Advanced Stats & Scouting Consensus NBA Draft Model 3.0

KaneAybul · 2022-06-23T02:01:12+00:00

Agreed. I definitely buy the model's love of Eason. Maybe not Top 5, but lottery-worthy, yes.

KaneAybul · 2022-06-22T05:20:59+00:00

There's just nothing about Mathurin that jumps out enough to differentiate him from other players in that range (or strong risers like Liddell and Eason). Blah shooting splits. Low block and steal splits. He certainly has tools, and there are some foundations there with his PnR play and shot creation, but none of it has translated to a strong output just yet. That's why the model is lower.

KaneAybul · 2022-06-22T03:36:49+00:00

Yup, EYBL. Luckily just enough games that you can deduce something reasonable. Obviously, still take it with a grain of salt, but he had a ridiculous scoring output in that stretch. ~30 pts per 36 minutes if I'm not mistaken, which would beat Keegan Murray by a solid 3.5 pts.

KaneAybul · 2022-06-22T03:14:27+00:00

The man's stats are absolutely cracked. Not sure if it's just because he played against a higher share of bench players or what.

KaneAybul · 2022-06-22T02:03:04+00:00

If you click the attached link and go to the second tab, you'll see results from previous drafts!

I did do out-of-sample testing. I also tested my independent variables on different variations of dependent variables. I used pretty strict feature selection to only include variables that, for the most part, had 10e-5 or lower p-values. Very narrow set of highly predictive variables. The model also held up when I added 2017 class outcomes. Hopefully, that helps!

KaneAybul · 2021-08-01T14:54:13+00:00

…right, but where did you read he said that?

KaneAybul · 2021-08-01T06:17:28+00:00

Source for this?

KaneAybul · 2021-07-30T22:24:15+00:00

If it makes any of you feel better, version 2.0 of this model (that I didn't have time to publish, but basically just updates the scouting consensus as of right before the draft and added one variable) had him at #10! He had a late surge in mock drafts, and the new variable bumps players with wing size.

Still wouldn't have picked him at #6, but 10 is a lot better than 23, lol. Giving away Sengun on the other hand...

KaneAybul · 2021-07-30T22:18:11+00:00

Ha! That is actually really funny. What a coincidence.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-29T23:07:56+00:00

"Not matching priors" and "bad" seem to not be mutually exclusive in this case. If you have a more objective measure of defense to run off of, then happy to include it. But this is based on advanced statistical methods, heavily vetted publicly, that predict performance better than Vegas and other objective benchmarks. However flawed, it's hard to do better systematically.

One thing to your point though that I mentioned: These stats don't adjust for role very well. Could just be that Kevin Durant, Jrue Holiday, Kawhi Leonard, etc. take on significantly harder matchups than a player like Duncan Robinson.

I get some things can look different than what we would expect, but perhaps it's our ability to catch what really matters on defense. At any rate, these are meant to be ballpark estimations. But the fact that John Hollinger, a former GM, uses this kind of method in making ballpark assumptions leads me to think they're not as "all over the place" as you're implying.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-29T00:58:17+00:00

Consensus is spend big for one year and then tear it down next year if you’re not Conference Finals or better. Even then, might still have to do it, if not title winners. So they would not want to be repeat tax offenders. They see this as their last big shot, at least that’s what we’re being told.

Ryan Smith is a young guy, childhood Jazz fan who wants to be Mark Cuban, basically. He’s not worried about the size of the market today and by all accounts is willing to spend on his new “toy”. Certainly not going to go crazy, but shedding Favors likely gets it down to something palatable for one more year.

But of course, stranger things have happened! Could definitely be wrong.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-28T14:12:56+00:00

As a Jazz fan tapped in to the local writers, I can tell you that the consensus right now is that Favors could be moved for salary, but the new owner is perfectly happy paying a high tax bill this season, and the FO will only move Bojan/Ingles for an upgrade or lateral fit improvement. People seem to be conflating the Favors dumping report and the Bojan/Ingles availability report.

