Maybe Michael Beasley should have been standing in front of Derrick Rose?

Image details: 2008 NBA Draft served by picapp.com

Can you use math to predict how good a college player will become in the NBA?

Chris Doughty, a 2008 industrial and operations engineering graduate of the University of Michigan, pointed me to a cool regression analysis of the great John Hollinger. Using data from current NBA players, Hollinger sees how well the players’ college stats explain their subsequent performance in the NBA.
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According to John, Rudy Gay, Marcus Williams, and Rajon Rondo would be the best 3 players from the 2006 draft.

So, who does John pick in the latest draft?

Michael Beasley, Kevin Love, Darrell Arthur, Marreese Speights, D. J. Augustin, and then Rose.

It’s particularly interesting to see what happens to players like Darrell Arthur who had very different Hollinger and actual draft ratings. Hollinger ranked Arthur 3rd in projected PER (player efficiency rating) but Arthur was taken 27th. (Donte Greene, Kosta Koufus, Roy Hibbert, and Marreese Speights were also undervalued by the regression’s lights).

As always, any NBA Basketball related comments are welcome.

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