Pretty awful game 1 by the Bucks here, but they escape with the victory. Continues their streak of never playing well in game 1s. Along with the discussion about this in game, really wonder if something is just off with the way Bud is prepping the team for game 1s or something.
they definitely escaped, if anyone of demar lavine or vuc on the bulls had an average shooting night bulls win the game
editâbut I guess only caruso and maybe brook lopez had a good game, was a rough game all around
I mean, Jordan Nwora wasnât available tonight, so you knew it was going to be a struggle.
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You wouldnât if you were running a team that actually wanted to compete.
Being a GM of a crummy NBA team is the easiest job in sports. Trade a still good player in Horford for an injured, unplayable albatross in Kemba and a middling first rounder and folks will clap you on the back and whisper sweet nothings in your ear.
Still a shame Kyrie didnât work out in Boston. Man is he fun to watch. Kept thinking back to this opening night lineup:
25 year old Kyrie
21 year old Jaylen Brown
27 year old Gordon Hayward
19 year old Jayson Tatum
31 year old Horford
Marcus Smart, Terry Rozier, Marcus Morris, Baynes and Theis on the bench.
Hayward snaps his leg 5 minutes in. Kyrie then gets knee surgery. They took Lebron to 7 games in the ECF without either of them. Then it all goes to hell next season.
Found a great sub on reddit r/nbadiscussion. Loved this post about the guards in the league. Obviously Iâm biased but the data is hard to argue with imo
https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/u1g23c/oc_allnba_guards_statistical_comparison/
- Shortlist was made around what iâve found to be the general consensus of who is in the consideration and who iâve seen receive votes. Jrue Holiday is the exception included on my own.
- Honorable mentions that didnât make the shortlist: Fred VanVleet, James Harden, Zach Lavine, Dejounte Murray and Darius Garland.
- Sorted in no particular order. Stat leaders among the players in the shortlist were bolded.
Boxscore:
â
| MP | PTS | TRB | AST | STL | BLK | TOV | TS% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Luka DonÄiÄ | 35.4 | 28.4 | 9.1 | 8.7 | 1.2 | 0.6 | 4.5 | 57.2% |
| Steph Curry | 34.5 | 25.5 | 5.2 | 6.3 | 1.3 | 0.4 | 3.2 | 60.1% |
| Devin Booker | 34.5 | 26.8 | 5 | 4.8 | 1.1 | 0.4 | 2.4 | 57.6% |
| Trae Young | 34.9 | 28.4 | 3.7 | 9.7 | 0.9 | 0.1 | 4 | 60.3% |
| Ja Morant | 33.1 | 27.4 | 5.7 | 6.7 | 1.2 | 0.4 | 3.4 | 57.5% |
| DeMar DeRozan (*) | 36.1 | 27.9 | 5.2 | 4.9 | 0.9 | 0.3 | 2.4 | 59% |
| Chris Paul | 32.9 | 14.7 | 4.4 | 10.8 | 1.9 | 0.3 | 2.4 | 58.1% |
| Jimmy Butler (*) | 33.9 | 21.4 | 5.9 | 5.5 | 1.6 | 0.5 | 2.1 | 59.2% |
| Donovan Mitchell | 33.8 | 25.9 | 4.2 | 5.3 | 1.5 | 0.2 | 3 | 57.2% |
| Jrue Holiday | 32.9 | 18.3 | 4.5 | 6.8 | 1.6 | 0.4 | 2.7 | 59.3% |
MP - Minutes per game; PTS - Points per game; TRB - Total rebounds per game; AST - Assists per game; TOV - Turnovers per game; STL - Steals per game; BLK - Blocks per game; TS% - True shooting percentage; (*) - eligible for both the guard and forward spots.
Sources: Basketball Reference.
Trae is otherwordly offensively. Highest volume + highest scoring efficiency with the 2nd best playmaking stats behind CP3.
DonÄiÄ, while he does have a very well rounded boxscore overall, him being the least efficient scoring wise (TS%) and most turnover prone on the list is a bit of a problem. Big raw boxscore averages boost him a bit in the publicâs eye.
Interestingly, Basketball Referenceâs boxscore only advanced models- WS/48, PER and BPM, rate Jimmy Butlerâs boxscore production as the best overall if looked at from a highest average rank standpoint across the 3 of them. That isnât a perfect method ofcourse, but provides some insight as to how different boxscore only advanced models rate just their boxscore production on a per possesion basis. Butler has the highest average rank across the 3 advanced models, (8) and is followed by Traeâs (12.6), DonÄiÄâs (13) and Morantâs (13.6) average ranks.
