supermariowest

LOL it means when I did the photo chop that I couldn't find a picture of him smiling in a white jersey that was high enough quality to use.

Likely story! I count 12 teeth in the picture, which surely means...

And, while you're at it, photoshop a copy of Space Jam into the Michael Jordan section of the picture.

I used to get into it with this guy on Realgm name Tsherkin because he was this stat wiz who swore on his opinions using advanced stats. I respected a lot of his opinions but a lot of times, he completely dismissed real game footage. That's something I take into great account. So you can use any stat that's there. I remember this one site where Josh Smith was some type of God at several years. He was the only player since... to ... and stuff like that. This is a simple game, do not try to over-analyze it.

Josh being the only player since somebody else to do something isn't an advanced statistic. Stuff like that is basketball trivia and nothing else.

That's the thing about guys who understand stats but have little understanding of the game. They have a hard time understanding impact is much more important than stats and that personnel is the holy grail of Basketball. Not just having a superstar which goes along way.

Why do you think the two are mutually exclusive? Statistics are unbiased records of what happened on the court. To fully understand stats, one must fully understand the game.

I am a stat head of sorts but rag on metrics a lot because most hard core NBA fans are also hard core fantasy players and NBA 2K players. You see it in fantasy stats and see it on your nintendo, so it must be true.

I'm not entirely sure what point you are trying to make, but most fantasy leagues use older, established statistics instead of advanced metrics.

They've had roughly the same level of "success" that the Hawks have had. Would you call a run of good, but not great, regular seasons and then an annual disappointing playoff run successful though? Because that's what these 2 teams have in common. In my eyes getting to the World Series, even once, trumps getting bounced out of the playoffs every year without reaching the series.

I'm looking at just the regular season. This must wreak of convenience (and it is convenient), but Beane's approach was more about success over a large number of games. In a 5 or 7 game series, anything can happen (more on this below). I'd say 95+ wins would constitute a great season and the Athletics did that three times in the window I mentioned. In fairness, I should point out that the Rays have also done this a couple of times.I think we're defining (or at least looking at) success differently, and that's OK, but it means that we'd just go back and forth on this forever. I do understand the point you are making, though. And I agree with the Swisher comment.Suppose team A advances to the playoffs and assume the probability of team A beating its opponent in a single game is 55% and that game outcomes are independent. I'm ignoring home/road splits and perhaps a slew of other important variables, but I still think stuff like this can be telling.Probability that team A wins a 5 game series: 0.593Probability that team A wins a 7 game series: 0.608So, in each case, there is about a 40% chance that the inferior team wins the series.

Fair enough, it may not be as drastic as I alluded to. But I did find the book to be better than Moneyball in content, style, and substance. I was not convinced after Moneyball that Billy Beane or his practices were the cause of the A's winning. I am more inclined to believe the 2% story.

It did seem that many of the Billy Beane type of players mentioned in Moneyball didn't really pan out. It's been five or six years since I read it, so I'll have to reread it after I read the 2% story.

Super, it is a little unfair to talk about the Rays pre-2005 as they were under different ownership than they currently are. Stuart Sternberg and Matthew Silverman bought a controlling stake in the team in 2005 and changed their business practices. Since then, they have blown the A's out of the water in terms of performance.

This is a good point. I wouldn't say that they have blown the A's out of the water, but I think it is fair to say they have outperformed the A's. I'm planning on checking out the book you mentioned.Dolf: I'd still disagree with the notion that the A's have never been as successful as the Rays. The sustained success from 1999 to 2006 is more impressive than anything the Rays have done post-2005. This certainly could change over the next few years.

I wonder if anyone will ever start quoting the anti-Moneyball movie "Trouble With The Curve". Analytics certainly have their place in sports but if I'm taking advice from anyone on how to build a team, it's not gonna be from Billy Beane as the A's have never been as successful as the Rays and they're in similarly small markets with small payrolls and have had vastly different levels of success.

