SoTD: Bargnani's defensive numbers over 4 years

[ZefSyde]

But ya, it had nothing to do with what you were saying.

It didn't. And with the way you're going at it, you're just going to make everyone dislike Bargs even more. He's not a messiah so stop making him out to be. His absolute highest ceiling will be a Dirk-lite and even that would blow everyone away. He's not going to be an MVP and it's possible he barely squeaks on to one All-Star team. He's a solid player for what he brings - but the fact that everyone sees him as an absolute star is stupid. Like if he ends up being a 3rd/4th option on a winning team that he would ultimately be a failure, which is just as stupid.

Bargs has his niche carved out for him, and that's as a streak scorer and a solid man-to-man defensive player. He's horrible on help D and he doesn't rebound and that has been fact thus far. I think you can build a winning, contending team with him on your starting 5, but I don't think you can build a winning, contending team building a team around him - the exact same as Bosh. He needs a star winger and defensive players around him. And by the looks of things, we may just get that in Demar, Ed and Amir. We'll know how Demar looks long term this season to see if the work put in translates, and we'll see if we can land a top pick to really put us on the right track. But as things stand Bargs is our best player and we're lottery bound.

Thanks for the picture from the future swami, I hear BC is looking for new talent evaluators and someone from the future could bring a real fresh perspective on the matter.

[ZefSyde]

If you don't need to be able to identify a basketball in order to reach your conclusion about a basketball player, your conclusion is probably worth ****.

The Warriors have been one of the worst ranked Drtg teams over the past few years. Do I then further need to "identify a basketball" to then conclude that they are in fact a bad defensive team?

All Drtg is Point scored on my team divided by number of defensive possessions my team was involved in. In other words, how many points we gave up on average per possession.

So somehow, giving up a lot of points per possessions in your mind reveals absolutely nothing about a team's defensive capabilities?

Come on guys, we were brains for a reason....use them to THINK.

Ok, good point. How stupid would it be if you replaced all those underlines with one player? Pretty stupid, eh?

[Hephaestus114]

Are you saying that he has actually improved defensively over the past 4 years?

With a gun to your head, who would you rather guard Dwight Howard: 2010 Bargnani, or 2006 Bargnani?

Just Pull the damn trigger. You'd be f$@#%@d either way.

[sh00n]

Thanks for the picture from the future swami, I hear BC is looking for new talent evaluators and someone from the future could bring a real fresh perspective on the matter.

Anytime sweetheart, didn't mean to offend you by saying detrimental things about your crush.

[ZefSyde]

Are you saying that he has actually improved defensively over the past 4 years?

With a gun to your head, who would you rather guard Dwight Howard: 2010 Bargnani, or 2006 Bargnani?

Just Pull the damn trigger. You'd be f$@#%@d either way.

Yup.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlUbUCUrYgQ[/youtube]

[Reg00]

If Toronto had 5 guys who could cover their man as good as Bargnani, then they'd be much better at defense.

"Help defense" in my mind is 80% team concept and understanding each others roles and 20% any particular talent specifically in one guy. It is not easily tracked. So many variables to team defense; Who is guarding the perimeter, are they playing zone, what is the coach trying to do on each sort of plays, and is he communicating those ideas well.

For instance, how do they attack a pick and roll, and why? Most teams either try to put pressure on the ball handler (either double teaming him or cutting him off), or fight their way through the pick and force the ball handler to make a decision to take it to the rim, where hopefully they have players ready to match him. I find Triano let's the switch happen too easily creating easy mismatches for his defense. It happens all the time. I might actually create a thread on the first game night on pick and roll defensive scenarios, tracking how they handle it. Cause it bugs me so friggin much. Is this a player not caring about defense, or a coach not willing to take a stand against lack defensive attitude. Or worst, a coach not caring about making it hard on the other team to run its plays. Letting all the NBA offenses run a smooth pick and roll is #1 issue for me in terms of Triano's defensive schemes.

It usually took an opposing team like, 4-5 passes to create a wide open shot for someone. It was really painful. Laying that all onto the lap of one guy because of a pretty lame stat line is weak weak weak.

