It doesn’t TRY to explain that player’s effectiveness to a game or a season. The number, while sometimes impressive and responsible for hype and a big contract, is simply non-partisan. It’s simple and explains a lot: a player who averages 23.3 points per game will probably get between 20-25 points a night with a dip or massive spike here or there, balancing everything out to that mean number. The PPG (points per game) average is a perfect use of statistics in basketball. And numbers can, in many cases, give you an average or a likelihood of what will happen. Entire sections of mathematics are dedicated to this purpose. Mathematics, of course, lends itself heavily to THEORY and ANALYSIS. And mathematics, as deeply as you look into the numbers, can’t predict the human mind. Basketball, while amazingly physical, is also shockingly mental. Well, maybe not Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant.but the rest are run by the same passions, distractions, and ideologies of the fan in the stands: They just have more experience dealing with it on a basketball court and can dribble better. While we see giants of talent on the floor, using their nearly superhero like bodies and amazing skills that far surpass the common man and woman, in the end they are utterly human, almost embarrassingly so. Plus, only ONE variable can destroy all that is built.but more on that later.īasketball is far from predictable. Hollinger, also the originator of another bogus statistical analysis called PER (Player Efficiency Rating), tries to make the game of basketball a predictable and calculable event, which, while maybe having some merits in sports books or a friendly bet (or perhaps fantasy basketball), kind of ruins the FUN and ART of the game. Using mathematics as his weapon an entire subsection of class of power is formed, lovingly presented in his Power Rankings, the epitome of what is likely his life work: an equation that measures a team’s strengths by the games they play and the stats they produce. That force is John Hollinger and his minions are the numbers that make up statistics. Obviously everyone is entitled to their opinion, but there is a burgeoning force in the NBA world that seems to embody all the above qualities but, at its heart, is the antithesis of what makes the NBA great. An epic charisma that sways all parties, an impressive sense of order or presentation that blows people out of their seats, or that lightning in a bottle moment when something just works.
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