Ball v.1.38

A few weeks back I wrote that I will start focusing my posts a lot more on defence. Today, Bryan Colangelo said that nearly every personnel decision he makes this off-season will focus on defence. Let's just assume he reads Caldeford.

Anyways, I'm only bringing this up because I want to lay out the two areas my future posts will be covering, and two things Bryan Colangelo said today have reiterated that these two areas are very important.

1. Defence & Potential Personnel Moves

2. Cap Spending, Luxury Tax & Performance

I will do some work on this second point because of recent emphasis on this by three people: Chris Bosh (in his post-mortem comments), Bryan Colangelo (same), and Michael Grange (who's touched on this subject many times in the past few weeks).

I suspect the correlation between payroll and performance is quite strong in the NBA (probably much stronger than NHL & NFL, perhaps even stronger than MLB). We will hopefully answer that question in the coming weeks.

Ball v.1.37

According to basketball-reference.com, the Raptors became just the 2nd team this decade to have a losing record with an offensive rating of 111 or higher.

The 27 teams from the decade that posted an offensive rating of 111 or higher averaged 55 wins per season.

In other words, with any kind of average defence, this could have been a special team.

But as we all know, they didn't provide average defence. Their defence was historically bad.

WORST DEFENSIVE RATING

SINCE 2000-01

2008-09 Kings 114.7

2005-06 Sonics 114.4

2008-09 Wizards 113.6

2008-09 Warriors 113.3

2009-10 Raptors 113.12

The Raptors had the 5th worst defence of this decade and the 10th worst defence of all-time. Of the 30 worst defences of all-time, just two, this season's Raptors and the 81-82 Nuggets managed to win 40 games, so that's an accomplishment.

With that being said, every move the Raptors make this off-season should be with an eye on just maintaining their offensive output while greatly improving their defensive performance.

I'll have much more to say on that in the coming months, but off the top of my head, here are a couple off-season ideas:

1. Sign-and-trade Chris Bosh to Houston for Trevor Ariza and Chuck Hayes

2. Sign Marcus Camby to replace Bosh. Overpay him. Do what it takes. Under any circumstances.

3. Sign-and-trade Raymond Felton from Charlotte for Jarrett Jack. Let offence (Calderon) or defence (Felton) win the starting job at the point.

Your lineup would then look like this:

Calderon / Felton at the point

Weems / DeRozan at shooting guard

Ariza / Turkoglu at small forward

Bargnani / Camby / Hayes / Johnson (if you can keep him) as your bigs

You'd be sacrificing a certain amount of offence to get a lot better at defence. I don't expect the team to make all these moves, but the Raptors need to improve on defence at each of the three positions on the floor (point, wing, post), so hopefully they address at least a couple of those spots.

Ball v.1.36

This was the best offensive team in Raptors franchise history (104.1 pts per game), and it was the worst defensive team in franchise history (105.9 pts against per game).

There really isn't much else to say (at least for tonight).

Ball v.1.35

Back in August, I cited a John Hollinger article that said the following:

"I guess what I'm saying is I have no idea how this will work out... It's easy to split the difference and say they'll be a .500-ish team, but I don't think that will be the outcome. I'm expecting either a brilliant success or a spectacular failure, and I'm not really sure which."

The lesson: Don't overthink things, just split the difference, predict a 40-42 record and call it a day.

Anyways, I'm going to re-post a lot of what I wrote back on that day, only because it came all the way back in August, and a lot of it has come "true" so to speak (and because the majority of people disagreed with me after I wrote it):

I think the conventional wisdom (especially in these parts) is that the Raptors have guaranteed a playoff spot with their moves this past off-season, and that consensus might be right. But I (and apparently I'm not alone) have my doubts, and here's why: This team has the makings of a truly awful defensive outfit.

QUICK ANALYSIS

I jumped over to basketball-reference.com to do a quick analysis using defensive metrics (quick aside: there's no need to talk about the limitations of defensive stats in basketball, we're all aware of their limitations, but we need to use something). Here's what I found:

The Raptors finished 22nd in Defensive Rating last season. In this decade (9 seasons), 11 teams have made the playoffs when finishing that low in Defensive Rating. Of those 11 teams, 9 of them lost in the 1st round of the playoffs. One of the teams that made it into the 2nd round was the 2005 Sonics, and they were lucky enough to play in the first round against a team that was as bad defensively as they were.

