The Ringer NBA Show - Ep. 35: The Genesis of PER and the Grizzlies' Untapped Potential With John Hollinger

Episode Date: October 20, 2016

The Ringer's Chris Vernon is joined by former ESPN analytics guru and current Memphis Grizzlies vice president of basketball operations John Hollinger to discuss developing his formula for PER (8:00), working for a franchise vs. covering a franchise (21:00), the importance of making smart personnel decisions (30:00), and the upside of the Grizzlies this season (38:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Welcome to the Ringer NBA show. I am Chris Vern. Today we've got a very special guest, John Hollinger. He's a former media member at ESPN, Sports Illustrated, etc. He is the creator of the often. referenced P-E-R, and he is now Vice President of Basketball Operations for the Memphis Grizzlies, and he joins us today.

Hey, John. Hey, Chris. Thanks for having me. Hey, thanks for coming on. So let's start at the very beginning with you. John Hollinger, when you are growing up, but we'll get to when you become famous statistician, John Hollager.

When you're growing up, are you baseball card collector? Are you a athlete? What are you growing up with? Should I be lying on a couch while we do this? Yes, yes. This is going to be the most in-depth John Hollinger interview you've ever done. Let's see.

I was a humongous sports fan of just every sport from like the time I was five. Way into baseball cards. Really, baseball was probably my first sport. I mean, at the time, you know, in the late 70s, early 80s, I mean, the NFL and NBA hadn't quite become the monsters they were today in terms of popularity. And baseball was kind of the thing. And then with my, I guess, mathematical bent, I became very interested in the numbers of baseball. Like, I knew all the guys' stats from the back of their baseball cards.

And when the Bill James books first came out in the early 80s, I was a teenager then, and I soaked all that up. up. At the same time, when I was a kid, I was always just much better at basketball than any other sport. So that got my brain churning a little bit as to how I could take some of the stuff in baseball and apply it toward basketball, too, because basketball really had nothing back then. What point would you say you started messing around with statistics, right? You say you're reading the Bill James stuff when you're a teenager. Is this like stuff you were doing like when you were in high school? You're trying to figure things out? Uh-huh. Yeah, I experimented with it in high school and college. Yes.

Experimented with stats. You go to Virginia. You get out of Virginia. That's where you graduate from. Yes. You get done at Virginia and what's the job? What are you doing? I was working for a, they did consulting for the Department of Energy in the D.C. area. What was the name of the company? It was called like analytical services. That was the name of the company. So, I mean, my major was in environmental science and economics. I had a double major at UVA. So I was, yeah, I was just, so I was doing that. Did a guest job?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. And then I was just on the side, you know, still messing around with my sports stats and everything. Now, at that point, do you care a lot about basketball yet, or are you still trying to figure out baseball stuff? No, no, I'm much more into basketball at this point and was already experimenting with the precursors to play. clear efficiency rating. And then probably the next thing that came along that really was a game changer for me was the internet. Right.

Which, for your younger viewers, there was, listeners, I should say, there was actually a time when there was no internet. The game changer was the internet. Do you remember those things? You would have to call this sports line thing to get the score of some late games? So you are, all right, so you get the over Virginia. How long do you have the desk job doing environmental science? So I worked there for two years, and then I was kind of bored with that, and so I moved to Portland, Oregon.

For what? Because it was there. You really just... Yeah. Wait, wait, wait, hold on now. Hold on. You're in the D.C. area. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And you say, I'm done with this job. Uh-huh. I don't... This is not going to be my career. I've gone out to the West Coast the year before, and I just loved it, and I really liked Oregon in particular. Did you move out there with no job? Correct. And then what job did you get?

I got a job with a market research firm in Portland. So it was like taking data for market research surveys, and they had a bunch of tech clients. And, you know, so. And now are you still working on basketball stats on the side? Yeah, exactly. That's your like passion. Because at this point, I started, I started, as I said before, the Internet came along. So I started my website, aleoup.com, at this point.

And that starts when? This was early 1996. Early 96, you start aleoup.com. Yeah, yeah. And allieupe.com is what? And it doesn't exist anymore. By the way, I typed it in. Yeah, I sold the domain.

