SB Nation User Blog: dishingoutdimes

Jennings Continues To Tear It Up!

dishingoutdimes — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:05:26 -0000

That's probably one of my favorite Brandon Jennings' highlights of the season, if for nothing else than John McGlocklin's reaction. But you have to admit, you were probably doing the same thing when you saw that the first time. Lots of people are mentioning Jennings for Rookie of the Year, but exactly how good has he been?

Let's start off with the leader boards. Jennings has poured in the points, as he's 14th in the NBA in made field goals (173), 6th in the NBA in made 3-pointers (50), 14th in the NBA in 3P FG% (44.6%), and 12th in the NBA in scoring (21.2 ppg). But Jennings isn't just racking up the points, he's making his teammates better as well. He's 13th in the league in assists per game (6.0). His assist to turnover ratio isn't in the top 20 (Ridnour's is though, he's #7), but it is a healthy and respectable 1.96. If you consider the traditional triple-double stats (points, assists, and rebounds) and sum those up, you get a pretty good idea for who the most complete players in the league are. Jennings is 22nd in the league in this category with 30.9 points, rebounds, and assists per game.

But there are some other metrics that show just how good Jennings has been. I'll take a look at those after the jump!

"Clutch Time" is defined by the site 82games.com as 4th quarter or overtime, less than 5 minutes left, and neither team ahead by more than 5 points. You can take a look at how a player has performed in such situations, and then project that out to 48 minutes worth of production, to take away things like pace and advantages to players who have been in those situations more frequently.

Brandon Jennings is shooting an effective FG% of 62.1% in the clutch times so far this season, an insanely high margin, especially for a guard. If you consider clutch points scored per 48 minutes, young Brandon is putting up an average of 58.1, which is better than anyone on the list from 2008-2009 - including Kobe Bryant and LeBron James.

Anyone who saw the Golden State game knows just how clutch Jennings can be. Before we go crowning him though, I'd like to see him continue this production through the entire year. As a Bucks fan, I've grown accustomed to being skeptical of how good the Bucks as a whole, or any individual players on the Bucks can be.

But as I heard several announcers say following Jennings' 55 point performance, you don't just drop a double nickel and then fade away. Jennings was in pretty good company with that performance (by a rookie) .

Brandon Jennings’ 55 points are the most by an NBA rookie since Earl Monroe had 56 on February 13, 1968. They’re also the second-most by a player under 21. The most was 56 scored by LeBron James on March 20, 2005.

Any time you can be grouped with LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Earl Monroe, chances are you've got at least a little talent.

The Bucks have a chance to be good. They have two PG in the top 13 in player efficiency ratings (PER) - Luke Ridnour with a PER of 20.15 (#5 among PG), and Brandon Jennings with a PER of 17.88 (#13 among PG). Andrew Bogut is certainly having an All Star caliber season. Only 4 of the Bucks' 11 losses have been blowouts (greater than 10 point losses).

There's a lot of promise there. They have solid young players who put forth a lot of effort in Ilyasova and Mbah-a-Moute. Delfino is playing fairly solid as well, and Michael Redd, despite all the flak that he gets, flies under the radar and is a necessary scoring threat to have on the team. I don't think Redd plays into the plans for the future, though. The Bucks stumbled upon an extremely talented player in Jennings, and will probably build around him and Bogut.

I know I made a case for the Bucks to hang on to Ramon Sessions, just like Mo Williams before him, but I'll make the same plea for Jennings now. Please John Hammond, please keep him around. This kid is putting butts in the seats (along with Bogut). He is clearly a special talent. He is making people around the NBA actually care about the Bucks. When was the last time that happened?

Ranking The Bowl Games

dishingoutdimes — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 03:56:25 -0000

More photos » by Al Behrman - AP

This guy will be playing in the best bowl game of 2009-2010. (AP Photo/Al Behrman, File)

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In the never-ending effort to rank the bowl games, most articles rely on just the author's subjective analysis of all parts of the game. For example, how big of a mismatch is it? How good or bad are the teams? Are the stakes high? Is it a traditionally good bowl game?

I've decided to put a statistical spin on things, by using the latest Fremeau Efficiency Index ratings from Football Outsiders. FEI is basically a formula that, "considers each of the nearly 20,000 possessions every season in major college football. All drives are filtered to eliminate first-half clock-kills and end-of-game garbage drives and scores. A scoring rate analysis of the remaining possessions then determines the baseline possession efficiency expectations against which each team is measured. A team is rewarded for playing well against good teams, win or lose, and is punished more severely for playing poorly against bad teams than it is rewarded for playing well against bad teams."

It is probably a better method of ranking teams than what the BCS or human polls would provide. So, what I did was compute a few things. In each of the tables I post, you'll see some abbreviated titles above certain columns. FEI next to certain teams is simply the latest FEI of each team (updated after championship week). Avg FEI indicates the average of both teams' ratings. The higher the value, theoretically the better the teams that will be competing in the bowl game. Everyone likes to watch bowl games with the elite teams. FEI Diff indicates the differential in the rating of the two teams in each game. Both of those values are ranked from 1 to 34, with 1 being the best rating. Z is simply the average of twice the z-score of the Avg FEI and the z-score of the FEI Diff. Basically, how much better the teams are compared to the average bowl game, and how much more evenly the teams are matched, play into this value. I weighted it to give the advantage to the bowl games with better teams in them, as those will be the ones most people want to watch.

