2016 NBA Playoffs Thread

[gtn130]

And you're ignoring the reality that nearly any coach would figure out ways to use a talent like James Harden. To get down to Beal's level of production, the new "context" would have to cut Harden's production by almost half. That ain't happening. Not even with Wittman. Not because of Nenê. Not no way, not no how.

But who said he would perform at Beal's level? Don't think anyone believes that. There is a pretty wide chasm between Beal and Harden's current production.

How much do YOU think playing for Wittman -- with Nenê (who played 1094 minutes this year) and Gortat (keeping in mind that Nenê and Gortat played 111 total minutes together this season -- Howard and Capela played 300 minutes together) and Wall -- would cut into Harden's production? 10%? 20%? 50%?

If his time in Houston didn't exist and the Wizards didn't have a model for how to use him, I think the drop off would be significant, like 25%. But this was in response to your comment about "mid-range Randy" -- it seems like you're moving the goal posts at this point by bringing up this past year

[gtn130]

If this lineup existed with 2014 Wittman as coach:

Wall
Harden
Porter
Nene
Gorat

Harden is never considered an MVP candidate in his career

[FAH1223]

If this lineup existed with 2014 Wittman as coach:

Wall
Harden
Porter
Nene
Gorat

Harden is never considered an MVP candidate in his career

The Wizards go to the Conference Finals.

And Harden performs better than Beal. Probably still scores 20 PPG+, gets to the free throw line, and is more efficient.

[gtn130]

If this lineup existed with 2014 Wittman as coach:

Wall
Harden
Porter
Nene
Gorat

Harden is never considered an MVP candidate in his career

The Wizards go to the Conference Finals.

And Harden performs better than Beal. Probably still scores 20 PPG+, gets to the free throw line, and is more efficient.

terrific strawmen you're blowing down bro

[TheSecretWeapon]

But who said he would perform at Beal's level? Don't think anyone believes that. There is a pretty wide chasm between Beal and Harden's current production.

How much do YOU think playing for Wittman -- with Nenê (who played 1094 minutes this year) and Gortat (keeping in mind that Nenê and Gortat played 111 total minutes together this season -- Howard and Capela played 300 minutes together) and Wall -- would cut into Harden's production? 10%? 20%? 50%?

If his time in Houston didn't exist and the Wizards didn't have a model for how to use him, I think the drop off would be significant, like 25%. But this was in response to your comment about "mid-range Randy" -- it seems like you're moving the goal posts at this point by bringing up this past year

No, I've been talking all along about this past year. I thought you were too. REALLY doesn't matter.

What changed when Harden went to Houston? Not a lot actually -- at least not at first. Basically he shot more often. The last couple years, his rebounds and assists went up. This year was his highest turnover rate.

Throughout his career, he's basically played the same way -- shots coming predominantly at-rim, from 3pt range, and the FT line.

According to PPA, over the past four seasons, Harden has been worth approximately 46.3 wins. Beal: 16.3. Reduce Harden's production by 25%, and he's down to 34.7 wins. Bump Beal's minutes to match Harden's, and Beal's eWins rise to 23.9.

So, if we imagine Harden being 25% less productive than he has been the past four years, AND we imagine Beal actually being healthy enough to match his minutes (Harden has played 3778 more minutes the past four seasons), then Harden would add "only" about 2.7 wins per season.

If we use actual minutes, but still imagine Harden being 25% less productive, it would be about 4.6 wins per season.

[dckingsfan]

So in conclusion, EG screwed up again not getting Harden.

[dckingsfan]

And in the meantime, Toronto pulling out its collective hair every time they go to the playoffs - they should hire Wittman

[dckingsfan]

If this lineup existed with 2014 Wittman as coach:

Wall
Harden
Porter
Nene
Gorat

Harden is never considered an MVP candidate in his career

And yourrrrrrrr ECF 2015 Wizards
Wall, Sessions
Harden, Butler
Pierce, Harden, Porter
Gooden, Pierce, Nene
Gorat, Nene

[gtn130]

How much do YOU think playing for Wittman -- with Nenê (who played 1094 minutes this year) and Gortat (keeping in mind that Nenê and Gortat played 111 total minutes together this season -- Howard and Capela played 300 minutes together) and Wall -- would cut into Harden's production? 10%? 20%? 50%?

If his time in Houston didn't exist and the Wizards didn't have a model for how to use him, I think the drop off would be significant, like 25%. But this was in response to your comment about "mid-range Randy" -- it seems like you're moving the goal posts at this point by bringing up this past year

No, I've been talking all along about this past year. I thought you were too. REALLY doesn't matter.