To who? It was like an educational company or something. How much? I didn't. I got it. It was a nice payday. Really? Yeah.

Yeah. I was more than 10 grand? Let's, let's, it was, it was nice. Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alleyoop.com, you had that many people going to that thing, huh? It was a popular. It was a good URL, you know, back then you could get good URLs.

You wouldn't, you know, now it's like Chris Vernon 86573.com. Trust me. Trust me, I know. So, okay, so you sell or you've got aleoup.com. Uh-huh. And you've got this job that you're bored with. Uh-huh. Right?

Is that fair to say? Yeah. So aleup.com becomes your passion. Yeah, exactly. And that's what turns into a media job? Yes. Because the next thing that happened for me was, so this again is back, try to imagine a time when newspapers were not yet on the internet. They would just send out a paper product in the morning and people would read that.

And so the Portland Oregonian was basically taking the first steps to go. online and they needed somebody to do sports and they don't know what they're doing yeah so i got this yeah yes so i got this yeah yes successful basketball exactly so i heard about this through friend of a friend and uh and uh was able to get my foot in the door there what is al what is ala because obviously all the archives are gone alleyup dot com was like if i went to it are you writing it was it was it was so it was like my per diem columns at esPN okay um and uh It was the same type of thing. So I was writing stuff probably pretty close to every day and posting my stats there.

By this point, I pretty much had P.E.R. pretty close to what the formula is now. Is it just you? Yes. Just you. Yep. Okay. So you were running the website. This turns into a job editing for the Portland Oregon.

Oregonian. Yep, yeah. And at what point now, how does P.E.R. You've worked on it since when? How long did it take you to come up with the formula, would you say? It's hard for me to really say because there were so much, there were like iterations of it. So I came up with something and I posted it, but I was still tweaking. And this probably went on for a few years until I really had something that I was,

happy with and sort of its final form came out in I guess it would be 2002 when my first when my when my when my book came out that was really the final form that it's been in for the last 15 years pro basketball perspective yeah exactly okay exactly so so by that time you tweak it for a couple of years is there a moment where you finally like plug it in and it comes up, Michael Jordan, Will Chamberlain. Like, it seems like all the right answers, and you're like, I've got it. Yeah, yeah. There was something pretty close to that where it was like, okay, this, this 100% passes the

smell test. This looks right. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. Because in the first version of P.E.R, Rick Smith was the greatest player of all time, and you knew you had to tweet. Shout out to Rick Smith, by the way. You're like, this isn't right. There's got to be a number off in here, right?

It was either him or Vern Fleming. I can't remember who. So is that really what's happening, though? You're just, you keep on tweaking this until it looks right? Yeah, until it looks right in until, I mean, obviously, I needed all the logic that went into it to be consistent, too. I mean, I cared that it looked right, obviously, but I needed to make sure that it, but I needed to make sure that the mathematics behind it were totally logical as well. Who did you run it by?

Did anybody help you with it? No. You're a loner. Yeah. A lone wolf in the creation of P.E.R. I was experimenting with stats. I was a loner. Yeah.

You know, all this. I'm trying to be nice about this, John. So you are coming up. So then when P.E.R. finally comes out. Do you realize at the time this is going to be big? No. Or do you think this is just something that's cool and there's a bunch of basketball nerds that care about this? Could you have ever envisioned that it would be regularly referenced that, like, I don't know.

I'm trying to. Absolutely not. First of all, I thought somebody would invent something better that would blow it out of the water. I'm working on it. I'm working on it. It's not going well. I hadn't really pictured you as being the guy doing that, but, you know, I thought somebody, I thought somebody would. You thought somebody would come along with something better than P.E.R.

And then I just, I never anticipated all of the things that happened after that. So to follow on, you know, sort of the biographical story. So after about three years in Oregon, which was good experience for me because I got to do things like cover the Blazers and get some experience on a more face-to-face level with the league, this is actually a great story. I was talking to a friend about, you know, I'd always really admired those Bill James books. I'd always wanted to do something similar to his books, but for basketball. and so a friend I was talking to a good friend of mine he said he said well you always wanted to do that book thing you know maybe you should go ahead and try it and so I had no idea how to get a book published so I bought getting your book published for dummies no you did I swear to God I did

shout out to the dummies people because son of a gun if that didn't work you bought how to get your book published for dummies? No way. This is an amazing story. This is the genesis of the pro basketball perspective. Holy mackerel. Okay. And it works.

