April 13, 2010
LeBron & the Double Standard

Earlier this week, NBA Fanhouse’s Tim Povtak wrote an article to attack LeBron for his decision to sit out 3 consecutive games to rest for the playoffs. Among other charges, Povtak argues that Bron should split his game check from this past Sunday 20,562 ways to partially reimburse attendees who obviously didn’t get to see him on the court. Povtak even goes a step further, charging James with “mocking the fans” and “stealing money” by voluntarily sitting out.

More importantly, though, he makes the point that because of his decision to rest, Bron “doesn’t respect the game” and therefore “isn’t good enough to be the MVP.”

I endured a similar argument between Pardon the Interruption’s Tony Kornheiser and Mike Wilbon earlier today. To their credit, both of them began the segment by stating unequivocally that Bron is and should be the MVP. However, they also then went on to agree that Bron should’ve played at least a portion of all of the games remaining on the schedule.

There are so many things wrong with each person’s argument that I don’t even know where to begin. The thing that I found most interesting about Povtak, Kornheiser, and Wilbon’s cases, though, was the supposed counter-examples they used.

In both situations, MJ became the primary figure. Povtak notes that Jordan played all 82 games 9 times in his career, including the seasons where the Bulls won 62, 69, and 72 games and clinched the #1 seed early. He also notes that Jordan played all 82 in his final season with the Wizards at age 40.

These are all facts. However, Povtak’s justification is laughable. He states without a shadow of a doubt that Jordan played all these games “because it was the right thing to do.”

Right. Because Jordan is world-renowned for his selflessness and desire to consider others. Which is why he did things like bring the coach who cut him in high school to his Hall of Fame induction ceremony strictly so that he could publicly humiliate the guy. It’s why he was known throughout his career as an aloof teammate who viewed the rest of the roster strictly as pieces that were bringing him down. It’s why he took the 1993-94 season off to play minor league baseball. For the fans. And because it was the right thing to do.

Kornheiser also argued that “unlike the NFL, this isn’t a game where one play can result in a season-ending injury.” Really? Apparently Kornheiser missed Andrew Bogut breaking his hand and dislocating his elbow after a dunk against the Suns, Chris Bosh getting his face fractured by an incidental elbow from Antawn Jamison, and Brandon Roy tearing his meniscus against the Lakers this Sunday. That’s three potentially season-ending injuries to franchise players in the past two weeks alone.

Povtak takes an even more ridiculous stance on this part of the issue:

James isn’t the only one with normal bumps and bruises that come with an NBA season. Magic center Dwight Howard takes more of a pounding than anyone in the league, forced to endure endless hard fouls because opponents know he can’t make free throws. Howard, by contrast, is likely to play the last two games, giving him 82 for the fifth time in six years.

Howard isn’t the only one who plays every night. Kevin Durant, who is dueling James for the scoring title, wasn’t afraid to play every night. Neither was Amare Stoudemire. There are many others.

Ignoring the extreme dubiousness of declaring that Da-wight takes the most hits of anyone in the league (Kevin Durant currently leads the league in FTAs with 835 to Da-wight’s 811), it’s ignorant to compare Bron to three guys whose teams are battling for playoff positioning, especially on the basis that James is “afraid.” But I guess I shouldn’t expect sound logic from a guy who can’t even spell Amar’e’s first name right.

Strangely enough, no one has felt the need to bring up the fact that Kobe will ultimately be inactive for 4 of the final 5 games of the Lakers’ season. He sat two games last week to “rest his legs” and will miss the final two games to ostensibly let a broken finger heal. Yes, unlike LeBron’s situation, the broken finger is a tangible injury. But it’s one Kobe’s been playing with since December 11th. Pretty hard to argue that it’s just become a necessity to tend to the injury now.

Also worth noting: in 14 seasons, Kobe has only played all 82 games 3 times. He didn’t do it the first time until his seventh season. For his career, he averages 73 games played per season. Bron currently averages 78.

I don’t bring this up to try to denigrate Bryant. Though I have many things against him as a player, I will never indict his competitiveness. I only bring it up to suggest that there’s a double standard in play.

