JB Coaching Not To Lose...

[OrangeFoo]

A couple of points which some seem to be missing here:
1) It's a pretty common statistical practice to take out the worst performance and the best performance when looking at data over a long course of time to control for one off anomalies. So it's perfectly ok for the espn guy to take out 03... although he probably should not have taken out 96. I'm not sure what that does to the analysis.
2) The point of the OP is that JB coaches different in November when the games don't matter as much than he does in March when they do matter. The folks defending JB by saying he went 31-2 in the regular season so you're not allowed to bitch are making the point for the bitchers. This year was one of JB's finest coaching jobs but now that the games matter much more he has totally gotten more conservative with his coaching. If he coached now like he did in the beginning of the year I would bet that yesterday would not have been so close. Now I have no time machine so I can't back up my assertion with facts so I guess all of the staunch JB defenders can ride off happily into the sunset.

Here's the deal though... we almost lost yesterday to a team whom if we had played them in December we would have beaten them by 20+.

 

[moqui]

Here's the deal though... we almost lost yesterday to a team whom if we had played them in December we would have beaten them by 20+.

how do you know that? SU played first round NIT loser Marshall in December and just barely beat them . . . and this is a team that JB said earlier in the week that he didn't schedule anymore because they were getting too good and might beat SU one of these years.

Most of you are just not realistic about the team you are rooting for. This team is and has been offensively challenged and will continue to play in these types of games unless the other team gets sloppy with the ball.

 

[CuseCPT]

ESPN the magazine summary: If you ignore a good chunk of the NCAA games JB won, it turns out he isn't very good at winning NCAA games!
:golfclap:

 

[OrangeXtreme]

Your job as a coach is to be there for the team & help them win when you are not shooting well right? So basically the team relies on the coach as a last resort right? The coach needs to make adjustments, game plans, Option B, substitutions and etc... basically just be effin prepared and make intelligent decisions when the players are off.

JB DOES NOT DO THIS !! Im not going to try and understand this man anymore. When he is under pressure in one and done games he completely melts down and loses any ability to think or act! I can't explain or understand that!

Seems to me that Fair was "off" yesterday, and Southerland received more playing time as a result.

Would you call that a "substitution" or an "adjustment"?

 

[Sgt Cuse]

An objective analysis shows that Boeheim has underachieved against his peers. Or maybe put another way, he's overachieved in the regular season with less talent only regresses to the mean during the Tournament. You could look at ratio of Final Fours appearances to total wins, ratio of Tournament wins to total wins, and several other metrics in comparison to his peers (K, Williams, Izzo, Pitino, etc.) and decide for yourself.

Of course, numbers can't tell the whole story. Boeheim deserves a ton of credit. I'm not calling for his head. I was only trying to say that Boeheim was not making adjustments and this is perhaps because he's too stubborn. There have been plenty of coaches that have been unwilling to change (Paterno, Bowden, Bob Knight, etc.). Just suggesting that Boeheim's success gives him self-imposed immunity for adaptation. Against the shortest team in the Tournament, Cuse out rebounded UNCA by 1 at the half. After "adjustments," Cuse out rebounded UNCA by 1 in the 2nd half.

What objective analysis are you talking about? You don't provide, or reference, any. This is all your opinion. The ESPN metric of PASE of .132 shows JB exceeds expectations in the NCAAT. That is one actual reference of a metric. And it says the exact opposite of what you state, that JB has underacheived.

Are you just going to sift through your bizarre thoughts until you find one that fits your theory? Who looks at ratio of tourney wins to overall wins? And you are just guessing that JB has done poorly. I would actually guess that he has done well. At least ESPN tried to develop the metric first and then apply it. You seem to want your conclusion and throw out possibilities to get there.

And this stuff about JB not making adjustments is getting ridiculous. He constantly tweaks the zone. As for your anecdote about the rebounds proving your point how about this rebuttal. SU after the first half was down 4, SU after the second half was up 7. Something changed in favor of SU. And it was the top adjustment I was looking for.

 

[newmexicuse]

Seems to me that Fair was "off" yesterday, and Southerland received more playing time as a result.

Would you call that a "substitution" or an "adjustment"?

Yes, but that was inside of the box. James was already a key part of the rotation. Jimmy does not go outside of the box, ergo, no MCW in the first half when Scoop was playing lousy.