I would say I followed the set there. What were the basic tenets? I mean, you write a book proposal, showed you how to write a book proposal. You know, who are the people you needed to get it to? Was able to get it in front of a publisher in New York. You do how many copies we're going to sell of this book on Amazon today? Everybody that's listening to is like, you know what? I always kind of wanted to get a book published too.

It works. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Shout out to the dummies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah. So it does work and you pitch pro basketball prospectus. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And they say yes. Yep, yep, yeah. So. Do you have any idea how many the first copies sold? Well, let's see. I have... The first edition? So there would be my mom, my dad, three sisters and a brother.

Seriously. Six. Seriously. Thousands? I don't even know if we got to thousands. How did people buy it? Again, we're going back to pre-intern. Amazon did exist by this point.

But were you carried all over the country? Oh, yeah. No, you could see it like Barnes & Noble and stuff. All over, though. Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. All right, so you did have good distribution on it.

Yeah. But you don't know how well the first one did. It did well enough for the – they picked up a second edition, right? Yes, yes. So there ended up being four editions, I think. Why did you stop doing the book? Because you got to – Well, I was at ESPN by that point, and they proposed that I just do everything for it online.

By the time I went to ESPN. And did they – did you sell it? Did you sell pro basketball prospectus? Or does somebody just take it over? The name, I never had, I'm trying to remember what the agreement was with this, but it was something like, because you know there was baseball prospectus. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But my publisher also had an arrangement with baseball prospectus. So, like, they were able to get that name for my book, too.

Oh, but I never really had it. Okay. So. I understand. Okay, so in terms of. That wasn't in the dummies book, so I don't really know how that all worked. So there is a stop at Sports Illustrated before ESPN. Yes.

So where the book really helped was that I was able to show that to the people at SI. Right. And say, you know, here's what I did. Here I'm legit. And so they hired me as an NBA editor at SI.com. Okay. And they were based in Atlanta at the time.

And then you were to ESPN for how long? I was at ESPN for close to eight years. So early 05 to late 2012. Now, if I go to ESPN's page and I pull up stats, still on the top right corner, it will say Hollinger players statistics, it will say Hollins are team statistics. Do they own that? Did you sell that to them? No. It was just a handshake.

It was just when I left there, they told me, you know, can we just keep your name up on these stats until we? figure out, you know, what we're going to do next with them. And nobody ever did. So just in perfect, they had, well, you know, they had, there was Hollinger power rankings too. And finally, late last year, I think, that was, that was, oh, that was the first one to go ushered off into the power rankings in the sky now. But, yeah.

When you left ESPN to take a job in the front office at the Grizzlies, it was just, they just said, hey, do you care if we keep putting these stats? up and you're like, no, I don't care. No, I mean, it was, yeah, it wasn't hurting me any. There is no, quote, owning that? No. Like, there is no. There's nothing to own, yeah.

So it's actually kind of good that they call them Hollinger stats, because they could just call it P.E.R. Yeah, or credit, right? Or Vernon's stats or something. That would be awful. All right. As time has gone on, you have now seen this, so many sports fans, and specifically basketball fans become so much more in tune about, is it odd to you to see how much more in tune people are with advanced statistics and metrics now as compared to, I mean, you were writing

about this stuff for a long time and it feels like the niche is no longer niche, that there is now a widespread proliferation of basketball fans understanding and dissecting this type of stuff? It's odd and amazing at the same time. I never imagined 15 years ago that it could happen like this, where stuff that I would have written even five or six years ago that would have been like a breathtaking revelation is now, yeah, whatever, everyone knows that.

Right. And just the leaps that have been made in this sport so quickly. I guess using baseball as my model again because they were kind of first, and it was so I guess baseball is a more traditional a little more close-minded sport as well but it took so long for there to be any level of acceptance

of the stuff that Bill James was doing that I just figured it would be the same thing in basketball and it's actually been a much more rapid acceptance process in basketball there are with every stat right there are criticisms of as there were with your PER or that are.

