Where do freshmen get to play?

New article up at Swish Appeal about schools in the NCAA D-1 power conferences that give a lot of playing time to freshmen.  The link is right here, give it a visit.

Field of (WNBA) Schemes

While writing about the Red Wings arena deal, Neil DeMause of the Field of Schemes blog sets someone straight about the WNBA:

1. MikeM on July 29, 2013 at 3:33 pm said:

   And now that you mention the WNBA, I have to ask: How close is that league to folding? If that league were to announce today that is was closing up shop immediately, as of COB today, would more than 20,000 people nationwide even notice? I kind of doubt they would. Heck, if they decided to give refunds for the rest of the season, probably more than half of those 20,000 would be relieved.
2. Neil deMause on July 29, 2013 at 3:35 pm said:

   The WNBA has a small, diehard fan base. It also serves two purposes for the NBA: It’s a way to market to women (and to people who can’t afford NBA ticket prices), and it fills dates in the summer when there are no men’s games. I don’t expect to see it go anywhere anytime soon, though teams will likely keep getting shuffled around.
3. ChefJoe on July 29, 2013 at 4:20 pm said:

   With a TEAM salary cap of $900k the WNBA is a relatively cheap marketing ploy. Tons of tickets to give away as charitable contributions and a way to market “family wage” basketball and help fill out arena box suite schedules.
   
   
   
   

Sounds right on the money to me.

Swoopes

I saw the documentary about Swoopes from Nine for IX last night on ESPN. It's a great story.  There's really not much for me to say that better people can't say already.  (As opposed to say, the AV Club, which gave the documentary a "C" and wrote a long review where the author misspelled Sheryl Swoopes's name as "Cheryl" from beginning to end. It's fixed now, but trust me, the misspelling practically jumped out at you.)

The AV Club author did say a few things that rang true, even though I believe that the writer was doing a hit job.  One of those was that the documentary doesn't really have the courage to let Swoopes be a basketball player - this might just be a fault of the subject matter, but they have to shoehorn family relations, her relationship with Alicia Scott and her new beau, and a bunch of auxiliary stuff in an attempt to "round out" Swoopes.  I won't say "feminize" but I'm sure thinking it - the documentary is marred by that espnW mindset that thinks that female fans really want something more along the lines of one of those feel-sad-good videos that they show to provide "human interest" whenever the Olympic Games are on and you don't know anything about the competitors.

A more interesting documentary might have been made about the Houston Comets franchise itself - how it came together, the role of Kim Perrot, the chemistry of Cooper-Swoopes-Thompson, some stuff about Arcain, the four franchise championships, the decline, some stuff about Les Alexander and how he pretty much had contempt for his own product, Van Chancellor going out the door, the disastrous sale to Hilton Koch, and the final game at Strahan Coliseum.  Now there's a saga for you.

Or...frankly...a documentary about Kim Perrot all by herself.  Kevin McFarland at AV Club would probably spell her name as "Kim Parrot" and give it a C-, though.

(* * *)

I've finally got the Freshmen minutes spreadsheet finished.  It's going to be a busy day at work, though, so don't expect anything until maybe Thursday-Friday.

Tonight might be busy because it's my 11th Anniversary.  That's right, 11 years ago today I got married, and the smartest words I've ever said were "I do".  However, we're a little tight on cash, so unless Ruth's got something special planned that she's not telling me about, the anniversary dinner is going to be spaghetti.

(* * *)

The WNBA is back.  Thank goodness, I was starting to get withdrawal shakes.  Tonight's game is New York at Washington, but I might not get to watch it.  (See above paragraph.)

Working and Dreaming

First, the working part. 

* Someone is interested in contributing - or at least looking over - the Historical Teams and Coaches Register.  The problem with any of these record keeping/stats based projects is that I work alone.  I don't have any one to check anything for accuracy, I don't have anyone to beta-read article texts, anything.  Which means that I'm pretty much left to be my own editor, with all of the advantages (I can post articles whenever and wherever I decide to) and all of the disadvantages (if there's an error, it's on me) that that entails.

Work has been busy, so he'll have to wait until I finish with that.

* The  freshmen minutes project is nearing completion.  I have data for all but 15 teams - the back half of the Southeastern Conference and the "new eight" - the eight teams that are being pulled in from the Atlantic 10, MVC and Conference USA to fill in what will be the (new) Big East and the American Athletic Conference.

The question then becomes one of interpretation.  There are lots of reasons a team might not play freshmen very much.

1. They don't have any freshmen to play on the squad.  California is the example, although the data I get from wbbstate.com only indicates that there were no freshmen on the Golden Bears who played any game minutes, not that there weren't any freshmen on the squad - if those freshmen played zero minutes, it wouldn't be reflected in the final writeup.

2. The philosophy of the coach might be that freshmen shouldn't play, and minutes are artificially limited.

3. The freshmen might not be very good.  This might be a good way to gauge recruiting success - when you put your freshmen on the floor, how good are they?

I am very close to finishing this, and my target date is Thursday.  At last, another article!

(* * *)

Since there's nothing going on either in the WNBA (we're in the vacation period after the All-Star break) or the NCAA (the second July evaluation period is over now), I had my first basketball dream last night.  It was very weird.

I had suddenly been asked to be the Dream's head coach - me, a person who has not only never coached a game but has never played basketball! - and I was on the road at Key Arena, which looked rather like a high school gym.  I was dressed up in my suit and trying to figure out what to do, holding three clipboards and clumsily dropping them.  Brian Agler was there with me, but he wasn't helping me.  So was the Dream PR guy, who told me that a halftime ceremony would be honoring Vicky Baugh - a Tennessee player who wore number 00 (my dream actually got that right).

My plan in the dream was to have the team leader, Angel McCoughtry, do the actual coaching.
Then I woke up.

Thinking back on things, this was a mistake by my Dream self.  I would have picked Armintie Herrington to actually player/coach the team while I pretended to be coach - she was an assistant coach for a while at Ole Miss.  Although, I don't know if we would have beaten the Storm, since the Dream haven't been that great on the road.

(* * *)

Last night my wife and I had dinner with a couple of acquaintances, one of whom was an ex-basketball coach.  I don't know if she coached high school, middle school, or whatever; I need to ask her that someday.

