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I was just going to ask if anybody read what was written... teams shooting under 60% at the free throw line? How do you defend that?
This is a good point. I don't know of many (any?) other teams who have a closing lineup so different than the starting lineup. Green has closed games in Ginobili's absence, but the big 3 are set in stone to close games when they're healthy, and Leonard seems to be a fixture late in the 4th as well.
I was just going to ask if anybody read what was written... teams shooting under 60% at the free throw line? How do you defend that?
How many times we did that this season? I can think of Howard, and maybe DeAndre Jordan... I don't recall doing it at any time in the last 5 mins of the game though...
Have Jack give'em the "Fuk Yo Team Clown Death Stare?"I was just going to ask if anybody read what was written... teams shooting under 60% at the free throw line? How do you defend that?
Lol it's not good defense it's "luck"
I've read it all.
I don't know how often they may have employed the tactic in late game situations this season, but attributing the numbers to luck doesn't pass the common sense test.I was just going to ask if anybody read what was written... teams shooting under 60% at the free throw line? How do you defend that?
From the article:
"In the last five minutes of games with a scoring margin of five or fewer points, San Antonio has yielded just 91.5 points per 100 possessions, the best mark in the league, according to NBA.com. Cut the time and margin to three minutes/three points, and the number drops to 78.1 points allowed per 100 possessions, also tops in the league."
The Spurs foul at an extremely low rate. If the opposition was converting those rare late game free throws at the league average of 75% instead of the 60% cited, it would change the numbers above by a point or less.
It's become a trend lately, in fourth quarters they seem to turn the defense up a notch. To ignore that is laughable.
Sorry Mel, but I'm going to disagree. Also from the article:
"Teams are 9-of-50 from deep against the Spurs in the last five minutes when the scoring margin is five or fewer, and just 1-of-13 in the last three minutes of even tighter games (margin of three or fewer)"
I don't dispute that the Spurs try harder late in games, that's readily apparent, but there's no team defense holding opponents to 18% and 7% respectively from downtown. The league average is 34%... The very best defensive unit on 3 pointers in the league is Boston and they hold opponents to 30%...
If they're giving up 78 pts per 100 possessions in the last three minutes and you adjust that 1 for 13 to the league average, how much higher than 78 do you suppose the number will be?
And are you really disagreeing that adjusting the FT % to the league average would have a negligible effect?
Increasing the 7% to 15% (doubling it basically), means an extra tied game (since the condition is 3 point difference in the last 3 mins). And 15% is still half of the league's best allowed percentage. If you double on that to reach the league's best allowed percentage, you would have 4 extra tied games.
I simply disagree it's that our defense causes free throw shooters to shoot under 60% in the clutch against us. The criteria is 5 points or less, thus each made freethrow is an extra point and does matter.
The 3 point shooting percentage could be argued more because it's a play you can defend, but the percentages are simply way beyond anything within the league standards.
That assumes the final margin of each game was three points and we don't know that. What we really need to know is the total sample size so that we could calculate the new pts per 100 possessions with league average percentages. I very much doubt that they would take the Spurs from league best in this metric to something like their overall numbers.
I notice you still haven't answered about the FT%.
If we had the actual stats, we could figure out how much luck plays into it. I don't see any of these stats in the public domain but I'll send out a few emails . . .
We don't need to assume that. Each missed shot was taken within the last 3 mins and the score differential at that point was 3. A miss means the Spurs keep a 3 point lead and gain possession, a make means the game is tied and the Spurs gain possession. It gives no indication of winner/loser, but I think we can agree making or missing those shots can easily change games.
It's the post right before yours...
I posted before I saw this.
I don't agree with your math. Or more accurately how you've chosen to word this.
The Spurs allow 18.2 FT attempts per game. When looking at 5 minute or 3 minute segments of a game, you get a very small number of attempts. Over the course of the entire sample, increasing the conversion rate from 60% to 75% is going to have a very small impact on the pts per 100 possession stat cited.
To add to this, the average scoring margin for the Spurs this season up to this point has been +4.94... which is top 5 in the league, but fairly far from the number 1 (Bulls, +8.28).
I saw your post on the FT %.
Again, the article rated late game defense on the metric of pts per 100 possessions. By that metric, basically defensive rating, the Spurs have had the top late game defense in the league. Without the raw numbers, it's impossible to be sure of how adjusting to the league average for 3pt % and FT% would impact the Spurs ranking in this metric.
My guess is that they would still be at or near the top.
I think you're missing the forest from the tree. It will undoubtedly have very little impact on the pts per 100 possessions. I agree with that.
But under the criteria the percentage is presented (last 5 mins, 5 point or less differential), one or two of those freethrows can easily be the difference between a tied game or a Spurs lead requiring the other team to foul.
I'm not dissing the pts per 100 possessions. I'm simply stating that those percentages under the criteria they were presented are very, very unlikely when compared to league averages.
I'm not sure how that fact lends or detracts from the credibility of the numbers cites in the original article.
I agree with that
The part where I disagree is the flukish percentages on 3 pointers and freethrows under those conditions. Again, the Spurs might have the top defense in the league in the fourth quarter, but with their scoring differential, it only indicates how bad it is in the first 3... And the deciding factor on some of those games are simply very flukish percentages.
I just explained.
That was I understood you to be doing in your first post in this thread below. My responses to you have been based on that understanding. It appears I may have misunderstood your intent.
I was just going to ask if anybody read what was written... teams shooting under 60% at the free throw line? How do you defend that?
We keep responding out of sequence
Edit: And I was behind one post when I wrote this.
I surrender.
I don't know if I'm not explaining this well or not. Let me put it a different way: The fact that there's stats for FT shooting and 3 point percentage within the last 5 mins of a game (or 3 mins of a game) and the score difference at that point was 5 (or 3) points, means that regardless what our points per 100 possessions was for that stretch, we were in games where the margin was really low going to crunch time. Once we're there, we're there. Our points per 100 possession won't affect the percentage of the free throws or 3 point shots (at least not to the degree we see) taken under those cir stances.
Not convinced it's more clear, but there you have it.
Well, no. I do think we do a better job late in games, but I don't think there's defense good enough in the league to make teams shoot under 20% consistently in the last 5 mins of a game against multiple opponents. (Especially 7%). That's plain and simple missed shots. Luck as you would have it.
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