By the Time I Get to Arizona...

U2 burned the April 4th date into my head as the day a "shot rings out in the Memphis sky." My two favorite bands growing up were U2 and Public Enemy. PE courted controversy on a number of occasions including a political diatribe on Arizona and its reluctance to make Martin Luther King's Birthday a holiday in that state. Bono and U2 have always been active voices against oppression while promoting public policy that helps the developing world. The intersection of pop culture and politics tests the dogmatic and has historically done so on the issue of race. The anniversary of King's death, along with the Arizona drafting strategy discussed in our previous post, allows me to offer another self-indulgent blog on drafting strategy that tries in vain to be more esoteric than it really is. Thesis number two on drafting: Don't draft white players from America in the first round! I say this at the risk of being compared to the Oklahoma baseball coach or the Navy football coach or even Jimmy the friggin Greek. This may not align with the progressive discourse envisioned by King but it is relevant nonetheless. While the result of this experiment is less powerful than the Arizona test, it still yields very good results. For example, Denver could have passed on LaFrentz (3rd) for Jamison or Carter. Szcerbiak (6th) was selected before Hamilton, Andre Miller, Shawn Marion and Jason Terry. Van Horn (2nd) before Billups. Todd Fuller before Potapenko, Kobe, Peja and Steve Nash. Bryant Reeves (6th) was selected prior to Damon Stoudamire, Montross before Eddie Jones, Shawn Bradley before Anfernee Hardaway! The list goes on and on... even current Cavs GM and former Spur Danny Ferry before Sean Elliott (former Spur and current Spur broadcaster). The white players taken who were not followed by an obviously better pick, have done ok but have not exceeded relative expectations. Examples here are Troy Murphy, Mike Miller, Christian Laettner, Rex Chapman and Chris Kaman (Kaman is solid and improving). There is some need by general managers to select strong college players even though they lack the potential to dominate in the pros. Often the decision is supported by the misguided belief that the player is especially smart or mature, which traditionally has led to a bias towards white players. Scouts are now more fair in dolling out gold stars for intelligence and maturity but still overestimate the downside risk of not having these qualities. Additionally, many of these players have size which may be another attribute that is overated. The confluence of solid white players who are sizeable has led to many disastrous choices by NBA General Managers. More specifically, we look at white big men taken as top 10 picks: Jon Konkac, Joe Kleine, Rony Seikaly, Shawn Bradley, Eric Montross, Bryant Reeves, Raef LaFrentz, Chris Mihm, Joel Pryzbilla, Chris Kamen...This is rivaled by the small forward list of top picks including: Chris Mullin, Danny Ferry, Christian Laettner, Tom Gugliotta, Keith Van Horn, Wally Szcerbiak, Mike Miller and Mike Dunleavy. Most of these small forwards are real players, some were complete busts but most were still mistakes, save Chris Mullin. With Adam Morrisson on the horizon, GM's have to look at the significant amount of data that would support passing on Morrisson with such a high pick. Is he the next Larry Bird? No. With that in mind, would you really be satisfied with Christian Laettner? Now, the poor performance of American-born white lottery picks is not solely or even a majority biologically based. There are a number of other factors that could possibly determine this phenomenon and is something that should be studied, but won't be. Additionally, we could look at what are the signs, if any, of a burgeoning quality white player. 1985-2004 NBA Drafts

