On Chemistry and Shooting
Much of the concern over San Antonio’s recent play comes down to the vague and unquantifiable designation of “poor chemistry.” It’s true, and anyone who has watched the team this year would say so.
Something to note is that the Spurs, though an improved offensive team, have had more than a few ugly bouts of poor shooting this season. Manu Ginobili, as one example, is shooting career lows. Some of his numbers have dropped 10 and 15 percent. That hurts a team like the Spurs-who depend on hitting open shots-more than we imagine.
Putting these two things together, I was reminded of a bit of reflection from Wayne Winston. I’ll leave it to you to think through the implications.
When [Joakim] Noah and [Tyrus] Thomas were on the court, they lost by ten points a game. I mean, they sucked.
Here’s my theory on that, because the Mavericks had the same problem. We look at every lineup, we know how good the players were [note: Winston is talking about his own adjusted +/- ratings, which he says are somewhat similar to what’s on basketballvalue.com]. So you talk about chemistry. Chemistry means the lineup played better than what you’d expect from the players. Negative chemistry means they play worse. The holy grail, which I need to work on, and I’m not sure it’s obtainable … is to figure out what characterizes the lineups that tend to play better, and what characterizes the lineups that play worse.
My theory on the lineups that play worse is that they have two guys who can’t hit the broad side of a barn. Like, Noah and Thomas, their effective field goal percentage is like 30 percent. Dampier and George, those two have no jump shot. I’m not positive, this would take a lot of statistical analysis, but I think that’s what we’re seeing. That’s the key.
