Another Look at Game 4 vs. the Suns with PopcornMachine's GameFlow

Edited 11/05: Added section headings to enhance readability, made some minor corrections and additions to fix errors, gremlins and things I missed the first time I wrote this, and replaced the SBNation-served graphic with a larger, easier-to-read one.

greyberger posted "Visual Lineups - First three games" the day before yesterday and turned us on to a really neat visual tool from popcornmachine.net.  It has a more or less conventional box score, but the truly unique tool is something called GameFlow, which is a chart showing the lineups, scores, stats, and team runs in a timeline format over the course of the game.  It's worth going to their website to see the GameFlow for the Suns game, because it has popups giving more detail about times and individual player stats, but here's a screen capture of the GameFlow sans the popups (click the pic to get a full-sized graphic that's actually readable without a magnifying glass):

via img222.imageshack.us

After the Jump, I'll explain how to read the chart, and use it as the basis of some game analysis.

How to use GameFlow, or anyway, how I use it:

PopcornMachine has a pretty good help page that explains how to interpret the chart, but I'll give a simple summary here.  The chart is a timeline of the game, and shows which players are on the floor with the colored bars adjacent to each player's name.  The first number in each colored bar is the number of points scored by the player during the duration of bar, and the second number is the HelpValue, which equals the rebound plus assists plus steals plus blocks minus turnovers during the period of the bar.

Game totals of minutes, points, HelpValue, and +/- are in the columns after the end of the game timeline.  Specific stats (time, +/-, FG, FT, assists, boards, fouls, etc.) within each bar or 'stint' are provided by a pop-up box that shows up if you hover your mouse over the bar.

At the bottom of the chart, there are quarter and running summaries of team points, FG%, 3pt FG%, rebounds, assists, and turnovers.  Between the two teams, there is a simple graph showing the point differential between the teams, and most interesting to me, the runs that each team goes on during the course of the game.  It is this last part that I'll focus on when analyzing the GameFlow.

Edit: Ugggh, I wrote this originally when I was tired and forgot an important feature.  In the middle, between the players' bars and the line showing the runs that each team went on, is a very important line, labeled lineup +/-.  It is calculated every time the team makes a substitution and shows the +/- from the time each five-man unit begins playing until the next substitution.  Even cooler is that when you hover your cursor over a box in the lineup line, you get a pop-up showing the players in the unit and the times on the clock when they started and when they finished playing together.

For me, basketball, most games anyway, is defined in terms of the runs that each team goes on.  A team that goes into halftime with the score tied or close and comes out firing in the third quarter can put it's opponent at a severe disadvantage, forcing them to use energy to fight back into a game.  A team that plays lock-down defense the way the Spurs did in championship years can grind out an extended run over most of a quarter that decides the outcome of a game.  Teams that can consistently put together big runs, while quashing opposing ones, will be winners.

GameFlow is really great for this kind of analysis, because not only does it show the runs each team makes (though I'm not 100% in agreement with the way their algorithm defines the starting and ending points of each run), but it shows what players are on the floor for each team.  It's a great way to see which units play well together, and the units against which they are at an advantage or disadvantage.

The game from the perspective of 'team runs,' as reported by PopcornMachine's GameFlow:

In terms of runs, the Suns starters struck first with a 5-0 burst, but the Spurs starters struck back with a 6-0 run to take the lead.  Things stayed tight until nearly the end of the first quarter, when the Suns started bringing in their reserves and went on a 5-0 run against our reserves.  (Edit: Technically, their run actually started when Parker was on the floor, and continued when Temple came in for him.)  The Spurs reserves didn't go on a counter-run but chipped back to take the lead going into the 2nd quarter.

