The J-Notes
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Utah Jazz Analytics Ranking: ‘One Foot In’

By Clint Peterson

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Feb 20, 2015; Salt Lake City, UT, USA; Utah Jazz head coach Quin Snyder talks with the media prior to the game against the Portland Trail Blazers at EnergySolutions Arena. Mandatory Credit: Russ Isabella-USA TODAY Sports

Everyone loves lists. Not everyone loves advanced stats, also known as “analytics.” Coming on the heels of the recent Charles Barkley anti-analytics rant, ESPN Magazine ranked all four major American sports league teams in their belief of using advanced analytics. The Utah Jazz analytics ranking was slotted as “One Foot In.”

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The interactive online version is straightforward and user-friendly, and ranked each team in one of five different categories: All-In, Believers, One Foot In, Skeptics and Nonbelievers. 10 of the 12 NBA teams slotted as either All-In or Believers are either currently in playoff contention or within one game of it.

Quin Snyder and Dennis Lindsey, from the San Antonio Spurs franchise tree, are at least moderate believers in the use of analytics as a supplement to what’s happening on the court and in roster-making. The Spurs, naturally, fall squarely in the All-In category.

"For years, under the pairing of coach Jerry Sloan and GM Kevin O’Connor, the Jazz successfully played an old-school style that featured few 3-pointers. In year 3 under new GM Dennis Lindsey, Utah has stepped away from the Sloan model, building a new culture — modeled off the San Antonio Spurs — that features analytics in an important role.The Jazz hired their first full-time analytics employee last summer and also have relied on outside resources. They’ve worked with the BYU statistics department, and count among their consultants two prominent writers.–The Great Analytics Rankings, Utah Jazz"

One of Dennis Lindsey’s duties as assistant general manager in San Antonio was to oversee the Spurs’ analytics department.

Late to the game, relatively speaking, the Utah Jazz have been making up ground in the analytics game, sending a representative to the Sloan Sports Conference for the first time in 2014, and hiring it’s first employee dedicated to analyzing advanced numbers.

"SALT LAKE CITY (August 22, 2014) – The Utah Jazz today announced that the team has hired Patrick Beilein and Lamar Skeeter as player development/video analysts, and named Taylor Snarr as coordinator of analytics.  Per team policy, terms of the agreements were not announced.Snarr spent the 2013-14 campaign as the basketball analytics intern for the Jazz, working directly with SportVU’s player tracking system.  A graduate of BYU-Hawaii, Snarr has over five years of professional experience with data and research analysis.  Most recently, Snarr worked with the Utah Department of Corrections as a research consultant from 2011 through June 2014.–NBA.com/Utah Jazz"

As far back as 2013, Bill Oram, formerly of the Salt Lake Tribune, noted that the Jazz “may also be building around a younger, more analytics-driven front office, guided by Lindsey.” Ironically, Oram now covers the Los Angeles Lakers who fall in the bottom ten of the ESPN the Mag rankings when it comes to analytics.

Current SL Trib Utah Jazz beat writer, Aaron Falk, recently breached the topic of analytics with Quin Snyder.

"“We talk about it a lot,” Snyder said Wednesday. “I think sometimes your conclusions [based on the data] are going to be erroneous, but more often than not it’s going to be information that’s helpful. I would much rather have it, and I believe in it.”Snyder said it would be a mistake to ignore the data and analysis, and it would be wrong to base all decisions entirely on numbers.“Like anything, a combination and balance is what’s most effective,” he said.–Aaron Falk, Salt Lake Tribune, February 11, 2015"

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Some of the biggest, most vociferous arguments between the two sides of the analytics debate happens when the side that uses only the old school eyeball test clash with those who prefer to rely solely on numbers. As with most things, the truth is somewhere in the middle.

Analytics gets a bad name from those who create elaborate narratives based largely on numbers as well as those who use cherry-picked numbers to support a particular stance. Quin Snyder and Dennis Lindsey are believers of the movement, finding value in using numbers as a supplement to what their mind’s eye perceive is happening.

They use advanced stats the correct way.

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