BUT, did you also happen to notice, that even though James was far and away our best player yesterday, that he was NOT on the floor at the end. WHY ????????????????????????

UUUGGGGGHHHH !!!!!

 

[OttoinGrotto]

1) It's a pretty common statistical practice to take out the worst performance and the best performance when looking at data over a long course of time to control for one off anomalies. So it's perfectly ok for the espn guy to take out 03... although he probably should not have taken out 96. I'm not sure what that does to the analysis.

That's not what the analyst did though. Suppose the analyst pulls out, say, 96, but then also pulls out 91 and the Richmond loss. Then maybe, maybe, you can justify it. But that's not what happened.

What happened is pure and simple data manipulation because the facts didn't fit the argument. http://www.amazon.com/How-Lie-Statistics-Darrell-Huff/dp/0393310728

 

[OrlandoCuse]

how do you know that? SU played first round NIT loser Marshall in December and just barely beat them . . . and this is a team that JB said earlier in the week that he didn't schedule anymore because they were getting too good and might beat SU one of these years.

Most of you are just not realistic about the team you are rooting for. This team is and has been offensively challenged and will continue to play in these types of games unless the other team gets sloppy with the ball.

I put this team closer to Bucknell, who almost made the tourney from the Patriot League (lost in their championship game). We beat them by 16, iirc.

I was actually scare of UNC-A when Marsh started to predict we would play them a week ago. I looked at the teams they played and the scores and realized they would give us a game. I thought they should have been a 15 seed and Norfolk St should have been our 16 seed. I'm sure Norfolk St will get run out of the building by Mizzou today. We didn't get a gift with the "best 16" that really was a 15 seed. RPI of 95 or so. That's a decent team.

 

[KingOtis]

I think it's great that we have a fan base that knows more about basketball than the third-winningest coach of all time.

 

[billsin01]

That's not what the analyst did though. Suppose the analyst pulls out, say, 96, but then also pulls out 91 and the Richmond loss. Then maybe, maybe, you can justify it. But that's not what happened.

What happened is pure and simple data manipulation because the facts didn't fit the argument. http://www.amazon.com/How-Lie-Statistics-Darrell-Huff/dp/0393310728

True and it's even worse to take out a championship season when, you know, the entire point of the tournament is to win a title. I mean, it's great to reach the final four but let's not kid ourselves. If JB had reached three more final fours but was still sitting with 1 championship, let's take a guess as to what the criticism would be. I'm going to go ahead and suggest that people would be saying he can't win the big one or can't win when it counts the most.

The point is that we are almost always in the tourney, and often have a chance, if the chips fall right, to win a few games. Somewhere around once a decade we go real deep. I don't know, it could be improved upon, but let's not get tooooo bent out of shape about it.

 

[KingOtis]

As for yesterday's game and the notion that JB was coaching not to lose...

The players aren't robots that JB moves around the court like a high-tech game of chess. Do you think that maybe - just maybe - the suspension of Melo was the straw that broke the camel's back? There have been so many distractions this season and, from a mental standpoint, perhaps the weight of it all has become too much. We're not the same team without Melo. The players know that better than anyone. It's one thing to ignore the Bernie Fine and drug stuff, but the loss of Melo has a direct impact on the team.

No, they're not robots. They're kids. They put everything into going 31-2 and getting a top seed in the tournament. And on the eve of the dance, they had the wind taken out of their sails. For the second time in three years.

 

[moqui]

This was in ESPN The Mag BEFORE Melo was declared ineligible




Pretty long, as it turns out. Thirty-three D1 coaches have reached at least three Final Fours during their careers.

a lot of those guys earned their records in the pre-64 team era. It was a lot easier when the committee didn't try to balance regions and you only had to win 2 games to get to the Final Four. In the modern era, the company is much more exclusive.

If you just go by the 64 team era, when everyone had to win (at least) 4 games to get to the Final Four. In that era, by my count the number is just 13 coaches with at least 3 Final Fours (technically, just 11 since both Steve Fisher and John Calipari have had 2 of their trips vacated). Billy Donovan went back to back with basically the same team, so he really only took two different squads to the Final Four. So, it is arguably just 10 guys who have made 3 or more in the modern era.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

a lot of those guys earned their records in the pre-64 team era. It was a lot easier when the committee didn't try to balance regions and you only had to win 2 games to get to the Final Four. In the modern era, the company is much more exclusive.

