After 36 games, Philadelphia’s mark is only 11-25. Apparently, such a record had made Ed Stefanski – president of the Philadelphia 76ers – unhappy. And furthermore, he thinks every0ne – including Eddie Jordan (the team’s head coach) – is to blame.
There is a tendency in sports to credit everyone with a team’s success, and blame everyone when the team fails. But statistics – which can separate a player from his teammates (and perhaps, separate a coach from his players)—give us the ability to assign credit and blame. And therefore, it’s possible to offer some thoughts on who in Philadelphia should really be unhappy.
The Same Story in Philadelphia
Let’s start with Table One, which reports the Wins Produced for the Sixers thus far this season.
Table One: The Philadelphia 76ers after 36 games in 2009-10
Table One indicates that the Andre Iguodala and Samuel Dalembert are on pace to produce 23.8 wins. The rest of the roster, though, is only projected to offer 7.3 Wins Produced this season.
For those familiar with the Wins Produced history of the Sixers, this is a very familiar story. We have seen the following since 2006-07:
- 2006-07: Iguodala, Dalembert, and Andre Miller produced 27.9 of the team’s 35 wins.
- 2007-08: Iguodala, Dalembert, and Miller produce 30.4 of the team’s 40 wins.
- 2008-09: Iguodala, Dalembert, and Miller produce 30.1 of the team’s 41 wins.
As noted in September, such numbers indicate that across the past three years, all players in Philadelphia not named Iguodala, Dalembert, or Miller have produced less than nine wins per season. In sum, what we have seen the past three seasons is happening again in 2009-10.
Assigning Blame
Last May the Sixers hired Eddie Jordan. Stefanski said the following when Jordan was hired: “I saw firsthand the immense impact Eddie Jordan had in helping the Nets reach two NBA Finals and as the head coach in Washington he consistently put his teams in a position to win on a nightly basis. He embodies all the qualities I was looking for in the next head coach of the Sixers and we are very excited to have him in Philadelphia.”
So last May, Stefanski was “very excited” to have Eddie Jordan as his coach. However, if we read a bit further past the point in the ESPN.com article where Stefanski is “very excited”, we see that it was not clear last May that Andre Miller was going to depart Philadelphia. And as we now know, Miller was not retained. Last season Miller produced 11.1 wins for the Sixers. As noted, the trio of Iguodala, Dalembert, and Miller have produced most of this team’s wins across the past three seasons. With just Iguodala and Dalembert remaining, the Sixers needed to find someone else to produce wins.
On an NBA team, it’s often a person like Stefanski who is charged with the task of finding “someone else to produce wins.” In an effort to replace Miller, Stefanski drafted Jrue Holiday (as noted in the past, the Sixers could have had Ty Lawson). Holiday’s production – as Table One indicates — is currently in the negative range (and Lawson is very much in the positive range). The team also added Allen Iverson, who is currently posting a 0.063 WP48 [Wins Produced per 48 minutes]. Fortunately, Louis Williams has been above average (average WP48 is 0.100). But even with Williams producing more, Miller’s 11.1 wins from 2008-09 are not fully replaced.
The Sixers actually had to do more than just replace Miller’s production. For the Sixers to improve on last season – which seemed to be the idea when the team changed coaches — more wins were going to have to be found. But the only players the Sixers added to last year’s roster (who are actually playing) were Rodney Carney, Jason Kapono, Jason Smith, Holiday, and Iverson. These five players were not above average performers last season (Smith was below average two years ago) and this year they are combining to produce -3.4 wins.
Such numbers suggest that the coach is not to blame. The players the Sixers are employing are – with few exceptions – playing as well as they did in the past. In fact, Table One indicates that the Sixers are exceeding (by a small margin) what we should expect given past performance. This suggests that for those wishing to assign blame the focus has to be on the person who picked the players. And again, that person would be Ed Stefanski.
Now in Stefanski’s defense, Andre Miller is now 33 years old. So Miller had to be replaced sooner or later. Furthermore, it’s not clear that Stefanski should have known that Elton Brand – the player leading the team in salary paid — was not going to return to the form we saw before he got hurt with the Clippers. In other words, had Miller stayed and been productive and Brand returned to form, the Sixers would currently be in the thick of the Eastern Conference playoff picture (not that this would be a great achievement). But Miller didn’t stay and Brand is simply not the Brand we saw in Los Angeles and Chicago. Consequently, the Sixers are simply not that good.
So what do the Sixers need to be good? Obviously they need more productive players. Yes, a coach can alter the productivity of players. But in general, that doesn’t happen. Therefore decision-makers – like Stefanski – should primarily focus on giving the coach a better roster. This means drafting better, or in other words, don’t choose players like Holiday over players like Lawson. It also helps to sign better free agents, or in other words, don’t sign players like Iverson, Kapono, and Carney.
