Quick Article: Differentials Thru Day 40
Quick Article: Differentials Thru Day 40
Hey everyone - super quick article comin at ya after I spent some time at my job working poring over the team statistics page. Tried to pull out some numbers that I thought were interesting, along with some storylines from this season (don't worry, no Bulls talk in this one).
1. Pacers proving people right (or wrong again)
Last offseason, most were high on the Pacers after acquiring Greg Oden for a very modest price from Ralph in a cap-relief move for the Jazz. The prevailing thought that pairing Oden, who had been the league's best defensive / rebounding big for the past 6 or so seasons, with prime aged, A/A defense / rebounding Andre Drummond, would prove to be too much to overcome for most opponents. Unfortunately for the Hoosiers, though, last year's Pacers team was a flop, finishing below .500 (albeit with a +2 differential) and missing the playoffs. You could even make the argument that this team is constructed WORSE than last year's, since the only meaningful change is 10 minutes of perfect big-butt play from Terrance Jones is going to Isaiah Stewart instead this year (while Jones plays almost 30 mpg for the Knicks).
This offseason, the podcast pundits (aka me) predicted another down year in Indiana, thinking that a full season sample size was enough to see that something was wrong with the construction of the roster, even if we couldn't see what that was. And instead, they've been off to a torrid start, with an 11.7 point differential and blistering shooting performances from basically everyone on the team (Sabonis and Talen Horton Tucker are the only two players on the entire roster not shooting a career-best number right now). While I think we can expect the shooting to regress some, there also is a likely chance that certain players on this roster have simply taken a step forward - the most likely candidates being DeAaron Fox, whose statline just looks fake, and Andre Drummond, who may be finally reaping the benefits of the +20 potential Tonger gave him several years ago. And if the shooting does regress, they're still the best rebounding team in the league by a wide margin - their +7.7 rebounding differential, best in the league, is about as close to the Sonics 5th best differential as the Sonics are to the 76ers 21st best differential. The Pacers are one of the most fun storylines of this season, and it looks like they're bouncing back from a 0th percentile outcome last season with a 90th percentile outcome this season.
2. Hornets zagging with steals over blocks
The Hornets are currently rocking the fourth best point differential in the league (+7.1) despite being in the same division as the two top differentials. Given their team make up of hyper-elite backcourt players (Murray / Lou / Semi / Clarkson) and lack of depth in their frontcourt (Willy did not record a block last sim, so he's stuck on 1 for the entire season), I would expect to just see them shooting the absolute shit out of the ball and outscoring opponents. But that's not the case - they're actually possession monsters. Despite none of Murray / Clarkson / Lou being exceptionally TO efficient (Murray isn't bad for this generation of SLN but 2.1 TOs aint nothin), they lead the league in steal differential by a preposterous amount (4.1, the Nuggets are second at 2.2, the Knicks are third at 1.5 - the difference between 1st and 2nd is the same as the difference between 2nd and 12th), and as a result lead the league in TO margin (4.8, 2nd is Clippers at 3, another insane delta) and FGA differential, with the +5.4 FGAs equating to double that of the 4th best Hawks.
A couple takeaways here: firstly, Jonathan Isaac is unbelievable - we know that possessions are usually created by the bigs, and with so few quality bigs in tow for Jack, a lot falls on Isaac's capable, Atlassian shoulders. Secondly, this Hornets team is proving that you can be successful without having any stud blockers (they're 5th worst in blocks and 9th worst in block differential) as long as you have exceptional stealers and good TO efficiency.
3. How unlucky are the Clippers?
The Clippers are turning in one of the most unfortunate seasons in recent memory. They're +6.9 on the season, good for the 2nd best differential in the West (and 5th best league wide), and yet they're just 12-11, one game over .500, despite having played 14/23 games at home. This isn't rocket science, but I expect the Clippers to maintain their point differential and start racking up wins sooner rather than later - they're winning possessions at at an amazing clip (7th in rebound differential, 4th in steal differential, 2nd in TO differential), but are falling victim to a career worst shooting season from Kyrie (inexplicably, given his A+ outside), and the worst shooting year from Fultz since his rookie season. With no reason to expect either of those trends to continue, the Clippers are due for massive regression in the second half of the season, and I expect them to finish towards the top of the table by year end.
