The More You Know
Back in October, Kirk Goldsberry had an amazing piece (Which warrants a read) that introduced the concept of the Shotscore. By taking into account shot positions, the leagues expected output at that position and the players actual output at said positions, we may understand the great scorers in the league. By using this metric we gain an interesting perspective on the leagues best scorers. By analyzing the Shotscore with the newly installed SportsVU sports cameras we can gain a greater insight into a number of different aspects of a game. For instance, lets think about the shot selection of Russell Westbrook.
Westbrook is obviously among the best players in the league and the criticisms of him has died down in recent seasons. That doesn't mean that there wont ever be some eyebrow raising when Westbrook takes more shots than Kevin Durant. And those eyebrows should be furrowing because Kevin Durant is Kevin Durant and he is, by that Shotscore metric, the second best scorer in the league. But Russell is amazing in his own right. Whose to say that his pull up jumper at the elbow is less efficient than a semi-open KD 3? Well, using an amalgamation of the new technology available could make that person a little more qualified. Analyzing the value of a single shot is pretty straightforward now-a-days; We have Shot Charts and a number of other different stats for that. Where it gets complicated is quantifying a "semi-open" shot.
In that Goldsberry piece he mentions how, with the combination of the SportsVU cameras and the Shotscore metric, we can begin to quantify defensive impact. Super exciting stuff particularly because we as fans will be able to appreciate defensive plays with greater nuance. Someday soon we will be able to tell who the best jump shot contester by noting how much the expected value of an opposing players drops when said defender is in range for a contest. I know it sounds pretty "Sports Science" but those days are getting closer than they may appear.
What it boils down to is that we are beginning to gather new types of positional data and with that will come new ways to look at the game we love, particularly on the defensive end. As the season goes on and the SportsVU cameras continue to collect data we will eventually have a good enough sample size to really start examining the data within a number of different contexts. How far can a player sag off a shooter to contain a river while still being able to recover and contest a shot? How does Giannas Antetokounmpo's ever growing name and arms effect shooters at varying contest ranges? It all sounds like a series of word problems right now, but someday soon we will have the concrete information to provide some interesting insights. Its a fun time to be an NBA stat nerd. The more you know right?
Westbrook is obviously among the best players in the league and the criticisms of him has died down in recent seasons. That doesn't mean that there wont ever be some eyebrow raising when Westbrook takes more shots than Kevin Durant. And those eyebrows should be furrowing because Kevin Durant is Kevin Durant and he is, by that Shotscore metric, the second best scorer in the league. But Russell is amazing in his own right. Whose to say that his pull up jumper at the elbow is less efficient than a semi-open KD 3? Well, using an amalgamation of the new technology available could make that person a little more qualified. Analyzing the value of a single shot is pretty straightforward now-a-days; We have Shot Charts and a number of other different stats for that. Where it gets complicated is quantifying a "semi-open" shot.
In that Goldsberry piece he mentions how, with the combination of the SportsVU cameras and the Shotscore metric, we can begin to quantify defensive impact. Super exciting stuff particularly because we as fans will be able to appreciate defensive plays with greater nuance. Someday soon we will be able to tell who the best jump shot contester by noting how much the expected value of an opposing players drops when said defender is in range for a contest. I know it sounds pretty "Sports Science" but those days are getting closer than they may appear.
What it boils down to is that we are beginning to gather new types of positional data and with that will come new ways to look at the game we love, particularly on the defensive end. As the season goes on and the SportsVU cameras continue to collect data we will eventually have a good enough sample size to really start examining the data within a number of different contexts. How far can a player sag off a shooter to contain a river while still being able to recover and contest a shot? How does Giannas Antetokounmpo's ever growing name and arms effect shooters at varying contest ranges? It all sounds like a series of word problems right now, but someday soon we will have the concrete information to provide some interesting insights. Its a fun time to be an NBA stat nerd. The more you know right?
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