It’s not unusual to feel bombarded with information -- numbers and letters filling your mind as you stress about jobs, your family, bills, and paydays. Sometimes this information can prove to be too much, and it’s best to sit back and let things take care of themselves. Emptying your mind can be a beneficial practice as you learn to focus your intention on things that matter the most.
I, myself, feel this way at times. But other times I feel comfortable in the influx and outflux of information via both numbers and letters. In my solitude, I have discovered another factor that may change the way basketball is played forever.
Previously, I recounted a way in which I can determine a player’s exact ranking within a specific league so long as advanced statistics are available to quantify his absolute contribution to an individual game, team, season, or career.
My determination still lacks in its completeness because of the fact that “tweeners” exist to throw off the value of scoring the ball. These anomalies excel at multiple facets of the game without dominating a single statistic. And more often than not, these players prove to be defensive nightmares because of their versatility and size.
I had already thought a bit about the idea of doing away with all positions, but the result would be utter chaos as coaches are left with approximations for a player’s comfortability on the floor (i.e. we would be back in the 1950s when the only names for positions were Guard, Forward, and Center).
My goal isn’t to abolish these three titles entirely; rather, my goal is to make them much more specific and precise.
At some local schools, I’ve noticed that there are usually numbers painted on the blacktop where students are assigned to sit. Never once did I consider that these could be foretelling...until today.
These numbers will usually run from one to fifty, spaced out evenly and covering almost the entirety of one half of a court. If we stretch the individual “boxes” created by these numbers, we are left with a visual diagram of one half of a basketball court.
Therefore, we can assign a numerical value to every space on the court, offensively or defensively, and we can determine which box (or boxes) a player operates best within.
As an example, let’s look at Michael Jordan, the greatest player to ever play basketball. Opponents feared him, and he hated to lose so much that he never allowed his team to face elimination in the NBA Finals. Moreover, his number 23 will prove to be a lynchpin in my new design.
The simplest basketball shot possible in a game is not actually a lay-up, despite popular belief. Lay-ups can be defended, and players are typically moving when they shoot them -- leading to a distortion of the player’s center of gravity.
The easiest shot, instead, must be a free throw.
Now guess where the best basketball player in the world would prefer to take a single shot that could determine a victory?
Once again, it is a free throw.
Since they cannot be defended, and a player has substantial time to prepare himself for this shot, free throws are the ideal shot for any player -- not just Michael Jordan.
His number of 23 plays a factor, because if you create and number fifty boxes on a basketball court (with each box measuring a rectangle with width of three feet and length of five feet), then the 23rd box is located directly at the foul line.
Whether or not it is by coincidence that Jordan wore number 23, we’ll never know. But for certainty, we know that values can exist for every shot on the court.
And instead of designating “hot” or “cold” spots like ESPN.com, we can assign a value to every shot or possession for when a player is on the floor.
In order to make this method fair for both sides of the floor, you can also use the numbers to determine where a player operates best on defense as well. Relative player size and strength will still be important, but the numerical values will make it easier to decide which player belongs in each spot of a zone defense or when to switch in man defense.
So with respect to both offense and defense, it is possible now to estimate and average a player’s “footprint” on the floor, and we can also determine in which spot he feels the most comfortable either shooting, passing, rebounding, or defending.
Thus far, the only available technology that could realistically represent this data is whatever program sites like ESPN.com use in their play-by-play game applications. But I have a strong feeling that they won’t be prepared to adjust their terminology as readily as I am.
Guards, forwards, and centers are a thing of the past. I would prefer to recognize players by their strengths as either a scorer, shooter, jumper, passer, rebounder, lockdown defender, ballhawk, shot blocker, or an all-around stud.
In this way, all skills are accounted for, and the most exciting plays in the game will still occur. The only wrinkle is that we should now know what to expect from a player after scouting him in a single game at any level. And we can factor out ridiculous shots like a halfcourt game-winner...even though we do love when these “accidents” happen.
© Austin T. Murphy 2016
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