by d-will8 on Sat Jun 30, 2012 10:38 am
retiredcoach:
To be perfectly honest, I feel like your point about the non-random nature of picking an ex-Jazz player to bring back hurts, rather than helps, your argument.
There are two ways to analyze any thing in sports. One is to go with opinion. Opinion can be based on knowledge, experience and ability to evaluate. Or it can be pulled directly out of someone's ass. So an opinion can be hard to evaluate out of context, especially when the person is unknown as is mostly the case online. However, generally speaking, the opinions coming from the ass region are the ones screamed out the loudest.
The second way is to just take the known facts and analyze them in relation to the decisions being made. Again there are people who understand things like statistical analysis and there are people who don't.
I haven't given my opinion on the trade. I've only looked at the past history, player stats and the current roster.
Why did I do that? Because the vast majority of posts are generally based on opinion. So it's also good to look at the objective as well as the subjective.
In my case, I do have the mathematical background to do the analysis. I understand APBRmetrics in basketball, which I got into after I met a guy who is a leading authority of Sabermetrics used in baseball. So I sometimes post my analysis of the history. In general, every time I do, I get all the statistical trash talk and explanations of why what I'm saying is so wrong. Not mathematically wrong, but wrong none-the-less.
One time I mentioned an analysis of coaching based on an article in the Journal of Quantitative Sports Analysis. I was insulted, trash talked and shouted down. Wow, I didn't realize that so many people were experts in statistical analysis.
My opinion is Mo may be an improvement over Devin because he may fit better in the Jazz system. I always felt Devin struggled a bit with that. I didn't think Devin made the players around him better, which is the number one PG objective. Mo is almost certainly will be an improvement over CJ, especially on the road, if Mo is willing to play the SG part time. (He says he only wants to start at the PG, doesn't want to come off the bench, and doesn't want to play the SG. But maybe Corbin can fix that!)
I am concerned that Mo only has a one year contract, and that Jazz don't have a young potentially very good PG on the bench.
My analysis of past data supports my concern that Mo only has a one year contract or that he may not work out for other reasons.
From a purely statistical view, most legitimate ranking sites say Devin is a better PG than Mo. That analysis includes both offensive and defensive stats. But if Mo is able to be more effective within the Jazz system then he is better for the Jazz. That won't be known for a year. If he is better and he leaves after a year, what did the Jazz get?
So there is my opinion along with my analysis of past history.
I hope the trade works out for the Jazz. I hope Mo can make the other four guys better. But it will be a year before anyone knows if Mo is on the other edge of the data and becomes an effective long term player for the Jazz or if he's typical of passed 2fer's and is a one and done.
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