There’s no time to waste with a provocative opening today. All I have for you is a brief rundown of some of what I find to be the more interesting statistics of Marcus Thornton.
Some Stats
- The Hornets have been better overall with Marcus on the bench than when he’s in the game. The team scores 3.7 more points per possession than the opposition when he’s not in the game (79% of the time) and 2.1 points per possession when he is (21% of the time).
- The team has been better offensively with Marcus on the pine. They score more points per possession (1.07 to 1.01) and shoot a higher eFG% (50.0 to 46.3).
- New Orleans is better defensively with Marcus on the floor. They give up .988 points per possession when he’s on the floor and 1.033 points when he’s off. They allow an effective field goal percentage of 46.2 when he’s on and 48.8 when he’s off.
- With Thornton on the floor, the team rebounding has been much better, specifically on offense. When he’s out there the team grabs 54.3 percent of all available rebounds, as opposed to the 49.5 percent they get when he’s not. Offensively the team snags 41 percent more boards when he’s on the floor compared to when he has his butt in a court side seat.
[pause]
Why in the world are the chairs not much bigger on NBA benches than they are in, say, my house? Those guys are much taller than the average person you encounter in day to day life, so why don’t they have bigger chairs? Not only that, but a seven foot tall person just wouldn’t ideally use the same size chair as someone who is five foot ten. It just would make more sense to have chairs that in some way correspond to the actual size of a player.
Now I’m not saying that there should be chairs tailored for each inch and pound, but why not have small, medium, and large chairs for guys who are 6’0, 6’6, and 7’0. Not one of those heights? Tough, but the chair is still going to fit you better than the the ones currently utilized by the league.
Look at Shaq here. Extra credit to anyone who can explain to me why all the chairs are so damn small.
[resume]
I’ll get together some more stats about his specific performance tomorrow, so stay tuned.
Check out 42’s journal entry- The Little Things, which touches on some Marcus stuff as well.
Edit- After the jump there are some more details about how Thornton has played with and without Chris Paul in the lineup, and some more details on how he has done in certain lineups. (Thanks to 82games.com)
31 responses to “Hornets Have Been Worse With Marcus Thornton on the Court (and other team oriented Bannerman stats)”
Funny how Thornton has gotten the cold shoulder due to defensive issues. If the team is better defensively and in rebounding, someone should show this to Monty. He can’t keep track of everything. Marcus’s offense will come back at some point. Defense? He’s dandy.
I talked to someone who says he’s getting the cold shoulder for offensive issues, who also just knows that his defense is going to go away.
I can’t decided who’s right.
Care to help?
As far as showing Monty, look at the bottom of this article that you already read http://www.hornets247.com/news/2011/01/05/video-pondexter-adjusting-to-the-nba-williams-on-thornton/
yeah true, he does watch the game film obviously. I’ve always felt that defense was more about effort, whereas offense seems to come by measure of talent. I would hope that once Marcus gets his scoring swagger back, he’ll keep the defensive intensity as well.
Great stats, I also love the Shaw picture! Haha
BTW, does anyone have a picture of Phil Jackson on his Frankenstien Office Chair? Lol
I have long shared your curiosity about the chairs. My guess is that it has something to do with fitting in more courtside seats. Also, the players with the most power might not want to complain about it, because they don’t want to be seen as caring about sitting on the bench…
I saw 42’s entry The Little Things, and I wanted to comment on it. But it seems like anyone who isn’t a super Marcus fan is “bashed”, so I decided against it. I like Marcus, I cheer for him and I want him to do well. The whole thing about him being a liability on defense, is getting old and I’m glad your stats prove when he plays the team’s defensive overall is better. At the same time, I think it’s his offensive that’s frustrating. He either is doing really well or really bad on offensive. More often that not, he’s doing bad. And yes I know he doesn’t get as much playing time as we would all like. But looking back when Willie was out and since then, his playing time increase. There was a string of 5 or 6 games when he played more than 20mintues. The first two of those games he scored 19 points (I think) each game after that he has been well terrible. All in all, I rather have him play more minutes and Marco play less. I’ll take his bad offensive nights for his hustle plays and defensive.
I have always wondered why in the world are the chairs sooo small for the NBA players. They all be squished together. Just imagining sitting that close to the massive body of Shaq and sweat pouring off him. -shivers- All those bodies that close, sweating, is just plain gross.
