Frye It Up

by Dave on Jul 10, 2007 1:27 AM PDT in News

In response to yesterday's question the amazing ZiggyBlazer sent in the following analysis:

Did a little study on Channing Frye for your question about The Buffet Of Goodness.

I compared Frye, Zach, Chris Wilcox and Shareef for the last 2 seasons.

Offense per 100 possessions while on the floor
Frye - 105.7
Zach - 105.1
Wilcox - 112
Rahim - 108.5

Offense per 100 possessions while off the floor
Frye - 106.2
Zach - 102
Wilcox - 107.5
Rahim - 106.8

Defense per 100 possessions while on the floor
Frye - 109.2
Zach - 112.8
Wilcox - 113.9
Rahim - 108.5

Defense per 100 possessions while off the floor
Frye - 112.1
Zach - 111.2
Wilcox - 113.1
Rahim - 106.3

So based upon the above Frye had the greatest impact of the 4 on his contribution to his teams defense. His team was 3 points per 100 possession better defensively with him on the floor. Wilcox was next best (0.8 points better), then Zach (1.6 points worse), then Rahim (2.3 points worse).

Wilcox had the greatest impact of the 4 on his contribution to his teams offense. His team was 4.4 points per 100 possession better offensively with him on the floor. Zach was next best (3.05 points better), then Rahim (1.65 points better), then Frye (0.5 points worse).

Overall per 100 possessions the net Plus/Minus score for the four
Wilcox +3.6 points
Frye +2.5 points
Randolph +1.45 points
Rahim --0.65 points

When Frye was on the floor the opponents FG% was 0.95% lower than when he was off the floor.
When Randolph was on the floor the opponents FG% was 1.4% higher than when he was off the floor.
When Wilcox was on the floor the opponents FG% was 0.90% higher than when he was off the floor.
When Rahim was on the floor the opponents FG% was 1.10% higher than when he was off the floor.

When Frye was on the floor his teams FG% was 2.15% lower than when he was off the floor.
When Randolph was on the floor his teams FG% was 0.70% higher than when he was off the floor.
When Wilcox was on the floor his teams FG% was 3.30% higher than when he was off the floor.
When Rahim was on the floor his teams FG% was 0.85% higher than when he was off the floor.

So from all of that Frye is clearly the best defender of the 4. When he is on the floor his teams defense improves. Rahim was the worst defender, followed closely by Zach.

On the offensive end Frye was the least effective of the 4. Zach's individual numbers are better than Wilcox and Rahim, but because of the demands placed on all the players and the other contributors on the team, Wilcox was the overall most effective offensive player of the 4. Clearly Wilcox helped Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis become very effective, through setting better picks, and help create spacing and pace. Wilcox clearly help Allen and Lewis much more than Zach helped Roy, Jack, Aldridge. Frye did the least to help, so obviously he didn't contribute much as the other 3 passing the ball, setting picks, spacing the floor, etc.

Overall of the four Frye did more to help his team than Zach and Rahim, but not as much as Wilcox.

Another way to look at things is look at Wins and Losses when the player was on the floor. During a players stint on the court did his team win for that "x" minute stretch of time.

Over the last 2 years the Sonics were 76-95 with Wilcox on the floor, a .444 winning %. Overall the Sonics had a .402 winning % during those 2 years, so they were .042 better with Wilcox on the floor. That equates to 6.89 wins over 2 seasons.

The Kings were 81-103 with Rahim on the floor, a .440 winning %. Overall the Kings had a .470 winning % during those 2 years, so they were .030 worse with Rahim on the floor. That equates to 4.92 losses over 2 seasons. The curse of Shareef Abdur Rahim lives. He can put up good numbers individually, but he always makes his team worse.

The Blazers were 98-136 with Zach on the floor, a .419 winning %. Overall the Blazers had a .323 winning % during those 2 years, so they were .096 better with Zach on the floor. That equates to 15.74 wins over 2 seasons. Obviously Zach didn't have much help the last 2 seasons, so he was critical to have on the floor. The Blazers would have been bad on an historical scale without Zach, because they were pretty bad with him, and he was the most important player both seasons.