I'd say probably not, but I haven't seen it. I hope to see it eventually.I'd disagree with the notion that the Rays have been more successful than the Athletics. Incidentally, Billy Beane's first season as GM of the Athletics was the same year that the Rays joined the MLB. Since then, the Athletics have made 6 playoff appearances while the Rays have made 3. In the first 10 years of their existence, the Rays only cracked 70 wins once (with exactly 70 wins in 2004). They've had winning seasons each of the past 5 years and have made it to the playoffs in 3 of those 5. From 1999 to 2006 (8 seasons), the A's averaged a little under 94 wins and cracked 100 wins twice. The A's didn't have any winning seasons from 2007 to 2011 (5 seasons), but won more than 74 games in each season.As far as playoff success goes, I suppose a case could be made for the Rays since they advanced to (but ultimately lost) the 2008 World Series. Other than that, it's been mostly playoff futility for both organizations. The terms "playoffs" and "shit show" usually go together, though.I don't think I'd go to Beane either, but the A's have definitely had more regular season success under Beane than the Rays have had over the same period of time. And, before the rest of the league caught up with the saber stuff, the A's were winning games at a very impressive clip.(...Sorry for all the baseball talk.)

To summarize what other posters have said, the only people who rag on metrics are people who (1) do not understand the metrics themselves or (2) do not understand the utility of the metrics.One of my favorite lines from Moneyball: Anti-intellectual resentment is common in all of American life and it has many diverse expressions.

Even Darth Vader eventually won his enemies over so surely we can all have some love for Lebron in some way.

[*]I won't forget 'The Decision' but I don't fault him for leaving Cleveland.

[*]I don't appreciate how he acted a couple of years ago after losing in the finals where he walked off the court like a chump without shaking hands.

[*]I applaud him for how he acted last night being classy towards the Spurs and basically remaining humble.

I hate him because of being on another team and being so good but I'd take him on the Hawks tomorrow if it were possible.

Agree on all accounts. The decision, the pep rally ("Not one, not two..."), and walking off the court were all chump moves.

Not a hater, not a lover, but I respect his game and what he has accomplished. What does Lebron have to do to impress some of you? It sounds like he would need to shed four inches, lose sixty pounds, figure out the mechanics of time travel, take his game to the 80s/90s, and steer a team full of Tito Jacksons (as Chuck would say) to at least six championships.Edit: didn't realize this was such an old thread. I'm happy to drop the issue.

Anybody hear Shaq mention Chris Paul and the Hawks last night?EJ was reading a Chris Paul tweet about Grant Hill's retirement. In the background, you can hear Shaq saying, "Chris Paul, Atlanta Hawks, here we go." That "here we go" might be "here he comes" or something else -- kind of hard to tell.

Concrete rumors AKA news. What you are saying is:Let's get some news.

Even if they don't come, I think many of us would love for the Hawks to go back to those jerseys. Seems highly unlikely though.Related question: other than the Wizards, can anybody think of a franchise that has reverted to an older logo/color scheme?

You can say the same about Dallas, Houston

True. I'm just saying this probably isn't enough to satisfy the Dwight-has-never-mentioned-us crowd.

Well, we still don't know if Dwight has mentioned us. We know a writer for DailyNews claims to have a source familiar with Dwight's thinking.

But seriousness, the Bulls are a tough team and well coached. All this really shows is that throughout the streak, the HEAT played in maybe six notable games (LAC, OKC, CHI, MEM, NYK, IND). The other 22 wins came against 14 other teams, of which only five are playoff bound (HOU, LAL, MIL, ATL, BOS) and of those five, 0 have a current seed above 5th. They played PHI three times, CLE twice, ORL twice, CHA twice, TOR twice, and ATL twice which we all know who the Philips Arena was rooting for that night. Put the HEAT in a seven game series vs. the Bulls or Pacers and they are beatable. Heck, I think the Nets and Knicks would give them a run for their money. Hawks may even pull off a few wins.