Team/ Misc. stats
â
| Games Played | Team Record (Seed) | Team Record Without Player | Net Rating | Swing | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Luka DonÄiÄ | 65 | 52-30 (4th) | 8-9 | +3.4 (50 win pace) | -0.9 |
| Steph Curry | 64 | 53-29 (3rd) | 8-10 | +10.6 (65 win pace) | +13 |
| Devin Booker | 68 | 64-18 (1st) | 8-6 | +9.8 (63 win pace) | +3.6 |
| Trae Young | 76 | 43-39 (T-9th) | 3-3 | +3.2 (49 win pace) | +5.7 |
| Ja Morant | 57 | 56-26 (2nd) | 20-5 | +4.6 (52 win pace) | -3.2 |
| DeMar DeRozan (*) | 76 | 46-36 (6th) | 3-3 | +1.2 (44 win pace) | +5.2 |
| Chris Paul | 65 | 64-18 (1st) | 11-6 | +11 (66 win pace) | +5.8 |
| Jimmy Butler (*) | 57 | 53-28 (1st) | 15-9 | +6.3 (56 win pace) | +2.5 |
| Donovan Mitchell | 67 | 49-33 (5th) | 8-7 | +6.5 (56 win pace) | -1.1 |
| Jrue Holiday | 67 | 51-31 (2nd) | 4-11 | +8.7 (61 win pace) | +11.6 |
Net Rating - Teamâs point differential with given player on the court per 100 possesions;
Swing - difference between the teamâs Net Rating (net points per 100 possessions) when a given player is on or off the court.
Example-
- The Grizzlies have been 3.2 points per 100 possesions worse (-) with Morant ON the court compared to OFF.
- The Suns have been 3.6 points per 100 possesions better (+) with Booker ON the court compared to OFF.
Sources: Statmuse; Cleaning the Glass
*Used Cleaning the Glassâs plus minus data as it factors out garbage time.
In terms of games played, Butler and Morant are the only ones that stand out negatively. Itâs been a COVID riddled season, the standard is different. 65 games are okayish?
Traeâs and DeRozanâs 8+ games over any other player cannot be overlooked though.
There is also some perfect examples here of how record/ seeding can be very misleading. Also whether people like it or not, a negative on/off is important. Especially if the player doesnât have a great Net Rating in the first place.
When judging an individual playerâs impact on winning/ team performance in general, team record should become mostly replaced by Net Rating. To better illustrate this:
- With Curry on the floor, the Warriors have played like a 65 win team.
- With DonÄiÄ on the floor, the Mavericks have played like a 50 win team.
- The Mavericks have finished only 1 game back of the Warriors.
- DonÄiÄ has also only played 1 more game than Curry.
You see the point. In discussion for All-NBA though people will point to Luka having brought a worse team to almost the same record as Steph, even though:
- The Mavs have played at a 52 win pace with Luka off the floor.
- With them both ON the floor, Curryâs Warriors have been whole 7 points per 100 possesions better than DonÄiÄâs Mavericks.
But not everything is black and white. Net Rating and on/off are differently influenced on a player to player basis by staggering/rotations, team composition etc.
For example: One superstar playerâs team could have an extremely lopsided team construction-a completely stacked starting lineup in contrast to one of the worst benches in the league. Letâs also say that the team doesnât stagger the superstar player with the bench at all. That would inflate the playerâs Net Rating and his Net Rating Swing. But then again it would still better to use than just team record with no context.
All in all, from the Team/ Misc. stats category-
: Holiday, Curry, CP3, Booker, Trae
: DeRozan (slightâ:chart_with_upwards_trend:), Mitchell
: Morant, DonÄiÄ, Butler
Advanced stats
I decided to use the 3 most trusted single season advanced stats according to a recent media/staff/coach/executive advanced stats poll conducted by HoopsHype.
Rate version-
â
| EPM | LEBRON | RAPTOR | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Luka DonÄiÄ | +4.5 (17th) | +2.54 (30th) | +6.3 (6th) |
| Steph Curry | +7.2 (4th) | +4.32 (6th) | +6.2 (7th) |
| Devin Booker | +4.5 (16th) | +2.71 (26th) | +4.8 (11th) |
| Trae Young | +4.9 (11th) | +3.02 (20th) | +4.5 (14th) |
| Ja Morant | +3.5 (32nd) | +3.45 (12th) | +3.1 (T-29th) |
| DeMar DeRozan (*) | +3.2 (38th) | +1.40 (70th) | +1.6 (T-73rd) |
| Chris Paul | +4.8 (12th) | +3.56 (11th) | +3.7 (24th) |
| Jimmy Butler (*) | +4.5 (15th) | +3.61 (10th) | +4.3 (T-15th) |
| Donovan Mitchell | +4.1 (20th) | +2.07 (38th) | +2.2 (T-54th) |
| Jrue Holiday | +5.3 (9th) | +3.20 (16th) | +5.6 (9th) |
Cumulative version-
Which is what ultimately matters for All-NBA/ MVP.