Until different roster decisions are made, though, Stefanski will probably continue to be unhappy. And since human nature often leads us to blame others for our problems, the unhappiness of Stefanski will probably lead to more unhappiness for Jordan, the players on the Sixers, and yes, fans of this team.
– 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.
Wages of Wins Journal 
Anon
January 11, 2010
It seems to me that signing marginally productive players such as iverson for the league minimum is still a good decision. sure maybe he’s not above average, but for the money he gives good value. now maybe iverson is a bad example because he cries if he isn’t playing 45 minutes a game, but as a more general point i think that an exponentially bigger problem is spending 20% of your cap on someone who missed over a year to injury and is getting old (brand).
having below average players isn’t necessarily bad unless you’re paying them too much.
anyways nice post.
Anon
January 11, 2010
of course obviously you want to sign players who have SOME value, and not the jason kapono’s of the world…
kevin
January 11, 2010
Well, I think bringing back Iverson was just absurd. He’s a lousy player who’s only going to get worse, will provide negative leadership, is not in the team’s plans beyond this year and is a whining crybaby and an attention hog to boot.
It’s better to just admit you suck and tell the fans you’re rebuilding than to try to bamboozle them by bringing in players like Iverson.
FanFeedr
January 11, 2010
Dr. Berri,
The net outcome of this is not only that Stefanski is responsible for Miller’s departure and not replacing him with some who would be as effective, but that the future of the Sixers *this season* is bleak, as their options for improving their roster efficiency are slim.
They don’t have assets that would land them a productive player, and Jrue Holliday isn’t a fully realized player.
The one option that they appear to have is starting Marresse Speights and/or giving him 35m a night, to at least make their games respectable.
TBall
January 11, 2010
Of course, if you only seek respectability, you will only attain respectability.
If the Sixers want to achieve, if they want to contend, they need to find a way to move the parts of their roster that will not be on the team when it starts contending for parts that could be on the team when it starts contending. That means moving a player like Dalembert, maybe to a size deficient team in the West (like Houston) that has to get past Bynum/Gasol, to either lower the future cap number or pick up young, promising talent.
Leon
January 11, 2010
If you keep drafting below average talent whilst there are still above average players waiting to be picked then you’ll be doing bad. Iguodala is the last time they nailed it, long while ago.
Joe
January 11, 2010
The truth hurts sometimes.
A coach rarely impacts WP48, but rotations sure can…
Jordan continually playing Thaddeus Young at the 4 at the cost of minutes for Dalembert, Brand, and Speights is killing the team.
John
January 11, 2010
Leon
You can’t determine what Speights and definitely Holiday (since any half arsed sixers fan knows yo’re referring to Holiday versus lawson) after less than 2 seasons.
Holiday has played very well when he gets minutes, it’s not his fault the coach doesn’t care about defense.
Italian Stallion
January 11, 2010
I don’t think anyone expected Jrue Holdiday to make an impact this year. In fact, I bet if before the draft you asked every GM which player they thought would be more productive this year, most would have picked Lawson. I think Holiday is looked at as having greater long term potential.
One might say they sacrificed wins this year for more wins in the future.
Whether Holiday eventually becomes the better player in another matter, but that was and still is the thinking.
That’s also why they allowed Miller to walk.
IMO, the Sixers already understand that when they screwed up with Brand, they had to start over. That process has now begun. Bringing in Iverson was a cheap way to create some short term excitement in Philly and perhaps add a couple of wins while that process is going on.
Johnny Y.
January 11, 2010
EJ’s biggest failure is failing to integrate Brand effectively in the rotation. He seems scared to play Brand next to Dalembert for reasons unknown.
76er’s already are a below average rebounding team, it doesnt make sense to play small ball when they are also a terrible 3 point shooting team.
Young and speights are terribly overrated; Young especially should not be starting at the 4 ahead of Brand.
todd2
January 12, 2010
Brand’s situation is unfortunate but may be telling. He isn’t tall (6’9″ is probably an exaggeration) or fast and the strength and stamina that carried him through his career may be fading due to age/injuries. Philly still owes him a lot of time and money. It’ll be interesting to see how DeJuan Blair’s career develops. They seem to be cut from the same cloth.
simon
January 12, 2010
However Brand does have something like 9′ 2″ standing reach that puts him on par with many centers in the league. So I’m not so sure if the height means much. The biggest thing for any of these big men will be whether they get injured or not.
