[Cracked Sidewalks] Welcome John Dawson! Did Buzz mention you might be playing some point for an Elite 8 team in 2014?

[CrackedSidewalksSays]

Welcome John Dawson!  Did Buzz mention you might be playing some point for an Elite 8 team in 2014?

Written by: noreply@blogger.com (bamamarquettefan1)

Buzz Williams continued to find unexpected talent this week when point guard John Dawson â€" the 2nd best player in New Mexico, signed for next season.  Granted it’s not a big basketball state, but Buzz seems to like finding players not under the spotlight.  Two years removed from having Dwight Buycks have to move from shooting guard to point guard, Williams seems to want to take no chances on being without options at the point after Junior Cadougan graduates this year.  If the description on future150.com is at all accurate, Dawson could be a great addition at the point.

"Dawson has elite court vision and the ability to make all his teammates better. He can score on all 3 levels. He loves getting out in transition where he is pretty much unstoppable when attacking the rim. He has excellent ball handling skills and can knock down the open 3-point shot with consistency. His length and athleticism and being 6'4" is what sets him apart from other point guards in the class."

Welcome to Marquette Mr. Dawson â€" and your timing may be perfect.
While the Value Add database currently pegs Marquette as a respectable 25th best team in the country heading into the upcoming 2013 season, the new roster with Dawson now shows Marquette as the 4thbest team in the country in 2014 with a legit shot at an Elite 8 if it stays in place and no one gets TOO good this year and makes it to the NBA.
The following is the projected 2014 Value Add roster by class and then name.


PlayerHtClassOffDefPG PerValue Add[/tr]

Burton, Deonte	6'5"	1 Fr	2.04	-0.91	0.00	2.95
Dawson, John	6'2"	1 Fr	0.64	-0.29	0.50	1.43
Wilson, Duane	6'3"	1 Fr	1.81	-0.81	0.50	3.12
Ferguson, Jamal	6'3"	2 So	2.44	-0.51	0.00	2.95
Taylor, Steve	6'7"	2 So	2.85	-0.60	0.00	3.46
Anderson, Juan	6'6"	3 Jr	2.35	-0.84	0.00	3.19
Mayo, Todd	6'3"	3 Jr	3.29	-0.71	0.00	3.99
McKay, Jameel	6'8"	3 Jr	3.40	1.60	0.00	5.00
Wilson, Derrick	6'0"	3 Jr	0.38	-0.82	0.00	1.20
Blue, Vander	6'4"	4 Sr	2.75	-1.26	0.00	4.01
Gardner, Davante	6'8"	4 Sr	4.23	-1.31	0.00	5.54
Otule, Chris	6'11"	4 Sr	0.01	-2.41	0.00	2.42
Thomas, Jake	6'3"	4 Sr	1.73	0.00	0.00	1.73
Wilson, Jamil	6'7"	4 Sr	2.17	-1.90	0.00	4.07
Total Value Add						45.06

This is a roster without super stars, as no player projects to have anywhere near the 9.0% Value Add that notes an All-American, but EIGHT players project to be above 3.0%, which is the level at which a player is a good BCS starter.  Deonte Burton barely misses that mark at 2.95%, so MU literally could have a roster of nine players who should be starting at the BCS level, and everyone should be good enough to contribute.  Of course there will always be those who excel or fall off the pace, but with these kind of odds it seems MU will have one of the strongest benches in the country and Dawson and his highly recruited teammate point guard Duane Wilson may have a choice of weapons to set up when they are on the court.
Back in May, I put out the rankings for the top 50 teams of 2014, and MU actually fell back several spots at one point.  However, after Dawson signed I updated all signings to date (the dump is not yet complete at www.valueaddbasketball.com but will be shortly), and the following are the new rankings.  Kentucky and UNC are always undervalued to some degree because they have so many NBA-bound players that it is tricky to project who will still be around in two years and if the players moving up from the bench are as good as advertised when they were recruited.  However, even assuming both will move to the top by next season, Marquette is on course for a team good enough to be in the Elite 8 for the first time since 2003.  I stretched the list to the traditional top 64 number for the tournament, mainly because a couple of Big East teams are creeping onto the list.
This is based on the projected Value Add of every player currently scheduled to be on the roster in 2014.  If a team is projected to lose more than one player to the NBA, we assume they will lose half of the potential draftees overall value (so Kentucky is assumed to lose two of their current four prospects, but not all four).  As outlined in the earlier piece, if a team averages getting at least 3.0% of Value Add each year from their new freshman recruiting class, but they do not have that much freshman talent signed yet, then we add a figure to assume they get to that level.  For example, Calipari averages getting 12.1% of Value Add out of each freshman class, and has only signed 1.3% so far for 2014 because he has the luxury of waiting to pick the top few that emerge.  Therefore we add 10.8% to Kentucky’s total after we assume they lose two of their four potential NBA draft picks.  Marquette has already exceeded it’s typical 3.1% with the excellent signing class, so we do not assume any more for them â€" though of course that can happen with late signings.

