90     0.30
Mike Conley                1.98     0.80     2.79     -0.28
Andre Miller               2.04     0.75     2.78     0.47
Devin Harris               2.86     -0.24    2.62     0.54
Kyle Lowry                 2.06     0.42     2.48     -0.12
Isaiah Thomas              3.75     -1.42    2.33     0.28
Sam Cassell                2.18     0.14     2.32     0.20
Goran Dragic               2.90     -0.73    2.16     0.32
Ty Lawson                  3.80     -1.80    2.00     -0.42
Derrick Rose               2.57     -0.57    2.00     0.50
Damian Lillard             3.20     -1.23    1.97     -0.04
Pablo Prigioni             1.57     0.39     1.96     0.17
Gilbert Arenas             2.70     -1.06    1.64     0.07
Steve Francis              2.00     -0.45    1.56     0.18
Allen Iverson              2.30     -1.25    1.05     -0.06
Jrue Holiday               1.15     -0.17    0.98     -0.27
Jeremy Lin                 0.71     0.24     0.95     0.61
Jameer Nelson              1.26     -0.32    0.94     -0.07
Antonio Daniels            2.58     -1.66    0.92     0.35
Brandon Jennings           1.64     -0.74    0.90     1.09
Eric Bledsoe               -1.67    2.43     0.77     -0.36
Stephon Marbury            2.55     -1.89    0.66     0.88
Eric Snow                  -1.23    1.58     0.36     -0.10
John Wall                  1.10     -0.79    0.31     0.03
T.J. Ford                  0.22     0.07     0.28     -0.05
Darrell Armstrong          -0.33    0.59     0.26     0.25
Scottie Pippen             0.38     -0.19    0.19     0.48
Tony Parker                1.60     -1.49    0.11     -0.55
Speedy Claxton             -1.07    1.16     0.09     0.54
Raymond Felton             0.82     -0.85    -0.03    -0.25
Terry Porter               0.17     -0.24    -0.07    -1.06
Mike James                 1.30     -1.40    -0.10    -0.14
Jose Calderon              2.37     -2.55    -0.18    0.25
Mo Williams                0.92     -1.12    -0.21    0.42
Kemba Walker               -0.09    -0.22    -0.31    -0.30
Mike Bibby                 0.95     -1.29    -0.34    -0.49
Terrell Brandon            -0.48    -0.01    -0.50    0.62
Damon Stoudamire           0.18     -0.71    -0.53    0.22
Beno Udrih                 1.32     -1.87    -0.55    -0.36
Matthew Dellavedova        0.62     -1.28    -0.66    -0.62
Jeff Teague                0.60     -1.26    -0.66    0.09
Tim Hardaway               0.52     -1.23    -0.70    -0.39
Gary Payton                0.56     -1.37    -0.82    -0.58
Earl Watson                -0.56    -0.34    -0.90    -0.40
Bob Sura                   -0.45    -0.49    -0.93    -0.16
Greivis Vasquez            1.02     -1.97    -0.95    -0.74
Shaun Livingston           -0.81    -0.25    -1.06    -0.14
Charlie Ward               -1.64    0.52     -1.11    -0.20
Sergio Rodriguez           -0.08    -1.04    -1.12    0.83
Jason Williams             1.06     -2.25    -1.19    0.27
Kyrie Irving               1.10     -2.30    -1.20    0.19
Travis Diener              -0.06    -1.29    -1.35    0.45
Trey Burke                 0.51     -1.86    -1.35    0.27
Mookie Blaylock            -2.50    1.11     -1.39    0.47
Rajon Rondo                -0.56    -0.86    -1.42    -0.11
Darrick Martin             -0.72    -0.76    -1.47    -0.49
Jarrett Jack               0.36     -1.91    -1.55    0.62
Greg Anthony               -0.83    -0.76    -1.58    0.93
Kirk Hinrich               -1.22    -0.38    -1.60    -0.75
Anthony Carter             -1.65    0.04     -1.61    0.17
Rafer Alston               -1.33    -0.39    -1.72    -0.48
Nick Calathes              -1.49    -0.35    -1.83    -0.63
Chris Duhon                -0.48    -1.36    -1.83    -0.63
Darren Collison            0.36     -2.20    -1.84    -0.21
Mark Jackson               -0.65    -1.21    -1.86    0.89
Brian Roberts              -0.04    -1.84    -1.88    0.63
Chris Whitney              -0.65    -1.25    -1.90    0.41
Jordan Farmar              -0.89    -1.07    -1.97    -0.55
Steve Blake                -0.49    -1.52    -2.01    -0.42
Jerryd Bayless             -0.21    -1.82    -2.04    0.17
Anthony Johnson            -1.16    -0.96    -2.12    -0.57
Sundiata Gaines            -1.14    -1.06    -2.20    0.07
Shelvin Mack               -0.22    -1.99    -2.21    -0.32
Jamaal Tinsley             -1.15    -1.09    -2.24    -0.73
Luke Ridnour               -0.19    -2.11    -2.30    0.03
Brevin Knight              -3.36    1.04     -2.31    -0.05
D.J. Augustin              0.86     -3.21    -2.34    0.15
Moochie Norris             -1.31    -1.11    -2.41    -0.05
Jose Barea                 -0.27    -2.16    -2.43    -0.20
Phil Pressey               -1.49    -0.94    -2.43    -0.42
Sarunas Jasikevicius       -1.80    -0.65    -2.45    -0.07
Rick Brunson               -1.37    -1.17    -2.53    -0.67
Dan Dickau                 -0.99    -1.59    -2.58    0.38
Carlos Arroyo              -1.04    -1.59    -2.63    -0.64
Travis Best                -1.33    -1.31    -2.64    -0.36
Howard Eisley              -1.87    -0.79    -2.66    0.38
Nick Van Exel              -0.38    -2.30    -2.68    0.02
Alvin Williams             -0.92    -1.77    -2.70    -0.10
Khalid El-Amin             -2.06    -0.69    -2.74    0.28
Ishmael Smith              -2.78    0.01     -2.77    -0.48
John Crotty                -1.61    -1.20    -2.81    -0.57
Ramon Sessions             0.17     -3.02    -2.85    -0.23
Kenny Anderson             -2.68    -0.18    -2.86    -0.95
Eric Maynor                -1.76    -1.20    -2.96    -0.63
Rod Strickland             -1.78    -1.19    -2.97    -0.21
Sebastian Telfair          -1.87    -1.12    -2.99    0.10
Earl Boykins               -0.13    -2.90    -3.03    0.23
Roko Ukic                  -2.37    -0.80    -3.16    -0.47
Charles Jenkins            -2.27    -0.90    -3.17    0.28
Raul Lopez                 -2.08    -1.13    -3.21    -1.16
Chris Childs               -2.76    -0.46    -3.22    -0.17
Jeff McInnis               0.89     -4.16    -3.26    -0.04
Jason Hart                 -2.32    -0.98    -3.30    -0.27
Jacque Vaughn              -2.64    -0.74    -3.37    0.27
Jay Williams               -2.01    -1.48    -3.49    0.33
Avery Johnson              -1.78    -1.71    -3.49    -0.14
Will Bynum                 -1.62    -1.88    -3.50    0.39
Kendall Marshall           -1.75    -1.81    -3.56    0.30
Eugene Jeter               -1.58    -2.08    -3.65    -0.49
Robert Pack                -2.36    -1.33    -3.69    0.32
Marcus Williams            -1.01    -2.80    -3.81    -0.23
Donald Sloan               -2.20    -1.80    -4.01    1.47
Frank Williams             -3.11    -1.38    -4.48    -0.79
Tierre Brown               -2.69    -1.80    -4.49    0.10
Michael Carter-Williams    -2.10    -2.51    -4.61    -0.34
Keith McLeod               -2.84    -1.81    -4.65    -0.22
Troy Hudson                -0.44    -4.23    -4.67    -0.83
Kevin Ollie                -2.56    -2.21    -4.77    -0.70
Kenny Satterfield          -4.31    -0.90    -5.21    -0.02
Mateen Cleaves             -5.37    -0.85    -6.22    -0.96
Jonny Flynn                -3.46    -3.99    -7.45    -0.44
OV = offense, DV = defense, O/U = over or underrated via z-score difference between 14yr RAPM sample and those numbers.

