Green Grove Project 2017/18 Season Analysis Company Overview We help the young athletes to accelerate their sport-specific growth through the statistical analysis. Our services are based on a Decision Management Tool which integrates and analyses the Athletic and Bio-Athletic data creating valuable insights for the athletes and the teams. ________________________________________________ International Award: Top-15 Rising Sports Analytics Startups in Europe (KPMG, 04/2018) Presenters: • National Statistical Conference (Lamia – GR, 05/2018) • World Series Sports Analytics Conference (Amsterdam - NL, 05/2018) Our website: statathlon.com Our website: statathlon.com Email Address: [email protected] Email Address: [email protected] Introduction Green Grove Project focuses on the individual and team performance of a basketball club, using various data analysis methods. Insights of this project can be used by the clubs and all relevant stakeholders (coaching and medical staff, players etc.) in order to track its performance in different categories. The case study used for this project is the Lithuanian club BC Zalgiris Kaunas. The selection was based on the following criteria: • A highly reputed and ambitious professional club from Europe. • The club would participate in a major continental competition with adequate number of matches to be led to fair conclusions. In addition, a few non - playing criteria were set such as team location (more specifically, coming from a country with high interest in basketball) and strong business profile. The data has been extracted from Euroleague Basketball Regular Season (2017-2018), where all 16 teams faced each other twice in 15 home and 15 away games. 01 AIMS & OBJECTIVES Aims and Objectives • To understand better the impact that various statistical • To help coaching staff identify the exact roles that are indexes have and find the correlation between them. missing from the current squad and look for players with similar skills in transfer market. • To assess each player’s performance in order to find his strengths and weaknesses, as well as his overall progress • To find out how certain players perform in games against throughout season. teams with different characteristics, in order to adjust defensive and offensive tactics accordingly in the future. • To provide useful recommendations to coaching staff regarding team’s actual strengths and weaknesses. Analysis • To explore team’s performance during specific phases of a outcomes can be used to determine if there are any fields game (early minutes, clutch time etc.). These results help the where team should pay more attention in training or during coaching staff to manage players more efficiently in relevant pre - game preparation. situations. 02 Green Grove Project Indexes Interpretation For the purposes of this project, more than 30 performance indexes have been used. They have split into 4 main categories, according to their complexity (basic & advanced) and content (individual & team). Basic individual and team performance indexes are being used by Euroleague Basketball and everyone can have free access to them through its official website or other partners’ websites. Advanced indexes are a mixture of indexes used in NBA, indexes that Euroleague Basketball does not directly provide and therefore their calculation is made through the official available data, and unique performance indexes which have been created by the research team of Statathlon. In the following pages all advanced indexes are explained. Their interpretation includes specific comments on what could be considered as a good performance in each of them, as well as a few conclusions and recommendations that can be extracted out of them. 03 5 Current Squad of Zalgiris Kaunas NAME POSITION HEIGHT (cm) AGE NATIONALITY JOINED Brandon Davies C 208 26 USA 2017 Kevin Pangos PG 188 24 CAN/SVN 2016 Axel Toupane SF/SG 201 25 FRA 2017 Beno Udrih PG/SG 189 35 SVN 2017 Paulius Jankunas PF/C 205 33 LTU 2010 Martynas Sajus C 208 21 LTU 2017 Gytis Masiulis PF 206 19 LTU 2014 Arturas Milaknis SG/SF 195 31 LTU 2016 Vasilije Micic SG/PG 195 23 SRB 2017 Martynas Arlauskas SG 199 17 LTU 2017 Aaron White PF 206 25 USA 2017 Antanas Kavaliauskas C 208 33 LTU 2016 Paulius Valinskas PG/SG 191 22 LTU 2016 Edgaras Ulanovas SF/PF 198 25 LTU 2014 Dee Bost PG 188 28 USA 2017 04 Green Grove Project 2017/18 Zalgiris Kaunas Fixtures Game Date Opponent Home/Away Game Date Opponent Home/Away 1 13/10/2017 Crvena Zvezda Belgrade Home 16 5/1/2018 Crvena Zvezda Belgrade Away 2 20/10/2017 Khimki Moscow Region Away 17 12/1/2018 Unicaja Malaga Home 3 24/10/2017 FC Barcelona Away 18 16/1/2018 Brose Baskets Away 4 26/10/2017 Real Madrid Home 19 18/1/2018 Valencia Basket Home 5 3/11/2017 CSKA Moscow Away 20 25/1/2018 Panhinaikos Athens Away 6 9/11/2017 