[ZefSyde]

Thanks for the picture from the future swami, I hear BC is looking for new talent evaluators and someone from the future could bring a real fresh perspective on the matter.

Anytime sweetheart, didn't mean to offend you by saying detrimental things about your crush.

No problem daddy, I just find it odd that you speak in such certain terms. But then again you know everything, daddy.

[Jose_Matador]

haha SuperSub kills me with these threads, he's too good at this. Nobody is better at exploiting Bargnani's weaknesses that SS.

[sh00n]

Thanks for the picture from the future swami, I hear BC is looking for new talent evaluators and someone from the future could bring a real fresh perspective on the matter.

Anytime sweetheart, didn't mean to offend you by saying detrimental things about your crush.

No problem daddy, I just find it odd that you speak in such certain terms. But then again you know everything, daddy.

[ZefSyde]

haha SuperSub kills me with these threads, he's too good at this. Nobody is better at exploiting Bargnani's weaknesses that SS.

Exploiting or distorting. We must use different dictionaries. I use websters, how about you?

[TMMC]

Since many of you bash SS for providing these stats that show Bargs' D in a negative light, how about this, can you guys dig up some stats that show Bargs in a positive light on defense? If SS is picking/choosing stats to support his agenda there has got to be stats that show the opposite correct?

The only positive defensive stats I've seen for Bargs came from the Synergy Sports thread where it showed his Post up / Man D being good. Also, his raw shot-blocking number of 1.5 is good. Other than that you guys got anything?

I don't think anyone is arguing the stats, its more the BS extrapolation that they have a problem with.


His PDSS DRat is 110.0 The same as Bosh and .5 worst than Amir. Calderon sits at around 118. So there you go big shot, put that in your pipe and smoke it

Here is the link: http://www.mediafire.com/?k7hbzunay6uzt4n


One factor that gets over looked from last year is how horrible the team was at defending the 3 point line.

4th worst in Opp. 3 pt attempts - 20.3
3rd worst in Opp. 3 pt made - 7.4
4tth worst in Opp. 3 pt % - 36.6%


How come no one bleats about this?

Reignman just said the Synergy site shows Bargnani's man D, and post up D is good. This stat's main variable is man D stuff. It really isn't all that suprising that Bargnani is about as good as Amir in man D. Unfortunatly defense is a lot more then just man D. Team defense, and defensive rebounding is where Bargs ranks as one of the worst in the league. Unfortunatly this stat doesn't capture that. However showing that the team is much worse with him defensivly on the court every single year he played is prety damn telling of his defensive game as a whiole

Is it "damn telling" or could it be that building an entire new team every single year (as Colangelo has done) is not the right way to build a winner... I mean we all sit around and talk crap at the local pub and on internet message boards every single year and ask each other things like. Is BC serious, nine new guys again? Or is he serious, BC is signing another defenseless offensive player? For the past four years nearly every single Colangelo signing was followed by "another offensive player who can't defend" punchline....

So after admitting and joking about all the strictly offensive players Colaneglo has brought in here the past four years who can't defend and admitting that Colangelo and his sign nine new guys every offseason building method is (Please Use More Appropriate Word) is it fair to say that our defense got worse every year simply because of Bargnani getting more minutes?

Come onnnnnn........

[Ripp]

If you don't need to be able to identify a basketball in order to reach your conclusion about a basketball player, your conclusion is probably worth ****.

The Warriors have been one of the worst ranked Drtg teams over the past few years. Do I then further need to "identify a basketball" to then conclude that they are in fact a bad defensive team?

All Drtg is Point scored on my team divided by number of defensive possessions my team was involved in. In other words, how many points we gave up on average per possession.

So somehow, giving up a lot of points per possessions in your mind reveals absolutely nothing about a team's defensive capabilities?

Come on guys, we were brains for a reason....use them to THINK.

Ok, good point. How stupid would it be if you replaced all those underlines with one player? Pretty stupid, eh?

