Veteran's Day, The Casino Effect & GWS

Today was a weird day. It was a record for attendence on a Monday - I'm sure because it was a holiday for some. And yet despite the fact that it was a record number for a Monday (22), it didn't include 3 of the 4 most frequent players: Jack, Alvin & Erik.

The other thing that was weird was what I'll attribute to the "Casino Effect". Maybe lots of guys went to the opening of the Snoqualmie Casino or something (I didn't), but today was the most ragged, half-assed, lazy, no-defense games I ever saw. The matador defense was the most often used today as guys happily let other guys waltz by them for a lay-up after lay-up. It was really weird how prevelent it was - so I'll just chalk it up to everyone being tired from playing poker and blackjack all weekend and pray it gets better by Wednesday.

Here are the cumulative W/L stats...

Next is a chart with the latest stat, Game Winning Shots. Now stick with me a moment... this is an interesting stats but also a flawed one. For instance, while I keep GWS, I don't keep track of how many someone heaved up and missed before they hit the game winner. Also, you have to win the game to be able to have hit the GWS, so I have to compare the GWS to your games AND your wins. So here is the chart... The first column is your actual Game Winning Shots made. The next is the number of games you've played in where I recorded who hit the GWS (needed for % purposes as so far I have only recorded the GWS in 53 games). Next is the % of games where you hit the GWS (regardless of if you won or lost). Next is the number of times your team won where I recorded the GWS, and finally, the % of times you hit the GWS when your team won.

So, for instance, Sean has hit 2 GWS out of 3 games he has played in where I recorded the GWS. BUT, he only won two of those three games, so he has hit the GWS in 100% of the games his team won and 67% of all games he has played. If you go down and look at Tony, he has only hit the GWS 3 times in 17 games (18%) BUT, only 5 of those 17 were wins, so he hit the GWS in 3 of his 5 wins (60%). There you go, have fun reading it...

Underdogs - supplemental

Since I keep everyone's winning %, you could argue that as they become more accurate over time as a reflection of everyone's skills, you could then add any teams individual winning percentages together and you'd have an idea of how good that team should be. Do that for both teams in a game, and you have a favorite and an underdog. Call it Power Rankings for noon hoops. For this purpose, I only use your winning percentage if you have played more than 20 games, if you have not, I use 50% for you to normalize the percentages of guys who hardly play.

Thus, the highest rated team so far of all 200 games we have played was 255 (the sum of their 4 winning percentages - or an average of almost 64%). That team was Alvin, James, Jason and Sean. There was also a 253 composed of BK, James, Pride and Steve. For clarity, 200% would be exactly average (4 guys with 50% winning percentages).

I won't rat out the lowest rated team, but I compared all the spreads in ratings for all games and came up with the theoretical biggest upsets.

At 30-6, James has an 83% winning percentage, so while he wins almost always, as you can imgaine, when he loses it's usually an upset, he's been on the losing end of 2 of the 3 biggest % differential upsets ever.

In one game, James, Joey, Steve and Sean had an 82% team rating better (242% to 160% sum for each team) than Erik, Rob (big), Rob (pony tail) and Erik and they lost.

In another game, the favorites Jack, James, Luke and Pride lost to Alvin, Bob, Erik and Kurt despite their rating of 57% points higher as a team (247%-190%).

Lastly, Erik, Jon, Keith and Rob (pony tail) beat Alvin, Marvena, Nate and Steve despite being out Power Rated 231% to 172%.

In all, favorites of at least 40 percentage points have a record of 41-9.

How's that for some crap you didn't need to know?

Typical Friday, 17 players

17 players today. Had 16 for a while which locked us in to playing the same matchups 3 times in a row. I'm going to see Tony scooping in a lay-up in my nightmares.

Here are the stats for today. Clearly James benefitted from having me on his team (Ha!)



These are the cumulatives for just the guys with 20 games played - sorted by winning %. James is still far in the lead... You can begin to see some names heading where they belong. There are now exactly 200 games in my database. I've been in 119 of them.

Alvin hasn't come recently, so he's dropped a little bit down the list of how often guys come. Here is the count of how many times each person has come to hoops...

Finally, the tandems. These are the two person tandems and their records regardless of who else they played with. Only tandems with 10 games played together are on this list. Considering there have been 63 different players so far, the combinations are legion. So far 490 different two player tandems have played together.

Wed the 5th - A visitor

So my friend Kevin from Long Beach, CA was here today. Hadn't picked up a ball in 10 years. Nice boards by him though we got beat a lot today. That's not very nice treatment for a far away visitor. Because of his visit, my posting is late and short.

I missed one or two games from Wednesday's action but there were 14 games in all recorded. Joey, Steve and James all went 5-1. Here are the cumulative win - loss records...

TK came back off injured reserve and then promptly defected to the Chinese National team. See him in a couple of weeks.

