Race in Sports

[fishercob]

Inspired by ESPN's new venture The Undefeated (of which a family member is a senior editor), my hope is that this thread could be a mature forum for frank discussion, testing of ideas, and finding new understanding.

To start us off, check out Wilbon's piece from this morning:

Mission Impossible: African-Americans & analytics
Why blacks are not feeling the sports metrics movement


Please read the whole piece before commenting. Interesting stuff.

[Ruzious]

With all due respect to Wilbon, I am not "feeling" what analytics have to do with race. Certain types of people like metrics, and certain types don't. To say it has to do with race is going down a slippery slope with no upside.

[TheSecretWeapon]

What a crummy article. Wilbon seems intentionally ignorant about analytics, which...fine...that's up to him, and he's welcome to enjoy sports in any way he wants. No particular reason he should know about analytics; he's been quite successful without them.

I instinctively distrust the "I talked to a bunch of people and they all agreed with me" construction. I've had a dozen analytics-based conversations with Milt Newton, who's a black guy. Milt knew plenty. Did he talk to Mitchell Butler? Mitchell was very helpful with my defensive tracking project in all kinds of ways. Did he talk to my son's math mentor, a black guy whose primary interest in sports is the numbers? Did he talk to CCJ, who's practically a genius when it comes to identifying guys who can play by looking at their numbers? Did he talk to Nate McMillan, who pushed for the Sonics to hire Dean Oliver (as a consultant) and who implemented many of Dean's recommendations...and won 52 games that year? Did he talk to Ed Tapscott? I had an interesting analytics conversation with Ed at the grocery store a couple years ago. (We talked about other stuff too, including that both our sons play euphonium.)

Also...Wilbon's assertion about black people never talking about the numbers is nonsense. I'm in black barbershops semi-regularly when I take my son to get his haircut. My experience is that black folks talk about every aspect sports, including numbers sometimes. I know passionate black sports fans who are versed in numbers just as I know passionate white sports fans who think analytics are a waste of time. To be honest, MOST sports fans don't care much about the numbers. Almost no one is weird enough to construct their own player rating metric. I know of maybe 10-15 people on the planet who have taken the time to do statistical analysis of college basketball players with a goal toward projecting how well they might do in the NBA.

His good point -- one I've seen someone else write about better -- is the issue of exclusion. The guys getting jobs with teams, by and large, are coming from Ivy League schools. They're getting hired by other Ivy League graduates, who are friends and/or are friends with their parents. It's another version of the Good Old Boys network.

[nate33]

I don't really think the issue is the complexity of the math. A large part of analytics is just an acknowledgement that box score stats are distorted by pace and minutes played so that per-game comparisons aren't really apples-to-apples. The math required to get per possession numbers, rebounding percentages, true scoring percentages, etc. is pretty elementary. There are some more complicated analytic techniques involving regression analysis and statistical interpretations, but even those aren't all that complicated. And even if one can't do the math, they can still understand the results and utilize them.

I think if there is any racial component to this, it is simply based on interest. Perhaps whites are more likely to get enjoyment out of turning these things into an abstract logical problem and then trying to anaylze it with spreadsheets and graphs. Perhaps, for whatever reason, most blacks don't particularly get much enjoyment out of that type of activity. They may prefer to look at emotional-intelligence type of concerns like leadership ability, performance under pressure, competitiveness. Who knows? Who cares? Both are valid and useful ways to analyze basketball.

[nate33]

I'm alarmed that Wilbon doesn't seem to understand why the per-100 possessions metric is used instead of the per-48 minutes metric.

[nuposse04]

Can't let a little thing objectivity **** up Wilson's perception of sports. Also ironic given that many racial problems in America are usually highlighted via some statistical analysis. :/

[TheSecretWeapon]

I think if there is any racial component to this, it is simply based on interest. Perhaps whites are more likely to get enjoyment out of turning these things into an abstract logical problem and then trying to anaylze it with spreadsheets and graphs. Perhaps, for whatever reason, most blacks don't particularly get much enjoyment out of that type of activity. They may prefer to look at emotional-intelligence type of concerns like leadership ability, performance under pressure, competitiveness. Who knows? Who cares? Both are valid and useful ways to analyze basketball.

And perhaps there's no real difference at all. Wilbon surely didn't make a convincing case that there is.

[nate33]

I think if there is any racial component to this, it is simply based on interest. Perhaps whites are more likely to get enjoyment out of turning these things into an abstract logical problem and then trying to anaylze it with spreadsheets and graphs. Perhaps, for whatever reason, most blacks don't particularly get much enjoyment out of that type of activity. They may prefer to look at emotional-intelligence type of concerns like leadership ability, performance under pressure, competitiveness. Who knows? Who cares? Both are valid and useful ways to analyze basketball.

And perhaps there's no real difference at all. Wilbon surely didn't make a convincing case that there is.

Yes. You're right. There is no evidence whatsoever to prove that there is any difference at all. It's pure conjecture on Wilbon's part. It's why I incorporated the word "if" into my first sentence.