2014 rankTeamRosterFreshman est.Total[/tr]

1	Texas	45.25	9.3	54.55
2	Indiana	50.19		50.19
3	Memphis	49.64		49.64
4	Marquette	46.06		46.06
5	Michigan St.	40.6	3.8	44.4
6	Arizona	44.14		44.14
7	Providence	39.77	3.7	43.47
8	Maryland	41.24	1.7	42.94
9	Iowa	40.11	2.7	42.81
10	UCLA	40.4		40.4
11	North Carolina St.	40.02		40.02
12	Kentucky	29.13	10.8	39.93
13	North Carolina	39.78		39.78
14	California	39.77		39.77
15	Michigan	39.63		39.63
16	Notre Dame	39.21		39.21
17	Louisville	38.95		38.95
18	Ohio St.	34.23	3.2	37.43
19	Virginia	36.47		36.47
20	Stanford	36.12		36.12
21	Arkansas	35.06		35.06
22	Georgetown	32.78	2.2	34.98
23	Connecticut	31.58	2.5	34.08
24	Baylor	31.16	2.5	33.66
25	Alabama	32.63		32.63
26	Florida	32.58		32.58
27	Pittsburgh	32.29		32.29
28	Nevada Las Vegas	31.82		31.82
29	Kansas	31.76		31.76
30	Houston	31.48		31.48
31	Georgia Tech	30.19		30.19
32	Colorado	29.72	0.1	29.82
33	West Virginia	29.43		29.43
34	Duke	27.84	1.4	29.24
35	Villanova	27.49	1.6	29.09
36	Oklahoma St.	29.07		29.07
37	Texas Tech	28.98		28.98
38	Syracuse	27.04	1.8	28.84
39	New Mexico	28.11		28.11
40	Mississippi	24.41	3.1	27.51
41	Iowa St.	27.24		27.24
42	Purdue	26.99		26.99
43	Rutgers	22.49	4.3	26.79
44	Xavier	26.44		26.44
45	Texas A&M	26.13		26.13
46	Harvard	25.78		25.78
47	Oregon St.	25.6		25.6
48	South Carolina	24.39		24.39
49	South Carolina Upstate	24.07		24.07
50	Richmond	24.05		24.05
51	Wisconsin	24		24
52	Virginia Commonwealth	23.99		23.99
53	Louisiana St.	23.92		23.92
54	Seton Hall	23.89		23.89
55	La Salle	23.43		23.43
56	Illinois	23.1		23.1
57	Tennessee	22.65		22.65
58	DePaul	22.49		22.49
59	Virginia Tech	22.18		22.18
60	Oklahoma	22.17		22.17
61	South Florida	22.17		22.17
62	Minnesota	21.63		21.63
63	Missouri	21.01		21.01
64	Wake Forest	20.74		20.74

http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2012/09/welcome-john-dawson-did-buzz-mention.html

[The Equalizer]

MU seems pretty simple--you've listed 13 scholarship players (and 1 walk-on--Jake Thomas) on our list of 14 players.  Tallied up the Value Add score, and reported a total of 44.06.

Where I'm having a harder time is understanding the ranking against other teams that have significant gaps in their rosters.

Take, for example, Louisville.  They're #17 on your chart with a score of 38.95. On ValueAddBasketball.com, Louisville has only 7 players listed for 2014, totalling 38.52 points, so it doesn't look like you made assumptions on what type of players they would use to fill out their roster.  

