(Roughly) Daily

March Madness is here, and the NBA is lumbering through the second half of its season; roundball is all around us.  Happily, there are infographics to help…

Kirk Goldsberry, a visiting scholar at the Harvard Center for Geographic Analysis and an assistant professor of geography at Michigan State, has created Courtvision, a series of graphic analyses like the one above aimed at better understanding the battles on the boards.

Readers will find it crammed with insight (e.g., the most effective 3-point shooter in the NBA?  Stephen Curry, of Davidson and the Golden State Warriors)…

Perhaps Dr. Goldsberry will follow fellow sport-data geek Nate Silver into politics…

[via Flowing Data]

As we dribble, we might recall that it was on this date in 1972 that the Cincinnati Royals announced the move of their NBA franchise from The Queen City to The Paris of the Plains, where the following season they played as the Kansas City Kings. (Actually, they were briefly “the Kansas City-Omaha Kings,” but “Omaha” was dropped after two years…)  At the time of the announcement the Royals– once the home of such greats as Wayne Embry, Jerry Lucas, and Oscar Robertson– were on the way to concluding a 30-52 season and missing the play-offs for the fifth year in a row.  It may be evidence of karma that the franchise has, since 1985, been the Sacramento Kings.

 Final home of the Cincinnati Royals (source)

Happy Pi Day!!!

… Or should we be celebrating (and using) Tau instead?