The Knicks were 93-128 with Frye on the floor, a .421 winning %. Overall the Knicks had a .342 winning % during those 2 years, so they were .079 better with Frye on the floor. That equates to 12.96 wins over 2 seasons. Frye was much better in 05-06 than 06-07. He helped the Knicks a lot, and without him they would have been much worse defensively. Brown utilized his skills well, Thomas not so well, but overall Thomas won more games.

That's a brainful and more but it does bring hope that maybe the talent imbalance in the trade was not as severe as it seemed at first blush. Thanks again to Ziggy!

--Dave (blazersub@yahoo.com)

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Comments

I'm a little dubious

about this kind of analysis. Statistics can be very misleading without any kind of context.

by jayseyfield on Jul 10, 2007 2:27 AM PDT reply actions

I'm a little skeptical

of stuff like this. There are so many variables and wrinkles to the game that I think it is hard to measure stuff like "winning" or "losing" on a individual scale. Having said that, big up to ZiggyBlazer for the hard work. Its a lot of fun to speculate how Frye will do in Portland and how Zach will do in New York.

by JPop on Jul 10, 2007 3:49 AM PDT reply actions

I love stats as much (or more)

than anybody and I also love analysis, but I seldom draw conclusions beyond "it makes it look like...". In this case (and casting no asparagus on Ziggy) I would almost say "throw them out" because this isn't tennis, it's a team game. Who else was on the floor at the time - who was on the floor for the opposing teams? So many intangibles.

I hope Channing Frye is not reading anything in the media right now - too many people around the country have put him under the microscope. "Let's see how he does" has evolved into "this is what he'll do." I'd much rather read about him coming out to Las Vegas to meet the team, bonding with Aldridge, becoming a Blazer in his mind.

by jorga on Jul 10, 2007 6:09 AM PDT reply actions

Great food for thought!

I loved the stats, Ziggy! Keep 'em coming! We all know that there are inumerable ways to interpret statistics, and all of them are right to some degree.

I liked your data set. Using the full two years of Frye's career, and including the best season of Zach's. Adding in the othe two players was helpful as well. I also appreciated your interpretation of what the stats meant.

It's true that none of it might be accurate, but this at least gives us a point of reference for an unknown commodity.

Thanks again!

by Steve The Hedge on Jul 10, 2007 8:21 AM PDT reply actions

Interesting stats, but...

Of the 4 guys you compared, Frye played only two seasons while the other 3 you can reasonably call veterans. Thus, they have much larger sample sizes. In essence I'd just like to say it'd be best to allow Frye to play without too many expectations. Give him a chance to prove himself a new player (or hopefully, the player of old with the upside of Dirk Nowitzki). It'd be silly to get hopped up on the thoughts that he's going to be a defensive force. Of the two years I've been watching Frye, I would never have thought he'd be anywhere near a defensive force - he just might have been featured in lineups that allowed less points than other Knicks' lineups. But again, he's young, he's learning, and I think he's going to get better and better at the defensive end, especially against centers.

by slyguy on Jul 10, 2007 8:43 AM PDT reply actions

Interesting stuff regardless of conclusions.

by bfan on Jul 10, 2007 9:14 AM PDT reply actions

Stat buffet

Somebody get the anti-grabs on Ziggyblazer and beam him in to space before he blows this blog apart!

2-4 the who

by 24thewho on Jul 10, 2007 9:26 AM PDT reply actions

The use and abuse of stats

I think jayseyfield, jpop, and jorga all make a valid point. You have to be careful in using stats, and making grand proclamations regarding them. I tried not to do that, but I am sure that I probably did overstate the significance of some things.

At the same time I did try and get a reasonable data set to evaluate. I looked at the same time frame for all 4 players, the last 2 years. In Frye's case this is a data set of 3,466 minutes played, and 221 separate instances where Frye was "on the floor". One thing to remember about all 221 instances when Frye was on the floor, the only common player in all 221 instances is Frye. Marbury played with Frye very often, as did Curry. But during those 221 instances Frye was the only player on the floor every single time. During those 221 instances the Knick's outscored their opponents at a much higher rate than they did excluding these 221 instances.

I wanted to give a little different perspective than the typical 23-10 measurements for Zach, and to put all of that into a context of somewhat similar players, playing a similar position, on teams with somewhat similar records. That is the reason why I chose the 4 I did.