What changed when Harden went to Houston? Not a lot actually -- at least not at first. Basically he shot more often. The last couple years, his rebounds and assists went up. This year was his highest turnover rate.

Throughout his career, he's basically played the same way -- shots coming predominantly at-rim, from 3pt range, and the FT line.

According to PPA, over the past four seasons, Harden has been worth approximately 46.3 wins. Beal: 16.3. Reduce Harden's production by 25%, and he's down to 34.7 wins. Bump Beal's minutes to match Harden's, and Beal's eWins rise to 23.9.

So, if we imagine Harden being 25% less productive than he has been the past four years, AND we imagine Beal actually being healthy enough to match his minutes (Harden has played 3778 more minutes the past four seasons), then Harden would add "only" about 2.7 wins per season.

If we use actual minutes, but still imagine Harden being 25% less productive, it would be about 4.6 wins per season.

His game has not been the same from OKC to Houston. His game today in Houston is pretty analogous to peak Gilbert Arenas'. In OKC he took way more 3pt shots relative to any other shot because -- get this -- he was actually playing off ball and catching and shooting more than being the ball dominant guard in the offense. His 3pt attempts per 100 possessions nearly stayed the same from OKC to Houston (7.7 to 8.1) while every other USG related stat went way up as you are aware. Today he takes way more midrange shots and shots closer to the rim because he's being guarded to the 3pt line and is playing off the dribble. Also, midrange shots are relatively wide open in Houston's offense.

My point though is that while he was insanely efficient with OKC -- he was still playing with two lock HOFers and Ibaka for a huge amount of the time. Being cast in a role that didn't maximize his skill set can still work pretty well when he's playing with an absolutely elite set of teammates. As it relates to Washington, he WOULD in fact be playing a fairly similar role to his time in OKC because 1) we have Wall and 2) Wittman just isn't the type of coach to put Harden in a role even remotely similar to the one he plays in Houston.

Additionally, playing with two lumbering bigs who can't shoot with range, a point guard who is less efficient from 3 than Pat Bev, and a coach who for 90% of his tenure wanted his team taking contested long 2s would result in Harden not only not getting to the line nearly as much as he does in Houston or did in OKC but it wouldn't even be in the game plan. He would be a better and more efficient version of Beal, but wouldn't be considered quite the player he is today.

[payitforward]

...His game has not been the same from OKC to Houston. His game today in Houston is pretty analogous to peak Gilbert Arenas'. In OKC he took way more 3pt shots relative to any other shot because -- get this -- he was actually playing off ball and catching and shooting more than being the ball dominant guard in the offense. His 3pt attempts per 100 possessions nearly stayed the same from OKC to Houston (7.7 to 8.1) while every other USG related stat went way up as you are aware. Today he takes way more midrange shots and shots closer to the rim because he's being guarded to the 3pt line and is playing off the dribble. Also, midrange shots are relatively wide open in Houston's offense.

My point though is that while he was insanely efficient with OKC -- he was still playing with two lock HOFers and Ibaka for a huge amount of the time. Being cast in a role that didn't maximize his skill set can still work pretty well when he's playing with an absolutely elite set of teammates. As it relates to Washington, he WOULD in fact be playing a fairly similar role to his time in OKC because 1) we have Wall and 2) Wittman just isn't the type of coach to put Harden in a role even remotely similar to the one he plays in Houston.

Additionally, playing with two lumbering bigs who can't shoot with range, a point guard who is less efficient from 3 than Pat Bev, and a coach who for 90% of his tenure wanted his team taking contested long 2s would result in Harden not only not getting to the line nearly as much as he does in Houston or did in OKC but it wouldn't even be in the game plan. He would be a better and more efficient version of Beal, but wouldn't be considered quite the player he is today.

Obviously, you have the right to speculate in this way -- but there is no way to prove or disprove such a claim, no way whatever to know whether you are right or wrong. So your claim is not exactly an empirical one. Its more like a picture in your mind which you are telling us about. Like an idea for a film script or something like that. A narrative vision.

I am not being critical, btw, I'm just trying to put statements of this kind in the right bucket. A similar one to this is the claim that this or that player would be radically better if only he could play with John Wall. E.g. Cousins. Another example of a mental picture spinning into a narrative, a tale one tells oneself.

OTOH, there is a body of statistical data saying that, overall, player productivity changes very little as guys move from team to team and coach to coach -- once you factor in the "development - peak - decline" curve. And there's no point in denying this data; the subject has been studied and the results are reasonably clear. It's also an intuitively sensible conclusion: no matter where I am I'm still the same guy.

