Now that regular season is over there are many, many stories to be told. For example, I could – and probably should – talk about the Rookie of the Year (Derrick Rose is the best rookie?), the 6th Man of the Year (Jason Terry is the best 6th man?), the Coach of the Year (Mike Brown is the best coach?), or the playoffs. But in the April 27 issue of Sports Illustrated is an interesting article by Phil Taylor about the misfortune of Jamal Crawford. And after reading the story I decided to offer a comment (or two).
Unlucky Crawford
Let me start with some of what Taylor had to say.
Not once in his nine years with the Bulls, Knicks and Warriors have you Higher Powers of Hoops allowed Crawford into a postseason game without a ticket. When Golden State put the finishing touches on its 29-53 record last week, yet another one of his idle springs commenced. “You would think after all this time, I would have gotten at least one chance,” Crawford says. “It’s weird, right?”
It’s more than weird; it borders on historic. Crawford, 29, has played in 597 games without a playoff appearance, the longest current streak and the sixth-longest in league history. At least he’s not close to Tom Van Arsdale’s record 929 games (yet). Crawford thinks he’s just had a run of rotten luck, but you know better. This is the NBA, where 16 of the 30 teams qualify for the postseason — it’s about as hard as getting called for jury duty. Sometimes it seems the six-month regular season exists just to eliminate the Clippers.
…..If you’re going to try to make the case that Crawford is the cause of this, don’t bother. Sure, he launches the occasional ill-advised 25-footer and sometimes plays less than inspired defense, but who in the NBA doesn’t? His résumé clearly shows that his failure to pass through the postseason gates is due to powers beyond his control (and we’re not just talking about Isiah Thomas’s coaching in New York). Crawford averaged 19.7 points for the Warriors this season, and he’s one of only four players in history to score at least 50 in a game for three different teams. The others? Wilt Chamberlain, Bernard King and Moses Malone. The guy can play.
Measuring Crawford
Okay, Jamal Crawford is not Wilt Chamberlain or Moses Malone. And even though King is overrated – as noted HERE and HERE – Crawford isn’t quite Bernard King either. For his career King posted a 0.112 WP48 [Wins Produced per 48 minutes]. Crawford’s best season thus far was in 2005-06 when he posted a 0.109 WP48. This was Crawford’s only above average campaign (average is 0.100), and after this last season his career mark was only 0.047. In sum, Crawford is a below average shooting guard.
Of course one might wonder how this is possible (okay readers of The Wages of Wins might not wonder, but Taylor might). Crawford has averaged 15.2 points per game for his career and managed to average 20.6 points per contest in 2007-08. And since we know player evaluation often begins and end with scoring in the NBA (as it did in this article), Crawford must be a “good” player.
When we look at all the individual stats, though, we can see some problems in Crawford’s game.
Table One: Career of Jamal Crawford
For his career, Crawford is below average with respect to shooting efficiency, rebounds, and steals. And other than taking shots, he really isn’t much different from average with respect to anything else. Once again, though, scoring dominates player evaluation. Therefore one should not be surprised that “unlucky” Crawford has collected more than $40 million in his career (and is scheduled to make more than $10 million in 2010-11).
What-If Crawford
Okay, so the evaluation of Crawford seems to be overly influenced by scoring. And Crawford really hasn’t helped his teams be more successful. But that doesn’t mean Taylor is wrong. It’s possible that Crawford has missed the playoffs because of bad luck.
To check out this story, I went back over Crawford’s career and played a game of what-if. Specifically, what-if Crawford was more productive? How often would he have made the post-season?
To play this game I increased Crawford’s WP48 in each season of his career and then looked at how his team’s Wins Produced would have changed. For example, in 2006-07 Crawford posted a 0.019 WP48 and his team’s (the Knicks) Wins Produced was 33.7. Had Crawford’s WP48 increased to 0.100, his team’s Wins Produced would have risen to 37.2. The 8th seed in the Eastern Conference that season won 40 games, so this improvement would have probably still left Crawford out of the playoffs. But at a WP48 of 0.150, Crawford’s team gets quite close. And at 0.200 or 0.250 it looks like Crawford would have been in the playoffs in 2007.
