Letters to the Editor
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Wrold Cup Replays
George,
I think that you are being a bit harsh. The World Cup games are in Germany, and so of course they won't be live in prime-time.
There is at least one replay of each game on ESPN2 or ESPN Classic. Maybe it would be nice if more of those replays were in prime-time, but I am sure they get better ratings with baseball than soccer re-runs.
Program your DVR/VCR to record some World Cup action if you have to work 9-5.
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A trite point about World Cup ratings
To echo gerontion72 here, there's another way the ratings numbers do not reflect interest in soccer. I watched the US game in a Portugese bar in Northeast Philadelphia. For its big screen TVs the bar used what appeared to be a Brazilian satellite station geared towards Brazilians in this country. Can't imagine that that showed up on any rating meters.
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Stats, re: nycprof
nycprof wrote:
"[Shaq] has been even worse this postseason, hitting just over 38%, and in the finals he has been truly atrocious, hitting a mere 4 of 20 before canning those last two, which puts him at 27% for the finals. As any statistician will tell you, when you are shooting that badly, you are increasingly likely to hit a few to get your average back where it should be. Shaq happened to hit two in a row at a critical juncture, but this is probably because he was due, not because he was particularly clutch."
Where are these hypothetical statisticians you are talking about? From a purely statistical point of view, each new free throw is a new roll of the dice. Therefore, the likelihood of Shaq making two free throws in a row is exactly 25%, since he is a 50% free throw shooter. It has nothing to do with how he has shot previously this postseason. If anything, his poor performace in the postseason would tend to make his two in a row LESS likely.
This idea of being 'due' is completely bogus.
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oops
Sorry for the double post. Obviously my computer skills are also completely bogus.
But seriously, where are these statisticians? Cause I have an open spot at my weekly poker table that they are welcome to join. :)
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Wade and Shaq
Rich
I don't think it is useful to compare Wade's performance during a single 48 minute game, with its natural ebb and flow, and Shaq's claim that over the course of his career his notoriously poor free throw shooting somehow improves when the game is on the line. Now if Wade consistently shot a low percentage from the field, and consistently turned the ball over, and somehow in the fourth quarter of most games turned things around and played extremely well, then yes I would have to question his concentration and focus in the first three quarters. But that does not seem to be the case with Wade; it does, however, appear to be what you and Shaq are asserting about his free throws.
Also, since what you are claiming flies in the face of the available statistical evidence (a career 50% free throw shooter makes a higher percentage when the game is on the line), I would think you bear the burden of proof. My guess is that Shaq's FT shooting is probably roughly equivalent (around 50%) for each quarter.
I do agree with you that it would be very interesting to dig up some old play by play logs and see what the game circumstances were and whether Shaq made his free throws. Too bad basketball fans aren't as obsessive about statistics as baseball fans.
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Heat Clarifications
Just a few points:
1. James Posey
His 3pt percentage on the regular season was .403, in the playoffs it is .429 . Compare that to Walker on the postseason (.341), or Jason Williams (.263, but .372 in the reg season). Who else on the Heat would you want or expect to make a 3 pointer?
Incidentally, Dirk this postseason is shooting .375 from 3pt land while Howard is shooting .429.
2. Shaq vs. Dampier
These blanket statements that Shaq is being toasted by Dampier because Dampier scored 6/7 from the floor wasn't wathing the game. Dampier had a bunch of uncontested layups becuase Shaq was forced to come out and help on Terry and Harris who blew by the Heat perimeter defense all game long, leaving Dampier uncovered. It is more an indictment of Miami's all season long poor perimeter defense. Now, Shaq getting out rebounded by Dampier is another story.
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Avery Johnson's Rookie Coaching Mistake
As good as the Heat were down the stretch, and as brilliant as Avery Johnson has been this season, it was Avery Johnson's rookie coaching mistake that let Miami back in the game.
With six minutes to go, the Heat were dead and buried, and the brooms were coming out for the sweep. Then Dallas stopped playing their offense and instead milked the 24 second clock on each possession, resulting in mediocre, rushed shots, instead of the good shots they had been getting.
You don't take your foot off the accelerator with six minutes to go. That's way too early. Save that stuff for the last three minutes.
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Bud Selig's "Everyone"
Bud Selig revealed his ongoing and total -- but not surprising -- disregard for the fans in his comment about the All Star game. There are countless examples of this during his reign as Commissioner, from not blocking the owner's determination to take the strike in 1984 to his wishy-washy public belches on drugs and drug testing to pretending Barry Bonds assault on the home run title is legitmate to, now, the All Star game. Bud Selig harms baseball on so many levels at a time when what the sport truly needs is a reincarnation of Kennesaw "Mountain" Landis to reinvigorate the world's most elegant of sports.
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Nice try MichaelY
Sure, each free throw is a discreet event, but unlike a poker hand, in which the cards are randomized prior to each deal, Shaq's free throws are part of a long series (nearly 10,000 as it happens) of discreet but related events which in mathematical terms are serially dependent. Thus the longer a cold streak (or a hot streak as the case may be) goes on, the liklier it is that some kind of opposite streak occurs. With Shaq this happens often, because he hits right around half of his free throws, which means he'll hit a lot of small and medium streaks in both directions. A 90% free throw shooter like Nowitzki will not have many anti-streaks, but if he were to miss, say, three in a row, it would be increasingly likely, in abstract terms, that his next shot would be a make. Now there is some debate amongst mathematicians about how to measure that likelyhood, but as it happens several papers have been published on free throw shooting because it is such a good example of serial dependency. For your amusement here is a link to one such paper:
http://www.stat.wisc.edu/~wardrop/papers/tr1007.pdf
p.s. The Bogus function, named after Charles Bogus, applies to impossible events, and while Shaq hitting a few in a row is improbable, it is not, as of yet, impossible.