A Big East overview comes in as the 40th article in Basketball Prospectus’ short history. It’s the site’s inaugural season, but there are the seeds of something new and exciting here.

The overview raises the same questions borne from Beast expansion — what are the implications of a 16-team conference? Why doesn’t everybody play each other each year? Well at least the answers to the second question are changing in 2009 (18 games, one full round robin plus three “rivalry” games) … There’s the usual predictions with nothing too surprising to say, and the projected standings present the usual sense of probable outcomes more than prognostic ones. … Gasaway correctly notes that offense separated the wheat from the chaff last year, with Georgetown being one of the more impressive offenses to come along in some time. It’s still early for analysis, but I’m strongly anticipate Ken Pomeroy’s Beast preview, which should look like this one on the Big 12 last year.

The authors at Basketball Prospectus should not be new to anyone–John Gasaway (Big Ten Wonk) and Ken Pomeroy (kenpom.com) continue what they started as “part-time” hobbies (good idea!) at this Baseball Prospectus spinoff. I’m a long-time junkie of the original BP. The baseball formula worked very well, and there’s little reason not to expect the same for other sports. Donald might not agree, but I see a lot of potential for basketball research. There’s a huge gulf between what announcers say and what really matters. If baseball provides any indication, this gulf will persist for quite a long time, if not forever. Analysis will inevitably invade the mainstream — I’ll put the over/under on Jim Nance dropping “tempo-based ratings” in context at 5 years.

Categories: BlogWatch, Dan'l B
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So it’s been in the news for a while, but ever slow on the uptake, we here at Big East Hoops hadn’t seen it until just recently.

It turns out that former ‘Cuse sharp-shooter Jason Cipolla has been dating Soprano’s star Lorraine Bracco for over, like, 5 years now. Cipolla was a behind-the-scenes driver for the show; Bracco was on screen, playing the mob-boss’s psychiatrist Dr. Jennifer Melfi. Psychoanalyze this, though: Bracco is 52 compared to Cipolla’s 31.

Cradle robber or Sugar Momma? (not that the two are mutually exclusive)

We congratulate Jason. Though he couldn’t make the NBA, he chose the next best thing…the AARP.

Kidding, of course. Best to both. Love the show.

Categories: BlogWatch, Mister D, NewsWatch, Nostalgia, Syracuse
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Like so many others, my favorite thing about the preseason is tossing out my picks and predictions, and then four months later, when I get one thing right, I can tell you how great my picks were. For those of you who followed along with me last year, you know I did fairly well during the season. My preseason picks from last season were a bit off, so I’m hoping to improve upon them this year. Anyway Big East Nation, let me know what you think about these picks.

Byes @ MSG

1. Louisville – OK Hoya fans, I know what you’re going to say, “Have you seen Big Roy?” The answer is yes, I have, and he’s incredible inside, and he’s got a lot around him, but Georgetown will not be as good as Louisville this season. This team is absolutely loaded. If we have a clear candidate for national champ this year, it’s the Cardinals. Sosa and Caracter should be even better as Sophomores this year. Williams will anchor the frontline and all four will give them significant scoring. And I think by year’s end, both Sosa and Caracter will have those star qualities that enable them to take over games. The only thing that worries me about the Cards is their maturity. Some of their players have some interesting personalities and as long as Pitino can keep them from being self-destructive, they should be dominant.

2. Marquette – Crap. Louisville & Marquette as the top two? What happened to this league? I think the old guard of the league should pay attention because these new teams are good, and they’ve all come to play and win. I was pretty hard on Marquette last year, and they kind of flamed out at the end of the season. They’ll be much better this season. The Golden Eagles are a poor man’s 2006 Villanova team. Dominic James is a great player, but if anyone is going to take the MVP away from Hibbert this year, I think it could be Jerel McNeal. For those of you who don’t know Marquette, watch McNeal. He does everything right, and everything very well. Marquette will be around the top all year, and I think they will overtake the Hoyas by year’s end.

