Imagine you’re the analytics director for the Cleveland Cavaliers. After the Cavs added a bunch of new players at the trade deadline, coach Tyronn Lue might come to you for advice on how best to fit them into lineups. Luckily, your team of analysts has already designed a Lineup Evaluator Tool to rate and score any five-player lineup. But that doesn’t quite get you where you want to go. You need to take in the players on the Cleveland roster and spit out a ranking of lineups. You need to get a feel for the best player and the best two-man, three-man, or four-man groupings to fit into your game plans.

You need Model 284’s Lineup Optimizer Tool.

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Put in a list of NBA players, and this tool will give you a sortable, scored list of all possible lineups. Also, take a look at which individual players, pairs, threesomes, and foursomes appear the most in the top 20. For a longer explainer, look here.

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Below is a table of our NBA Lineup spacing metric applied to all NBA Lineups that played more than 50 minutes together in the 2016-2017 season. Our NBA Lineup Spacing metric seeks to quantify a lineup’s ability to generate and score from efficient shots (i.e. at the rim and from the three point line). For complete methodology behind the calculation, see here.

Continue reading NBA Lineup Evaluator: Spacing (2016-2017) →

Preface

First and foremost, I regret to inform you that this analysis is NOT done with player tracking data.

Secondly, I want to say this lineup metric is called spacing, but it is not really a measure of spacing; it is more a measure of how capable a lineup is of producing efficient shots. So, why call it spacing? Firstly, because spacing is catchy and trendy, but also because we believe that when the average fan thinks or hears the word spacing, they are generally thinking about maximizing the optimal shots in basketball: three-pointers and shots at the rim.

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The NBA Lineup Evaluator tool provides lineup estimates for various metrics we’ve developed to assist in analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of a lineup. Enter any combination of players below. For more information on the lineup components, check out the methodology article.

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