For the rankings, follow the link below; they are after the jump!

The Elite Bowls

The best bowl game? Turns out it is the Sugar Bowl - between Cincinnati and Florida. The teams are fairly evenly matched (it is the 4th most evenly matched game), but it is also the bowl game with the 2nd best combination of teams rankings-wise. It's worth noting that all BCS Bowl Games are in this first "elite" tier of bowl games. The one non-BCS game that managed to sneak in? The Capitol One Bowl between LSU and Penn State. This should come as no surprise. Both teams are very evenly matched and are above average squads. It also comes with a bit of extra oomph as it will pit the minds of Joe Paterno and Les Miles, and it will be an early afternoon game on New Years' Day (late enough so most people will be awake to watch it). For future reference, the bolded team is the one that would be favored based on FEI rating.

The Above Average Bowls

The next tier of bowl games is the "above average" tier. These games are the next best bowls to watch, but you won't necessarily be setting your calendar by them. These are the bowls that pit above average teams, but still have a reasonable chance of producing a good, down-to-the-wire game. Notably for Sooner fans, the Sun Bowl comes in just shy of the mark to make it into an elite bowl matchup. Oklahoma and Stanford both have mediocre records, but both have excellent FEI ratings suggesting that the teams have underachieved but are both very dangerous.

The Gator Bowl is the 3rd most evenly matched bowl game, which pulls it up to the ranking of the 8th best bowl game. The overachieving bowls this year (i.e. ones that are usually terrible, but could be good in this case)? The Meineke Car Care Bowl, the Emerald Bowl, and the Papajohns.com Bowl. The Meineke Car Care Bowl pulled off a great matchup this year by being able to snag two solid teams in Pittsburgh and North Carolina.

The Below Average Bowls

There are some pretty mediocre bowls in this bunch. Most of them usually have pretty mediocre matchups, but you wind up watching them anyways because you're bored, you have some extra snacks in the freezer, and it's football! None of these bowl games features particularly great teams, but it is interesting that the EagleBank Bowl, the International Bowl, and the Hawaii Bowl all feature very evenly matched teams.

The Terrible Bowls

These bowl games, in all likelihood, will not be very good. They feature mediocre to below average teams, typically from weaker conferences, and they generally feature a huge mismatch. You have to ask how a bowl like Ohio vs. Marshall would draw much viewership at all.

The Awards

Best Bowl Game: Sugar Bowl (Cincy vs. Florida)
Worst Bowl Game: New Mexico Bowl (Fresno State vs. Wyoming)
Biggest Overachiever: Emerald Bowl, #11 (USC vs. Boston College)
Biggest Underachiever: Outback Bowl, #21 (Auburn vs. Northwestern)
Why Is This Being Played?: Humanitarian Bowl, #32 (Bowling Green vs. Idaho), let's see it's a late December bowl game in the mountains of Idaho, pitting two 7-5 teams, one from the MAC and one from the WAC. Yikes.
Potential Blowout: GMAC Bowl (Central Michigan vs. Troy), CMU is a very good team, and Troy hails from the Sun Belt conference with a mediocre record.
Something's Got To Give: Orange Bowl (Georgia Tech vs. Iowa), Ga Tech comes in boasting the #1 Offensive FEI, and Iowa has the #3 defensive FEI. Two elite units match up. Whoever wins this battle, probably wins the game.
Best Game Probably Nobody Will See: Hawaii Bowl (SMU vs. Nevada), these two teams are very evenly matched but they have no pull whatsoever to a national audience.
Shootout: Las Vegas Bowl (Oregon State vs. BYU), both teams come in with offensive FEI rankings of better than #20, and defensive FEI rankings of worse than #60.
BCS Game With Best Chance of Blowout: National Championship Game (Alabama vs. Texas), Alabama comes in with an exceptionally high FEI rating as the result of beating some very good teams rather soundly and surviving a very tough conference. Texas comes in with a solid FEI rating that lacks somewhat because of their struggles as of late (against Texas A&M and Nebraska).
New Years Reigns Supreme: despite recent adjustments in the bowl schedule, January 1st still remains king of the bowl days. The average ranking of the bowl games on this day is 7.8! If you remove the early clunker of the Outback Bowl, the average ranking is 4.5 and no bowl played on the day is ranked worse than 8. You have to flip between the Gator and Capitol One Bowls in the early afternoon, the matinee is the Rose Bowl, and you follow that up with the primetime special - the Sugar Bowl. If you want to pick a day to veg out in front of the television, this is it!
Don't Be Fooled By January 2nd: the average ranking of these bowls? 19.2. It seems that the conspiracy this year was to create another day where you could sit around just watching football all day. But all indications are that this will be a collection of mainly mediocre bowl games.
Best Pre-Christmas Bowl Game: that honor falls to the Poinsettia Bowl, which is played on December 23rd between Utah and California.
No NFL Network? No Problem: only one bowl game is played on the NFL Network this season - the Insight Bowl. I have it ranked as the 29th best bowl game (6th worst). Unless you have a burning desire to watch it, you shouldn't be missing much.

