josh smith to boston? (rumor?)

[jay]

I would rather get Monroe.  Olynyk, Vitor, Clips pick, Nets/Hawks pick.

Draft the best player available and build from there.

Trade Bass for an expiring and a pick in the 25-30 range.

[BballTim]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

[BballTim]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

  You don't trade for Smith because he's Rondo's friend. You'd trade for him because he's a pretty good rebounder and defender and scores well from the inside. It's a deal worth making if you think you can ween him off the jumpers. Ir's probably not if you don't. The fact that he's Rondo's friend would have been useful if we'd traded for him last year and we needed him to re-sign with the team, now it doesn't matter much.

[Evantime34]

If we can buy low on Josh Smith then we have to do it. If Smith is better than what we are giving up to get him then a deal makes sense for us. Rebuilding is about improving the quality of your talent pool and a deal where we got Smith for Wallace or Humphries would do so.

[jaketwice]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

[Fafnir]

Jake you're missing BBallTim's point. He's pointing out that 60%+ FT shooting is well past the point where "hack-a-" whomever is an effective strategy against such a player. Which is what you alluded to in crunch time.

So team's don't intentionally foul Smith/Rondo to avoid having to play defense conventionally. He's not addressing their free throw shooting in a broader context. I'm not sure why you retreat to overall offense in response.

[BballTim]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

  The three pointer doesn't change the calculus, I included that. FYI, less than 10 teams have ever had a fg% as high as 40% on three pointers. No team in the league averages close to the number of points per shot that Rondo did last year on his free throws. To put that into perspective, Rondo hit .645% of his free throws last year. If the Celts had a TS% of .645 this year and nothing else changed we'd score about 24 more points a game.

[BballTim]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

  I'm old enough to remember Nick Anderson. The end of games, where teams that are behind have to foul is the only area of concern. You could just put Smith on the bench for that. That's obviously far different than the non-stop hacking you were talking about.

[kozlodoev]

I'm old enough to remember Nick Anderson. The end of games, where teams that are behind have to foul is the only area of concern. You could just put Smith on the bench for that. That's obviously far different than the non-stop hacking you were talking about.

And Rondo. And don't forget to not give Rondo the ball in the last 2 minutes, either.

[jaketwice]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

  The three pointer doesn't change the calculus, I included that. FYI, less than 10 teams have ever had a fg% as high as 40% on three pointers. No team in the league averages close to the number of points per shot that Rondo did last year on his free throws. To put that into perspective, Rondo hit .645% of his free throws last year. If the Celts had a TS% of .645 this year and nothing else changed we'd score about 24 more points a game.

Miami averages 1.31 points per shot. You want to use last year's FT%? Okay, Smith made 52% of his free throws. Of the two, Smith attempted more free throws, 321, to Rondo's 93; if you add those numbers, multiply the FT%s and then average, you get 54% free throw shooting from your starting small forward and point guard.

Using your logic, this amounts to 10.8 points per 20/FTs. This is worse than the worst PPS (Milwuakee) in the league.

If you account for 3 pointers, this analysis is even worse. Bad FT shooters get that team in the penalty more often, which is why Detroit and Houston (the teams with the two worst FT%s in the league are amongst the top five (1 and 5) in free throws attempted. It's not as if the other team doesn't read the scouting report. ...once you're in the penalty, I can prevent you from getting back in the game by fouling your bad free throw shooters, who are likely to only make around one point.

If I am smart, you will never have a chance to shoot a three. We have all seen players get wrapped up at mid-court. Off the ball fouls, and so on.

Bad free throw shooting is a huge liability. We cannot win a championship if they guys shooting 25% of our free throws only hit even 60% of their shots. Of the last 10 NBA champions, 8 have been in the top 10 in points per shot (the exceptions being that 2009 LA team which, IMHO, won because of officiating issues and because we lost Perkins for Game 7)(the Celtics were top 10 in PPS that year) and the 2004 Pistons, who may have been the best defensive team of all time).

TP for encouraging a very nerdy level of analysis.

[BballTim]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

  The three pointer doesn't change the calculus, I included that. FYI, less than 10 teams have ever had a fg% as high as 40% on three pointers. No team in the league averages close to the number of points per shot that Rondo did last year on his free throws. To put that into perspective, Rondo hit .645% of his free throws last year. If the Celts had a TS% of .645 this year and nothing else changed we'd score about 24 more points a game.

Miami averages 1.31 points per shot. You want to use last year's FT%? Okay, Smith made 52% of his free throws. Of the two, Smith attempted more free throws, 321, to Rondo's 93; if you add those numbers, multiply the FT%s and then average, you get 54% free throw shooting from your starting small forward and point guard.

Using your logic, this amounts to 10.8 points per 20/FTs. This is worse than the worst PPS (Milwuakee) in the league.

