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ALLEYOOP.COM
The Basketball Page for Thinking Fans
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ABOUT ALLEYOOP.COM
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My name is John Hollinger, and unless you see another name credited I've written everything you see on this site. As you read through the columns on this site, you'll probably notice that some of my opinions and takes are quite different from those you'll see in the mass media. I know it's just a game, but I get annoyed at the knee-jerk reactions and the lack of thought given to things that should be obvious (more on that below).
One of the inspirations for me in creating this site was the transformation in thought that has gone on in baseball over the last 20 years. Thanks to the work of people like Bill James and Rob Neyer - guys who never played the game but nonetheless asked lots of questions - people don't blindly accept what they're told by coaches and announcers anymore. It's reverberated to the point that it's actually changed how teams operate - from pitch counts to drawing walks to free agency to probably 50 other ideas that came out of the research done in the last 20 years by dedicated, intelligent fans.
Basketball has yet to have that transformation. If you don't believe me, check out the 2001-02 award winners, for example. Thanks to a collective cognitive dissonance among the voters that I can only describe as disturbing, what was probably about the sixth best team in the league ended up with the MVP, the Coach of the Year, the Defensive Player of the Year, the Sixth Man winner (even though he did most of his damage as a starter), and five players who got votes for the All-Defense Team. And yet, despite all the other award votes, the argument for the MVP winner was that "they'd be a lottery team without him." Does this sound like a rational thought process?
So while baseball forges ahead, basketball waits. Part of it is that the numbers are less wieldy in basketball. Part of it is that defense, a tough thing to evaluate non-subjectively, plays a much bigger role in basketball. But part of it is the same intellectual laziness among media and management that afflicted baseball for 80 years - until a few guys with calculators put a big foot in the game's collective rear. The same thing needs to happen in basketball, and I started this site to lead that transformation.
In 1996, from the comfort of my own bedroom, I launched Alleyoop.com as a place for NBA fans to get a more analytical, less knee-jerk look at the game than I felt mass media was providing. From 1996 to 1998 Alleyoop.com chugged along, garnering positive reviews along the way from places like Web magazine and the Wall Street Journal.
I've done some other things since then, as most of you know. I was the sports editor for Oregonlive.com for three years, where I got to start a major sports site from scratch - not a lot of people can say that -- and had a front row seat for the antics of the Jail Blazers.
After that I went to SI.com in Atlanta for two years and wrote regular features on many of the topics I ranted on above -- you can find links to all of my SI stuff from this site. I also have contributed to the New York Sun, Village Voice, and Basketball Digest.
But the biggest project on my plate is Pro Basketball Prospectus, which heads into its third year as the one book that delves into the numbers and tells it like it is. It was a very rewarding year -- I don't think anybody else had Michael Redd projected as an All-Star -- and as long as the talking heads refuse to arm themselves with information the book will continue to be refuge for fans who demand and deserve better. This year's edition will have even more on similarity scores and player projections, in addition the usual analysis that breaks down every player and team. It should be the best one yet. |
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