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I was thinking about this recently and then stumbled upon a topic about Rondo's assist streak being kept alive so it sounds relevant:

Almost everyone has read or heard that in the past assists were scored differently (as in it was more difficult to get an assist even if you passed the ball to the player who scored). I also remember someone mentioning in another thread watching an old Celtics game in which Bob Cousy led all players with 7 assists when to the eye test of a 21st-century basketball fan he should have been in double digits.

So I ask: when did assists counting change? Was it an explicit rule change (not a rule per se but a guideline for scoring an assist)? Did it just happen as an evolution of the statisticians as they started to acknowledge passes that didn't directly lead to a score without a dribble?

Is it safe to assume assist counting has always been done loosely and has been at the mercy of the score keepers? There are also theories about certain teams inflating their players' stats at home. Is there any truth to that? If there is, assists look like a thing that could be swayed by that way more than rebounds for instance.

On a side note, I vaguely remember someone else mentioning watching Walt Frazier's legendary 1970 Finals game 7 in which he was credited with 19 assists and that person sweared he could count far less than that. So maybe at the end of the 1960s they were already giving assists very loosely.

I really hope someone knows more about the history of assist counting and I'd appreciate any insight into it.

I still hope someone offers an insight into this. Is counting assists really that subjective or did at some point statisticians change the way they count assists?

I've bitched about how overstated the assist is (especially if it's not scored the right way).

But I have another problem with the assist as a statistic; it's one thing to recognize a teammate being open for an easy basket and hitting him for a look you know he'll hit at a high percentage. It's a whole different story if all you do is have the ball the whole game and pass the ball to teammates 80 times hoping they shoot it every time.

I'm not saying that's totally how it breaks down, but as an offensive efficiency metric the assist is lacking. I think a better way to measure it would be: what percentage of passes after a teammate has taken a shot leads to an actual assist? That way you're better measuring whether a guy is making the right reads on a per-possession basis or if he's just giving it up to guys who like to shoot the ball a lot, playing in a really high-pace offense, etc.

So you'd have stats like:
FGA/pass into a shot
FG/pass into a shot
FG%/pass into a shot

ie Mike Conley passes it to Marc 5 times, Marc takes the shot 3 times and makes it twice.
So just to make it clearer:
3 Field Goal attempts/5 passes into a shot
2 FG/5 passes into shots
2FG/3FGA=.666FG%/pass into a shot

I think that would be a lot better at measuring the kinds of looks you actually create for teammates and how good you are at reading offensive situations. And I don't think it would be that hard to keep track of.

The other problem with the assist is that it also rewards guys who play in a system where people are more likely to take jumpers, because if you're dropping it off to guys down low, a lot of the time they're getting fouled and going to the line instead of scoring a basket. I don't know if it breaks down that way statistically, but that's what I suspect anyway.

In the old days, it almost had to be a layup before the passer got credited for an assist. I don't know when it changed.

Put it this way.

Bob Cousy won an assist title averaging 7apg in an era where teams scored well over 100ppg average.

The assist stat is ridicilous. I have seen guys get an assist after the person they passed to took three dribbles and did a spin move.

I think at the moment you are given an assist if you are the last person to pass to someone before they score. Even if they waste 20 seconds of the clock in an iso move.

While todays assist numbers are inflated: they're just as inflated as Stocktons and Magics numbers. So Rondos features isn't less impressive than theirs, we'd have to go back longer to actually notice a difference. Cousy is a good example.

While assists are obviously an indication of a good passer, making the right play determines who's a great floor general. Oscar Robertson is one of the 2-3 best passers ever, and averaged 10 apg or more for a lot of seasons with Cincy. But when he played his first season with KAJ, he only averaged about seven apg. Why was that? For one thing, Milwaukee played more of a passing game, and Oscar didn't have to control the ball as much as did in Cincy. For another, even though you'd think Oscar would get about 15 apg with a scorer like KAJ, the fact that they used KAJ for a lot of iso meant whoever threw the ball to him, mostly Oscar, rarely got credited for an assist. If they had some sort of stat for making the play that led to a basket, Oscar would easily have led the league. But while he made sure A-J got the ball in good position to make his moves, he rarely got an assist for it.

