Archive for the 'Layups' Category

Sporcle presents another in a long line of great NBA quizzes: Can you name every Coach of the Year Award winner?

For those who are still recovering from the NBA Finals, here's a reminder: the NBA Draft is a week from today! Yes, time has flown by for me, too!

Luckily, Ed Weiland of HoopsAnalyst is back for what must be the 5th or 6th year in a row, bringing us what I consider must-read material, hands down the best draft previews available on the entire internet. Ed doesn't succumb to hype or anecdotal analysis; his rankings are strictly by the numbers, and he looks at the key indicators that have predicted success -- and failure -- in the past. Here are the links to Part I of his lengthy preview:

• NBA Draft 2009: Shooting Guards
• NBA Draft 2009: Combo Guards
• NBA Draft 2009: Point Guards

Seriously, everyone out there who's interested in the Draft should read this stuff.

Apropos of our little Kobe debate in the comments of another post, ESPN.com's own Sports Guy, Bill Simmons, has written a piece that I think perfectly sums up my feelings on Kobe, the Lakers, and the entire experience that the media gave us in these playoffs (especially during the Finals):

Read the rest of this entry »

It's been a while since we linked a Sporcle quiz, so here's one that should test your NBA knowledge: Can you name the All-Stars (since 1989) that were not taken in the 1st round of the draft?

I don't typically link directly to YouTube vids, but here's a brand new mix from KBlaze, one the net's best mixmakers, celebrating the highlights of The Admiral, David Robinson. D-Rob is one of our favorites here at the blog because his numbers were simply off the charts at his peak in 1993-94 & 1994-95. Yes, Hakeem did him dirty in the playoffs, but because he was on the wrong end of a few Dream Shake highlights (which I would challenge anyone to stop, btw) we don't think he's been treated fairly by the general public over the past 15 years. So here's to you, Mr. Robinson:

(Bonus points for old-school Craig Sager footage at the beginning, too. Didn't know that guy owned a suit that wasn't ridiculous...)

Here's a fascinating piece at the blog Cheap Talk regarding the frequency of tie games in basketball. If we assume points scored and allowed are independent of each other, our prediction for the odds of a tie after regulation is much lower than it actually is in real life. Why is that?

(H/T: Chicago76 at APBRmetrics.)

Some unfortunate league-related news today: 13-year NBA veteran and former league ironman Randy Smith passed away Thursday at the age of 60.

Smith, a 6'3" guard who played in 906 consecutive games from 1972 to 1983 (an NBA record until A.C. Green broke the mark in 1997), was a 2-time All-Star and MVP of the 1978 midseason classic, in addition to being named 2nd-team All-NBA in 1976 (the same year he finished 9th in the league in Win Shares). Along with Bob McAdoo, he was the face of the old Buffalo Braves in the 1970s, before they became the Clippers. To be honest, the league could use a few more tough little guys like Smith nowadays. May he rest in peace.

UPDATE: Kevin Arnovitz has a really good post about Smith over at TrueHoop.

Back in high school, Leroy made the varsity team instead of Mike. Mike was motivated by this, and became the greatest of all time. Now Leroy wants to motivate you, too.

(For those wanting the real story behind the site -- and, yes, Nike is obviously behind it -- go here. As an added bonus, it also has all of Leroy's "infomercials" embedded on one page. Love that Charlie Murphy!)

Basketball Geek's Ryan Parker has been looking at how plays end in recent posts, calculating the distribution of each type of play-ender over the past few seasons. And in his most recent post, he pairs that knowledge up with the circumstances under which each play began. The conclusions: Steals are really good (duh), offensive rebounds lead to a high probability of scoring (duh), the old yarn about missed threes leading to long defensive rebounds and better scoring chances appears to be slightly true, and a bit of a surprise -- offenses actually do worst coming out of a timeout (contrary to conventional wisdom, which assumes the coach will draw up a good play for a score).

(Hat tip: TrueHoop.)

From the New York Times (via TrueHoop): William C. Rhoden and the great trumpeter Wynton Marsalis talk about the parallels between two of the biggest personal passions in my life: basketball and jazz music.