Our Defense

[garyeb2]

So what do you think about Money Ball? Did Billy Bean really do that or is it just Hollywood nonsense. Did the Boston Redsox copy Billy Bean or is that nonsense?

I think Billy Bean really won a lot of games completing ignoring the "way" it was supposed to be done and based his decisions on statistics.

Come on. You are a smart guy. Is anecdotal evidence and a movie plot the best you can do? There are lots of well educated people that follow along on this board. If I were off on my argument very far they would have swooped down like a hungry hen on a June bug and beat me over the head with their book learning.

Bad defense gets you beat. OU is 6-1. They are not playing bad defense. They are good defenders playing good defense most of the time. They are busting too often. But, that is a process issue.

When someone says that OU is playing bad defense and here is the Ken Pom efficiency rating to prove it, well, that is just not good enough. Those ratings are based on a small sample of a single result of many possible results of contest that can be impacted by a high degree of randomness. They are not a prof and are subject to inaccuracies. Ken Pom's ranking of OU's defense could be just right or too high or too low or way too high or way too low.

My point was and still is that some posters are assigning way too much value to fallible statistics in making their arguments.

 

[DenverSooner]

Come on. You are a smart guy. Is anecdotal evidence and a movie plot the best you can do? There are lots of well educated people that follow along on this board. If I were off on my argument very far they would have swooped down like a hungry hen on a June bug and beat me over the head with their book learning.

Bad defense gets you beat. OU is 6-1. They are not playing bad defense. They are good defenders playing good defense most of the time. They are busting too often. But, that is a process issue.

When someone says that OU is playing bad defense and here is the Ken Pom efficiency rating to prove it, well, that is just not good enough. Those ratings are based on a small sample of a single result of many possible results of contest that can be impacted by a high degree of randomness. They are not a prof and are subject to inaccuracies. Ken Pom's ranking of OU's defense could be just right or too high or too low or way too high or way too low.

My point was and still is that some posters are assigning way too much value to fallible statistics in making their arguments.

I am not a baseball fan but it is my understanding that Billy Bean fundamentally changed baseball based on statistical analysis . My brother is a big baseball fan and used to work for the Rangers. I will talk to him about it.

What about Mike Caro in poker?

What about the insurance industry?

I don't know much about Ken Pom. I think OU's defense is much improved under Kruger. I only commented because it seems to me you want to completely ignore the statistics or completely invalidate them.

 

[campbest]

Ken Pom's efficiency ratings are probably too low on OU right now...with that said, OU has some work to do in defending in the half court. OU is scoring a bunch of points per game, that doens't mean they are a great offensive team. This early in the season efficiency ratings and advanced analytics serve a limited purpose as the sample size is small and teams are tweaking with rotations, personnel, schematics, etc. However, when you get into January/February these statistics mean something.

Analytics are changing the game and are now widely used in the collegiate and pro ranks. You have entire front offices in the NBA dedicated to the study and application. Anyone who believes they have a very limited or no purpose is simply behind the times or has to big an ego to adapt. Brad Stevens didn't take Butler to consecutive NC games by rolling the ball out there, he is a staunch proponent of applying advanced statistics to give his team an edge. Tough to really argue with him.

 

[garyeb2]

I am not a baseball fan but it is my understanding that Billy Bean fundamentally changed baseball based on statistical analysis . My brother is a big baseball fan and used to work for the Rangers. I will talk to him about it.

What about Mike Caro in poker?

What about the insurance industry?

I don't know much about Ken Pom. I think OU's defense is much improved under Kruger. I only commented because it seems to me you want to completely ignore the statistics or completely invalidate them.

Good questions. While I am very respectful of Caro's contribution to poker, I'm more of a Skalansky guy. He is the ultimate numbers man. Those guys are incorporating statistics into probability math. That is different from this discussion.

I'm not trying to invalidate statistics. They are invaluable when used in the proper context. Here is the key. A very large sample size and the absence of randomness in the outcomes. The statistics being discussed fail on both counts.