3. Georgetown – Here’s another real good team, but I think they’re going to miss Jeff Green more than people think. The Hoyas are big, deep and obviously, very experienced. They’re going to have a real strong year and Hibbert will likely win the Conference POY Award. Like Pitt last year, they’re everyone’s favorites. But like Pitt, the Hoyas are going to slip behind this season.

4. Connecticut – This may be a dumb pick. After the top 3, there appears to be a drop-off. And UConn has by far the most talent of the lesser 13. Last year, they were freshman, and they did squat with that talent. This year, they’ll probably do more. Dyson is a stud, and they should get more consistent play from Price and Robinson. And of course, Adrien will be a monster inside. But the key is what Thabeet can do offensively. On defense, the Huskies will be solid, but if Thabeet can’t catch the ball again, their offense won’t flow. If Thabeet gets a lot better, look out! UConn is still one year away from having a real good team, but they’ll be in the mix this season.

Playing on Wednesday

5. Providence – Here’s my sleeper. The Friars lost Herbert Hill, and there’s no question that’s going to hurt, but they are getting Randall Henke back, and everyone else is back, and they are a year older and a year more experienced. Providence will not challenge for first, but they’ll turn a few heads this year and get some national recognition.

6. Syracuse – The Orange are building a serious team, and although they’ll be young, like UConn, they have a ton of talent. Newcomers Flynn and Green should fit well with Harris and Devendorf. If they can figure out where they are going to get production from in the middle, that’d help a lot. Syracuse is going to be flashy and fun to watch but highly unexperienced. They’ll beat a couple teams they shouldn’t, and they’ll lose a couple games they shouldn’t. In the end, look for the Orange to be on the better half of the league’s midpoint.

7. Notre Dame – The Irish lost quite a bit of offense from last season in losing Falls and Carter. However, they are left with a young, promising team who can do very well this season. Kurz and Zeller are solid in the frontcourt. Harangody is going to be even better this year, and he’ll be in the conversation about All-Big East 1st team. The guards are good as well with Jackson and McAlarney. But the X factor is Zach Hillesland. Hillesland is another Joe Alexander type who can do everything for the Irish. This team will get better and better as the year goes on, and will cause serious problems for the upper echelon teams.

8. West Virginia – I think the Mountaineers will be decent this year. They are kind of a tough call though because of the coaching change. West Virginia still has a solid team returning, including bigeasthoops.com favorite, Joe Alexander. This team is also very deep and should have a decent season.

9. Pitt – Their dynasty is over. With Gray and Kendall leaving, Pitt is left with nothing in the middle. In a league that has such great big men, the Panthers will struggle to beat the top teams. The backcourt of Cook, Ramon and Fields are very good. But with no inside game, Pitt will struggle to find points. They’ll still beat the weak teams of the league, but I can’t see them finishing much higher than 9th.

10. Villanova – Scottie Reynolds. Scottie Reynolds. Scottie Reynolds. Villanova has a great player in Reynolds, and not much more. Reynolds will carry them to a few wins, but the Wildcats aren’t going to be competing the the top teams with only one real good player.

11. St. John’s – There’s another drop-off here. It’s hard to figure the Johnnies finishing much higher than this, but I think Mason and Lawrence will be able to carry St. John’s into the Big East tournament.

12. Seton Hall – The Pirates will not be much better than last year, but I think they may have enough to get the last spot into MSG, where they will promptly be destroyed and sent home for the year.

Better luck next year (when everyone makes The Tournament)

13. USF – Here’s my 2nd upset pick. For any other team, finishing 13th would hardly be considered an upset pick, but this is USF, a team that has been just terrible in their first two seasons in the Big East. The Bulls have a player named Kentrell Gransberry in the middle who is actually really good. He’ll carry the Bulls this year, and maybe, just maybe, they can challenge for a spot at MSG.

14. DePaul – The Demons had a nice team last year, and I actually thought they could have done a little better last season. After losing Mejia and Chandler, DePaul is now back to where they were a few years ago, the bottom of the league. Jerry Wainwright is going to have to rebuild again, and in the meantime, the Blue Demons are going to take some lumps.