We were talking about Elena Delle Donne's injury.  She said that the reason Delle Donne got hurt is that she hadn't been taught how to take a charge.  There is a way to fall that keeps you from bonking your head against the floor.  Delle Donne didn't fall right, and therefore the injury.  (If you want to know how to "fall right", you cross your arms across your chest like a mummy and tilt your head into your chest.  Supposedly, this works.  Good old-school advice for all you forwards out there.)

2013 WNBA All Star Game

Statistics from the 2013 WNBA All Star GAme:

Refcam looks:  11 *
WNBA commercials:  9
Mentions that Brittney Griner was unable to play:  5
Audio from miked players (Candace Parker):  2
"Quick Ain't Fair" commercials:  2
Use of the phrase "Three to See":  2 **
Locker room speeches (Lin Dunn, Cheryl Reeve):  2
Appearance from NBA personnel (Adam Silver):  1
Times question of "Will we see a dunk?" asked:  1
Audio from miked coaches (Lin Dunn):  1

* A season retrospective included a video clip of Lamont Simpson wearing a refcam for the very first time.  This video clip of refcam feed from a previous game is not included in the totals.
** Twice in season retrospectives, the phrase "Three to See" was used. We are only counting uses of the phrase during a game broadcast.

Oh yeah, and the West beat the East 102-98.  Lamont Simpson wore the refcam for this game, and he keeps the record of being the only WNBA referee to wear a refcam.  

(* * *)

I'm thinking about something I read either from the recruiting-101.com website or some other website  I actually read it several days ago but this is the first time I that I felt I could use the knowledge.  Unfortunately, no link.

It was an admonition for athletes that one's career can end at any time.  The advice was that if you're choosing a school for basketball, you want to go to one where you have the opportunity to play as a freshman.  I'm not saying a guarantee, but an opportunity.

The reason being was that if you know you're going to be stuck behind someone in the rotation and that you're only going to see limited time on the court at best, then imagine getting the chance for significant time in your sophomore year but in the first game you suffer a significant, career-ending injury.  It's not merely that your career is over, it's also that you've basically thrown away a year that you could have been playing at some other school.  Or, a year that you could have devoted to academics.

 The philosophy espoused was that an athlete only gets to play a certain number of games - so play them.  You never know when it will all be over.  As said above,  you're not looking for a guarantee, you're looking for the chance to earn the opportunity to play.  You don't want to go to a school where you're not going to get that opportunity.

This led me to think about which schools last year gave the most minutes to freshmen.  It might be something to track year by year.  I have last year's data, so I could hopefully punch up some numbers for 2012-13.  It might show up on Swish Appeal; I'll let you know.

Updates

The Historical Coaches Register sheet has now been updated.  The new teams coming to the Big East and AAC have been added. Those teams are:

Big East: Butler, Creighton, Xavier
AAC: Central Florida, Houston, Memphis, SMU, Temple

The link to the new file is posted in the links over to the right.  

My goal today:  watch the All-Star Game, and get out of helping with packing stuff for our move.  The "due diligence" period has now passed.  The house has been inspected by the inspector and accessed by the bank.  Therefore, if our buyer wants to get out of the move, she has to forfeit a fee.  

Moving date for the both of us is August 15th-16th.
The signing date is August 26th.  We are officially less than one month away from having the house sold.  Wow.

X marks the spot

I have a new article up at Swish Appeal about a NCAA power conference move for greater control over football:

http://www.swishappeal.com/2013/7/26/4559992/x-marks-the-spot

The WNBA's summer vacation

We had company last night, so I've not seen any of the games played on early Thursday.  We are now officially past the halfway point of the season.  The trade deadline is August 15th.

This makes me wonder if Trader Bill Laimbeer's plan was to "pump and dump" Sammy Prahalis - give her a lot of minutes, let her score a lot of points and then trade her for someone theoretically better.  The problem with this theory is that he only gave Sammy P. a couple of minutes in that loss against San Antonio, and those were the last 2:05 of the game.

By the way?  The Liberty shot 26.7 percent.  The Silver Stars shot 31.1 percent.  That game should be buried in a lead vault.

As they would say in The Music Man, "Ye Gods!"  Psycho Sammy's stats:  one rebound, one steal, one turnover.

(* * *)

I'll probably have a new WNBA Box Scores spreadsheet up for download later today.  Watch for it on the side links.

(* * *)

The All-Star Game is coming up Saturday.  I don't have any real passion to watch it.  All-Star Games are leftovers from a time when a league needed to raise money for an important cause, or to provide players with significant salary bonuses.  The NFL's All-Star game, the Pro Bowl, is a joke and the WNBA's All-Star Game isn't much better.  Watching players play at 3/4 speed and setting up a lame dunk at the end isn't my idea of spending a pleasant Saturday afternoon.

The WNBA home office must be kicking itself.  Brittney Griner has a knee injury and can't play.  Elena Delle Donne has a concussion, and really shouldn't play and I don't expect her to.  Skylar Diggins wasn't good enough to be chosen an All-Star, and the coaches rightly picked Tulsa's Glory Johnson as a reserve.  Instead of "Three To See" it's "Nothing To See Here". 

Hey, they brought it on themselves.  Call some fouls once in a while, and expand the roster.  Then maybe your players will be healthy enough to take part in what's supposed to be one of your showcase events.

(* * *)

Working on two little things.  I've had to put my attendance project on the back burner.  It turns out that I'm not missing the NCAA women's basketball attendance numbers from 2013, but the men's basketball numbers.  Why is it taking so freaking long for the NCAA to release those numbers?   July is almost over.

The first little thing is a project that looks at the "recruiting fingerprints" of all the major schools - what is the average (median) distance that a school recruits from?  I figured out a way to enter a lot of the latitude and longitude data mechanically, but the 400 or so glitches have to be handled on a case-by-case basis.  I'm down to the last 150 or so.  Give me a few weeks.

The second thing is running a linear regression on when NCAA women's BB coaches are likely to get fired.  It's looking promising, but I have to get the data entered.  Unfortunately, I can't run a log regression like I'd like to and have to settle for a multiple linear regression.  Statisticians will be protesting with calculator's a-blazing outside of SB Nation's front offices.

