Reading a Boxscore Beats Watching a Game
It was only a few weeks ago, but at the BET Hip-Hop Awards' Show, rap mogul Jay-Z made a statement that I not only apply to my life as a student/appliance salesman/poker player, but that wannabe-pundits should apply to a game they might have missed the previous night.
"Men lie, women lie... numbers don't."
God, I love Jigga.
Seriously though, this same principle can be applied to glancing at box scores. Sure, it's only columns of numbers, but those numbers tend to tell a story about what transpired on the court. I mention all of this because I missed the Maryland game (I couldn't find it on TV if it was on at all), and I logged on this morning to look at the results. Conclusions I can make based upon the box score alone:
* The first thing I mentioned from my last post was that Mike Jones needed to come out and look for his shot. Good things tend to happen when Jones starts jacking, and I'd say 18 points on 7-11 shooting is pretty sick.
* I also mentioned Greivis Vasquez needing to play more under control. 16 points on 5-7 shooting is excellent efficiency. Of course, it troubles me that, as a player who handles the ball a ton, he had more assists than turnovers.
* Building upon that, the Terps had 20 assists to 25 turnovers. That in itself shows a little bit of complacency. So does the fact that Maryland was only leading 39-33 at half-time. I don't want to accuse them of looking ahead, but... well, I bet Gary Williams threw out a couple of naughty words at half-time to get them re-focused.
*Very encouraging for Maryland as a team that they held Fordham to 32.8 percent shooting for the game. That confirms two things: 1) an inspired second half defensive effort, and 2) the Rams' struggled to create shots for themselves.
I've been reading box scores for as long as I can remember, and I really think it's the best way to evaluate players and teams. It's great to speculate about potential and raw talent, but truly the box score tells the whole story.
"Men lie, women lie... numbers don't."
God, I love Jigga.
Seriously though, this same principle can be applied to glancing at box scores. Sure, it's only columns of numbers, but those numbers tend to tell a story about what transpired on the court. I mention all of this because I missed the Maryland game (I couldn't find it on TV if it was on at all), and I logged on this morning to look at the results. Conclusions I can make based upon the box score alone:
* The first thing I mentioned from my last post was that Mike Jones needed to come out and look for his shot. Good things tend to happen when Jones starts jacking, and I'd say 18 points on 7-11 shooting is pretty sick.
* I also mentioned Greivis Vasquez needing to play more under control. 16 points on 5-7 shooting is excellent efficiency. Of course, it troubles me that, as a player who handles the ball a ton, he had more assists than turnovers.
* Building upon that, the Terps had 20 assists to 25 turnovers. That in itself shows a little bit of complacency. So does the fact that Maryland was only leading 39-33 at half-time. I don't want to accuse them of looking ahead, but... well, I bet Gary Williams threw out a couple of naughty words at half-time to get them re-focused.
*Very encouraging for Maryland as a team that they held Fordham to 32.8 percent shooting for the game. That confirms two things: 1) an inspired second half defensive effort, and 2) the Rams' struggled to create shots for themselves.
I've been reading box scores for as long as I can remember, and I really think it's the best way to evaluate players and teams. It's great to speculate about potential and raw talent, but truly the box score tells the whole story.
posted by Justin Cherot @ 10:55 AM
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