Hollinger

[Greenbean]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Of course, there also was the little matter of their opponent. Boston is one of the league's elite defensive teams and historically the Magic have never had an easy time scoring on the Celtics, because Kendrick Perkins doesn't need double-team help to defend Howard. From the opening tip, as Redick and Carter noted, it was clear the Celtics had brought their A-game.

"Defensively in the first half we were terrific," said Boston coach Doc Rivers.

One of the biggest problems for Orlando was that it couldn't make a 3-pointer. The Magic were only 5-of-22, and the normally deadly Rashard Lewis was 0-for-6 -- including a couple of fourth-quarter tries that could have made the final seconds much more interesting.

But part of the reason was that they weren't Orlando's typical shots -- many of them were contested looks rather than the Magic's usual two-passes-around-the-perimeter-to-a-wide-open-weakside-shooter variety. The Celtics particularly cut off the corner 3-pointer, the highest-value shot in the game, limiting Orlando to five attempts and no makes from the corners.

Of course I read it. Like I said in my OP he gives a quick shout out to Boston's defense, then explains that it was because Orlando "wasn't ready" and that their 3's didnt fall.

After your quote, he goes on to say:

The paucity of 3s had a fairly simple explanation: The Celtics rarely were put into help situations, as Orlando didn't threaten the Celtics off the dribble for the better part of three quarters and didn't need to double Howard on the block.

"We weren't able to score one-one-one, " said Van Gundy. "We've got to get better ball movement, and we either have to be able to convert better in the paint or we've got to draw help and make passes."


In other words, all Orlando has to do is move the ball better and penetrate mroe and they will prevail. If they dont, the Celtics will.

The same rationalization for the Cleveland series. All LeBron has to do is be in "attack" mode for the whole game. Well, what if that is not possible against this defense?

And you are right, he does not use stats in this article. Which is my beef. He is twisting what actually happened to support the stats that he has telling him Orlando is an unbeatable force.

[Roy Hobbs]

He thought that there was no "switch" as Roy says.

I still don't think there really is, the C's are just now healthy and are playing well. I fear their old flaws are going to reappear, especially since we don't have a huge match up advantage to fall back on like we did in the Cleveland series. (whomever Mo Williams/Jamison guarded)

Really?  I think the past 12 games are a much, much higher level of basketball than we've seen since Christmas.  Injuries are to some extent an excuse, but the team was healthy over the last few weeks of the season, and they still played like crap.  A lot of that was due to effort, not going after rebounds, etc.  In those "hustle" categories, I've seen a sea change, which I attribute to the "switch".

[Fafnir]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Yes but the OP's main complaint is the Orlando in 5 prediction, which I assume would use his power rankings any other tools.

[Fan from VT]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Of course, there also was the little matter of their opponent. Boston is one of the league's elite defensive teams and historically the Magic have never had an easy time scoring on the Celtics, because Kendrick Perkins doesn't need double-team help to defend Howard. From the opening tip, as Redick and Carter noted, it was clear the Celtics had brought their A-game.

"Defensively in the first half we were terrific," said Boston coach Doc Rivers.

One of the biggest problems for Orlando was that it couldn't make a 3-pointer. The Magic were only 5-of-22, and the normally deadly Rashard Lewis was 0-for-6 -- including a couple of fourth-quarter tries that could have made the final seconds much more interesting.

But part of the reason was that they weren't Orlando's typical shots -- many of them were contested looks rather than the Magic's usual two-passes-around-the-perimeter-to-a-wide-open-weakside-shooter variety. The Celtics particularly cut off the corner 3-pointer, the highest-value shot in the game, limiting Orlando to five attempts and no makes from the corners.

From many of the broadly disparaging comments about Hollinger in general, I think it's clear a lot of people don't read him regularly. He actually frequently writes about the inadequacies of his stats and when his eye and numbers are on different pages and why that might be. I think this is why every fan base thinks he's biased against them.