If UL adds 6 players, each with a Value Add of 1.43 (equivalent to the value of MU's Dawson), would their score increase by 8.58, bringing them to 47.53?    

I would think that approach probably understates UL's total ValueAdd.  Based on their recruiting history, I doubt they fill 6 roster spots with Dawson-equivalents.  My guess is at least one or two are the equivalent of a McKay or better.  Two 5 point players combined with four 1.43 players such recruits would put them ahead of Texas.

Am I missing something, or is the team-to-team comparision not really valid until we know how teams will fill their rosters for 2014?

It would be interesting to see what would happen to the team rankings if you assumed full rosters of 13 players with some minimum value reflecting traditional recruiting prowess -- say 3 ValueAdd points for each player on any team normally in the top 25, 2 points for each player for teams ranked 25-50, and 1 point for each player for everyone else.

[bamamarquettefan]

You make an excellent, excellent point and I may adopt your suggestion exactly.  I had tried to estimate the "filling the freshman class" simply by making sure the team had their typical class, but you are correct - actually plugging the number of spots would be the more effective mode.  Then we would start with the Louisville roster that you elude to (below are the Value Adds for each player).  This may take a little bit to automate the process somewhat- but I am going to hack away at it and get an updated set of numbers and method moving forward.  Thank you!

Dieng, Gorgui   9   4 Sr
Behanan, Chane   8.66   3 Jr
Upshaw, Robert   5.76   2 So
Smith, Russ   4.95   4 Sr
Rozier, Terry   3.25   2 So
Anton Gill   2.95   1 Fr
Terry Rozier   2.44   1 Fr
Akoy Agau   1.94   1 Fr
   38.95   

[bilsu]

Does Swanson have any value? He should be on the team in 2014.

[bamamarquettefan]

He does not project to have Value in 2014, and my report was just generated players with Value for all teams.

I will add him back to the list when I update however.

Thanks.

[UticaBusBarn]

As always, good "stuff" and most interesting. One question this long time Warrior fan has raised before is the value of the coach.

If one were to take your value added calculation at the beginning of the season, and then take the same number at the end of the season, might not this provide a valid indication of the "value added" by the coach?

Obviously, talent is talent. Just as obviously, some players develop and become better, and others do not. The factory schools (KU, Duke, et al.) seem to get the best 20, or so players a year, and usually at the end of the season end up meeting their value added rank.

However, what talent did Coach Williams' second "pee wee" team have? Is it not true that Coach Williams appears to "grow" players AND get his guys to play hard, unselfish, team basketball, usually playing above where they should play?

Can this coaching ability be measured, and, how would some of the leading coaches compare one to the other?

Again, if the value added results in a probability of the 30th ranked team, but the team ends up in the top ten is not that an indication of the value added of a coach? Conversely, if Indiana is projected as number one based on value added, but ends up 10th, does that not indicate a short fall in the coaching for that year?
And, if one were to run the probability numbers for a minimum 3 year period, would one not have some further indication of a coaches value?

As always, thank you for all your insights.

[77ncaachamps]

Wow. Jamal AND Deonte register at 2.95?!

I don't know whether that's good for a soph equalling a phenomenal fresh, or a fresh equalling a soph!?!

[bilsu]

He does not project to have Value in 2014, and my report was just generated players with Value for all teams.

I will add him back to the list when I update however.

Thanks.

How does Swanson who averaged 3.6 pts and 1.9 rebounds in 13.2 minutes as a freshmen at Idaho St project with no value? I am not arguing that he is a star, but he must have some value.

[brewcity77]

How does Swanson who averaged 3.6 pts and 1.9 rebounds in 13.2 minutes as a freshmen at Idaho St project with no value? I am not arguing that he is a star, but he must have some value.

I could be wrong on this, but I believe Value Add takes into account a player's value to that specific team. So looking at a Marquette team in 2013-14 that projects to have him behind Burton, Ferguson, Taylor, Anderson, Mayo, McKay, Blue, and Jamil at the 2-4 positions probably would project to a guy that gets minimal minutes at best. I'm sure that on Idaho State he'd project to have value because a freshman getting 13.4 minutes would likely get more (and thus play a more significant role) on a team with their level of talent as a sophomore and junior, but at Marquette, he simply wouldn't be expected to play enough minutes to register an added value.

