posted by David Friedman
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JonMVNbasketball Arenas is a better blogger than baller. There, I said it. Sue me!
http://mvn.com/nba-76ers/2007/12/13/arenas-is-a-better-blogger-than-baller-calls-out-iguodala/
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tziller No, no he's not.-
Doctor Dribbles This is about the most predictable backlash in the L--and maybe the easiest story for a blogger to write today. That doesn't make it right.-
David Friedman How is this "backlash"? When did Arenas' alleged MVP status become such a sacred cow that it cannot be questioned even when his team goes 9-5 without him? Do you mean to say that the subject is not even open for discussion? Who decides that? I guess I never got the memo about which stories are predictable and which ones are "backlash."
This post was not some snap reaction to one game.
Did anyone actually read what I wrote or did you all just see the headline and have a heart attack that there is a heretic loose in the Church of Arenas who dared to say that Arenas is not the best player in the NBA? Who knew that saying that would be such a scandal?
By the way, does anyone who thinks that challenging Arenas' alleged MVP status is such heresy want to make a good case that Arenas is actually as good as, in no particular order, Dirk, Nash, Kobe, LeBron, Wade, T-Mac, Yao, Garnett, Dwight Howard, Duncan?
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Doctor Dribbles It's backlash because it was obviously coming as soon as the Wizards kept winning and Arenas kept running his mouth; we talked about it a week ago at Bullets Forever. Gil's an easy target because he puts himself out there with his blog and comments, which everybody loves when you're playing well and can back it up, but makes you Damon Jones when you're on the DL.
And you can write about whatever you want--isn't that the point of a blog?--but that's separate from its predictability. If yours is such a rare perspective, why is there a simultaneous wave of criticism making the same point?
I've read what you wrote--all of it, from your original post to responses here, TYI, and BF; even responded to it--and you're the one creating strawmen. Who legitimately had Arenas for MVP at the end of last season? Please, I'd love to know. However, when the Wizards were at the top of the conference at the all-star break--and Gil's PER was in the top 10 in the L, right beside LeBron and ahead of guys like Kobe and Nash--it was fine to include him in the discussion. That says more about the inanity of picking MVPs of an unfinished season than reflects Gil's status.
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David Friedman I agree about the inanity of picking MVPs of an unfinished season. That was one of the major points of my post. Another point is that since Arenas was anointed, so to speak, he seems to have retained a residue of that status even now--hence the over the top reactions to me raising the possibility that maybe Arenas is not one of the ten best players in the NBA, that he is only 15th or 20th.
I don't know about a "wave" of criticism of Arenas; you make it sound like there is some cabal conspiring against Arenas. I've written about Arenas periodically for quite some time and I've had the same take as I mentioned in this post: he's an All-Star but not an MVP level player. For whatever reason, this post attracted more attention. I guess Wizards' fans feel very sensitive that their team's success may be construed to reflect badly on their favorite player; it's almost like they don't want the team to do too well while Arenas is out. Strange.
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David Friedman Dwyer is using a strawman with the Ewing/Bledsoe point. Arenas is in his prime, not an aging vet. As for his point about assists, assists are not necessarily the best measure of ball movement: one, the statistic is subject to the whim of individual scorekeepers and two, on a play where there are five passes before a player catches the ball, takes two dribbles and shoots an assist would not properly be awarded but there certainly was ball movement. Anyone who thinks that the Wizards don't have significantly better ball movement without Arenas playing simply does not know what he is talking about.
Why exactly should one All-Star out of three on a perenially mediocre team be considered an MVP candidate?
Arenas is the 15th or 20th best player in the NBA, not one of the top five.
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Pradamaster Ball movement is nice and well, but the Wizards' offense isn't better than it was last year.
Their offensive efficiency was 111.1 last year, good for fifth in the league. This year, it's 109.4, good for ninth in the league. There's a somewhat legimitate argument that Gilbert held the ball for too long at times last year, and that made the offense predictable, but on the whole, as great as this additional ball movement looks, it's not making the offense better.
The improvement has come on the other end. Last year, the Wizards' defensive efficiency was 112.5. This year, it's 109.4. Now, one could argue that's also because of Arenas, but they'd be grasping at straws there. A closer look shows that the Wizards' major improvement has actually been on the defensive glass. Last year, they allowed opponents to grab 29% of their missed shots, good for 24th in the league. This year, thanks primairly to improved play by Brendan Haywood, the Wizards are only allowing opponents to grap 24.7% of their missed shots, good for sixth in the league. That is a better indicator of why the Wizards are treading water (and I do say that, because this 9-5 has come against a very easy schedule) without Arenas than pointing to the better ball movement.
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tziller You're not supposed to use numbers, Prada. You supposed to rely on how the Wizards offense looks. Didn't you get the memo?
Great breakdown.
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David Friedman Aren't 9-5 numbers, too?