Then there's recall bias in criticism against him. I mean, if you can remove your thoughts from predictions and be right 60% of the time, that's quite significant. But you have to commit fully; you can't predict with your mind some of the time then numbers the other times, that defeats the purpose and gets you closer to 50% right. So people love to hold on to when he's wrong disproportionately to when he's right...it's as if not being 100% right proves his entire method wrong when he himself is clear that it's not even a possible goal.


For what it's worth, here's the rankings of expert predictions at true hoop:

http://bluecork.net/nba/Smackdown2010.php

[nickagneta]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Of course, there also was the little matter of their opponent. Boston is one of the league's elite defensive teams and historically the Magic have never had an easy time scoring on the Celtics, because Kendrick Perkins doesn't need double-team help to defend Howard. From the opening tip, as Redick and Carter noted, it was clear the Celtics had brought their A-game.

"Defensively in the first half we were terrific," said Boston coach Doc Rivers.

One of the biggest problems for Orlando was that it couldn't make a 3-pointer. The Magic were only 5-of-22, and the normally deadly Rashard Lewis was 0-for-6 -- including a couple of fourth-quarter tries that could have made the final seconds much more interesting.

But part of the reason was that they weren't Orlando's typical shots -- many of them were contested looks rather than the Magic's usual two-passes-around-the-perimeter-to-a-wide-open-weakside-shooter variety. The Celtics particularly cut off the corner 3-pointer, the highest-value shot in the game, limiting Orlando to five attempts and no makes from the corners.

Of course I read it. Like I said in my OP he gives a quick shout out to Boston's defense, then explains that it was because Orlando "wasn't ready" and that their 3's didnt fall.

After your quote, he goes on to say:

The paucity of 3s had a fairly simple explanation: The Celtics rarely were put into help situations, as Orlando didn't threaten the Celtics off the dribble for the better part of three quarters and didn't need to double Howard on the block.

"We weren't able to score one-one-one, " said Van Gundy. "We've got to get better ball movement, and we either have to be able to convert better in the paint or we've got to draw help and make passes."


In other words, all Orlando has to do is move the ball better and penetrate mroe and they will prevail. If they dont, the Celtics will.

The same rationalization for the Cleveland series. All LeBron has to do is be in "attack" mode for the whole game. Well, what if that is not possible against this defense?

And you are right, he does not use stats in this article. Which is my beef. He is twisting what actually happened to support the stats that he has telling him Orlando is an unbeatable force.

Disagree with this completely. What he is saying is that because the Celtics can play Howard one on one instead of doubling ,the Celtics don't go into "help situations". Meaning they can stay out on the perimeter and contest three point shots and take away the ball swing to the weak side creating that "paucity of three pointers" especially in the corners.

Now as a coach, the way I would combat that is to drive, if you can take your man off the dribble and try to get Perkins to rotate off Howard thereby leaving Howard open for the dunk or kick out and ball rotation back to the weak side as Boston rotates their defense.

Here's the problem. Carter is the only Magic player that can take his man off the dribble on the outside if Howard kicks out and yesterday Howard wasn't kicking the ball out.

I think Hollinger does a good job of analyzing yesterday's game and really hits a home run with this article saying what happened.

[Roy Hobbs]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Of course, there also was the little matter of their opponent. Boston is one of the league's elite defensive teams and historically the Magic have never had an easy time scoring on the Celtics, because Kendrick Perkins doesn't need double-team help to defend Howard. From the opening tip, as Redick and Carter noted, it was clear the Celtics had brought their A-game.

"Defensively in the first half we were terrific," said Boston coach Doc Rivers.

One of the biggest problems for Orlando was that it couldn't make a 3-pointer. The Magic were only 5-of-22, and the normally deadly Rashard Lewis was 0-for-6 -- including a couple of fourth-quarter tries that could have made the final seconds much more interesting.

But part of the reason was that they weren't Orlando's typical shots -- many of them were contested looks rather than the Magic's usual two-passes-around-the-perimeter-to-a-wide-open-weakside-shooter variety. The Celtics particularly cut off the corner 3-pointer, the highest-value shot in the game, limiting Orlando to five attempts and no makes from the corners.

