Hoops Hypothesis

The year was 2012. 3-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year Dwight Howard was disgruntled in Orlando, and Orlando head coach Stan Van Gundy had been fired at the conclusion of the 2011-12 season, possibly at Howard’s insistence. Many suitors were interested in Howard, including the super team chasing Brooklyn Nets, his preferred destination. Also in the race were the Los Angeles Lakers, who recently traded for Steve Nash, with designs on their own super team. This confluence of events would lead to one of the most ill-fated trades in NBA history. The Lakers had won the NBA Championship in 2009 and 2010 led by Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol. However, they were left in the dust after the Miami Heat landed LeBron James and Chris Bosh to pair with Dwyane Wade, and the Oklahoma City Thunder made the Finals in 2012, buoyed by the young trio of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden. LA was determined to land some more star players, so they went out and made a big splash. They agreed to...

I recently posted an article  about statistically identifying good trade and free agency acquisitions for the San Antonio Spurs. With this article, I am going to suggest how the Spurs are going to acquire the aforementioned players. For those who haven’t read the previous article yet, the eight players we will be trying to trade for are Aaron Gordon, Will Barton, Malik Monk, E’Twaun Moore, Otto Porter Jr., Dario Saric, Mo Bamba and Montrezl Harrell. Depending on their contracts, we might try to sign them in free agency. So, without further ado, let’s look at our first trade. 1.   Aaron Gordon and Khem Birch for DeMar DeRozan and a 2021 2 nd round pick This trade is one of the few that benefit both teams. The Orlando Magic have struggled to generate offense, ranking bottom 10 in the league over the last two seasons, and DeRozan, a 25 point per game scorer, would certainly help with that. His defensive limitations will be overshadowed by the rest of Orlando’s main 5, which ...

Every sports fan, diehard or casual, has watched Moneyball, the movie about the use of statistics in baseball. While sports has become more receptive to the use of statistics to identify players, many fans still do not like to use or misuse statistics to back up their opinions. As an avid NBA fan, I too love to concoct fictitious trades to help make my team better. Through the use of statistics, I am going to try to make well informed decisions regarding player acquisitions for the San Antonio Spurs, my favourite NBA team. To tackle this problem, I used a linear regression model. To create the model, I first collected box score data for the Spurs’ 2019-20 season. This data was then used to create a model that will give a composite score, which predicts a team’s record. According to the model, a score closer to 1 indicates a better record, while a score closer to 0 indicates a worse record. Using Basketball Reference, I identified 8 players who the Spurs could feasibly acquire and who...

Since the turn of the decade, the NBA has evolved at the speed of light. The advent of high volume 3-point shooters, small ball and the point forward phenomenon are just a few of these. Basketball is being played at its fastest pace since the 1960s, with the “pace and space” era leading to points galore. The architects of this movement include Steph Curry and Mike D’Antoni, who have become synonymous with the evolution. However, there is one man who does not get enough credit for his role as perhaps the originator of most of these tactics. His name is Don Nelson. Don Nelson is one the greatest coaches in NBA history. Coaching four different teams in 34 years, Nelson has the record for most wins, with 1,335. However, his lasting impact is in his style of basketball, which helped usher in a lot of the basketball tactics and playstyles we know today. Don Nelson got his start in coaching as an assistant with the Milwaukee Bucks in 1976. After 18 games, head coach Larry Costello resig...

Ron Artest, also known as Metta World Peace, might not be an NBA legend, but he is certainly one of the more well-known NBA players of the 2000s, both for his on court accomplishments and his rather eccentric personality. Artest was born and raised in New York, and went to his hometown St. John’s University, where he played from 1997-1999. After declaring for the 1999 Draft, the Chicago Bulls selected him with the 16 th overall pick in the draft. Artest’s hometown New York Knicks passed on him to select Frédéric Weis, a French center. Weis would never play in the NBA and is remembered for being on the wrong end of Vince Carter’s ‘Dunk of Death’ at the 2000 Olympics.   From 1999 to 2002, Artest would play for the Chicago Bulls. He was thrust into a starting role in Chicago and made the All-Rookie 2 nd team in his first year. During the 2001-02 season, Artest was traded to the Indiana Pacers for a package headlined by Jalen Rose. In Indiana, Artest would reach his peak, winni...

Most casual NBA fans know the term ‘Moreyball’ from watching the Houston Rockets. It gets it name from the Rockets’ GM, Daryl Morey, who helped turn Houston from also-rans into consistent championship contenders. But most people don’t know the origins of Moreyball and how it evolved into its current form. Moreyball has its roots in analytics, consistent with Morey’s status as a co-founder of the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. The essence of the style is to take analytics-friendly shots (3 pointers and shots at the rim) while reducing the amount of non-analytical friendly shots (the long two or mid-range shot). This is mainly achieved by surrounding a big man with four shooters, ensuring that both 3-pointers as well as shots at the rim are taken. One of the first iterations of Moreyball was showcased by the 2009 Orlando Magic, who surrounded star center Dwight Howard with four shooters. This novel idea helped the Magic reach the 2009 NBA Finals, where they would go on to los...

There have only been 4 players who have ever recorded a quadruple double (Double digits in 4 categories). Hall Of Famers David Robinson, Nate Thurmond, Hakeem Olajuwon (twice) all recorded quadruple doubles in points, rebounds, assists and blocks. The 4th member of that esteemed list is Alvin Robertson. Unlike the other three, Robertson was a guard, and recorded his quadruple double in points, rebounds, assists and steals. He did not make the Basketball Hall Of Fame and his achievements have been forgotten by most NBA fans. Alvin Robertson was drafted by the San Antonio Spurs with the 7 th pick in 1984 and would go on to play 10 seasons in the NBA, 5 with the Spurs, 3 with the Milwaukee Bucks, and 1 each with the Detroit Pistons and the Toronto Raptors. In only his 2 nd season in the league, he recorded 301 steals (3.7 per game), a record that still stands to this day. He would lead the league in steals two more times in his career and retired with an average of 2.7 steals per gam...

In the 1989-90 season, the Portland Trail Blazers bought out Dražen Petrović’s contract with Real Madrid and convinced him to join the NBA. This would mark the start of a trailblazing career that was tragically cut short.        Dražen Petrović was born in Šibenik, Croatia on the 22 nd of October, 1964. At the age of 15, he was already in the first team of his hometown club, and by the age of 18, Petrović had blossomed into a star for Šibenik. After serving in the military for a year, he moved to Cibona in 1984, where he would play till 1988. At Cibona, Petrović shined. He once scored 112 points in a Yugoslavian League game ( 40/60 FG, 10/20 3Pts, 22/22 FT), which is possibly the most efficient performance in any European league ever. He averaged 37.7 points in the Yugoslavian first division and 33.8 points in European competitions in his 4 years at Cibona, cementing his status as a European star. In 1988, at the age of 23, he moved to Real Madrid, where he stayed ...