Speaking of which, the PTI team unintentionally showed just how much of a double-standard they have when they discussed Larry Brown in the same segment as the “controversy” over LeBron’s rest. With the Bobcats having just secured their first ever playoff berth, and with his friend and admirer Michael Jordan having just bought the team, Larry Brown has apparently asked for and received permission to talk to other teams about coaching vacancies at the end of the season. He has made 13 coaching stops in his career, usually leaving after two seasons or so by his own choice.

To no surprise of mine, both Wilbon and Kornheiser laughed this off as, essentially, Larry being Larry. No sense that this is a complete slap in the face to ownership and his players, and certainly no sense that Brown is “disrespecting the game.”

At the end of the day, I can understand why some people could be upset at Bron for sitting out. But as I’ve said before, these are the same people who would tar and feather him, the coaching staff, and ownership if Bron were to play in these final meaningless games, get injured, and end the Cavs’ chances at the title before they even really began. Wilbon stated that Jordan and Pippen simply refused the Bulls’ ownership’s request to rest in those storied seasons. Had they not stayed healthy, the entire conversation would have changed. Just another double-standard at work.

At the end of the day, this whole controvery is a joke. It’s exactly the kind of lazy journalism and unfounded outrage that gives me a reason to keep writing this blog. This entire situation is going to be judged by how the Cavs and particularly LeBron (as if there’s a big difference between the two) perform in the post-season. I’m just thankful that the playoffs start in another four days so that sports writers like Tim Povtak can potentially find something meaningful to spend their time on.

-T

11:00pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/520171203/lebron-the-double-standard
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FILED UNDER: NBA Cavs Bron Kobe 
March 26, 2010
The Jamison Report

I’ve had a couple of different conversations with Mike and my dad over the course of the past few days about Antawn Jamison’s overall performance as a Cavalier. I did not see the trade as a definite problem-solving upgrade when it happened, and I’ve only rarely been impressed with him since. Of course, I also feel like practically every time I check the box score, he shot 50% and got a double-double.

Brian Windhorst made a couple of points about Jamison during a radio segment earlier this week that pushed the issue even further. Tonight, I felt I needed to sit down and do an honest accounting of Jamison to find out whether or not my in-game feelings about him—particularly on offense—are accurate or not. So, here goes. (Thanks in advance to our friends at Hoop Data and Basketball Reference for the numbers.)

First, the basics. In the 16 games since coming to the Cavs, Jamison’s per-36 minute averages are 16.2 points on 47.6%FG (including 34.6%3P),  8.8 TRB, 1.7 AST, 1.3 STL, 0.7 BLK, 1.5 TO, and 3.0 PF. Pretty solid.

In his 41 games as a Wizard this year (which is a ridiculous-sounding sentence, if you take it out of context), his per-36 minute averages were 19.0 points on 45.0%FG (including 34.5%3P), 8.2 TRB, 1.2 AST, 1.0 STL, 0.4 BLK, 1.4 TO, and 2.5 PF.

This means that since the trade, he’s improved in almost all the traditional categories. FG%, 3P%, total rebounding, assists, steals, and blocks are all up. There’s a negligible difference in his turnovers, and his fouls have increased by 0.5.

However, you’ll notice that even though Jamison’s FG% is up, his per-36 minute scoring is actually down. This is entirely because of his bizarre struggles at the free throw line. For his career, Jamison shoots a passable 72.9% from the stripe. In his 16 games as a Cav, he’s plunged to 44%—the worst percentage on the team. He’s also getting 1.5 fewer FTAs per 36 minutes in Cleveland than in Washington.

Still, from these numbers, he appears to be a strong net positive for the team. But is this the whole story?

Let’s dig a little deeper.

One of Windhorst’s points in the podcast was that Jamison has been phenomenal at creating his own shot. Actually, this is completely untrue. As a Cavalier, Jamison has been assisted on 80.4% of his shots at the rim, which eclipses his previous high of 65.0% last season (to be fair, most of these advanced stats only go back to the 2007 season, so keep that in mind).

In fact, Jamison the Cavalier hasn’t been very good at creating his own shot anywhere on the floor. His most independent mark comes on FGAs closer than 10 feet, where he’s assisted on only 46.2%. On 16-23 footers, though, he’s assisted 85.7% of the time. And on both 10-15 footers and 3 pointers, he is at 100%. Yes, that means that Jamison has never created one of those two types of shots for himself since coming to Cleveland.