There are some people that just discounted. Not discounted, but rather like, it doesn't take this into effect or it doesn't take this into effect. Right. Okay, when you look at all the other ones that people who reference, I just want to get John Hodger's perspective on these things. What do you think about win shares? I think it's useful.

It's, I mean, that's more of a quantity stat, right? It can be useful for doing big picture stuff for evaluating large. sets of data for evaluating careers. I think some of the stuff that on the, when I was on the writing side, are some very interesting arguments. I think wind shares can be helpful with those. For what we do on a day-to-day business with the Grizzlies,

probably not that useful except for sometimes you may want to aggregate into large data sets just to have it as another. input and see what it gives you. Real plus minus. Yeah, that's a that is a very interesting tool. It has it has some real correlation with with results on the court. Probably the biggest limitation you have with that. You get into some real issues when you do when you work with lineups in the NBA. So you have 10 different variables, right? Because there's five guys that are on the court for you

and the five on the court for the other team. But the other thing is that players are not randomly interchanged and dispersed. You will tend to have one five-man lineup, your starting lineup, that plays a massive amount of minutes, and then lots of other lineup combinations that play very few. And that can do, that can really do some whack things. to your data in terms of trying to, in terms of the conclusions it will give you about the relative strengths of different players because it's going to be focusing very heavily.

If your lineups are non-random, it's going to be, you can end up with it trained very heavily on low minute samples where the lineup happened to be different. Well, I'm glad you mentioned that because I do want to ask you about lineups because I think sports fans now, like I can go and I can go to even the NBA. page and I can look up two-man lineups and three-man lineups and four-man line-line line, any different level of combination. And I'm curious, just from your perspective, as someone that is analyzing one specific team that you're dealing with every day, is there a, when people talk about sample size

and small sample size, at what point does it become reality to you? You know what I'm saying? Like if I'm looking at a, how many minutes does a unit typically need to play for it to be relevant for me to say he should be playing that unit, he should be playing that combination or whatever. I'd love to give you a simple answer, but the truth is there isn't. There is none. There isn't a hugely simple answer. It's, um, uh, the more, the more extreme, the more extreme the more extreme the, the more extreme the, the, the more extreme the, effect the fewer minutes you need, right?

Okay. Like, if we're minus 1,000, right? We don't need that big a minute sample to figure out that something's gone way wrong here. Understood. But likewise, you wouldn't take into account if something was plus 1,000. You would say, ah, it needs to play a little more before we, right? In fairness, it's usually the negative is the one that it's almost like a confirmation of, right? Like, they suck when they play this and this guy together.

And then you see the data and it's like, okay, I don't need to like, yeah, it pretty much confirms what I'm watching with my eyes. Yeah, and especially where it's interesting with us is because we've had, now it's going to be a little different this year, but the last couple years we had a lot of roster continuity so that we could look over multiple years. And now you're getting into really big chunks of data where we could see different combinations and, and how they affected each other. Offensive rating and defensive rating. Yeah, I probably don't use that a ton. I just think there are better proxies for those things. So those being referenced as he has an offensive rating or a defensive rating,

just in your mind's eye, you don't sit there and go that's relevant to me necessarily. Yeah, and it's not to take anything away from it. I mean, I understand. It's very coherent in what it's trying to deliver. Okay, why are you not something extremely relevant to you? I don't understand the stuff all that well, honestly. Like, I mean, in terms of why. It's how well do you play offense when the guy's on the court?

How well do you play defense when the guys on the court? But that's with the five-man team and there's lineup effects and all that. So I'd rather, I'd probably rather delve into the lineup effects. You think it's very difficult to isolate one guy? Yes, that would be accurate. Is that fair? Yeah. Okay.

I do get it then, John. I might as well come up with the new P.R. Vernon, Vernon ratings. They may be changing that link right now. Nobody wants it. Has any of your, like for those that are listening that were big fans of you and grew up reading you, have your, the numbers like, let's say, PER will forever be PER. You have done no tweaking to it. Is that so?