From many of the broadly disparaging comments about Hollinger in general, I think it's clear a lot of people don't read him regularly. He actually frequently writes about the inadequacies of his stats and when his eye and numbers are on different pages and why that might be. I think this is why every fan base thinks he's biased against them.

Then there's recall bias in criticism against him. I mean, if you can remove your thoughts from predictions and be right 60% of the time, that's quite significant. But you have to commit fully; you can't predict with your mind some of the time then numbers the other times, that defeats the purpose and gets you closer to 50% right. So people love to hold on to when he's wrong disproportionately to when he's right...it's as if not being 100% right proves his entire method wrong when he himself is clear that it's not even a possible goal.


For what it's worth, here's the rankings of expert predictions at true hoop:

http://bluecork.net/nba/Smackdown2010.php

I think what's got people riled up at Hollinger this time is a combination of 1) him being very dismissive of the Celtics chances; and 2) him bringing up the fact that Jameer was hurt last season as justification of his pick, but conveniently overlooking that KG was hurt, as well.  That second point, especially, harms his credibility.

[fairweatherfan]

Just wondering, how many of you guys read the article?

Hollinger uses almost no stats in his analysis of what happened yesterday and clearly gives credit to Boston:

Of course, there also was the little matter of their opponent. Boston is one of the league's elite defensive teams and historically the Magic have never had an easy time scoring on the Celtics, because Kendrick Perkins doesn't need double-team help to defend Howard. From the opening tip, as Redick and Carter noted, it was clear the Celtics had brought their A-game.

"Defensively in the first half we were terrific," said Boston coach Doc Rivers.

One of the biggest problems for Orlando was that it couldn't make a 3-pointer. The Magic were only 5-of-22, and the normally deadly Rashard Lewis was 0-for-6 -- including a couple of fourth-quarter tries that could have made the final seconds much more interesting.

But part of the reason was that they weren't Orlando's typical shots -- many of them were contested looks rather than the Magic's usual two-passes-around-the-perimeter-to-a-wide-open-weakside-shooter variety. The Celtics particularly cut off the corner 3-pointer, the highest-value shot in the game, limiting Orlando to five attempts and no makes from the corners.

From many of the broadly disparaging comments about Hollinger in general, I think it's clear a lot of people don't read him regularly. He actually frequently writes about the inadequacies of his stats and when his eye and numbers are on different pages and why that might be. I think this is why every fan base thinks he's biased against them.

Then there's recall bias in criticism against him. I mean, if you can remove your thoughts from predictions and be right 60% of the time, that's quite significant. But you have to commit fully; you can't predict with your mind some of the time then numbers the other times, that defeats the purpose and gets you closer to 50% right. So people love to hold on to when he's wrong disproportionately to when he's right...it's as if not being 100% right proves his entire method wrong when he himself is clear that it's not even a possible goal.

I usually defend Hollinger - I'm not always happy with his analysis but I'm very glad someone like him has a mainstream voice these days.  My problem is that picking Orlando in 5 seems like an overly strong reliance on the numbers, which strongly favor Orlando, and not enough consideration of the circumstances that caused that discrepancy.  But I guess a stats guy is probably gonna generally err on that side anyway.

[Greenbean]

Disagree with this completely. What he is saying is that because the Celtics can play Howard one on one instead of doubling ,the Celtics don't go into "help situations". Meaning they can stay out on the perimeter and contest three point shots and take away the ball swing to the weak side creating that "paucity of three pointers" especially in the corners.

Now as a coach, the way I would combat that is to drive, if you can take your man off the dribble and try to get Perkins to rotate off Howard thereby leaving Howard open for the dunk or kick out and ball rotation back to the weak side as Boston rotates their defense.

Here's the problem. Carter is the only Magic player that can take his man off the dribble on the outside if Howard kicks out and yesterday Howard wasn't kicking the ball out.

I think Hollinger does a good job of analyzing yesterday's game and really hits a home run with this article saying what happened.

Listen we can argue all day about what this guys was trying to say but his article is titled "Magic Implosion", not Celtics defensive dominance. He spends the first half of the article quoting Magic players saying they werent ready for Boston's intensity.