Don’t worry about getting bashed. You should worry about getting into a good discussion where you may be proved wrong to a degree.
I don’t mean you you. I mean the general you.
Interested stats, Joe, interesting indeed! I’d be interested in digging into those stats a tad more to see ‘when Marcus is on the floor, certainly there must be other changes made on the floor as well?’ I realize that these ‘team’ stats aren’t always reflective of individual player impact! We know that Me, You and David West on the floor would produce one set of statistical results, With Me, You and Jack on the floor, certainly the stats would be different again, and finally with Me, Thornton and Smith on the floor, the team stats would look very different. Why? Would that be a true reflection of my impact on the floor? I’m not sure… but I woul like to dig into it a little more because I believe it could only help! As for those chairs, I’ve also wondered that forever! C’mon NBA, get with the program, these are not normal people!!! LOL (that was great, Joe)
P.S. Joe, Wade says he hates you!!!! (LOL)… that means we really love you. lol
Absolutely. I completely agree that Marcus has been on the floor with a bunch of different teammates this season, some of whom certainly weren’t the most accomplished. Also, he’s only played 376 minutes this year. Itt’s true that a lot of these stats don’t really mean all that much going forward, but like you said, they are interesting nonetheless (in my mind at least).
Y’all know that Marcus is one of my favorites, which is why I try to do an article every so often on him. I used to chant with you all the time last year. If you’re in the old section I’ll swing by tonight.
i bet the chairs are small so the players dont block all the fans on the floors view. no idea though, phil jackson always gets a special big chair
I can tell u why the chairs are so damn small. because no one wants to pay for special chairs for big people. you’d think with all the millions of dollars they pay players, teams can front just a little extra cash to ensure that their big men sit comfotably and in better alignment
Joe,
I am not sure of the method you used to calculate the stats since you didn’t specify, but surely you used methods of statistical control. Otherwise your numbers don’t mean what you are trying to say. If so, rewrite the article. Or perhaps the article is intended as flame bait ; )
http://www.itl.nist.gov/div898/handbook/mpc/section2/mpc2.htm
These ideas don’t really apply here. For one, there is no measurement error to speak of. Points are discretely counted, as are assists etc. At times things are changed ex post facto (James lost a faux triple double this way), but that’s rare and not at issue. Secondly, statistical control typically looks at long term changes in a process by periodic sampling. We do not have a stable process to measure, and Joe is not talking about the evolution of the team with and without Marcus on the court. He’s taking a snapshot.
The inferential value of his numbers are somehing to pick at, but I think the data was collected and processed correctly.
What additional info would you like?
I know what info I’d like: what site/tool are you using to crunch the numbers? I had to pick my numbers for my journal out of the box scores.
I love that a rocket scientist has my online back. Thanks 42! I really wasn’t trying to say anything about the stats, aside from what getting some conversation. I was planning on doing this all at once, but I had some work to do today and didn’t have time to write the other part of it. Instead of re-doing all the stats tomorrow or whatever, I decided to just split it up.
Tomorrow’s post will get into some more personal stats, which in my mind are more telling of a players performance.
For these stats I used 82games.com. Guess I forgot to add that in there.
Joe: I take care of my womens.
42,
Good catch. Statistical control is not correct terminology.
I am implying he is looking at a local phenomena and applying it globally. He cannot draw his conclusion, which is the Hornets have been worse with MT5 on the court, dependent on the manner he calculated the numbers. I would like the see the method the numbers were calculated.
He needs to compare apples to apples. CP3-Rocky-Trevor-West-Emeka vs. CP3-Green-Trevor-West-Emeka vs. CP3-Jack-Tevor-West-Emeka vs. CP3-MT5-Trevor-West-Emeka vs MT5 + bench vs W.Green + bench vs Jack + bench
Or only take things where only the individual is accountable for the outcome. i.e. “The Hornet’s are a better free throw shooting team without MT5” or ((Team FT made – MT5 FT) / (Team FT attempted – MT5 FT attempted)) * 100 > MT5% would be a valid conclusion, although maybe not correct, using Ryan’s method.
I am not making a argument or writing an article based on statistics, therefore I didn’t use a site to gather numbers.
Yeah, that’s what I was saying about the inferential value. Agreed.
One of the great things about basketball is the large number of matchups, the good days, the bad days, etc. The is very frustrating to do a `t-test’ type analysis we all know and love.