Yet, results that are statistically true don't determine any specific, individual case -- there are exceptions to every such statistical result. Right now, I can't think of an obvious exception to this particular one, but I'm sure they exist. All the same, it would seem that the most likely result of having James Harden instead of Bradley Beal is that you'd have Harden's productivity rather than Beal's. That's worth about 10 wins in Kev's system and in WP48.

Edit: btw, that 10-win figure is based on the just past season. If you use the 2014-15 season instead, and equalize for minutes played, Harden was worth @14 extra wins (once again using the tools at boxscoregeeks.com). So... following the exact method I said one could not use to produce empirical results ( ! ), we'd have had a 60-win season and would all have been saying what a genius GM Ernie Grunfeld is!

[BigA]

Obviously, you have the right to speculate in this way -- but there is no way to prove or disprove such a claim, no way whatever to know whether you are right or wrong. So your claim is not exactly an empirical one. Its more like a picture in your mind which you are telling us about. Like an idea for a film script or something like that. A narrative vision.

In my narrative vision, I am thinking about all the games, especially this year, where the Wizards had long scoring droughts causing them to lose a big lead or preventing them from closing out a game and what would have happened if they had James Harden. Either replacing Beal or able to play when Brad wasn't. Having Harden wouldn't have won all those games, but I can't help but envision the Wizards winning quite a few.

[gtn130]

...His game has not been the same from OKC to Houston. His game today in Houston is pretty analogous to peak Gilbert Arenas'. In OKC he took way more 3pt shots relative to any other shot because -- get this -- he was actually playing off ball and catching and shooting more than being the ball dominant guard in the offense. His 3pt attempts per 100 possessions nearly stayed the same from OKC to Houston (7.7 to 8.1) while every other USG related stat went way up as you are aware. Today he takes way more midrange shots and shots closer to the rim because he's being guarded to the 3pt line and is playing off the dribble. Also, midrange shots are relatively wide open in Houston's offense.

My point though is that while he was insanely efficient with OKC -- he was still playing with two lock HOFers and Ibaka for a huge amount of the time. Being cast in a role that didn't maximize his skill set can still work pretty well when he's playing with an absolutely elite set of teammates. As it relates to Washington, he WOULD in fact be playing a fairly similar role to his time in OKC because 1) we have Wall and 2) Wittman just isn't the type of coach to put Harden in a role even remotely similar to the one he plays in Houston.

Additionally, playing with two lumbering bigs who can't shoot with range, a point guard who is less efficient from 3 than Pat Bev, and a coach who for 90% of his tenure wanted his team taking contested long 2s would result in Harden not only not getting to the line nearly as much as he does in Houston or did in OKC but it wouldn't even be in the game plan. He would be a better and more efficient version of Beal, but wouldn't be considered quite the player he is today.

Obviously, you have the right to speculate in this way -- but there is no way to prove or disprove such a claim, no way whatever to know whether you are right or wrong. So your claim is not exactly an empirical one. Its more like a picture in your mind which you are telling us about. Like an idea for a film script or something like that. A narrative vision.

I am not being critical, btw, I'm just trying to put statements of this kind in the right bucket. A similar one to this is the claim that this or that player would be radically better if only he could play with John Wall. E.g. Cousins. Another example of a mental picture spinning into a narrative, a tale one tells oneself.

OTOH, there is a body of statistical data saying that, overall, player productivity changes very little as guys move from team to team and coach to coach -- once you factor in the "development - peak - decline" curve. And there's no point in denying this data; the subject has been studied and the results are reasonably clear. It's also an intuitively sensible conclusion: no matter where I am I'm still the same guy.

Yet, results that are statistically true don't determine any specific, individual case -- there are exceptions to every such statistical result. Right now, I can't think of an obvious exception to this particular one, but I'm sure they exist. All the same, it would seem that the most likely result of having James Harden instead of Bradley Beal is that you'd have Harden's productivity rather than Beal's. That's worth about 10 wins in Kev's system and in WP48.

Edit: btw, that 10-win figure is based on the just past season. If you use the 2014-15 season instead, and equalize for minutes played, Harden was worth @14 extra wins (once again using the tools at boxscoregeeks.com). So... following the exact method I said one could not use to produce empirical results ( ! ), we'd have had a 60-win season and would all have been saying what a genius GM Ernie Grunfeld is!

You guys are repackaging the same argument and refusing to acknowledge how context would affect Harden. I understand players are the same person from team to team and coach to coach, but if they're asked to do completely different things then it doesn't matter.