Poll

Of the Elite Bowls, which one is best in your opinion?

Statistical Plus-Minus Update; Tony Crocker Playing MUCH Better

dishingoutdimes — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 16:31:49 -0000

Willie Warren still leads the pack in the statistical plus-minus department. Obviously he's been one of the more valuable players on the team, and it shows, as his SPM figure has ballooned to an absurdly high 26.24. I wish I had calculated it after the Arizona game when he had 25 points and played a great game, because I'm sure the figure would have dropped last night. Willie got in a bit of foul trouble and then couldn't really find a rhythm.

Tiny Gallon, Steven Pledger, and Cade Davis all still boast positive figures. Tony Crocker has made a very sharp turnaround. Previously he was slightly negative, but now has the second highest SPM on the team (11.23). Tommy Mason-Griffin has also made a considerable turnaround. After starting out the season strongly in the negative, he is almost back to a neutral figure and has been playing much better as of late.

As the team continues to jell, Crocker is going to be very important. His last two or three games have been great - he's hustled and scored, and done everything in between. The Sooners really need Crocker to be a legit second scoring threat to Warren. If both of those guys are firing on all cylinders, it will be tough to stop the Sooners' offense. This is because the Sooners would then have two guys who can create their own shot, and be scorers rather than shooters (there's a huge difference).

Add in a couple of marksmen (Pledger and Davis), a floor general (Tommy Mason-Griffin), and a big man (Tiny Gallon) and things are looking brighter for OU. One big concern I have is that Tiny Gallon will start to wear down especially as OU gets into conference play. They don't really have a lot of depth in the post. I think Orlando Allen has been playing alright, and he deserves more of a look off the bench than he's gotten recently.

The Sooners have clawed their way back to 6-3. Perhaps they'll start receiving a few votes in the polls next week. First, they're going to need to prove they can win away from home, and they'll have a couple of opportunities coming up - most notably this Saturday at Utah. Second, they need a signature win. Beating UTEP (ranked #29 in the KenPom ratings) on December 21st, and beating Gonzaga (AT Gonzaga) on December 31st would both qualify.

Of course, getting on the Sportscenter cycle doesn't hurt with the pollsters, and that's what Crocker's performance last night did for the Sooners.

Sooners Have A Tough Game On Sunday

dishingoutdimes — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 18:20:48 -0000

Fresh off a 67-47 domination of Arkansas (2-5), the Sooners play host to Arizona (3-3) on Sunday in the Pac 10 - Big 12 Hardwood Challenge. Above is a chart of the Statistical Plus-Minus breakdown for the OU-Arkansas game. Again, here is a basic definition of SPM:

The one measure that I found that I really like is statistical plus-minus. What is it? Basically it is the number of points that a player would add to a team if that player replaced an "average player", over 100 possessions. It is based on tempo neutral statistics (averaged for "per 40 minute production"). It accounts for things like turnovers hurting a team, and things like assists and steals helping a team.

I excluded Andrew Fitzgerald and T.J. Franklin from the analysis as neither played more than 3 minutes. Admittedly SPM works best when applied over a longer stretch of games, but it does offer some revealing trends. Ryan Wright had probably his best game of the season, which is funny because you probably wouldn't have noticed him on the court all that much. He only played for 12 minutes, but had a productive 12 minutes with 4 points, 3 rebounds, and an assist. As expected, Tony Crocker was basically the MVP of the game. He had more minutes than Wright (Ryan's production probably would have fallen with more minutes). It was one of Tony's best games as a Sooner. It seemed like every time down the court he would get a rebound. He finished with 16 points, 16 rebounds, 2 assists, a steal and a block.

Willie and Tommy Mason-Griffin both had solid games. "TMG", as he is sometimes called, needs to round out the stat line just a bit more. His assist totals continue to stay down, but he also decreased the number of turnovers he had. Cade Davis' SPM figure is slightly negative, which is enormously misleading. He's probably the other candidate for MVP in the Arkansas game. He hassled the nation's top scorer, Rotnei Clarke, all game long and held him well below his season average with 11 points. Without Cade's consistent effort on the defensive end, this game would have been much closer. For reference, Cade held Rotnei to a -3.46 SPM figure, an unbelievable accomplishment for the junior guard from Elk City, Oklahoma. The most impressive thing was the number of isolation plays they ran for Rotnei Clarke, and how all but 1 or 2 (if memory serves me right) failed because of Cade's defense. I thought the shift to man defense was a big plus for the team as a whole.

Bottom line: Cade Davis deserves a lot of credit for the performance he had against Arkansas, and defending Rotnei Clarke. It's no easy job to defend the nation's leading scorer for 38 minutes, especially when you're used to coming off the bench. Cade has had to work hard ever since he got here, and clearly the effort is paying off.

More on the 'Zona game after the jump!

Arizona will come into the game at 3-3, after dropping two consecutive games to Vanderbilt (#23 KenPom ratings), and UNLV (#40 KP). In fact, their last time out it was a heartbreaker, at home, in double overtime (74-72 loss). Arizona plays a lot of man defense as well. Their low defensive turnover% (15th lowest in NCAA) suggests they play teams straight up and don't gamble on the passing lanes (the low defensive steal% also suggests this). Thus, I would expect a half-court game where both teams will try to set up plays. This would decrease the number of possessions in the game, probably pretty close to being in line with OU's average of 65 per game.

