#tweeted

Someone tell Vogel this cool stat @ericdgoodman36 sent me! Pacers are + 42 when Lavoy Allen & Chris Copeland are both in, -49 when both sit
— Gregg Doyel (@GreggDoyelStar) November 13, 2014

Introduction to Basketball Reference's Player Index

The fantastic Basketballreference.com has a neat tool which allows you to run ad hoc reports on various statistics.

For example, I wrote this query to determine who are the best 6th men in the league thus far this year.

This particular one was fairly simple - I wanted to see any players during the 2014-15 who had not started any games, who had played in at least six games (we're roughly 7 or 8 games into the season), sorted by Win Shares (an estimate of the number of wins contributed by a player).

Here is the link to their "Play Index" - http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/

                     Best 6th Men in NBA as of 11/12

Player	Team	Win Shares
Isaiah Thomas	Suns	0.9
Lavoy Allen	Pacers	0.8
Devin Harris	Mavericks	0.8
Brendan Wright	Mavericks	0.8
Aaron Brooks	Bulls	0.7

Projecting Future All Star Game Debut Dates

Background

The other day I was wondering whether or not Michael Jordan played in the all-star game his rookie year (he did - here's a great story on how players such as Isiah Thomas "froze him out" over jealousy of his Nike Air Jordan sneaker endorsement).

Then I started to wonder how long, on average, it takes All Stars to become just that - an actual nominal All Star. I looked at all All-Star games dating back to 1997, tracking data on any "1st appearances" that occured. 

Not surprisingly, for a player who makes the All Star team, the average number of years into his career before he makes his first all star appearance varies based on - 

     a) where a player was picked in the draft

     b) the position the player plays

Average Number of Years Needed to Make First All Star Appearance

	Draft Position
Position	Top 5	6 through 10	11 through 30	Second Round	Undrafted	Total
G	3.9 yrs	4.6 yrs	5.2 yrs	5.7 yrs	None	4.5 yrs
F	4.2 yrs	4.3 yrs	6.4 yrs	8.3 yrs	None	5.2 yrs
C	6.5 yrs	6.3 yrs	6.8 yrs	7.3 yrs	6.0 yrs	6.7 yrs
Total	4.3 yrs	4.7 yrs	6.1 yrs	7.2 yrs	6.0 yrs	5.2 yrs

Here are some interesting findings from the data:

• Since the 1997 All-Star game, only two players made the game in their rookie season (Tim Duncan and Yao). 
• During this stretch, the most veteran first time All Star was Anthony Mason in 2001, who was in the midst of his 13th season when he was selected as an injury replacement for Grant Hill. 

  

  His son also does this shaved
  word into head thing

• Out of the 108 first time all stars from 1997 to 2014 (which includes every player who began his career after the 1994-95 season)
• 96/108 (88.9%) were 1st round draft picks. 
• 10/108 (9.2%) were 2nd round draft picks
• 2/108 (1.9%) were Undrafted (Ben Wallace & Brad Miller)
• The 2002 All Star game featured 10 first time players, the most during the span from 1997 to 2014
• More of a note than a finding, but the 1999 All Star game was cancelled due to the lockout. There were nine players who made their All Star debut in the 2000 game, and some of these players, such as Allen Iverson, would have made the game had it been played in 1999. Originally I tried adjusting the data by projecting who would've made it that season, but it did not alter the findings in any significant way, so I decided not to mess with history for now :)

Projecting Future All Stars

On average there were 5.5 players per draft between the 1997 and 2006 drafts who were selected as All Stars. Keeping this data point in mind, along with the chart from above (and some boring standard deviation data which you can see in the attached set) I tried to select players who I think could make it as All Stars, and project when they will make the team.