So, a team that was ranked 22nd defensively last season trades Moon/Marion for Turkoglu (defensive downgrade), and Parker/Kapono for Wright/Bellineli/DeRozan (neutral, maybe slight upgrade), while keeping the rest of their starters the same. Doesn't common sense say, at best, they stay the same defensively next season?

I don't know how else to put it: Not one team that's been as bad defensively as the Raptors were last season has made it past the 2nd round of the playoffs this decade.

ONE MORE WAY OF LOOKING AT IT

Here's another way of looking at it: I gathered all of the individual defensive ratings for the starters on each of the Eastern Conference champions since the beginning of this decade. The theory being we should be able to get a good snapshot at what it takes to win in this conference. Here are the ratings (the lower the better)

EASTERN CONFERENCE CHAMPIONS

STARTERS AVG. DEFENSIVE RATING

2009 ORL - 101.8

2008 BOS - 98.4

2007 CLE - 101.2

2006 MIA - 104.4

2005 DET - 101.4

2004 DET - 102.0

2003 NJ - 97.8

2002 NJ - 99.2

2001 PHI - 98.2

Now, I know you're all wondering, what is the average rating for Toronto's projected starters? Well, we don't have a rating for DeRozan, so we'll slot Antoine Wright into the starting SG spot for now, and here's what you get: 109.6.

It's tough to put into words how awful that is. All I can say is, for those of you who think Toronto's success next season is a given, I'd be more than a bit worried about how the team plans on keeping the ball out of their own hoop.

Anyways, so my semi-prediction of a defensive rating of 109.6 comes awfully close to Toronto's current rating of 110.2. That's all I'm saying. Allow me to gloat for a bit.....

.....

Ok I'm done.

WOW...

This team looks good when they play a team that's giving a solid 64% on the floor. Some post-game notes:

- What I'm most impressed with about Amir Johnson: 6-7 FT... just the third time in his career he's hit at least 80% from the line (min. 5 att)

- Calderon's 12th career turnover-less game with at least 10 assists

- Turkoglu with 8+ rebounds for 3rd straight game - longest streak for him since 2007

- Raps had a season-high 37 assists, which ties the NBA season high for road assists. Let's put this in even more perspective: First off, if you're ever tracking assists, track road assists, they're much more "legit." So that being said, since the turn of the century, road teams have put up 37 assists or more just 25 times. That's in over 12,000 games! That means it happens about once every 480 games.

HOME 'COOKIN (OF THE STATS)

Let's take this assist thing a bit further... I'm going to list the leaders in double-digit road assist games (with how many times they've done it at home in parantheses):

Nash 26 (27)

D. Williams 24 (24)

Rondo 18 (26)

Kidd 14 (21)

Other notables:

James 10 (14)

J. Calderon 4 (2)

Devin Harris 0 (7)

M. Ellis 0 (5)

D. Rose 1 (5)

M. Williams 1 (5)

I'm shocked by the Deron Williams thing. I guess the commonly-held belief that assists are easy to come by in Utah isn't necessarily accurate. Rondo getting some love from the home stat guys, and I'm sure Mark Cuban threatens to fire his stat guys if they don't pad Jason Kidd's assist totals.

Ball v.1.34

A quick playoff race primer:

Toronto owns a one-game lead over the Bulls with 5 to play. They also own the tie-breaker against the Bulls regardless of the one game remaining between the two.

This is not news.

But let's put it into perspective and try to explain why John Hollinger still says the Raptors have an 86% of making the playoffs (though admittedly, that number doesn't take Chris Bosh's injury into account).

Let's consider two scenarios: One where the Raptors beat the Bulls in their head-to-head matchup, and one where the Bulls win.

First, if Toronto beats Chicago on Sunday, for all intents and purposes, the race is over, regardless of what happens in the other games.

Chicago would need to make up 3 games in the remaining part of the schedule. So, they would need to go a minimum of 3-1 against Cleveland, New Jersey, Boston, and Charlotte, while Toronto would need to 1-3 or 0-4 against Boston, Atlanta, Detroit, and New York. What is the likelihood of Chicago going 4-0 combined with Toronto going 1-3? Or the likelihood of Chicago going 3-1 with Toronto going 0-4? I'd say about 2 percent.