Brandon
January 12, 2010
Itallian Stallian/John
The key word there is “potential”. Why does everyone feel the need to say that a player has potential. Do scouts ever just flat out watch college basketball anymore? If they did they would clearly see that Ty Lawson is a better basketball player than Jrue Holiday. It’s not rocket science here. He was better than him in every aspect of the game except height. That’s all the potential I need.
John
January 12, 2010
Brandon
yes scouts watch games, but there’s more than just watching games, and if you think a 19 year old kid playing out of position can be compared to a 4 year senior surrounded by a lot more talent, then there’s no point in continuing to discuss the issue with you because you don’t get the premise
John
January 12, 2010
That’s also why they allowed Miller to walk.
They let Miller walk because to sign him for more than one season would have meant massive luxury tax payments…the sixers moves are more about the luxury tax than on the court issues, and be prepared for it to get a LOT worse as the sixers have about 64 million committed next year and the cap is going down…not up…
todd2
January 12, 2010
Defending the post has more to do with leverage and stamina that it does reach.
Italian Stallion
January 12, 2010
Brandon,
The value of anything is not a function of the present. It’s a function of the present plus the future.
I am sure the thinking and evaluation process was much more complex than this, but here’s a very basic model.
Ty Lawson is 22 and Jrue Holiday is 19.
Players typically improve from the age of 19 through 22 (and continue improving for a few years thereafter).
What these teams are doing is projecting that Holiday will be better at 22 than Lawson is now. Then they will have that better player for many years thereafter. So they sacrifice some wins in the short term for a greater total number of wins over the long haul.
You can argue that the teams have underrated Lawson’s probable short term contribution or overrated Holiday’s potential long term contribution, but I don’t think you can argue with the thinking. They are using a fundamental valuation process.
It wasn’t long ago that people were arguing that Durant wasn’t a very good player.
How does that thinking look right now?
He may be on the verge of becoming super elite player on BOTH ends of the court!
Of course the trick with any investment is to be sure you have good insights into the future so you can value whatever it is properly.
In most cases the future is not perfectly clear. It’s kind of fuzzy and within some probable range. So you have to give yourself a margin of safety before you speculate about the future.
A bird in the hand is clearly worth more than a bird in the bush.
A bird in hand may be worth more than two in the bush, but I’m starting to think about it.
If there are 5 birds in the bush and I have a huge net, screw the bird in hand. I’m taking a shot. ;)
Italian Stallion
January 12, 2010
John,
IMO, once you say to yourself I am not willing to pay player “X” his fair market value (even if it’s because of the luxury tax) despite the fact that he’s one of my key players, you are in the rebuilding process.
If they didn’t screw up badly by wildly overpaying for Brand, Miller would probably still be on the team and the Sixers would be in a different position as far as trying to improve the team goes.
To me, from here, it looks like a reset to zero, with the eventual dumping of Brand as a longer term goal would be the best possible course of action. I think they understand that.
They need to do what the Knicks are doing now.
They need to slowly get rid of the bad contracts, draft and develop players that will be peaking in 3-5 years, and screw around with some veterans on short term contracts to try to keep the team tolerable to watch.
Brandon
January 13, 2010
John/Itallian Stallion:
I understand the reasoning of a 22 year old Holiday could be better than a 22 year old Lawson. I just don’t agree will that thinking at all. Lawson was better as a freshman than Holiday was as a freshman (higher WP48). Yes, Lawson was on a better team than Holiday but UCLA didn’t face half the competition that UNC had to. I’m also not buying the fact that he was played out of position. In college, because the ability is so much lower than the pros, the cream rises to the top on the floor, no matter the position. There are no excuses, Holiday had a very dismal year as a freshman and to me there was no indication that he could be a productive NBA player, let alone better than Lawson someday. Does every 19 year old college player have high potential then? My little brother is 14 maybe he has even more potential to be a better player than Lawson.
Lawson improved every year in college finishing his senior (or junior I forget) year in dominating fashion lead and lead his team to the national championship with an outstanding college WP48 with no indication that he won’t stop improving. What else does he have to do? Why take a risk on a complete question mark when a proven commodity is right there? It just doesn’t make sense to me.
I also find the Durant argument invalid as Durant was great in college while Holiday was quite bad.
Italian Stallion
January 13, 2010
Brandon,
What you are arguing is that the projections that the Sixers made for Holiday were faulty.
Could be.
That’s the kind of question that won’t be answered for another few years.
I think what you have to understand is that not only are teams looking at the box score, they are looking at the probabilities of a player improving based on size, measured athletic talent, work ethic, intelligence, personality, and God knows how many other factors for which data exists.
todd2
January 14, 2010
Stallion brings up a great point. How does a team know when to hit reset?