That said, none of these shot-creation statistics are really anomalous for Jamison’s career, with the exception of the percentage of assists he’s receiving at the rim. Since 2007, he’s never been assisted on fewer than 95% of his 3s, or 79.3% of his 16-23 footers. His shots from 10-15 feet (now assisted 100%) were assisted 80% of the time earlier this year in Washington. So in all of these facets, the Cavs’ coaching staff and front office shouldn’t exactly be surprised by what they’re getting.

I also don’t want to lose sight of the fact that a shot being assisted is not necessarily a bad thing. After all, they’re worth the same amount of points regardless of how hard an individual player has to work to get them. So regardless of how often he’s assisted, how well is he actually shooting from each of these distances?

The news here is mixed. Jamison is finishing at the rim at 61.3%, which is 1.0% worse than Pau Gasol. However, 61.3% is also his worst career performance since 2007—though only by a slim margin. On the flip side, he’s shooting a career-high 59% from less than 10’. But the news from there is all down-hill. Jamison is shooting 33.3% from 10-15’, 35% from 16-23’, and 34.5% from 3P—all of which are consistent with his career averages since 2007.

Windhorst’s other point from the podcast was that Cavs’ officials seem to be a bit disappointed with Jamison’s accuracy from the perimeter. If they are, they haven’t been paying attention to the numbers.

What about his shot selection, though? If Jamison’s generally avoiding the shots he’s worst at, the different FG percentages take on a completely different light. The good news is that Jamison is taking the most attempts (5.0 per game) at the rim, his area of greatest shooting efficiency, and the least attempts per game (0.6) from his most inefficient zone, 10-15’. The bad news is that he then goes in almost complete reverse order. His 2nd most attempts per game (3.3) come from beyond the arc (34.5%3P), 3rd most attempts from 16-23’ (35%FG), and ironically, 4th most attempts (1.5) from less than 10’—his second most efficient shooting range (59%FG).

This last point is where, in the JMID view, there’s potential for trouble. The surface reason for getting Jamison was to add a “stretch 4” to open up the paint even further for other players. The Cavs’ game against the Hornets on Wednesday was a great example of how well this can work if the opponent commits to keeping a man on Jamison at the perimeter. However, if I’m an opposing coach, I look at these numbers and see that Jamison essentially only makes 1 out of every 3 shots he launches from beyond 9’. 33% is a chance I’ll take all day. I dare Jamison to knock down significantly more than that before I start keeping a defender on him wide.

One caveat is Jamison’s 3P%. 34.5% is not great. But it’s better than Kobe and identical to Bron. Effective FG%, or eFG%, a statistic that adjusts shooting percentages to account for the fact that success on a 3 pointer is more significant than success on a 2 pointer, suggests that shooting 34.5%3P is as good as shooting 51.0% from anywhere inside the arc. So, that puts things into a slightly more positive light.

Jamison’s real problem from a shooting efficiency standpoint is his tendency to send long 2s. The reality is that if he’s not shooting from under 10’, he might as well be gunning for triples. He has basically the same risk but a greater reward.

In conclusion, even though we’re only dealing with 16 games, the numbers seem to suggest that what we’re seeing from Jamison offensively right now is about what we should expect. The hovering cloud is whether or not what we’re seeing now will ultimately be enough come playoff time.

-T

3:17am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/474517894/the-jamison-report
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FILED UNDER: NBA Cavaliers Cavs Antawn Jamison LeBron Kobe 
March 10, 2010
Against Sportsmanship

HBO aired a much hyped documentary about the career-long rivalry between Larry Bird and Magic Johnson this past Saturday night. I watched it tonight, but I’ve also seen a host of basketball writers comment about it since this weekend. All of the commentary is in basically the same glowing terms. Though they all applaud the doc itself, the bigger cheers seem to come from the memories it revived of the actual on-court battles that these two great players had in the earlier era of the NBA—battles that, from the footage I’ve seen, were truly epic.

