With Diante Garrett moving into first place all-time on the ISU career turnover list I wanted to take a closer look at the numbers and offer a few thoughts. First, like Brett Favre holding the interception record it is a bit of a backhanded compliment because it means that you were at least around long enough and played enough despite the turnovers that a record was able to be set.
Also, stats like this are a bit disingenuous, in my opinion, because it offers no context. For instance, as I tweeted a couple weeks back, if Don Smith (Zaid Abdul-Aziz) had played as many games as Jeff Grayer he would've scored 2,787 career points as opposed to Grayer's 2,502. Yet, Grayer is often considered the most prolific scorer in ISU history.
I included the points per game, rebounds per game, assists per game, steals per game, and assists:turnovers per game as auxiliary information. Although assists and turnovers are often used together to compile assist-to-turnover ratio, I don't think they are really all that related. Other than to say, for every silly play at least he gets credit for creating a basket on offense. But if that is the case then FG's made should also be lumped into that ratio.
Further, I included games started to get some idea of what kind of minutes these players have played in order to get some context to how many potential possessions they played to be able to notch a turnover in the first place. For a guy like Garrett it would be difficult to state just how many possessions and percentage of seconds the ball is in his hands and he has been asked to be the sole creator many times. All of that just increases his exposure for potential to turn the ball over. It should be noted that there are surely similar scenarios with the other players listed.
All that said, here is the data I'm building up to. Of the top 25 players in most career turnovers here is the data for turnovers per game. Notable guys that turned the ball over at a high rate but didn't play enough or long enough to make the top 25 turnover list would be: Mike Taylor - 5.42, Derrick Hayes - 3.79, Tim Barnes - 2.77, Ricky Morgan - 2.72, and Marquis Gilstrap - 2.72.
Also keep in mind that turnovers have been tracked for ISU players since just the 1982-83 season. This chart is sorted by TO/G but it does show the rank of these 25 players for total turnovers, assists per game and assists:turnovers per game as well. Also keep in mind that I didn't compile this in order to prove how great of a point guard I believe DG to be, more so it is to shed light that bagging on him for being the all time career turnovers leader is unfair.
Jacy was not asked to score at all. It takes a lot of pressure off and reduces the opportunity for turnovers when you don't do anything but pass. Don't get me wrong, I loved Jacy, but he was nowhere near the complete player that DG, Tinsley, Blalock, or many of the others were.
Is there a statistic for the number of times a player has choked in the last 2 minutes of games? DG would win that one by double digit margins ...
Or the stat I really want to know ... how many times a player has dribbled the ball off his own foot with the game on the line. DG's current count is 3 over the last 2 years and I haven't witnessed any other ISU player doing that in nearly 30 years of watching ISU hoops. Now that is some record !!!
Is there a statistic for the number of times a player has choked in the last 2 minutes of games? DG would win that one by double digit margins ...<br> <br>
Or the stat I really want to know ... how many times a player has dribbled the ball off his own foot with the game on the line. DG's current count is 3 over the last 2 years and I haven't witnessed any other <acronym title="Iowa State">ISU</acronym> player doing that in nearly 30 years of watching <acronym title="Iowa State">ISU</acronym> hoops. Now that is some record !!!
These posts frickin infuriate me. Without DG we would not be in any of those games. Garrett has played his entire career without a single other person who could create off the dribble. He plays almost 40 minutes a game. He averages 18 points and 7 assists per game. He never quits. He doesn't ***** about bad calls. He just plays, and plays hard. He's been the best player on the court for either team regardless of who we are playing.
Simply put, DG is not the reason we have lost the games we have lost, he is the reason we won the ones we have won.
Last edited by snowcraig2.0; 02-06-2011 at 06:54 PM.
Is there a statistic for the number of times a player has choked in the last 2 minutes of games? DG would win that one by double digit margins ...
Or the stat I really want to know ... how many times a player has dribbled the ball off his own foot with the game on the line. DG's current count is 3 over the last 2 years and I haven't witnessed any other ISU player doing that in nearly 30 years of watching ISU hoops. Now that is some record !!!
Is there a statistic for the amount of moronic posts you're going to make about DG? You have probably set some type of record.
These posts frickin infuriate me. Without DG we would not be in any of those games. Garrett has played his entire career without a single other person who could create off the dribble. He plays almost 40 minutes a game. He averages 18 points and 7 assists per game. He never quits. He doesn't ***** about bad calls. He just plays, and plays hard. He's been the best player on the court for either team regardless of who we are playing.
Simply put, DG is not the reason we have lost the games we have lost, he is the reason we won the ones we have won.
It is of course true that he keeps us in games but when does that cease being an excuse for being AWFUL at the end of them?
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Originally Posted by LindenCy 
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