AX Armani Exchange Olimpia Milan Away 21 1/2/2018 Maccabi Tel Aviv Home 7 14/11/2017 Unicaja Malaga Away 22 9/2/2018 Khimki Moscow Region Home 8 16/11/2017 Baskonia Vitoria Gasteiz Home 23 23/2/2018 Anadolu Efes Istanbul Away 9 23/11/2017 Anadolu Efes Istanbul Home 24 1/3/2018 FC Barcelona Home 10 30/11/2017 Maccabi Tel Aviv Away 25 9/3/2018 Fenerbahce Istanbul Home 11 7/12/2017 Panathinaikos Athens Home 26 15/3/2018 Baskonia Vitoria Gasteiz Away 12 14/12/2017 Fenerbahce Istanbul Away 27 20/3/2018 AX Armani Exchange Olimpia Milan Home 13 19/12/2017 Brose Bamberg Home 28 22/3/2018 Real Madrid Away 14 21/12/2017 Valencia Basket Away 29 30/3/2018 CSKA Moscow Home 15 28/12/2017 Olympiacos Piraeus Home 30 6/4/2018 Olympiacos Piraeus Away 05 Green Grove Project Individual Performance 06 Green Grove Project 16 8 Individual Performance - GSI Game Score Index (GSI)– Kevin Pangos & Paulius Jankunas appear to be the most ‘productive’ players during the year. 7 players perform better than team’s season average (4.4). Game Score Index presents the overall performance of an athlete. It is more accurate than Euroleague’s PIR index, since it emphasizes more to categories that have bigger impact on the game. 07 Green Grove Project Individual Performance – Assists & Turnovers Assist Percentage - 3 players perform better than team’s index Turnover Percentage - Vasilije Micic has very poor (25.33). Despite his position, Edgaras Ulanovas shows high performance on ball handling, by committing approximately 1 assisting ability. turnover every 4 attempts. An effective index that evaluates playmaking and passing skills of a Usually higher in guards than forwards or centers. Players with high player. Players with good performance in this category are usually turnover percentage should not be heavily involved in actions that those who should run the offence. have to do with ball handling as they are quite prone to turning the ball over. 08 Green Grove Project Individual Performance – Blocks & Steals Block Percentage – Despite his position, Beno Udrih shows Steal Percentage – 4 players perform better than team’s high blocking ability. In addition, Ulanovas has the highest season average (1.69). Despite his position, Brandon Davies blocking percentage despite his height (1,98m) and position. appears to be the most effective ‘stealer’. Good indicator of defensive (and particularly blocking) skills of a player. Players with high steal percentage values are considered good Quite useful especially for power forwards or centers, who are the defenders and could be a good suggestion to guard opponent point ones that are usually more likely to block a shot. More than 2 guards for instance or be on floor when teams want to pressure. blocks/game is considered good value. 09 Green Grove Project Individual Performance – Free throws & Rebounds Free Throw Rate (%) – Despite his impact on Zalgiris’ game, Rebound Rate (%) – Arturas Milaknis & Vasilije Micic are the Kevin Pangos has the 2nd worse rate among his teammates. least effective players on the rebounding sector Moreover, Paulius Jankunas has the 5th best Free Throw Rate and FT% above 80%. It is probably the best index to compare rebounding ability of two or more players because it takes into account both playing time and total Players with high free throw rate (especially if they also have high rebounds contested. number of field goal attempts) are very efficient at drawing shooting fouls. 10 Green Grove Project Individual Performance – Assisting Efficiency Assist to Turnover Ratio – Despite his impact on Zalgiris’ Assisted Field Goal Made (FGM) – Paulius Jankunas is the most game, Brandon Davies has the 4th worst rate among his efficient ‘executioner’. teammates. Players with high value in this category can be considered good spot It is used to evaluate ball handling and passing skills of a player. In shooters or finishers from close range, since the majority of assists end general, values greater than 1 are considered good. up in those kind of field goals. 11 Green Grove Project Individual Performance – Shooting Efficiency EFG% (Effective Field Goal Percentage) - 7 players perform 2PA/3PA Ratio – Antanas Kavaliauskas & Paulius Jankunas are better than team’s season average (56.9). Arturas Milaknis is a more efficient than their guard teammates. Brandon Davies great scorer beyond 3 – point line, thus increasing his did not try any 3P shot during regular season. performance in this category. It could be used though together with FG%, EFG% or TS% to find out Similar to Field Goal Percentage, but adjusts for the fact that 3 - point whether a low value in any of those 3 indexes could be a result of field goals are worth 50% more than 2 - point field goals. Ideal to use increased number of 3PA instead of 2PA. to compare the FG% of two or more players.