drizzlybear said:
God bless your stamina, in addition to your perspective. I lean more towards Townie's preference for the eye test with this team, especially this particular season. I continue to hope you're right about Hyder, though I continue to not share your optimism there. Stats like Ass/TO I think are not terribly insightful for this season due to such limited playing time for each of our PGs, plus the fact that the offense so frequently goes through (and often starts with) Bradley, especially late in close games. The resulting stats for our PGs end up being misleading, IMO, as they are subject to the whim of somewhat random things that can happen, including who they're playing with (or against) on the floor, during the small stretches of minutes they play in any particular game. I think that's especially true for Hyder.
In Hyder I do not see quality physical traits, I do not see quality perimeter shooting, I do not see effective/consistent playmaking for a team offense, nor do I see disruptive on-ball defense at the tip of the spear; and yet I do see a discouraging number of poor decisions and bad turnovers, and missed shots (notwithstanding his recent good game). I hope you're right and I'm wrong about him.
This entire thread is teetering on the edge of insightful/interesting and exhausting/annoying for me.
A couple points to your comment and SocalTownie's raving review of my stat dump. First, yeah, obviously most of us watch the games and have our own eyeball tests. That's good and fine. The issue with the eyeball test over time is a) our eyeballs tend to see what they want to see and b) our memories of what we saw/see can be influenced and biased. Year-to-year data provide and objective evaluation. Plus, most people are going to be more critical of an 8-19 season compared to a 14-18 season. I'm not saying to blindly follow the data without context. I am saying I honestly can't remember exactly what players looked like at the beginning of this season, much less last season and the data provide an objective lens.
To your point about assist/TO stats, that's fair. But that's why I'd point to the poss% and min% stats with ith. For example, Brown is averaging 26 minutes per game this year compared to 19 last year. His average assists have gone up to 3.1 from 1.8 while TOs have gone from 1.1 to 2.0. His poss% has increased, meaning a higher percentage of possessions end with him doing something while he's on the court compared to last season. And despite this, he still has improved in virtually all statistical categories. Has that led to better on-court outcomes for Cal? No. But he has objectively improved. This is where bias can come in. Despite being a lesser player last year, I think fans had a more favorable impression because a) he was in a backup role on a team that won more games compared to a lead role in a team that won fewer games, b) expectations have (fairly or unfairly) shifted since he's no longer a freshman, and c) people are going to be more critical when the team takes a noticeable step back.
For Hyder, I actually think his assist/TO rate is more important because of his oddly high poss%. His on-court poss% is 25%, meaning when he's on the court, a quarter of Cal's possessions are ending with him (again, why he is so much more visible to fans than, say, a Jalen Celestine, who has a poss% of 13.8%, lower on the team than everyone besides Thorpe and Bowser). No one has a higher poss% rate than Hyder except for Bradley, who has one of the highest poss% in the country. While Hyder is only averaging 1.8 assists per game, he has the highest assist% on the team, meaning, his rate of assists per possession is the highest on the team.
All of this comes with a bit of grain of salt as Cal is a better shooting team this year. So assists are more likely to occur compared to last year. But Hyder wasn't on the team last year, obviously, so it's less of a factor for him compared to looking at year-over-year stats for Brown.
Anyway, I get it. I watch the games. Both Brown and Hyder looked overwhelmed and frustrating at times. But unless you've got a top point-guard recruit, that's what's going to happen. I imagine the hope was Foreman would be able to take some of the pressure off Brown/Hyder this season, but that clearly didn't happen. The hope is all three take another step forward next year because Cal doesn't have any other PGs coming in next year unless there's some unforeseen roster turnover.
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