NBA Analysis - April 7, 2006

Mavericks on 2 days rest this season are 10-5 ATS and 3-12 OU. The Mavs have only gotten 3 points or more on 5 occasions this season and are 2-3 ATS and SU. They've lost the last three with these conditions including one at San Antonio. The Spurs on 1 day rest are 22-22-1 ATS and 19-26 OU - add to that being at home and they become 8-13-0 (-1.9) ATS 6-15-0 (-2.6) OU… After a loss, the Spurs are 9-6-1 (3.3) ATS, 7-9-0 (2.4) OU and 14-2 (11.75) SU. Dallas and SA are 2-5 OU in their last 7. It's hard to imagine SA losing two in a row at home with the playoffs around the corner. Dallas has had some issues on the road but this isn't very far to travel. 5 points is just too much to refuse, especially in a heated game that is expected to be low scoring. Oh, by the way, I expect it to be low scoring. Additionally, Dallas looks good under the conditions described below. Let’s throw some good money after bad. Got a nice trend to test with four occurrences tomorrow and another on the 8th and 9th. Teams playing on 2 days rest against teams on 1 days rest are 61-34-3 ATS since January 1st. These are those games: Grizzlies Bucks home 2&1 Mavericks Spurs away 2&1 Jazz wolves away 2&1 Supersonics blazers away 2&1 Cavaliers Nets away 2&1 20060409 Bobcats Raptors away 2&1 And then you got a bunch of teams playing each other for the second time within 6 days which is a good trend for road teams and the under. The Blazers/Sonics overlap so I gotta be pro-Sonics because they are on 2 days rest and also the visitor. ATS: 13-23-1 (-1.5) O/U: 15-21-1 2006 0407 Hornets Raptors 1&1 2006 0407 Blazers Sonics 1&2 2006 0408 Bulls 76ers 2&0 2006 0409 T'wolves Hawks 1&1 2006 0410 Pacers Knicks 0&0

When ‘Cats are Dogs The Nets are 2-4 ATS when giving 10 or more this year but the Bobcats are 6-9-1 ATS on the road when getting 10 or more points… which probably means that they generally deserve to be big dogs in general. The Bobcats always seem to have three guys who are injured- and often it is a different group of three- yet they still provide a steady stream of young talent off the bench. They play well enough to win but never actually do. In fact, they have covered 39 games this year but only won 21 SU. The Bobcats can run and are very athletic. They are 6-11 SU in games with totals over 200 and while the total is only 192 tonight, there is a chance that this turns into an open-court game. The big one tonight- Pistons at Heat The Pistons are 1-7-1 ATS since 3/1 The Heat are 3-8 ATS at home in their last 11 games The Heat should be hurt without the presence of Mourning though they are 8-4 this year without him. Jason Williams’ absence might be a net positive for the Heat as Wade will have to have the ball in his hands more. The Heat are 12-6 SU without Williams this season. The Heat are 1-4 ATS and SU when the line is between 2 and -2. The Pistons are 2-3 in this scenario including three straight loses, the last one a 100-98 loss at Miami. This one is all about Detroit. The Pistons are 6-2 SU when playing a team that they lost to in the previous game this season. Kobe returns to the scene of the (non)- crime The Lakers are 1-5 OU against the Nuggets in their last 6 meetings. The total is currently 205, which isn’t a reduction when compared to the two teams’ previous meetings. The Nuggets are an overish team at home at 24-13 OU, including 6 straight. The Nugs have covered 6 of their last 7 at home ATS. During this time they are shooting 49.7% from the field and 44.2% from the 3-point line. I guess the Nuggets are the play.

Do I have to watch the first round now?

