re: Cam Thomas Front-runner for POY SEC

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because it obviously hasn't been to the detriment of the team's offense as a whole, otherwise, they wouldn't be such an elite efficient team that also has THREE other players averaging double digit scoring.

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But what if those THREE other players were averaging 2-3 more points a game each due to more shots for them?


You can manipulate stats to say what you want them to say. I can look only at a couple of stats and say that based off his his first three starts, Myles Brennan is the best qb in LSU history. Of course, total passing yards is not the only measure of a qb. Just as a scoring the most points does not make a basketball player the SEC POY.

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If the last two games are any indication,

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Really his last 3. He was efficient in the Bama loss and actually the best offensive player in that game (8/19 from the field, 2/4 from 3, and 4/4 FT). He didn't have the assists that game; but from a scoring standpoint, he was by far the best.

He has also been contributing in the rebound department and starting to rebound down better as a guard. He has averaged 4 rebounds per game the last 3.

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I guarantee you if we went through those games we can find many wasted offensive possessions in which Thomas forced unnecessary shots early in the shot clock.

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And I can probably find just as many dumb turnovers or useless possessions by other players too. See how that works?

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Which of those other players are up for player of the year?

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Which of those other players are up for player of the year?

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Technically all of them are up for it. This isn't like national awards where there is a semi-finalists and finalists list that voters can only consider.

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And that my friends is how to utilize obfuscation.

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No. Obfuscation is what you were using to begin with when asking a pointless question that had no relevance to the point of the conversation.

I answered your question directly. All of them are eligible for POY. You didn’t ask which ones are serious contenders for it or how many will likely receive votes, which would still be pointless and irrelevant questions to the conversation. You asked which are eligible and I answered that question.

If you’re going to use big words, at least know how to use them properly.

This freshman has played really well for the Tigers and has lived up to his billing. He has made many big shots and has been an outstanding free throw shooter.

I hope he does win the SEC Player of the Year.

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This is false. Where LSU ranks in scoring is not an indicator that Thomas is making the team better by hogging shots. That fact is that if he took less awful shots, and gave the ball up to his teammates who have been FAR more efficient than him, all of those pretty TEAM numbers would be better.

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And NO ONE has argued that what he does makes the team better. But the argument that he makes them worse or hinders the team is absolutely false and would result in no more wins than they have if changed.

So here, I decided to play your hypothetical game and run some arbitrary numbers, even though they are foundationally based off real numbers. And I did it 3 ways:

Scenario 1: You want to give more shots to Smart and Watford as you specifically stated; so let's do that.

Cam has attempted 100 more shots than Waford and Smart; so let's take those away and divide evenly between W & S at 50 a piece. Now that's 1 arbitrary thing; but since W & S play roughly the same amount of minutes per game and S has only attempted 3 less shots than W, it is possible. Also arbitrary is that I can't account for the # of attempts by any of the 3 players that don't get put in stats b/c they are fouled on the shot and don't make it.
Nevertheless, I figured an avg. of points per FG attempt for each player. W=1.35/att.; S=1.36/att; & Cam=1.34/att. Right off the bat, you can see that there isn't a whole lot of difference between the 3.

But if I give W & S 50 more attempts on the season, that raises their per gm avg. by 3.7 pts per game each resulting in the team scoring 7.4 pts per game. That's awesome, right? Well, by reducing Thomas' attempts, that obviously lowers his per game avg. by 6 pts per game, meaning the team only nets +1.4 pts per game. Their closest losses on the season were by 4 to both SLU and UF; so both of those still result in losses.

Scenario 2: Even though you didn't mention Days, I decided to let him get in on the fun using the same above system.

Now, Days plays significantly less minutes per game than W & S; so it would stand to reason, he would have less attempts. So taking away 100 from Cam still, let's give 35 more to W & S each, and 30 to Days. Days is efficient, scoring 1.5 pts/att.

So using the same process as before, LSU nets +1.75 pts more per game, which (surprise, surprise) does not result in any more wins for the team.

Scenario 3: Dividing percentage of shots evenly

The way to net the team the most points increase would be to evenly divide the percentage of shots between the Big 4. Currently, the 4 of them combined account for nearly 80% of the shots taken by the team. If we just divide evenly at 20% per person, which wouldn't be a true measure as, again, Days plays at least 6 less minutes per game than the other 3; so it's not realistic that he would have the same amount of attempts. But for the sake of argument and it actually benefits the team more to have him take at least as many shots as the other 3, since he is the most efficient, we'll keep it that way.

By using this metric, it results in a net +2.95 pts/gm better for the team. And as we have reviewed before - NO MORE WINS.


TLDR Version: Despite me showing you how even in the games LSU lost b/c of offense and even some b/c of defense (SLU), Cam was still either the best or 2nd best scorer on the team; I'm now showing 3 different ways to give others more shots and Cam significantly less still resulting in the same number of losses the team currently has. Therefore, no, he does not make the team worse, significantly worse, or hinder their performance at all by doing what he does. Additionally, it is disingenuous of you to discount the apparent change in game and improvement he has made the last 3 games in a row. It is also disingenuous of you to assume that Cam's bad shots lead to runouts and points for the other team while not also factoring in the number of boneheaded shots and turnovers that I have seen from both Watford and Smart that have led to runouts and points for the other team. In fact, I could make an argument that it was Watford's dumb/lazy passes and Smart's lazy attempts to cut to the ball that cost LSU the end of the Texas Tech game.

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Maybe you know, maybe you don’t. But if you get fouled in the act of shooting, that is not designated as a FG attempt.

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I do know, which is why I said this in my last post: "Also arbitrary is that I can't account for the # of attempts by any of the 3 players that don't get put in stats b/c they are fouled on the shot and don't make it."

If they are fouled and make the shot, it does count as an attempt. But there is no way to track that except for going through each game and charting the shots for each player.

But for the most part, it all comes out in the wash anyway and my point was to show that while you could increase the team point total some, it is only still a very small amount, which would not have translated to anymore wins than they already have.

One thing I think needs to be taken into his consideration when we talk about his field goal percentage is how often he gets to the free throw line. Basically every time he gets fouled that equivalent to a made bucket. Let’s say he is 3-10, that’s 30%, but he is 8-8 from the stripe, that is basically 4 more made shots, would be equivalent to being 7-14 instead of 3-10.

I don’t disagree 100%. However a lot of shots he gets fouled on are “bad shots.” Also he doesn’t just draw fouls, he draws them an unbelievable amount. Most I’ve ever seen from a guard in college.