Fatigue

[jacobkdoyle]

I'm opening a thread for this so people can avoid it if they'd like.

I'm just trying to gain a more informed opinion. I just always assumed fatigue was a real thing that can manifest itself in many ways. It seemed outrageous to me to think it isn't a real thing bc that honestly has never occurred to me. So I'm not trying to move the goal post by bringing in new variables to test. I'm legitimately trying to work towards the core of the issue. If we are talking about rest not being important in basketball, surely we need more examples than just a couple random seasons from a couple players on one college team. That's about 0.00001% of the issue imo. And even within that, we hardly began to unlock possible reasons for and against those examples. Just to add to the conversation, I've come up with 4 examples of how I believe fatigue can show itself. If I'm 100% off to think that on any of these, please tell me why.

In-Season Fatigue
Gary Clark was coming off of probably the best stretch of his career. He had 5 double doubles in 6 games, and missed the 6th by 1 rebound. He was named AAC Player of the Week in back to back weeks. Then against UConn our coach said he's tired and he had 5 pts 6 rebs.

Team Fatigue
We played Xavier as a step up in competition. Then we got a week off before playing Florida in NY, Miss St at UC, at UCLA in the span of 8 days. We then played 2 games in 3 days just 3 days later. In those games we only beat Arkansas Pine Bluff by 28...only outscored them by 1 in the 2nd half. Then gave up one of our season highs in points at home to Cleveland State 2 days later and only won by 19.

Short-Term Fatigue
Jacob Evans was fresh going into the AAC Tournament last year. Then shot 13-17 the first 2 games without having to crack 30 minutes. Then the 3rd game in 3 days he had to play 34 minutes and shot 3-11. This was against SMU though, so I don't know how much that factors in. It'd be interesting to see FG% by round of conference tournaments. Would it get better as it goes bc better teams are playing, or would it stay the same or drop bc players are getting worn down? I'll look into it.

Season-Long Fatigue
Here's an example similar to what was presented today:
Justin Jackson last 5 games at UC was just 28/65 from the field, and 10/27 the last 2 games where he played 40 and 37 minutes and one of the games was his 2nd in 2 days. This would be the falling off a cliff example. He played 380 more minutes as a SR than JR. But as Coach Cronin mentioned just today, we needed him at the time. We were in the middle of a great season.

So are any of these example where fatigue in no way, shape, or form played a role?

 

[jacobkdoyle]

Freshman Wall would be another form. I'm sure there are plenty examples of that. Could sophomore slump refer to the adjustment to a heavier workload in some cases?

 

[juckerrules]

Found this

Freshman Wall would be another form. I'm sure there are plenty examples of that. Could sophomore slump refer to the adjustment to a heavier workload in some cases?

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2018/jan/26/ku-coach-bill-self-searching-ways-fight-fatigue-fa/

Interesting article...I think the most important fatigue factor may be mental and emotional, not physical.

That may be a factor in the Cats' slow starts of late...they maybe don't have the mental and emotional zip until they get into the flow or feel the need to put the pedal to the metal to avoid a loss...I don't know...maybe kind of like it's Sunday night & that paper is due Monday at 8:00 and you haven't done squat but now that shit's real etc.

 

[Chad Brendel]

Mick recanted the Gary comment today. Said he had a tooth knocked into him gums that Gary didn't tell anyone about until after the game that impacted his play. It wasn't fatigue, it was Gary protecting himself.

As for Justin Jackson, what most didn't know at the time was that he was dealing with a bad shoulder issue the last 3-4 weeks of the season. He couldn't fully extend his right arm, and it had a major impact on his scoring at the rim...

 

[sedziobs]

In-Season Fatigue
Gary Clark ... against UConn our coach said he's tired and he had 5 pts 6 rebs.

Team Fatigue
We played Xavier as a step up in competition. Then we got a week off before playing Florida in NY, Miss St at UC, at UCLA in the span of 8 days.

Short-Term Fatigue
Jacob Evans was fresh going into the AAC Tournament last year. Then shot 13-17 the first 2 games without having to crack 30 minutes. Then the 3rd game in 3 days he had to play 34 minutes and shot 3-11.

Season-Long Fatigue
Here's an example similar to what was presented today:
Justin Jackson last 5 games at UC was just 28/65 from the field, and 10/27 the last 2 games where he played 40 and 37 minutes and one of the games was his 2nd in 2 days.

So are any of these example where fatigue in no way, shape, or form played a role?

As with any issue, we need to clearly define what the claim is. Fatigue, like many other factors, is not black and white. The claim from the UCF thread seemed to be that resting players 5 minutes so they aren't playing all 40 will improve performance in the future. That's a specific claim, but it's not testable. We have to rely on intuition.

