The art of the assist and why AST:TO should never be used

Basketball statistics have become a contentious issue among fans ever since the “Moneyball” movement made its way into the NBA. Some people view statistics as scouting tools that can enlighten fans, coaches and players alike. Others believe statistics to be "witchcraft nonsense," as someone in my group chat recently said.

Whichever side of the argument you align yourself with, there is one thing both sides can agree on; all statistics are flawed and without proper context they are nearly pointless.

Some statistics are inherently flawed and some are simply still in their infancy (e.g. any "advanced" defensive stat that you have ever come across). However, there are others that are simply misused by fans or at least misinterpreted.

Assist to turnover ratio (AST:TO) is one of those statistics.

The worth(lessness?) of AST:TO

The fantasy basketball savant that is Chris Towers posed a question on twitter back in early December.

There were a variety of answers but in general the majority of people appear to think that AST:TO tells you how good of a passer a player is. On the surface this makes sense; it should provide an insight in how often a player’s passes result in a turnover as opposed to an assist.

But in reality, AST:TO tells us nothing. Why? Because it doesn't differentiate between passing turnovers and every other type of turnover.

For example, let's say you make ten assists in a game and only one of your passes the entire night leads to a turnover. That’s a great passing night, right? But what if you also committed an offensive foul, stepped out of bounds and had the ball stolen from you twice?

AST:TO will count them all. So according to those who use AST:TO as an indication of passing ability, your great passing night suddenly looks horrible.

Sure, you didn't have the best game, but your turnovers were a combination of spacing out mentally and being too aggressive on offense, neither of which are a reflection of your skill as a passer.

From turnovers for backcourt violations to traveling, AST:TO counts them all. It really doesn't tell you how good a distributor someone is. In fact, it doesn't tell you much of anything.

Assists to passing turnovers ratio

As an alternative to the impotent AST:TO, I present to you a much more useful statistic: assists to passing turnovers ratio (AST:PTO).

Many NBA stat websites track this statistic (under various names) for teams as a whole but it’s difficult to find for individual players.

Lucky for you, I have taken the time to calculate the ratio for all 400+ players that have stepped foot onto the court this season. This required a lot of tedious data entry but after a few hours of work (and some procrastination) the job was completed.

Where better to start than the league leaders?

League leaders in assists AST:PTO

As you can see, Chris Paul is the "point god" that we all believe him to be. An exceptionally efficient passer that appears to put the rest of the league leaders to shame. Meanwhile, our very own Draymond Green earns the title of the only non-guard in the top ten for assists per game with a AST:PTO greater than 5.0 (Suck it LeBron!).

Some of the more diehard NBA enthusiasts will be aware of the recent rise of Nikola Jokic. He leads all big men in points per possession (assists and points) with 1.39 per. But while the Serbian sensation has been incredible since gaining a starting spot in Denver, he's still not the most efficient passer at his position.

The title of most efficient passer among big men this season belongs to Marc Gasol; who is possibly the best passing big of his generation.

To expand on this further I have created the infographic below highlighting the top five wings, guards and big men in AST:PTO (minimum 100 assists this season required)

AST:TO vs. AST:PTO

If we select a few of the top players in AST:PTO and compare their ranking in the more well-known AST:TO there are some glaring inconsistencies.

In terms of AST:PTO, Gasol is the highest ranked center while Gordon Hayward and Giannis Antetokounmpo are two of the top five wings. But despite their high rank in AST:PTO, Gasol, Hayward and Antetokounmpo don't even appear in the top 40 of ESPN’s AST:TO rankings.

Meanwhile, Jokic, who is ranked second among big men in AST:PTO, is ranked just slightly lower in AST:TO, sitting at fourth among big men.

So what are we to take from AST:PTO?

In the book Freakonomics, co-author Steven D. Levitt says, “Information is a beacon, a cudgel, an olive branch, a deterrent--all depending on who wields it and how.”

AST:PTO simply tells us the ratio of passes that resulted in an assists to passes that resulted in a turnover. That's it. You could look at it as an indicator of how efficient a passer is, but it doesn't necessarily tell us how skilled a passer is.

This statistic doesn't tell us about the players court vision or the creativity required to make these passes — "the art of the assist," if you like. It can’t capture those bold and daring passes that usually occur spontaneously from the sheer imagination of the greatest passers in the game.

There are two types of flair when it comes to distributing the ball. One type is unnecessary and leads to turnovers, like Stephen Curry’s behind the back pass in game seven of the NBA finals. The other wows the crowd and reminds us why these guys are pros.

So while I do think AST:PTO is useful and definitely a better option than AST:TO, I urge you all to remember that it doesn't take into account everything about passing.

It doesn’t tell us how often a player passes straight into a shooter’s pocket or if the timing was on point. It doesn't tell us if the turnovers from passes were a result of forcing a pass, making a poor decision, using the wrong kind of pass or just plain bad luck.

In the future I'm hoping to elaborate on this more and look at other ways of statistically measuring a distributors value. But until then, we Warriors fans can boast about Green’s and Andre Iguodala’s passing ability with some relevant numbers to back them up.

Below you will find the full list of AST:PTO for all 400+ players in the league. The table has a search function so if there are any other players you were curious about you will be able to find their AST:PTO here. Unfortunately I can't afford to manually update the data on a daily basis so these will become outdated.

All data in this article was gathered from NBAwowy, stats.nba.com and NBAminer.