While Arizona does have a pretty good record, they have yet to beat anyone ranked higher than #100 in the KenPom ratings, and statistically their best win was against Colorado. They also have not played a game at a true away site.

What does Arizona do well? Their defense is only allowing 0.905 points per possession (PPP), which is good for 55th in the NCAA. They hold teams to a low effective FG% (44.1%, 65th NCAA) and have a low defensive A/FGM ratio (38th NCAA) which suggests that they play defense to set up a lot of one-on-one matchups and try to make you beat them with individual effort on that end of the floor.

I think a key to the game for the Sooners will be to run the floor on misses by Arizona, and not allow them to simply sit back and dig in their heels. We have the athletes to run the floor, and doing so would put the Wildcats out of their comfort zone.

Likely Bowl Bids - Latest News

dishingoutdimes — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:57:41 -0000

More photos » by Sue Ogrocki - AP

By dashing OSU's hopes for a bid to the BCS, the Sooners jumped up the ladder in the Big 12 pecking order. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)

Browse more photos »

Well ccmachine already detailed the options pretty well in this post a couple of days ago, so read that for good bowl information. I'm here to provide a few quotes and news nuggets from the past couple of days and then try to break them down with a little analysis.

Most Likely Scenario - Texas beats Nebraska

Texas would travel to the National Championship Game and the Cotton Bowl would select Oklahoma State as they are next in the Big 12 pecking order behind the BCS. Oklahoma State is close to Dallas, and as ccmachine pointed out, "The attraction that a Les Miles vs. Mike Gundy match-up would bring is off the chart."

Nebraska would then get selected for the Holiday Bowl, in all likelihood, as most reports in the media and indications are that the Cornhuskers would get a berth here with a loss to Texas.

“If Nebraska loses in that game, we believe Nebraska would be a better selection for us than Texas Tech,’’ [Holiday Bowl Chairman of the Board] Baber said.

“(The Raiders) need to root for Nebraska to beat Texas,’’ he said. “That’s probably the best chance of them being here.’’

This leaves several options for the Sooners, more after the jump...

Gator Bowl

They seem likely to fill at least one of their bids with Florida State:

What hasn’t yet been reported is the ACC’s side. Just spoke with two members of the league office, and they said if the Gator Bowl is correct in interpreting its contract – and it seems that the Gator Bowl is correct – then it would be allowed to select FSU assuming Virginia Tech goes to the Chick-Fil-A Bowl (which it will).

They do have the option of choosing a Big 12 or Big East school, but as an ESPN blogger points out, they are likely to choose West Virginia:

The one near certainty seems to be West Virginia to the Gator Bowl, regardless of whether the Mountaineers beat Rutgers this weekend. The Gator Bowl, like any postseason game, wants to sell tickets and wants the Mountaineers' dependable traveling fan base.

Given that it seems like the Gator Bowl wants to lock things up soon so they can sell tickets, and OU getting to the Gator Bowl would likely result from an upset in the Big 12 Championship Game, I think it's probably safe to rule out this bowl for now. Additionally, I haven't heard OU's name be floated at all for the Gator Bowl.

Alamo Bowl

"Currently, we think our pool of Big 12 teams is Texas Tech and Oklahoma," Alamo Bowl CEO Derrick Fox wrote in an e-mail. "And our Big Ten pool is Michigan State and Minnesota.

The Alamo Bowl has basically whittled their choices down to Texas Tech and Oklahoma. However, it seems like they'd like to take Texas Tech, and they even bring up the dreaded "head-to-head":

“They’re one of the best traveling schools we’ve ever invited,’’ said Rick Hill, the Alamo Bowl vice president of marketing. “They brought record numbers, and had one of the best ESPN walking-off-the-field quotes from Mike Leach: ‘We’re not playing worth a damn,’ and just kept walking.’’

“Texas Tech did an outstanding job the last time they were here,’’ Hill said. “They won head to head against Oklahoma (this season). They finished strong. They’re a team that was a very high-profile team last year. Our fan base locally has seen them a lot and been impressed.’’

However, the allure of the Sooners could land OU in San Antonio. The VP of marketing points out that other than in 1999, the Alamo Bowl has never had the option of selecting the Sooners, and they may want to do that given the fan base and the spanking of their rival Oklahoma State.

Sun Bowl

The Sun Bowl appears likely to select California if Oregon beats Oregon State in the Civil War this weekend, but USC would likely fall to them if Oregon State can pull off the upset.

Matching up against this Pac 10 squad would be likely the leftovers of the Alamo Bowl. The Sun Bowl is probably going to try to pick a team from the area (OU or Tech), and this effectively eliminates Missouri.

The biggest rumor is that the Sun Bowl would try to create a "Stoops Bowl", but that's something the brothers have indicated they don't want:

Mike Stoops said a bowl matchup between Arizona (7-4, 5-3 Pac-10) and Oklahoma (7-5, 5-3 Big 12) would be "something we would try to avoid at all costs."

"I don't think it would be fun for either one of us," Mike Stoops said at his weekly campus news conference on Monday. "I think it would be very uncomfortable for probably everyone.

