Wages of Wins = Anti-Diesel

[AHF]

In the universe there are certain ideas dealing with opposites, negatives and polarity. There is positive and negative charge. There is matter and anti-matter. Apparently, there is Diesel and Wages of Wins "Vivek."

Diesel has long been the voice calling out the worthlessness of Marvin Williams:

[T]o see him on the court now and see him getting beat by everybody he plays then missing layups and easy shots and to see him just stand on the three point line waiting when Joe is doubled makes me sick.

I dare you to watch Marvin play over some sustain period of time. It's not heightened expectation that's out there winded. It's not heightened expectation that is out there wasting possessions It's not hieghtened expectations that's getting burned on defense and playing defense with his hands. It's not heightened expectations that bowling into the lane like a bowling ball and falling clumsily until he hits something. It's not heightened expectancy that is just stinking the game up but yet still starts. What it is is Marvin. If Marvin played for another team, nobody on this board would care about him. He has Hawks birthrights since we drafted him and resigned him and now we act as though he should always get the benefit of the doubt. He's not so good. We have wasted player after player waiting for him to .... STEP UP. It's not going to happened... there's your expectation. I don't expect him to step up and probably deep down in every Hawks fan heart, neither do they.

Let me just state this. On several occasions, I have read reports from the AJC and saw where Marvin made excuses for himself. To me, that's the sign of a loser.

etc.

Now we have the anti-Diesel:

http://www.peachtreehoops.com/2012/8/15/3243660/atlanta-hawks-off-season-graded-by-wages-of-wins

The Hawks lost their best player from last season, Marvin Williams

Let's repeat that:

BEST PLAYER

.

.

.

MARVIN WILLIAMS

Wow.

Now when acids and bases mix, they generally neutralize one another and all is fine. When matter and anti-matter collide, though, the results can be explosive.

Let's play this one safe and make sure that Diesel and Vivek never enter the same room, shall we?

[Supporter]

Had to be a type!

[macdaddy]

That's the strangest thing I've seen in a while. I usually want my 'star forward' and 'best player' on the floor in the 4th quarter. That must be some kind of joke. Its a shame Marvin is still dogged by the draft position because he's not a bad player. But this far into his career people have to realize that even though he has the perfect size, quickness, form, likeability, effort that doesn't make up for the fact that he is an average shooter and bad finisher. But so is a bunch of the league.

[Guest]

Vivek is using Wins Produced, it is pretty easy to tell from him blogging at Wages of Wins. You would have to be a complete dope to not realize this...

I hunted for the numbers that he could be basing his argument on and to my surprise there is a statistical measure that Marvin lead last year's team of full time players in: Win Shares/48 minutes. Joe Johnson came in third in this category, so it is close to his appraisal of Joe. Kyle Korver also has a strong WS/48 number, so I think it must be his measuring stick.

http://www.peachtree...y-wages-of-wins FAIL! A complete analysis where someone goes through to pick apart the analysis of another blogger, pointing out their faults while at the same time being completely and utterly wrong. The original analysis must be an "A" since the guy Vivek was at least consistent with the measure he is using (Wins produced) while the analysis of an analysis must be an "F" for being f***ing stupid to just take the time and read the "Wins Produced" section that is a main link on the Wages Of Wins blog. Even beyond that, the blogger at Peachtree Hoops just typifies not having any analytical knowledge:

Now that I know what he's basing it on, let's evaluate his claims. Win Shares are a tricky subject. If the team doesn't win then you can't get many Win Shares.

WRONG! It comes from box score statistics, wins are fairly independent of this. Its not like Win Shares says "OK Miami win X number of games, so this is as many shares as we can give to the players on the team..." That is a misunderstanding about the basketball win shares, this is different from the baseball win shares that Bill James developed. People should shut up about analytics if they can't even comprehend what they are saying. People also shouldn't be throwing out statistics in an argument like it is the end all.