The Spurs extended their lead slightly after the break, but then the Suns bench started what would become a 12-3 tear.  Even bringing in Manu for Neal did not slow the Suns reserves down.  It was only about a minute after Blair came in for Splitter (who had drawn his 2nd foul) that the Phoenix run ended and the Spurs began chipping away at Suns' lead.  It was around the time that Frye picked up his second foul and the Spurs starters returned and went on an 8-2 run against the Suns reserves.  Then the Spurs reserves started, and the starters continued what would be an 8-2 run against the Suns reserves, around the time Frye and Lopez both picked up their 2nd fouls.  (Lopez was in for 23 seconds before picking up his 2nd foul, forcing Gentry to insert Siler into his lineup, and the Spurs took full advantage). When Turkoglu and Gr.Hill came in for Warrick and Childress, the Suns went on a short 5-0 burst before the Spurs responded with a 6-0 run their own to take the lead (Anderson and Splitter came in for Manu and DeBeast in the middle of that run). The Suns chipped away at the Spurs lead and drew even by the end of the half.

After the half, the Spurs starters went on a 17-4 run against their Phoenix counterparts (Edit: and substitutes... the Spurs starters were +9 over the Suns starters during that stretch) that I thought at the time would be decisive.  Sadly, it was not to be.  Warrick and Frye came in for Lopez and Turkoglu, and the Suns went on runs of 5-0 and 13-4 to bring the score back to a one-possession game.  The first run was against the starters minus Manu (Anderson playing SG while Manu rested) and the second was (mostly) against the Duncan/Manu/Anderson/Dice/Temple unit.

At the beginning of the fourth quarter, a Dragic-led mixed unit made a 8-3 run to take the lead against a Parker/RJ/Dice/Splitter/Anderson unit, but (two minutes) after Childress came in for J.Rich, the Spurs went on a 5-0 run, followed by a Phoenix 6-1 run.  Next came the important 9-2 run with RJ 2.0's three consecutive treys (not shown by PM as a 9-2 but as a 6-0 run) that put the Spurs up by 6.  The Suns came back from the timeout with a Nash/Hill/JRich/Frye/Warrick unit that went on a 9-0 run against the Spurs starters minus Blair plus Dice (though Temple was also in for Parker for about 1:13 during that run, -4 during that stint).  Finally the Spurs starters (minus Blair plus Dice) went on their game-deciding 8-0 run against the Phoenix unit that had just gone on the 9-0 run.

GameFlow-based analysis:

The good news is that the Spurs' starters outplayed the Suns' ones (as a unit -- +9 at the beginning of the third quarter was the difference), and they also beat up on the Suns' reserves.  But the Suns bench had its way with our bench last night... hopefully that will not be the case when George and Matt are healthy (and Splitter/Neal/Anderson/Temple have more experience).

Though people have said they think Temple played decent one-on-one D against Nash and Dragic, he was in units that posted big Phoenix runs against the Spurs, and he was largely uninvolved in any units that went on runs against the Suns... hence his -12 +/-.  Dice had a -8 +/-, but at least he was involved in the decisive final run, and contributed two FTs and three boards in the last 6 minutes or so.  Anderson and Splitter were at least in the mini 5-0 run in the 4th, and contributed 3 points each in the first 5:46 of the fourth quarter.

Edit: I wanted to add that the chart shows that Duncan dominated the game (not just points but boards, assists, steals) from the middle of the 2nd quarter until he sat down with 2:03 to go in the 3rd, and that RJ 2.0's shooting was insane in the 4th: 4 for 4 from behind the arc, 6 for 6 overall, with an additional 2 for 2 at the line.  That's something I missed when I focused just on the runs made by each team.

The chart also shows that no Sun was in double figures in the first half, which is surprising given that they scored 50 points to tie it up going into the break.  Another interesting tidbit... it appears that Nash's only good quarter, efficiency-wise, was in the 3rd quarter, and it appears that he scored most of his points on Temple, not Parker.  Richardson played decently through the third and the front part of the fourth, but 2-6 shooting in the first and the back half of the fourth pretty much made for a horrid night for him.  Robin Lopez had an incredibly awful -14 in only 12.5 minutes of play, partly due to being on the floor during the Spurs 17-4 3rd quarter run, and during part of RJ 2.0's triple-play display in the fourth.

I've only scratched the surface as far as what can be gleaned from GameFlow... I'd be interested in everyone's comments about what they see using this marvelous tool.  I'm looking forward to using this a lot over the season to try to understand how the team is playing, and why Pop uses the rotations/five-man-units he does.