You might have never heard of Ben Rohrbach’s “Danny Ainge System,” which uses analytics to evaluate NBA front offices, but it’s an interesting window into assessing and ranking the top executive of each NBA team’s track record in that job the Yahoo Sports writer came up with we think is worth a closer look.
The method, inspired by the former Boston Celtics president’s stint with the Toronto Blue Jays and the parallels between Daryl Morey‘s team-building approach and Billy Beane’s Moneyball strategy, assesses executives across three categories: draft picks, trades, and free-agent signings. Each transaction is categorized using baseball terms, such as HR (Bona fide All-Stars), 3B (Top-flight performers), 2B (Front-end rotation players), 1B (Other noteworthy contributors), BB (Lateral and inconclusive moves), and K (Diminished returns).
Buy Celtics TicketsBoston’s team president, Brad Stevens, comes in ninth in this exercise, ahead of Tim Connelly of the Denver Nuggets and Minnesota Timberwolves and behind Kobe Altman of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Let’s take a look at how Stevens did in the three categories to get there.
Pearlman joined us to talk all things Celtics-Lakers, how his book and series came to be, and what he thinks of the show having had an eagle-eye view of its creation, even appearing in cameos with … https://t.co/6qXMGl3YrX
— The Celtics Wire (@TheCelticsWire) August 29, 2023
Draft picks (OBP: 1.000 • SLG: .000 • OPS: 1.000)
BB: Juhann Begarin (45th, 2021)
Trades (OBP: .750 • SLG: 1.167 • OPS: 1.917)
2B: Al Horford (2021) • Derrick White (2022) • Malcolm Brogdon (2022)
1B: Daniel Theis (2022)
BB: Tristan Thompson (2021) • Juan Hernangomez (2021)
K: Bol Bol (2022) • Mike Muscala (2023)
Free agents (OBP: .333 • SLG: .333 • OPS: .667)
1B: Sam Hauser (2021)
K: Dennis Schroder (2021) • Danilo Gallinari (2022)
TOTALS … OBP: .667 • SLG: .889 • OPS: 1.556
