I've Got the Giggles

Take that, Carlos Delfino's demon vines!

Also, I hope you enjoy this latest joint effort from Ziller and myself. Warning: Twilight jokes ahead. No, we didn't get any free shirts.

FD Guest Lecture: Rising from the Whirl

Guest post today from Scout PT, whose ideas over email could not be denied.

Recently, I've been thinking about the job of a point guard—what he does and, more specifically, how he's measured. Basketball, as those who read FD know, is often opaque to numerical analysis. Baseball and football have discrete plays which provide clarity in the evaluation of individual actions. Strikeouts. Yards per attempt. OPS+. Basketball is a flow game and thus harder to measure. The player at the center of the flow—the point guard (and I include here for intellectual completeness point forwards, point centers, and point gauze-wrapping trainers...)—is perhaps the hardest to measure.

In the general discourse, PGs are measured first on assists - themselves, the most subjective of all major sports statistics, relying on the charity of a scorer to judge whether a player is credited for facilitating a direct move to the basket. Did or didn't, 8.3 per game or 5.1, no shades of gray, no description of quality, no description of whether the PG hit his forward in stride for a power lay-in or whether he chucked it up for the center to wrestle through four guys for an ugly bucket. Beyond assists, other measures of a PG's effectiveness include points and concepts like assist/turnover ratios—useful numbers, when considered in the proper context. Scoring 30 points a game is great, unless four dudes are watching the other player—sadly, often the best player on the team—go one-on-five every time down the court. The game is about the team and the rhythm. The extra pass. Moving off the ball. Getting everyone on the squad to move off the ball, and then to make the extra pass. That's what a PG should do. That, to me, is the magic, and point guards are the magicians.

How, then, does one measure magic? I've had a few discussions in which certain players are dismissed as "gunners", "ballhogs" or "just plain bad shooters". The determination is usually made by examining shooting percentages. Kidd and Cousy, two of the greatest court magicians, have horrible career shooting percentages, even adjusting for style-of-play in Cousy's era, and often receive criticism for such performance. Does that bad number mean they're bad shooters? Conscience-less gunners? I don't think so. Both guys had pretty good career foul-shooting percentages and, in the case of Kidd, decent 3-point shooting percentage. When they wanted to, each of them could turn it on and dominate. Outside, inside, whatever. Neither of these guys is Rajon Rondo.



One might consider styles when attempting to measure magic. On the other end of the shooting percentage spectrum are guys like Stockton and Nash (at least, in the glory years). Stockton, in particular, posted crazy numbers. Super crazy for a 6 foot 1 player. My gut tells me that the reason was that Stockton and the glory-years Nash were very disciplined shooters. They took shots they thought they could make and didn't take ones that they didn't, and didn't put themselves in positions where they'd end up with bad shots. That's how you shooting 57 percent from the field. But does that mean that Kidd and Cousy were undisciplined? Kidd, maybe, but Cousy? Aw, hell naw.

Here's what else my gut tells me. Cousy and Kidd have very similar styles. They're the kind of PGs that give the best shots to their teammates. Let's call them Superior PGs, in the I Ching sense of Superior. To illustrate, just think about the flow for a minute. If the ball ends up in the Superior PG's hand with 3 seconds left on the clock and he's stuck in a place he hates shooting from. Too bad but somebody still has to shoot the rock. Kidd and Cousy probably take that shot. Another guy might look to dish because he's in bad-spot hell, but I think guys like Cousy and Kidd take ownership for not executing in the first place and letting things get that bad and take the shot.

See, if the Superior PG dishes to his big for an easy lay-in after he drives and draws the big's man, that's doing his job right. But the shooting percentage win goes to his big. If the big's guy doesn't switch and the Superior PG is stuck under the basket looking at a wall of the wrong colored uniforms and thinking about which of a bunch of bad options is the least bad, all that happened because he's not doing his job right. The Superior PG might still take the shot from a bad spot because a) he didn't do something right in the first place and b) someone still needs to shoot the damned ball. And if he drives and things actually go well, and the choice is for the Superior PG to take a good shot or to dish to a guy 5 feet farther in who has a better shot, well, you know what he'll do.