Connecticut @ Atlanta

First note:  I have a writeup of the Atlanta/Connecticut game which will be posting at Swish Appeal at 11 am ET.  So give me some click love.

Last night, for reasons that I won't go into, I had the opportunity to sit courtside at the Atlanta vs. Connecticut game.

Watching the game at courtside is a very different experience from watching it in the cheap seats.

In the cheap seats, you get an overhead view, almost a video-game view where you can imagine the players as pieces being moved.

In video games, you get a "tilted perspective" view.

Courtside, you get a "flat perspective" view.  You can't look overhead anymore, you can only see laterally on either side of the court.

I was surprised by how freaking loud courtside is.  You almost couldn't hear yourself speak down there.  But I wouldn't exchange a courtside view for anything, and if I ever get another chance to sit at courtside, I'll leap at it.

(I then thought, "The wealthy sit like this all the time."  People who are not wealthy have to purchase blocks of time where other people will pretend that they are wealthy.  For three days on a cruise boat, the staff will pretend that you are wealthy.  But for the wealthy, life is a cruise boat.)

The hard part of courtside is that since my depth perception isn't great, it was very hard to interpret what was going on and who was moving where on court to do what.  But there is a bonus to courtside in that you can see the looks on player's faces.  Armintie Herrington was providing a great bit of defensive play as the clock expired in the third quarter, and I could see the look in her eyes.  That was freaking amazing.

You can also hear the front row fans and boy are those some loud people.  They were riding referee Tony Dawkins like a dog, particularly after he called three quick fouls on Angel McCoughtry late in the third.

The fans knew him by name.  These were no causal fans, to pay four figures a year for a courtside seat.  They could not only be brutal, but witty.  One fan said after a particularly bad call, "They're marking that one down!  You're not going to be asked to work the playoffs this year!"

A side effect is that they could sometimes be brutal to the Dream players as well.  "For God's sake, someone play defense onMontgomery!"  I suspect that players, being players, can block all of that out.  Players have amazing tunnel vision, and I suspect that after 10 years of organized basketball, they develop tunnel hearing.

(* * *)

There has been some discussion about Anne Donovan.  Talking to someone in the Dream org yesterday, they couldn't believe what has happened at Connecticut.

That's grist for a whole article.  Remember, this isn't really Donovan's team yet.  It's Mike Thibault's old team with some broken parts.  Who did Donovan get in the draft?  Kelly Faris, is averaging about 1.1 ppg and two players that didn't make the team.  Ashja Jones is hurt and Kara Lawson is acting like she's hurt, so there you go.

To make my point, I want to talk about a side project I had been planning - it seems that at least in college coaching, there are a few college coaches who have an inexplicable drop off in win percentage before they retire.  They've been around for 10 years, have gone to the tournament, and then all of a sudden they can't win games anymore.  It's like a 37 year old batter hitting .300 one year and when he hits 38, all of the sand runs out of the hourglass and he's hitting .220.  The coach hits a wall, and the winning seasons are over.

After some thought, I determined that there is no way to separate recruiting ability from the equation.  A coach isn't so much a game planner as a CEO.  Most college coaches have someone on staff dedicated to full-time recruiting, and the success of the program can change dramatically once that person leaves.  To paraphrase something Pat Summitt's dad said, "You don't win take mules to the Kentucky Derby."  It seems that good talent can sometimes overcome bad coaching, but bad talent can't be turned into good talent by good coaching.

I don't think Anne Donovan has hit the wall just yet.  She turned the Liberty into a 20+ win team after she got her hands on it.  She's won a WNBA championship.  Give her time to get her players, and let's see what she can do with them.

New York @ Indiana, NCAA WBB Attendance Data

Last night's game was New York at Indiana, and that game was an 8 on a scale of 1-10.  It was a game great at keeping you in suspense and you didn't know who was going to walk away with the win (save for New York's seven minute long inability to score a bucket).

New York likes to attack the post and they do - the problem is, they can't seem to do much else.  Plenette Pierson and Kara Braxton were doing the job that Laimbeer told them to do, but couldn't seem to get past Indiana until Pondexter woke up and scored 15 of her 24 points in the second half.  Since New York's third quarter was almost a scratch, she scored those points in the late third and early fourth quarter.


The game, however, showed how important Tamika Catchings is to the Fever.  I hate the fact that WNBA writers always want to give the award to players on teams with winning records - it's "Most Valuable Player" not "Most Valuable Player Under Good Circumstances".  This is why Sylvia Fowles doesn't have an MVP; she played for a few crappy Chicago teams.   Indiana's resurgence coincides with Catchings's good health, and if there's an argument to be made for players who contributions aren't adequately reflected in a standard box score, that player is Tamika Catchings.

If you think about it, attacking the post is an excellent basketball strategy.  Dean Oliver stated that there are four factors in winning a basketball game:

1)  Shooting percentage.  You maximize your percentage when you're close to the basket.
2)  Turnovers.  Well, hm.  Nothing attacking the post does about that, except you have to remember not to drop the ball.
3)  Offensive rebound rate.  You're in a great position to get an offensive rebound close to the basket.
4)  Free throw shooting.  You're very likely to get fouled on drives to the basket.

I don't know, if I coached a basketball team I'd be very tempted to run an offense the way Trader Bill runs it.

(* * *)

Three games tonight, including Atlanta vs. Connecticut.  I'll be there, but will YOU?  Only you can search your soul and answer that question.

(* * *)

I have been waiting for some time to get the 2013 numbers for women's basketball attendance in the NCAA.  Now that I have them, I can finally write that article that compares NCAA MBB attendance to NCAA WBB attendance.  You might see that article on Swish Appeal today, or tomorrow.

2013 WNBA: games with highest attendance

 Here are the highest attendance figures posted this season:

* July 10:  Washington @ Chicago - 14,201
June 14:  Los Angeles @ Phoenix - 13,065
* July 18:  Chicago @ New York - 12,858
July 12:  San Antonio @ Washington - 11,268
July 18:  Phoenix @ Los Angeles -  11,105
July 17:  Atlanta @ Los Angeles - 10,876
May 31:  Atlanta @ Indiana - 10,756
* July 11:  Minnesota @ Indiana - 10,230
May 27:  Chicago @ Phoenix - 10,200
* June 25:  Indiana @ Atlanta - 10,155
May 26:  Seattle @ Los Angeles - 10,090

* - kid's day game

I don't remember there being so many games this year with attendance in five digits.  If I'm wrong about that, correct me.