We all love t-tests, right?
But, I think Joe has in fact met his goal of getting a conversation going.
I did post a few more stats as well, but I was trying to be fairly careful about how I worded things. All I meant by the headline is what the stats say- With Thornton, the team hasn’t performed as well on the court as they have without him. I’m not implying anything, at least not deliberately.
Agreed. MT5 is always a hot topic ; )
Why would the offense not dramatically drop when Marcus is on the floor?
Chris Paul/David West/Emeka Okafor/Belinelli/Ariza vs. Jack/Green/Thornton/Smith/Mbenga…Come on now. Similarly, our bench being better at defense and rebounding is not surprising. They hustle their butts off compared to our sometimes laxidazical starters.
One thing to remember. Marcus usually comes into the game as the opposition makes a sub. He has never had to guard a starting opposing Shooting Guard. That has always fallen on Marco’s/Trevor’s shoulders.
The stats show that the teams defense is better when facing the oppositions second unit. I think what bugs me even more about this is the fact that it shows how terrible our bench scoring is that even with Marcus in the game, we manage to score less than the opposition.
If anything, these stats show that our second unit is doing fine defensively, but that we can’t score worth a damn when they’re in too.
Thing about that start to the 4th quarters where we lose a big lead. Why is that? It’s never that the opposition comes out firing and completely blows us out in the 4th. We are still able to keep them UNDER their routine production. But goddamn do we have trouble putting the ball in the hoop with the second unit. We go with CONSISTENT MINUTES without scoring.
I don’t have the stats for it, but I would LOVE to see what our 1st and 3rd scoring quarters look like versus the 2nd and 4th. I guarantee you that stat will be VERY alarming, and show just how thin our bench is, and how badly we lack depth.
I think you’ll be slightly surprised. Our starters go through their own 6-8 minute spurts scoring 0-4 points quite frequently too.
Are these stats about who he’s on the floor with? Some of the commenters touched on this. If Thornton only plays half his minutes (less?) with Paul, of course the team’s offensive stats are worse. If he’s on the floor without the starters, of course the overall team stats are worse. How do Thornton’s individual numbers compare with Belly, Green, and Jack’s individual numbers? With or without Paul on the floor? It’s not that the team stats aren’t valuable, but as just an ignorant fan, I wonder how the team would do with Thornton getting Belly’s minutes. I’m not saying it should happen, or that I want it to happen, but I just wonder what it would look like. …Plus Belly would put some size on the second unit. I still think Jack, Banks, Thornton, Green, or Belly will be traded pretty soon. Even just for a pick or financial relief, to break up the logjam and solidify roles.
Some of the individual stats are in the journal Joe references.
Joe, you touched on a great point. It’s hard for Monty to find time for Marcus, Green, Jack (who is used to starters min.) Belly and Pondexter. Need to trade 1 or 2 of them, just to get someone consistent minutes. It’s very hard to get in the flow, five min at a time. Go Hornets!
Oh yeah, one more thing. I think we all know which one of those guys will be traded. Anybody want to buy a “Thornton’s Thunder” sign real cheap? I know where you can find one!
Hey…easy with the ‘Thornton’s Thunder’ sign…now you’re hitting me in the heart!!! Lol (seriously, I’d love to see him stay right here in the Crescent City)…I’d hate to see our local boy geaux off somewhere else, excel exponentially, then come back to make us all regret it 🙁 Call me selfish, lol… Seriously, I know we’d all like to see our team play to their full potential!! That’s the goal!!
Hey…Westbank Ripp, easy with the ‘Thornton’s Thunder’ sign…now you’re hitting me in the heart!!! (I know where u live/work) Lol (seriously, I’d love to see him stay right here in the Crescent City)…I’d hate to see our local boy geaux off somewhere else, excel exponentially, then come back to make us all regret it 🙁 Call me selfish, lol… Seriously, I know we’d all like to see our team play to their full potential!! That’s the goal!!
Its not Thorton as much as Jarrett Jack. Everytime the Hornets are up they bring in jack and lose the lead. Come on does no one else see this? The hornets palyed much better when the had Bayless eventhough he made some mistakes. To the point CUT JACK’S MINUTES WIN GAMES!!!!!!!
What do you want to do Joe G? Keep him and coach him or trade him in a package deal?
Keep him for sure. I’m just hoping that we can re-sign him to a nice deal without too much competition.