As to your examples, fatigue could play a role in all of them, or it could play no role. That sounds cliche, but it's true. Cronin already admitted today that Gary was not tired against UConn. He was apparently trying to protect his injured mouth. But even Cronin doesn't know for a fact whether Gary's performance suffered from fatigue, and Gary himself probably doesn't either. No data is going to help either.

Against Florida, we lost for a variety of reasons. To my eye, the most important was it took us way too long to adjust to Chiozza isolating our small guards and backing them down. Possibly the week off played a role, but there's no real way to tell. If we played that same game 9 more times, we might win 6 of them. Trying to draw conclusions about anything from any individual game is difficult.

Evans' shooting percentages over a 3 game stretch are purely anecdotal in my opinion. There's way too much variance to say anything with that small of a sample.

The Jackson case would probably be better served using a metric other than shooting, since his effectiveness was not necessarily measured that way. Regardless, that example also suffers from small sample size, and it's not controlled for anything at all.

There are different philosophies regarding rest among coaches across college and NBA basketball. And each philosophy is valid because there is no conclusive evidence regarding the effectiveness of rest.

Personally, I think rest is pretty insignificant from game to game. If a player has a sore joint that needs to heal, then keeping him off it as long as possible will help. But I really doubt that giving a healthy Evans 35 instead of 40 minutes is going to do anything for him. And I also doubt that playing Florida after a week off had much to do at all with why we lost. But I can't test those ideas, so they remain opinions.

 

[Cartel]

Play more minutes greater risk of injury. Play less minutes less chance to get nicked. IMO that is the reason to limit minutes.

 

[jacobkdoyle]

Is Tom Thibodeau in part to blame for the decline of Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah? I know people have often complained about him giving guys 40+ minutes in NBA games. You have to wonder if those guys would've fallen off anyway, or if the workload contributed. So maybe one night of playing extra minutes won't hurt so much. But what happens when that adds up night after night, year after year?

 

[sedziobs]

Is Tom Thibodeau in part to blame for the decline of Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah?

This brings to mind the debate around Dusty Baker and Mark Prior. Another usage debate where there is no clear right answer.

 

[jacobkdoyle]

This brings to mind the debate around Dusty Baker and Mark Prior. Another usage debate where there is no clear right answer.

Ha yeah Dusty Baker definitely had that reputation. Yeah it's hard to know how to test pitchers bc there are so many different situations. Like Verlander this year for example. He pitched over 240 innings last year and all the way through the playoffs. I'd bet a lot that his first half numbers won't be great this year. But is it bc he's tired/worn down from a heavy workload? Or bc he's on an awesome team and can take it easier in the spring bc he knows they only need him for the end anyway? That's just 2 potential variables in play out of God knows how many, and for just 1 player. You really kinda need to look at it all on a case by case basis I think. But unfortunately you don't really get the answer until after the fact. So if it is more of a guessing game, coaches may just play it safe bc that way they can sleep at night.

 

[ervins84]

But what happens when that adds up night after night, year after year?

It's a big debate among training staffs in the NBA afaik.

There's a lot of different teams doing different things wrt rest (see the
Spurs, sixers treatment of embiid, and many other different ideas).

The most common working theory I've heard is when a player's workload/stress gets to a certain point, that injuries increase. Now how you define workload and what percentage it increases is really hard to determine. Most teams have a group of quants and trainers working together to come up with the perfect load management schedule. Whoever does figure it out, damn sure isn't going to share it publicly.

This is why teams will track players heart rates, speed throughout the game, etc and when things get above or below a certain threshold, they will recommend getting guys out and or days off with rest.

Basically "playing in the red danger tired area" increases injuries. The debate is defining what percentage is the red danger area and how big of an increase it is.

 

[waterhead]

As with any issue, we need to clearly define what the claim is. Fatigue, like many other factors, is not black and white. The claim from the UCF thread seemed to be that resting players 5 minutes so they aren't playing all 40 will improve performance in the future. That's a specific claim, but it's not testable. We have to rely on intuition.

This was my basic understanding of the claim being made. IMO players are getting chances for small spurts of rest all game due to tv timouts, team called timeouts, FT situations, etc etc. Adding 2 additional minutes of break in each half doesn't seem like a game changer to me.

I can see where resting outside of games would seem to be a better option. Give the players a chance to recover from minor injuries and sore muscles etc. There are obviously longer spurts of rest available outside of game situations. Adrenaline can help with most of that stuff during games.

