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A Good Word on Cotton

So he is like trey burke with speed, quickness and athleticism.

Trey with speed, quickness and athleticism > trey without quickness, speed, and athleticism imo

Burke is a way better passer.

It's okay, we need 3 PGs, and Cotton > Hanlan from what I can tell.
 
Burke is a way better passer

Probably right. I just haven't seen him showcase that particular ability much since he is also a chucker
 
I know he gets hated on a lot, for very good reason, but Burke actually runs the offense pretty well. I wish he would push the pace a lot more, but he does a ton of little things that get overlooked. I truly think he plays a lot better this year. I don't think he'll ever be a good starter, but he should be a very capable backup.
 
I'm not sure it's really relevant to debate "pass-first" vs. "shooting" PG anymore. We're not going to see Stockton-to-Malone or even Williams-to-Boozer. This isn't your father's Utah Jazz. The plays can and will run as much through the wings as they will through the PG. Quin has talked about the playmaking abilities of Burks, Hood and Hayward. To me it seems the most important qualities Quin's system needs is 1) can the player guard his position on the other end; 2) can he hit 3's? And, TBH, I'm not sure we have that in ANY of the PG's currently on the roster. Exum is close...if he can develop a shot.

And I agree with Howard. If Burke can reign in his inner-Iverson, he could be a very competent backup.
 
I know he gets hated on a lot, for very good reason, but Burke actually runs the offense pretty well. I wish he would push the pace a lot more, but he does a ton of little things that get overlooked. I truly think he plays a lot better this year. I don't think he'll ever be a good starter, but he should be a very capable backup.

Dalamon said:
Burke is a way better passer.

Oh, so Burke actually passes the ball. It's been so long since I've seen him do it, I forgot he actually could.
 
Hmm. Not sure how I missed this the first time around. A stat I'm not too familiar with, called PIE:

"So I threw in a new stat that I haven't mentioned before - the PIE stat (or Player Impact Estimate). This is a stat produced by the NBA. Here is what we are told about it:

"It is a simple metric that gives an excellent indication of performance at both the team and player level. It’s a major improvement to our EFF Rating. Notably 2 things changed: (1) We included Personal Fouls, (2) We added a denominator. We feel the key here is the denominator because it acts as an 'automatic equalizer'. Using the denominator, we find there is no need to consider the 'PACE' of the statistics that are being analyzed. In its simplest terms, PIE shows what % of game events did that player or team achieve. The stats being analyzed are your traditional basketball statistics (PTS, REB, AST, TOV, etc..) A team that achieves more than 50% is likely to be a winning team. A player that achieves more than 10% is likely to be better than the average player. A high PIE % is highly correlated to winning. In fact, a team’s PIE rating and a team’s winning percentage correlate at an R square of .908 which indicates a 'strong' correlation. We’ve introduced this statistic because we feel it incorporates a bit of defense into the equation. When a team misses a shot, all 5 players on the other team’s PIE rating goes up."

Here's how to calculate PIE:

(PTS + FGM + FTM - FGA - FTA + DREB + (.5 * OREB) + AST + STL + (.5 * BLK) - PF - TO) / (GmPTS + GmFGM + GmFTM - GmFGA - GmFTA + GmDREB + (.5 * GmOREB) + GmAST + GmSTL + (.5 * GmBLK) - GmPF - GmTO)

Note that a rating of 10% is a player that is "likely better than the average player". Trey had a 6.75% rating in summer league play in his second year versus Cotton's first year rating of 10.33%. Cotton's second year rating jumped to 14.25% (my understanding is that "elite" players fall in the 15-20% range).

What were Cotton's and Trey's PIE rating for the 2014-15 NBA season? Trey came in with a rating of 8.5% and Cotton with a rating of 10.5%.

Getting back to the point. Cotton's first summer league numbers were similar to, if not better than Trey's second summer league stats; and Cotton's second summer league is head and shoulders better than Trey's. When you throw in the NBA season data, it's clear Cotton's the better PG right now."

Link:

https://www.slcdunk.com/2015/9/1/9061213/why-i-will-be-burned-at-the-stake-prior-to-my-41st-birthday
 
Hmm. Not sure how I missed this the first time around. A stat I'm not too familiar with, called PIE:

"So I threw in a new stat that I haven't mentioned before - the PIE stat (or Player Impact Estimate). This is a stat produced by the NBA. Here is what we are told about it:

"It is a simple metric that gives an excellent indication of performance at both the team and player level. It’s a major improvement to our EFF Rating. Notably 2 things changed: (1) We included Personal Fouls, (2) We added a denominator. We feel the key here is the denominator because it acts as an 'automatic equalizer'. Using the denominator, we find there is no need to consider the 'PACE' of the statistics that are being analyzed. In its simplest terms, PIE shows what % of game events did that player or team achieve. The stats being analyzed are your traditional basketball statistics (PTS, REB, AST, TOV, etc..) A team that achieves more than 50% is likely to be a winning team. A player that achieves more than 10% is likely to be better than the average player. A high PIE % is highly correlated to winning. In fact, a team’s PIE rating and a team’s winning percentage correlate at an R square of .908 which indicates a 'strong' correlation. We’ve introduced this statistic because we feel it incorporates a bit of defense into the equation. When a team misses a shot, all 5 players on the other team’s PIE rating goes up."