On the bright side, my wife said my ankle no longer looks like an eggplant, now it looks like a fish.

It's Fri morning and time to get ready for hoops. Sweet.

Decent turn out for a Monday & a quasi-disputed game

Wound up with 19 guys today which is the most yet for a Monday. There were 15 games in all. While Jason topped today's W/L, it was a good day to be named Zach. I also understand there was a disputed game outcome. I didn't see it, but from what I found out, the game ended at 21 with a disagreement over whether the ball was live/everyone was playing. The solution was to go to 31 and the other team won (not the team that got to 21 first). I appreciate the creative solution, however I'm pretty sure the team that ultimately lost wasn't too happy about it. Here are today's stats...

Nineteen players is the most we have had on a Monday, maybe the wintery weather will bring more guys to the gym. Here are the number of players for each day since I started tracking...

Here are everyone's cumulative W/L. There are now 175 games in the books. Also, I was able to add the last game from last Friday after I left. I had recorded the players but didn't know who won. Today I found out which team won, so that got added to the data also. Here's everyone...

22-0 & Three courts

It was a newsworthy day at hoops. There were three courts going for only the 3rd time I can remember at noon hoops in the past 4 years. Sweet. That did make it a little hard for me to record all the results (despite my mind of steel), so I think I missed two or three games. However, I did get the results on a record 19 games.

In the first game of the day, my team lost 22-0. And it wasn't that close. BK, Pride, James and Ray Ray were on the winning team. There's no reason to drag my teammates names into it, but it was hideous. The bummer was that I lost a lot of money on the game in Vegas, because I had my team and I was getting 21 points.

Pride and James both went 8-1 yesterday and Zach Jr went 4-0. In all, exactly 24 guys showed up - good thing they were all there at the same time so we could get the three courts going.


Here are all the cumulative results...






Here are the ranked results for guys with 20+ games. James winning % probably surprises no one.







Finally, here is the chart of what days guys show up on. There have been 5 of each Mon, Wed and Fri, and now you can see some patterns for guys. This way, if you care, you can know which guys might show/not show on any give day of the week. I put the guys with the biggest differential at the top of the list. For instance, Joey comes almost every Wed and Fri, but not yet once on Monday. On the other hand, Keith loves Mondays, but that's it. Here you go....




By the way, there is now an "Injured Reserve" list in the right column for guys who are hurt. Let me know if you are out for a while and I'll pop you on it.

Quick NBA update

Just watched the first half of the Spurs vs. Suns. Spurs went into full Hack-a-Shaq mode at the end of the first half in a close game. Four straight fouls as soon as he crossed mid-court. Pussies.

By the way, he hit 5 of 8.

10/29 - Two courts again

Eighteen of us showed up today so two courts were in play for a while. This was a little unfortunate as my team got drubbed by the same team on the same court three straight times.
In all, there were 12 games played (no doubt some defense was played in at least 6 or 7).

Here are today's stats... Marvena skunked us all...

Haven't shown the two player tandem stats in a few posts. It's slow going compiling games for tandems as there are so many combinations. Here are the stats for only those players that have teamed up at least 10 times...

Here are everyone's cumulative numbers...

I kept the shooting stats for a games I sat out on today and once again the winning team was absurd.

Shad, Marvena, Kurt and Jack shot 10/15 (2/3 from 3) for their winning 22 points.

The losing team, Matt, TK, Jason & Bob went 3/9, that's right, 9 not a lot of shots in that game for them. They were 0/2 from 3.

My new stat is GWS. That's game winning shots. Every one of us thinks he's the guy that should be taking the GWS, and I don't mean to throw more fuel on the fire, but just for fun I started keeping track. Although I didn't get many of the ones on the other court (Don't worry, I did get all the wins and losses).

Today's GWS that I recorded were Don (twice), Grant, Jason, Bob, TK, Kurt and Erik (Erik made 2,467 three pointers in the last game, so he should have made the last one). Of course, this would be a lot more meaningful if I kept attempts at GWS to see your %, but I'm not that motivated.

Nara.

NBA Opening Night

Nice debut by Greg "Sam Bowie 2.0" Oden. Bummer.

Watched all 3 games last night and amazingly, in the Bulls vs Bucks, the refs called 5 traveling violations in the 1st quarter. Too bad after next week they'll never call traveling again.

How in the world does Tyronn Lue - better known as "Point Guard Smurf" - get any minutes in the league?

Oh, and I overnighted Dwight Gooden a razor.

Monday the 27th - abrupt ending

First, I have to apologize to my hoops buddies for ending today in the middle of the last game by re-tweaking my ankle. That's bogus.

Anyway, only one court today, so only six total games. No one went undefeated and no one had more than 3 wins. Nate and Alvin continued their winning ways. Here is the chart of all the guys who have played at least 20 games sorted by Win %. Nate has played 19, he'll shoot to the top next time he plays.