Other than the Heat, 15 out of 29 teams (51.7%) will make the playoffs. 12 of the 27 wins (44.4%) came against playoff teams. Not bad. They can't play OKC every night. And I know you're not arguing that they should play OKC every night, but I think you are selling them short.Let's say the Heat have a 70% chance of winning any game they play in and that the result of any one game has no effect on the result of any other game. (This 70% would obviously be higher against teams like the Bobcats and lower against teams like the Thunder, but let's just say it's a constant 70%.) The probability of winning 27 games in a row? A cool 0.00657%. So, under these assumptions, the odds of something like this happening are about 1 in 15000. Pretty fantastic.To your other point, I would agree that they are beatable in a 7 game series, but I don't think it's very likely.

So, a power forward shooting 31% in one game is more ridiculous than penguin porn?More to the point, yes. I'll offer a simple proof: I am both a fan of Josh and a fan of the Hawks.

How often does Josh wow us with his athleticism these days?

Sanders and whatever expirings are required for salary matching is good for me. No way we could possibly hope for more. This kid is what a fundamentally sound Smith could have been, rebounding blocking shots and take high percentage shots. Please Ferry make it happen!

Agreed. Who do you target in the off-season? Edit: Maybe that's a conversation for some other thread.

Effjee14, I have yet to see you give any logic that makes much sense.

The logic he provided yesterday: "I'm usually right when it comes to basketball."

Say we swap Smith for Ellis/Sanders. Assuming the deadline has not passed, would we be allowed to trade Ellis or is there some rule against this?

It's hard to believe that a thread like this is necessary, but somehow it is.

How can we actually know which of these options is more/least likely. Josh has not stated that he wants out, he hasn't said he must have a max deal, and he hasn't said he wouldn't leave atl for any amount of money. No one knows at this point, probably not even josh. The market will dictate how much money he gets this summer. I'm thinking no one throws a full max deal at smith.

He also hasn't stated that he wants to stay, he did say that he thinks he deserves a max contract, and as a restricted free agent, Josh signed an offer sheet with the Memphis Grizzlies. Further, there was a thread bouncing around a few days ago stating that Josh was offered a maximum extension but turned this offer down. And (somewhat less meaningful) all of the talking heads around the NBA think he is gone next year. So, there is plenty of evidence pointing to the third option (Josh softening his stance on the max contract and signing a reasonable contract with the Hawks) being the most unlikely. Am I saying that it won't happen? No, absolutely not.One last point: Assuming we don't trade Josh, it stands to reason that he will have just as many teams pursuing him in free agency as he does now, meaning there is a very good chance that at least one team will offer a better contract than whatever the Hawks might offer. Letting the market dictate our future makes little sense when we can trade Josh for young players and/or draft picks and then use the $60+ million it would take to sign Josh to sign players who are equally productive.

Can anyone show an instance where a team that traded its best player, significantly changed its fortunes for the better. It just doesn't happen often, if at all. I'm willing to let him walk if a deal can't be reached this summer. At least we will have the cap space to start rebuilding. We're not a hot market for highly performing players, that means we need to keep the ones we have. If josh was 30, I wouldn't give him 15 mill a year, but at 27, in the middle of his prime, 15 mill a year is reasonable. Josh Smith haters keep saying you can't win a championship with josh, but then want to trade him for pieces u can't even get to the playoffs with. I don't like constant losing, y'all guys can keep that over there. I say stay put, build, and be ready to make a move in 2 1/2 years. I at least want make a run at a championship before we HAVE to rebuild.

The past four years = making a run at a championship. If we don't trade Josh, consider three possible scenarios:1. Josh demands a max contract, pricing himself out of Atlanta. (Will he get it somewhere else? That's another conversation.)2. Josh decides he doesn't want to play in Atlanta and signs elsewhere.3. Josh softens his stance on the max contract and signs a reasonable contract with the Hawks.I think the general feeling is that the third option represents the most unlikely scenario. In other words, it doesn't really look like Josh will be on the team next season. Because of this, trading Josh for some combination of young players, draft picks, and miscellaneous "pieces u can't even get to the playoffs with" would be a very reasonable thing to do. Nobody here is arguing on behalf of constant losing.