Sun Bowl reps were in attendance for OU's beat down of Oklahoma State (as were the Alamo Bowl reps), and therefore it's likely that one of those two bowls will select OU after seeing the dominating performance:

"We've had the Sooners twice in our bowl and they're great people, friendly people, great tradition -- you couldn't have anybody any better," Sun Bowl chairman emeritus Jimmy Rogers said.

And final word from the Sun Bowl reps:

"There's a pretty good chance we're going to get Oklahoma on the other end. If that were the case, and if coach (Mike) Stoops didn't want to play his brother, we'd honor that," he told the Star.

Least Likely Scenario - Nebraska Beats Texas

This would throw a huge wrench into things. Nebraska would get the automatic bid to the Fiesta Bowl, and Texas would likely get an at large bid sitting at 11-1 overall and likely still ranked high enough to be in the BCS pool. This means that the Holiday Bowl, sitting in position to select the next Big 12 team after the Cotton Bowl, would suddenly have to choose between Missouri, Texas Tech, and Oklahoma.

But who would the Holiday Bowl choose? It's doubtful that it would be Missouri. Between Texas Tech and Oklahoma, I would suspect they would probably choose Texas Tech. They have only selected a team with 5 losses three times. The last time was in 2002 when they took an 8-5 Arizona State Sun Devils team. They seem to go for the best possible matchup record-wise. However, Sooner fans would probably travel better to San Diego than Texas Tech fans.

If Tech goes to the Holiday Bowl under this scenario, OU would wind up in the Alamo Bowl, that much is obvious from what the Alamo Bowl reps have said.

Overall Odds

The Sooners are most likely to wind up in the Sun Bowl, as the Alamo Bowl seems to be leaning towards Texas Tech. If Nebraska manages to upset Texas, the Sooners would most likely wind up in San Antonio, with an outside shot at the Holiday Bowl. I'd put it at about 65% odds for Sun Bowl, 30% odds for Alamo Bowl, and about 5% odds for Holiday Bowl.

Arkansas-Oklahoma Preview: The Game Without Defense

dishingoutdimes — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:07:41 -0000

At 7PM tonight, the Oklahoma Sooners (3-3) try to build a winning streak after winning their last time out against Nichols State. The Sooners are a perfect 2-0 at home so far, and have averaged a 17.5 point victory in the Lloyd Noble Center. They will be hosting the Arkansas Razorbacks (2-4) who have yet to play a true road game, and who are coming off three straight losses at home to mediocre opponents - Morgan State, East Tennessee State, and Alabama State.

Arkansas' Projected Starters
Pos.	No.	Name	Ht.	Wt.	Year	2009-10 Stats / Notes
F	00	Michael Washington	6-9	239	Sr.	14.0 ppg, 5.6 rpg, 47.9 FG%
F	2	Jemal Farmer	6-5	213	Jr.	13.0 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 48.1 FG%
F	33	Marshawn Powell	6-7	220	Fr.	14.3 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 48.6 FG%
G	15	Rotnei Clarke	6-0	184	So.	26.7 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 57.4 3FG%
G	23	Julysses Nobles	6-1	170	Fr.	8.5 ppg, 2.7 rpg, 6.7 apg

Oklahoma's Projected Starters
Pos.	No.	Name	Ht.	Wt.	Year	2008-09 Stats / Notes
F	24	Tiny Gallon	6-9	290	Fr.	12.3 ppg, 10.5 rpg, 60.4 FG%
G	5	Tony Crocker	6-6	209	Sr.	10.2 ppg, 4.8 rpg, 40.0 3FG%
G	11	Tommy Mason-Griffin	5-11	203	Fr.	8.8 ppg, 5.2 apg, 41.2 3FG%
G	13	Willie Warren	6-4	203	So.	20.4 ppg, 3.0 rpg, 6.0 apg
G	34	Cade Davis	6-5	199	Jr.	7.3 ppg, 3.0 rpg, 1.8 spg

From indications in interviews, it seems as though Willie Warren will manage to crack the lineup again, after he was either in the doghouse or ill the last time out against Nichols State. More of the preview, after the jump.

Obviously, one of the guys the Sooners need to focus on locking down is Rotnei Clark, a 6-0 shooting guard who scores a lot for the Razorbacks. From the OU Athletics website:

He has made 35 3-pointers (5.8 per game) and is shooting .574 from behind the arc. Clarke hit an SEC-record 13 treys against Alcorn State and scored a school-record 51 points.

According to Statsheet.com, Clarke plays about 93% of the minutes for his team and he is the most efficient offensive player in the country at 1.43 points per possession (PPP). He is also number one nationally in effective field goal percentage, field goals made, 3-point field goals made, points per game, and 3-point field goal percentage. He doesn't just shoot well, but he gets a high volume of shots. If the Sooners are going to succeed tonight, they may well need to double team Clarke and make the rest of the team beat them.

To the right, Clarke is "on fire" this season...

Of course, this game will be lacking defense overall, as both teams enter the game with woeful defensive resumes. Arkansas yields about 1.098 PPP good for a rank of 288, or 60th worst nationally. Oklahoma is actually worse, giving up 1.115 PPP, good for a ranke of 301, or 47th worst nationally.