An example would be instances where economist have uncovered wide spread cheating on standardized test using statistical reviews of the scores. Big samples and not much randomness in test taking.

My experience with insurance was with a national company that underwrote extended service contracts for automobiles. With the use of statistics they had built actuary tables that were breath taking in their scope. They could predict with reasonable accuracy the future cost of repairs of any make or model with any current mileage. The use of statistics in that application was a good thing.

My point is that not all statistics have the same value. In some applications they are very accurate representations of a circumstance and in others they have little or no value. It is my opinion that in the current discussion that have little or no value because they fail the two primary test of validity.

As far as baseball goes. Watch "Trouble With The Curve." That Clint Eastwood movie kind of pokes fun at the Billy Bean approach.

 

[61sooner]

Wasn't a weak point against Mercer the D around the basket? The big from Mercer looked he could have scored 30 with a better touch and he was just tossing up 3-4 footers without any trouble.

 

[pnkranger]

Gary, I think you're missing the point. We are not saying that because ken Pom lists us as inefficient defensively that we are bad. We are watching the games, seeing that the team is playing poor defensively (bad rotation, blown assugnments, bad positioning in the post, scrambling, etc.)....then we're looking at ken pom's statistics which do back up what we are seeing with our own eyes.

If your whole argument hinges on sample size, then you're basically poo pooing all basketball statistics. Even one season is not adequate sample size in your description. That's just false though, as you can see from the. Or relation between post season results and efficiency ratings.

Additionally, your argument that each game is only one particular outcome and this worthless is moot because, regardless of which potential outcome it is, it is still THE ONLY outcome. There won't ever be another outcome for that particular game. There is only one and thus it is edfective as a measurement.

 

[BanjoCharley]

Two statisticians go hunting.

They see a rabbit and statistician B tells statistician A: "You take the shot."

"A" does and misses the rabbit eight feet to the left but the rabbit doesn't move.

"B" says: "Shoot again!" "A" does and misses the rabbit eight feet to the right and "B" says: "Got him!"

 

[AdaSooner]

I thought we played about 30 minutes of really solid defense tonight. The best we've played all year.
I know that's not reflected in the final score.

When a team gives up 80 plus to their opponent, your first thought is that no one played good defense. That was not the case with OU. I agree, we played our best defense of the season last night. Mercer's offense was totally stymied by our press and our half court defense for the first 25 to 30 minutes.

Oh, our kids gave up an easy bucket on occasion. On the whole, though, I thought our D was pretty darned good. It's not easy to maintain your intensity when you're up by 30, so I'm not surprised that a Bob Hoffman coached team cut into our lead in the last ten to twelve minutes. Still, you can bet that Bob was not happy with the way his team handled OU's pressure defense. The game was never in doubt at any point after the first five to seven minutes.

As CoolM said, this team is still a work in progress. But I was impressed, and pleased, with the progress I saw on defense last night.

 

[MI Sooner]

I win and a loss is just a statistic. How is a 6-1 record (which measures offense and defense) a more meaningful for measuring defense that points allowed per possession (of which there are hundreds).

 

[SoonerinNC]

Also our competition has been pretty good. Actually the breakdowns close to the basket was the only thing that bothered me last night. Even those occurred later in the game.

Mercer will help our RPI in the long run. Remember they had a very close game with Seton Hall as we did. Our progress from the Seton Hall game was in evidence last night.

 

[garyeb2]

Gary, I think you're missing the point. We are not saying that because ken Pom lists us as inefficient defensively that we are bad. We are watching the games, seeing that the team is playing poor defensively (bad rotation, blown assugnments, bad positioning in the post, scrambling, etc.)....then we're looking at ken pom's statistics which do back up what we are seeing with our own eyes.

If your whole argument hinges on sample size, then you're basically poo pooing all basketball statistics. Even one season is not adequate sample size in your description. That's just false though, as you can see from the. Or relation between post season results and efficiency ratings.