Getting to the game; disposing of obligations

Tomorrow, the Dream return to Philips Arena to play Connecticut.  The Dream have dropped their last four games and have the longest active losing streak in the W.  Connecticut has lost their last two, so somebody needs a win. 

After that, the Dream are off from July 24th to August 3rd!  That's a 10-day layoff, and they go to Phoenix.  Then a 7-day layoff after that with a game on August 10th against Indiana.  The good news?  Atlanta will get  a chance to heal.  The bad news?  The Dream will be rustier than a old hinge at a swap meet coming off those long layoffs.  There hasn't been a team in the W this season that's had a 10 day layoff.  Angel McCoughtry will get a chance to firm up her travel plans and Erika de Souza will tweet pictures of Brazilian food, but what's going to happen to any kind of cohesiveness?  A good question to ask Señor Fred.

Truly, the schedule gods hate us.

I have to get over the issue of getting to these games.  I usually leave after work and fight my way through the traffic, then end up paying for a parking spot that I don't want because the other options aren't available.  I've decided that I'm going to increase my discretionary cash fund and just suck it up and deal.

I have a new article for Swish Appeal on women's vs. men's basketball attendance that I have to get finished.  I have the data, but it hasn't been started yet.

(* * *)

In my internet life, I have three hobbies/obligations:

a)  women's basketball
b)  an on-line baseball sim, and
c)  an Internet writing forum.  What are we writing?  It's three syllables, and two of those syllables start with the letter "F".  I'll give you the definition:

"is when someone takes either the story or characters (or both) of a certain piece of work, whether it be a novel, tv show, movie, etc, and create their own story based on it."

And no, I'm not going to tell you what that novel/TV show/movie/etc. is.

Right now, I'm thinking about ditching two of these hobbies - b) and c).  I hate to ditch b) because I basically begged to be a part of b).  I managed to turn a 67-95 team around to finish 80-82 in the first year that I managed the team, but...well, I think my time could be better spent elsewhere.  My current plan is to do three sim seasons with the team, and then split.

The other obligation is more problematic, as I've been with it for about 14 years.  I met my wife in that forum.  (She split lonnnnnnnng ago.)  It's becoming a forum of old people, as the novel/TV show/movie/etc hasn't been popular for years now.  I know two people on that forum who have actually died since I started following it.  That's scary.

I've also been writing a massive serialized thing-that-I've-been-writing for about 3 years now.  It's about 145 parts long and about the size of five Gone With The Winds.  I'd like to finish it, but I don't really see what the point of finishing it is, because:

a) I'm basically writing it for a bunch of acquaintances now, and
b) editing it for publication for realsies would take months.

Work has now added a fourth obligation - studying for a job advancement exam.  I don't need to pass it - my continued employment isn't contingent on it - but management has indicated that they'd like to see me study for it, and I'd like to please them as I like my job more or less.

But trust me - when I can ditch b) and c) for good, they're gone.

Cream of Atlanta

Yesterday's game was of course, Atlanta at Tulsa, where the Dream attempted to turn around a three game losing streak.  Instead, the Dream lost 90-63, going 0-for-the Road Trip.

Sad trombone factoids:

* It was the first time the Dream has lost four straight games since August 3-13, 2010.  (Happy flute stat:  they went to the WNBA Finals that year.  Sad trombone:  they were swept by the Storm.)

* It was the worst loss to the Shock ever.  The previous worst loss to the Shock was a 97-76 loss on June 22, 2008 when the Shock were still in Detroit.

* Atlanta is 6-2 vs. the Shock in its Tulsa incarnation.  The previous loss to Tulsa was an 84-80 loss on August 28, 2012...which was Fred Williams's very first day as the head coach of Atlanta, having taken over from Marynell Meadors.

So...s@#t. 

The key to this loss, besides Atlanta's 33.3 percent shooting, was Liz Cambage remembering that she was the #2 draft pick in the 2011 WNBA Draft and actually playing like it for once.  She had 22 points and 15 rebounds on 8-for-10 shooting.  Glory Johnson was 9-for-14 with 24 points and 10 rebounds.

Not many post-game quotes, which implies that Atlanta might have gotten up and gotten the hell out of there.  No Sancho Lyttle.  No Tiffany Hayes.  Fred Williams picked up two technical fouls from Michael Price and got out in the third quarter.

I'm surprised that the W posted this quote in their recap:

"Angel tried to get to the lane to get things to happen offensively, but Tulsa collapsed on her and then she didn't get some of the calls she should have got," said Atlanta coach Fred Williams, who was sent to the locker room with 1:05 to play in the third quarter after receiving back-to-back technical fouls.

Well, it didn't help that McCoughtry shot 8-for-24.  The team was 0-for-17 from 3-point range.  I don't know if that's the worst 3-point performance from a WNBA team this season, but it has to be close to it.

Turn your heads and look away.  The only hope is that we can break the streak against Connecticut, a team which is really good at playing really bad right now.  They also have to come to Philips.  I'll take a win against Connecticut, you know.

(* * *)

During the game, the Tulsa Shock announcer stated that Fred Williams's lifetime record (before this game) was 17-7.  This is not true.  He forgot Williams's tenure in Utah.

1999 - Utah - 13-15
2000 - Utah - 18-14
2001 - Utah -  5-8
2012 - Atlanta - 7-3
2013 - Atlanta - 10-5

Career:  53-45 (1-2 in playoffs)

Señor Fred replaced a fired coach in 1999 but was fired himself in 2001.   In 2012, Williams replaced a fired coach.  He has to be looking uneasily at Joe Ciampi and Julie Plank sitting on the bench with him.

(* * *)

An interesting article about Fred Williams's firing at Southern California.

http://articles.latimes.com/1997-04-16/sports/sp-49249_1_fred-williams

Williams, 40, recently completed his second season with a 20-9 team that reached the second round of the NCAA tournament. But some players and parents were unhappy with Williams' laid-back coaching style.

