Toronto Raptors, statistical anomaly

[Schad]

As anyone forced to suffer through one of my posts knows, I like numbers. And since December, those numbers have loved the Raptors; the team has been a consistent feature in the top 10 of Hollinger's power rankings, and stat-based record projections have tended to place our end-of-season win total anywhere from 47-53 (right now, KnickerBlogger has us as a likely 52 win club; Hollinger at 49).

The reason is simple: a number of well respected stat geeks have indicated that, across sports, margin of victory is one of the best predictors of future outcomes...the Nets, for instance, were punching above their margin of victory for the first 40 games, but it has caught up to them.

In your average game, we outscore opponents by 3.88 points/100 possessions, which is 9th in the league (3rd in the East). This fact, when combined with a schedule in the top five in difficulty (1st in the East), is the primary reason that I have been extremely optimistic about our chances in the second half.

To a degree, I still am...we have a favourable schedule remaining, and a franchise-record 48 wins is definitely in reach (it would take a 20-11 closing kick). However, an interesting trend is developing: while we blow teams out of the water with regularity, close wins have been more difficult to come by. We're 11-5 in games decided by 15+ points, and only 4-10 when the margin is 5 points or less. Those numbers combine to make us a ferocious team on paper, but somewhat less imposing on the court.

This interests me for two reasons; one, our team was extremely good in close games last year, and frankly, our 'clutch' numbers indicate that most of the key cogs aren't wilting under pressure this year, either. Bosh and Calderon perform admirably (as did Ford when healthy); Parker, Moon, Bargs and Delfino are solidly mediocre; and, Kaponobot is shooting an eFG% of .950 on limited late-game attempts. Despite all this, our record in close games is poor...why?

Second is the possible first-round match-up with the Cavaliers, another statistical anomaly whose margin of victory (negative) indicates that they should be 23-29, not 29-23. However, they are 2-8 in 15+ point blowouts, and a ridiculous 17-5 in tight contests.

Speaking in broad terms, not necessarily about a Raps/Cavs series, what's the general opinion? Does the inexorable parade of favourable stats indicate that we're a sleeping giant come playoff time, or is it more important to be a team that guts out close victories...even though innumerable stat geeks have written about the fallacy of 'clutchness' in the past?

[Boogie!]

not looking at stats, close wins are important because it shows the ability to grind it out, make defensive plays, and get the win. the reason we blow teams out is because usually they're not good to begin with and we shoot such a high percentage. but when our offense isn't clicking we still can't get key stops and these are the games that usually end up being close.

[MikeM]

We have favourable stats because we blow alot of teams out. We blow alot of teams out because our 12th man is better than their 8th man alot of the time, so when it's garbage time, our unit is significantly better than our opponents.

This skews the stats IMO.

[Dennis 37]

I've always thought that we a re a team that wins in the first half. Third quarters of close games are what sink us. If we have a comfortable lead at half, we play reasonably well in the third, many times a close lead at half results in a poor third quarter. So in my opinion we lose close games is the third and not in the fourth.

[JWiLL02]

While I like Sam, I blame alot of our struggles in close games on him. Yes, it is the players who are on the court making decisions, but we run the EXACT same plays from opening tip until the final buzzer. There's absolutely no variety in our offensive sets, and once teams make adjustments late game (the good teams, usually) our offense is stagnant and results in alot of contested, bad shots.

Although I'm not sure how good Mike Brown is with the X's and O's, he doesn't even need to diagram plays with LeBron on the court.

I've always thought that you need a star wing player to be a great clutch team, and if you don't have one, you'd better have some damn good plays to get your best players good looks. I think having great PG can overcome not having the swingman who can create for himself. Guys like Paul, Deron Williams and our very own TJ Ford have showed this in the last couple years.

Do you happen to know how we did in close games last year? I thought we were pretty solid, and most of that could be attributed to TJ making plays. Not even considering the stretch where Bosh went down and TJ carried us, he was always in control for us in the clutch, and seemed to succeed more often than not.

