Ken Nelson

Should basketball coaches bench players for “foul trouble”?  It makes no mathematical sense, but everybody does it. As a perennial 6th man, I loved it – I got to play. But it never made sense to me as a policy. Basketball hasn’t yet made the jump to quantitative analysis that baseball has. And the stats they use (points, assists, rebounds) don’t really help in determining who will help you win.

Jonathan Weinstein thinks it is silly too. His commenters bring up some interesting counter points.  But in the end, I think his position holds.

For instance, what about the theory that a player with 4 fouls will play softer than a player with less fouls, and that the other team will play against them more?  I’d submit the player will play smarter – which he should have been doing all along. Less fouls, means less free throws and less penalty situations. I’d want my player to play like they had 4 fouls the whole game.

Basketball has a glaring quantitative hole in it that I wish the Utah Jazz would walk through.  Unfortunately, they keep Jerry Sloan for the umpteenth season, and go home after 4 straight losses to the Lakers.  Come on Jazz, cut the payroll, dump Sloan and hire some statisticians!