Archive for the 'Layups' Category

Sporcle time, ladies and gentlemen: Can you name the NBA's all-time career coaching wins leaders?

ESPN's Outside the Lines (for my money, probably the best program on the network) showed a very thought-provoking piece today about former NBA guard Cuttino Mobley, who was forced to retire this year shortly after an early-season trade sent him from the Clippers to the Knicks for salary-cap purposes. In the trade physical, it was supposedly discovered that Mobley had a life-threatening heart condition, but new reports have surfaced indicating that Mobley's condition was known to teams as far back as his Houston days (for instance, each of his 4 teams had a clause written into his contract absolving them of liability in the event of on-court death). The report raises questions about the commodification of players as "walking contracts" under the current CBA, an unsettling circumstance particularly heightened by the battle for who gets the cap and/or luxury tax benefits out of Mobley's very serious health condition.

Most Wayman Tisdale memorial pieces over the past few weeks focused on his great college career, his terrific musical talent, and his irreplaceable personality, but few systematically broke down his pro career and looked at him as a player without the positive bias one is tempted to include because of what a great person he was (speaking for myself, I know I'm guilty of glossing over his somewhat disappointing pro career for that reason). Harlan Schreiber of HoopsAnalyst, though, took on the challenge of putting aside personal feelings for Wayman, and the result is a really good retrospective on the strengths and weaknesses of Tisdale the player.

Here's a good Sporcle quiz that is sure to bring back memories... Can you name ESPN's Top 25 College Basketball Players of All Time?

Here's an interesting article... You've heard of the pythagenport floating exponent in baseball, right? Zach Fein of FeinSports.com has come up with something similar for the NBA. The standard 14 that we use is very good, but you can get slightly better results from this formula:

Exp = sqrt(Poss.) / log(Poss.) x 0.75 - 2.8

Where "Poss." is possessions, as defined by our glossary. The overall increase in accuracy is small, but I think it's still a very worthwhile pursuit to find better exponents for the pythagorean method.

Oh, and can we call this the "Pythagenfein" formula from now on?

Finally, the Sporcle quiz we've all been waiting for... Can you name the players inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame?

Here's the Wayman Tisdale segment with Jim Huber that EJ was talking about on Inside the NBA last night:

"Wayman Tisdale's Courage"

Dan Levy of On The DL interviewed TNT's Ernie Johnson (one of BBR's favorite TV personalities) this week, and the always-entertaining EJ talked about working his dream job, his faith, and how he has such good chemistry with Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith.

It's been nothing if not a rough week for the basketball community. First, Chuck Daly passed away, and today comes the tragic news that Wayman Tisdale has lost his 2-year battle with cancer.

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I love the breakdowns Gian Casimiro provides at Seven Seconds or Mess, and in the latest webisode, he takes a look at how the Celtics D has handled Dwight Howard so far this series. A lot of buzz has been about how few shots Dwight's been seeing, to the point that Howard himself even complained about his touches after Game 5. But 7SoM explains why Howard isn't an easy guy to get quality looks for:

7SoM Celtics vs Magic Dominant Dwight?