[Schad]

Last season, we were 10-11 in blowouts, 15-9 in close contests. The difficulty is determining whether that sudden turnaround is really indicative of anything beside a small sample size. Heh, combine the two seasons are we're exactly at .500 in games of +/- 5 points...

[Hendrix]

I was actually just looking at this and thought it was weird. Raptors are 10th in offensive efficiency, and 11th in defensive efficinecy while having a hard shcdeule. Cleveland is 17th in offensive officiency, and 18th in defensive efficieny while having an easier schedule but they have a better record then us.

Persoanly I think Cleveland's stats might be sqewed by them going 0-6 (I think) when LBJ was out. Also think their combination of defense, rebounding, and a one of the best go to scorers in the league favours them in a match up.

I think our stats could possibly be sqeweed by us beating a lot of baed teams by 20-30 points when they arn't playing defence. During the playoffs teams will D up, hustle on the boards and we won't get as many easy shots which is where we excel.

Winning close games when both teams are trying realy hard is more important then racking up a lot of points against bad teams to get your margin of victory bigger imo.

[Schad]

Hendrix,

You're correct to a degree...Cleveland was -103 in the six games without LeBron, +36 in the rest of the season. Even still, if one assumes they would have won three of those six (against Seattle, Charlotte and one of NJ/Was/Tor), their narrowly positive margin still wouldn't jive with their record.

As for the blowouts of bad teams skewing things, that's absolutely true...but the contention of Hollinger and others has been that the ability to crush bad teams and hang with good ones is, over the long haul, the true test of quality. San Antonio was the poster child last season; he had them on top of his Power Rankings for most of the season because their margin of victory was better than that of 67 win Dallas.

Of course, that line of thinking also had Houston as a potential powerhouse (Pythagorean Win% of .710 vs. .564 for Utah, even though just one win separated them in the standings), and we all know how that turned out...

[I-AM-A-BEAST]

Last season, we were 10-11 in blowouts, 15-9 in close contests. The difficulty is determining whether that sudden turnaround is really indicative of anything beside a small sample size. Heh, combine the two seasons are we're exactly at .500 in games of +/- 5 points...

You actually bring up a very good underlining point. One thing I've read in statistical analysis pieces is that one of the reasons that point margin is so reliable is because the clucthness of a team is something that wavors so easily, not only from game to game......... but season to season. And the numbers show that. The year before last we sucked in the clutch. Then we were good, and now suck again.

That's the thing with close games; so many little things can happen to change the outcome of a close game, and a lot of those times those factors are either flukey, uncontrollable and decided through a matter of luck. I rather be a team with a bunch of 20-30 point wins then a team squeeking by on close games all the time. It's a more reliable source of success.

I still think we have a run in us, and wouldn't be surprised if we win the first six after the break. It's a soft sched and were due.

[The_Hater]

We have favourable stats because we blow alot of teams out. We blow alot of teams out because our 12th man is better than their 8th man alot of the time, so when it's garbage time, our unit is significantly better than our opponents.

This skews the stats IMO.

Umm, blowouts happen with the rotation players... THEN the scrubs enter the game in the final minutes of the 4th Q. What game did you watch where our scrubs were the ones that blew out the other team early?

Other than that, you're completely missing the point anyways.

[99 Problems]

Well, the defensive style of the playoffs should make it more apt to have closer games, and that is worrying as we do seem to struggle in those... Seeing as how our players tend to have too much defensive miscues and turnovers in crucial situations, I don't like our chances in a Cavs style grind out series, which would probably be a very short series....

I highly doubt we'll be able to blow out Cleveland if we do indeed match up... So its on our more experienced players to change this trend and completely suprise us with their clutch play if we want to have a chance at advancing....

[Marlowe]

Curious to know if the close games (5 point diffirential) we've lost this year are to good teams (.500+)?

