John Hollinger: Analytics People Watch More Games Than Charles Barkley Does
Charles Barkley is getting his share of feedback from his bashing of the advanced analytics systems that have become more relied upon in the NBA. Most recently from Memphis Grizzlies executive John Hollinger, formerly a valuable stats person for ESPN, who was quoted in Howard Beck of Bleacher Report’s list of myths about the stats wave in the NBA:
Myth No. 5: Stat guys don’t even watch the games.
Hollinger: We watch a lot of (bleeping) games. I don’t know where that one started. I guarantee you everyone who’s doing analytics watches a lot more games than Charles Barkley does.
This is almost becoming a divided line where we all have to choose a side.
There are plenty of things to learn from the analytics portion of the game, even for Hall of Famer Charles Barkley. The fact of the matter is, this kind of studying of the game is helping teams make huge leaps in their production. In that sense, analytics is even helping the overall IQ of the game.
I’m sure Barkley watches plenty of basketball, after all he’s an analyst and commentator for TNT and CBS, but Hollinger is pretty justified here. The time spent by these analytics people not only watching but calculating film and tendencies is probably rigorous. In time, I believe Barkley will have to take it upon himself to just go ahead and at least have a conversation with one of these guys. Watch how and why they operate. I think he’d come away from that exchange with a little more tactical insight, though I also think that Barkley couldn’t care any less how many basketball games they watch.