Now, let's assume Chicago beats Toronto on Sunday. That would mean Chicago only needs to make up one game to overtake the Raptors in the standings. But that's still easier said than done. Assuming Toronto takes care of business against teams with nothing to play for (Detroit and New York), Chicago still needs to go 3-1 against their opponents to get the playoff spot. Again, this isn't very likely.

The big question is: Can Toronto take care of business against those poor teams without Chris Bosh?

Ball v.1.33

So, Chris Bosh broke his face. Where do the Raptors go from here?

(Quick aside: I understand the point of view held by our friend Mr. Grange, who wrote yesterday that there really is no difference between finishing 8th or 9th in the East. Grange went on to say that it would have probably been in the franchise's best interests to tank last season and earn a higher draft pick than what they got -- Mr. DeRozan -- and I certainly can't argue with that logic. However, regardless of the futility involved with following this team, what is the alternative? The Blue Jays? So I'm still going to bang out some blog posts until it's all over)

Anyways, as I was saying, where do the Raptors go from here? What questions should be asked at this particular point?

To me, I think there are two practical questions to ask:

1. What will Jay Triano likely do in terms of minute distribution without Bosh?

2. What should Triano do in terms of minute distribution without Bosh?

If he is going to be out for a game, two games, the rest of the season, whatever... I want to know whether the team is making the right call with their new rotation.

ANSWERS

Triano actually has more options than you think, and he showed them last night. There are two obvious or likely choices (Amir Johnson and Reggie Evans), a less likely choice (move Bargnani to the 4 and have Rasho Nesterovic at the 5), and an even less likelier choice (go small and have Hedo Turkoglu play the 4).

First off, the Turk hasn't been all that bad as a 4 in a small lineup this season. He's a -6 this year as a Power Forward (compared to minus a hundred and something overall). Obviously this isn't a potential "extended" solution, but I think you'll see Triano more likely to throw this lineup out there a bit more than before (probably not against Atlanta, but you could see it against Boston and Chicago).

Next, you saw Rasho get some burn last night. Let me be clear, regardless of matchups, Rasho being on the floor should be avoided as much as humanly possible. The Raptors get outscored by 10 points per 100 possessions when Rasho is on the floor. To put that in perspective, I've gone crazy this season at how many minutes DeMar DeRozan gets, and the team only gets outscored by 7 points per 100 possessions when he is on the floor. Anyways, granted Rasho hasn't played all that much, and some of those minutes have come in garbage time, but the numbers back up what my eyes tell me: Rasho can't move anymore, and moving is an essential part of being a useful basketball player.

So, based on this, it seems like the obvious and likely scenario is to have a standard three-man big rotation with Andrea Bargnani, Amir Johnson, and Reggie Evans. I think most people would suggest you should just move Johnson into the starting lineup and go from there, however, the more Evans plays, the more the numbers are starting to say something fairly startling. That's why I think he should start alongside Bargnani. And it's why I think he should start alongside Bosh when/if the time comes.

Let me build my case:

First off, and in simplest terms: With Evans on the floor, the Raptors outscore their opponents by 2.15 points per 100 possessions (best mark on the team).

Why is that possible? Why does it happen? Well, fans and writers (including myself) have commented on how much better Toronto's defence is when Amir Johnson is on the floor, and it's true, the defence is better. Overall, Toronto's defence allows 110 points per 100 possessions (last in the NBA). When Johnson is on the floor, they allow just 107.3 points per 100 possessions (which would rank in a tie for 22nd in the NBA with Phi and NO).

That's good, but it's not that good.

I'm reminded of a classic bit from one of my favourite movies of all-time. Go here (0:33 mark, not safe for work, well unless you work at a really cool place). Amir Johnson makes Toronto's defence better, but he's still not a great defender. In other words, Raptor fans are starving, and Amir is just a regular old cracker, not a Ritz.

Now, getting back to my point, and to further the analogy, Reggie Evans is a Ritz for starving Raptors fans. With Evans on the floor, opponents are scoring just 100.6 points per 100 possessions, a mark that would rank tied for fifth in the NBA with the Milwaukee Bucks. Now that is the best cracker I've ever had!

One more way of looking at it: 82games tracks the PER of the opponent that you are covering on the floor of every minute you play. It's a bit of a flawed statistic (defence isn't 100% individual... if you rotate away from your man to help on some penetration from the off-wing and your man ends up slamming home an alley-oop because someone else failed to rotate down, is it really fair that your man got those two points?) but it still tells stories that seem to make sense. For example, Calderon's opponents produce the highest PER of any individual on the team (which he offsets by having the 2nd highest PER of his own on the team). Anyways, here are Toronto's big men, listed by their Opponent's PER:

Evans 11.1

Bosh 18.1

Bargnani 19.1

Johnson 19.8

Nesterovic 21.6

Reggie gets after it defensively. And that's why I think he should start for the remainder of this season and the playoffs.