This might explain why he's been relatively successful in Atlanta.  He's laid back.  I don't think that Marynell Meadors carried a whip and a chair, but clearly Williams's coaching philosophy is different from that of his former boss.

(* * *)

While learning more about Señor Fred and his time in Utah, I found out about Bill Stokes, a former WNBA referee who had a heart attack during a Utah vs. Houston game on August 20, 2002. (Candi Harvey was Utah's coach at the time.)

http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2002/08/21/spt_official_striken.html

At the top of the post is a photo from what might be that game.  Oddly enough, the photo source is a Bob Corwin article about the Houston Comets franchise folding.  (The photo was behind the paywall, but had been archived by Google Images, a case of a photo being available from an article but not the article itself.)  I would have posted it right here, but Blogger won't let me.

I'd like to know what happened to Bill Stokes.  He wanted to return to the life of a referee, but there is no other information about him on line.  Bill Stokes, wherever you are, maybe you be healthy and happy.

New article up at Swish Appeal

This one is about the NCAA vs. O'Bannon.  Not so much about women's basketball as about a lawsuit which threatens the major sources of revenue of athletics departments.  I've said nothing about the wrongness or rightness of O'Bannon's cause; I'm keeping those cards close to my chest for now. 

Go over to Swish Appeal and give us some click love, huh?

Chicago, Connecticut, Comic Books

I try to allot myself two hours a day to watch one game.  Today's game will be Atlanta @ Tulsa, where the Dream can hopefully put this nightmarish road trip to an end. Even so, anyone scarred by the 2008 season has fears that they could lose this one.

Last night, that game was Chicago vs. New York. 

 (Obviously, these are Skylar Diggins fans.)

That 80-69 win by Chicago is explained easily - whatever New York had, Chicago had more of it.  Plenette Pierson was able to keep Elena Delle Donne capped but everyone else wasn't so lucky.  Vandersloot had nine assists, Fowles had 15 points and 11 rebounds on half an ankle, and Tamera Young had been saving her points for a rainy day to unload with 17 points (Young averages 5.8 ppg.)  After the first half, New York threatened a few times but they weren't able to sustain anything.

The Sky also had 10 blocks in the first half, one of those interesting, "most X in a half" records kept by the WNBA.  They tie with a few other teams.  The Sky shot 46.2 percent compared to the Libs and their 36.1 percent, and New York has now lost six of its last seven.

(* * *)

Since it's only me and Google reading this blog, I've been wanting to replace the header with a photo or otherwise snazz it up.  The instructions I get on the web for this are not very clear.  Furthermore, there is a dearth of photos of Pam Parsons, the former coach of the South Carolina women's team whose career ended in scandal in 1981.  You could probably ask someone following women's basketball who Pam Parson's was and you're more likely than not to get an answer of "who?"

Let's make one thing clear:  the title is not to make fun of Pam Parsons.  Rather, its a nod to the progressive rock band the Alan Parsons Project.  "Alan Parsons?  Pam Parsons!"  And furthermore, my project has more "P"s in it.  Alan should have changed his name to Peter or Paul or something.

Actually, I feel a great deal of sympathy for Pam Parsons.  Some good articles:

Stormy Weather at South Carolina (Sports Illustrated, 1982).
Coach Has Left Sad Legacy (Seattle Times, 1996).
Chatman's departure at LSU strikes chord with Parsons (ESPN, 2007).
Hearing on Perjury Shows Partisan Divide (Washington Post, 2008).

They even dragged Parsons into the spotlight during the Bill Clinton impeachement brouhaha, as you can see from the last link.  (Hey, Parsons served jail time for perjury, so let's get her in front of an ethics committee to show how bad perjury is.)  The 1996 link mentions that Parsons was living somewhere in Atlanta, and I wonder if she's still here almost 20 years later and watching Dream games incognito.

The short story is that Parsons was pretty much destroyed. She was a 32 year old woman having an affair with a 17-year old, and ended up offering that 17-year old a scholarship.  There were a lot of shenanigans going on in that program, but this is what they got her for.

In 1996, Sylvia Hatchell put it right on the nose.

"Pam Parsons left a cloud over women's basketball," says North Carolina coach Sylvia Hatchell, incoming president of the Women's Basketball Coaches Association. "For one thing, people think everybody involved is a lesbian, which isn't anywhere close to being true. What's worse is that she made it like those people who are gay don't follow the rules."

I don't know about what "gay" has to do with "not following the rules" part, but there were a lot of bad things going on at South Carolina that had nothing to do with Parsons being lesbian.  I think that even if she were as clean as Pat Summitt is reported to be, that she still would have turned out to have been exiled.  Being a lesbian in basketball in 1982 was a lot worse than being one in 2007.

As for the Chatman scandal at LSU, she stepped down before things got public, and you can read about it from 10 different sources and still not understand it.  (Louisiana State doesn't plan to give out details.)  My best guess is that she had a relationship going on with one of her former players that started when that player was actually on Chatman's team.   Possibly more than one player.  Who knows?

Results:  in 2007, Chatman is coaching the Chicago Sky, and has been coaching overseas, and aside from this shadow over her career, she can still be held in relative respect.  Whereas Parsons is persona non grata.  (The "deny it all" strategy on the witness stand didn't help.)

Forgive me for being a bleeding heart liberal, but I'd like to say that after 31 years, Pam Parsons has suffered enough.

(* * *)

Worked some more on the Historical Coaches Sheet yesterday, adding Central Florida.  There were Division II until around the mid-1980s.  Joe Sanchez coached there before he went on to Wake Forest.  

(* * *)

Today's crisis - ants in the kitchen!  This is the first time we've ever seen ants; they got in from under the glass sliding patio door and headed straight for the cat food.  We exterminated all the ants we could find manually, fumbled with the caulk gun, and made repairs.  Good as new, but we don't know what's going to happen until the next rainfall.

(* * *)

Since we're getting ready for a relocation, we had to empty out the closet under the stairwell.  Here is where I've stored 15 long boxes belonging to both myself and my deceased best friend, Tim Bruce.

(Note:  long boxes come neither with large blue plastic tub, or cat.)

