Newbie on basketball statistics

[josecarlos]

Hi all!!!

I'm new on basketball statistics. I'm developing a website for basketball women league from Spain. And I would like to know what stat's per team in a game you consider most important and the same to players.

I have too many questions, like ...

- is a good practice to calculate the PER for only one game?
- I'm calculating Offensive Ratio for players in a game but when the player has scored 0 points I've got very unreliable results. So, in that case, for these players is better to assign 0 like Offensive Ratio?
- How I have said, I'm newbie ... Where I can start to learn about basketball statistics? Any book in particular? Any web in particular? I have see in the forum that some of you recommends some books or articles, but I don't know if these are recommended to start on basketball statistics

Thanks in advance to everybody and excuse me for my regular english.

Best regards,

José Carlos

[Crow]

http://www.d3coder.com/thecity/advanced-stats-primer/

http://www.scribd.com/mobile/doc/66264287

There is so much. Look around here, google, Nylon Calculus, twitter, etc.

There is a recent stat intro article by Nick Sciria but I can't find it.


PER for one game (GameScore) is a quick take on amount of activity (mostly individual offense) that can somewhat useful as a first cut on performance but is heavily influenced by FGAs. Look into DRE as well.

[josecarlos]

http://www.d3coder.com/thecity/advanced-stats-primer/

http://www.scribd.com/mobile/doc/66264287

There is so much. Look around here, google, Nylon Calculus, twitter, etc.

There is a recent stat intro article by Nick Sciria but I can't find it.


PER for one game (GameScore) is a quick take on amount of activity (mostly individual offense) that can somewhat useful as a first cut on performance but is heavily influenced by FGAs. Look into DRE as well.

Thank you so much for your help!!! I will look for information about DRE.

[Crow]

https://fansided.com/stats/dre-single-g ... ason-long/

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jose_Martinez1 This professor is one of or the leading academic basketball analyst in Spain. Maybe try to find his current contact info, if you are very serious about the subject. He has some posts here, but in was years ago.

Might look here http://www.eba-stats.com/ for basic definitions, ideas and conversation.

Look at what stats the WNBA has and what is at basketball-reference.com. See what you have and don't have data for.

For news coverage, maybe look at swishappeal.com and talk to them about questions, ideas.

Good wishes with your project. Take it in steps and know how much time you want to give it.

Ask more questions as you wish and see what you get.

[josecarlos]

https://fansided.com/stats/dre-single-g ... ason-long/

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jose_Martinez1 This professor is one of or the leading academic basketball analyst in Spain. Maybe try to find his current contact info, if you are very serious about the subject. He has some posts here, but in was years ago.

Might look here http://www.eba-stats.com/ for basic definitions, ideas and conversation.

Look at what stats the WNBA has and what is at basketball-reference.com. See what you have and don't have data for.

For news coverage, maybe look at swishappeal.com and talk to them about questions, ideas.

Good wishes with your project. Take it in steps and know how much time you want to give it.

Ask more questions as you wish and see what you get.

OMG!!!! Thank you for your appreciated help!!! I'l try to contact with that professor and read his articles and I'll read all the sites that you recommend me. Thanks a lot!!!

Thanks for your wishes too!!! My project is a very beta version but I started last month and I'm going adding functionalities little by little

Don't worry. All the questions that I have, I'll ask them!!!

[josecarlos]

Hi to everyone!!!

I've got a pair of questions with Offensive Rating statistic. I have found two different formulas to calculate it. One is from Dean Oliver and it is a very big formula and the other is a very simple formula: 100*PP/(FGA+0.44*FTA+TO)

Which one is better? Why Dean Oliver's formula returns positive results for players who have not scored any points?

Thanks in advance for your appreciated help.

José Carlos

[Mike G]

Maybe Dean's formula includes offensive rebounds?

[Crow]

Dean's OR is better if you want a more holistic measure of offensive activity including assists and offensive rebounds. The later measure only covers scoring usage. "which is better" questions come down to what you want to measure.

[josecarlos]

Hi!!!

I've got another question, this time about pace factor. I know how to calculate the pace factor for a team, but I don't know how can I do it for a player.

I have read that too much times people gives the pace factor of a team to every player of that team and this is not correct. So, how can I calculate pace factor for only one player?

Thanks in advance.

José Carlos

[josecarlos]

Maybe Dean's formula includes offensive rebounds?

Yes Dean's formula includes offensive rebounds for both player and team

[josecarlos]

Dean's OR is better if you want a more holistic measure of offensive activity including assists and offensive rebounds. The later measure only covers scoring usage. "which is better" questions come down to what you want to measure.

I want to be most accurate in my calculations, so I will use Dean Oliver's formula. However, I still do not understand why I get positive results with players who have not scored any point when in Dean's words ...

"Individual offensive rating is the number of points produced by a player per hundred total individual possessions. In other words, 'How many points is a player likely to generate when he tries?'"

[Crow]

If you want to do for a major league just find a site that gives total possessions on court and divide by minutes then multiply by 48. If doing for your Spanish women's league you may have to write code to count possessions from play by play data or count them manually. You could estimate possession from the total boxscore activity (counting the things that end possessions including team turnovers and minus offensive rebounds) that occurred while they are on court but you'd lose a bit of accuracy.

Check the definition of possession. It is different than a "play". An offensive rebounded ends a play but the possession is continued. Timeouts don't create new possessions. There is some extra details for "minor possessions" that you might find discussion of if you search.

[Crow]

Don't worry about the zero points scoring case. It should be pretty rare, especially for more than 1 game. If a player has a positive value but scored no points they must have done something else of value, indirect point impact.

[josecarlos]

If you want to do for a major league just find a site that gives total possessions on court and divide by minutes then multiply by 48. If doing for your Spanish women's league you may have to write code to count possessions from play by play data or count them manually. You could estimate possession from the total boxscore activity (counting the things that end possessions including team turnovers and kinus offensive rebounds) that occurred while they are on court but you'd lose a bit of accuracy.

Check the definition of possession. It is different than a "play". An offensive rebounded ends a play but the possession is continued. Timeouts don't create new possessions. There is some extra details for "minor possessions" that you might find discussion of if you search.

Right now I'm estimating possessions from total boxscore. I don't have access to play by play after the game has finished.

Thanks for your comment.

[josecarlos]

Don't worry about the zero points scoring case. It should be pretty rare, especially for more than 1 game. If a player has a positive value but scored no points they must have done something else of value, indirect point impact.

Ok, I'll keep that in mind. Thanks