Table Two: Playing What-If with Jamal Crawford
Table Two repeats this game for each season of Crawford’s career (prior to 2008-09). As one can see, unless Crawford managed to reach the 0.200 mark, his teams probably never make the playoffs. To put this in perspective, Kobe Bryant and Brandon Roy posted WP48 marks of 0.226 and 0.240 respectively this year (who would have guessed Roy was slightly more productive than Kobe in 2008-09?) So Crawford’s productivity would have had to come close to Kobe and Roy for his team to make the playoffs during his career.
When we look at it this way, maybe Crawford – despite all his millions – has suffered from some bad luck. Yes, Crawford is not a very productive player. But he has also not played on very good teams. And unless Crawford morphed into one of the better shooting guards in the game, he simply was not going to make the playoffs given the teams that decided to pay him.
Before we feel all that sorry for Crawford, though, we should remember that he has been paid more than $40 million in his career. And we should also remember, NBA players are not paid much to participate in the playoffs. In other words, the salaries paid to NBA players have already been paid before the post-season begins. So maybe Crawford has really been quite lucky. So far in his career he has never had to play an NBA game for less than his regular salary. And this is more than Kobe or Roy can say (and really, how many people think Kobe and Roy are that close in productivity?).
– DJ
The WoW Journal Comments Policy
Our research on the NBA was summarized HERE.
The Technical Notes at wagesofwins.com provides substantially more information on the published research behind Wins Produced and Win Score
Wins Produced, Win Score, and PAWSmin are also discussed in the following posts:
Simple Models of Player Performance
What Wins Produced Says and What It Does Not Say
Introducing PAWSmin — and a Defense of Box Score Statistics
Finally, A Guide to Evaluating Models contains useful hints on how to interpret and evaluate statistical models.
Anon
April 23, 2009
of course being overpaid limits the amount of money that can be spent on productive players. If an NBA team signed me to a $10 million a year contract, sure I could complain that I’m unlucky that my team isn’t as good, but a bigger issue may be that they’re wasting valuable cap space on a player who doesn’t put much on the table, and don’t have as much to spend on good players.
Lior
April 24, 2009
In a related point, those NBA execs who would hire Mr. Crawford to play significant minutes for their team are likely to hire team-mates based on similar talent evaluation models. It is not surprising that Jamal Crawford and Eddy Curry used to play for the same team while Shane Battier and Carl Landry also play for the same team, but a different one.
Michael
April 24, 2009
Wow, I didn’t realise Brandon Roy was that good! ;-)
simon
April 24, 2009
I was sure you’d write about Kevin Love’s hurt feelings about being placed #6th on the ROY voting, but I guess I’ll see it sooner or later.
It still surprises me though, how many people on the internet forums are saying “Love is good, but Mayo, Westbrook and Gordon are better, this has been a great rookie class,” whoa..
mrparker
April 24, 2009
On one hand every team he has played for sucked. On the other hand no good team would want him. Finding a way to be one of the highest paid at a job that you don’t do well is just par for the course when an ill informed billionaire or billionaire wanna be is signing your checks.
Isaac
April 24, 2009
In general I like your analysis, but what about the effects of playing good defense? If things like FG% and points per shot are so important (and I agree that they are) shouldn’t your analysis of Crawford include the average FG% of the player he guards? Is there an absence of data or is it a methodological decision?
I apologize if this is a question you have answered in the past.
Dustin
April 24, 2009
Isaac,
Defense is only included so much as if the team’s defense is good, each player on that team will get an adjustment.
WoW does not make an attempt to recognize individual defense. Are you suggesting crawford is an above-average defender?
Zarathustra
April 24, 2009
Certainly there have been less productive, higher paid players that have made the playoffs. Marbury, Cardinal, LaFrentz, Allen Houston. They all made more money than Crawford and produced less and they’ve all tasted the playoffs. Hell, Shandon Anderson not only tasted the playoffs– he won a ring! Even John Koncak who’s name became a synonymous with cap-crippling contracts to horrible players managed to play in 53 playoff games.
Taylor is right that making the playoffs is as much about luck as it is about skill. Machiavelli said destiny is one part virtue and one part fortuna. The trick is minimizing the effects of luck and maximizing the effects of one’s skill. It’s easier done in politics than on a basketball court, though, where team composition is almost completely out of players’ hands.
In Crawford’s case, he has been the victim of his fortuna.