Like your draft rater, you know, that was a big. column that you came out with every year analyzing college players, etc. Like what of the stuff that we got used to reading you right about, what has changed since, let's say you were at ESPN and you became a front office member of an NBA team? I would say the stuff that deals with projections has changed a ton from the way I did. Not just draft. I mean, I would project player stats for each season, too. when I was at ESPN.

Right. So that has changed a ton. The basic nuts and bolts formulas haven't changed at all. I mean, pure point rating is still pure point rating, you know, offensive rebound percent, defensive rebound percent. I mean, and really, why would they change? It's like batting average, you know, it's asking, like asking someone in baseball, have you changed a formula for batting average?

Well, no, it's been the same since like 1880, you know? So. But your player projections would be different. now than what they once were in terms of how you get to the numbers? Yeah, yeah. Interesting. And part of that is just we have access to so much more now and more advanced stats especially. Give me something that's been a breakthrough for that.

Something that you now have access to that you maybe didn't when you were writing about basketball analytics for so long. Seasons of data from the three-point era, for one. Interesting. I mean, they initiated the three in the 80s, but nobody really used it for 10 years, and then they moved the line way in in 1996, I think. So that gives you like two years of data that's completely out of line with everything before and after. And really, once you get to the turn of the century is where you start seeing things, you start getting into those teams like Sacramento, you know, maybe late areas. where Houston with the Lodgeman was maybe the first one to kind of do it, but that was the short three point line era too.

But where it looks more like the game is now. And so you really get some projectability when you start dealing with results from that. Because if you try to project you start from the 70s and you end up with all kinds of weird outliers and stuff, like, oh, a 6-2 shooting guard. What's wrong with that? You know, like everyone has one, you know? Just the game has changed too much. I think that's one of the biggest differences actually compared to, say, baseball, where you have a century of data and the game is pretty much still the game. Right.

And the game in basketball has changed. I mean, you see now when they show these replays on NBA TV, playoff games in the 70s, it's almost like you're watching a different sport. I mean, it's just everything so much, just the way they space the floor, the types of shots are trying to get, the size. everything is just completely different. Athleticism is what really stands out. When you flip on and they're, you know, the classic games, you can even watch a classic All-Star game. And there's like a couple of guys that look like crazy athletes like now.

But like now, I mean, I mean, good grief. I mean, like, just think about the moment of the finals last year with LeBron chasing that guy down. Yeah. There's nobody that looks like LeBron in those old films, really. Yeah, yeah. And it's too, you know, the weight training. I mean, just, and players are so much smarter about their bodies. I mean, in the 70s guys were smoking cigarettes at halftime.

I mean, they didn't know, you know? How did you get, when did you first get a sense? Did you have a goal of being in a NBA front office? How many offers had you had to become a part of a front office prior to the Grizzlies? And how did you end up getting a job at the Grizzlies? Well, the real goal was to end up on. Vernon's radio show. And so I kind of work backwards from there.

I'm sure you hear this a lot. Yeah, everybody. You were on my radio show when you were at ESPN. That's true. That's right. So that happened. I've been in a few different studios now. This is a place across from FedEx Forum, right?

Yes. You've been to at least three different studios with me. Unfortunately, my career has taken more turns than yours recently. But it's all, listen, we're on the ringer right now for God's sakes. Yeah. All right. So how do you end up in a front office? And did you think, when you were writing for ESPN, did you, was that even a goal of yours?

I really thought I would just be writing for the rest of my career and, you know, and I was perfectly fine with that. I had had some nibbles from teams, but it had never really been, it had always been, situations where they kind of just wanted somebody to be over in the analytics box and just kind of stay over there. And it wasn't that enticing to me given what I'd already established at ESPN. The difference, I think, with... They were going to put you in a dungeon with your computer and then go say, tell us what matters. Yeah, yeah, it'd be Melvin in office space down in the basement.

That was the offer. I politely declined to go into my book. And when the Grizzlies approached me, when shortly after Robert bought the team, the thing that was different, obviously, was that it was in a position of front office where I could have much more direct impact on some of the key decisions. Power, honestly. Yeah. Yeah. You want to feel like your work is meaningful and having an impact and listen to. And I knew with Robert's background what he was trying to build that that was going to be able to be able to happen in Memphis.