One more reason Reggie is quickly becoming a favourite of mine, and it's my Stat of the Day

STAT OF THE DAY

CHARGES PER 40 MINUTES - NBA LEADERS

Nick Collison 1.45

Reggie Evans 1.36

Jose Juan Barea 1.26

Kyle Lowry 1.25

Jared Jeffries 1.20

Quick note: There was a great article I read just the other day about the value of taking a charge, and for the life of me, I can't find it anywhere. But essentially, the idea was this: A charge is more valuable than a block because a block only changes the possession about 50% of the time. So, players who take charges are probably undervalued in most people's eyes.

By the way, here's my quick take on why this Evans-in-the-starting-lineup thing won't happen: Jay Triano is an offensive-minded coach, and Bryan Colangelo is an offensive-minded GM. They would rather have Amir Johnson out there because he can run the floor, and dunk the basketball, and make some pretty plays. If I was selling the Toronto Raptors to the public, I would rather have Johnson out there too. But if I were trying to win games, then Evans would be on the floor, no questions asked.

Ball v.1.32

Had a reader chime in with this today: "Player A just got lit up by a rookie in yesterday's game, was a -15, while Player B was +14 and almost single handedly got us back into the game!"

May I refer you to the many times I've mentioned the issues with sample sizes and the problem with using one-game plus/minus to make/break arguments.

Ball v.1.31

Let's compare two players using 82games.com data:

Comparison #1: When Player A has been on the floor this season, his team has outscored their opposition by 7 points. When Player B has been on the floor, they've been outscored by 108 points. Who has the edge?

Comparison #2: If you only counted the score when Player A was on the floor in each game, his team's record would be 28-25. If you only counted the score when Player B was on the floor in each game, the team's record would be 28-38. Who has the edge?

Comparison #3: Player A has turned the ball over 82 times as a result of a bad pass or bad ballhandling. Player B has turned it over 127 times using the same criteria. Who has the edge?

Comparison #4: Player A & Player B have both played over 300 minutes with the same set of four other players. Player A is +6 with those players, Player B is -91. Who has the edge?

Comparison #5: Offensively, the team is 4 points per 100 possessions better when Player A is on the floor. The team is 0.6 points per 100 possessions better when Player B is on the floor. Who has the edge?

Comparison #6: Defensively, the team is 2 points per 100 possessions better when Player A is on the bench. The team is 3 points per 100 possessions better when Player B is on the bench. Who has the edge?

Comparison #7: The team grabs 49% of all available rebounds when Player A is on the floor. The team grabs 48.7% of all available rebounds when Player B is on the floor. Who has the edge?

SUMMARY

I want to post a message left by a reader (edited for length purposes):

Read your blog a bunch. Disagree with you a lot. But still read....

I do not think I have ever seen you use a numbers based argument (other than small sample size 5 man units or defensive ratings / offensive ratings of those sample sizes) to prove Calderon is better (than Jarrett Jack).

The whole sense I got from reading this guy's message was that he probably rips my blog on whatever message board people would thereotically talk about my blog (I highly doubt these so-called message boards exist, but if they did, I suspect he would rip me on them). But he tried to be civil while also ripping me since you know, he was writing on my website.

So anyways, that was the motivation for this quick little summation of everything I've been saying all season long about the Calderon/Jack debate. Or essentially, how it's not even a debate at all (I think you can guess the identities of Player A and Player B).

Calderon dominates in overall plus/minus and offensive metrics, and he even comes out (just slightly) ahead in areas you think Jack should dominate (defensive numbers and rebounding).

Listen, that doesn't mean I'm suggesting Calderon is a better defender or rebounder than Jack. BUT, if Jack were THAT much better of a defender or rebounder than Calderon, you would expect to see the numbers back him up.

So if Jack's presence on the floor isn't having a tangible impact defensively or on the glass, then it's no contest who the better point guard is, because Calderon's presence on the floor has a huge impact offensively.

I hope this clears everything up. You may resume ripping me on your message boards (if said message boards happen to exist).