If you account for 3 pointers, this analysis is even worse. Bad FT shooters get that team in the penalty more often, which is why Detroit and Houston (the teams with the two worst FT%s in the league are amongst the top five (1 and 5) in free throws attempted. It's not as if the other team doesn't read the scouting report. ...once you're in the penalty, I can prevent you from getting back in the game by fouling your bad free throw shooters, who are likely to only make around one point.

If I am smart, you will never have a chance to shoot a three. We have all seen players get wrapped up at mid-court. Off the ball fouls, and so on.

Bad free throw shooting is a huge liability. We cannot win a championship if they guys shooting 25% of our free throws only hit even 60% of their shots. Of the last 10 NBA champions, 8 have been in the top 10 in points per shot (the exceptions being that 2009 LA team which, IMHO, won because of officiating issues and because we lost Perkins for Game 7)(the Celtics were top 10 in PPS that year) and the 2004 Pistons, who may have been the best defensive team of all time).

TP for encouraging a very nerdy level of analysis.

  I'm curious about where you're getting your numbers from. They're different than anything I've ever seen.

[Fafnir]

If you're going to be nerdy Jake, you should know that using Point Per Shot is the wrong measure to judge "hack-a" strategies relative efficiency. Point Per shot ignores turnovers and other free throw attempts, which are the other possibilities beyond a make or a miss.

Given you're supposing Rondo/Smith being wrapped up at half-court then by conceit you're ignoring the chance of a turnover or foul to another player during the hack.

Meanwhile comparatively playing traditional defense you want to look at points per possession because you can still get a turnover or foul a free throw shooter.

Portland scores at 1.12 points per possession. A composite Rondo/Smith hack strategy will yield 1.08 points per possession using your 54% figure.

So a 54% make rate renders an output of a top 8 offensive team. A mere 60% free throw make rate yields a 1.2 per possession, which would lead the league.

Now where a "hack-a" strategy can be useful is three-fold.

1. It can be used to get into a players head.
2. It can be used to rest your team from running up and down the floor.
3. It can make sense if you're already down and you wish to gamble because your defense is proving to be a sieve. An all-in risky strategy.

[Fafnir]

  I'm curious about where you're getting your numbers from. They're different than anything I've ever seen.

He's using point per shot, which ignores turnovers and probably free throws. Maybe even offensive boards, depends on how you choose to calculate it.

Its the wrong metric to use for this situation.

Edit: Got it Miami has scored 5200 points, shot 3834 times, and took 1198 free throws

5200/3834 = 1.356 points per shot

add in free throws at .44 shots per fta
5200/(3834+1198*.44) = 1.19

Just looking at free throws alone changes the number massively. You can add in turnovers and offensive boards to get a normal offensive rating.

[jaketwice]

Hope it stays a rumor

Agreed.

I know this blog is Rondo-obsessed, but advocating the collection of Rondo's friends is NOT a plan for rebuilding.

I am actually not a big Rondo fan, but if the plan is to build around him (per Danny Ainge, not anyone on this blog)
then JSmoove is probably as good of a dance partner as the Celts will probably be able to find for him.

It's either that OR they land a franchise player in free agency (Melo, Lebron, etc) or they draft in the top 3.

I don't see either of those scenarios happening.

You would have two players on the team that were sub-60% free throw shooters who were NOT centers.

The Celtics would be fouled into embarassing oblivion. You could literally just hack anyone on the team.

If you are shooting 60% from the FT line, your odds of making both are 60% * 60% - or 36%. Pretty good odds that you can hold the Celtics to one point on free throws. Rondo can be hidden, to the extent he doesn't drive in to the basket in crunch time - but not Josh Smith and a Center.

If Rondo could shoot FTs at even a league average level, and if we could get a center like J. Noah, who shoots 72% on FTs, it would be worth considering.

  Rondo and Smith are both over 60% career free throw shooters. And you're looking at it wrong. Say you foul Rondo 10 times when he's going to shoot. Even though he won't often make both free throws on average he'll get 12-13 points on the 20 FTs. If you let the Celts (or pretty much any team in nba history) take 10 shots without fouling them they'll get 10-11 points on average from those shots. That's why, despite all the claims that we'll see hack-a-Rondo galore we've never really seen it.

Rondo is career 62%, Smith is career 65%
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/3026/rajon-rondo
http://espn.go.com/nba/player/_/id/2411/josh-smith

Both (albeit a limited sample size for Rondo) are shooting sub-60% this year. I think the 3-point shot changes the calculus you are using. If you take 5 threes and make 2, you get six points on 40% shooting. You would need to shoot 60% from the field in order to get the same number of points from 2-pointers, or make 6 free throws. A shot from deep is worth three free throws.

Moreover, your presumption seems to be that free throws are taken in lieu of ordinary baskets. This is incorrect. Every team in the league shoots at least 20 free throws per game. The question is whether those free throws translate into 12 points, or whether they translate into 18 points. To give you an idea of the importance of those shots - if Detroit made 82% (as Portland does)of its free throws (instead of its second worst 67% mark)  it would score as many points per game as Golden State.

