Atlanta @ Toronto

[tontoz]

While Acie isn't likely playing as much *with* the starters, he's also not playing as much *against* starters.

.

So are you trying to say our bench players are on par with the bench players of other teams? I sure hope not.

Blo Wright has made 4 baskets on the season. Ditto Solomon. Zaza is shooting 35.6%, Shelden 37%.

The only bench players who can score are Childress and Lue.

AJ has played slightly less than twice as many minutes as Acie on the season. However he has played over 4 times as many minutes with the starters as Acie has. No question that works in his favor.

Bottomline, Acie Law hasn't earned major minutes this season, while Anthony Johnson has. I have no problem with Acie getting the backup minutes.

Seems like everyone has forgotten that Acie lost the starting job due to injury, not poor play.

Basically, if the player's box score stats are awful, you're not likely to find justification for them by digging deeper into less wieldy stats like +/- or PER.

All of killbuckers opinions are based on those two stats.

[High 5]

There's no question that AJ has outplayed Law thus far this year, but Law is going to get another chance tomorrow to show what he can do. He needs to start making shots eventually.

[killbuckner]

You are manipulating stats like usual.

LOL you just can't handle the truth.

You say i am manupulating stats but you give no examples. Just like you make up things claiming i said them.

The fact is that the most successful 5 man unit the Hawks have had this year includes Acie, not AJ or Lue.

Neither you or kb can say anything to refute that.

Uhhh... Tontoz... I will refute that by pointing out its completely false. I have absolutely no idea how you can be so consistently flat out wrong- even looking up stats is too difficult for you. The most productive 5 man unit that the Hawks have is AJ, Joe, Marvin, Smith, and Horford. (+28). Actually the most productive unit for Law is playing with Shelden and Childress which would sure seem to indicate that playing with backups (and AGAINST backups) is helping Acie's +/- and not hurting it. But once again way to go proving to everyone that you will ignore reality when it doesn't fit with what you want to believe.

Honestly I was pretty much done tryign to convince you about this. I don't particularly care if you want to stick your head in the sand about Acie's actual production. But flat out lying about the stats? Seriously get a grip kid. I am starting to feel really bad for you.

[smabie]

Uhhh... Tontoz... I will refute that by pointing out its completely false. I have absolutely no idea how you can be so consistently flat out wrong- even looking up stats is too difficult for you. The most productive 5 man unit that the Hawks have is AJ, Joe, Marvin, Smith, and Horford. (+28). Actually the most productive unit for Law is playing with Shelden and Childress which would sure seem to indicate that playing with backups (and AGAINST backups) is helping Acie's +/- and not hurting it. But once again way to go proving to everyone that you will ignore reality when it doesn't fit with what you want to believe.

Actually, over 377 minutes, AJ and main starters at +29. Over 83 minutes Law & same starters are at +8.

Meaning, AJ has played with those players slightly more than 4.5 times as long as AC has.

So, if you stretched AC's numbers over 377 minutes, he would have a +36 with the starters (36.34 more accurately).

Likewise, if you condensed AJ's numbers down to 83 minutes, he would have around +6 (6.38, to be specific).

+8 is more than +6.38. +36.34 is greater than +29.

Note that I'm not arguing for more reliance on AC; just applying the numbers. My position is play AC more/Lue less, and if you're playing through a 3rd or 4th quarter and going 10 minutes without a FG, maybe putting AC in might be a better option than sitting with your thumb up your @$$.

Any questions?

[tontoz]

The most productive 5 man unit that the Hawks have is AJ, Joe, Marvin, Smith, and Horford. (+28).

As usual you ignore stats that don't suit your purposes.

That is flat out wrong. First of all the lineup you have above doesn't even have a winning record. Secondly +28 for 377 minutes simply isn't as good as +8 for 83 minutes. That is just grade school math using per minutes played.

Actually the most productive unit for Law is playing with Shelden and Childress

Again there is the issue of small sample sizes. I, unlike you, ignore stats with small sample sizes because i know they aren't reliable. That lineup has only played together 22 minutes.

You have said time and again that i had no statistical evidence to support Acie starting. Then when i provide exactly that you try to discredit it. Typical.

which would sure seem to indicate that playing with backups (and AGAINST backups) is helping Acie's +/- and not hurting

That is just plain dumb. If Acie is +8 playing with the starters, and his overall +/- is bad, then that has to mean that Acie's +/- is being hurt from playing with lineups that don't include all the starters.

Now lets look at all the lineups on that page. This list only shows lineups that have played together for at least 17 minutes. Counting Acies +/- for every lineup on that page i come up with -22.

However Acies total +/- is -67. So where is the additional -45 coming from, Mr Statman?

You won't answer because you can't without making yourself look foolish.

[tontoz]

smabie nice post but don't expect killbuckner to respond. He ignores stats when they don't back up his argument.

It must kill him that his beloved +/- is betraying him.

[killbuckner]

Tontoz- you have to be kidding me. I can't even believe you are digging your hole deeper and deeper.

Shelden is the only player on the team that Acie is positive with.

Here are the worst 3 Hawks on the team for +/-.

Zaza -21
Childress -22
Law -67

But you still think that his teammates are the ones dragging down Acie's +/-!? Ridiculous. Have fun living in your world of denial. I have giftwapped this information for you so many times and its clear that you just have no interest in having reality affect your little dreamworld.