With regards to Frye his rookie year (05-06) was far better than last year. That explains why he was untouchable last summer, but was available this summer. Which one will be a Blazer is going to be an interesting development.

Another way to look at the 4 is to look at their "Fair Salary" based upon their relative contribution. I get this from 82games.com, and they have 05-06 done, but they don't have 06-07 done yet. So looking at 05-06 these are the results

Frye $5.36 million
Randolph $5.85 million
Rahim $6.30 million
Wilcox $5.18 million (Wilcox is for his time in Seattle only, so I adjusted his numbers up to 82 games, not really the best way to do it, but it does serve to put things into context)

As a rookie Frye compared very well to the other three players. Now in 06-07 Zach got fully healthy and took great strides forward, and Frye took a step back.

From a "Moneyball" perspective, Frye was a great deal, and Zach (who was just coming back from micro-fracture surgery) a poor deal in 05-06. Frye was paid about $2.2 million for $5.4 million in production. Zach was paid $10.7 and contributed $5.9 million.

In 06-07 both contributed closer to their salaries, Frye getting paid about $2.5 million Zach $11.3 million.

In the end this is about getting a player who is not as good as Zach, but costs about 75% less, thus allowing us to pay Oden, Roy, LA et al, while still getting a good contribution at a fair salary from Frye.

If I get a chance I will try and do a comparison regarding some of the other stats collected by 82games.com, such as passing, turnovers, rebounding etc.

by ziggythebeagle on Jul 10, 2007 9:42 AM PDT reply actions

Plus

Frye won't cost the PPD any overtime...

by jorga on Jul 10, 2007 11:00 AM PDT up reply actions

interesting but basically useless

You just cant put a stat on how a much a guy contributes to his team winning. These type of stats can be twisted in many different ways, depending on who you want the stat to work for or against. The problem is Zach is a 35+ minute starter and Frye is more of a role player. Also, Frye gets more chances to play against the opponents bench, where Zach and Wilcox are playing starter minutes, mostly against other starters. Just way too many variables in this type of analysis, it is interesting though.

by myemic23 on Jul 10, 2007 11:46 AM PDT reply actions

It's important to note ...

that someone kind of high up in the Blazer organization is a purported proponent of such statistical analyses: Kevin Pritchard. Nobody but Pritchard and his staff knows what the formula is that they use, but it's likely to contain some similar statistics to the ones that Ziggy used here, so it's fair to assume that Pritchard likes the picture that these stats paint--even if it's more of an impressionist nature than realist.

by bfan on Jul 10, 2007 1:38 PM PDT reply actions

I appreciated this

thanks for taking the time Ziggy. It's an interesting perspective and I liked how you tried to go apples to apples. At the end of the day I take this as encouraging tidbits that he could be a really nice piece for us but ultimately we won't find out until he suits up.

His past performance is no guarantee of future performance (or whatever it is they always say on a prospectus) so we'll know around Christmas but great summertime fodder. Thanks.

I'm a buffet of goodness.

by TP43 on Jul 10, 2007 5:37 PM PDT reply actions

Ouch, my head hurts !

Dave,
I didn't know that we had to be a math
major to follow this blog. Maybe I can throw
some history/poly sci towards Nate or Luke's
career. College math classes were always held
first thing in the morning and it was doubly
hard to concentrate.

Here is my math formula for the Blazers:
(Nate + Roy)-Zbo x LMA(15lbs)+ JJ & Martell
x 3 + GO - 2(Tonsils) = DYNASTY

That's all the math we need !!!

It's GO time !

by walkoff41 on Jul 10, 2007 6:38 PM PDT reply actions

Cool

I had breakfast at a place on Macadam on February, 6th of 2005 and Derick Anderson came in and picked up some food, then Shareef Abdur-Rahim came in alone and had steak and eggs covered in cheese. The Blazers beat the Kings that night.

I'd like to know if the statistics change for Shareef if he had steak and eggs covered in cheese for breakfast before the games.

"Aloha" is mostly used in customer service, everyone else says, "howzit?"

by tominhawaii on Jul 10, 2007 8:53 PM PDT reply actions