Here’s what I know: on court, Bird and Magic hated one another. It was about more than basketball to them. Because of the franchises they were both drafted by, the personal vendettas that went back to their college years took on all kinds of new dimensions in the pros. West coast vs. east coast. Glamorous Los Angeles vs. working class Boston. The cold-blooded recluse vs. the warm-hearted charmer. Black vs. white in a racially divided America. To hear them tell it, each guy went to the box scores the next morning and checked to see how his rival did the night before, and each of them used those results as fuel to try to get better. They lived to play one another. More accurately, they lived to try to beat one another.

Admittedly, part of this antagonism was roiling before Magic and Bird arrived on the scene. The Lakers & Celtics had squared off in the Finals seven different times prior to the 1979-80 season, with Boston winning on each occasion. Magic may not have been the whole difference, but he was certainly instrumental. The Celtics and Lakers met in the 1983-84, 1984-85, and 1986-87 finals, with the Lakers coming out victorious in the last two of those three series. Magic was unanimously voted the Finals MVP in ‘87. Bird received that honor when the Celtics took the trophy in ‘84.

While Lakers / Celtics in the Magic / Bird era was arguably the greatest NBA rivalry of the 20th century, there were certainly others. The “Bad Boys” Pistons vs the Bulls, where the infamous “Jordan Rules” were spawned. The Lakers vs. the Pistons in the same time period, along with the MJ Bulls vs. Bird’s Celtics. Even the early 2000s gave the fans the Lakers vs the Sacramento Kings, which had enough drama, entertainment value, and genuine poisonous feelings between the players that it could be considered great.

Yet today’s NBA has none of that.

Yes, rivalries still exist. Obviously the Celtics / Lakers tilt in the 2007-8 Finals was treated as big news. The Suns and Spurs don’t like each other very much. The Cavs were even at the center of what could have been a great rivalry with the Wizards—that is, if they were ever meeting anywhere later than the opening round of the post-season, and if the Wizards were ever actually able to beat the Cavs.

But unfortunately for the fans, we’ve entered what I will call the Sportsmanship Era of the NBA.

Part of this sad circumstance has to do with the way the game is officiated. Chuck Daly’s Jordan Rules made for great drama and a more even competition, but they also very much made it possible that the greatest player in the game could end up getting knocked out of the series (or more) by injury. Flagrant fouls were established in the NBA in 1993 to help protect players like Jordan, whose mastery of the game was so high that only the roughest physical play could hope to stop them.

This isn’t a phenomenon specific to the NBA. The NFL is also notorious for the legislative body armor it’s created around the quarterback position. All sports commissioners have a justified compulsion to protect their leagues’ biggest stars. The acknowledged wisdom is that it’s those stars who generate interest in the league and, therefore, revenue. While the league office can’t make these stars bullet-proof, they can certainly institute as many precautions and penalties as they think are necessary.

The irony, though, is that the “revised” officiating has arguably made the game far less competitive and, therefore, interesting. Just as linebackers and defensive linemen in the NFL argue that they can barely do their jobs now, NBA players argue that it’s impossible to even get near enough to established great players to hope to stop them. In recent NBA history, I like to point to the way Da-wyane Wade was officiated in the 2006 Finals as the best example of this. (There’s an entire series on Youtube covering the 5 most outrageous phantom calls in that series. Phantom fouls three and five are my favorites.)

It’s a conscious decision on the part of the league. David Stern and company have clearly come to the conclusion that what best serves the NBA is great players given a wide berth to be great, not the best teams fighting each other the hardest to win. I’m sure Stern would argue that the two are not mutually exclusive, but I beg to differ—partially because the life or death intensity of Bird and Magic’s rivalry in the 1980s was the phenomenon that prevented the league from capsizing.

By no means am I saying that I want the players going after one another in the parking lot with tire irons. (The last thing I need in my life as a sports fan is LeBron howling “Why? Whyyyyyyy?” while holding a kneecap busted by some thug hired by Kobe to take him out of the Finals.) I’m also not saying that sportsmanship shouldn’t be taught in youth sports, when kids need to learn the boundaries of behavior. But considering the firestorm that ignited over LeBron’s refusal to shake hands with Orlando after losing in game 6 of the ECF last season, I am saying that the focus on clean play and sportsmanship in professional sports has gone too far.

In fairness, the league isn’t wholly responsible for this situation. The other contributing factor is the culture of friendship that’s developed among the players. Unlike LeBron and Da-wyane, Bird and Magic weren’t going to dinner with one another during the season or advising one another on contract negotiations. They played against one another once in college, but they didn’t grow up together in AAU tournaments as high-schoolers and younger.

