Win Profile of the 2007-08 San Antonio Spurs

This is Day 2 of Remember the ABA week on Bucks Diary. Today we look at the 2007-08 San Antonio Spurs. Click here to see the Spurs Win Profile Chart.

As you may notice, the Spurs Win Profile was not quite as dead-on as the other previous team Win Profiles had been. The Spurs profile was able to explain 51.6 of the Spurs 56 victories, which is a little better than 85% accurate, but I had been doing better. Yesterday, with the Denver Nuggets, I think I came within a game of their actual win total. But you'll have some teams that are off by a little. Overall, the formula is 94.6% accurate. And I went back and looked at the Win Splits I did at the end of the season, and the predicted record I got there varied from the Spurs actual record by the same number of games. So my calculations of individual performances were accurate, and that is the crucial thing.

Before I go on to my comments on the Spurs results, I have a new measure for determining "elite" status in the NBA. If a player can produce in the neighborhood of one victory for every one percent of playing time he consumes, he is an elite player. That's phenomenal production that projects out, as you can easily figure, to the fictional total of 100 victories. So far Kobe, Paul Pierce, and LeBron James were just short, whereas KG and Dwight Howard were well over, and so was Andrew Bynum in limited action, and now we add to the list the name Manu Ginobli.

Comments

1. I've said this already, but Bruce Bowen may be the worst "high minute" player on a good team in NBA history. His defense is basically reputational rather than factual at this point in his career, and he has never produced on the offensive end at all. He's costing the Spurs, and its a poor reflection on Popovich that he doesn't realize it.

2. Same with Jacque Vaughn. Why is he out there for so many minutes? They couldn't find anyone who could do even a little better than average defense and way below average offense?

3. Ditto for Robert Horry. Put that guy out to pasture.

4. You're going to blow up over this one, but technically, Manu Ginobli is a better Win Producer per minute of action, or was this season, than Kobe or LeBron. Of course, injuries hurt your value and they must be accounted for, and you have to show up in the postseason too. Ginobli sure didn't.

5. Tony Parker was kind of less than I thought he would be. His defense was pretty good, but his offense was just kind of okay.

6. You ever wonder why Damon Stoudamire gets kicked around to every team in the Association? He's cotton candy. He looks good, but there's no substance to him. No productivity on either end of the floor. He was horrible for the Spurs.