Thank you, Dalton is Doug. ST hated Doug. Doug was worth a second and ballast. Knecht was a fantastic shooter and I think he will do fine in the NBA but if SA wants to spend premium draft capital on Knecht why not keep Doug/Champ and just go with that and spend the pick on a different need?
Maybe SA likes Knecht as an Doug upgrade but that's a hard sell at top 10 imho
Such extreme awareness on how measurements are perceived give me pause, I'm wondering how much of his otherworldly college stats are explained by these gimmicks (i.e., avoiding shots the team needs but would hurt his individual stats, gambling on defense for steals, etc.).
good call
it could be a double edged sword as such scheming could go against the grain of Spurs team first mentality
8 pick no brainer
When something’s hard to believe… speculate? This line of thinking is downright scary and usually goes down a rabbit hole of conspiracy theories that no longer make sense. When does it stop? It doesn’t. People just start to ignore the evidence in front of them and worse yet, start to believe the speculation is truth because it’s a chain effect from person to person.
the next post after heyheymymy is…. “Oh Reed has character issues, he’s not Spurs material” then the guy after that will be like… “i don’t know where that came from, but he makes it sound like fact so it must be true!”
I like and generally agree with many of your posts man, but come on now we're discussing spurs draft prospects, not destabilizing society here, I think 'scary thinking' might be overselling it. Ariel brought up a legitimate question, it's ok for them to have questions when Reed clearly gamed his combine measurements. If this isn't the place for out of the box thinking, where is? I still remember when I came up with "better brother theory" for Cody williams.
I think that the counter to Ariel's question though is that (I think) advanced stats such as BPM/BPR are calculated based on how much a team wins while said player is on the floor in addition to box score metrics, and Reed's statistical impact in these metrics were dominant independent of what teammates he shared the floor with. So while it's possible to game your percentages by taking more selective shots, if it's really causing your team to lose more, your +/- is probably going to go down and your BPM/BPR is not going to be affected that much. Could be wrong, it's a legitimate point.
“Clearly gamed” - I just respectfully disagree. People are paid to do a damn job. Do we really believe that the guys doing the measurements are so incompetent that they wouldn’t spot a player cheating their measurement or that they don’t have a standard operating procedure for taking measurements? I don’t think it’s that cut and dry but it’s so unbelievable that it’s easier to talk out of our asses than believe there are competent professionals in the NBA.
I think that the counter to Ariel's question though is that (I think) advanced stats such as BPM/BPR are calculated based on how much a team wins while said player is on the floor in addition to box score metrics, and Reed's statistical impact in these metrics were dominant independent of what teammates he shared the floor with. So while it's possible to game your percentages by taking more selective shots, if it's really causing your team to lose more, your +/- is probably going to go down and your BPM/BPR is not going to be affected that much. Could be wrong, it's a legitimate point.
Are you talking about the people who posted Devin Carter's measurements as Stephon Castle's?
There’s a difference in people taking the measurements the right way vs the data being put in the right way.
My point is that if someone could do it, then anybody could do it and all of it is pointless.
I'm with you on this topic. It's been a silly talking point based on biases for whoever someone's preferred target is.
Tankathon Blocks:
Sheppard = 0.9
Carter = 1.0
That's your measurement manifested in games.
Narrative:
Before measurement, "He ia not athletic."
Measurement taken, "He game his standing reach."
Remember up to this time it is still official measurement.
Last edited by alfahdlan; 3 Weeks Ago at 07:11 PM. Reason: auto edit of my laptop of the word tankathon to talkathon
Bro, no one cares about standing reach. It's easy to pull your arms a few inches, which he did.
On the surface that sounds like a very sensible reply. "do we really believe that the guys doing the measurements are so incompetent that they wouldn’t spot a player cheating their measurement or that they don’t have a standard operating procedure for taking measurements?" these people are professionals hired to do a very specific job, why would you not trust them to do their job correctly? Anyone questioning them must be "talking out of their asses".
Problem is, that reasoning is nothing but assumptions based on prejudice, in this case, that the measurements MUST be right because of who took them. A better way to "not speak out of our asses" (one way or the other) so would be to check how consistent combine measurements are between players that were measured in different years. So I went ahead and took a look at the past 3 drafts (you're welcome to do the work yourself if you want to go farther), and there are 13 players with more than one measurement: Adem Bona, Coleman Hawkins, DaRon Holmes II, Drew Timme, Harrison Ingram, Julian Strawther, Leonard Miller, Nikola Djurisic, Reece Beekman, Terquavion Smith, Terrence Shannon Jr., Trey Alexander and Zach Edey.
Looking at the standing reach measurements for the same player, 3 cases were the same (Leonard Miller, Terquavion Smith, Trey Alexander), in 4 cases difference was 0.5" (Strawther, Djurisic, Beekman and Edey), 3 times they came 1" apart (DaRon Holmes, Drew Timme and Harrison Ingram), once 1.5" apart (Coleman Hawkins), once 2" apart (Terrence Shannon), and once 2.5" apart (Adem Bona). A possible explanation would be natural growth but most actually recorded a lesser standing reach, but all of those who experienced an increase in standing reach (Drew Timme, Djurisic and Strawther) their wingspan actually shrank.