I’m not necessarily happy about this development as a fan, but it’s one I can understand as a human being. NBA players’ lives are basketball, and this starts at a very early age. Basketball is their recreation, their escape, their profession, their social life, their fraternity, and in many cases, their support group. Outside of professional sports, how many other industries are there in the world where a 19 year-old African-American kid can not only become a multi-millionaire, but also associate with a bunch of other people in the exact same position? I don’t think you need a second finger to count. In this regard, it’s natural for these players to bond with one another. Who else understands their lifestyle, their stresses, their responsibilities, and in many cases, the “have-not to have-everything” culture shock they’re experiencing?

In fact, this may be an even bigger prevention of true rivalries than the rule changes. Magic repeatedly tried to reach out to Bird early in their careers, dating back to when they played one another in the NCAA championship game. The antagonism was manufactured entirely by Bird. He snubbed Magic on purpose and made it clear that he had no desire, no reason to be friends with him. In Bird’s book, Magic’s only function in his life was to play against Bird and ultimately, to lose to him. This persisted for years. Even looking back on it now, Bird admits that his greatest joy in winning the ‘84 title was “knowing that [Magic] was suffering” because he’d lost. The plan ultimately backfired, as Magic credits that loss for driving him to work even harder so that he’d never experience that feeling again. But the fact remains that those Lakers-Celtics Finals would never have reached the intensity level they reached if not for Bird’s willingness to play the heel.

In today’s NBA, I don’t think there are any young players willing to play that role. The only star in the league with the right temperament seems to be Kobe, the guy who, according to Mike D’Antoni, implored his All-Star team to “step on the throats” of the Eastern Conference All-Stars coming out of a time-out a few years back. But like it or not, Kobe is a part of the old guard. His career is in decline. The league is in the hands of LeBron, Da-wyane, Carmelo, Chris Paul, Rajon Rondo, and others still well under 30. Led by LeBron’s example—which is really Magic’s example, minus his early relationship with Bird—these players are as much friends with one another as competitors against one another.

What they don’t have that Magic and Bird both did is a persona different from their true selves. Magic talks extensively in the documentary about how he was really two people: Earvin and Magic. Earvin was the fun-loving charmer who lit up every room he walked into; Magic was the guy who got to the gym before everyone else and literally lived for the opportunity to take revenge on Bird. After their second Finals showdown, Bird met “Earvin” when Converse coerced the two men into shooting a joint shoe commercial in French Lick, Indiana. They connected, they bonded, they felt at ease with one another. Magic then thought they could be friends the next season, that the first time they played one another, the two of them could go out for a beer after the game, chat, catch up, reminisce, etc.

But as soon as the next season began, Bird made it abundantly and instantly clear that Earvin was dead to him. He wanted to throw Magic to the crows. All of the old venom returned in an instant, and the true rivalry—the knock-down, drag-out physical rivalry, the test of wills, the hunger for not only victory but the pain of their competitor—picked up right where it left off. And it was Bird’s attitude that created that scenario.

Professional sports today are a very different animal from the Bird / Magic era: finance-wise, marketing-wise, lifestyle-wise. There didn’t use to be much drive other than winning. Now, players are brands. They have images to not just protect and develop, but cross-market. It’s less profitable for LeBron and Kobe to hate each other than it is for them to be friendly enough to co-star in Vitamin Water and Nike campaigns. Ironically, that Converse commercial with Bird and Magic—the one where they became off-court friends—may have set the precedent for this. But no one in the Sportsmanship Era of the NBA has chosen to flip that switch off so completely that the personal relationships truly become inconsequential when it comes to tip time.

Some people will still call Kobe / LeBron a rivalry. I think that label is a ridiculous reach. Yes, the public has christened them to be the two best players in the game (despite its indisputable factual error). But the two have never played one another in any game of real consequence. In fact, they’ve done more note-worthy things as Olympic teammates than NBA opponents. But the sponsors, the marketers, and even the league know deep down that rivalries are good for the sport. They know this because the Bird / Magic antagonism saved the NBA from bankruptcy in the 1980s.  But it also resulted in fights, in blood, in bruises, in injuries—in short, in the general peril that the foundation of the league’s success was one bad fall away from disappearing.