Vindicater wrote:Put it this way.

Bob Cousy won an assist title averaging 7apg in an era where teams scored well over 100ppg average.

The assist stat is ridicilous. I have seen guys get an assist after the person they passed to took three dribbles and did a spin move.

I think at the moment you are given an assist if you are the last person to pass to someone before they score. Even if they waste 20 seconds of the clock in an iso move.

It's hard to believe you even know what a basketball looks like if you really think this is true

[Presence] wrote:

Vindicater wrote:Put it this way.

Bob Cousy won an assist title averaging 7apg in an era where teams scored well over 100ppg average.

The assist stat is ridicilous. I have seen guys get an assist after the person they passed to took three dribbles and did a spin move.

I think at the moment you are given an assist if you are the last person to pass to someone before they score. Even if they waste 20 seconds of the clock in an iso move.

It's hard to believe you even know what a basketball looks like if you really think this is true

He's obviously exaggerating, but I've seen some ridiculous assists being handed out where a player just swings the ball and the receiving player at the 3 point line does some fancy work, gets around his defender and lays it in.

"credited to a player tossing the last pass leading directly to a field goal, only if the player scoring the goal responds by demonstrating immediate reaction to the basket."

this is the NBA rule of an assist now, and I do believe there is a time limit something like 5-8 seconds. 20 seconds is highly exaggerated.

KGboss wrote:"credited to a player tossing the last pass leading directly to a field goal, only if the player scoring the goal responds by demonstrating immediate reaction to the basket."

this is the NBA rule of an assist now, and I do believe there is a time limit something like 5-8 seconds. 20 seconds is highly exaggerated.

what if he fakes a pass then scores? that's not immediate reaction to the basket. What if someone does like a Rondo behind the back fake and lays it in?

I've seen a player hesitate to shoot..bounce the ball a few times and then shoot and it wasn't counted as an assist. Yet weaving through traffic then scoring is an assist.

Anyone have further insight into this? Feel like it's relevant for the same reasons OP originally brought it up and feel like we never get good information about this except for some mediocre article from Deadspin or whatever about Chris Paul.

And to say, "Well everyone does it, so it's not really a big deal, it all balances out" seems like a total cop-out answer that sort of intellectually dishonest. If we're trying to look at what's actually happening with all these bogus assists being handed out (if there's a negative consequence to it, etc.) I'd like to hear from someone who maybe has something to say about it that hasn't already been said.

2009-2022: 23 AST/G vs. 85 FGA/G.

1960-1973: 23 AST/G vs. 102 FGA/G.

Ergo, players from the Wilt Chamberlain Era should have their assists adjusted upwards about 20% to adjust for the massive rule/rule interpretation changes.

Thoughts?

yeah assist numbers in the nba are pretty wack... If the player that gets the ball creates their own shot it shouldnt be an assist.

More reason to not compare across eras. But we will because we're ball fans.

ty 4191 wrote:2009-2022: 23 AST/G vs. 85 FGA/G.

1960-1973: 23 AST/G vs. 102 FGA/G.

Ergo, players from the Wilt Chamberlain Era should have their assists adjusted upwards about 20% to adjust for the massive rule/rule interpretation changes.

Thoughts?

Think how many triple-doubles Big O and Wilt would have racked up if they counted assists then like they do now

One heck of a random necro post.

But it’s fascinating for the assist to FGA ratio being much higher these days. I don’t think you can adjust stats (not including corrections) from the past. That’s a slippery slope.

I think it has more to do with the quality of the scorekeepers and how much home cooking goes on than the era in history. John Stockton's assist per game average at home was much higher than on road games for example.

CIN-C-STAR wrote:Think how many triple-doubles Big O and Wilt would have racked up if they counted assists then like they do now

Answer: A lot more. Like 20% more in today's game.

How about if they had counted blocks, for Wilt's career? At all? He averaged somewhere around 8 blocks per game, career, and gets zero statistical credit for it.

I mean, not all assists are created equal like not all points or rebounds are. Every stat has varying difficulty or value. One shot might be entirely self-created, another just a cleanup bucket. That's why we contextualize stats and break things down further.