SB Nation User Blog: howlingfantods

Karate Kid was set in LA, come to think of it.

howlingfantods — Fri, 08 May 2009 17:00:15 -0000

Karate Kid was set in LA, come to think of it.

Hollinger takes a shot at Nate

howlingfantods — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:03:13 -0000

Hollinger takes a shot at Nate

"Phil Jackson finally got the memo that the way you beat Yao Ming is by using smaller, quicker players to front him on offense and attack him on defense.... This at least proves that Jackson's more flexible than Nate McMillan, who apparently was waiting for Game 12 to make that adjustment in the first round."

My biggest gripe about griping about the officiating:

howlingfantods — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 20:54:46 -0000

It's a classic boy-who-cried-wolf scenario.

There is nothing surprising or one-sided about the officiating so far. Houston's had a strong defensive philosophy of contesting without fouling for years now. They consider it a blown defensive stand when they give up free throws. Our guys foul every time they think they're beat. We consider it a blown defensive stand when we give up a dunk/layup, and since we're not good enough defensively to stay in prevent interior scoring without fouling, we end up fouling a lot.

Have there been some bad calls/non-calls? Yes, but I've seen plenty of examples on both ends.

But making all this fuss now, when the officiating has been pretty fair according to pretty much any perspective other than total homers, yall lose all credibility when a horror show like the 2000 WCF or the 2002 WCF happens. When we get royally screwed in the WCF against the Lakers in a couple of years because Bennett Salvatore lets Kobe live on the line but lets BRoy get mugged, yall are going to have zero credibility when yall rant and rave about it, since you're crying wolf this year.

Hollinger: BRoy as MIP?

howlingfantods — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 23:34:43 -0000

Hollinger: BRoy as MIP?

Interesting vote. For non-insiders, here's an excerpt:

I nominated Brandon Roy for Most Improved Player in our ESPN.com award votes Tuesday, and I suppose I should explain that pick. I've been an ardent Devin Harris supporter in that category for nearly the entire season, but when I looked over the full body of work one more time before submitting my vote, I realized that Roy's improvement was just as large in PER terms. And while Harris slumped a bit after the All-Star break, Roy kept chugging along.

good bill simmons podcast, with Hollinger as guest

howlingfantods — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:31:16 -0000

good bill simmons podcast, with Hollinger as guest

Deals with all the methodological discussions where most of our arguments hit a dead end. Is quality of player really measurable? Why do we have good stats for measuring some things but not other things that are equally measurable? Which stats are more meaningful than others?

Since Simmons considers himself a stats-opponent but obviously pays a lot of attention to Hollinger, Kevin Pelton and the like, this ends up being a very good exploration of the strengths and weaknesses of the current advanced stats landscape.

Simmons on Durant (again)

howlingfantods — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:17:14 -0000

Simmons on Durant (again)

Thought this was interesting timing since we've been talking Durant a lot. Good points in the article (bearing in mind that Simmons was a huge pro-Durant guy in The Great Debate, as was I). He talks about how the commentariat spent a lot of time thinking about Durant early in 07-08, concluded he was overrated, and stopped thinking about him in time for him to take a pretty major step forward this season under their new coach. And now as a result, he's authentically one of the more underrated players in the league.

Topical and timely since it's been sounding to me like the folks talking about Durant around here haven't seen him too much since they canned PJ. He's really transformed his game -- last year and the first couple of months of this season, I wasn't feeling too confident about my prediction that he'd end up challenging LBJ for best player alive. Over the last two months, he's made me a believer again.

Here's a bonus link from Dave McMenamin of NBA.com talking about Durant's improving defense now that he's playing at SF and occasionally PF instead of SG. A bit premature, I think, but I'm seeing improvements there too.

KP sends another email.

howlingfantods — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:48:16 -0000

KP sends another email.

(from Hardwood Paroxym.

Jamal Crawford reveals Channing's deep dark secret

howlingfantods — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 20:20:48 -0000

Jamal Crawford reveals Channing's deep dark secret

Scroll to the bottom. Turns out Channing has more hidden talents that we haven't seen. Hardly surprising news, though.

The reason you guys are all freaking out

howlingfantods — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 10:12:59 -0000

is that this site is an echo chamber of uncritical cheerleaders. Any criticism of the team, anyone pointing out that this is a good team, not a great team, and isn't ready to sit at the grownups table with the Cavs, Lakers and Celts gets shouted down. Anyone pointing out the obvious, that Oden folds under pressure and Aldridge is as hard as wet tissue, that Trout will gun you into trouble as much as gun you out of trouble, that Blake is an ideal backup but a very unideal starter, that depth is a nice to have asset for regular season wins but not a recipe for titles, gets shouted down as apostates here.

Maybe now, when we talk about the things we need to do to be competitive for a title, like make some smart trades for vets who've faced adversity and playoff level intensity or to get tougher interior players or point out that Nate does some good things but may not be a championship level talent as a coach, you cheerleader types might try hearing us out instead of automatically dismissing us, eh?

Blazer Myth #1 - Nate is a "defensive-minded" coach.

howlingfantods — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 18:19:02 -0000

When Nate was a player, he was a very good defender, got on the all-defense second teams a couple of times on the basis of his very quick hands. He led the league in steals once and was often among the league leaders, very impressive considering that he generally played backup minutes for most of his career.

As a coach, Nate talks a lot about defense. So what have his results looked like?

Defensive rating (points allowed per 100 possessions)

2000-01 Sonics - ranked 24th of 29 teams

2001-02 Sonics - 17 of 29

2002-03 Sonics - 17 of 29

2003-04 Sonics - 27 of 29

2004-05 Sonics - 27 of 29

2005-06 Blazers - 28 of 30

2006-07 Blazers - 26 of 30

2007-08 Blazers - 17 of 30

2008-09 Blazers - 28 of 30 so far

Not very good, with no teams above average, and many teams in the cellar.

So can we please stop being surprised at what a godawful mess our teams are on defense? Twice is coincidence, three times is pattern, and nine times is dna, blueprint, determinism, whatever.

The reality is that Nate being a talented defensive player has nothing to do with being able to coach a lick of defense, any more than Isiah was able to coach brilliant ball control, unselfishness, and clutch scoring.

(stats from basketball-reference.com, natch).