Insomuch as an inexplicable phenomenon can be explained.
We love maps and charts. We love NBA All-Star Weekend. So, we made some maps and charts related to the NBA All-Star Weekend.
You can click on the images to see bigger versions. All maps and charts herein are original to SBNation.com. Any errors can be blamed on Nick Young. Enjoy.
1. Where 2015 All-Stars are from
First things first: there are a lot of 2015 All-Stars. Four All-Stars have been replaced as of Thursday morning, bringing our 2015 total count to 28 All-Stars. On average, 2.5 All-Stars per year get added by commissioner decree, so this spate of injuries isn't completely abnormal.
As for the map, we went with where each player spent most of his formative basketball-playing youth, not strict birthplace. This poses a few issues I'll explain here. Marc Gasol grew up in Barcelona, but played high school ball in Memphis as brother Pau starred for the Grizzlies. Marc then returned to Spain to begin his pro career before making the NBA. I listed him as Barcelona. Kyle Korver moved from L.A. to Iowa at age 12. I picked Iowa for him. He seems more Iowa than L.A., to be honest. It's not perfect.
Check out the fact that L.A. has three All-Stars, Chicago has two and New York City has ... zero. We need a new Mecca. Maybe the Caribbean? Can we get an island All-Star Weekend?
2. Where All-Star Weekend has been held
The first All-Star Weekend was held in 1951, back when the league was essentially a regional association centered in the Northeast and Great Lakes regions. Hence all those All-Star Weekends in New York (including Rochester and Syracuse!) and Boston. (The Commonwealth hasn't hosted All-Star Weekend in 50 years. That's amazing.)
One key is that non-NBA cities rarely host All-Star -- Las Vegas is the only example if you don't count the stadium suburbs like Arlington and Pontiac (which I do not -- I lumped those into metro areas here). Several NBA cities have never hosted All-Star. Toronto gets its shot next year. Sacramento might be in line in a few years. No word on Portland, Memphis or Oklahoma City, though.
Two more notes: I know Boston is not actually in the Atlantic Ocean (yet) and I have decided to treat Cincinnati like Greywater Watch, assuming it floats around the Ohio and Licking rivers. Because clearly I have trouble placing it accurately despite referencing maps while doing so.
3. States that produce the most All-Stars from the past 25 years
This map shows from which state every American player who has made an All-Star team since 1991 hails. The same rules as from the 2015 map apply: I focused on where a player spent most of his youth, not where he was born. For example, Carmelo Anthony and Michael Jordan were both born in New York, but spent the bulk of their formative years in Maryland and North Carolina respectively.
California leads the way, with New York right behind it. South Carolina is rather good in turning out All-Stars despite its size: Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, Jermaine O'Neal and Larry Nance. Alabama and Indiana are also quite good. The only state with an NBA team that has not produced an All-Star in the past 25 years: Utah.
4. How teams have been represented in the All-Star Game
Wow, what a massive chart! This shows which teams had at least one All-Star in any given year since 1991. Note that no one had any All-Stars in 1999 due to the lockout. I also grayed out years in which a team did not exist. The Charlotte line combines the old Charlotte Hornets, the Charlotte Bobcats and the new Charlotte Hornets. (Man, it's not been pretty since the end of the old Charlotte Hornets.) The New Orleans line combines the New Orleans Hornets and Pelicans, of course.
A few things stand out. One is the Spurs! They have one season other than '99 without an All-Star, and that's the season they won the lottery and added Tim Duncan to their star-studded team. The longest current All-Star drought belongs to the Milwaukee Bucks, who haven't had a pick since 2004 (Michael Redd!). DeMarcus Cousins' broke the Kings' equivalent streak.
You may also be asking yourself which 2009-10 Sixer made the All-Star team. That'd be Allen Iverson, who had been cut by the Grizzlies after three games that season. He played two dozen games for Philly, made All-Star by fan vote and that was the end of his NBA career.
5. Dunk champs vs. Shootout champs by height
This chart compares the height of the winners of the Slam Dunk Contest and the Three-Point Shootout each year they have been held at All-Star. You might think tall guys would be more heavily represented in the Dunk Contest and shorter guys (guards) would win more Shootouts. It hasn't been the case. The median height for Shootout winners is 77.5 inches (or 6 feet 5.5 inches) and the median height for Dunk Contest winners is 78 inches (6'6).
Of course, two guys with four dunk titles between them skew that. Spud Webb (5'7) is the shortest Dunk Contest champ, and Nate Robinson (5'9) won three. No Shootout winner is shorter than those guys. But on balance the average-sized (for the NBA) wings do better in the Dunk Contest than taller guys. We'll see how Giannis Antetokounmpo (6'11) and Mason Plumlee (6'10) fare against Zach LaVine (6'5) and Victor Oladipo (6'4) this weekend.
Dwight Howard (6'11) is the tallest dunk champ, with two more titles going to 6'10 competitors (Larry Nance and Blake Griffin). Meanwhile there has been a 7-footer Shootout champ (Dirk Nowitzki) and three 6'10 winners (Peja Stojakovic twice and Kevin Love once). The 2015 field is on the short side, loaded with guards.
from SBNation.com - All Posts http://ift.tt/1EfNzlQ
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