Note: 2015 is this upcoming All-Star game

Player (position)	Draft Year	Model Projected 1st Time Appearance	Model Projected Latest Possible 1st Time Appearance
Serge Ibaka (PF)	2008	2015	2016
Ty Lawson (PG)	2009	2015	2016
Derrick Favors (PF)	2010	2015	2016
Gordon Hayward (SF)	2010	2015	2017
Kemba Walker (PG)	2011	2015	2017
DeMarcus Cousins (C)	2010	2016	2019
Greg Monroe (C)	2010	2016	2019
Lance Stephenson (SG)	2010	2016	2017
Klay Thompson (SG)	2011	2016	2018
Jimmy Butler (SG)	2011	2016	2018
Bradley Beal (SG)	2012	2016	2018
Jonas Valanciunas (C)	2011	2017	2020
Kawhi Leonard (SF)	2011	2017	2019
Victor Oladipo (PG)	2013	2017	2019
Andre Drummond (C)	2012	2018	2021
Tyler Zeller (C)	2012	2018	2021
Terrence Jones (PF)	2012	2018	2020
Draymond Green (PF)	2012	2018	2021
Michael Carter-Williams (PG)	2013	2018	2020
Giannis Antetokounmpo (SG)	2013	2018	2020
Tim Hardaway Jr (SG)	2013	2018	2020
Andrew Wiggins (SF)	2014	2018	2021
Jabari Parker (SF)	2014	2018	2021
Cody Zeller (C)	2013	2019	2022
Kelly Olynyk (C)	2013	2019	2022
Elfrid Payton (PG)	2014	2019	2021
Doug McDermott (SG)	2014	2019	2021
Jusuf Nurkic (C)	2014	2021	2023

Who's the NBA's most Euro-style Big?

The stereotypical European big man is a tall guy (6'10'' or taller, generally) who likes to step out and take threes rather than fight for baskets inside.

I combined shooting data from nba.com/stats with height data from basketball reference to try and find the players in the NBA who, at 6'10'' or taller, take the most shots from outside of 20 feet.

Findings (for data - click here) 

• There are 15 players who are 6'10'' or taller and take more than 40% of their total shots from outside of 20 feet. 
• 7 of 15 are, in fact, European
• It makes a defenders job a lot easier when you know where the players are going to be - Channing Frye only takes 4% of his total shots at the rim. Dirk only takes 8% of his shots at the rim.
• On average this season throughout the league, players who are 6'10'' or taller take 12% of their shots from 20+ feet, and 42% of their shots from inside of 5 feet. Thus the players on the list above are very much a unique group. 

Winner

Steve Novak of the Utah Jazz wins this award and it's not even close. He takes a whopping 77% of his total shots from 20+ feet (while making 59% thus far this season) and has not attempted a single shot from inside of 5 feet. Congratulations Steve!

Steve Novak putting doing his "Discount Double Check" (actually).
Austin Rivers does not approve...

Stats queried on nba.com/stats

Lance Stephenson is Hogging All of the Rebounds!

So far this season Lance Stephenson of the Charlotte Hornets (seen here blowing out the candles on a cake at his 9th birthday) is averaging 10.4 rebounds per game, which is good for 13th in the league.

What makes this especially interesting is that he is only 6'5'' and is, positionally, a shooting guard. As of 11/11, he is averaging more rebounds than 23 out of 30 starting centers in the league, including Charlotte's own starting center Al Jefferson (see chart below). Also this is not just the result of one monster game, as he has four 10+ rebound games in seven games (including 3 games with 13). This isn't a fluke.

Starting Centers in the NBA for Each Team

Stephenson is putting up 23% more rebounds than the next closest guard in the league, Rajon Rondo (who is putting up Jason Kidd type numbers at 9 ppg, 11.2 apg, 8 rpg) and 36% more than the next closest guard after that - James Harden at 6.7 rpg.

Here are a few interesting things that stand out analytically:

• While Stephenson is averaging 2.0 offensive rebounds per game, he is also averaging 3.3 turnovers per game. So while his offensive rebounds save possessions, he is giving up more possessions than he is saving with rebounds. Among those averaging at least 2.0 offensive rebounds per game (55 players) Stephenson has the highest differential in this area. 

• Stephenson is possibly stealing rebounds - By using the NBA.com/stats rebounds dashboard (http://stats.nba.com/player/#!/202362/tracking/rebounds/) , we can see out of the 10.4 rebounds per game, an average of 8.3 are uncontested (no defender within 3.5 of ball). The NBA uses a stat called contested rebound %, and Stephenson's is at 20.5% (8.3/10.4). There is nobody else in the top-20 in the league in rebounds that comes even close to this figure! (see below). Without watching film, it could very well be the case that he is "stealing rebounds" - meaning that he is jumping in front of teammates who could otherwise be getting those rebounds. He is probably stealing them from Al Jefferson - who's defensive rebounding % has gone from 28.3% last season to 15.7% this season.
• Columnist Gregg Doyel wrote about how Lance did this last year on the pacers