I also know he thinks the Magic will beat the Celtics in 5 games meaning Orlando will win the next four if he is right.

He uses various quotes mixed with what happened in the game to paint the picture that the Magic were rusty. Yeah the Celtics played great defense but as soon as the Magic make adjustments, like they did midway through the 2nd quarter (what he said, not me. from my calculations, the 4th quarter was the only time the Magic looked good), they will be fine.

Also, by my count, Jameer Nelson can penetrate, and Rashard Lewis should be able to get by KG as well.

Anyway the point of starting this thread was to point out that Hollinger doesnt write without bias which is supposed to be the whole point of his articles or so i thought.

I really could care less about these guys and it is way more fun to see them eat crow. I am just disappointed in a guy that I used to enjoy reading. The more prominence he gets on the site though, the less interesting his writing becomes.

[Andy Jick]

Who cares what this Hollinger clown thinks? He's no wise old man in the sky, looking down on us with his calculator & teleprompter.

These so-called "experts" are a dime a dozen these days, as nearly anyone who has dribbled a basketball finds themselves on television or with a blog...

The one thing that can't be measured with any statistical analysis is HEART...  Basketball players are not inanimate objects - they are people who have a will to choose, and this Celtics team has chosen to dig deep and leave the numbers in the dust...

The sooner people like Hollinger understand this, the sooner they'll figure out what we here see...

[Fan from VT]

Disagree with this completely. What he is saying is that because the Celtics can play Howard one on one instead of doubling ,the Celtics don't go into "help situations". Meaning they can stay out on the perimeter and contest three point shots and take away the ball swing to the weak side creating that "paucity of three pointers" especially in the corners.

Now as a coach, the way I would combat that is to drive, if you can take your man off the dribble and try to get Perkins to rotate off Howard thereby leaving Howard open for the dunk or kick out and ball rotation back to the weak side as Boston rotates their defense.

Here's the problem. Carter is the only Magic player that can take his man off the dribble on the outside if Howard kicks out and yesterday Howard wasn't kicking the ball out.

I think Hollinger does a good job of analyzing yesterday's game and really hits a home run with this article saying what happened.

Listen we can argue all day about what this guys was trying to say but his article is titled "Magic Implosion", not Celtics defensive dominance. He spends the first half of the article quoting Magic players saying they werent ready for Boston's intensity.

I also know he thinks the Magic will beat the Celtics in 5 games meaning Orlando will win the next four if he is right.

He uses various quotes mixed with what happened in the game to paint the picture that the Magic were rusty. Yeah the Celtics played great defense but as soon as the Magic make adjustments, like they did midway through the 2nd quarter (what he said, not me. from my calculations, the 4th quarter was the only time the Magic looked good), they will be fine.

Also, by my count, Jameer Nelson can penetrate, and Rashard Lewis should be able to get by KG as well.

Anyway the point of starting this thread was to point out that Hollinger doesnt write without bias which is supposed to be the whole point of his articles or so i thought.

I really could care less about these guys and it is way more fun to see them eat crow. I am just disappointed in a guy that I used to enjoy reading. The more prominence he gets on the site though, the less interesting his writing becomes.

1. He can't change his prediction now, but if he could, he would. From this point on, he certainly wouldn't expect Orlando to win four straight.

2. As for his thesis statement perspective/point of view, ESPN assigned Hollinger to write about something from Orlando's perspective and assigned Sheridan to write from the Celtics' perspective.

[ssspence]

No problem with the Hollinger article. ESPN pays him to perform statistics-based analysis. Most of us would probably do the same if in his shoes.

I'd agree that his prediction was blind to the corner the Cs appear to have turned (who picks the ECF winner in 5 games?), but... who really cares. after all, the Cs have only won one game. so save the cigars for later.

[footey]

Here's the glitch in Hollinger's thinking:  he clearly doesn't think the "switch" exists, and after watching this Celtics team, it's clear that it does.

You can't evaluate this matchup based upon regular season numbers.  If you do, you're a fool at this point.

