Okay, some responses.

Sam: We have not been able to find a link between shot attempts and shooting efficiency. So I remain unconvinced that a player generally shoots worse as he shoots more. But even if that was true, how much more effective does this make Martin? Players like Lee, Okafor, DWilliams, and Barnes improved tremendously. Not sure we can look at Martin in such a way to close that gap.

About the minutes and production link that Jed also noted… I have found that minutes and production are positively linked. As a player plays more, his per-minute numbers go up. There is a causation issue here. It could be the player gets to play more when he is perceived to be better by the coach. So the direction of the relationship is unclear to me. I would add that the impact is not very large. It is not the case that changing minutes has a huge impact on over-all performance.

I will note that Mikki Moore has played semi-regular minutes before in his career, and his past numbers do not suggest he played much better for the Nets last season. In fact, back in 2000-01 he played 1,154 minutes in 81 games for the Pistons and posted a 0.087 WP48. So relative to his 2000-01 campaign, he was not as good last year. I should add that in 2004-05 he played 1,178 minutes for the Clippers and posted a 0.001 WP48. So relative to that season he was better for the Nets. Regardless, I still would argue that relative to his career, he was not much better for the Nets last season and it seems hard to argue that a player who was only worth a 10-day contract three years ago is now worth $18 million.

howlingfantods: Neat comment. I did not remember about Zach Randolph winning the award in the past.

Jason: Great comment as always. Not sure how to incorporate a propensity to foul out in the analysis. In a sense it is there, since if you foul out your productivity goes to zero.

Dave probably has better data on this.

One anecdotal comment: it does seem appropriate to credit Biedrins as being greatly improved even if most of his increased productivity is a matter of playing time. His playing time in previous seasons was limited largely by his inability to stay out of foul trouble. Being able to stay on the court was something he needed to improve and did. It doesn’t show up in wp48 as much as it does in total wins but in a real game, the penalty for the 6th foul is greater than the penalty for any of the previous 5. WP does not make this distinction. For most players it may not be an issue. For Andris, it certainly was.

A minor question regarding your playing time hypothesis. I’d be curious to see if there’s any evidence that we can treat production per unit time as a linear function. That is, if I double player X’s playing time from 15 min/game to 30 min/game, should I expect to see all of his stats (scoring, rebounding, etc.) about double?

It seems to me that we can’t make this assumption, at least for relatively large increases (in absolute terms) . Although I’m no expert, it seems like it’s quite a different matter to sustain a given level of play for 40 minutes versus 10 or 20, especially night in and night out. Players get tired or injured, defenses lock down, etc. and surely this must have some kind of effect on production.

If this is true, then perhaps it might really be worth it to pay a premium for the guy who can produce at level T for 40 minutes. Of course, this wouldn’t explain why a guy like Mikki Moore gets the MLE, since according to your metric he’s below average for all playing times, but maybe it makes front offices look slightly less irrational.

Anyhow, looking forward to your reply, and love the site.