I get Stathead daily emails from Sports-Reference, and something has been puzzling me about the NBA this season, and I'm wondering if you have the time to make a post to explain this to me (and anyone else who might be interested).
Chet Holmgren is having the strongest season of any rookie this year. (8.2 Win Shares - leads all rookies, Derek Lively is second with 4.6!) He's ALSO leading all rookies at 3.2 VORP. That, again , makes sense to me. Usually, ranking highly in one of those statistics means ranking highly in another.
But there's a puzzle. Because the second-leading VORP among rookies belongs to Victor Wembanyama, at 3.0 VORP. Now, when I look at that number, and I see how much Wemby has played this season (63 games, 29 minutes per game; compares favorably to Holmgren's 70 games and 30.1 minutes per), I'm left to wonder: what on earth is that Win Shares is or isn't capturing in Wemby's performance that has him at a relatively miserable 2.8 Win Shares? His Box Plus-Minus (4.4) is actually better than Holmgren's (4.0), and while he hasn't played AS many minutes, it's not like he's sitting out half the games. So what gives?
Any chance you are publishing a 2024 march madness forecast? I relied on the 538 bracket forecast for over a decade. My 538-based brackets were usually in the top 85th+ percentile nationally, and I won several local contests.
Neil:
I get Stathead daily emails from Sports-Reference, and something has been puzzling me about the NBA this season, and I'm wondering if you have the time to make a post to explain this to me (and anyone else who might be interested).
Chet Holmgren is having the strongest season of any rookie this year. (8.2 Win Shares - leads all rookies, Derek Lively is second with 4.6!) He's ALSO leading all rookies at 3.2 VORP. That, again , makes sense to me. Usually, ranking highly in one of those statistics means ranking highly in another.
But there's a puzzle. Because the second-leading VORP among rookies belongs to Victor Wembanyama, at 3.0 VORP. Now, when I look at that number, and I see how much Wemby has played this season (63 games, 29 minutes per game; compares favorably to Holmgren's 70 games and 30.1 minutes per), I'm left to wonder: what on earth is that Win Shares is or isn't capturing in Wemby's performance that has him at a relatively miserable 2.8 Win Shares? His Box Plus-Minus (4.4) is actually better than Holmgren's (4.0), and while he hasn't played AS many minutes, it's not like he's sitting out half the games. So what gives?
Any chance you are publishing a 2024 march madness forecast? I relied on the 538 bracket forecast for over a decade. My 538-based brackets were usually in the top 85th+ percentile nationally, and I won several local contests.