JGC wrote:If you've noticed some shortcomings in my stats, it's possibly because I'm often pulling them out of memory and not staring blankly at a play-by-play or a stat sheet. I might be off by a few percentages.
Can you argue like an adult? Why must I be "staring BLANKLY" at a PBP sheet? Is there something insipid or robotic about my analysis? When you offer empirical analysis, be right. Take a few seconds to figure out whether what you remember is what really happened. I do that. That's why I reproduced the PBP information (after watching or listening on radio to games).
But I won't pull them out of memory unless I'm quite certain it's close. Your conclusions I often find short-sighted though, FWIW, since I find I don't always agree with them.
Empirical claims aren't evaluated by whether or not you agree with them. They're evaluated by looking at the consistency of the argument and the scientific method. You admit that the key test you're using to figure out whether my analysis is short-sighted is whether you agree. I don't view things that way. I disagree with people all the time. I don't suppose that just because we disagree there's a problem with their analysis. The problem could be my own.
It's possible that that is either due to an over reliance on stats (even though I do like stats myself) or just ... denial about what the real problems may be. For instance, I do not think practice is a "good excuse" for our poor play.
It sounds like you're saying the following: TR says X. JGC disagrees with X. So, TR is wrong. TR's mistake might be because of over reliance on stats or denial. That's not a charitable argument, so I'll just suppose that that's not what you're saying. Unfortunately, I don't know what you're saying. You're making empirical claims. Marshal some evidence that isn't simply anecdotal.
I remember hack a dwight around the 3 minute mark when we had a 4 point lead. How do you lose 7 points in 4 mins in the final quarter of a game? Probably a combination of poor offensive execution and poor defense. I also, for the record, recall us being up by 2 pts after D12 hit his final hack a dwight FTs at the 2 min mark. Am I wrong on this? So to say the lead was gone, is, short-sighted or just, an oversight (unless I'm wrong on this).
Why doesn't the next possession count? The point is to trade possessions and get more from yours (Rockets) than the Lakers did from theirs. The very next possession the Rockets hit a shot to tie the game. It's not short-sighted. It's not an oversight. It's simply true. It was, moreover, tied three times DURING the FT-a-thon. In other words, the four-point lead evaporated in the time between 3:18 and 1:38, 100 seconds.
I'm sorry but in a game where we led by 8 after 1 quarter, 13 after 2 quarters and came in to the 4th quarter leading by 10 against what should be an inferior team, that should be enough to put the game away hack a dwight or not.
I agree with you on that point. Our bench surrendered part of the lead: 11 to 7. Our starters let it slip from 7 to 4. Then Hack-a-Dwight let it disappear altogether. Still, despite all that, we had to hit one of three shots(or perhaps two; Jamison's might have come after the buzzer) to win or send it to OT. We failed.
If Dwight can shoot 63% from the FT stripe in hack a dwight situations, then we should still be winning games. Don't you think?
I don't know why you've chosen 63%; so let me say that he didn't shoot 63; he shot 50% (5-10). Now, IF he shoots 63%, would that be enough? I don't know. Think of this argument I've seen on the board:
1. If player X consumes a bunch of possessions, that makes everyone else's O slough off and their D suffer because (presumably) they feel out of the flow.
2. When Hack-a-Dwight occurs, a player consumes nearly every possession.
3. Thus, in Hack-a-Dwight, everyone else's O and D suffer.
So, I don't know whether Howard's shooting 63% is good enough. It's an empirical claim, and we'd have to look at the data in order to evaluate it. Now, if you just mean something like "They're professionals! They have to play through that!" I suppose I agree in some sense. But, as I've told you in previous exchanges, this isn't a video game. These are real human beings and they react in ways that you cannot always predict. The best thing to do is look at their actual performance, see how they react, and come up with a strategy to address the reality, not some armchair thought you have.
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So true. He's right that he does many things to help the team otherwise. He yields position on boards and blocks shots into the third row, sending possession back to the opposing team.