[lethalweapon3]

Between the Marvin and the Chillz' WoW articles... I think I've figured out what Billy Knight's been up to lately.~lw3

[TheNorthCydeRises]

LOL. I'm a big stats guy. And I'm one of the ones who believes that Marvin didn't play nearly as bad as people made him out to be. But that article is just flat out ridiculous. LOL @ JJ being our 4th best player and Marvin being our "star forward".But this is what happens when you latch onto one stat, and try to use that to validate everything. Gotta use stats in it's totality, to form an overall profile for a player.That's why Hollinger acting like the sky was going to fall, just because we lost Josh Childress back in 2008, was ridiculous.

[AHF]

Vivek is using Wins Produced

I question the validity of any metric that says Marvin Williams was our best player.

[Guest]

I question the validity of any metric that says Marvin Williams was our best player.

That is fine, can you first explain what they are doing to create the stat to me?

I have slowly drifted away from advanced statistics because of what I see with their nuts and bolts. But if I did not look at their foundations, I do not think I would be qualified to make any comments about them. Peachtree Hoops has been awful with this approach, they do not understand what is under the hood and only use statistics that confirm what they have already concluded.

To me, a problem with the WoW article is that they do imagine you can encompass a player's total impact in one statistic. Their analysis that Marv is the best, Korver helps while Lou doesn't all stems from the first problem. I cannot argue about Marv/Korver/Lou because that is actually a logically consistent statement from what has been asserted (but the assertion is debatable). The Peachtree Hoops article has no understanding of the WoW article and so the criticism is from straw men that WoW did not have any connection to. Peachtree should be ashamed to be that lazy and dumb (it is just one lazy/dumb blogger here but it hurts the entire blog).

[PSSSHHHRRR87]

As Mark Cuban said, "The box score is the most worthless piece of information in all of basketball... it only tells half the story about a player" or in other words, numbers do lie. Marvin will always be known as Duck Butt and the guy that could never live up to being selected 2nd overall in Atlanta. He was a good player, but he was definitely never our best player. Hell, he was our 6th or 7th best player, even on nights when he started.

[Guest]

As Mark Cuban said, "The box score is the most worthless piece of information in all of basketball... it only tells half the story about a player" or in other words, numbers do lie.

So when the numbers tell you Joe scored 40 points...he really didn't? Numbers don't lie, people just don't know how to interpret them all of the time. I read the article where you are quoting Cuban, Mark also proceeded to talk about +/- and how he employs Wayne Winston to build him a proprietary ratings system for their players, which lineups work best, how lineups/players have been trending recently, and all this for the opposing team as well. Mark Cuban is a huge proponent of advanced analytics, he just realizes it does not just output answers of "the best player". You still need human ingenuity to correctly use the statistics.

[AHF]

Mark Cuban is a huge proponent of advanced analytics, he just realizes it does not just output answers of "the best player". You still need human ingenuity to correctly use the statistics.

Agreed. While Peachtree Hoops had the analytics all wrong, they did incorrectly reach the correct conclusion, however. The "plug this into my formula that spits out best player" calculation that Wages of Wins ran to ascertain that Marvin was the best player on the Hawks comes from a flawed premise. While I think that advance statistics can tell you things that aren't easily identified by simply watching games or reading box scores, the idea that Marvin was our best player during any season of his career is so laughably bad that it totally undermines the credibility of the statistical analysis that arrives at that conclusion.

It reminds me of the Brett Lawrie for MVP results of baseball-reference's WAR.

http://thecutoffman.mlblogs.com/2012/06/22/brett-lawrie-and-the-problem-with-war/

The numbers are sometimes just so bad that all you can do is laugh at them. At least baseball reference ran bad numbers but didn't try to pitch Lawrie as some current superstar when their calculations came out badly.

WOW actually put into their "narrative" that Marvin was our best player.

