Good mid-major article on ESPN with Duke connection

[patentgeek]

http://espn.go.com/blog/collegebasketballnation/post/_/id/13966/positional-flexibility-in-college-hoops

The article discusses a theory espoused by a writer for Basketball Prospectus, Drew Cannon, that mid-majors may be well-served to forget about conventional basketball positions when recruiting.

http://www.basketballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=1190

If I'm not mistaken, Cannon is a statistics major at Duke (or at least was as of last spring) whose study on mid-majors (conducted for Scout.com) was written about in the New York Times last spring.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/16/sports/ncaabasketball/16ncaa.html?_r=1

Interesting stuff. I don't know how well the theory may hold for power conference teams, although the unconventional use of Scheyer at point and Nolan at SG may provide some validation.

[SilkyJ]

This is incredibly interesting to me. Great find.

I think we are in the midst of some sort of basketball statistical revolution (although it may not be a full fledged revolution) and these kind of things are incredibly intriguing to me. I'm thinking about attending the next "Dorkapalooza" as Bill Simmons calls it (the MIT Sloan Sports Management Conference or something like that).

Gordon Hayward comes to mind from recent memory in terms of a guy who doesn't fit in to a traditional offensive and defensive role. His offensive game is more like a SG/SF but he defended more in the post b/c of his size...also like Singler in his first 2 years.

[Newton_14]

This is incredibly interesting to me. Great find.

I think we are in the midst of some sort of basketball statistical revolution (although it may not be a full fledged revolution) and these kind of things are incredibly intriguing to me. I'm thinking about attending the next "Dorkapalooza" as Bill Simmons calls it (the MIT Sloan Sports Management Conference or something like that).

Gordon Hayward comes to mind from recent memory in terms of a guy who doesn't fit in to a traditional offensive and defensive role. His offensive game is more like a SG/SF but he defended more in the post b/c of his size...also like Singler in his first 2 years.

Agree. I especially enjoyed the 2nd article. I had actually read the 3rd article before. Very interesting look at "players" vs "positions". Of course K figured this out long ago and has been very successful with it, especially this year with Jon the "Handler/Distributor", Nolan the "Scorer/Distributor", Kyle the "Scorer/Rebounder", and Zoubs the "Rebounder". Add in a Lance Thomas as multi-dimensional defender and glue guy, a pair of Plumlee's as Rebounders and Andre as "The Shooter" and it all added up to lots of Hardware.

In reading the article it fit with my thoughts last night at the summer league watching Quincy Miller and Deuce Bello. It was my first time seeing those guys in action and what immediately struck me about both was neither guy really fits the mold of any of the traditional "positions". They are both really good basketball players with incredible quickness, length, ballhandling, and jumping ability. They look like clones with the small exception of Miller being about 4 to 5 inches taller.

Miller is 6'10 but really is not a PF or C as most guys his size are. Bello is sort of like a 3 but can guard the 1 through the 4 if he had too. Miller could guard probably anything from a 2 to a 5.

We have often talked about the concept of playing one position but guarding another on this board, especially last summer with Lance and Kyle. It is an interesting concept and an interesting way to look at the game from a nonconventional view.

[patentgeek]

Yeah, I find this stuff very interesting also. It seems that basketball, and in particular college basketball, is ripe for some significant statistical analysis, which seems to be the interest of the Duke student mentioned in the article. Good for him - makes me envious.

[4decadedukie]

Agree. I especially enjoyed the 2nd article. I had actually read the 3rd article before. Very interesting look at "players" vs "positions". Of course K figured this out long ago and has been very successful with it, especially this year with Jon the "Handler/Distributor", Nolan the "Scorer/Distributor", Kyle the "Scorer/Rebounder", and Zoubs the "Rebounder". Add in a Lance Thomas as multi-dimensional defender and glue guy, a pair of Plumlee's as Rebounders and Andre as "The Shooter" and it all added up to lots of Hardware.

In reading the article it fit with my thoughts last night at the summer league watching Quincy Miller and Deuce Bello. It was my first time seeing those guys in action and what immediately struck me about both was neither guy really fits the mold of any of the traditional "positions". They are both really good basketball players with incredible quickness, length, ballhandling, and jumping ability. They look like clones with the small exception of Miller being about 4 to 5 inches taller.

Miller is 6'10 but really is not a PF or C as most guys his size are. Bello is sort of like a 3 but can guard the 1 through the 4 if he had too. Miller could guard probably anything from a 2 to a 5.

We have often talked about the concept of playing one position but guarding another on this board, especially last summer with Lance and Kyle. It is an interesting concept and an interesting way to look at the game from a nonconventional view.


Excellent thread and great, thoughtful post; thank you both.

If you accept this thesis -- and I do, because Duke has thrived in seasons (such as '09-'10) when our "strict position" comparative alignment simply did not seem to be overwhelmingly strong -- what does this suggest about UNC? Am I correct that since (and throughout) the Smith era, the Heels have been especially "position oriented?" Further, perhaps that is a deficiency that comes with a wealth of potentially excellent players; the requirement for teams (including many at UNC) to innovate and to create non-traditional offensive and defensive mixes simply is not compelling when there are outstanding players to easily and comfortably fill a standard "position based approach."

[patentgeek]

I think UNC's situation is an extreme one - because they tend to recruit so successfully (don't forget that just a year ago many people were touting Roy as a recruiting genius), they are more able to pick and choose players that fit the mold of particular positions - e.g., quick point guard with floor vision and good ballhandling skills, tall shooting guard, traditional back-to-the-basket center, etc. As such, they have fewer issues with having to adjust to non-traditional roles. That may be one reason why, when the wheels started coming off last year (a glorious year, I might add), they were slow to adjust - they just aren't accustomed to having to make those kinds of adjustments.

[m g]

not that it has much bearing on his ability to analyze basketball... but it must be embarrassing when your article gets published with an obvious math error right at the beginning