| EPM eW | LEBRON WINS ADDED | RAPTOR WAR | Average rank | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Luka DonÄiÄ | 11.7 (13th) | 7.1 (T-22nd) | 10.8 (5th) | 13.5 |
| Steph Curry | 15.3 (5th) | 9.6 (5th) | 10.2 (7th) | 5.7 |
| Devin Booker | 11.9 (11th) | 7.6 (T-14) | 9.2 (11th) | 12.1 |
| Trae Young | 14.2 (6th) | 8.8 (7th) | 10 (9th) | 7.3 |
| Ja Morant | 8.3 (39th) | 7.1 (T-22nd) | 5.6 (T-42nd) | 34.6 |
| DeMar DeRozan (*) | 11.6 (15th) | 6.5 (29th) | 6.1 (T-35nd) | 26.4 |
| Chris Paul | 11.4 (16th) | 8 (12th) | 7 (T-20th) | 16.2 |
| Jimmy Butler (*) | 9.8 (23rd) | 7.2 (21st) | 6.9 (T-22.3) | 22.4 |
| Donovan Mitchell | 10.9 (18th) | 6.4 (32nd) | 5.8 (T-40.5nd) | 30.2 |
| Jrue Holiday | 12.4 (10th) | 7.6 (14th) | 9.4 (10th) | 11.3 |
EPM eW - estimated Wins; RAPTOR WAR - Wins over replacement; (X) - Playerâs rank among all players for given stat; (T-X) Tied for X place
*Used a little higher minutes requirement on RAPTOR (1250 total minutes).
*It also seems like Bball Indexâs LEBRON stat isnât up to date with the last 2/3 games yet?
*in calculating the average, among tied ranks i used X .2/.25/.33/.5 depending on the number of players in the tie. I also didnât include ties for EPM, as it doesnât list players as tied and i donât know if it ranks them based on .01 decimals instead.
Sources: Estimated Plus Minus; LEBRON; RAPTOR.
The average rank method isnât the greatest, especially with only 3 metrics in play.
For example, in EPM, the difference between Curry (4th) and Durant (5th) is the same as the difference between Mitchell (20th) and Draymond Green (36th).
But in this case it does the job and sorts the 1st/2nd/3rd All-NBA teams the same as if it would if you took the time to account for the difference between each rank.
All-NBA teamsâ guards according to the 3 leading advanced stats (cumulative version):
1st team - Curry, Trae
2nd team - Holiday, Booker
3rd team - DonÄiÄ, CP3
There is a 6.2 rank difference between the lowest ranked player on the list CP3, and the highest ranked player outside the list, Jimmy Butler. Other players that i havenât included such as Dejounte Murray, FVV etc. arenât close either.
Point is that this top 6 is definite in the advanced modelsâ eyes. They think that there is a distinct gap between these 6 and the next guard in consideration for All-NBA.
Thatâs one of the reason why i included Holiday, who wonât get much consideration from the voters, but has a really strong statistical case top to bottom- which also doesnât mean that he has to get in as other things matter too. Stats donât account for narrative and other human factors, like âhelpâ, or the fact that Holiday is a 2nd/3rd option.
And in general, just the boxscore mostly prevails as the biggest factor for All-NBA along with seeding and games played.
Conclusion/ TL;DR
Morantâs and DonÄiÄâs All-NBA cases arenât as strong on paper as they are in the publicâs eye. There is a case to be made that Trae easily deserves it over both of them. I believe there isnât much of an argument for DonÄiÄ over Curry for 1st team. I also really donât see Mitchell over CP3, Holiday or Morant. Butler is probably getting voted in as a F.
my All-NBA guard slots:
1st team - Curry, Trae
2nd team - Booker, DonÄiÄ
3rd team - CP3/ Morant
Had a tough time choosing between Morant, CP3 and Holiday for 3rd team.
What are yours?
Also great breakdown of nets vs Boston
https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/u6bdtz/2022_playoffs_game_1_breakdown_brooklyn_nets/
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/nba for memes and takes. /nbadiscussion for actual basketball talk.