Nash still underrated, but mostly due to the defensive aspect.
Neil Paine
Posts: 73
Joined: Mon Apr 18, 2011 1:18 am
Location: Philadelphia
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by Neil Paine »

J.E. wrote:Neil, I'm sorry to say this but you're doing this community a giant disservice by acting like your way of testing metrics - computing error on the same data that was actually used to fit these models - is a valid test.

Everyone, for the love of god, please get a better sense of what constitues in-sample and out-of-sample data and why it's important to not mix these up. Maybe take part in a kaggle.com competition or two to get a sense of what out-of-sample really means, and how these kind of competitions are set up in a correct way
Hey Jerry, you know the great thing about historical metrics? We can cut them off at 2000 (or whenever you want) and still have a large sample to test on. No need for the rudeness.
permaximum
Posts: 416
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:04 pm

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by permaximum »

J.E. wrote:Neil, I'm sorry to say this but you're doing this community a giant disservice by acting like your way of testing metrics - computing error on the same data that was actually used to fit these models - is a valid test.

Everyone, for the love of god, please get a better sense of what constitues in-sample and out-of-sample data and why it's important to not mix these up. Maybe take part in a kaggle.com competition or two to get a sense of what out-of-sample really means, and how these kind of competitions are set up in a correct way
I know that someone would say this. So I did not use any 2014-15 data to fit my model. If "someone"'s not satisfied with the results there'll always be 2014-15 season to test. Besides, I tested BPM out-of-sample 2014-15 + 2000-1974. Prediction doesn't really suffer.

BTW my metric (two metrics in fact, MAX_1 and MAX_5) has been ready since a week ago but I still couldn't find the time to fix b-r linkfy errors for player codenames. Hopefully, it'll be done tomorrow.
Statman
Posts: 548
Joined: Fri Apr 15, 2011 5:29 pm
Location: Arlington, Texas
Contact:

Re: The popularization of BPM

Post by Statman »

AcrossTheCourt wrote: I think the versatility term (the assist/rebound thing) really hurts some point guards -- the ones who don't rebound. A lot of point guards derive their value from distributing, and if that term is attached to rebounding it hurts them more than others.
We talking about Dave Berri & Wins Produced or BPM?

Joking btw, I just remember the WP days in which practically all the best rebounders at every position ranked at the top of the overall rankings.
Post Reply