15. Cincinnati – When they joined the Big East, I thought they would be good. But they’re not. And the Bearcats are not getting any better. This is a pretty poor team, and they finished last last year. They won’t be much better this year.

16. Rutgers – For a couple of years, Rutgers got pretty good, and watching their home games were incredibly entertaining. I even went so far as to claim that they had by far the biggest Home Court Advantage in the conference. But that was about four years ago. This Rutgers team is bad. They’ll finish last, and have no shot all year of making the Big East tournament. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

Categories: Commentary
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I’ll leave it up to old media.

I feel bad for him, especially regarding this:

Johnson, a top 50 national recruit in 2005, exhausted his junior eligibility by playing six minutes in UConn’s first exhibition Thursday against Assumption, according to a UConn spokesman. If Johnson is unable to have a year of eligibility restored, and because he must sit out two semesters when transferring to another Division I school, he will not be eligible to play until the spring semester of 2009, when he will be a senior.

Marcus Johnson is/was a serious talent who never found his place at UConn. I remember several games last year thinking that this was the only guy who could hit a medium range jumper consistently on the team. Alas, things did not work out. We wish Marcus the best of luck.

Categories: Commentary, Connecticut, donald
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There is a (relatively) large upheaval in sports right now. The situation is similar to Wall Street a decade or more ago, when traders bought and sold stocks based on gut feeling and inside knowledge about a particular industry. Then came the quants — PhDs in quantitative disciplines such as Physics and Mathematics from the ivory tower — and their mathematical models that told people when to buy and when to sell. Wall Street has never been the same since…

The quants are now making a headway in sports. The success story has been baseball, where quantitative analysis has even made its way into the mainstream media. The relatively-avid baseball fan knows a bit about Billy Beane, Bill James, Baseball Prospectus, and SABR. It’s not uncommon for baseball to hire people with outstanding quantitative skills and limited traditional baseball experience (and this). It’s safe to say that quants have very much influenced baseball — people are now paying attention to the various statistics and measures that they’ve come up with (value over replacement, etc.).

Football seems to be the next sport to topple. One could actually argue that it’s already been toppled, what with the BCS already being decided by a bunch of freaking computers. Coaches are already paying attention to quants; Belichick might not be running up the score this season when he goes for it on fourth down in the fourth quarter — he might just be following the optimal dynamic programming schedule. It’s known that he’s read it.

And of course, basketball is seeing the eggheads. There’s Daryl Morey, who taught a course at MIT titled “Analytical Sports Management”, now as GM of the Rockets. And just this season, Ken Pomeroy has started a website Basketball Prospectus (named after the wildly successful Baseball Prospectus site) that takes an analytical approach to college basketball.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am a man of science, and I truly believe in the power of reason over gut feelings. But I have strong reservations about such quantitative approaches to basketball. Baseball is a discrete game very amenable to analysis — each at-bat is reasonably well-approximated by just two players interacting (the pitcher and the hitter), each at-bat can reasonably be taken to be independent of previous at-bats, etc. It’s these simplifying assumptions that allow observations such as on-base percentage is what matters, not your hitting percentage. It allows people to reasonably simulate a baseball game and determine what order of hitters is optimal. My belief is that it’s these reasonable assumptions that have allowed quants to have such a large effect on baseball. I’m less of a believer that quantitative analysis can model football well, but I believe two things make football amenable to quantitative analysis — the first is that it’s discrete, so that events can be separated from one another with ease. The second is that most everything is planned — and it’s the plays that largely dictate play, rather than individual improvisation.

Basketball, on the other hand, has nothing going for it — something that happens on one side of the court directly affects the play on the other side, so the separability from play to play doesn’t exist. Individual improvisation is everything; sure, college run offenses and defenses, but more often than not those are general methodologies of play, rather than specific instructions as in football or baseball. Statistics that quants have been pushing for — pace-independent measures of ball security (turnovers divided by posessions), effective field goal percentage (weight three point makes more than two point makes) — make sense, but I don’t believe they capture basketball in the same way the measures do in baseball and football. Of course, I would love to be proven wrong.

Categories: Commentary, donald
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