Unfair advantage from the zebras

[ambchang]

Since for as long as I can remember, there has always been talk about how certain players are getting preferential treatment from the referees, and it always comes down to people refuting by saying Player A has the same number of FTAs as Player B, thus there is no preferential treatment, I tend to disagree.
Afterall, a player who shoots lots of jumpers SHOULD have less contact when shooting, thus less FTA, than a player who drives into the paint a lot.
I am taking this hypothesis to make a model.
I will take the shooting data (courtesy of 82games.com) of ALL the players in the 05-06 regular season, and run a model to predict how many FTA a player should have based on how often he shoots inside and outside. After this model is created, I will use it to predict how many FTA's each player should shoot, and see the difference between actual and predicted FTA per 48 minutes, then rank those players.
I will use the same model to predict playoff numbers.
And yes, I do know that players like Shaq and other poor FT shooting superstars may have a higher number of FTAs based on intentional fouls, but I am not ready to put in FT% as a predictor.
The forum should expect the model, and some sort of findings by mid-January (I don't have all day sitting there and typing out stats in the spreadsheet, you know).

[Spurs16212]

I officiate games for middle school and high school basketball... I understand what is going on through the course of a game.

As for preferential treatment.... I can see your point to an extent. The difference from shooting outside and inside is that you are going to see alot more contact inside and see more fouls called. Now for a official they must distinguish if the contact gains an advantage and is a call at the official's discrestion. Some supertars (ex. Kobe Bryant or Ray Allen) get alot of calls from outside shots due to small contact that alters their shot. But then some people wonder why they get the call and other players for example Raja Bell not get those type of calls. Thats where some favortism comes in and mouthing off after a call was made is also at the official's discretion and tend to tolerate the superstars much more than an average player.

[miss paxton]

After this model is created, I will use it to predict how many FTA's each player should shoot

What criteria are you going to use to determine how many FTAs a player "should" have?

[ambchang]

What criteria are you going to use to determine how many FTAs a player "should" have?

This is not a science at all, and I am taking FTA from outside of the paint, 3 pters, points from the paint (not including tips, and dunks), then tips and dunks.
The reason for distinguishing those is that many dunks happen in transition, and when a guy can get a dunk, there is little reason to foul him, thus I am predicting that this could actually lower FTA, but then it's up for the model to decide.