Also it would be interesting to see if last year the close games we've won are to bad teams (sub .500).

That may suggest there was progress.

Sorry I'm a bit sleepy if the above seems like incoherent drivel.

[MikeM]

-= original quote snipped =-



Umm, blowouts happen with the rotation players... THEN the scrubs enter the game in the final minutes of the 4th Q. What game did you watch where our scrubs were the ones that blew out the other team early?

Other than that, you're completely missing the point anyways.

Yes, our rotation players blow teams out. But usually not by 30+. I think it's when garbage time hits that the scores get outrageously out of hand because when the other team is playing Joe Scrub, we have Delfino and Kapono in the game. Lead goes from say 20, to 30. Our point differential jumps up considerably, thus we look like a powerhouse. Thus we get confused when we have this great point differential because we beat the Bucks by 39 points or whatever it was.

Did I say our scrubs blew teams out early? No. I don't know where you got that from. But they do inflate our point differential, which makes us look alot better than we are.

[omeloon]

When we're given open shots we're one of the most dangerous teams in the league. When those open shots are taken away, we struggle mightily... especially with Calderon running the point. He either swings it on the perimeter or takes it upon himself to score. You can't win close games when you don't have guys who can break the defense down making it easier for EVERYONE (including himself) to score. Not at all putting the blame on Calderon for our lack of close game success, but if we're going to be happy with Moon, Kapono, Parker, and Delfino, Calderon will have to get more creative.

[jbraptor]

Do you like Math?

[don't panac]

the importance of set plays, rotation and clock management becomes significantly more important in close games.
it might have something to do with the coaching staff.

[Marvin!]

Curious to know if the close games (5 point diffirential) we've lost this year are to good teams (.500+)?

Also it would be interesting to see if last year the close games we've won are to bad teams (sub .500).

That may suggest there was progress.

Sorry I'm a bit sleepy if the above seems like incoherent drivel.

an interesting point.

my perception is that a number of the close games lost this year have been to the upper end teams - the Boston games were very close (ie the last minute 3 by Ray Allen to win, when they had been blowing everyone out of the water at that point)

not sure if that is accurate though.

[Marvin!]

the importance of set plays, rotation and clock management becomes significantly more important in close games.
it might have something to do with the coaching staff.

the coaching staff is pretty much the same as last year, except Evans replaced Jim Todd.

why then would the numbers have flipped given that the coaches are the same? that is the question.

[Chevy Chase]

I think that margin of victory also plays out in the following ways:

When a team blows out an opponent there is no disputing who the better team was.

When a team wins with a small margin of victory one of a few things happened:

1) The winning team hung on to a small lead, showing resiliancy but not the ability to pull away.
2) The winning team hung around and was able to finnish with a flury and "steal" a win. This also shows resisliancy, however if the team was really good, they would have taken over the game much earlier.
In these games often times, you can say that the losing team was the better team but they: fell asleap for a quater; called a time out too late to stop a run; substituted a mismatch too slowly; came out of the gate/half-time with lethargy; or any number of issues that kept a good team from a larger margin of victory.

Come playoff time, I would much rather see the Raps up by 10 at the half and find a way to hold on to the win, than have the game neck and neck the whole way through and find a way to steal it at the end.

[tecumseh18]

Anecdotally, I think we've seen that if Cleveland is in a close game, LeBron will not let them lose.

Positionally, wing players are better placed to decide a game in the last few seconds, and ours are weaker than they were last year. Parker, for example, just isn't quite the same player.

Statistically, I agree with someone's observation above that luck often decides close games, and we just haven't had as much of it this year.

Another issue is clutch rebounding. Are we actually worse at rebounding this year than last year? That has been a deciding factor - e.g Spurs.

But truth be told, I've taken consolation from some of the close losses this year against good teams. We coulda shoulda won many of them, and with further development of our youth things will surely improve in seasons to come. The Jazz, for example, dominated the Raps in the ACC last year, but they really should have had that game this year.