Between 1981 and 1995, comic books were a huge part of my life.  Around 1997?  Nothing.  I got out of them.  I don't know how much they're worth and my wife has been begging me to sell them.  But over 1/2 of these books are Tim's books, and I don't want to sell the books, because it would feel like selling Tim.

So they stay.  I can say one thing about comic books - the endless arguing over minutiae ("Who would win in a fight?  Thor, or The Hulk?") prepares one excellently for a life following women's basketball.

Downloads, Glorious Downloads

Two new things going on.  The Historical Coaches Register - a list of coaching won/loss records associated with power conference NCAA programs - is available for download if you click the link to the right.

In addition, I've added the WNBA Box Scores Sheet, v. 1.1.6.  This sheet parses publicly available WNBA box score data and does wonderful things with it.

And I have a new article up at Swish Appeal.   The WNBA Box Scores Sheet was a big help in writing that one.  Hopefully, the WNBA referees association won't come to chase me down.

The Washington/Indiana Tecmo Bowl

Watched Washington vs. Indiana last night through WNBA Live Access but found it very hard to get into.  Part of the reason was the broadcast quality.  WNBA Live Access wasn't broadcasting very quickly and most of the broadcast was plagued with resolution issues.

Furthermore, it was a basic three-camera setup.

1) Camera pointed at center court which swiveled either toward the left basket or the right basket, depending on where the ball was at.
2) A camera at the left baseline, and
3) A camera at the right baseline.

The problem was that the center court camera was somewhat on the upper level and was so far back that I got more of the audience and less of the court than I should have.  The endzone cams seemed to have been used rather sparingly, giving it the impression of a Fever game produced by the Junior High School AV Club.

Can you see the problem there?  I dare you to pick out any of the players.  Hope you have good eyesight.

Very hard to get into that game, I give my viewing experience a 3 out of a 10, tilted toward those moments when the view shifted to an end camera and the broadcast quality was particularly good.  Washington lost the thread at the end when Indiana made a huge run and tightened up on defense, and the Mystics dried up and blew away like that kid who kics the footstool on the Charles Atlas ad.

That viewing experience, however, was an improvement over Tulsa/Connecticut.  It's always hard for a commentator to provide both play by play and color, and this was another one-announcer setup.  Whatever his name was, I want to be on whatever it was he was on.  He moved with the slow of an overly patient Steven Wright.

This game telecast of #connecticutsun vs Tulsa... No play by play. The league majors in mediocrity #wnba
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

Instead, the tulsa gamecast piping in obnoxious PA sounds #unwatchable #wnba #connecticutsun #awful
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

When is the #wnba going to give a crap about how it is viewed? #connecticutsun #givemetheclicker
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

#wnba has its priorities messed up , Really distressing Players deserve better support than they are getting #connecticutsun
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

Go ahead, Laurel Ritchie, put #cptvsports on and tell me David Stern would tolerate this #nba #wnba #connecticutsun
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

#nymets losing 11-0. Watching this rather than #wnba game with #connecticutsun. Yes #thatbad
— John Altavilla (@jaltavilla) July 20, 2013

I just want everyone to know that I agree with John Altavilla.  (Translation:  if I posted this on my own, people would have thought I was a lone nut.  I'm borrowing Altavilla's credibility.)

(* * *)

Went out this morning, got a haircut at the Aveda Institute.  Good haircuts fairly cheap by students studying to be beauticians.  The first haircut I came out looking like I lost a fight with Billy Idol.  The good thing is that hair always grows back.

Unfortunately, I'm getting a Leif Garrett "hair island" in the front.

See that?  Me in ten years.  I have thought about shaving the old nogging.  Talked to a guy behind the counter at Aveda, young slim black guy who started losing his hair at about 15.  He had a "good shaped head" - part of the problem with shaving your head is that some people's heads are a little irregular looking.  He told me to hang on to my hair as long as I could.

The wife is talking about me taking Propecia.  Hoo boy.

(* * *)

Sent out the WNBA Boxscores Sheet today to a few selected friends.  I might make it a public document.  Some day I'll write a long rant about how sports institutions like the WNBA (or Major League Baseball, or the National Football League) make it a point to hide information fans might want.

Take Katie Smith's lone technical foul she got this year.  A great guy, P, stated that Smith's foul had been rescinded by the league.  I didn't know that.  The WNBA didn't go out of its way to make that public, either.  According to P the W rarely publicizes rescinding them unless it affects a player suspension.  

Well, if that's the case, why bother keeping it a secret.  That's another rant somewhere down the line.

How does rest affect the results of WNBA games?

Hard to say.  We only have 89 games to look at in the 2013 WNBA season.  Here is the list so far:

Days Since Last Game?	W	L
0	7	5
1	2	7
2	32	23
3	13	10
4	8	14
5	14	10
6	8	13
7	3	4
8	2	0
9	0	3
10	0	0
11	0	0
12	0	0
13	0	0
14	0	0
	89	89

Note that "0" days since the last game means that this was the opening game of the season.  The record is not .500, since some teams opened against teams that already played games.

Furthermore, there is the complication that two teams in a matchup will have had the same number of days of rest.  If one team is on three days rest and that team plays a team also having three days rest, after the match we had a "win" in the three days rest column and also a "loss", since both teams having had three days rest cancel each other out when they meet (get it)?

Having one days rest is detrimental.  The only two wins off one day of rest were an 85-80 win by Washington over Minnesota at home after beating Connecticut on the road the previous night and an 84-48 blowout by Los Angeles over San Antonio at home after losing in Phoenix by 16 the night before.

There is also the theory that too much rest will hurt you.  Note that of the three teams that had nine days of rest, all of them lost.

6/23/2013 - San Antonio 78, New York 77.  The Libs had nine days of rest.  They could have pulled this one out, but missed their last three shots.
7/9/2013 - Minnesota 94, Atlanta 72.  Atlanta was the team coming off nine days of rest.  After this game, Sancho Lyttle had foot surgery.
7/11/2013 - Los Angeles 94, Tulsa 78.  Los Angeles got a road win over well-rested Tulsa.

