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Lawrence Dean Oliver (born February 1969) goes by “Dean Oliver” is an American statistician and basketball analytics pioneer. Oliver is currently an assistant coach and advisor for the Washington Wizards, and has worked in the NBA since 2004. Oliver is known for creating the “Four Factors of Basketball” which is a formula that incorporates free throw percentage, rebounding, shooting, and turnovers for both a team and their opponent. He is also the author of Basketball on Paper, a book using scientific and statistical methods to evaluate team performance and how to strategize. Oliver is also the creator of the Journal of Basketball Studies, an analytical basketball blog created in 1995.

Early Life and Career

Lawerence Dean Oliver played point guard for California Institute of Technology from 1986-1988. In his senior year, Oliver became an assistant coach at California Institute of Technology, he was a coach from from 1988-1990. Oliver graduated in 1990 with a bachelors in engineering and applied science. In 1990, Oliver was accepted to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s engineering graduate program. At his time in Chapel Hill, Oliver worked as an advanced basketball scout for Bertka Views, the scouting company ran by Bill Bertka of the Los Angeles Lakers. Oliver graduated with a PhD in engineering in 94’ and worked as an environmentalist consultant until 2002.

Career

Dean Oliver began writing the outline of his book, Basketball on Paper¸ in 2002, coincidentally at the same time Michael Lewis was writing Moneyball, a book about how the Oakland Athletics’ used analytics to get a competitive advantage. The timing of Moneyball inspired Oliver to work full time in basketball analytics. Oliver’s book came out in 2004, the same year he landed his first NBA job with Seattle SuperSonics. He was hired to be an analytical consultant to the coaching staff and management. His position with the Sonics lasted two years until he went to the Denver Nuggets in 2006. Oliver was the Director of Quantitative Analysis and was influential in the Allen Iverson trade. After four and half years with the Nuggets, Oliver stepped away from the NBA for almost four years to work at ESPN as a director of production analysis. Oliver lead the development of statistics used for ESPN’s coverage of Football. In 2014, Oliver spent a year with the Sacramento Kings as director of player personnel and analytics. In October 2015 Dean Oliver joined TruMedia Networks as Vice President of Data Science. TruMedia Networks is an engineering firm specializing in sports analytics solutions for leagues, franchises and media partners. After fours of serving his role, Oliver was hired to join Scott Brook’s staff on the Washington Wizards to be an assistant coach and analytical consultant. He is still working for the Wizards as of November 2020.