[montestewart]

What a crummy article.

Wilbon among the leaders in Nonsense/48.

[fishercob]

What a crummy article. Wilbon seems intentionally ignorant about analytics, which...fine...that's up to him, and he's welcome to enjoy sports in any way he wants. No particular reason he should know about analytics; he's been quite successful without them.

I instinctively distrust the "I talked to a bunch of people and they all agreed with me" construction. I've had a dozen analytics-based conversations with Milt Newton, who's a black guy. Milt knew plenty. Did he talk to Mitchell Butler? Mitchell was very helpful with my defensive tracking project in all kinds of ways. Did he talk to my son's math mentor, a black guy whose primary interest in sports is the numbers? Did he talk to CCJ, who's practically a genius when it comes to identifying guys who can play by looking at their numbers? Did he talk to Nate McMillan, who pushed for the Sonics to hire Dean Oliver (as a consultant) and who implemented many of Dean's recommendations...and won 52 games that year? Did he talk to Ed Tapscott? I had an interesting analytics conversation with Ed at the grocery store a couple years ago. (We talked about other stuff too, including that both our sons play euphonium.)

Also...Wilbon's assertion about black people never talking about the numbers is nonsense. I'm in black barbershops semi-regularly when I take my son to get his haircut. My experience is that black folks talk about every aspect sports, including numbers sometimes. I know passionate black sports fans who are versed in numbers just as I know passionate white sports fans who think analytics are a waste of time. To be honest, MOST sports fans don't care much about the numbers. Almost no one is weird enough to construct their own player rating metric. I know of maybe 10-15 people on the planet who have taken the time to do statistical analysis of college basketball players with a goal toward projecting how well they might do in the NBA.

His good point -- one I've seen someone else write about better -- is the issue of exclusion. The guys getting jobs with teams, by and large, are coming from Ivy League schools. They're getting hired by other Ivy League graduates, who are friends and/or are friends with their parents. It's another version of the Good Old Boys network.

As much as I'd like your next blog post to be about what each Wizards is really worth salary-wise ( ), you should really write a response to Wilbon.

[Kanyewest]

What a crummy article. Wilbon seems intentionally ignorant about analytics, which...fine...that's up to him, and he's welcome to enjoy sports in any way he wants. No particular reason he should know about analytics; he's been quite successful without them.

I instinctively distrust the "I talked to a bunch of people and they all agreed with me" construction. I've had a dozen analytics-based conversations with Milt Newton, who's a black guy. Milt knew plenty. Did he talk to Mitchell Butler? Mitchell was very helpful with my defensive tracking project in all kinds of ways. Did he talk to my son's math mentor, a black guy whose primary interest in sports is the numbers? Did he talk to CCJ, who's practically a genius when it comes to identifying guys who can play by looking at their numbers? Did he talk to Nate McMillan, who pushed for the Sonics to hire Dean Oliver (as a consultant) and who implemented many of Dean's recommendations...and won 52 games that year? Did he talk to Ed Tapscott? I had an interesting analytics conversation with Ed at the grocery store a couple years ago. (We talked about other stuff too, including that both our sons play euphonium.)

Also...Wilbon's assertion about black people never talking about the numbers is nonsense. I'm in black barbershops semi-regularly when I take my son to get his haircut. My experience is that black folks talk about every aspect sports, including numbers sometimes. I know passionate black sports fans who are versed in numbers just as I know passionate white sports fans who think analytics are a waste of time. To be honest, MOST sports fans don't care much about the numbers. Almost no one is weird enough to construct their own player rating metric. I know of maybe 10-15 people on the planet who have taken the time to do statistical analysis of college basketball players with a goal toward projecting how well they might do in the NBA.

His good point -- one I've seen someone else write about better -- is the issue of exclusion. The guys getting jobs with teams, by and large, are coming from Ivy League schools. They're getting hired by other Ivy League graduates, who are friends and/or are friends with their parents. It's another version of the Good Old Boys network.

As much as I'd like your next blog post to be about what each Wizards is really worth salary-wise ( ), you should really write a response to Wilbon.

It also needs quotes from CCJ.

[TheSecretWeapon]

One thing that just hit me from the article -- Wilbon also doesn't understand the concept of eFG.

One stat, according to ESPN Stats & Information, assigned Curry some number in excess of 100 for his 3-point sniping from the corners. This tells you just how bogus the exercise is if the “percentage” reports to be greater than 100.

Effectively, this is Wilbon saying that the statement "three is greater than two" is bogus.

eFG is Effective Field Goal percentage. It reflects the reality that...well...three is greater than two. It's not saying that Curry, for example, is shooting 115% on corner threes, it's saying that (because three is greater than two) his shooting on corner threes is EFFECTIVELY the same as shooting 115% (or whatever the actual number was) on two-point attempts. Because, you know, it is.

Basically, as soon as basketball added the three point shot, FG% became an anachronism. This is not a difficult concept to grasp. It's as simple as three is greater than two.

[TGW]

Sigh....Wilbon needs to go sit down somewhere.