Welcome to Another Sporadic Five Out, this time it’s still July!
Not much going on in NBA world. So I thought I’d share some random thoughts of my, of yours, and of others, and hope you find them interesting.
- Summer League Stat Translation To The NBA
Even if you don’t play fantasy basketball, it’s probably worth listening to at least some of Locked On Fantasy Basketball with Josh Lloyd. Sometimes it’s just Josh marching through rankings and somewhat tedious fantasy stuff. Sometimes it’s really useful statistical analysis, not just for fantasy,
but for how the NBA works, in general, explained well by Josh Lloyd.
Of particular note of late is an episode on whether or not efficiency collapses with more usage for NBA players. Short Answer (apologies to Josh - any mistakes my own) - sort of, but not for superstars, which is partly why they’re superstars, and not maybe the way you think. It’s really fringe stars that see statistical collapse the most with increased usage.
Also of note, his explanation of work by a group or person called The F5 that tracks just what stats from Summer Leagues translate to the NBA in a positive way. Here’s what does, according to them, and Josh: three point attempts (not percentage), assists (not turnovers), blocks, steals and to some extent, rebounds.
That’s it. That’s literally all that correlates with NBA success and translates to The Association.
Guess what? That’s just what Reed Sheppard did well. All of it. Including rebounds. Assists were in my opinion depressed somewhat by guys who couldn’t make open layups.
2. Remember The Morey Poison Pill?
I wonder if a mild regret of the Rockets summer is not keeping some powder dry to force teams into something resembling the old Daryl Morey Restricted Free Agent Poison Pill (since legislated away, like Many Morey Moves). Right now three pretty interesting restricted free agent players are sitting around with what amounts to a somewhat derisory qualifying offer sitting around. (I will play for the qualifying offer.) Those players of course are Kuminga, Giddey and Grimes, which sounds like a jazz fusion band.
Because of the second apron and NBA hard cap it creates, those players’ teams have them over the metaphorical barrel. No one has any money to make a offer for their teams to match. Their teams for various reasons don’t want to pay these players much, or pay them long term.
If you still had, say, a salary exception, you might make an offer for a shooter like Grimes if you were the Rockets. Now, Stone can’t have known this would happen, and doing business early is a less risky approach than doing it late, and I have little to complain about with the Rockets roster. But some shooting would be nice. Another ballhandler would be nice. Would their teams match an offer around the midlevel exception? I’m not so sure they would.
3. Take This Qualifying Offer and... Send Me To A Back Specialist In Germany
If you were Kuminga, Giddey or Grimes, what would you do? Salary and compensation is all relative to your industry, scarcity of people who do what you do, etc. So with that in mind, I might take the qualifying offer and then mysteriously come down with a back condition that rendered me unable to play except when I felt like it.
I know there are actual physicians reading this blog, so maybe a back injury/condition/extreme-perhaps-bogus-pain isn’t the hardest condition to disprove. What is?
This condition would render me unable to provide services to my team, except occasionally. It would be miraculously cured by a long term contract with another team as a restricted free agent.
None of these players is old, and all are being leveraged really hard by their teams. Kuminga may be something of a doofus, but he has a point about how Golden State has treated him.
4. Who Do We Hate?
Alright, who is the target of ire on this year’s Rockets? We don’t have Jalen Green to kick around anymore, though a few got a celebratory knife or two in at his valedictory words for Houston.
We know TDS must have its villain. Who will it be? Ime? Stone? Reed? Jabari? Fred? Dark horse Dorian Finney-Smith? Sengun? Tari’s leg? Amen’s dribbling? Amen’s shooting? Clint Capela being 30? Aaron Holiday’s 12 minutes a game?
Sing it out!
5. Quit Stopping The Clock On Shot Clock Violations
I’ll complain about a rule here, briefly. I don’t believe a rule infraction should EVER, EVER, EVER be a benefit to the team committing the infraction. So I don’t think a team that didn’t manage to get a shot that at least hit the rim, off in 24 seconds should ever get a chance to stop and set its defense as a result of its infraction, if it’s at all possible not to stop the clock.
Sure, someone might airball a shot into the stands. Fine, the clock must stop. Otherwise, it shouldn’t stop at all, or should stop for only the time it takes for the team who caused the violation to inbound the ball. No referee grabbing and holding the ball, no setting up. If the team who caused the shot clock violation grabs the ball and throws it in within a second, great. They deserve to do that.
No Benefit To The Team Committing The Infraction. Ever.
More from thedreamshake.com:
- Houston Rockets vs. Golden State Warriors game preview
- Chris Paul is ready to remind you why he is an all-time great
- Isaiah Taylor signs with Hawks
- Rockets 2017-2018 player previews: Ryan Anderson
- James Harden will be even better this year with Chris Paul
- Rockets 2017-2018 player previews: Clint Capela
- The Rockets are a serious threat to land LeBron James, Zach Lowe writes