The theory is that there is an "optimal rest period" for a WNBA team.  Not too short, but not too long.  I don't think there are enough data points to prove anything, but the current season results look promising.

WNBA Technical Fouls as of 7/19/2013

Technical fouls as of the end of yesterday's games:

Player s

Taurasi, PHO:  6
Charles, CON:  4
Johnson, TUL:  4
Ajavon, WAS:  3
Snow, WAS:  3
Toliver, LAS:  3
Bone, NYL:  2
McCarville, MIN:  2
Braxton, NYL:  1
Breland, IND:  1
Cambage, TUL:  1
Coleman, LAS:  1
Currie, WAS:  1
Dupree, PHO:  1
Gilbreath, PHO:  1
Griner, PHO:  1
Harding, LAS:  1
Hawkins, SEA:  1
Hornbuckle, PHO:  1
Houston, PHO:  1
Kizer, PHO:  1
Larkins, IND:  1
Lavender, LAS:  1
McCoughtry, ATL:  1
Ogwumike, LAS:  1
Peters, MIN:  1
Pondexter, NYL:  1
Ruffin-Pratt, WAS:  1
Smith, NYL:  1
Thomas, PHO:  1
Wiggins, TUL:  1

Coaches





Hughes, SAS:  2
Agler, SEA:  1
Kloppenberg, TUL:  1
Reeve, MIN:  1
Ross, LAS:  1
Williams, ATL:  1

Taurasi is one technical away from a one-game suspension.  Phoenix leads the league in technicals with 13, almost one technical per game.  The only Phoenix players that don't have a T are DeWanna Bonner, Penny Taylor and the late departed Sammy Prahalis.

Phoenix @ Los Angeles, 7/18/2013

10:00 ESPN2 must really be feeling the burn.  Britney Griner is still not playing due to knee problems.  As far as most of the (non-women's basketball following) universe believes, women's basketball is "something something Griner something".  They were probably hoping that they'd announce Griner to the All-Star Game roster, too.

10:03:  Crowd is looking realllly spotty at LA.

10:05:  Nice of Ogwumike not to force the shot when she saw that she couldn't shove her way to the basket.  She looked to pass the ball out.  Sparks up on a 10-0 run but this doesn't mean anything.  Good basketball teams get runs; LA got theirs right away.

10:07:  Annoying Boost Mobile commercial, "It's All About the W".  Come to think of it, Griner might still get announced to the All-Star Game.  You never know what casual fans are thinking.

10:09:  Dupree scores Phoenix's first basket.

10:12:  I read an article somewhere on line today about some girls basketball player who wears leggings - which were supposed to be different and popular.  (Note: T-shirts under jerseys?  Supposedly not popular.)  Looking at Taurasi's black leggings.  Once again, Diana Taurasi is a fashion trailblazer.

10:14:  Have seen Los Angeles fall asleep a couple of times in getting the rebound. 

10:17:  I really hate it when ESPN shrinks the screen to postage stamp size and surrounds it with factoids.  When I want to see a game, I want to see a game.

10:20:  My wife asks, "So I'm on my own for the rest of the night?"  Yup.  I kiss her good night and head back to the game, bringing a cup of chocolate pudding with me.

10:20:  Quarter over, LA up 23-16 over Phoenix.  The Sparks offensive sets seem to be working.  Phoenix is more of an "attack the basket" team tonight.

10:23:  Corey Gaines, the Luckiest Coach on Earth, is interviewed by Rebecca Lobo.

10:24:  Apparently, Carol Ross agrees with me that Los Angeles is not a grat rebounding team.

10:26:  Nice behind the back dribble by Charde Houston, stopped by an A'dia Mathies blocking foul.  Houston has a Grace Jones thing going on there.  She's so striking looking.

10:28:  It looks like the LA fans have now showed up to the game.  Traffic must be just like Atlanta's.

10:29:  Mercury close to 31-28 in the second.  Penny Taylor has added a couple of shots.  Have eaten my pudding up and starting to feel sleepy, but with a little over 5 minutes left in the second the game has gone by very quickly.  I think I can survive until they name the All Stars, at least.

10:33:  Delle Donne, McCoughtry, Taurasi, Griner all named as All-Star Game starters.  I can live with those choices.  At least three of the four of those players deserve it.

Prediction:  At the All-Star Game, the West team will "clear the lane" and Griner will try to dunk.  Say, Britney, while you're busy at the ESPYs and at Conan, why don't you play some basketball?

10:35:  For some reason, I'm thinking of high school, when I gave a book report that was so long it took a half hour to read.  Why I wrote so much about El Cid I have no idea.  The other students loved it; they had to postpone a bunch of book reports from Friday to Monday.

10:37: Phoenix hits an 11-0 run.  Keep talking, Britney, it seems to be bringing the Merc some luck.  Although we missed a nice big chunk of that run with this @#$@%# interview.

10:38:  "Family of Quicks" commercial.  Very nice little poem - "quick ain't fair".  I hate the commercialization of selling kids athletic shoes, though.  Whenever a sneaker commercial comes on, I literally won't look at it.  I turn my eyes up, or down, or somewhere else in the room.  So I have heard this commercial about a hundred times, but I haven't actually seen it.

10:41:  Taurasi with a technical foul.  Phoenix players have an ungodly amount of technicals.  Some stats on that later.

10:44:  Houston tries a bounce pass that goes out of bounds.  Can't remember who she was passing to but the player didn't see it.  Remember, the rule is that a missed pass is always the passer's fault.  If the passer didn't think the player could get it, why did she pass it?

10:45:  Really, Alana Beard, what are you thinking?  Taurasi's got all that reach on Beard.  If Taurasi had gone ballistic, my money would have been on her.

10:47:  Phoenix now up 46-36.  Looks like a Beard vs. Taurasi war out there.

10:50:  Phoenix scores like 33 points in the second quarter.  Taurasi has 18, Phoenix leads 46-38.  Fast game, not even 11 pm in the Eastern Time Zone yet.

Hope now that I can get to bed at a decent time.  No guarantee that I'll last the game.  Unless halftime is really compelling, I tend to zone out.

10:54:  Interesting factoid:  Elene Delle Donne does not get hazed like the other rookies across the league.  I wonder if its because someone high up either in the Sky or the WNBA said, "Lay off Delle Donne."