Giannis Antetokounmpo switched from forward to point guard in March and nearly averaged a triple double over the last two months of the season. Counting stats, but you can see what I'm getting at.

Kevin Love functionally plays a completely different position with Cleveland than he did with Minnesota. His rebounding numbers have tanked because he's standing behind the 3pt line for a huge chunk of offensive possessions instead of being the centerpiece of the offense posting his man up and collecting offensive boards. He's still the same rebounder he was in Minnesota, but he's literally just standing farther from the basket now.

Lance Stephenson's WS went from 7.4 in 2014 to -0.9 in 2015 after going from Indy to Charlotte. Same guy.

Josh Smith's production fell off a cliff going from Atlanta to Detroit. Maybe that had something to do with the fact that Maurice Cheeks was rolling out a Smith-Monroe-Drummond front court??? Maybe Josh Smith isn't good at playing small forward?

Look at the trajectory Rajon Rondo has been on. Do you really think he's the same guy wherever he plays? He was a MASSIVELY negative player with the Mavs -- their offense tanked from an ORating of 109 down to 102 pre to post all-star break. Dallass was 3 points per 100 possessions better with Rondo off the court. This past season in Sacramento he was completely playable and was one of their 3-4 best players.

Look at the entire GSW roster from Mark Jackson to Kerr. This isn't difficult.

------

Clearly it is true that on average players are the same from team to team, but we're talking specifically about James Harden and not the general concept of players switching teams. Using broad strokes and saying "Guys usually don't get much better/worse while in their primes! It's all just variance!!!!!!!!!1111" is cool and all, but this isn't some hot take narrative I'm spinning. I just outlined a number of cases off the top of my head where a player was miscast with a different team/coach and the results showed it. It does happen, and there are plenty of indicators with Harden that it would be the case for him in DC.

tl;dr good luck

[montestewart]

gtn130, I agree that context can make a difference. Of the players you mentioned, Kevin Love is the most similar to Harden as a perennially potential AS, and his numbers changed when he went to Cleveland. But he's still a very productive player, and one of the knocks against him on the Wolves was that he stole rebounds from his own teammates. How much better a rebounding team were the Wolves with Love competing for the league lead in RPG, and how much worse a rebounding team is Cleveland now that Love is getting fewer rebounds? (That's a sincere question; I don't know the answer.) Chris Bosh likewise saw significant alterations to his game and counting stats when he came to the Heat, while continuing as a very productive player.

With Harden playing alongside Wall, maybe all their numbers suffer, Harden w/ fewer PPG and worse advanced metric measures, Wall with fewer APG. On the other hand, maybe Harden gives up some usage, a few PPG and APG, but modifies sufficiently to become a multi-threat scorer both on and off the ball, as well as the primary ball handler when Wall's off the court. Maybe Wall's usage, PPG, and APG go down, but maybe his turnovers also go down, and his shooting % goes up, because (as someone above observed) he now can dump off to Harden to create something rather than dribbling down the clock before taking an ill-advised Hail Mary.

I could see a Harden-Wall offense creating something vaguely analogous to the Arenas-Hughes backcourt of 2004-2005, two guards that in similar and different ways could make something happen. (Hughes is another example of context making a difference, as that was by far his best season as a featured second leading man.) I'm not going to assign a number of wins that Harden could bring, but I'm guessing the Harden-Wall backcourt would probably figure itself out, regardless of Wittman, and would be a much better backcourt than the Beal-Wall backcourt. No way to know for sure, but the failure to make that trade seemed a mistake then, and it still seems a mistake in hindsight.

[nuposse04]

D-Mo on the rockets seems like a guy to me who has no "middle ground" in his game. Dude either makes damn good plays or horrifically dumb ones. Btw, wth happened to T.Jones? Out for the year?

[nuposse04]

Rockets have a perfect chance to even the series yet they are **** in their own mouths with some absurd plays. D-mo runs the floor like a human waste land and they make Wizards like stupid passes to advance the ball.

[FAH1223]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/bleacherreport/status/724352417832169473[/tweet]

Wish he was the Wizards coach.

[FAH1223]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/mrmichaellee/status/724345131160084482[/tweet]

Looks bad.

Warriors will beat these stupid Rockets. They should also beat the Clippers without Steph.

Beating the Spurs? Don't see it.

Same with the Thunder.

[payitforward]

...You guys are repackaging the same argument and refusing to acknowledge how context would affect Harden. I understand players are the same person from team to team and coach to coach, but if they're asked to do completely different things then it doesn't matter.