And I've told you this before. I am in that age range where I grew up reading Bill Simmons columns. I read your analysis. And weirdly enough now, Robert Pair of the owner of the Grizzlies is, we're around the same age, he grew up a religious reader of yours. So that's the bizarre thing. Like it's almost like as time went on now kids that grew up reading Bill Simmons, John Hollinger, etc., they're owning NBA teams now. Yeah.

It's part of the reason that I think probably they've reached out to you is because he had always been somebody that read your stuff and thought, wow, this is smart forward thing. stuff. Yeah, hopefully you thought that. Yeah. What Chris is really trying to say is that I'm quite old. You still got a job. Hey, listen. So being a media member, being a writer, and then transitioning into the front office,

what's the biggest difference about what your perception of how the NBA works versus how it really works in terms of like decisions, draft, trades, et cetera? because when you're in the media, listen, as I know, you get to sit in an ivory tower and you get to criticize. And part of what you did, I mean, some of your stuff was pretty biting over the years, whether it was about players or whether it was about trades that teams made or decisions that coaches were making or whatever else. And so going from that to now being on the inside of an NBA team, what's the biggest difference about the way you're making? you thought everything was versus how it really is, or is it about what you always thought? I would say the biggest differences are,

you know, you think of it from the exterior sort of the way you're running a fantasy football team, let's say, you know, and that it's all about the personnel decisions. Right. and on the inside there's so much other stuff you have to deal with that is absolutely vital for your success but has nothing to do with those types of decisions like what um like uh how you do scouting how you do um health and fitness of players um um who you hire to be on your staff.

I mean, those decisions right there, I mean, they have a huge impact on winning and losing. And they have nothing to do with like any of the, you know, trade draft. Trade draft signings. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And then. So do you think if you went back to being a writer, you would be easier on people? I think so actually one of the things that changed for me even during the time I was writing I realized this I very pretty early on I got away from ever criticizing or rarely at least individuals on a decision and just said the organization should have done X or should have done Y and I think really on the inside it's been

backed up. There are so many layers within any organization to any decision that gets made. Nobody is the emperor who just gets to decide by themselves. I mean, that's just not how it works. Anywhere. Ever, in any organization. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And so I think that's something that people on the outside don't always get. And, you know, you'll see it on, you know, Twitter especially has been horrible for this because it's just hot takes 101. Right. And so it's just, I can't believe Chris Wallace did this or didn't do this or or if not him, you know, 29 other guys with with other teams. But it's trying to figure out who is responsible for whatever you want to complain about.

They are organizational decisions at the end of the day. Yeah. He is John Hollinger. We're going to talk more about the upcoming NBA season with him. First, I'm going to tell you, it's officially basketball season. So it's time for you to ask yourself a crucial question. Where will you be watching the games? Parked on a stool and a crusty sports bar crammed onto a friend's couch. You can do better with Sling TV, watch NBA basketball on your terms, on your turf. The Sling Orange service has the live hoops you love on ESPN and TNT as well as shows, sports news, and more on the top networks, all for just 20 bucks a month. Get instant access to must-see games, expert commentary and analysis, the best of live TV,

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All right, John. So people know with the Grizzlies last year. You're a historically injured team. You did set the record in NBA history, 28 players used in a season last year. When you think back to the Grizzlies last season, what are your overwhelming thoughts? Is it all about the injuries? You know, the injuries really, it was a huge rash late, though, right? we had already played 55 games, basically, so the injury to Mark was our 52nd game, I think.

So we had already had two-thirds of our season up to that point. And that's the part that I probably remember more, because I think of it more as having our team. I mean, it was definitely interesting and unprecedented what happened in March and April. Usually, as a front office member, by March, your work is essentially done, right? Because the trade deadline has passed. Your hands are usually pretty much tied by that point. And we were making a roster move every single day. Like every single day in March and April, we're doing stuff.

I know more about injury exemptions than I ever wanted to. And but we – so that was – And it also tested your depth chart in terms of your scouting department, right? Because at some point you get to like, hey, is Jordan Farmer still alive? Right. You know, even by that point in the year, the D-League has usually been picked pretty clean too. Right. So you're really, you know, you're really moving further down the list at some point.