Crawford is a mediocre player with a bad contract and even worse luck.
brgulker
April 24, 2009
Sounds a lot like a guy named Allen Iverson, to me.
I guess it’s just bad like a superstar like AI’s never been on a legit championship contender, right?
/sarcasm
Rob O'Malley
April 24, 2009
brgulker I hope you aren’t seriously trying to defend Iverson as productive player.
Him for Chauncey Billups was about a much of an even vacuum as you can get in sports. PG for PG, one player for one player.
Detroit went from being a 59 win team to a 39 win team with one swap and a coaching change. That’s an incredibly significant difference.
But what about swapping him for another pg in Andre Miller? Philly was doomed weren’t they? Oh wait they went on and made the playoffs.
Actually I’m not really sure the point you’re trying to make, but I certainly hope it’s not that one.
Rob O'Malley
April 24, 2009
Im sorry Philly didn’t make the playoffs that year but they did play much better without him. For some reason I thought they managed to make it in.
Michael
April 24, 2009
Still in the 2001 playoffs he was amazing to watch.
I know he was overrated and everything, but as a fan I will never forget those playoff series against VC and then the big three (Cassell, Big Dog and Jesus.) Really was special to watch.
PJ
April 24, 2009
I should perhaps wait for the ROY post, but… there’s something to be said for playing a role with such responsibility as Derrick Rose has this year. Rose played 37 mpg as the starting point guard on a playoff team. Kevin Love, on the other hand, played 25 mpg, often coming off the bench, as a power forward for a team that won 24 games.
I’m not seeing Rose is the reason the Bulls made the playoffs, or that Love is responsible for his team’s crappiness — just that the pressure and the expectations (not to mention the total minutes) for them were wildly different, and I’m willing to give Rose a lot of credit for those factors. Despite Love’s greater per-minute productivity, I don’t think he was the more deserving candidate. You could make a good case for Brook Lopez — but again, I think the role of point guard, especially for a team fighting for (and making) the playoffs counts significantly in Rose’s favor there. I think he was a good choice. (And no, I’m not a Bull fan.)
dwoytek43
April 24, 2009
“and really, how many people think Kobe and Roy are that close in productivity?).”
I do. At this point in their careers, offensively at least, Roy does just as much with lesser usage rates and fga attempts overall. also, has a about a half a turnover less per game than kobe this year. It looks like Kobe took care of the ball a bit better this year than in previous years too.
dwoytek43
April 24, 2009
roy
http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/r/roybr01.html
bryant
http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/b/bryanko01.html
Tom Mandel
April 25, 2009
Alan Iverson — I don’t think Dave ever said he wasn’t a productive player, just that he is wildly overrated.
It’s not hard to understand that — he was the size of a toothpick in a league full of lumber, yet he threw himself around with abandon. Basketball is only partly competition. The other part is entertainment, and AI in his prime was very fun to watch.
liquorcricket
April 25, 2009
Bless you! I read this article and immediately came to this site to see if you had done the analysis of Crawford. He’s not a good player and its not surprising that bad teams that need some flash have been willing to overpay to get his 15-20 points per game. You see this all the time. I’m a Cavs fan, but BL (Before LeBron), this was usually their M.O. Our team is horrible, buy one player who can score and build your PR around that guy, inflating his perceived value.
Nelson James
April 25, 2009
Guys, he already wrote about K-Love on the article about Pzrybilla
https://dberri.wordpress.com/2009/04/12/an-award-for-joel-przybilla/
BTW, figuring out the spelling to Przybilla is about as natural in the English language easy as spelling Szczerbiak (both of which my spell-check tell me is wrong anyways haha).
simon
April 26, 2009
I know dberri has covered Love, but still…6th? Then again, it’s amazing how many people something along the line of “Yeah Love is good, but Westbrook and Gordon are absolute stud. Oh and what an amazing rookie year Mayo had.”
I think people often project the possible(i.e. potential) future productivity on the ROY voting. Which also explain all the Durant fans last season getting angry when dberri suggested Durant’s rookie season wasn’t that great.
Jacob Rosen
April 27, 2009
Jamal Crawford equals the opposite of Robert Horry.
Peter
April 28, 2009
By the way, through four games in his series, while the average point guard puts up a Win Score per 48 of 6.14, Chauncey Billups has tallied 19.67.
Whoa.