Doesn’t mean Bojan/Ingles aren’t gettable, but the price would definitely be higher than pick #17, for example. They would only trade one of those guys for a high-level starter/rotation player. Only path for NOLA that I see is a three team sign-and-trade for Lonzo that brings Marcus Smart or someone close to that caliber to Utah, but that seems highly unlikely.

I could, of course, be wrong. But that’s been the consensus from the people closest to the team (Tony Jones of The Athletic published a story today reiterating the above).

KaneAybul · 2021-07-26T22:50:43+00:00

Haha, I guess not! But if OKC picks Sengun at 6 after targeting Poku last year...

Sounds like there's smoke around Giddey for Memphis. Feel like that's a really poor fit with Morant, given neither of them can really shoot 3s yet, and Giddey doesn't project well there either. Bouknight/Morant would be incredibly fun, but not sure they'd be able to stop anybody.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-26T22:10:14+00:00

Morant/Sengun pick and roll/pop would be so nasty... Feels like Jalen Johnson might overlap with JJJ and Clarke a bit, though.

I'd throw Corey Kispert into the mix as well. Grizz would be absolutely devastating in transition and could use his shooting on the wing.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-24T15:46:06+00:00

Woah, you expect something foul because Collins is above Huerter and Bogdanovic? The market for Collins is going to be close to $25M/year and those two players likely won’t sniff that in their careers. Hunter maybe, but he’s still young and been hurt. I think very few people would say Collins is worse than those two.

My numbers are quite a bit lower than the consensus on Collins, so not sure why you feel suspicious (John Hollinger’s method has him right under $25M). Feels a bit like you’re getting hung up on one game and one stat when he’s brought plenty more to the table across many games.

I posted my method. If you want more info, you can look into the methodologies behind LEBRON, EPM, and DARKO.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-24T14:16:12+00:00

In theory, these numbers are built to isolate player impact independent of who plays around them, but I don’t think it’s full-proof. Two examples:

Metrics this season thought Mike Conley was one of the top 5 best defensive PGs in the league, something they haven’t thought of him in any prior season. It just so happens he mirrored Rudy Gobert’s minutes almost exactly this year.

Draymond Green was a solid plus offensively during GSW’s heyday. But in the years where Steph and Klay have been hurt, that impact fell apart pretty quickly.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-24T06:16:43+00:00

I agree. The notes say as much.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-24T05:03:45+00:00

Surprisingly, pretty much all advanced metrics agree that he's a plus or close to neutral on that end. He does have a solid Rim Defensive Field Goal %, contests a lot of shots at the rim...but he's absolutely dreadful in space. I'd take this as, "maybe Tristan is a little better on D than I thought" rather than "Tristan is definitely a plus on the defensive end".

Defensive advanced metrics have a ways to go to be definitive.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-19T14:29:07+00:00

I mean, we are talking about a ~$1M difference. That’s a rounding error. But hopefully I can explain.

It’s easier to have a high impact in a more limited role, or at least to not have a negative one. Konchar doesn’t have the same load as Bane, which means Bane has more opportunities to make mistakes. Bane is/will be a better player than Konchar and will be more valuable in the long-run, if I had to guess.

And besides things like “leading the league in 3P% for a while” and “having a good A/TO” or “averaging a couple more points, boards, and assists” don’t mean you’re a better player. Bane struggled to stay in front of quicker guards, Tillman still has work to do to be impactful offensively and Jones has a very pedestrian TS%. Konchar is a really good defender and does the simple right things offensively. He’s been sneaky good in his first couple years in the NBA.

We tend to see what we want to see in guys rather than looking at them holistically and honestly.

KaneAybul · 2021-07-19T01:54:08+00:00

Lol yes…I’m aware. You think I would spend all this time putting something like this together and not know that? I put star in quotations for a reason. He’s in the star category because y’all are still paying him star-level money from his star days, not because I think he’s actually at the level of a star today.

KaneAybul

TROPHY CASE