The best way to predict the future . . .

[Blaze01]

Lillard is not the 6th best pick in this draft...I just do not believe that at all...I think POR is reaching if they take him there...

 

[42N8Bounce]

Lillard is not the 6th best pick in this draft...I just do not believe that at all...I think POR is reaching if they take him there...

If we don't take Lillard at #6, where do you think he will go?

 

[42N8Bounce]

Wow, this is some great stuff. Thank you for all of your time and effort to put this together, and for posting it on this board.

Not a problem. Putting this program together was quite a learning process on my part. I often hear people compare player A to player B, but wonder what their basis is. Most often its a physical resemblance, with some vague stats resemblance.

One guy I was high on before this process was Kendall Marshall. He ended up at 21 as a low end starter. Not bad. Just meh.

With two second round picks, I would love to see Portland take a guy like Jae Crowder (Big East Player of the Year), Will Barton (Conference USA Player of the year), Quincy Miller (Big 12 Freshman of the year), Henry Sims, or Marcus Denmon. I think they all have "flaws", but they also bring a lot to the table. We'll see...

 

[BlazerCaravan]

If we don't take Lillard at #6, where do you think he will go?

If you as the GM want him, need what he provides, and you don't take him at 6, you better know he'll be available at 11. Only then is he not worth spending your 6 on.

 

[Blazinaway]

If you as the GM want him, need what he provides, and you don't take him at 6, you better know he'll be available at 11. Only then is he not worth spending your 6 on.

I have been slowly movin toward the Lillard bandwagon but I have to ask myself is if one of the reasons he looks so good is that there is simply no other PG is this crappy PG draft who is even close to him? Is he that good? or just the shinniest penny in a dull pond?

 

[julius]

Fuck, way to set the bar high. Now I gotta act like I know what the hell I'm talking about.

 

[Blaze01]

and if he is a bust? Or the next in a long line of 6'2 SG in a PG body? You just wasted a hight lottery pick b\c you reached for a need...

well done....not...

 

[Blaze01]

I have been slowly movin toward the Lillard bandwagon but I have to ask myself is if one of the reasons he looks so good is that there is simply no other PG is this crappy PG draft who is even close to him? Is he that good? or just the shinniest penny in a dull pond?

we have a winner....

 

[RR7]

and if he is a bust? Or the next in a long line of 6'2 SG in a PG body? You just wasted a hight lottery pick b\c you reached for a need...

well done....not...

Or you thought he was BPA. What if someone YOU think is BPA is a bust. Good job. You wasted a lotto pick.

 

[Blazinaway]

we have a winner....

It's interesting and POR is a team whose mgmt and fans are DESPERATE for a good PG after the drought we have had! The one saving grace IMO is tat our new GM does not bring that baggage with him and hopefully will be very objective the the selection process and not be swayed by our "PG baggage"

 

[42N8Bounce]

Fuck, way to set the bar high. Now I gotta act like I know what the hell I'm talking about.

Nah. This game wouldn't be fun without all of the hope and emotions. Nobody really knows what they're talking about. It's just educated guesses. Here are some of the "expert" picks in years past - 2009 #2 Hasheem Thabeet; 2008 #8 Joe Alexander; 2006 #3 Adam Morrison; 2004 #8 Rafael Araújo; 2004 #10 Luke Jackson. And these GMs were suppose to 'know what the hell they were doing.'

 

[42N8Bounce]

and if he is a bust? Or the next in a long line of 6'2 SG in a PG body? You just wasted a hight lottery pick b\c you reached for a need...

well done....not...

I wouldn't draft Lillard at #6 because of need. If Anthony Davis, Bradley Beal, Thomas Robinson, and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist are all off the board, I think Lillard is the BPA. If any of those other individuals are there at #6, I'd go for them.

 

[Boob-No-More]

Not trying to shoot the messenger, but the one thing that jumps out at me is how flat out awful the highest ranked players have collectively performed at the NBA level.

Here's the highest ranked players for each of the eight years presented:

2008 - Michael Beasley
2007 - Greg Oden
2006 - Adam Morrison
2005 - Sean May
2004 - Devin Harris
2003 - Michael Sweetney
2002 - Chris Borchardt
2001 - Shane Battier

These guys are all listed as future all star+ or all star, but of the eight, there is only a single all star game appearance (Devin Harris) and several guys that just flat out sucked (Sweetney, Morrison, Borchardt, etc.). Adam Morrison's ranking of 116.9 is WAY off the charts, nobody else even comes close. But, we all know how well A_am fared in the NBA.