I note as an aside here that there is an unresolved issue in my mind as to whether there is more ego - and less Superior-ness - in taking the shot from underneath that wall of wrong-colored uniforms or in pre-empting the whole issue and making a 15 footer rather than driving in an attempt to get a switch and a lay-in for your big. I also note that much of the PG's choice is dictated by the quality of said big.



But all things require balance, even being Superior. The greatest of all our magicians, Magic himself, had a .520 career FG%. Superior? Not Superior? First, you have to back out the Showtime fast breaks. Half-court Magic has a shooting number much closer to that of mortal men. Still, Magic was a pretty good shooter and, if you'll remember, Magic used to catch a lot of shit in the press about overpassing. He'd have an easy lay-in on the way and WHOA LOOKIT THAT the ball would end up in Rambis's hands.

*FACEPALM*

To his credit, Magic always acted like he had the team's best interest at heart. I'm the assist man, he'd say, that's what I do. He was unselfish to the point of selfishness. It was only after he got it through his head that the game wasn't just about making gorgeous passes - whether for the benefit of teammates' scoring or his own prestidigitational glory - that he ended up scoring 24 a game and taking home MVP trophy #1. That, my friends, isn't ego. It's Superior.

So, we return to the central question. How do we measure magic? The answer is, you don't. You describe magic. Maybe someday soon, 82Games will figure out how to break every PG's game down into quanta. Then we can measure magic. Until then, we watch, we feel for the flow, we think, we debate about whether a Kidd or a Nash, a Stockton or a Cousy, a young Magic or an older Magic is truly Superior.

The Difference Between Cults and Cliques

There's already a little grumbling about Kidd's inclusion on Team USA, that he'll crowd out what should rightfully be the Chris Paul/Deron Williams show, that there's nothing he can do that those two can't do better, and that we should hurry up and get the torch-passing over with (as if it hasn't been passed already). I completely understand the desire to see Paul and Williams take center stage, but feel compelled to say that Jason Kidd is the absolute perfect fit for this incarnation of Team USA.

This might seem like an unusual stance to take given that I typically am fully in favor of embracing the future and burning the past, and there's no question that Kidd has been fully eclipsed at this point by those two. Paul and Deron don't have any dues left to pay or any lessons to learn by sitting behind Kidd. Similarly, this isn't about Kidd's years of service, the wisdom gained from them, or the locker room hierarchy that will supposedly help him manage the egos. Deference to our elders means little to me and I have no use for symbolic positions meant to honor past glories. Kidd was pretty underwhelming this year both during his disappointing Mavs reunion and certainly while sleepwalking with the Nets. I fully acknowledge that Paul can run circles around him at this point and that Deron actually has a jumpshot. But none of that changes the fact that the U.S.'s demolition of last summer's FIBA Americas Championship was a thrilling display of basketball, largely because of Kidd's role. Carmelo put up the stats, LeBron got the highlights, and Kobe basked in the defensive glory, but it was the aging Kidd who set the tone for the entire run in a way that Paul or Deron couldn't replicate.



As ecstatic as I get over the Paul-to-Chandler oop, it's almost entirely about Chris Paul's wizardry. Kidd's passes, on the other hand, are complete deferrals to the power and majesty of his finishers, which is exactly what this crowd needs. When Paul's at his finest, the players around him almost feel like props that are out there for his pleasure. LeBron James and Dwight Howard are anything but props. With those two, in addition to Kobe and Melo, this year should still be primarily about them and the terror they can inflict. They shouldn't be out there headless though, which makes the deteriorated Kidd the perfect compromise to set them up without taking any of their spotlight; to put the ball in the perfect place every time, while still allowing the finishers to lead.