Exactly.  TP.

[footey]

Disagree with this completely. What he is saying is that because the Celtics can play Howard one on one instead of doubling ,the Celtics don't go into "help situations". Meaning they can stay out on the perimeter and contest three point shots and take away the ball swing to the weak side creating that "paucity of three pointers" especially in the corners.

Now as a coach, the way I would combat that is to drive, if you can take your man off the dribble and try to get Perkins to rotate off Howard thereby leaving Howard open for the dunk or kick out and ball rotation back to the weak side as Boston rotates their defense.

Here's the problem. Carter is the only Magic player that can take his man off the dribble on the outside if Howard kicks out and yesterday Howard wasn't kicking the ball out.

I think Hollinger does a good job of analyzing yesterday's game and really hits a home run with this article saying what happened.

Listen we can argue all day about what this guys was trying to say but his article is titled "Magic Implosion", not Celtics defensive dominance. He spends the first half of the article quoting Magic players saying they werent ready for Boston's intensity.

I also know he thinks the Magic will beat the Celtics in 5 games meaning Orlando will win the next four if he is right.

He uses various quotes mixed with what happened in the game to paint the picture that the Magic were rusty. Yeah the Celtics played great defense but as soon as the Magic make adjustments, like they did midway through the 2nd quarter (what he said, not me. from my calculations, the 4th quarter was the only time the Magic looked good), they will be fine.

Also, by my count, Jameer Nelson can penetrate, and Rashard Lewis should be able to get by KG as well.

Anyway the point of starting this thread was to point out that Hollinger doesnt write without bias which is supposed to be the whole point of his articles or so i thought.

I really could care less about these guys and it is way more fun to see them eat crow. I am just disappointed in a guy that I used to enjoy reading. The more prominence he gets on the site though, the less interesting his writing becomes.

1. He can't change his prediction now, but if he could, he would. From this point on, he certainly wouldn't expect Orlando to win four straight.

2. As for his thesis statement perspective/point of view, ESPN assigned Hollinger to write about something from Orlando's perspective and assigned Sheridan to write from the Celtics' perspective.

While the perspective thing may have validity, it does not excuse the premise of his article, which is that the Celtic victory could very well be explained by the rust of Orlando. Even Coach Van Gundy was not buying into that.  Also find it ironic that Sheridan was chosen to cover the Celtics this season, as he has pretty much always picked against them. I guess he does not have to like them as a team to cover them, though.

[footey]

"The Orlando Magic barely showed up on offense until midway through the third quarter, amassing a deficit so large that not even the Celtics could blow it, and that was the key to the Magic's 92-88 Game 1 defeat to Boston."

The above sentence is Hollinger's thesis: that the Magic did not get going until it was too late; even the Celtics, who will blow any lead, were able to hang on (barely). The more I read his premise, the more I feel a little annoyed by his inability to eat crow. It ignores our play-off record to date, which involves 12 games, and should stand for something at this point. He certainly wasn't afraid to bail on us in 2008. Our regular season record made us prohibitive favorites, but once we struggled against ATL, Hollinger quickly turned around and started picking all 3 of our opponents to beat us.  An elephant never forgets.

[Roy Hobbs]

"The Orlando Magic barely showed up on offense until midway through the third quarter, amassing a deficit so large that not even the Celtics could blow it, and that was the key to the Magic's 92-88 Game 1 defeat to Boston."

The above sentence is Hollinger's thesis: that the Magic did not get going until it was too late; even the Celtics, who will blow any lead, were able to hang on (barely). The more I read his premise, the more I feel a little annoyed by his inability to eat crow. It ignores our play-off record to date, which involves 12 games, and should stand for something at this point. He certainly wasn't afraid to bail on us in 2008. Our regular season record made us prohibitive favorites, but once we struggled against ATL, Hollinger quickly turned around and started picking all 3 of our opponents to beat us.  An elephant never forgets.

Yeah, that "not even the Celtics could blow it" crack was gratuitous, and shows that Hollinger hasn't really been paying close attention.  This team has found its heart.