Here's how to calculate PIE:

(PTS + FGM + FTM - FGA - FTA + DREB + (.5 * OREB) + AST + STL + (.5 * BLK) - PF - TO) / (GmPTS + GmFGM + GmFTM - GmFGA - GmFTA + GmDREB + (.5 * GmOREB) + GmAST + GmSTL + (.5 * GmBLK) - GmPF - GmTO)

Note that a rating of 10% is a player that is "likely better than the average player". Trey had a 6.75% rating in summer league play in his second year versus Cotton's first year rating of 10.33%. Cotton's second year rating jumped to 14.25% (my understanding is that "elite" players fall in the 15-20% range).

What were Cotton's and Trey's PIE rating for the 2014-15 NBA season? Trey came in with a rating of 8.5% and Cotton with a rating of 10.5%.

Getting back to the point. Cotton's first summer league numbers were similar to, if not better than Trey's second summer league stats; and Cotton's second summer league is head and shoulders better than Trey's. When you throw in the NBA season data, it's clear Cotton's the better PG right now."

Link:

https://www.slcdunk.com/2015/9/1/9061213/why-i-will-be-burned-at-the-stake-prior-to-my-41st-birthday
I'd like to see a list of PIE numbers for everyone in the NBA (or at least everyone on the Jazz) in order to evaluate how relevant this calculation is. Do you know where anything like that is?
 
I'd like to see a list of PIE numbers for everyone in the NBA (or at least everyone on the Jazz) in order to evaluate how relevant this calculation is. Do you know where anything like that is?

Good point. It should be somewhere on this site:

https://stats.nba.com/

Not that I've found it yet. If I am able to figure it out, I'll post it.

OK, that didn't take long. Just find the player you're interested in, and click on the last name. You can get all that player's stats, but the PIE is right there on the first page for that player. I don't know if you can find a PIE running list, from highest to lowest, but you can at least click on each Jazz player and get the PIE for each.

As an example, Dante's is 3.7% for last season. Which might lead one to conclude the point made by this writer is very weak. But, it's the NBA claiming how relevant it is, so draw your own conclusions. I would not take Dante's 3.7% and predict failure, that 's for sure. In any event, Cotton's sample is still very small.

While I'm here, I'll make what I think is the only real prediction I've actually made about Cotton: he will excel, stand out, in training camp. He will stand out and erase any thought on the part of the FO that they need to sign another guard this season.
 
I'd like to see a list of PIE numbers for everyone in the NBA (or at least everyone on the Jazz) in order to evaluate how relevant this calculation is. Do you know where anything like that is?

OK, here are some.....

Cotton 10.5%
Gobert 16%
Favors 13.8%
Hayward 13.9%
Hood 8%
Ingles 7.2%
Burks 8.3%
Burke 8.5%
Exum 3.7%
Withey 9.8%
Millsap 4.9%
Booker 10.6%
 
And here are the PIE's for 3 elite players....

Chris Paul 17.3%
Lebron James 17.1%
Stephen Curry 17.8%

So, it would seem elite players will fall between 15-20%. And by that figure, Gobert is in the elite range at 16%, with Hayward and Favors not far behind. I would imagine Dante's PIE is low due to his offensive limitations or "struggles" last season.
 
OK, here are some.....

Cotton 10.5%
Gobert 16%
Favors 13.8%
Hayward 13.9%
Hood 8%
Ingles 7.2%
Burks 8.3%
Burke 8.5%
Exum 3.7%
Withey 9.8%
Millsap 4.9%
Booker 10.6%
Interesting. If this stat is a relevant measure of performance (and it looks like it might be) then the things you have been saying about Cotton are going to prove true. We don't have a number for Neto, but Cotton's number is way better than his other competition.

BTW, if I'm understanding the formula correctly it appears to adjust downward for blocks and offensive rebounds (two of the categories Gobert excels in) but he still turns in a stellar number. And on that same subject, I don't see why an offensive rebound should be weighted less than a defensive rebound. If anything, it should be worth more. Nor do I understand why a block should only be worth half of the other stats.
 
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