So now the league does its best to cultivate these bloodless face-offs: rivalries of stats, of individual records, of awards, with the hope that they can soon have rivalries where championships are decided  between teams of guys who really want to win, but also really want to lend a hand to help their opponent get up from the floor.  Hard-fought games that don’t cross the danger zone into “chippy.” Just enough emotion to steer clear of technical fouls. Losers crushed by the outcome, but not so crushed that they would forget to shake hands with the victor afterward. In short, rivalries governed by sportsmanship.

I reject these pseudo-rivalries. If that makes me a barbarian, so be it. But LeBron snubbing Da-wight after losing a hard-fought series is nothing compared to Kevin McHale clothes-lining Kurt Rambis to prevent a lay-up in game 3 of the ‘84 Finals. To pretend otherwise is absurd.

My great fear in all of this is that we as current basketball fans are being shorted, that the great players of today are stopping short of the top level of intensity because of the league’s doing and the players’ handling of own their personal relationships. It’s a selfish perspective, I realize. Part of the reason the NBA is like this is because the players themselves want it to be. After all, league rules aren’t forcing them to help opponents up from fouls or hug one another before and after games. On that level, the Sportsmanship Era is a grassroots movement that puts me even further in the minority than I originally thought.

But if I’m the only one against this new age of sportsmanship, then I’d also ask this: why were so many people so excited by a reminder of when Magic and Bird hated one another? I believe that the answer is that it created some of the best, most memorable basketball ever played. The emotion, the competitiveness that took the games to that level does not exist right now. And unfortunately for the fans, I also believe that it means the current league’s full potential may never be reached.

But that’s ok. At least we can all still be friends.

-T

1:30am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/438708270/against-sportsmanship
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FILED UNDER: NBA LeBron Kobe Magic Bird Celtics Lakers Rivalries 
January 21, 2010
Cavs / Lakers Bazooka Point

Kobe “The Greatest Finisher in the Game” Bryant’s 4th quarter performance:

5 minutes 23 seconds, 1-6 FG, 2-2 FT, 4 points, 0 REB, 0 AST, 0 BLK

Lebron’s 4th quarter performance:

6 minutes 22 seconds, 5-7 FG, 1-2 FT, 12 points, 3 REB, 0 AST, 1 BLK 

Granted, there was a lot more to the game than that. Most of all, it seemed like the Lakers - for a second time - couldn’t match the Cavs’ intensity down the stretch, didn’t know how to handle the physical play, couldn’t “make love to the pressure,” in the parlance of Stephen Jackson, when it came to winning time.

This was the case despite that A) Mo was in a suit, B) Jamario was in a suit, C) the Cavs had practically no time to change the game plan from what they would’ve used had Mo been available, D) Cavs shot only 33.4% 3FG, E) the Lakers had all their players available…I could go on.

The point is, the Cavs are 2-0 against the Lakers — the exact opposite of their record in the season series last year. It doesn’t determine anything for the future, but if you try to tell me it doesn’t represent progress…well, I’ll bet that you also think Kobe is the MVP of the 4th quarter.

-T

11:36pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/347114463/cavs-lakers-bazooka-point
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FILED UNDER: Cavs Lakers Lebron Kobe Bazooka Point 
December 23, 2009
LeBron vs. Kobe: A Tipping Point

I’ve sensed the tide turning recently in the endless Kobe versus LeBron debate regarding who’s the better player. It came largely when people (finally) began to pick on the blanket statement that Kobe is the best player in the world in the clutch. Henry Abbot, I thought, did the most damage to Kobe. John Schumann jabbed him a couple times.

But this article from scout David Thorpe (linked above) may be the death knell. As Thorpe notes, the advanced stats all show Bron is the better player, but players and former player analysts all side with Kobe. Thorpe analyzes their skills here, and the impact they have on the team and the game … and Bron comes out ahead.

Tonight might be a vacation night for the JMID crew. If you wake up in the morning, and there’s no bazooka point on the Kings game, well, then blame it on the alcohol.

1:01pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/297295797/lebron-vs-kobe-a-tipping-point
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FILED UNDER: Cavs Lakers Bron Kobe