And we were, you know, we were able to tread water with some of the guys we got and at least get into the playoffs. So we were happy that as a, you know, as a department, we were able to come up with, we were able to come up with Jordan Farmer. We were able to come up with Xavier Mumford and at least stem the bleeding and get ourselves in the playoffs. As a guy that does so much analysis on these type of things and you see projections and you see, like, listen, you still know all the guys that are writing statistical analysis, right? Yeah. And it seems to me it's very, very difficult to gauge the Grizzlies because last year is almost like, okay, what do we pay attention to to even project what this year can be? But you do read some, in fact, I would say quite a few of the guys that expert in data. Say age regression, injury regression, whatever else it may be, right?

And so the projections are lower this year on the Grizzlies than they have been in the past. You are also a guy that does data. Why is, when you read the data-driven projections for the Grizzlies that are rather down on them as a, certainly not. No data-driven projections has the Grizzlies as like a home court advantage team or a top four seed in the West or whatever else. What do you make of that? I guess I expected that, given what our point differential was last year, even before the injuries hit and our age profile. The thing I think that...

So the question then is, what exists outside that data that you would line up to oppose that? For people that are out there that are thinking, I think the Grizzlies could be better than that, but I've seen all these articles saying that... Yeah, yeah. And I think the things you would juxtapose again... that are our physical conditioning are the benefits we can get from bringing in David, David Fisdale and kind of opening things up, taking better advantage of the three-point shot, and that some of the guys, the younger guys that we've brought in, because really beyond those, you know, the Corps

four and a couple other veteran guys, we have a lot of younger players now. which I haven't really had in a while. Right. That hopefully can be put some wind in our sales. And they're guys that you wouldn't really have much of a projection for if you're doing a statistical analysis. What do you project Wade Baldwin and Andrew Harrison as? Well, they weren't in the league last year. What do you project James Ennis as?

Well, he's hardly played. Yeah, yeah. But we think they're guys that put some. significant wind in our sales and we think certainly from a physical perspective I think this is an eye test thing Mark and Mike is it fair to say I mean everybody seems to be saying about the Grizzes it's just if they're healthy or not mm-hmm it's fair right it's it's fair given the injury issues we had and you know Chandler Parsons obviously is is another one so that was a that's a calculated risk on on our end okay why Chandler Parsons

We don't even get into the Conley stuff Conley signed a massive deal in the all season Conley's been with this team for a long time an outstanding point guard but Chandler Parsons was probably the biggest free agent acquisition well not probably certainly the biggest free agent acquisition that the Grizz have ever made

he had trouble making it sliding darko yes he had trouble making it through the seasons last couple of years has not been available for the playoffs I think he played like what 62 games last year yes but you guys pushed your chips in and free agent

and said, we really want Chandler Parsons? Why? I think there are two things here. So the view from 10,000 feet of the free agent market in general was that the choices you had last summer were to pay max money for a good player or to pay almost as much for a okay to mediocre player. I mean, that's the way the market turned out. Clearly going the max route for a good player was going to be the. the better alternative.

And so that, with Mike and with Chandler, I think those were clear decisions. As far as Chandler in particular and what he brings for us, we've never really had that secondary ball handler who can create stuff for other guys. And at the same time, be a legitimate, strong three-point threat, too. we've had players who gave us bits and pieces of that. Rudy could score. Tashon could facilitate and make plays for other people. You know, Jeff could get his own shot.

But to have that in the same player where you can, you know, be that three-point threat and also be able to put the ball on the floor and create for yourself or others, that's just not something we've had and I think especially the guy who's really going to benefit from that is Mike who basically hasn't been able to play off the ball at all in the this is my fifth season now here

just because we haven't had other people on the floor with him who could make that possible so that's what we're really excited about is that offensively that's just a weapon that we have never been been able to have

and then what that can do for the other four guys who've been carrying us for the last six years now when he's on the court with them. And especially, you know, now you open up the floor a little, put mark above the three point line. And people have been so used to seeing the Grizzlies, you know, slow the game down,