If you didn't see or don't remember Kidd's FIBA performance, it was absolutely flawless, and something I can't wait to see recreated on an even bigger stage. The statline he ended up with doesn't appear striking (1.8 ppg, 3.3 rpg, and 4.6 apg in 15.9 mpg), but his two most important numbers were the just 10 shot attempts and 5 turnovers over the course of the 10 games. That second stat is especially staggering when one thinks back to the ridiculous array of passes he attempted. In particular, two of his botched passes stick out to me more than all of his successes: at one point he attempted a full-court bounce pass that weaved between three defenders, barely beating his streaking target to the spot. Even more impressive was the highlight of the entire tournament: the failed off-balance, off-the-backboard alley oop to LeBron from the 3-point line. Had LeBron connected (and he arguably should have), it would have gone down as the greatest pass I've ever seen.




Despite all the absurd pass attempts, he still ended up with a tournament-leading 9.2 ast/to ratio. That number is off the charts in a regular season, but in an intensified series of All-Star games, it just doesn't seem rational. But when you have LeBron and Dwight on the other end of your lobs and they're actually trying, you can usually get away with things you couldn't imagine anywhere else. Chris and Deron are definitely going to have their share of inspired plays, both by themselves and using their teammates, but with those two their highlights are manifestly of their creation, with their stamp always firmly affixed. In the NBA, this makes their play hugely preferable to Kidd's diminished game. Surrounded by other future HOFers though, I'll take Kidd's seemingly-less-authored genius every time.

At least as important as his awe-inspiring lobs was Kidd's unique approach to moving the ball that summer. He came into the tournament absolutely determined to never dribble the basketball, opting instead for full-court outlet passes after both makes and misses. He may have dribbled the ball 6 or 7 times over the entire week and a half, never holding the ball for more than a second or two. The "hot potato" style completely took over, as though the entire team collectively decided, "fuck dribbling," which translated to incredibly gorgeous basketball. Somehow a team starring Carmelo, Kobe, and LeBron managed to use hardly any isos at all, save for an occasional reassertion of Kobe's alpha status. On a team loaded with scorers, a point guard that needs to dominate the ball has the potential to disrupt the awesome flow that this group established last summer. With Kidd at the reigns, I feel confident we'll be treated once again to the steady stream of flawless touch passes we saw last August.



Chris Paul and Deron Williams are absolute virtuosos on the court. They'll be spectacular both this summer off the bench and as they lead us to the next 3 or 4 gold medals. But for this year, it's still all about Kidd setting the table without ever claiming the foreground. Not as a nostalgic tribute to what's come before, but because his current style is what will make for the most exciting and dominating basketball right now.

Nothing Ages You So Fast As Refusing To Mature

Quickly: I truly and seriously am coming to hate the MVP award. Next year, I'll just find the player who best embodies the most positive cliches and fucking say he should win. Why bother with shit like how well they actually played during the season when you have data like "rebounding is about desire. Kobe wants it more, so he's a better rebounder than LeBron" at your fingertips? Kobe is becoming the NBA's answer to Juno for me-I really like him, but his supporters are so overwhelmingly fawning, pretentious, and obnoxious that I have begun to loathe his very concept. Also, I have become convinced that Jason Collins is the NBA's answer to Pi: he is an elaborate inside joke on the public by NBA literati, an experiment to see if people will believe something truly horrendous has value they are unable to see if they say it enough. (Shoals: You can cut that out if you want. It just felt really good to write.)

















So anyways, the best player who has no way been tarnished by MVP talk this season, other than to call his hopes for the award hubris, has been Amare Stoudemire, who is very quietly putting together one of the best scoring seasons in a long, long time.

STATISTICAL INTERLUDE:

Amare's rocking 25 a night on 65% "True Shooting" which is FG% with free throws and threes in there too, basically making it better. The only other players, as far as I can tell, to post a higher TS% than Amare and score over 20 points a game are Kevin McHale and Charles Barkley. And that's it. Ever. Even a little bit scarier: The one thing "True Shooting" doesn't account for is "And-1" baskets, and Amare leads the league with 94 And-1 buckets.