Kevin Love functionally plays a completely different position with Cleveland than he did with Minnesota. His rebounding numbers have tanked because he's standing behind the 3pt line for a huge chunk of offensive possessions instead of being the centerpiece of the offense posting his man up and collecting offensive boards...

...Using broad strokes and saying "Guys usually don't get much better/worse while in their primes! It's all just variance!!!!!!!!!1111" is cool and all, but this isn't some hot take narrative I'm spinning. ...

I love arguments like this, where all you have to do is point to numbers and what you're responding to just evaporates.

E.g. Love's rebounding "tanked" when he went to Cleveland: his last year in Minny he got 13.8 boards per 40 minutes. This year in Cleveland he got 12.6 boards per 40 minutes. IOW, he "tanked" 1.2 rebounds. Oh, but you stress offensive boards. He "tanked" .48 of those per 40 minutes at Cleveland this year.

And it's all because "he's standing behind the 3 pt line...": his last year in Minny, he took 7.2 three point attempts per 40 minutes. This year in Cleveland he took... 7.2 three point attempts per 40 minutes. Hmmmm.

Well, what *has* changed? Pretty simple, really. Minny had very few scoring weapons, so Love got heavier usage *aside from* 3 point attempts. He took @50% more 2-point shots, and he got to the line a ton. But, he's the same guy, so he shot just about the same FT% this last year as he did his last year in Minny.

So, you aren't really saying anything at all about "how context would affect" a player, are you? What you are saying is that if a guy takes fewer shots, it's very very likely that he will score fewer points.

You know what, gtn? You are right. In fact, shockingly, if you look around the league you will find that by and large guys who shoot less score less. Overall, that is.

But this pointless comparison you provide -- whether it's of Love or any other player -- tells us nothing about James Harden. There is no wire and no wireless connectivity either between Love's productivity and Harden's productivity, though you are right that Love is no longer the centerpiece of his team's offense -- after all, Cleveland does have LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, etc.

But even that has no bearing on James Harden. He would have been the centerpiece of our offense just as he is in Houston, had he come here instead of Houston.

[J-Ves]

IT is better than Wall


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[gtn130]

...You guys are repackaging the same argument and refusing to acknowledge how context would affect Harden. I understand players are the same person from team to team and coach to coach, but if they're asked to do completely different things then it doesn't matter.

Kevin Love functionally plays a completely different position with Cleveland than he did with Minnesota. His rebounding numbers have tanked because he's standing behind the 3pt line for a huge chunk of offensive possessions instead of being the centerpiece of the offense posting his man up and collecting offensive boards...

...Using broad strokes and saying "Guys usually don't get much better/worse while in their primes! It's all just variance!!!!!!!!!1111" is cool and all, but this isn't some hot take narrative I'm spinning. ...

I love arguments like this, where all you have to do is point to numbers and what you're responding to just evaporates.

E.g. Love's rebounding "tanked" when he went to Cleveland: his last year in Minny he got 13.8 boards per 40 minutes. This year in Cleveland he got 12.6 boards per 40 minutes. IOW, he "tanked" 1.2 rebounds. Oh, but you stress offensive boards. He "tanked" .48 of those per 40 minutes at Cleveland this year.

And it's all because "he's standing behind the 3 pt line...": his last year in Minny, he took 7.2 three point attempts per 40 minutes. This year in Cleveland he took... 7.2 three point attempts per 40 minutes. Hmmmm.

Well, what *has* changed? Pretty simple, really. Minny had very few scoring weapons, so Love got heavier usage *aside from* 3 point attempts. He took @50% more 2-point shots, and he got to the line a ton. But, he's the same guy, so he shot just about the same FT% this last year as he did his last year in Minny.

So, you aren't really saying anything at all about "how context would affect" a player, are you? What you are saying is that if a guy takes fewer shots, it's very very likely that he will score fewer points.

You know what, gtn? You are right. In fact, shockingly, if you look around the league you will find that by and large guys who shoot less score less. Overall, that is.

But this pointless comparison you provide -- whether it's of Love or any other player -- tells us nothing about James Harden. There is no wire and no wireless connectivity either between Love's productivity and Harden's productivity, though you are right that Love is no longer the centerpiece of his team's offense -- after all, Cleveland does have LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, etc.

But even that has no bearing on James Harden. He would have been the centerpiece of our offense just as he is in Houston, had he come here instead of Houston.

lol you went on this rant to address Love's rebounding without even mentioning the many other examples I gave you. k

Love in 2011 (and 2013) - 21 rebounds per 100
Love in 2015 - 15 rebounds per 100