As I study the past results, the only conclusion I can safely draw is that no matter how you slice and dice the numbers, the draft is still a crap shoot. Back to that class of 2006, the top three ranked players are Morrison, Tyrus Thomas and Shelden Williams. I'm not sure what system KP and company was using, but I'm sure glad they used it and not yours.

Anyway, interesting analysis and very nicely presented. I'm not sure if it changes the way I feel about who we should take with our two lottery picks, but it's certainly more food for thought.

BNM

 

[42N8Bounce]

Not trying to shoot the messenger, but the one thing that jumps out at me is how flat out awful the highest ranked players have collectively performed at the NBA level.

Here's the highest ranked players for each of the eight years presented:

2008 - Michael Beasley
2007 - Greg Oden
2006 - Adam Morrison
2005 - Sean May
2004 - Devin Harris
2003 - Michael Sweetney
2002 - Chris Borchardt
2001 - Shane Battier

These guys are all listed as future all star+ or all star, but of the eight, there is only a single all star game appearance (Devin Harris) and several guys that just flat out sucked (Sweetney, Morrison, Borchardt, etc.). Adam Morrison's ranking of 116.9 is WAY off the charts, nobody else even comes close. But, we all know how well A_am fared in the NBA.

As I study the past results, the only conclusion I can safely draw is that no matter how you slice and dice the numbers, the draft is still a crap shoot. Back to that class of 2006, the top three ranked players are Morrison, Tyrus Thomas and Shelden Williams. I'm not sure what system KP and company was using, but I'm sure glad they used it and not yours.

Anyway, interesting analysis and very nicely presented. I'm not sure if it changes the way I feel about who we should take with our two lottery picks, but it's certainly more food for thought.

BNM

Agreed. Those guys stats were off the charts. That's why I think you definitely need to take the 'intangibles' into account. It's easy in hind sight to recognize that they would have been bad picks. The challenge is doing it before the draft. Obviously the GMs have a similar problem, because on average, this program picked more talent overall. Why did the GMs miss Millsap, Rondo, Granger, and David Lee? The challenge is to look at these results, and weed out the 'obvious' future busts. If it were easy, the Blazers would have Chris Paul right now.

 

[KingSpeed]

Welcome!

 

[Blaze01]

If we don't take Lillard at #6, where do you think he will go?

I guess my answer will be, I don't really care? I mean if some other team reaches for him and lets a better player slip to POR at #11, then good....

I am not even convinced that he is the best PG in this draft, I think Teague may end up being the best PG to come out of this draft in a few years time....

But, overall I think this draft is really weak in terms of PG prospects....Which is inflating him, that and POR fans (let's hope not mgmt) desire to find a PG....

 

[DaLincolnJones]

Well put Blaze, reminds me of the time i spent in Alaska, the pretty girl was the one with teeth. I dont like any of the guards as a lottery pick. short, cant shoot, cant pass, cant cereate their own shot, tweener, etc. Lillard underwelms me beyond belief.

 

[blazerboy30]

BdB is my initials. It also stands for Basketball data Base.

You're right. Grading the success of an NBA player is quite subjective. Doing it for over 500 players gets grueling. The basics -
100 = 5 + time All Star
90 = 2+ time all star
80 = all star 1 time
70 = high end starter 15 + points and or long successful career.
60 = average starter 10-15 points a game.
50 = low end starter 10- points a game.
40 = high end backup (started less than half their games played)
30 = average backup
20 = low end backup
10 = barely played in the NBA
0 = played less than a full season in the NBA

I'm curious if you tried combining this with a more easily quantifiable metric from the players' careers. Throwing out a random example, why not use a player's median career PER? Or to get a better idea how they performed at the peak of their career, a player's 2 standard deviation PER?

You could still combine this with your player rankings since PER obviously isn't perfect. This would give you a combination of subjective and quantitative ratings and you can play with the weightings of each to see if your model gets better.

Interesting project. Nice job!

 

[42N8Bounce]

I'm curious if you tried combining this with a more easily quantifiable metric from the players' careers. Throwing out a random example, why not use a player's median career PER? Or to get a better idea how they performed at the peak of their career, a player's 2 standard deviation PER?

You could still combine this with your player rankings since PER obviously isn't perfect. This would give you a combination of subjective and quantitative ratings and you can play with the weightings of each to see if your model gets better.

Interesting project. Nice job!

Very good suggestion. Phase 2!