RETURNING TO THE REGULARLY SCHEDULED PONTIFICATION:

So Amare's got 25/9/1.5 with some baggage in regards to the defensive end, on the previously mentioned historically nuts shooting percentage. Dirk won the thing on 24/9/3.5 on 60% true shooting and a whole hell of a lot of baggage on the defensive end, while KG's candidacy is far more legit than Amare's with 19.5/9.5/3.5 on 58%, as is DH with 21.2/14.4/1.5 on 62%.; While KG is quite beastly on the defensive end, and DH more than holds his own, Amare being at 13th in the race reeks of bullshit.



























(From the "Shit that's funny in retrospect" file: One Oscar-Nominated film in 1995 contained multiple instances of the phrase "Jew Motherfucker." It was not the one made by Mel Gibson, which won best picture.)

In reality, what Amare has gone and done is hit the glass ceiling of not being the guy who makes it happen on his team. So long as Nash wears the orange and purple and produces prodigiously, Amare will never receive his proper due, as his play is seen, to a degree, as a function of what Nash makes. Shawn Marion chafed under this to the point where he had to be moved, leaving his legacy as a perfect cog behind for a future as a flawed but uninhibited paradigm.















Nash and Amare now lie as the prime example of symbiosis in this league; both are the absolute best at what they do in terms of running a pick-and-roll, with Nash's unreal outside shot, ball-handling, and passing on the one end and Amare's explosion, ability to finish, ability to draw contact and hit free throws, and newly acquired deadly mid-range J on the other. As such, their success is inexorable from each other's talents: Both were very good before they found each other, but have now ascended based on the ability of the other.

Amare is a victim of the NBA's version of the Peter Principle- he's producing like a superstar, but is seen as a role player because his success is aided by the system he plays in rather than the system requiring him to sacrifice in order to aid those around him. To be given his proper due as a superstar, he must attempt to take on additional responsibilities until he inevitably hits an Iguodala-like wall or Curry/Kemp level all-out collapse.

















There's definitely some Peter Principle-type shit happening with the Suns, the most rigidly hierarchical team in the league-Nash has the ball in his hands, Shaq creates space, Raja makes open threes, Hill picks up slack throughout the facility, and Amare fills the existing space with aplomb.

The Suns make sense to us because they follow the rigid structure of our everyday life, while the Warriors operate on a constantly shifting paradigm in which Ellis, Davis, S-Jax, or even Harrington or Azubuike is capable of centering the offense around him based on the circumstances of the situation. And the Nuggets operate on a completely arbitrary system, with the strong but opaque notion of attack driving the team to an urgency that none of them really understand but are eager to execute.














Everybody says that the definition of a superstar is somebody who makes marginal players better. However, Amare is a superstar-level talent who is clearly made far better by the system that employs him, and him and Nash thrive because they make life easier for each other instead of one relying inordinately on the other to make life easy for him-Amare doesn't only look for wide-open dunks when he's around Nash, and Nash doesn't throw the ball into Amare and wait at the three-point line for open jump shots-instead, they both work in harmony with each other to produce the perfect high pick-and-roll.

Right now the NBA Peter Principle seems to dictate that anybody who is associated with the words "Most Valuable" has a god-given responsibility to shoulder a gigantic burden, while role players' respective strengths should be nurtured to the best ability of the team.

It's wouldn't seem to be all that radical of an idea, getting guys who make life easier for your superstars, but it seems to be one completely lost on NBA teams, who instead seem to be hell-bent on milking their superstars for all they're worth.




















Two major trades related to this principle occurred this season-the Shaq trade originally caused no small level of distress here and made me wish that the Suns had just traded Amare to the Hawks and officially given up on the dream, but by getting a guy who can create space for a guy who excels with space given to him by Nash, they unleashed the beast within Amare and have found something radical and new in the context of the half-court offense.

The 76ers made the de facto swap of Kyle Korver, a lights-out shooter, for Thaddeus Young, a slasher on a team full of them. On the surface, this wouldn't make a whole lot of sense, but taking the burden off of 'Dres Miller and Iguodala has transformed the 6ers into a shifting and furious full-speed attack.