I have nothing against stat analysis but sometimes we can't see the forest for the trees.
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tziller I agree with your comment completely, only not in the way you think.
Tree: Gil out, Wiz good.
Forest: All the other factors as to why Wiz good.
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David Friedman The listing of other explanations for why the Wizards are doing well now (defense, rebounding, contributions by bench players, etc.) still begs the question of why all of these factors "magically" coalesced right after Arenas left the lineup. If so many factors about this team improved in the offseason then why did the Wizards start so slowly and then all of a sudden improve?
My post raised the general question of how can Arenas be as valuable as he is alleged by some to be if his team can do so well without him for a month. The specific explanations that have been offered here do not refute the validity of that question. For instance, defense and rebounding are both affected by court balance. When Arenas played, he was fond of launching long jumpers early in the shot clock. When he went through a stretch during which a lot of those shots went in he scored a ton of points, the Wizards won some games and a lot of people apparently became convinced that he was the best player in the league. By the end of the season, the team was 39-34 and he was a high scoring player with a less than great shooting percentage. Yes, I understand that when you factor in the three point attempts that his "true" percentage is not that bad but the problem is that Arenas is a point guard, not a shooting guard. He has to get everyone involved and he has to make sure that the court is balanced correctly. Arenas shoots so many threes and long jumpers that it makes it difficult for the team to get back on defense on those nights when he is 1-9 from three point range. Also, as I pointed out last year, a .375 three point shooting point guard can get that percentage by shooting 5-8 one night and 1-8 the next. His team may win the first game but will almost certainly lose the second game. Anyone who understands basketball and watches Arenas play sees a talented player--an All-Star--who is more caught up in his own numbers and in "proving" things to outsiders than he is in playing winning basketball. Not that he doesn't want to win--everyone wants to win--but he does not want to pay the price by employing better shot selection, playing better defense and considering how his conduct/comments may not be good for the team. It is funny that people think that Jordan is coaching better this year--the same Jordan who was widely believed to be the brains behind the Nets' back to back Finals appearances. Maybe Jordan just has a group of guys who are listening better. Last year, Jordan all but pleaded with Arenas to stop with his 50 point guarantees and to focus more on defense. Find some video of the post game press conferences last year with Jordan gritting his teeth when asked about Arenas.
By the way, contrary to what has been suggested in some comments, I never said that the Wizards are better off long term without Arenas . All I said is that they have done well without him for a month and that this alone is reason enough to say that he is not really an MVP-level player. Most All-Stars can "look" like an MVP for a week or two and that is all that happened with Arenas last year.
People can crunch the Wizards' numbers this season however they like and they can convince themselves that Arenas' tsp and assist totals make him an elite player but he's been in Washington for four seasons, he's played with other All-Star level players and his team is consistently mediocre. That is the real "forest."
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David Friedman "the team was 39-34 with him"
Of course, I mean that the team was 39-34 before Arenas' season-ending injury.
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JonMVNbasketball What isn't right Doc is him commenting on other people's contract situations when he has his own situation to worry about. It's obvious that I'm not a big fan of his game or his blog, but at least he won an award for the blog.-
Doctor Dribbles Well, nobody disputes he'll be a better blogger than baller for at least the next three months. And some Gilbert > no Gilbert.
So wait--it's OK for you, me, and an army of writers and bloggers to comment on salary situations (and whatever else), whereas someone who actually lives that life, with an inside perspective, shouldn't say anything? And while you call Gil a "chucker," consider his impact: Three straight Wiz playoff appearances for the first time in decades. Gil also credited your guy Iguodala as a "great, overall player," but not someone to build a franchise around. And based on Iggy's career so far, until he proves he can become a more efficient scorer, how can you disagree?
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JonMVNbasketball Doc,
Perhaps I don't disagree with the points, just how they are being said.
As for Gil's commenting on other contract situations, as a blogger it is fine for us because we are removed from the situation. However, what happens when the blogger BECOMES the source? There are journalistic lines of integrity that are challenged. There's stuff that you can say on the record, but stuff that should be kept off the record.
Frankly, I'm not sure how it all plays out. It does make our job fun though. We get insider information that we wouldn't get otherwise, but the integrity of that information is skewed. In my opinion, that's the problem with Arenas viewpoint on the players who didn't reup this offseason and will be headed for the restricted market this summer. He is looking at it only from his perspective without having all the facts.
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... get enough W's, it's all on that player's talent/production/performance. It's a completely two-faced argument. [image] Is it a secret that the formulas generally adore Gil? Dean Oliver rates Arenas highly. Same for Hollinger and the adjusted plus-minus set. (Berri hates scoring and thus is recused from the matter.) Almost all basketball seamheads consider Arenas an elite efficient scoring genius. So the opposing view from much of the anti-stats crowd -- elucidated so plainly in David Friedman's senseless assault on Gil last year -- is that all those points come at a cost to ...