Here's everyone sorted by alpha...

Here's the list of everyone who has shown (57 different guys) and how often they've come. Out of the 57, an amazing 21 have only come once out of the 13 days. On the other end, 12 guys have shown up at least half the time.

By the way, if you didn't see it, there's an ugly NBA flunkie poll near the top of the right column. Make your choice.

Since more guys have started to get some games under their belt, I have a sheet that sums the winning % for the four guys on each team (guys with less than 20 games played are normalized to 50% for this purpose). So, soon I'll be posting about team favorites and underdogs based on the combined historical winning % on two opposing teams.

Oh yeah, and the gloves came back today. I have the "hands of a thousand cuts" and I'm pretty sure no one would appreciate them cracking and bleeding on the ball. So, it's gloves until they heal again. Bummer. I'm gonna blame them for my shooting today as I lost out shooting 4 for 3 and 4 for 1 and had to sit out.

AnkleStorm

Because of my frakked-up ankle injury, I was only there to record 3 games today, so while they are part of the cumulative stats, I'm not gonna bother to post any of the spreadsheets today.

Hopefully, the ankle will get better soon, right now it looks like a snake that swallowed a watermelon.

On the bright side, for the first time today I tracked shooting percentages in a game that I sat out.

The skins were James, BK, Steve & Pride

vs.

The shirts were Marvena, Matt, Erik & Shad

The skins won 24-13. That's right, 24. I'm happy to call out the score from the sideline if someone asks, but if I'm not in the game and no one asks, I reckon it's not of my damn business.

Anyway, the skins shot a remarkable and I do mean remarkable 11/16 from the field for 69%.

They were 2/2 from three point range and 9/14 from inside the arc.

The shirts shot 5/15 for 33%, including the heaving of a slew of threes. They were 3/9 from three point land and 2/6 shooting twos. So 33% on twos and threes each. Pretty interesting.

But again, 11/16 for the skins, crap that's good.

Hope to see you Monday.

Wednesday the 22nd - only one court, ugly last loss

Not so many dudes for a Wednesday. I wound up 3-4 but lost the last two games after having decent leads. It's amazing how much how you finish stays with you. Doesn't matter how you did all day if the last game is ugly. Reminds me of a time I played golf and was 8 over par after 4 holes and then played the next 14 holes in 2 over to shoot an 81 (good for me). Left feeling great, but if the opposite had happened and I'd been 2 over after 14 and finished 8 over on the last 4, the lake would have another set of golf clubs at the bottom.

Anyway, here's the cumulative on who shows up...there have now been 55 different guys (54 and Marvena).




Here are the wins and losses, I alternated colors to make it easier to follow across the row...



Finally here are today's results...




Not near as many games today because we didn't have two courts going.

And for everyone looking to be able to make fun of something, my hands are cracking again and there's no stopping them, so look for the "Return of the Gloves" soon.

Monday - Part 2, Comebacks and Yacks

Forgot to mention a couple of stories from Monday. Both occured in games I didn't see 'cause I was playing on the other court, so I don't know the details. Anyway, Tony was on a team that was down 20-6 and won. Sweet.

On the darker side, poor Ryan yacked his guts out. He walked off of his court (the middle one) and walked over to our court and puked just about two feet off of our court's endline slightly to the right of the basket. Effectively taking away my ball saving and hard driving fast breaks to the right side. I appreciate that no one can help when they have to yack, and I admire that the kid continued playing, but from now on I have a new community center rule... When you are going to puke, don't run over to my court to do it. Puke on your own court. Is that so much to ask?

Monday the 20th - Happy to be back - and our 3rd Zach

I'm way too hyper to not play hoops for 5 days, zoiks.

Some rare faces in the crowd today, here are today's stats - seems like lots of underdogs won today...

Here are the cumulative stats for everyone... There have been a total of 110 games played...

Haven't shown the tandem stats in a few days. These are the wins and losses for tandems of two regardless of who else they played with. Tandems that have played at least 7 games together are on this chart. Jack & I have made our way to 50%.

Tony (and a few other guys before) suggested we compile a list of email addresses so we can communicate when necessary and recruit guys when attendence has been light. I could put something on this site so everyone could list theirs, but I'm afraid that the spyders and bots will collect all our addresses and bury us in spam. So, as an alternate, if you send me your email address (via my profile page), I will collect the list of everyone who sends me theirs and then email it to everyone on the list.

Way too many Zachs....

No Longer a Man

Well, I didn't get to play today and I feel 57% less manly for it. Some guys are trying to reconstruct the wins and losses and that is very cool of them. Thanks especially to Trent who's bugging people for what they remember. If we can put the games together, I'll of course add them to the database.

In the meantime, since sometimes I only post the cumulative stats, several guys wanted to see the daily stats more regularly. So, to that end, here are the daily stats from the last two weeks (of course, today (Friday the 17th) is not included)....