beat you 88 to 82, Zach Randolph, Marcus saw in the post. And then just as someone like, The other night, there's a Grizzlies preseason game. You play against the Houston Rockets. They shot 44 threes the Grizzlies did. Yes. Now, that seems extreme, but do you think that it is the Grizzlies and the way they are playing now,

and you would reference Fisdale earlier, do you think people are going to be shocked when they tune in and watch the Grizzlies play this year? Was that an extreme outlier, or is this going to be commonplace where the Grizzlies are now a team that shoots a ton of threes like many other of their peers? I would say... 44 is outrageous. I would say yes to both. Now, it was a double overtime game. But also, I mean, if we get 44 open threes, we're going to take 44 threes, okay? Those are good shots.

Why wouldn't you take those? There's no too much or too little, right? It's all about the quality of the shot, right? You know, if you're just dribbling up and chucking off the dribble with a hand in your face, then, no, that's a terrible shot. It doesn't matter if it's a three or a two. Right. But if we can get open threes, we feel like we have the shooters to make those shots now, really at every position.

I mean, we had all, we had, this is where I really did a double take and was like, is this our box score? We had all five starters make at least two three-pointers in that game. Which is like never happened in a season. Yeah, ever, ever, ever, ever, certainly not with us. No, and 44-3s is like a half-season total for the amount of it. amount of attempts that the grizzlies have taken. You know, honestly, 44 shot attempts, that's Mark and Zach, you know, down within six feet of the basket usually.

That's where 44 shot attempts have come. But the grizzlies are, people have called them dinosaur ball, they're the last to evolve. That's not so anymore in your mind. When people watch the grizzlies, they're going to see a different type of franchise than what they're used to. The way we play offense is going to be different from. the way we have played offense in the past. I think that's definitely true.

We're still going to post up. We're still going to have that defensive mentality. But I think we're going to be doing it out of a much more open floor and a much more three-point-minded attack. Because if you look, we're still getting a bunch of paint shots. We're still getting a ton of free throws. where what we've really done is replaced a lot of long twos with threes. And that's something I've been...

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So do you've been screaming about? I did the math on this and three is more than two. Over the course of... All right, so with the season coming up, and it's going to be starting next week, your overwhelming thoughts on... Forget the Grizzlies. Just your overwhelming league-wide thoughts going into this year.

the things that you are thinking about the most about this upcoming NBA season. Is it Golden State? Is that on everybody's mind? No matter whether you work for a team or you just analyze the NBA. I mean, we saw the way it played out last year with Golden State, but then with Durant going there this year, what matters to you? That's not necessarily Grizzly specific. I think certainly you look at Golden State, and it's fascinating to see how that's going to work out.

And also, as one of their competitors, you scratch your head a little bit and say, okay, we got to figure out how we're going to deal with this. You know, it would be, you know, you'd like to have three Tony Allen's for that game and put them on all three guys, but you can't do that, so you've got to figure something else out. but I mean that's that's that's that's part of the great challenge in this at the same time it's tough it's tough to get too deep into what another you're so the thing that changes in this job from say a media job is you're uh you're kind of an inch wide and a mile deep right you're so into what your own team right is doing you you just have less time to think about the other

the other 29. And I mean, we're still watching their games, evaluating their roster, trying to put ourselves in the heads of their front office as to what moves they would make, because that's how you generally can come up with good tree advantages and trade ideas. But it's tough to get back to that place where you're looking at it as a fan. You can't do it anymore. It's really hard. It's easier to do actually with like the European leagues or colleges, which we're scouting

and watching all the time, but we don't have any skin in the game. Right. So it's probably a little easier when we watch those. I am going to go and work on the Vernon stats so that when I go to ESPN.com and I click on the stats page in the top right corner, it no longer says Hollinger statistics, Hollinger team statistics. I'm going to petition them to get those replaced with the Vernon stats. But I've got to, obviously, I've got to work on getting something better.

I've told them they can't make that change until. I get a sandwich named after me in Memphis. I do have that. He is John Hodger. Thanks for coming on the podcast. Hey, thanks for having me, Chris. That is the Ringer NBA show. Today's episode brought to you by Sling TV.

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