Additionally, your argument that each game is only one particular outcome and this worthless is moot because, regardless of which potential outcome it is, it is still THE ONLY outcome. There won't ever be another outcome for that particular game. There is only one and thus it is edfective as a measurement.

No, I'm not missing the point. I'm not just sitting here dreaming up stuff to argue about. The points that I am making are part of fundamental statistical theory. The concepts of sample size, one of many possible outcomes, and absence of randomness in the outcomes are well founded in academic study and research.

 

[WTSooner]

Ken Pom didn't invent the stats on his page. He simply gathers the data, and charges folks a modest price in that he gathers that data, and presents it in an organized manner on his website for what, over 300 teams?

But his stats aren't anything crazy. ESPN has a lot of the same stuff for the NBA. And they are generally regarded as some of the best stats available for analyzing basketball. They aren't perfect, but they are some of the better stats available.

Like pnkranger has mentioned, if you watch the games, and compare then to the stats that are note worthy, they appear to tell the same story. That our D is struggling. That we give up too many easy buckets. That, in general, teams are having more success against us than maybe they should be. I don't need a stat to tell me that we don't rotate well, or have a shot blocker at the rim, or get beat off the dribble too much. My eyes tell me that. The stats simply back that up. If the stats said something different (and from time to time they do), then one would have to dig a little deeper for the answer. Or maybe small sample size would be to blame.

 

[WTSooner]

JMO, of course.

 

[pnkranger]

Well said, WTSooner. Not dreaming up things to argue about, just trying to discuss our team's potential and opportunities for improvement. We need to get better on defense if we want to make the NCAA tournament. That is all I'm saying.

 

[campbest]

Not having a player able to alter shots at the rim will contribute to some defensive woes all year. With the renewed emphasis on perimeter physicality and change in the block/charge call, it puts a premium on anyone who can block/alter shots.

 

[AdaSooner]

Not having a player able to alter shots at the rim will contribute to some defensive woes all year. With the renewed emphasis on perimeter physicality and change in the block/charge call, it puts a premium on anyone who can block/alter shots.

Agreed. The good news: Help is on the way!

 

[SilliSooner]

^
This

I'm not pleased with our defense either, especially in defending the arc. We give up way too many easy shots on the perimeter by playing good defense for 20 to 25 seconds, only to leave a three point shooter unattended before the shot clock runs out.

That said, with our lack of size and a shot-blocking post on the interior, we don't have much choice. This team's best chance to win is to pressure our opponents into making mistakes that can be converted into easy buckets. I would like to see this team press more, not less.

While I agree that some of the points we're giving up off of the dribble penetration can be attributed to the rules changes, I don't agree that the new rules have anything whatsoever to do with leaving a three point shooter open. That's the result of a breakdown in our defense where at least one player gets caught out of position because he failed to rotate to the right spot fast enough to get a hand in someone's face.

"He had a hat!" The Jewish mother says after God delivers her little boy from the sea and back to the beach.

From what I see, we're forcing a batch more turnovers than we're making. Uhhh, at our size, I don't see us playing it much differently. Yeah, folks are getting shots but they're not always great ones. We even harassed the # 1 team into a bunch of hurries. They made some, then they started missing.

We've started the last three games as strong as I've ever seen an OU team of late start - 50-60 point first half pace. Alabama, Seton Hall and Mich State isn't trash. Even Mercer is better than most cupcakes other teams are scheduling.

Forget the hat. Be happy you've got an speedy, athletic team playing together with minimal turnovers.

 

[MsProudSooner]

Does anyone know when Bennett's foot will be healed enough to make him available for more minutes?

 

[garyeb2]

Does anyone know when Bennett's foot will be healed enough to make him available for more minutes?

I think it was foul trouble more than foot trouble. He had 4 in 7 minutes.

 

[DenverSooner]

As far as baseball goes. Watch "Trouble With The Curve." That Clint Eastwood movie kind of pokes fun at the Billy Bean approach.

Does it? That isn't how I interpreted that movie.