11:07:  Looks like Alana Beard will be joined at the hip to Diana Taurasi for the rest of the game.  No help defense duties for whoever guards Taurasi.

11:11:  It looks like at this hour of night, they assume that everyone watching ESPN2 is impoverished.  All comeons for free credit scores and fly-by-night college degrees.

11:14:  Announcers call Taurasi "so wise and savvy".  You use the word "wise" for someone who is old.  Taurasi isn't old.

11:15:  The WNBA really needs to make drawn foul statistics as part of their basic box score.

11:20:  Sparks make a run - closing from 15 to 8 points - when Taurasi is taking a rest on the bench.  So she's back.

11:21:  The Merc have had four days off, which might be the optimum amount of time off.  I remember that horrible loss by Atlanta against the Lynx, when Atlanta had about a week off.  Might be interesting to do some stats about league win percentages based on number of days between appearances.

11:27:  Phoenix up 65-51 with 1:27 or so left in the third.  The game is becoming a real slog and LA hasn't been able to figure Phoenix out.  Marissa Coleman hits a 3-pointer, but the Sparks need another run.

11:29:  Taurasi on the bench, LA closes again.  Third quarter almost over.  My wife asks me to run the trash to the curb at "the next commercial", so I will.  My midnight bedtime looking better and better.

11:31:  Parker hits as time expires in the third after the jump ball.  However, she didn't get it off in time.

11:33:  Waiting forever for the refs.  I'm taking the trash out.

11:36:  Returned from trash.  Beautiful three-quarters moon in the sky (quite fitting).  ESPN has gone to commercial; never did find out what they decided.

11:38:  Carol Ross decides that one player guarding Taurasi isn't enough.  Phoenix up 67-60.

11:41:  Charde Houston picks up foul #4.  Picked up a couple of quick ones.

11:43:  I wondered what the rule on technical fouls was.  Apparently, the rule is that one you pick up your #7 technical foul, you get suspended for the next game.  Taurasi is at #6 on the season.  Los Angeles is now in the penalty, down by eight, 71:63 with 7 minutes left.

11:45:  Parker goes back to the line.  Damn you, Sparks, for keeping this interesting.

11:46:  Sparks on 18-6 run, Phoenix up 73-71 now.

11:48:  Phoenix just up by one point, 73-72.  Less than five minutes left.  Looks like I'll be staying up.  But if this goes into overtime, I'm off to bed.

11:51:  There's some useful stats.  Parker 7 points in the 4th quarter, 11 in the first three.

11:56:  Toliver misses one from about 12 feet unguarded; Taylor hits one falling down.  7-0 Phoenix run.  That's the way the night is going for LA.  Toliver gets the technical, and I think that Los Angeles's home winning streak will come to an end.

11:58:  Too many damned commercials.  Hurry up.

12:01:  1:45 left, Parker at the line, and I stop typing.  Hey, I only allot myself two hours, anything over that and you gotta pay me.


After the fact:  Turns out that Phoenix won 90-84.  Los Angeles's 19-game win streak is over.  Taurasi scored 15 of her 32 points on the free throw line, where she was 15-17.  Shades of Angel McCoughtry.

Why I don't watch all of the games

One of the hardest life lessons to learn - I'm starting to get uncomfortably close to 50 but I haven't gotten there yet - is that you can't know everything.  Believe it or not, I thought at one time that I could know everything about mathematics, or about nursing, or about risk management and when I found myself against that hard wall of ignorance I generally banged my head against the wall too much and ended up with the intellectual equivalent of a concussion.

In following women's basketball, it has taken me about six years to figure out that there is no way that I am going to know everything.  It is only recently that I could say with any honesty, "I'm happy with that."

There are people at Rebkell who either have the luxury or the passion to watch every single women's basketball game there is.  I certainly tried at one time, but now I have to realize that that's not just going to be possible, that there are just a few brilliant people that are going to know more than I am every going to know.

Part of the problem is that I have a wife and that I want to spend time with her.

Another part of the problem is that she not only has no interest in women's basketball, she has no interest in just about any sport except hockey.  She has told me that she could follow hockey, but that adding hockey viewings to her itinerary is just a massive time sink that she doesn't want to get involved in.

When you get older - when you have to work eight-plus hour days and advance your career - then you have to make very careful choices about what you want to do.  In economics there is something called "opportunity cost".  A good example is from Wikipedia.  You come into some money, and you can spend that money in a number of ways.  You can go on vacation, or you can spend that cash on home repair.  So going on vacation doesn't just cost you the money and time on vacation, it costs you the opportunity to make significant repairs on your home.

Likewise, the opportunity cost of watching a women's basketball game is the cost of the things that need to get done in those two hours.  Last nights Atlanta-Los Angeles game had a 10:30 pm start time, and the opportunity cost of watching that game would be the cost of foregone sleep - I'd be in bed at 12:30 pm ET or later.  And I was really exhausted.  So I said, "No, I can't watch this game, I'll be a disaster tomorrow."

Good decision.  The Dream dropped that game 77-73.  Angel McCoughtry was back, but the Dream had no bench production - four measly points from their non-starters.  All of the starters played 30-plus minutes (with Alex Bentley playing 37 minutes - wonder if she played that much in a game at Penn State?) and none of the bench players got more than 9 minutes.  Ruth Riley made a 3:37 guest appearance.  I really wonder why Ruth Riley is on this team.  (Something I'll have to ask Fred Williams if I get a chance to chat.)  It's too late in Riley's career to see her play the Brittainey Raven/Chioma Nnamaka role.

Then again, maybe it's an opportunity cost problem from Senor Fred, too.  If you don't put Riley on the team, then who are you going to put on it?  Maybe Riley, believe it or not, brings the best value.

Interesting fact of the day:  In games which are "close" - decided by five points or less - Washington's Mike Thibault is 5-2 on the season.  The Mystics have played more close games than anyone, and have won more close games than anybody.  I don't think that's just random chance.  I suspect that players listen to Mike Thibault, and that explains why his job security has been good.  But he needs to win a title somewhere to shake off that reputation of falling short in the postseason.  Hey, why not the Mystics, someday?  Give Thibault a few more years.