Dear Tim,

I hope you’ll have a chance to read this and respond. I’d be happy to provide you with the spread sheet. I sorted Ellis’ stats after 42 games based on the number of minutes he plays. His season average is about 43 minutes so I divided the stats in half considering games where he played 43 minutes or less and games where he played more than 43 minutes. Here’s what I found:

AVERAGE MARGIN WHEN ELLIS PLAYS 43 minutes or less = 17.5 points
Ellis minutes=864, Non Ellis Minutes=266 (about 5.54 games)

AVERAGE MARGIN WHEN ELLIS PLAYS more than 43 minutes = 8.8 points
Ellis minutes Non Ellis Minutes #games
Ellis minutes=1210, Non Ellis Minutes=86 (about 1.79 games)

I think you should consider revising the conclusions* you make using +/-. It is a valid measure of what is happening on the court but you need to consider a large number of games and the context of where the minutes are coming from.

The substitution pattern Nelson has employed is that when a game gets out of hand, Ellis sits. Sorting the games by Ellis’ minutes shows the ratio of meaningful non-Ellis minutes versus blowout non-Ellis minutes is more than 3:1 (~86/266). So out of every 4 minutes that Ellis was off of the court, 3 of those minutes comes from games where the average margin of victory was 17.5 points whereas just 1 minute comes from games where the average margin of victory was 8.8 points. Is it really meaningful to look at +/- stats that are weighted substantially with blowouts? Probably not.

*
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/2010/01/26/monta-ellis-peripheral-stats-spelled-out-b-a-d/
“Ellis is -182 in the plus/minus, which is not a good number. He’s -4.4 per game. The Warriors are -3.4 per game on the season overall.”

I noticed Curry fake from the 3pt line and drive in and miss at least once. He’s getting so automatic from distance that I think it’s the wrong move not to put it up. Don’t want to turn into another Kapono. Same with Morrow.

Feltbot, your recap is not up, as far as I can see.

BTW, trying to defend the Fat Man’s obviously excessive drinking by comparing him to Billy Martin makes so little sense one would think, perhaps . . . well, you’re just proving my point. When was the last time an old drunk coached an NBA team to anything good?

If you want “direct effect” — just look at what this drunk has done to the team the last few years with his idiotic rotations (even Fitz was on his case last night), SNSB, and that incredibly boring iso and two-man game — which is all he seems to know.

And is it any surprise he’s so reviled by the players? Is there one guy on the team who would actually CHOOSE to play for this jerk? Why do so many wish to flee? Why do none wish to come here?

The Nelson game is over. Somebody clue the Fat Man in.