While not a universal indicator of success, I think it's no accident that of the top ten teams with the highest FT%, 9 are in the playoffs.

Finally, a bad free throw-shooter is worth much less at the ends of games. You may be too young to remember Nick Anderson in Orlando in the 90s. But those last minute buckets are necessary makes.

  The three pointer doesn't change the calculus, I included that. FYI, less than 10 teams have ever had a fg% as high as 40% on three pointers. No team in the league averages close to the number of points per shot that Rondo did last year on his free throws. To put that into perspective, Rondo hit .645% of his free throws last year. If the Celts had a TS% of .645 this year and nothing else changed we'd score about 24 more points a game.

Miami averages 1.31 points per shot. You want to use last year's FT%? Okay, Smith made 52% of his free throws. Of the two, Smith attempted more free throws, 321, to Rondo's 93; if you add those numbers, multiply the FT%s and then average, you get 54% free throw shooting from your starting small forward and point guard.

Using your logic, this amounts to 10.8 points per 20/FTs. This is worse than the worst PPS (Milwuakee) in the league.

If you account for 3 pointers, this analysis is even worse. Bad FT shooters get that team in the penalty more often, which is why Detroit and Houston (the teams with the two worst FT%s in the league are amongst the top five (1 and 5) in free throws attempted. It's not as if the other team doesn't read the scouting report. ...once you're in the penalty, I can prevent you from getting back in the game by fouling your bad free throw shooters, who are likely to only make around one point.

If I am smart, you will never have a chance to shoot a three. We have all seen players get wrapped up at mid-court. Off the ball fouls, and so on.

Bad free throw shooting is a huge liability. We cannot win a championship if they guys shooting 25% of our free throws only hit even 60% of their shots. Of the last 10 NBA champions, 8 have been in the top 10 in points per shot (the exceptions being that 2009 LA team which, IMHO, won because of officiating issues and because we lost Perkins for Game 7)(the Celtics were top 10 in PPS that year) and the 2004 Pistons, who may have been the best defensive team of all time).

TP for encouraging a very nerdy level of analysis.

  I'm curious about where you're getting your numbers from. They're different than anything I've ever seen.

http://espn.go.com/nba/statistics/team/_/stat/offense-per-game

I came up with the 54% number by extrapolating from the last year's numbers that you highlighted above. Rondo shot .645 on 93FTA (60 shots made), Josh Smith shot .517 on 321 attempts (166 shots made). 226 shots made total divided by 414 total attempts is a 54% joint FT%.

You can see from the above that although Detroit has the worst team FT% in the league, it shoots the fifth most free throws. ...they did fire Mo Cheeks, who hasn't really had that successful a coaching career - but I can't imagine that Detroit has been coached to draw fouls.

[jaketwice]

If you're going to be nerdy Jake, you should know that using Point Per Shot is the wrong measure to judge "hack-a" strategies relative efficiency. Point Per shot ignores turnovers and other free throw attempts, which are the other possibilities beyond a make or a miss.

Given you're supposing Rondo/Smith being wrapped up at half-court then by conceit you're ignoring the chance of a turnover or foul to another player during the hack.

Meanwhile comparatively playing traditional defense you want to look at points per possession because you can still get a turnover or foul a free throw shooter.

Portland scores at 1.12 points per possession. A composite Rondo/Smith hack strategy will yield 1.08 points per possession using your 52% figure.

So a 52% make rate renders an output of a top 8 offensive team. A mere 60% free throw make rate yields a 1.2 per possession, which would lead the league.

Now where a "hack-a" strategy can be useful is three-fold.

1. It can be used to get into a players head.
2. It can be used to rest your team from running up and down the floor.
3. It can make sense if you're already down and you wish to gamble because your defense is proving to be a sieve. An all-in risky strategy.

No, it's the proper metric. As I understand the debate, the question is whether the Celtics would ultimately lose more game as a result of poor free throw shooters being fouled more often.

The objection to this line of reasoning is that compounding all free throws, and then looking at the true percentage, ACTUALLY, a free throw is a better percentage bet than letting the player take the shot.

Since the debate centers around: shooting v. free throw shooting, a metric which ignores free throw shooting is PRECISELY the appropriate metric to use. My argument (or at least the part of my blog post subject to debate) is whether teams would more likely foul our bad free throw shooters than allow them to shoot. It IS more likely, but only because Josh Smith is such an outrageously bad free throw shooter. If Smith were even as good as Rondo then there would be some question about the efficacy of this strategy - but, unfortunately, his free throw shooting is so bad, that you would rather be Milwuakee than have a Rondo/Smith Combo shooting your free throws.

Finally, if my math doesn't do it for you - look at how teams actually treat bad free throw shooting teams in the NBA: the two worst teams are amongst the league leaders in attempts. I contend that is not an accident. If Houstong made 80%, instead of less than 70% of its free throws, it would lead the league in scoring (although it is unlikely, in that event, that it would get 31 shots from the stripe every game).