I don't see a long term trend of diminishing returns developing for high usage players. If a player calls his name for a break during a game then I will assume he is tired enough to put in another player. If they aren't complaining then keep them in when the game is close. I don't see a need to risk injury when games are in hand. Get your studs out of the game.

 

[Cartel]

It's a big debate among training staffs in the NBA afaik.

There's a lot of different teams doing different things wrt rest (see the
Spurs, sixers treatment of embiid, and many other different ideas).

The most common working theory I've heard is when a player's workload/stress gets to a certain point, that injuries increase. Now how you define workload and what percentage it increases is really hard to determine. Most teams have a group of quants and trainers working together to come up with the perfect load management schedule. Whoever does figure it out, damn sure isn't going to share it publicly.

This is why teams will track players heart rates, speed throughout the game, etc and when things get above or below a certain threshold, they will recommend getting guys out and or days off with rest.

Basically "playing in the red danger tired area" increases injuries. The debate is defining what percentage is the red danger area and how big of an increase it is.

I think it is important to remember that NBA is much different then college. They play over twice the games sometimes back to back and the players are older. In my mind apples to oranges. College players have at least two days to recover and play only twice a week. Not to mention they have 10 years less on their bodies.

 

[Alum2013]

Anyone who doesn't believe in fatigue emotionally, mentally and physically near the end of a college season has never played a college sport before. Fatigue is 100% a real thing. Does everyone get hit by it at the same time? No; but at some point it will hit a player if they go long enough without mending.

 

[Alum2013]

I think it is important to remember that NBA is much different then college. They play over twice the games sometimes back to back and the players are older. In my mind apples to oranges. College players have at least two days to recover and play only twice a week. Not to mention they have 10 years less on their bodies.

They also aren't used to playing as many games in college as they did in high school. The rookie wall is just as real as tge freshman wall because their bodies aren't used to it. Your body conditions for what you condition it for. Plus NBA players only have basketball games/practice, that's it. College athletes still have alot of other things going on that can be draining.

 

[sedziobs]

Anyone who doesn't believe in fatigue emotionally, mentally and physically near the end of a college season has never played a college sport before. Fatigue is 100% a real thing. Does everyone get hit by it at the same time? No; but at some point it will hit a player if they go long enough without mending.

I doubt anyone thinks fatigue in general is a total fabrication. This is why we need to clearly define the claim. Does Evans playing 35 instead of 40 minutes in a handful of games affect his performance in subsequent games? That question is not the same as "is fatigue real?".

 

[jacobkdoyle]

I doubt anyone thinks fatigue in general is a total fabrication. This is why we need to clearly define the claim. Does Evans playing 35 instead of 40 minutes in a handful of games affect his performance in subsequent games? That question is not the same as "is fatigue real?".

The more I hear what people are saying, the more I think it is on the coach to handle each situation accordingly. Cronin seems to have a handle on it.

*This isn't a Coach Cronin must be right bc he's the coach thing. He's just closest to the situation and mentions its importance often.

 

[cincyguy13]

Some of it is boredom. I don’t care what level of sport you play, hard to get excited about playing inferior teams night after night.

 

[cincyguy13]

I don’t think fatigue is a big factor. The grind of the season might be getting old, but I don’t think they are actually tired. At that age I could play basketball all day everyday, and these guys are in way better shape and better athletes than me

 

[waterhead]

I guess the thing you want to look at when resting players is how that relates to end of year tourneys etc. Last year our highest usage guy ranked lower than #20 in AAC minutes per game.

I am not going to dock us for losing to an underrated UCLA team but we got slammed by SMU in the tourney finals and we lost to them 2 times late season or tourney. They were "supposed" to be a team that was not deep and subject to fatigue.

They had 3 guys averaging more minutes than our top player mpg. Another one tied with our highest player. Another one getting close to 30 mpg.

They reeled off 16 straight games and beat us twice in the process end of year.

Someone pointed out that their 1st round loss in the dance was "maybe" due to fatigue...but forgive me if I don't think game 16 they were well rested and game 17 it all caught up to them. Fatigue just did not seem like a factor for SMU last year and they played their guys heavily.

 

[jacobkdoyle]

Mick recanted the Gary comment today. Said he had a tooth knocked into him gums that Gary didn't tell anyone about until after the game that impacted his play. It wasn't fatigue, it was Gary protecting himself.

As for Justin Jackson, what most didn't know at the time was that he was dealing with a bad shoulder issue the last 3-4 weeks of the season. He couldn't fully extend his right arm, and it had a major impact on his scoring at the rim...

I missed that yesterday about Clark. Thanks.

Chad, at what point do you think about workload management? Mainly for injury concern? More for big guys? Light practices? What's your preferred remedy to keep guys fresh?