Arkansas has a very high defensive FTA/FGA ratio, which basically means they give up an extraordinarily high amount of free throws for every field goal attempt by the other team. Usually this occurs with teams that play leaky defense, and allow guys to get to the rim fairly easily.

This makes Willie Warren vital in this matchup. Willie needs to put the ball on the floor and attack the rim, and get their guys in foul trouble. He's really the only guy on the team that can do that with ease. Crocker does an okay job, but the burden will mainly fall on Willie's shoulders. Cade is a jump shooter. Pledger so far has shown no inclination to be anything but a jump shooter.

The KenPom analysis page for the Razorbacks says they play mostly man. While they allow opponents to shoot a high percentage from 3-point range, they tend to keep opponents from shooting from 3-point range often. This tells me that they probably play a somewhat aggressive defense, but can get beat on dribble-drive penetration. Tommy Mason-Griffin and Willie Warren will need to attack the basket and hang on to the ball, and then possibly kick it out to shooters.

The other place the Razorbacks can be beat is on the offensive glass. They are, quite frankly, not adept at getting offensive rebounds when they are on offense, and they yield a pretty high percentage to the other team. With some talented scorers playing for Arkansas, OU will need to make sure they limit second chance points.

This is a game the Sooners should not lose. Arkansas has lost 4 of their last 5, even with Clarke lighting it up, and they lost their last three in a row! At home! Time for the Sooners to lock it down on defense and get some momentum into the Arizona game.

Statistical Plus-Minus Look At Sooners; The Cade Davis Effect

dishingoutdimes — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 16:38:20 -0000

More photos » by Matt Slocum - AP

Cade Davis has been one of the Sooners' most valuable players this season. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Browse more photos »

There's lots of interesting basketball statistics being developed these days to determine the value of players to their basketball team, similar to WARP in in baseball, or DVOA in football, and I figured I would take a look at it since the regression was easily available.

The one measure that I found that I really like is statistical plus-minus. What is it? Basically it is the number of points that a player would add to a team if that player replaced an "average player", over 100 possessions. It is based on tempo neutral statistics (averaged for "per 40 minute production"). It accounts for things like turnovers hurting a team, and things like assists and steals helping a team.

Here's a good post on the topic on 82games.com (an NBA website), if you feel like becoming a stat nerd. I used this updated regression from basketball-reference.com to calculate the values for the Sooner basketball team over the entire season so far. Players with less than 40 minutes logged were not included.

Follow the link to see the results, posted in a table after the jump. The results are very interesting, and somewhat surprising, unless maybe you've watched all the games so far with a keen eye to what's been going on.

What are you looking at in the above picture? Well all of the statistics are basically used in the calculation of the statistical plus-minus. The second column from the right, titled "SPM", is the actual value. Boxes shaded in green indicate that player positively contributed to the Sooners' efforts over the season. The thick horizontal line shows the cutoff between the positives and the negatives. The column on the far right is the theoretical amount of points added by a player greater than an "average player", on a per game basis (based on the Sooners' current 66 possessions/game clip).

You can see that Willie Warren has clearly been the most productive player, and he has probably added the most value to the team's efforts so far. However, Steven Pledger, Cade Davis, and Tiny Gallon all have positive statistical +/- figures. Tiny appears to get the slightly positive values because of his significant rebounding contributions, and the large offensive rebound figures. Pledger doesn't do much in the stat box other than shoot, but he does that pretty well, which has made him the second most productive Sooner so far.

If you haven't been watching closely, Cade Davis' +3.62 SPM figure might be a bit shocking to you. It's good for third on the team. But Cade has been giving a lot of effort this season - "doing a lot of things that don't show up in the stat sheet". He also fills out a lot of the hustle statistics well, limiting turnovers, getting steals, and crashing the boards. Capel has started Cade Davis the past several games, and for good reason.

As you can see on the graph to the right, from Statsheet.com, Cade Davis experienced a peak in his minutes per game average right around this time of year last year, before Capel started whittling down his rotation. He's seen quite a boost in playing time in Alaska, and as the Sooners return home for a game against Arkansas on Wednesday, one can't help but hope that Capel allows Cade to continue to see more minutes. One thing more than anything else, Cade tries hard. He gets the hustle plays that a team needs, and it seems like we always make runs with him on the floor.

As far as the negative end of things go, a couple things stand out like sore thumbs. First, Tommy Mason-Griffin has logged the most minutes on the floor of anyone on the team, and yet his SPM figure (-9.43) is good for second worst of any of the rotation players. It probably has a lot to do with the fact that he's a freshman point guard, and typically freshman will struggle in this regard (adjusting to D1 basketball). However, if this is the case, he can't continue to log the most minutes on the team. Willie needs to run the point and Mason-Griffin can still get about 20-25 minutes off the bench. The SPM figures suggest a lineup of Willie at point, Pledger at shooting guard, Cade at another guard position, Crocker as a SG/SF, and Tiny Gallon as the center. This would be a somewhat small lineup, but it would probably allow for the most productivity until all of the freshman can adjust.

The other thing that stands out is Ryan Wright's woeful -10.43 SPM figure, by far the worst on the team. I don't know what it is, but I never seem to notice him do anything out on the floor, other than when guys blow by him for easy baskets. We started to see it in the last few games, but expect Orlando Allen to start to get more minutes as a sub in the post, along with Fitzgerald.