After tonight's convincing win at San Antonio, it begs the question, can the Kings knock off the Spurs in the first round? Well, let's take a look at history shall we? The first #8 seed to take out a #1 seed was the 1994 Denver Nuggets. The 1994 Nuggets played .500 ball all year, finishing 42-40 before taking out the top-ranked Seattle Supersonics and then scaring the Jazz, taking them to a 7th game. In fact, in that series, the Nuggets almost made more history by dropping the first three games, including a 111-109 loss in game 3, before taking the next three. I didn't know this team. Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf is a personal favorite of mine, Dikembe too.  Lafonso Ellis, Reggie Williams, Bryant Stith, Robert Pack, Rodney Rogers, and the former Brian Williams rounded out the bunch. This was a defense-centric team, anchored by Mutombo and his 4.1 blocks per game; and balanced, with 5 and almost 6 players averaging double-figures. The Seattle team that they knocked off finished the regular season 63-19. Kemp and Payton at their best, Schrempf, Ricky Pierce, Kendall Gill and Sam Perkins each averaged more than 12 ppg. Cage and McMillian both got 20+ minutes. Denver split the season series with Seattle, winning both at home and losing both on the road. They were 1-4 against Utah during the regular season. The Nuggets were 28-28 at one point, 35-35 and ended 42-40... so it wasn't as though they got better during the end of the regular season. Did they get it together during the playoffs? Did they just match up well against Seattle? Is George Karl really just a bad coach? Those were probably all factors, as well as Denver being solid at home - a place that can be tough to play at due to the high altitude. The next time this #8 over #1 feat was accomplished was in 1999 when the Knicks upset the Heat in Game 5 on Allan Houston's last-second runner. The Knicks were largely comprised of Houston, Ewing, Sprewell, Larry Johnson, Kurt Thomas, Ward and Camby. The Knicks were 19-6 at home in this labor strife-shortened season. Like the Nuggets before them, having a significant home winning percentage was essential. Again a defense-oriented team, the Knicks held Miami to score totals of 75, 82, 73, 87 and 77 during their series. So, is this a similar situation? The Kings do have balanced scoring with Bibby, Artest, Miller, Wells, Abur-Rahim and Kevin Martin. With Artest, they now have a legitimate stopper and an emotional leader. At 21-12 overall and 12-2 at home since Artest joined the team, the Kings are the equivalent of a 50 win team, a more worthy opponent than the Spurs have faced in the past. There are a couple of things working in the Spurs favor. Currently, the 1st round is a best of 7 series (likely due to TV), whereas series were 5 games until 2003. A 7-game series will almost always be won by the better team, barring injuries. Another factor is the increased rest between games. In 1999, NY and Miami played their 5 games between the 8th and 16th of May. The other factor - the Spurs are reigning champions, more mature and deeper than last year's squad. Popovich is a great coach and choking seems unlikely. Sacramento is a 32-1 longshot to win the Western Conference on WSEX.com... this is a tradable contract. If Sac wins the first round, the value of the contract would rise from 3 to maybe 33-ish... (figured from a 70% chance of then beating the 4-5 winner and then 50% of the winning the Conference Finals). Even if the resulting price was only 27, that would be a 9-fold gain, implying a 10% chance of beating the Spurs. If I hadn't lost all my money on the previous bets that I recommended, I would jump on this one.

It's a natural for any viewer of any poker program on TV to think about going pro - the glorious world of playing full time, making cash money, choosing your own hours, living it up in Vegas. And then of course, there's reality. For months, I've been reading Mike Cunningham's blog, a former track coach turned poker pro. Have you realized you can become a poker pro in mere seconds? What does it mean to go pro? It means you've quit your full time job and decided you're going to play poker full time. The subtitle of Mike's blog is: "It's easy to be a good person and to be a positive person when the deck is hitting you in the head. But what happens when the deck is hitting you in the nuts?" Evidently, the deck hit him HARD in the nuts. 9 months after his entrance into the world of professional poker, Mike will likely return to the track world. Bad beat. mikecunningham.blogspot.com Here's another blog tracking a man's quest to go pro and play full-time. http://stockfield.wordpress.com/

People talk about their problems, here's mine

I've got under 187 in Sac-Sas tonite. Game is on ESPN. Hate watching NBA on ESPN, brutal telecasts in every way. Can't explain why, just something stuffy, too organized, overproduced. Game is 5 under the number with 40 seconds to go. ESPN cuts to bonus coverage of GSW-NOK, GSW down 2. I pay over $100 a month for cable, I pay for League Pass, and I'm sitting with an outdated computer waiting for the scores to update. On ESPN.com. Fuck ESPN. Thanks to both teams for making me a cookie.