To be honest, when I started this, I didn't expect it to make it this far. My first challenge was to design a system that could select "similar" players. I learned that sounds easier than it is, looking at just stats. Once I got that down pretty smooth, I then moved into determining how to average out those selected players to get a 'prediction'. Rather than getting too deep into that side, I started with the simple 0-100.

 

[42N8Bounce]

Well put Blaze, reminds me of the time i spent in Alaska, the pretty girl was the one with teeth. I dont like any of the guards as a lottery pick. short, cant shoot, cant pass, cant cereate their own shot, tweener, etc. Lillard underwelms me beyond belief.

There certainly aren't any good classic point guards in this draft. People point to Kendall Marshall, but he has his flaws. Lots of scoring/combo guards. I think Damian Lillard certainly has risk, especially coming from a small school. But I am intrigued on his upside. I'm curious how Dion Waiters game will translate to the NBA. Marcus Denmon from Missouri also had a very successful college career. Each year there seem to be a guard that slips late in the draft that we look back and wonder how we missed him. No matter the position though, I say take the best player available. Although BPA is certainly a subjective measurement.

 

[Further]

Very interesting thread. Thanks.

By the way, you nailed exactly who I want to draft 6th and 11th with Lillard and sulinger.


Any Likely second rounders jump out at you.

 

[Blazinaway]

I thikn we are going after Drummond

 

[42N8Bounce]

Very interesting thread. Thanks.

By the way, you nailed exactly who I want to draft 6th and 11th with Lillard and sulinger.


Any Likely second rounders jump out at you.

I'm really curious about Jae Crowder. He came out as number two on this list, but I think that's an anomaly. He's the Big East player of the year. I guess the knock on him is that he's undersized for a small forward. I think he'd be a worthy risk in the second round.

I would love to see Will Barton around when we pick at #40. That guy really resembles Lamb, physically and stats. I think he's underrated.

Another guy that may be around in the second round that I would be interested in taking a shot at is Marcus Denmon. A good scorer (17.7 ppg) and well rounded (5 rpg, 2.1 apg, 1.5 spg and only 1 fpg & 1.2 tpg) on a very successful Missouri team.

In the second round you're not looking for an all star. Just a solid backup contributor that can fill a role. Each of these guys have flaws, but I think they would be worth the risks.

 

[BrianFromWA]

Tony Wroten, imo, is going to be that PG that 5 years from now people go "how did he last to #25 (or whatever)?" I'd love to get him.

2nd round: O'Quinn, Kim English, Plumlee?

 

[Fez Hammersticks]

Tony Wroten, imo, is going to be that PG that 5 years from now people go "how did he last to #25 (or whatever)?" I'd love to get him.

2nd round: O'Quinn, Kim English, Plumlee?

2nd round I like John Jenkins.

Let Diebler and Jenkins duke it out.

 

[BrianFromWA]

You think he makes it to the 2nd round? Most of the mocks have him going late first. But he is interesting.

 

[tester551]

I found it interesting how similar the stats were this year for Jeremy Lamb and Will Barton. People are talking a lot about Lamb, but not so much about Barton.

Agreed. Barton is my #1 target for the Blazers. I think he will end up being the best SG in the draft.

I am also very high on Crowder. He will be a better player than Wes. He will end up being a solid starter for sure.

 

[Fez Hammersticks]

Agreed. Barton is my #1 target for the Blazers. I think he will end up being the best SG in the draft.

I am also very high on Crowder. He will be a better player than Wes. He will end up being a solid starter for sure.

Uhh...

For what pick?

I haven't looked at his advanced stats yet but WOW is he skinny: 6'6" | 174 lbs.

 

[tester551]

Uhh...

For what pick?

I haven't looked at his advanced stats yet but WOW is he skinny: 6'6" | 174 lbs.

I would target him around #18-20. In THIS draft, I am a proponent of trading down & picking up some vets. I don't see much difference between pick #6 and #25.

Barton is also the same size as Lamb. No one is saying Lamb is too skinny. I think Barton has a strong all-around game - which I think will translate very well.

In the past drafts, I targeted within Portland's range were:
2006: Roy (& stay the hell away from The Stash),
2007: Was really torn between Oden & Durant
2008: I liked Hibbert the best, but we just drafted Oden...
2009: Ty Lawson
2010: Elliot Williams or Pondexter
2011: Faried, Reggie Jackson, or Darius Miller

 

[42N8Bounce]

2nd round I like John Jenkins.

Let Diebler and Jenkins duke it out.

If Jenkins made it to the 40th pick, that would be an excellent pick up for us. This program has him at #12, and compares him to Allan Houston, Wesley Person, and Anthony Peeler. I'm guessing he'll be gone by then.