Ah, but the point is, how is this team stat computed? You sum over all the different lineups that appeared during the course of a season. So assuming we have enough data, we can analyze lineups too.
And so that is essentially what this stat does...sum up the aggregate performance of lineups which involve Bargs and those which don't, over the past four years.

[ZefSyde]

Apology accepted.

[dagger]

Meh, the stat argument is endless as is finger pointing

Shooting guard

Anthony Parker 108
Anthony Parker 108
Anthony Parker 111
DeMar DeRozan 115

Chicken, meet egg

[Scott Carefoot]

I'm increasingly beginning to think that Bargnani is going to replace Vince Carter as the most polarizing player in the Raptors' history, which is confounding to me because Vince clearly could have been one of the best in the League if he cared enough about the game so it's understandable why some people would be so loyal to him even though I wasn't among those people. But Bargnani... look, he's almost definitely not going to ever make an All-Star Team, and if he does, it will be as the last man picked like Mehmet Okur or Jamaal Maglore.

If he was ever going to be as great as so many fans seem to think he will be, he would have showed it by now on the court. But his supporters will continue to make excuses about how his teammates, his coaches, his GM, etc. are holding him back. Meanwhile, truly great players don't need excuses made for them, because they just effing win. Note: this is why neither Carter nor Bosh were or are truly great players, either, and yet people continue to make excuses for them as well.

[Ripp]

Meh, the stat argument is endless as is finger pointing

Shooting guard

Anthony Parker 108
Anthony Parker 108
Anthony Parker 111
DeMar DeRozan 115

Chicken, meet egg

So is the point of this to say that DeMar represents a downgrade defensively, and thus is the reason for Bargnani's poor defensive numbers over the past four years?
Like, what is your point?

[hoop_head]

I wonder what an analysis of our perimeter defence would look like over that same 4-year period. Specifically look at the PG and SG spots, and overlay those statistics over the analysis done on Bargnani.

You do realize that those stats in the OP are in comparison with his teammates, right? So for every player with a negative score, another player has a positive score to make up for it. And they would all balance out.

As was pointed out, he has the lowest score of all the Raptor big men meaning the team defense was at it's worst when he was on the floor last year. I believe that he's had the worst score of the Raptor big men for 4 consecutive years now but that might be incorrect.

As for the perimeter players you pointed out, some of them would have positive scores, others negative scores. Our perimeter defense was terrible last year but that doesn't really explain why Amir Johnson and Chris Bosh scored so much higher defensively than Bargnani did. Considering they had similarily bad defenders in front of them. And that's the basic point of this thread.

I don't dispute ss15's numerical analysis. It makes sense that if you have a bad defensive team, and you track the results of playing a big man that has marginal mam-to-man defence coupled with MIA help defence, the numbers should show that the worst defensive team performance comes with playing said player.

If you look at the team DRtg over the last 4 years, it has dropped every year. I'm pointing out that Bargnani isn't alone, he's part of an overall decline in team defensive prowess. Yes you can point to Bosh and Amir having better defensive numbers than Andrea, and that's valid. I'm looking at the team as a whole, and not dismissing Andrea's numbers but putting them into context with the team decline in defensive rating.

Now you could argue that this declining defensive trend is due to Bargnani's increased role over the years with the team, to some small or large extent. There is some level of truth to that, because he arrived in the NBA completely unable to play the role of a big man. His individual ORtg and DRtg numbers show growth in offence, but decline in defence. I'm suggesting that the defensive numbers be considered in the light of the overall team decline in defence, instead of isolating his individual defensive stats as an absolute of progress or regression.

[TMMC]

haha SuperSub kills me with these threads, he's too good at this. Nobody is better at exploiting Bargnani's weaknesses that SS.

Exploiting or distorting. We must use different dictionaries. I use websters, how about you?

I would say he does a bit of both and that generally is what makes his threads so heated and sometimes annoying...

[sh00n]

Apology accepted.

That's nice.

[Its-A-Rap]

lets see how he does with bosh not being there. And amir and davis will help him out, rather then a bosh who has the same weaknesses.