Fansided

Nylon Calculus: How’s it goink for 3-point oriented teams in the playoffs?

By Drew Steele

HOUSTON, TX - MAY 24: Eric Gordon #10 of the Houston Rockets shoots against Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors in the first half of Game Five of the Western Conference Finals of the 2018 NBA Playoffs at Toyota Center on May 24, 2018 in Houston, Texas. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Bob Levey/Getty Images)
HOUSTON, TX - MAY 24: Eric Gordon #10 of the Houston Rockets shoots against Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors in the first half of Game Five of the Western Conference Finals of the 2018 NBA Playoffs at Toyota Center on May 24, 2018 in Houston, Texas. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Bob Levey/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit

Let me take you back to May 10, 2015, at 10:28 AM. For those who care about NBA memes, this is one of the more important dates in NBA history.

That was the day legendary coach and failed NBA executive Phil Jackson tweeted out this fantastic tweet.

What spurred Jackson to use a term that he considered New York slang (it’s not) to address 3-point shooting in the NBA? The Golden State Warriors faced off against the Memphis Grizzlies the night before in the Western Conference Semifinals. The Warriors lost Game 3, going down 2–1 in the series, and shot 23.1 percent on 26 3-point shot attempts. During the 2014–15 season, Golden State seventh in 3-point attempt rate and first in 3-point percentage while Memphis was 29th and 23rd, respectively.

Jackson’s tweet came off as a harsh, prisoner of the moment criticism, suggesting that the Warriors’ high-volume and efficient 3-point shooting that helped them win 67 games was abandoning them in the playoffs. The Zen Master clarified his tweet in an interview with the New York Times a month later with the following response:

"They have all these analysts. I just wanted to see someone come back to me with statistics: Is 3-point shooting in the playoffs as consistent as it is in the regular season? Does your 3-point-shooting percentage change because you’re in the playoffs? No one figured that one out. And that’s probably me being obtuse to leave it open at the end."

There is more to the response, but it has to do with defining “goink” and that’s an entirely separate subject to address. What I do want to address are the following questions Jackson poses both in his interview as well as the inference of the tweet — or maybe I should say what the public is assuming Jackson is suggesting.

Is 3-point shooting in the playoffs as consistent as it is in the regular season?

Does being a high-volume 3-point shooting team affect its win percentage in the playoffs?

To address these questions, I collected per-100 possession team data for both the regular season and playoffs from the 1996-97 season through the 2017-18 season via NBA.com. The first question was a simple approach where I compared the means and standard deviations of 3-pointers made, 3-pointers attempted, and 3-point percentage for the respective populations. The results are in the table below:

For the most part, the figures do not fluctuate significantly. There are some small differences such as the playoff 3-point rate slightly increases and the 3-point percentage slightly decreases compared to the regular season. The standard deviations do not differ much at all, except for the 3-point percentage figures. There is a notable difference between the fluctuation in the regular season and playoff 3-point shooting efficiency where there is a larger deviation from the mean in the playoffs, suggesting that 3-point efficiency is not as consistent in the playoffs versus the regular season.

One very important factor to keep in mind is that 3-point shooting is a volatile metric that takes a significant sample to stabilize, and the playoffs are not always a significant sample size. It’s understandable that there would be a larger variation when 53 teams shot less than 30 percent from behind the arc and only eight of those teams played 10 games or more. There’s also the issue of defenses generally being tougher in the playoffs.

Jackson’s clarification question via the Times interview may be cleared up, but the real fun is addressing his sassy tweet. How do 3-point oriented teams fare in the playoffs?

To determine that we first need to determine who is considered a “3-point oriented team.” Using the same 1996-97 through 2017-18 time frame as before, I calculated the standard deviation of 3-point rate for each regular season. If a team had a 3PAr greater than or equal to one standard deviation above the mean, they received the dummy variable “1” and teams that did not fit that criteria received a “0” dummy value. I then performed a linear regression on the playoff per-100 team data with the dependent variable being Win Percentage and the following independent variables:

  1. 3PAr Dummy Variable
  2. 3-pointers Made
  3. 3-pointers Attempted
  4. 2-pointers Made
  5. 2-pointers Attempted
  6. Free Throws Made
  7. Free Throws Attempted
  8. Rebounds
  9. Assists
  10. Turnovers
  11. Steals
  12. Blocks
  13. Personal Fouls

Below is a table of the results:

Holding all other variables constant, every unit increase in 3PAr Dummy Variable, the variation of Win Percentage is increased. Translation: 3-point oriented teams — defined as teams that shoot one standard deviation or greater above the 3PAr mean during the regular season — positively affect the variation of their win percentage in the playoffs compared to teams that are not 3-point oriented.

Next: Grayson Allen, draft stock and quantifying the decision to go pro

Phil Jackson’s assessment in his sarcastic tweet is in fact, not true. Teams like the Houston Rockets of this past season — a Chris Paul injury away from reaching and winning the NBA Finals — the 2015-16 Cleveland Cavaliers, and the 2010-11 Dallas Mavericks were not at any disadvantage for being 3-point oriented.

Seriously, how’s it goink?

Home/Nylon Calculus