I’d recommend this article to just about anybody: “The No-Stats All-Star” from New York Times Magazine. [Update: I forgot to tip my hat to aldaily.com -- of all places -- where I found the link. Patrick Maloney at lfpress.com blogged it earlier too.]
It’s by Michael Lewis, who walked away from Wall Street in the 1980′s and wrote Liar’s Poker about his experience. His critiques of the arrogance and excess in the finance industry is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the causes of the economic crisis (start with the much-discussed article he wrote for Portfolio in December, with the definitive title, “The End“).
Analysis-minded sports fans should be familiar with Lewis’s Moneyball: the Art of Winning an Unfair Game (2003), about the use of quantitative analysis of baseball stats to decide everything from draft picks to pitch selections.
The present article focuses on the unlikely subject of Shane Battier of the Houston Rockets. The gist of it is the old truism (familiar to coaches in any sport, at all levels) that real champions win games not scoring titles.
The Grizzlies went from 23-59 in Battier’s rookie year to 50-32 in his third year, when they made the N.B.A. playoffs, as they did in each of his final three seasons with the team. Before the 2006-7 season, Battier was traded to the Houston Rockets, who had just finished 34-48. In his first season with the Rockets, they finished 52-30, and then, last year, went 55-27 — including one stretch of 22 wins in a row. Only the 1971-2 Los Angeles Lakers have won more games consecutively in the N.B.A. And because of injuries, the Rockets played 11 of those 22 games without their two acknowledged stars, Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming, on the court at the same time; the Rockets player who spent the most time actually playing for the Rockets during the streak was Shane Battier.
The article gets interesting from there, going into how the Rockets use different kinds of statistics to their advantage — focusing on probabilities and team results rather than raw individual stats like points, assists, etc – some good stuff on Battier vs. Kobe — and underscores it all with the human-interest profile of Battier’s unselfish style of play.
I’ve already written intensively on the hazards of focusing on extrinsic metrics and rewards (see Our Society of Overachievers, as well as the thing on Cisco’s new organizational style) so I’m pretty enthused to see more evidence to support my position… But don’t let my bias diminish the fact that the article is a very entertaining piece of literary non-fiction, and I’m recommending it on its own merits.
In fact, it rekindled my enjoyment of basketball (just an enjoyment of watching it for now — at least ’till the weather gets better). I’ve been meaning to cancel the cable sports package I subscribe to (the free trial expired last month) but now I’m glad I didn’t… Houston plays Dallas on Friday (ranked 6 and 7 in the West) followed by the Hornets and Lakers… trade deadline tomorrow, things getting serious… I’m watching a high-scoring LA / Golden State game right now — or I will be when I finish writing this — and unless a great story develops in the NHL, it looks like the NBA playoffs will take TV priority around here through the spring.
Update: Continued here…
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