MLK, Heuristics, 'Zona and the NBA Draft

On the anniverserey of Martin Luther King's death, we take a quick look at a simple system of drafting college players coming out of the University of Arizona. This connection may seem like a stretch, or a leap but I don't really care. While King and the Civil Rights Movement forced the nation to self-examine and re-examine our views on race, Arizona, the last state to acknowledge King's Birthday as a holiday, is home to a basketball program that allows us not to think when drafting ball players. Malcolm Gladwell is the author of Tipping Point, his most recent book, Blink, examines decision-making that is a result of one's immediate thought without examination. Gladwell cites research by psychologist Dan Goldstein to support his thesis that there are times when decisions made upon reflection is actually worse than an instinctual decision. Interestingly, Gladwell sat down with Bill Simons and proposed his theory that he could do a better job as GM than Isiah Thomas simply by picking top players who came from Duke and UCONN. I think most people could do better than Thomas, and I am sure Farfel will agree. What is unique though is the recognition that there may be some value in picking players from top programs rather than substituting one's own judgement of talent. While Gladwell looks upon Duke and UCONN as the top college programs, the University of Arizona is actually the program to watch. I once was very negative on Lute Olsen, probably because he screwed up my bracket a couple of times in the early 1990's. Lateley, he has done much better in the tourney and his players have significantly outperformed in the NBA. Looking at the NBA draft from 1985- 2004 and it is clear that U of A players should be picked sooner rather than later. One does need to do a whole lot of fancy statistical analysis here, basically, it is clear that more often than not the Arizona player is the better choice than the one immediately prior. Arizona Draftees: First Round Picks: Channing Frye, Andre Igoudala, Richard Jefferson, Jason Terry, Michael Dickerson, Damon Stoudamire, Khalid Reeves, Chris Mills, Bison Dele, Sean Elliot, Anthony Cook. Second Rounders of note: Salim Stoudamire, Luke Walton, Gilbert Arenas, Tom Tolbert, Steve Kerr.

Very Trendy

There are some more opportunities to lose money on the hardwood tonight. Hawks +11.5 at Nets (186) The Hawks are 11-5 ATS, 6-10 OU and 4-12 SU when getting more than 9.5 points. This includes 5 straight ATS and 9 of 10 ATS. Since they have won 1/4 of these games straight up, the +665 moneyline looks good... even though the Nets have won 12 in a row and can't possibly lose- that's when they do lose, right? The Hawks under is helped by a strong trend that continues with teams playing each other for the second time in a short period. The OU is 21-43 when two teams are playing each other for the second time in 7 or less days! The Nets are 29-43 OU this season though only 16-19 OU at home. Rockets +5 at Sonics (202) The Rockets/Sonics game also meets this condition. While one had to be crazy at one point to take the under in a Sonics home game, that is no longer the case. With the Rockets in town, 202 is a fairly high number. Celtics -2 at Raptors (209) The Raptors are 14-7-2 ATS at home since New Year's... and I don't remember when Boston became such a good team- Take the Raptors and 2 points. Kings +6.5 at Mavericks (192) The Kings are 10-15 OU on the road since January 1st. During that time, the Mavs are 6-16 OU at home, 20-2 SU and 13-9 ATS. So the Mavericks win at home but don't necessarily cover. OU's in the range of 192 (Not sure how people figure out what range to use, but I am using 187-197) are 1-7 OU for the Mavs at home during this period. I'm taking the Kings and the under. Pacers +3.5 at Bulls (185) The Pacers are 12-23-1 OU on the road while the Bulls are 20-16 OU and 15-21 ATS at home. The Bulls win and go over at home when they hit 3-pointers. Indiana however, is 3rd best in the league in 3-point defense both on the road and overall, allowing 4.3 3-pointers per game. The Bulls average 6.8 made 3-pointers at home. It is hard to take the Bulls and give points to anybody but they seem to do ok as favorites. When the Bulls make 4 or fewer three's they are 6-12 ATS and 5-13 OU, 2-7 ATS and 3-6 OU at home. The Bulls are 16-8 OU when they make 6 or more 3-pointers. I'll take the under here. Knicks +11.5 at Wizards (215) Another nice little trend is home teams on two days rest versus opponents on one days rest. This season, the home team is 55-35-4 ATS (37-11-3 since New Year's) and 56-38 OU. The Wiz should blow out this team though I'll pass on the total. -I expect some harsh words from Farfel on these picks.

One Shining Moment...

Looking over the recent history of NCAA final games, a couple of things stood out. Indiana was just 2-7 from the FT line against Maryland who shot 22-28 from the line. Kansas shot 13-30 from the line in its three point loss to Syracuse a couple of years ago. That Kansas team had Collison, Hinrich, Graves, Miles and Langford. Let's see if Florida's clutch FT shooting is a factor here tonight. I have no idea who is going to win this game but it should be a dandy. I was wrong with thinking there was value in the over last game so I am changing my tune and taking the under (129).