If you just go by the 64 team era, when everyone had to win (at least) 4 games to get to the Final Four. In that era, by my count the number is just 13 coaches with at least 3 Final Fours (technically, just 11 since both Steve Fisher and John Calipari have had 2 of their trips vacated). Billy Donovan went back to back with basically the same team, so he really only took two different squads to the Final Four. So, it is arguably just 10 guys who have made 3 or more in the modern era.

Yeah, that needs to be recognized.

 

[Oakland]

OrangeinOak said: ↑

A SU is a fast paced high scoring team.​

no, actually, we are not. SU plays at an adjusted tempo of 65.5, 201st out of 335 D1 squads. If you don't understand that basic fact, then you shouldn't even be in this conversation.

Thanks for the condenscending reply, where you throw me in with a bunch of assumed knuckleheads and lecture me on issues I didn't bring up, and opinions that I don't have. I'll think twice before wasting any more of my time responsing to your posts.

Since you ignored my basic premise, that was supported by facts, I'll move on to your response. SU is in the top 40 of scoring (out of 344), and 3rd in the BEC, where one could say the result is 'adjusted' for top competition. So I still think SU is a high scoring team. The fast paced is obviously a reference to our universally acknowledge transition game (the fastest paced component of a BB game), but will concede your point about adjusted tempo.

I will take issue with "but he completely outcoached Eddie SourGrapes yesterday and gets to play another round. Jeezus," - are you are talking about the great JB coaching job? Is this one of your cherished facts? Here are my facts, one of only 7 coaches (out of 150 something) of a #1 seed to be losing at halftime to a #16 seed, and ahead by ~4 pts with 2 mins to go - came close to being the first #1 coach to lose to a #16. Can't imagine what your definition of "completely outcoached" means - whatever it is, I have a different one.

 

[SyracuseFan]

Would you call that a "substitution" or an "adjustment"?

OK let's settle this right now!

EVERYONE Be true to yourself and answer this, please.

Am I to believe that there is really anyone in this thread who believes that it's a sound strategy to play zone for 40 minutes against the the teams we have played who were seeded 14-16. I want to know who thinks 9-10 very athletic and extremely talented players should play a slow down game, when we can't shoot, have a bad half court offense and zero low post presence?

SERIOUSLY Step up right now!

I want to know who believes this strategy is sound! I want to know why I'm such a big jerk because I believe in saying the hard truths. Is it true that some fans have no clue about the game of basketball?

Is it true?

Nobody argues with the MAIN point so stop throwing stones and spewing innuendo when nobody with half a brain believes the bad upsets were caused by anything but insane coaching decisions.

I know JB makes subtle adjustments I am not blind nor an idiot. I know JB is a good coach and in fact when you put it all together he has been a great coach in career numbers.

However in the case of my above question, I'm asking everyone. What have I said that is non factual?

THE BENCHING OF MCW ALONE SHOULD MAKE EVERY SU FAN NERVOUS

 

[mikekan14]

Reminder, I didn't write the ESPN article but I searched for PASE (Performance Against Seed Expectation) and found this website...http://www.bracketscience.com/articles/_navTop10.asp?i=1

Top Active Coaches (name, PASE)
1. Brad Stevens (only 4 appearances), 1.931
2. Tom Izzo, 0.909
3. Sean Miller, 0.748
4. John Beilein, 0.705
5. Steve Fisher, 0.610

The list stops there for free content but the site uses Bill Self as an example and he's at #33 with a PASE of 0.011 for active coaches with at least 5 Tournament appearances. That apparently is a different list as the one above since Brad Stevens hasn't been removed from the sample data. Reminder, Jim Boeheim's PASE is 0.132.

Then using http://statsheet.com/mcb/coaches for the coaching statistics I compared a few measures. Disclaimer: I don't know if this site has updated with this year's Tournament results nor do I know how accurate it is. However, the same source of error (if it's systematic) should be distributed so I don't foresee the chance that something is that far off that it should be considered a statistical outlier. I selected 9 other coaches to compare based on longevity and name/team recognition. Many other coaches (Howland, Dixon, Gary Williams, Mark Few, etc.) could have been included in this survey but I cut the list off at 10 total.

