Please read through first...
http://www.82games.com/comm31.htm
Correlation of Team Positional Production and Wins
We'll first focus on just the team's actual player PER rating (ignoring the counterpart of the opposition), and have three views based on the 2002-03 season, the 2003-04 season, and the two seasons combined...
...Still the correlation values from year to year are pretty consistent for PG and PF, and overall it comes in as PG-PF-C-SF-SG in order of importance. Now, before all the GM's rush out to trade their high priced Shooting Guards, perhaps what we are seeing is merely a reflection of the NBA currently and not a long term indication of true worth of positions. For instance, when Jordan was in his prime and ostensibly a shooting guard, it seems likely that the SG production would correlate somewhat more substantially with Wins! These days it is the Power Forwards and Point Guards getting the most notice -- Duncan, Garnett, Kidd and co are some of the stars of the immediate pro basketball era. However, if another crop of Jordans comes along who's to say that the SG's won't become the dominant "correlators."
Correlation of Opponent Positional Production and Wins
This time we'll look at the production allowed to opponents by position:
...For the opposing production by position, the order of importance according to the correlation comes in as SG-SF-PG-C-PF, which is interesting to say the least. Whereas having a great shooting guard is downplayed, being able to defend the opposing two guard is significant!
Correlation of Net Positional Production and Wins
...For the net production by position, it's PG-PF-SF-C-SG, but again with the wide standard deviations, the 95% CI does not allow for any conclusive stance on one position over another.
At the same time, we can infer from the data that for the past two years, the teams with high producing point guards and forwards have been faring better than those with juggernaut two guards or centers...
I thought this was an interesting read and decided to share. Based on the statistics, successful teams recently has had both a dominant PG and a dominant PF offensively, and defensively has been able to shut down the wing players.
10/7/2004 11:09 AM