From TrueHoop: “Dr. Oliver Eslinger is the associate head coach at MIT, where the players are really smart. Over the last season, Eslinger tells me, the MIT team has started to put their player’s IQs to good use by using all kinds of stat geek type numbers to inform the team’s strategy. He tells me the insight from the numbers has actually led to some wins. And now he has used some of their numbers to analyze Team USA, and make a case that Dwyane Wade has been the most effective player so far.”
Now, don’t get me wrong, I love the stats, and I mean no disrespect to Dr. Oliver Eslinger or MIT, but anyone who watched the games could tell you that Dwyane Wade has been Team USA’s most effective player so far. I haven’t looked at a single stat from the tournament, but Wade’s stood out with energy on defense, and efficiency on offense. Do we really need a statistician to tell us this? Sometimes I think we spend all this time creating stats that end up telling us exactly what we’d know if we simply bothered to pay attention during the game. /end rant




August 21st, 2008 at 2:13 pm
[…] Original post by seth […]
August 21st, 2008 at 7:40 pm
I like the rant…you’re completely right — stats only mean so much. In this case, it was just out of curiosity to see who came out on top and the order of the rest. Of course, D-Wade is the man and it will be exciting to see what he and his teammates have in store the rest of the Games…
-Doc