At the crux of the exercise is the acceptance that a coach's win total is directly correlated to how good a coach he is, otherwise the normalization to wins isn't going to support my point. Also, I used the coach's career win total so Calhoun's will include his tenure at Northeastern, Pitino at BU, K at Army, Self at Oral Roberts, etc. I think it should be noted that comparing expectations and resources at their previous mid major schools to their current teams is akin to apples and oranges. In any case, those wins were not excluded. Also, no weighting was considered so I can't over weight Boeheim's wins because that came from the tougher Big East nor can I underweight Calipari's wins in the SEC or CUSA. Perhaps a more statistical analysis would normalize win records to an opponent's cumulative winning percentage. I didn't do that. I also understand there are other measures that exist that others will feel are more appropriate.

I looked at 3 measures:
1. Tournament Wins/Overall # Wins (TW/OW): overall coaching wins include tournament record so it is a measure of how many of his total wins are from the tournament.
2. Tournament Wins/Tournament Appearance (TW/TA): measures how "deep" a team goes, on average
3. Final Four Appearances/Tournament Appearance (FF/TA): measures how often a team makes a run to the Final Four. This is probably the least significant measure because of the small sample size.

Coach: TW/OW, TW/TA, FF/TA
Boeheim: 0.0473, 1.75, 0.125
Calhoun: 0.0583, 2.32, 0.182
Calipari: 0.0595, 2.46, 0.231
Huggins: 0.038, 1.42, 0.105
Izzo: 0.085, 2.50, 0.429
K: 0.085, 2.93, 0.407
Matta: 0.050, 1.78, 0.111
Pitino: 0.061, 2.38, 0.313
Self: 0.059, 2.15, 0.077
Williams, Roy: 0.086, 2.76, 0.333

*If you multiply the 1st and 3rd columns by 100, you'll have the number as a percent. So of Boeheim's 888 wins, 4.7% of them came from the Tournament, where as Tournament wins make up 8.6% of Roy Williams's win total (673). Sorry about the unformatted table

It looks like Coach K, Tom Izzo, and Roy Williams have the largest proportion of wins coming from Tournament success of this list. On average, Coach K's teams win just under 3 games in each tournament (i.e. Elite 8). For every ten trips to the dance, Izzo's Spartans and K's Blue Devils will have advanced to the Final Four 4 times.

Feel free to check my math. If this could be done for many more coaches, it'd be nice to see the standard deviation and mean. This exercise is only good to see relative differences as opposed to statistical differences. You can't really quantify how much less 1.75 tournament wins per appearance vs 2.15 tournament wins is without the standard deviation (sigma). You could do it for a sample size of 10 but there's so much variation that you really couldn't make a conclusion with 95% confidence.

 

[realorange]

You folks better listen to SyracuseFan because he is so knowledgeable and makes so much money he could buy this board. That's his stock answer when we object to his tirades too much.

 

[SyracuseFan]

80% of JB is excellent. Stop arguing these tournament numbers everyone who is sane knows he's a good coach. His numbers in the tournament even show this.

My contention is the 20% is not just bad its borderline insane. It just doesn't make sense in an era of horrid college basketball teams to completely handicap your strengths before you even get started.

The gap between good and bad teams is not what it once was. You have to exploit every advantage you have.

 

[mikekan14]

What objective analysis are you talking about? You don't provide, or reference, any. This is all your opinion. The ESPN metric of PASE of .132 shows JB exceeds expectations in the NCAAT. That is one actual reference of a metric. And it says the exact opposite of what you state, that JB has underacheived.

Are you just going to sift through your bizarre thoughts until you find one that fits your theory? Who looks at ratio of tourney wins to overall wins? And you are just guessing that JB has done poorly. I would actually guess that he has done well. At least ESPN tried to develop the metric first and then apply it. You seem to want your conclusion and throw out possibilities to get there.

And this stuff about JB not making adjustments is getting ridiculous. He constantly tweaks the zone. As for your anecdote about the rebounds proving your point how about this rebuttal. SU after the first half was down 4, SU after the second half was up 7. Something changed in favor of SU. And it was the top adjustment I was looking for.

Please see my post. I appreciate the skepticism. I understand a lot of people post without first looking something up or just shoot from the hip. For clarification, I said that JB has underperformed against his peers. PASE is a measure of over/under performance in comparison to their tournament seed. And absolutely, the word "peer" is subjective. Furthermore, if you read the rationale behind tourney wins per overall win, you may not find it so bizarre after all. But then again you may still find the stat awkward; I recognize that stats can be mangled to indicate anything.

