Comments on: How Does Pace Really Work?

By: Notes from Golden State » Boston Celtics Basketball – Celtics news, rumors and analysis – CelticsHub.com

Tue, 29 Dec 2009 15:30:39 +0000

[...] * Finally, this loss was extremely rare in one sense: It is the C’s first loss in the last two seasons against one of the league’s five fastest-paced teams in which the C’s played closer to the fast club’s pace than their own middling/slow pace, according to my prior research. [...]

By: Charrua

Charrua — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 00:21:27 +0000

I’m new, but here’s another idea regarding pace.
One of the things that the Celtics defense does well it’s to force turnovers, right? In fact, it’s the one thing they do better than anyone (at least this year). So, it stands to reason that when the defense it’s working well, there are a lot of turnovers and fast breaks, and when it’s not working so well, there are less turnovers and more half court sets, right? Maybe what the weird pace numbers are saying is that the Celtics have been having trouble forcing turnovers against fast teams.

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:02:37 +0000

I want to clarify a sentence above, which should read:

“If Perk gets whistled on a few close calls on screens and the Celts suffer one or two bad bounces, the turnovers are more likely to hurt you in a smaller sample (playing at a slower pace), whereas these things will more likely even out across a greater number of possessions.”

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:58:31 +0000

Actually, I think that what T started to get at is very interesting. Having 10 more possessions a game increases the sample size of the game itself. There is no question that these Celtics are better per possession than almost every team in the league. It stands to reason that if they maximize the number of possessions in the games they play, there will be less noise in the results of the game.

A bad team playing the Celtics will be better off if the game is slow and the Celtics make a few key turnovers because they will have 8 to 12 fewer scoring chances to make up for those turnovers if the game is slowed down. If Perk gets whistled on a few close calls on screens and the Celts suffer one or two bad bounces, then those turnovers are more likely to hurt you in a smaller sample, where these things will more likely even out.

They counter is that pace is more likely to tire the stars, but I think this is somewhat overstated. It doesn’t mean the Celtics have to run the fast break to up their possessions–they can instead deliberately look for shots earlier in the shot clock.

Anyway, I think that you’re on to something here Zach in that the Celts are probably better off with more possessions against bad teams, because they bad breaks aren’t going to bite them. When they’re clearly the better team, they want to have more possessions because they are more likely to end up on top when the sample is larger.

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:46:46 +0000

It seems pretty simple to me: the fast-paced teams included in this sample aren’t very good at basketball. All of the ‘08-’09 teams were in the lottery, and of the ‘09-’10 teams, only the Suns look like the real deal.

By: Hardwood Paroxysm » Blog Archive » Lion Face/Lemon Face 11.16.09: So about the weekend…

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:10:01 +0000

[...] CelticsHub did a breakdown of the Celtics’ issues with pace and discovered something startling. The Celtics are losing games when they control the tempo and winning games when the opponent controls. Could mean nothing, but that’s still pretty weird. The issues I’m seeing are mainly with perimeter defense. The Celtics have been incredibly successful the last few years in packing the lane and forcing you into long-range shots. Essentially, no dunks allowed. But it’s almost as if the perimeter defense is so committed to that that they’re willing to let perimeter shots be taken with no defensive deterrent. In their last four games, one convincing win, two losses, and a stinker win against the lowly God-hated Nets, the Celtics have been terrible at three poitn defense, excluding the Utah cruise. Utah shot 0% from the arc, which is a whole Lemon Face in and of itself. In the Nets, Hawks, and Pacers games? You’re looking at 46%, 27% (not bad), and 50% to the Pacers. You can cut off dribble penetration all you want, but in this league, you do have to run off three point shooters. You’d think the Celtics would have learned that last year from, oh, I don’t know, the Orlando series. [...]

By: Today’s Celtics Links 11/16 « Flceltsfan’s Weblog

Today’s Celtics Links 11/16 « Flceltsfan’s Weblog — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:48:18 +0000

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