Whitney Hand Out For Season

dishingoutdimes — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 08:17:08 -0000

Talented Sooner guard Whitney Hand is out for the remainder of the 2009-2010 season with an ACL injury.

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Well the Sooner's doctor office just keeps getting fuller and fuller. I don't know if someone has a voo-doo doll of our Sooner players somewhere, but this is just getting ridiculous. I will defer to the official Soonersports.com for the recap on this injury:

The University of Oklahoma sophomore, who was the 2009 Big 12 Freshman of the Year, underwent an MRI Monday morning that revealed a complete tear of the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in her right knee.

"All of us are aching individually and collectively for Whitney right now because she loves to play basketball," OU head coach Sherri Coale said. "Although we lose her tangible presence on the floor we won't lose the intangible quality of her leadership. We would ask the Sooner nation to keep Whitney in their thoughts and prayers and to stand united alongside our team as we move forward in our season."

Hand's injury occurred near the end of the first half of OU's win over San Diego State on Friday, Nov. 27, at the U.S. Virgin Islands Paradise Jam.

Oklahoma will pursue a medical hardship waiver to preserve Hand's eligibility.

This leaves the OU women's basketball team with just 9 players to work with for the remainder of the season.

Home-Road Splits For Football Team Pretty Significant

dishingoutdimes — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 06:38:36 -0000

Home: Mr. Hyde; Away: Dr. Jekyll

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With a 1-5 record away from home thus far this year, and a 5-0 record within the friendly confines of Gaylor Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, one wouldn't be terribly surprised to learn that the Sooners have some pretty severe home-road splits.

It's been very difficult to explain exactly why that is. The offense is under the guidance of redshirt freshman Landry Jones, who just isn't accustomed to playing in a hostile environment yet. He seems to get flustered more easily on the road. At home, though, Jones has even set some school records through the air.

However, even the defense has fallen victim to the road woes. One only has to look to the last game where Texas Tech had the ball for over 37 minutes and shredded the Sooners for 549 yards.

Thus, the splits provided to the left shouldn't be too surprising, but they really are. The Sooners outgain opponents by 321 yards at home, but then get outgained on the road!

At home, OU outscores opponents by about 40 points on average, but on the road they lose by about 3 points on average. In virtually every statistical category, there is a dramatic difference between their home statistics and their road statistics.

There are even some dramatic splits with players. Landry Jones has a 175.37 passing efficiency at home, but only 102.13 away from home. DeMarco Murray rushes for 77 yards per game at home, but only 39 yards per game away from home.

Luckily, the Sooners don't need to worry about road woes this week as they host the Cowboys from Oklahoma State. This will only be OSU's fourth game on the road all season. Their previous games - against Iowa State, Baylor, and Texas A&M - were not exactly "tests". The average ranking of those three teams, using Football Outsider's rankings was 83rd (out of 120 FBS teams). The toughest game was probably against #54 Texas A&M.

I don't know if any other top team has had such an easy schedule away from home. As a matter of fact, Oklahoma State fares poorly in the FO rankings because of their poor strength-of-schedule (92nd nationally, or 29th easiest).

The last time a ranked OSU team visited Norman was in 1997, when they beat the Sooners 30-7. The last time the Sooners were unranked in a Bedlam game was in 1999, Bob Stoops' first year. The Sooners won in Norman 44-7.

The Playoff Hunt - Where We Stand After Turkey Day

dishingoutdimes — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 00:58:21 -0000

The Football Outsiders playoff odds updated after Green Bay's victory over San Francisco showed some encouraging trends. It should be noted that Green only held a 0.8% chance to take the division, something that would be predicated on the Vikings losing 4 more games than the Packers the rest of the way. Basically, the Packers are battling for a wild card berth.

Those odds gave them a 69.1% chance of locking up a wild card berth, and a 69.8% chance of reaching the playoffs altogether. This was a 14% improvement over the previous week, and surprisingly high given that we were tied record-wise with two other teams (Philadelphia and New York) and one game ahead of another (Atlanta).

Those playoff odds are likely to improve after the Packers beat the Lions to improve to 7-4, and the New York Giants lost to the Denver Broncos to fall to 6-5. Let's take a look at the Packers playoff chances with a bit more analysis, after the jump. We'll be examining the Packers, Dallas (because they are the one division leader that appears not to have everything sewn up already), Philadelphia, New York, and Atlanta. However, Carolina, San Francisco and Chicago will not be included, as their odds were all worse than 10%, and the Packers own the tiebreaker over San Fran by virtue of their victory (San Fran has the best odds of any of the 4-6 teams).

Green Bay Packers (7-4)

First, we should take a look at the Packers. They still have home games against Baltimore and Seattle left, and road games against Chicago, Pittsburgh and Arizona. It helps to be playing the Ravens at home, and it also helps to be playing Arizona in the last game of the season. By then, the Cardinals should have clinched whatever they can clinch. In fact, if New Orleans and Minnesota keep winning, it's likely that the Cardinals won't have any chance to play for a bye. Given that they'd need to play in a week, they'd probably rest some players, giving the Packers an advantage (if it comes down to the last week).