 

[SyracuseFan]

You folks better listen to SyracuseFan because he is so knowledgeable and makes so much money he could buy this board. That's his stock answer when we object to his tirades too much.

That is just insane, I've never said anything about my finacial status. I can't believe I just read that. Do you work for Yahoo Sports?

Goodbye.

 

[HarrisonJBounel]

THE BENCHING OF MCW ALONE SHOULD MAKE EVERY SU FAN NERVOUS

NO.

MCW is NOT READY. PERIOD.

 

[Sgt Cuse]

OK let's settle this right now!

EVERYONE Be true to yourself and answer this, please.

Am I to believe that there is really anyone in this thread who believes that it's a sound strategy to play zone for 40 minutes against the the teams we have played who were seeded 14-16. I want to know who thinks 9-10 very athletic and extremely talented players should play a slow down game, when we can't shoot, have a bad half court offense and zero low post presence?

SERIOUSLY Step up right now!

I want to know who believes this strategy is sound! I want to know why I'm such a big jerk because I believe in saying the hard truths. Is it true that some fans have no clue about the game of basketball?

Is it true?

Nobody argues with the MAIN point so stop throwing stones and spewing innuendo when nobody with half a brain believes the bad upsets were caused by anything but insane coaching decisions.

I know JB makes subtle adjustments I am not blind nor an idiot. I know JB is a good coach and in fact when you put it all together he has been a great coach in career numbers.

However in the case of my above question, I'm asking everyone. What have I said that is non factual?

THE BENCHING OF MCW ALONE SHOULD MAKE EVERY SU FAN NERVOUS

You do realize JB has gone several years with like only 1 or 2 out of conference losses. He has accumulated an amazing record based largely on the zone.

So, yes, I think JB using the zone is sound strategy.

 

[mantonio]

Do you think this is the reason why many higher seeded teams lose as much as they do in the Tourney.

The talent level differential is not what it used to be, but honestly, these top 4 seeds are clearly head & shoulders better in talent, & often handle these same teams in the regular season.

If Syracuse would embrace their superiority & use their strengths, instead of trying to force improvement of their weaknesses, they would put these low seeds away early...

 

[Sgt Cuse]

Please see my post. I appreciate the skepticism. I understand a lot of people post without first looking something up or just shoot from the hip. For clarification, I said that JB has underperformed against his peers. PASE is a measure of over/under performance in comparison to their tournament seed. And absolutely, the word "peer" is subjective. Furthermore, if you read the rationale behind tourney wins per overall win, you may not find it so bizarre after all. But then again you may still find the stat awkward; I recognize that stats can be mangled to indicate anything.

I think your numbers are flawed because the data for JB includes wins that predate the 64 team tourney. So his ratios are going to look worse.

 

[mikekan14]

I think your numbers are flawed because the data for JB includes wins that predate the 64 team tourney. So his ratios are going to look worse.

Really? You just really have that hard of a time admitting that there have been more successful coaches than Jim Boeheim? That’s all I’m trying to say. I’m not trying to say he’s a bad coach!

Fine, the tournament expanded to 64 in ’85. I’m assuming that’s the 84-85 season and not the 85-86 season. Roy Williams, Izzo, Self, Calipari, and Matta all began coaching after ‘85 so their numbers don’t need adjusting. I’m too lazy to do this for anyone other than Boeheim. I don’t need to prove my point that badly. NOTE: I’m not adjusting for differences in conference tournament settings so I’m not factoring in more or less opportunities to win games based on number of rounds in the conference tournament, or single/double byes.

Taking away data from before Boeheim's '84-85 season = 182 less wins, 6 less tournament appearances, 5 less tournament victories. (May be off by a win or two)

Boeheim’s percentage of overall wins coming from the tournament increased to 5.24%. He now averages 2.06 wins per tournament appearance and 16.7% of his tournament appearances have reached the Final Four. Compare again to the trimmed list of coaches who started coaching after ’85.

Coach (TW/OW, TW/TA, FF/TA)
Boeheim (5.24%, 2.06, 16.7%)
Calipari (5.95%, 2.46, 23.1%)
Izzo (8.5%, 2.50, 42.9%)
Matta (5.0, 1.78, 11.1%)
Self (5.9%, 2.15, 7.7%0)
Williams (8.6%, 2.76, 33.3%)

I’m done posting for the season. This isn’t productive.

Good luck. Go Orange. Happy St Patty’s Day