NBA Stats Notebook: What happens if you don't believe the stats?

Few people probably expected the NBA at large to be focused on aReddit conspiracy theory for most of Saturday, but here we are.

Reddit user u/AdMassive6666 posted an elaborateinvestigationinto the validity of Jaren Jackson Jr.'sblock totals at home so far this season. The SparkNotes: Thisposter essentially accused the Memphis Grizzlies' scorekeeper ofartificially inflating Jackson's block counts at home, leading to amassive chasm between his home and away stats. They cited examplesthey believed backed up the claim and then tossed out accusationsof personal bias or financial motive.

The conspiracy spread like wildfire Saturday morning and thepost had over 44,000 upvotes by the afternoon. Meanwhile, NBA mediamembers across Twitter were fact-checking the claim, which looksmore and more like atheorythan an actualconspiracy under further scrutiny.

I watched every block by Jaren Jackson Jr.in slow motion from alternate angles to investigate the NBA Redditthread claiming the Grizzlies scorekeeper is "posting fraudulentnumbers."But only 3 of his 66 home blocks are incorrectly labeled, acompletely insignificant amount. pic.twitter.com/84ZiE1rPVD

— Kevin O'Connor (@KevinOConnorNBA) January 28, 2023

There are already alotof videos and threadslike Kevin O'Connor's breakdown, including this one from @swarlayzers, this one fromAdam Spinella, this responsefrom former stat-checkerNeemaDjavadzadeh.Most of the follow-ups reach the sameconclusion: The initial poster either cherry-picked somenarrative-suiting examples or was just plain wrong about theirclaims.

Furthermore, the post painted a picture that some corruptmastermind is at the center of Jackson's absurd defensive seasonwhen that simply is not how NBA statskeeping works.

This post is making its way around theleague now, not just the internet. For what it's worth, I checkedin, and the Grizzlies use the same official scorer this season asthey used last season. https://t.co/DViGP4JMxO

— Fred Katz (@FredKatz) January 28, 2023

Fred Katz ofThe Athleticgets the ballrolling with this thread, explaining that recording stats is not aone-person job anymore. In 2018, Spencer Lund of Complextook a peek atthe life of an NBA statistician and the evolution of the process.This segment offers a brief explanation of gameday protocols:

"The four-man statistics crews is divided into primary andsecondary inputters and callers. The primary caller does just that:calls out each play using numbers instead of names. The primaryinputter marks 'a touch screen of a basketball court,' the Brooklynstatistician says. That screen is connected to the screen of thesecondary inputter, who edits mistakes and double checks iffyplays. The secondary caller works the DVR, and they’re connected toNBA headquarters in Secaucus, NJ. That connection to Secaucusduring the game is new this year, as is the mandate that everyarena have four statisticians for a game.

Despite that connection, it’s still up to the discretion ofthe statisticians to decide an assist. The primary inputter makesthe first read, but if the stat is unclear 'it’s kind of aconsensus, majority rule,' the Nets’ statistician explains. The NBAsays that they audit every stat, and they’ve always done it thatway since they went digital in the late ​’80s; this season they’rejust connected during the game."

The NBA backed this up in its own counter to the Redditpost:

“In order to ensure the integrity of our game statistics,auditors, independent of the statisticians on-site, review allplays and stats decisions in real-time during NBA games,” league spokesman Tim Frank told NBCSports. “If changes are necessary, they are made at that timeor following a postgame review. All of the plays questioned in thepost on Memphis games were scored consistently within the rules setforth by the NBA statisticians manual.”

Today's technology also puts the NBA light-years ahead of thehuman error from a single set of eyeballs. "Using cameras installedin the catwalks of every NBA arena, Second Spectrum software tracksthe movements of every player on the court and the basketball 25times per second," the league's statistics databasesays on its tracking data.

Still, some categories will involve judgement calls by nature.Even if some of Jackson's blocks are debatable, this isn't thefirst time the NBA fandom has questioned the integrity of thenumbers. Matthew van Bommel and Luke Bornn conducted a massive study about scorekeeperbias in 2016.The Athletic'sSeth Partnowhas pointed out repeatedly how the frequency of shot attempts atthe rim are unusually low at Golden Warriors home games, while thevolume just outside the restricted area is much higher, for bothteams competing. It's not a result of some ulterior motive; therejust appears a tendency by the Warriors' record-keepers to judgeshot locations differently.

Assists are notoriously subjective. Folks often wonder if JohnStockton reallyracked up his all-time record of15,806 assists, and Andy Larsen looked into thetotal for the Salt Lake Tribune in 2019.Larsen'swork supports Stockton, but at the same time, he noted that thevery definition of an assist leaves gray areas. Zach Kram wrote for TheRingerin 2020 about how even generousassist-crediting has changed in recent years.

So why is this suddenly captivating the league again? Threewords: legalized sports betting.

Most basic NBA counting stats are now linked to video via theleague's official database, with help from Second Spectrum. Thatopens up record-keeping to public eyes, including Redditors andpeople with money on the line.

Professional sports leagues, in marrying themselves to sportsgambling, will face barrages of criticism about judgement callsbecause the stakes are higher than ever for viewers. The accuracyof block counts shouldn't be that big of a deal, nor should itfactor so heavily into awards consideration as it is implied withJackson. But it does now because millions of dollars can swingsides.

Maybe technological innovation renders human statskeepingobselete one day, and computers can track literal touches of abasketball with perfect precision. We're not there yet, though (anddoesn't that get kind of creepy at a certain point?).

Defining assists and steals more clearly is one obvious pathwayfor improved transparency. For example, I firmly believe basketballshould credit assists almost like hockey. Remove any subjectivetime measure or scoring difficulty component and automatically givean assist to the last passer of the score, provided the pass landedin the frontcourt. That's straightforward, and "good" assists arealready up for debate anyway, so what would really change?

In general, today should really challenge the NBA fan base andbetting base to understand the rulebook. At most, the major leagueanalysts settled on 3-5 Jackson home blocks that were categorizedquestionably. The league itself backed up every swat. Amplifying aconspiracy theory like this one not only wastes a ton of time, butit means more ears will ignore future complaints, even if they doend up having merit.

It's great to hold pro sports leagues accountable, but youbetter be right when you do.

THE OUTLIERS (a.k.a. other random interesting numbers Ifound in the void):

For the record, Jaren Jackson Jr. is as good adefender as any and all numbers say.Another data point for this season's ridiculous NBAscoring:

The number of players with a 30-point gamein each NBA season. pic.twitter.com/ur04gbctPu

— Todd Whitehead (@CrumpledJumper) January 22, 2023Caitlin Clark is one of the most mind-boggling scorers in theworld:

The longest range shooters in women'scollege hoops: pic.twitter.com/b5x7zc4FVV

— Synergy Basketball (@SynergySST) January 24, 2023This is just over a week old now, but a really interestinggraphic from SIS Hoops. Lauri Markkanen stands out to me:

A player's shot diet can shift meaningfullyfrom year to year. Here's a look at the players who haveexperienced the largest changes in median shot distance this yearcompared to last: pic.twitter.com/OK8BLRqwt0

— SIS Hoops (@SIS_Hoops) January 20, 2023