[thecampster]

Agreed. While Peachtree Hoops had the analytics all wrong, they did incorrectly reach the correct conclusion, however. The "plug this into my formula that spits out best player" calculation that Wages of Wins ran to ascertain that Marvin was the best player on the Hawks comes from a flawed premise. While I think that advance statistics can tell you things that aren't easily identified by simply watching games or reading box scores, the idea that Marvin was our best player during any season of his career is so laughably bad that it totally undermines the credibility of the statistical analysis that arrives at that conclusion.

It reminds me of the Brett Lawrie for MVP results of baseball-reference's WAR.

http://thecutoffman....oblem-with-war/

The numbers are sometimes just so bad that all you can do is laugh at them. At least baseball reference ran bad numbers but didn't try to pitch Lawrie as some current superstar when their calculations came out badly.

WOW actually put into their "narrative" that Marvin was our best player.

I can tell you I've written countless things that I've gone back and proofread and laughed at myself. I'm guessing he forgot to proofread it.

[AHF]

I can tell you I've written countless things that I've gone back and proofread and laughed at myself. I'm guessing he forgot to proofread it.

While it is laughable, it is more Hollinger laughable than typo laughable. Read hawkfanatic's post above. Vivek is relying on the win's produced metric -- very intentionally.

[Sothron]

I question the validity of any metric that says Marvin Williams was our best player.

And people wonder why I don't consider advance metrics worth anything. Just watch the games and try and tell anyone Marvin was our best player.

[AHF]

And people wonder why I don't consider advance metrics worth anything. Just watch the games and try and tell anyone Marvin was our best player.

Some advanced metrics are very useful, IMO, but using them as a proxy for the value of a player without blending that with a lot of other data (analytics, visual scouting, etc.) doesn't make sense. The data is useful - very useful - but only when you use it for the appropriate purpose. If someone tries to use a vacuum cleaner to cut their lawn it doesn't mean the vacuum isn't useful, just that someone is totally off base with what they are doing.

[Seano]

If someone tries to use a vacuum cleaner to cut their lawn it doesn't mean the vacuum isn't useful, just that someone is totally off base with what they are doing.

Heh. Well sheesh, no wonder I haven't been able to get the damn grass cut! I've tried the Electrolux, the Hoover, the Kirby, nothing was working! It would have been a lot more helpful if you'd told me about this several months ago!

[HawkItus]

Here is my problem with avanced statistics. It ignores the very thing that separates the very best player and everyone else. Physical ability. I'm sure you could come up with some advanced statistic for why Lebron is better than Marvin. But, put simply Lebrom does almost everything on a basketball court physically better than Marvin. You don't need numbers for that. Just watch them play.

[EazyRoc]

And people wonder why I don't consider advance metrics worth anything. Just watch the games and try and tell anyone Marvin was our best player.

He was! Ok no he wasn't

[High5]

That is fine, can you first explain what they are doing to create the stat to me? I have slowly drifted away from advanced statistics because of what I see with their nuts and bolts. But if I did not look at their foundations, I do not think I would be qualified to make any comments about them. Peachtree Hoops has been awful with this approach, they do not understand what is under the hood and only use statistics that confirm what they have already concluded. To me, a problem with the WoW article is that they do imagine you can encompass a player's total impact in one statistic. Their analysis that Marv is the best, Korver helps while Lou doesn't all stems from the first problem. I cannot argue about Marv/Korver/Lou because that is actually a logically consistent statement from what has been asserted (but the assertion is debatable). The Peachtree Hoops article has no understanding of the WoW article and so the criticism is from straw men that WoW did not have any connection to. Peachtree should be ashamed to be that lazy and dumb (it is just one lazy/dumb blogger here but it hurts the entire blog).

You can't really blame someone for not being able to fully understand another person's insanity. And reading some of the comments on that Wages of Wins site, "Vivek" is not alone on his planet. Scary stuff.

[MaceCase]

Advanced stats are only cool when they support people's preconceived notions. The same stat will tell you that Smoove led the league in defensive winshares and people will say "Hell yea! That sounds absolutely right!" but then they'll tell you that Marvin led the team in overall winshares per 48 and it's "What kind of bull shit stat is this?!"Moral of the story, don't be hypocrites.