[bilsu]

Yes, but generally, no matter how good he is, the 13th player on the team is not going to get much playing time. The value of the 13th best player comes in practice and if the team gets hit with a lot of injuries.

[bamamarquettefan]

How does Swanson who averaged 3.6 pts and 1.9 rebounds in 13.2 minutes as a freshmen at Idaho St project with no value? I am not arguing that he is a star, but he must have some value.

A good question, and while BrewCity's approach would be equally valid, I actually measure each player against a typical 8th or 9th player on a BCS team.  Let's just say that a typical BCS 8th/9th man would have been one of the better players at Idaho State and playing against that lower competition would have scored 5 pts and grabbed 3 rebounds per game if he had played the 13.2 minutes a game that Swanson did at Idaho State.

Swanson's contributions (3.6 pts, 1.9 reb) had value of course for the team, but he does not have VALUE ADD because he had less value than the universal BCS replacement player.

By the same token, even a player like Crowder last year is "only" worth about 9 points a game in VALUE ADD.  That might sound way to low because if he averaged scoring twice that a game (18 points), and so when you add his average 2 assists, 8 rebounds, 1 block and 2 steals you would think he would be worth 30 points a game.  But again, a good BCS replacement player playing in his place would have had some of those points, rebounds, etc. so we want to know Crowder's Value Add BEYOND the standard replacement player.  After all the math is said and done, we can say that on an average night last year, if you had to replace Crowder with our universal replacement player, then an 80-72 win turns into a 75-76 loss.  Crowder added 6.24% in offense and took away 4.89% from opponents offense, and one player being worth 9 points will change a bunch of games a year even though 9 doesn't sound that high when you first hear it.

[bamamarquettefan]

Wow. Jamal AND Deonte register at 2.95?!

I don't know whether that's good for a soph equalling a phenomenal fresh, or a fresh equalling a soph!?!

yes, and just be aware that when I first calculated that the average freshman sees his value add increase by more than 150% for his sophomore year, it seemed to high.  However, i can tell you that I had meetings with several NBA teams and they all said my calculation was very consistent with what they had observed.  That is the huge jump for players.

I have not broken it down by age, so that is where you get more of a question.  Should we really expect MAyo to make a bigger jump than Blue this year since he is a rising sophomore and Blue is a rising Junior?  That's what these projections will show, BUT probably the fact that Blue is younger than Mayo indicates Blue will actually make the bigger jump - I just don't have the age data to run the study.

[bamamarquettefan]

If one were to take your value added calculation at the beginning of the season, and then take the same number at the end of the season, might not this provide a valid indication of the "value added" by the coach?

I believe that would be correct in theory, because if the sum of the parts is greater than the actual individual parts, it would seem the coach was the one adding the value.

The only trick would be sample size.  If a coach only has a couple of seasons then you might see a pattern developing, but the margin of error is huge when we are only getting one set of data a year for a coach.  Definitely worth monitoring, and you are absolutely correct that Caliprari taking 5 of the 10 best recruits and winning a title does not necessarily indicate he is a great on-court coach, while Brad Stevens taking Butler to consecutive title games with a much lower level of players certainly proves that he is.

[The Equalizer]

yes, and just be aware that when I first calculated that the average freshman sees his value add increase by more than 150% for his sophomore year, it seemed to high.  However, i can tell you that I had meetings with several NBA teams and they all said my calculation was very consistent with what they had observed.  That is the huge jump for players.

I have not broken it down by age, so that is where you get more of a question.  Should we really expect MAyo to make a bigger jump than Blue this year since he is a rising sophomore and Blue is a rising Junior?  That's what these projections will show, BUT probably the fact that Blue is younger than Mayo indicates Blue will actually make the bigger jump - I just don't have the age data to run the study.

Wouldn't the biggest jump occur if and when a player becomes a starter--not necessarily based on class or age (or coaching, for that matter)?

Acker's big jump came his senior year--because that's when Dominic James graudated (and Junior Cadougan was injured). 

I would guess the reason why most make a jump from frosh to soph year is that coaches generally try to recruit replacment players one year out--one year to groom him then three years of starting.