The Eddy Curry Story: More Money, More Problems

by Harlan Schreiber

One of the side stories that has consumed the NBA the last few years is the many high profile bankruptcies of NBA players after their careers end.  In a well-remembered Sports Illustrated story from 2009 by Pablo S. Torre, it was estimated that 60% of NBA players go bankrupt within two years of retirement.  The article discussed the factors that led to the players losing astounding sums of money so quickly: hiring cronies to manage the cash, investing heavily in real estate (and failing to allocate funds to steady securities), divorce/child support costs, and just playing spending too much.

Since the 2009 article, we’ve seen even more bankruptcy filings by former big earners Derrick Coleman (reportedly earned $91 million in the NBA) and Antoine Walker ($108 million), as well long-retired vets like Rick Mahorn. Interestingly, we have heard the low lights of certain athletes but the stories never detailed the descent and the multiple bad decisions that it takes to blow millions as they were being made.  Rather, we only heard the lament after the filing of the bankruptcy petition.  More recently, we now have an active NBAer who may provide us with insight into the problems before we get to bankrupcy in Eddy Curry, who will make over $11 million next year (and has been paid over $57 million for his career so far).  Just a few months ago, he was whacked with non-payment of a loan, as well as a failure to pay a settlement on civil claim in Illinois.

We obviously can’t know exactly is going on behind the scenes but Curry has left a trail of litigation that gives a nice little window into his activities.  So let’s take a look at what we’ve got.  Remember, we don’t know what’s true or not but that the allegations are taken from court pleadings that we found online.  Here’s what we have with Curry:

-July 2008: Curry is sued by Jacob & Company Watches, Inc., a well-known jeweler for athletes and other celebrities.  According to the complaint, Curry purchased multiple pieces of jewelry for a total cost of $952,000 in 2005 but failed to pay off the full amounts, leaving a balance of $452.686.88.  The matter was settled in March 2009.  It is not clear what the settlement terms were but annexed to the motion papers was an e-mail exchange between the attorneys for the jeweler and Curry’s attorney that implied that Curry would pay the full amounts by November 2008.  Apparently, the money was not paid at that time and the jeweler moved for a default judgment against Curry in January 2009.  Presumably, this move finally convinced Curry to pay. Continue reading The Eddy Curry Story: More Money, More Problems…

Reflections on the LeBron Watch

by Harlan Schreiber

The big news of the day is that soon the LeBron James Saga will be over.  On Thursday night, James will announce his decision on ESPN on prime time.  The whole spectacle raises all sorts of interesting questions, both basketball and human nature related.  We can’t definitively answer any of those questions now (or perhaps ever in some cases) but, still, this whole event some reflection and investigation.  Let’s take a stab at some these issues:

-Where is LeBron going?

I have no idea and have absolutely no inside knowledge on the subject.  We do know certain facts that at least allow for a theoretical handicapping.  Recognizing that we are making guesses based on rumor/innuendo we’ll still try to distill an educated guess based upon the facts as we see them.  In order to find the facts, let’s do a team-by-team breakdown.  Here’s how the contenders look:

(1) Cleveland: Cleveland is still the hometown favorite and the mention of them trying to get Chris Bosh recently seems to indicate that the Cavs were working with James.  On the other hand, the Bosh Affair also seems to indicate that LeBron was making sure that whichever team he went to brought in another star-type player.  The fact that the Cavs couldn’t land Bosh doesn’t bode well for them if that is the case.  Still, Cleveland seems to be the leader as the hometown squad and have already acommodated James by upending the coach and GM to suit him. Continue reading Reflections on the LeBron Watch…

NBA Draft 2010: Top Players by Position

by Ed Weiland

I wanted to do a quick rundown on how I rank the players by position, since the previews weren’t always clear on that. The 30 players in bold are the top 30 and basically the ones I would assign to teams in round one if I were the GM of all the teams at the same time, whatever that means. 

Point Guard 

1. John Wall
2. Jeremy Lin
3. Greivis Vasquez
4. Dee Bost
5. Ben Uzoh
6. Armon Johnson
7. Mikhail Torrance Continue reading NBA Draft 2010: Top Players by Position…

Most Improved, A Review

by Harlan Schreiber

Is there anything sillier than the NBA Most Improved Award?  The parameters of the award are confusing and the application is often incorrectly applied, no matter which standard most people would reasonably apply.  Here are the possible standards of “improvement”: 

-Good young player steadily improving

-Player with no previous expectations or who was considered a good player but becomes good out of nowhere

-Established player in his prime going from good to very good (i.e. peak season)

-Player who improves merely by getting more minutes

-A player who was considered a prospect craps out and then later becomes good 

These are rough approximations of standards for the award and they can overlap but they fairly encompass most scenarios.  I thought we could look back at the award’s history and see what value, if any, we can distill from this review.  The award itself came into to existence in 1985-86.  Previously, the NBA had created a “Comeback Player of the Year” but had abandoned the idea after a few years, allegedly because the NBA was tired of giving the award to players who had comeback from substance abuse.  Before we get to the Most Improved Award, let’s review the old Comeback Award to see if the award did yield potentially embarrassing results: Continue reading Most Improved, A Review…

Monta Ellis and PT Examined

by Harlan Schreiber

A lot has been made in the NBA stat analysis community that Monta Ellis is a bit overrated.  Ellis’ rate states are quite gaudy.  He has 25.8 ppg, 5.4 apg, and 4.2 rpg.  On the other side, Ellis is playing 41.5 mpg and has a rather pedestrian 16.9 PER based on his mediocre shooting, mediocre free throw rate (compared to touches), below-average three point shooting (.327%), and his high turnover rate (3.6 TOs per-36 minutes).   Of course it takes a degree of talent to play 41.5 mpg to begin with but you can put me firmly in the camp of those who believe Ellis to be a decent player. 

What interests me about Ellis, however, is not the debate of his worth but how he is absorbing minutes like a sponge.  Ellis is currently second in the NBA in mpg behind Gerald Wallace, who is playing 42 mpg.  What should we be expecting from our NBA players?  Well, 42 mpg is a lot for an NBA players.  There are currently 100 players who have logged a season of 42 mpg or more (minimum of 60 games played).  Going back to the beginning, logging tons of minutes was a 1960s concept. Here is a distribution of the 42 MPG club by decade: Continue reading Monta Ellis and PT Examined…

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