[tontoz]

Tontoz- you have to be kidding me. I can't even believe you are digging your hole deeper and deeper.

Shelden is the only player on the team that Acie is positive with.

Here are the worst 3 Hawks on the team for +/-.

Zaza -21
Childress -22
Law -67

But you still think that his teammates are the ones dragging down Acie's +/-!? Ridiculous. Have fun living in your world of denial. I have giftwapped this information for you so many times and its clear that you just have no interest in having reality affect your little dreamworld.

Now lets look at all the lineups on that page. This list only shows lineups that have played together for at least 17 minutes. Counting Acies +/- for every lineup on that page i come up with -22.

However Acies total +/- is -67. So where is the additional -45 coming from, Mr Statman?

You won't answer because you can't without making yourself look foolish.

[tontoz]

Just some more evidence on the "usefullness" of +/- stats.

Over the last 10 games Acie's +/- is not only much better than AJ's but also much better than Marvin, Smith and JJ.

http://www.nba.com/statistics/lenovo/le ... team=Hawks

[Rip2137]

+/- is a flawed "stat" that ignores basketball. It always has been, it always will be.

What it does do is show you how important a players role is on a team, which can be pretty helpful. Besides that, its a stat that gets used to show who is a better player and it is ridiculous that anyone would think that it does that.

Aj is a starting point guard with Starting point guard minutes. Acie is a backup point guard with backup point guard minutes. AJ is going to have a higher +/-.

Acie didn't have a great game offensively in Toronto, but the game was lost on the defensive end, where he played a great game and Lue didn't. +/- won't show that.

And for all those that love the stat, always remember this. If Dirk retires this year, according to +/- and the way some of you want to use it, he would have had a better career than Larry Bird and Julius Erving just to name two.

[JoshB914]

It doesn't matter what stat you look at, IV is behind AJ in every one. Win % for a five man unit? Is that a joke?

[tontoz]

It doesn't matter what stat you look at, IV is behind AJ in every one. Win % for a five man unit? Is that a joke?

I am not sure what games you are watching but the games i watch have 5 players on each side.

The point i made about Acie's +/- being mostly because he plays with lineups full of bench players that don't have much floor time has been proven beyond question.

Acie's +/- is -67 overall. But on the page i showed his total +/- for every lineup was only -22.

So where does the other -45 come from?

neither you nor kb can answer this without looking foolish.

[JoshB914]

I didn't bring that stat up. Win % for five men is confusing to me, how does it measure tha? I don't have to look at just stats to tell that IV isn't ready for big minutes yet. You can tell by watching him play.

[Rip2137]

Still once again, AJ has a damn good record when he plays over 30 minutes. He is obviously the guy that should be getting the bulk of the minutes for this team right now.

Acie should be getting the back up minutes exclusively however.

[smabie]

I didn't bring that stat up.

You may not have brought the stat up, but you did back up kb's use of it as "proof" that AC was worse than AJ, repeatedly, and attempted to debate tontoz's positions with referrals to it and kb's use of it.

And I quote...

1/19, 20:13

Well I guess that settles that issue.

(in which you quoted kb's use of the +/- statistic)

1/20, 00:00

Tontoz you are looking at one game while he is looking at stats for the entire season. I don't see how you can even begin to argue that IV is always on the floor with second teamers when it is clear that isn't isnt the case.

(which referred to a tontoz post which referred to 4 recent games, not 1 like you mentioned, btw)

1/20, 00:48

Tontoz you have said time and time again that IV's numbers are depleted because he always is playing with the second team. Obviously he spends plenty of time on the floor with our top guys.

...

Anyway, may I make a minor point or two in all of this?

We've gotten slightly Off Topic.

And...

Some of us are so eager to argue with each other about stuff which really, really isn't all that life-shaking important, to the point that in some cases we're arguing with other people who are saying exactly the same thing...

*ahem*

So if I may suggest we relax, stop arguing about the PG situation for a day or two, and come at it with logic and pertinent points in a whole new thread, as opposed to allowing emotion to get the better of us, and think that people who are countering what we use as "proof" that we're right are doing so to put us down?

[JoshB914]

No I backed up KB's stats when he showed who IV plays with most. Please read my posts. The claim was that he only played with backups when the reality was that he was playing with starters around him all the time. That dispels a very basic theory on this board that IV's stats are down simply ebcause he is playing with only second stringers.

And I've said it a million times, whether you like +/- or not AJ is ahead of IV in every statistical category. If the best stat for IV is his win % amongst five guys then that is a bad sign. Usually things like APG, PPG and the like determine a PG's ability, not win % five man units.

[tontoz]

And I've said it a million times, whether you like +/- or not AJ is ahead of IV in every statistical category.

As usual you fail basic math. Acie's +/- is better with the starters than AJ. PERIOD.


Quoting myself here.

Counting Acies +/- for every lineup on that page i come up with -22.

However Acies total +/- is -67. So where is the additional -45 coming from, Mr Statman?

Still no answer from math wizards JoshB and KB. And there never will be one for one of two reasons. They don't understand basic math or they can't admit the truth.

[tontoz]

The claim was that he only played with backups

Nobody has ever made that claim but you keep repeating it like kb's obedient lap dog.

[tontoz]

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/only

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/always