Of course, this logic would seem to suggest that the Kidd trade would have worked instead of completing the downward spiral of the Dynasty That Would Be. Well, Dirk actually is a lot better with Kidd on the team, and if you saw them against the Warriors it's clear that the Kidd-fueled Maverick attack is pretty fucking scary, although the Warriors can't guard anybody at all right now. If I ever dared to question Don Nelson, I would be worried that his Bataan death-march rotation and suicide-style of play has worn the Warriors down for their playoff push, but I am confident this is all part of Nellie's master plan. Also, Harris is a guy who creates a good deal more for himself and others than people realize-Kidd's actually been more of a catch-and-shoot guy for the Mavs than Harris was. And Harris is pretty clearly an upgrade over Kidd defensively at this point in their respective careers. (The moral of the story: when you trade a 24-year old making the rookie scale for a 35-year old guard making max money and throw in DeSagnia Diop, expiring contracts, and draft picks, you should probably be absolutely positive that the player you're getting is better than the player you gave up.)























(I'm pretty sure I found this picture on this site. Occasionally, we must make sure that some things are never forgotten.)

If you follow the Cavs, it's shocking how different the offense looks with Delonte West playing with LeBron, as he pushes the ball to get LeBron transition opportunities and can tilt the defense with the ball in his hands to keep things from stacking up on LeBron, often leading to a resounding LBJ dunk off a simple dribble-handoff. And this was the third string point guard on the Sonics. Team USA showed that LeBron can be a fairly deadly shooter when he's allowed to set his feet and get a look at the target, but he takes a higher portion of his threes off the dribble than anyone else in the league. However, the conventional wisdom seems to be that LeBron should be surrounded by spot-up shooters who he can do all the work for.


























MAKING IT EXPLICIT-There seems to be a notion that the relationship between elite slashers/post-up players and spot-up shooters is symbiotic, as shooters supposedly keep the defense from "bunching up" and provide space for the stars in which to work. I find this to be mostly a load of crap-from watching guys like Kobe, CP3, LeBron, and Duncan, I can tell you that spot-up shooters get open looks via those guys about 95% more than those guys get open lanes via their shooters. For a case study, the Cavs have made the de facto swap of Eric Snow (possibly the worst outside shooting backcourt player in the league) for TITS GIBSON (arguably the best three-point shooter in the league this year other than Nash, who is a complete freak), and the upgrade gives LeBron perhaps a quarter-step more space than before-Snow and Boobie get left alone just the same, but Boobie can actually make the defense pay when the defense leaves him alone.

On a common sense level, I'd set a 40% three-point shooter up with a wide-open look and give him all the time he could possibly need before I'd leave LeBron or Duncan's man without help, because they're going to score in that situation like 90% of the time. The relationship between stars and spot-up shooters is, at best, a 90-10 proposition in terms of benefit.















Howard is one of the best guys in however long at getting and converting alley-oops and quick catch-and-dunks, to the point where he's scoring 20 points a game without an especially nice post game or any outside shot to speak of, but his status as a superstar has the Magic convinced that he should stick himself in the post and be surrounded with shooters instead of finding a more suitable option at point than Jameer Nelson to get him the looks he enjoys.

This is why I'm glad my boy O.J. Mayo had a fairly innocuous freshman year instead of a Durant/Beasley like star turn-as a role player, O.J.'s deadly shot and first step will be complimented by whichever team lands him, while Durant, and soon Beasley, were thrown straight into the fire of being the guy whose responsibility it is to nurture the rest of his team.



















The MVP race reflects the NBA's strict sense of hierarchy-one man is the superstar of his team, and all the rest are there to benefit from him, driven by a sense that every NBA team has one ideal play, with their superstar as the sole catalyst, that they run 110 times a game. However, in Amare Stoudemire, a superstar who keeps the trappings and benefits of a role player, we see the argument for a more collective effort, in which roles are symbiotic, each player helping all others, including the supposed superstars. And that's why a glimmer of hope still lies in the Suns.