I love the Football Outsiders statistics because they use value adjusted stats that take into account how a team performs on every single play, and then examines how the team performs against the league average. The Packers have a lot to be proud about, as the defensive DVOA is at -12.1%, putting them at first in the NFL (take that Dom Capers haters!). Their offensive DVOA isn't much worse at 19.5%, good for fourth in the NFL. However, their special teams really lets them down, as their value adjusted rank is 2nd worst in the league. Overall though, the Packers tend to perform far above the league average in many situations, making them a formidable team (if only we hadn't lost to the Bucs!) Their weighted value score places them at 7th in the NFL in this respect.

Football Outsiders statistics for the five teams in question. Records are current as of this Friday.

The good news is that, of the five teams effectively competing for a wild card, the Packers have the second easiest remaining schedule, and that they already have one more victory than the team that has the easiest remaining schedule. The Baltimore game should tell a lot, as it will be a matchup of the #6 (Ravens) and #7 (GB) teams in the NFL per the FO rankings. The fact remains that the Packers are a tough team, but they need to start playing for all 60 minutes and closing teams out.

Dallas Cowboys (8-3)

The Cowboys really helped their case with the win over the Raiders on Thanksgiving Day. Their Playoff Odds will likely improve to near or over 90%. That doesn't seal whether or not they'll win the division, but it would take a pretty monstrous collapse for them to fail to get into the playoffs now. Unfortunately for them, they have the 7th toughest remaining schedule in the NFL: home games against San Diego and Philadelphia, and road games against the Giants, the Saints and the Redskins. Only one of those teams is below .500, so it looks like the Cowboys will have a fight on their hands.

For the Packers' sake, I think we want to see the Cowboys keep winning. It will solidify them as a division leader. If they fall out of the lead for the NFC East, we will suddenly have a team to compete with that will have a very good record. However, it is worth pointing out that the Packers hold the tiebreaker over the Cowboys by virtue of their win at Lambeau Field. If the Cowboys lose one more game than the Packers the rest of the way out, and they are battling for a playoff spot, the Packers would advance to the playoffs.

Philadelphia Eagles (6-4)

Since the Packers haven't played the Eagles, the first tie-breaker if they finished with similar records would be conference record. Then it would go to record in common games (with a minimum of four). Currently the Packers have an NFC record of 6-3, and the Eagles own a 5-2 record. This is where the Buccaneers game really hurts. The rest of the Packers NFC matches should be easier than their games against the Steelers and the Ravens. The Eagles, meanwhile, still have to play on the road against Atlanta, New York Giants, and the Cowboys, and at home against the Redskins, Broncos (AFC) and 49ers. If I had to put money on it, I'd say the Eagles would wind up with more conference losses than the Packers, but let's not forget that the Eagles are a tough team - they are 5th in the league in weighted DVOA, tops in the NFC East. Both the Packers and Eagles have played the Bucs, the Cowboys, the Bears, and will play the 49ers. Right now, the Packers are 3-1 in such games, with one left against the Bears, and the Eagles are 2-1 with two games left against the Cowboys and 49ers. Thus, the Packers will probably hold the tiebreaker advantage over the Eagles at the end of the season (barring something crazy), which means we probably want the Cowboys to have a fair amount of success.

Either way, the Eagles are a tough team, and I'm fairly confident that the NFC East will field one of the wild card teams. Right now, the Eagles hold a significant advantage over the Giants. I'm thinking that the NFC East teams will beat up on each other, and that should provide the Packers with some margin of error.

New York Giants (6-5)

The Giants' loss to the Broncos really helped clear up the playoff picture, and probably boosted the Packers' playoff odds quite a bit. It exposed the fact that the Giants have a lot of problems. They got their clock cleaned by New Orleans and haven't been the same since. They've lost 4 of their last 5, and it doesn't get any easier as they have three consecutive divisional games left, and have to close out the season in the Metrodome. They have the 2nd toughest remaining schedule in the NFL per Football Outsiders.

Given all of that, it's really tough to see the Giants climbing back into it. They have a 4-3 record in NFC games so far, putting them with an equal number of losses as the Packers in the first tiebreaker, and 2 wins in the hole. They still have to play home games against Dallas, Philadelphia, and Carolina, and road games against Washington and Minnesota.

Atlanta Falcons (5-5)

The Falcons need a lot of help as their playoff odds were worse than a coin flip before the weekend started, a lot of the teams ahead of them won, and even if they win, they'll still be tied with the Giants, whom they'd lose the tiebreaker to. Luckily for them, they still have two games left against Tampa Bay, one against Buffalo at home, and one on the road against the Jets. However, they also still have to play the Saints and Eagles at home. Their margin of error is razor thin.

What We Need To Happen

Take care of business. We won't make the playoffs if we don't win games. I don't think it's necessary to win out, but we will probably need to win 3 games or more out of our remaining 5.
Have the Falcons fade out. They have a pretty easy schedule. Ideally you'd like to have them lose to the Saints and Eagles as those are their most likely losses.
Have the Giants fade out. They're doing a pretty good job of this already. If this happens, then it doesn't matter what the Eagles or Cowboys records' are, as the Packers would qualify for the playoffs over the Falcons and Giants.