So as you can see, these standing reach measurements aren't anywhere near as consistent as you claimed they were, and they are subject to variation that can't be explained by natural growth. As to why focus on Sheppard and not everyone else, it's because he is the most obvious outlier, in that his standing reach came far below expected and his max vertical jump came off the charts, and given the relationship between both you can either:
a) take combine measurements as gospel and believe he's an alien (you) or
b) use logic to try to come to a reasonable explanation for what could have happened ("conspiracy" types?
As far as intent, even if there was an honest mistake he could have easily came out and made it right, yet he didn't and let the hype work in his favor, so I have to doubt there was no intention behind it. Of course even in the face of the data, everyone can go by the explanation they deem most likely. But I would say, I don't know that there's a more "out of your ass" notion than that of "measurements as gospel".
https://huddlecourt.com/what-is-standing-reach/
This is the protocol of measuring standing reach. The facilitator will pull your arms up. Now tell, how can one pull his arm down while the other one pull it up. It is not reaching up independently, facilitator will pull it up.
Last edited by alfahdlan; 3 Weeks Ago at 12:50 AM. Reason: change somebody to facilitator
I had with our PG (and any player for that matter) who can’t shoot. Reed is a knockdown shooter and more. At worst he could our SG and he would be great at it. I’m not against drafting Castle and Reed if both available. This draft really defends who’s available. Risacher/Dilly, Risacher/Castle, Reed/Holland. As long as we get a shooter and a PG from this draft would be great. The thing I like about Reed is he seems to be an overachiever. TP comes to mind, the smallest in the room but who thinks he is the best. Another thing is when Reed said he could be the water boy as long as the team’s winning. It’s all about the team. He prides himself on defense. I think Pop would love this kid.
I would be happy with reed at 4, then trade 8 down to the early mid teens for salaun. Don’t mind holland or castle either.
He's a flawed diamond that I see very limited ways to make function at the NBA level. He has strong positives: a very high BBIQ (both passing and help defense), and a great shooter.
But his flaws magnify. He doesn't have the handle to be a primary creator (ie the ability to attack a set defense with the ball in his hand, so as to create advantage). So he can't be your PG, unless there is another player who's going to be primary creator. (Primary creator is not Wemby, at least not yet; he is not Jokic/prime Durant. This is one of the issues with why things did not work well when we played Wemby as the 4 early last season.) The Spurs don't have that guy currently...
Further, as an individual defender (ie straight up, not help), Reed has issues with college guards. In the NBA he can't defend anyone but PG's effectively (and possibly not even that). Teams will hunt him on switches, just to be able to go at him: it both minimizes the impact of his help defense and gives them an easy target to go after. (He saw a lot less of this in college; there is much less game planning in college. No 7 game playoff series.)
Maybe a the spurs could live with that off the bench, but as a starter? I don't see how to make it work without players we don't currently have.
He reminds me a bit of JJ Re but with some defensive chops, just going off highlights. I'd be ok with it, but at #4 or even #8 we really can't do better? This draft, yo.
Because people disagree that he’s a bench player?
People making a huge deal about him allegedly gaming the vert as though him jumping 38 instead of 42 would be a huge difference maker and that 38 would just be written off as a pedestrian number
Sheppard on PG13's podcast: https://youtu.be/cP4uZk3usGw?t=2579
Interviewer: "Reed, during the NBA combine you recorded one of the top max vertical leaps at 42" and I don't know many white guys that have a vertical leap of 42 inches, but I'm a little confused because you said that you didn't expect it, so why were you surprised? did you not know you that you had bounce? or, like, walk me through that"
Reed Sheppard; "I know I can jump, but I didn't know I was going to have the highest vertical in the NBA but, you know, I got to give a lot of credit to my guy Ryan at proactive you know, he kind of helped us out with a little arm trick (makes the motion of raising his arm) so I was able to get a couple more inches but, you know, it was all fun and I did, I looked up at the board and when I saw 42 inches it kind of made me laugh because I wasn't expecting it, and I know no one else was expecting it, so it was a funny time"
That wasn't the issue, 38" vertical would have been perfect, the thing that I pointed out is that this guy seems obsessed with maximizing individual stats to make himself look better, when they have no influence whatsoever on the actual game. So it kind of made me wonder if there's a pattern there.
The combine is literally about numbers and teams use that info. Players training to maximize combine numbers is common and smart. Like nfl players training specifically for the 40 yard dash with technique, hand usage, etc
its not concerning. The end result is Sheppard has a better vert than most expected and whether his true very is 42 or 37 that rings true
No, Sheppard doesn't have a better max vertical leap thab expected, he has the same vertical leap he had prior to the combine (whatever the actual number may be) but just happened to artificially inflate it so that it'd look better on paper. And though It for sure happens, the degree to which he played the system wasn't so common, since he's the one that was clearly left off side (football reference). Of course you should watch out your weight, perform as best you can athletically, and gain every inch possible, and maybe you haven't watched him play, but the guy is clearly super conscious of counting stats, and you might not be concerned and take his stats as gospel, but to me it's one small detail that matches what the eye test told me.
However much you think he inflated his vert by, say 4 inches, the result of him having a 38 inch vert is better than most thought he would get coming in
There are currently 3 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 3 guests)
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