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Yeah Iâm so glad I found it. R/nba basketball discussion is so so bad but the memes are hot fire. Iâm absolutely loving the in depth detailed discussion on nbadiscussion backed by data.
The Kyrie bounce pass to Mills in the corner is otherworldly.
https://i.imgur.com/Vb2dSG7.mp4
Not sure if that will embed properly. https://i.imgur.com/Vb2dSG7.mp4
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The post argues for more Claxton minutes and I think itâs fine to ID him as their best big. But I think, weâll see some hack-a-Claxton. Those free throws he took were ugly as hell. Thereâs a chance he becomes unplayable.
Dudeâs playing for a contract. Do some diaper shots, man, youâd get $100mm.
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Yeah I was a bit surprised the Celtics didnât do the hack-a-claxton towards the end but instead they had faith in their defense and it turned out well. But yeah definitely a weakness. Nets start playing Ben Simmons and thats two in the 4th quarter that are huge liabilities at the line.
Most of you guys likely followed basketball longer than me. Do you guys think there has been a significant shift where teams/players are caring less about the regular season and kinda coasting like LeBron was famous for, trying to save themselves for the playoffs? You also see coaches doing it resting their starters a lot towards the end of the season. Feeling like seeding matters less than just getting their in good health.
Then again getting tough matchups in the playoffs makes a huge difference. Getting a couple 7 game series instead of easy 5 or 6 game ones more than negates coasting in the regular season. Think it worked so well for LeBron because the east was so bad didnât really matter the seeding.
It feels like most of it stems from the realization that players are human beings and need rest once in a while, which makes Jason Whitlock angry.
As a Bucks fan, I never really paid attention to that stuff until recently. When they were good in the 80s, it was pre-internet and I was a kid, so I didnât care about anything except cheering on my sports heroes. Then the Bucks were bad for a long time aside from a short stretch with Big Dog, Cassell, and Ray Allen, so I didnât pay attention to resting players, tanking for playoffs spots, etc.
The current, good Bucks are kind of interesting in that when they got good, they went hard for the #1 seed, got it two years in a row, and lost in the playoffs. Last year, they were more content to rest guys, got the #3 seed, and won the title. Looks like they did the same thing this year (plus they didnât have a healthy team most of the season). They semi-tanked the final game - I think they were content with the #3 and playing the Bulls in the first round, but would have been fine with the #2 and the Nets, so they just let things play out.
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Donât have any comments on all of the stats stuff because I donât pay close attention to it anymore but I went to a recent wolves-mavs game and couldnât believe how bad the mavs looked not counting Luka. I have no idea how that team was even above .500
Did you used to read the old NBA threads in 2p2 SE? There were some pretty damn sharp NBA people posting there for years, I havenât followed them in a while so I donât know if the content is still good. Like 4 or 5 posters went on to work for NBA teams
Feel like this has been happening across all sports.
I think itâs really interesting what the Celtics and Bucks did - Bucks obviously didnât care about getting #2 and wanted to play Chicago round one. Celtics did care about getting #2 and have the tougher first round matchup (though they had a shot at Cleveland beating Brooklyn in the play in), but having home court in a potential round 2. I donât think either of them are wrong - home court in Round 2 may be more valuable to the Celtics in theory - younger team, less playoff success (the key players all have made the ECF twice, but obviously donât have the recent road success that the Bucks had last year - Game 7 against BKN was on the road for the Bucks, and they won at least one finals game). I could understand an accomplished team caring about home court less.
I was initially all for the Celtics getting #2, reasoning that if they canât beat the Nets they wouldnât beat the Bucks in round 2, so walloping the Bulls or whatever would be meaningless. But I saw an interview recently from Tatum talking about the bubble playoffs - he felt like the 2nd round series against the Raptors - it went 7 games - took a lot out of the team and that it really cost them in the series in the ECF against the Heat. They were just more tired than the Heat, it was a contributing factor.
So, maybe having a first round war against the Nets will hurt them even if they win. Bucks winning in 5 would give them 4 more days of rest than a Game 7 BKN-BOS winner.
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Donât think thatâs true for football with first round bye. More leagues need to add that so regular season has more meaning. I do like that MLB added the wild-card play-in game to add some meaning to regular season (although would be better if they just gave top 3 teams byes, regardless of divisions).
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Absolute travesty that Wolves-Grizz is on NBATV tomorrow.
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There has got to be a relation to the broader trends in sports. Like overall the intensity of the athleticism is increasing so itâs got to be harder to go all out every single game. And the players of course make much more money and have much more autonomy.