4. Tankathon
Assuming Wemby decides to come out in this year's draft (certainly not a given), this lottery will be the highest-leverage lottery since the infamous 13-1 jump in 2004. The Nets are putting on a tanking clinic, despite rookie PG Scotty Pippen Jr. actually playing admirably (may see his body washed up in the Swamp if he keeps this up). They're actually not losing possessions at as poor a rate as you would expect for a -18 team - they're currently 4th worst in FGA differential at -2.4, behind the Rockets / Raptors / Cavs and just ahead of the Blazers / Nuggets / Magic, all of whom are competing - but man do they suck at shooting, with a -5.5% FG% differential that other tankers can only dream of. Other front runners for the Wemby sweepstakes are the Rockets, who sport the second worst point differential at -14.8, lead the league in minus FGA differential, and aren't too far behind the Nets in FG%. These two rosters will likely be the ones duking it out for top odds by the end of the season, and both teams could desperately use an injection of superstar talent. The Nets have some interesting pieces between the aforementioned Pippen Jr., Jabari Smith, and Cam Thomas, but Zion is tank-commanding this team to -17.8 in the final year of his rookie deal. And in Houston, a Wemby pairing with Paolo could be the heir to the championship winning Curry / Blake / TMac Rockets that dominated in the front court.
Other (dis)honorable mentions in the tanking race include the Raptors, who are shooting the ball just efficiently enough behind Okoro and Amen to prevent them from the true cellar, a trade I'm sure Jwoo is happy to make, and the 76ers, who have the 4th worst point differential in the league in LeBron's penultimate season. The 76ers don't actually do anything terribly - they're actually neutral in block differential and 3PPG (in fact, they take 2 more threes on average than opponents per game), a result of LeBron's corpse propping up an otherwise barren roster.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... id=0#gid=0
1. Pacers proving people right (or wrong again)
Last offseason, most were high on the Pacers after acquiring Greg Oden for a very modest price from Ralph in a cap-relief move for the Jazz. The prevailing thought that pairing Oden, who had been the league's best defensive / rebounding big for the past 6 or so seasons, with prime aged, A/A defense / rebounding Andre Drummond, would prove to be too much to overcome for most opponents. Unfortunately for the Hoosiers, though, last year's Pacers team was a flop, finishing below .500 (albeit with a +2 differential) and missing the playoffs. You could even make the argument that this team is constructed WORSE than last year's, since the only meaningful change is 10 minutes of perfect big-butt play from Terrance Jones is going to Isaiah Stewart instead this year (while Jones plays almost 30 mpg for the Knicks).
This offseason, the podcast pundits (aka me) predicted another down year in Indiana, thinking that a full season sample size was enough to see that something was wrong with the construction of the roster, even if we couldn't see what that was. And instead, they've been off to a torrid start, with an 11.7 point differential and blistering shooting performances from basically everyone on the team (Sabonis and Talen Horton Tucker are the only two players on the entire roster not shooting a career-best number right now). While I think we can expect the shooting to regress some, there also is a likely chance that certain players on this roster have simply taken a step forward - the most likely candidates being DeAaron Fox, whose statline just looks fake, and Andre Drummond, who may be finally reaping the benefits of the +20 potential Tonger gave him several years ago. And if the shooting does regress, they're still the best rebounding team in the league by a wide margin - their +7.7 rebounding differential, best in the league, is about as close to the Sonics 5th best differential as the Sonics are to the 76ers 21st best differential. The Pacers are one of the most fun storylines of this season, and it looks like they're bouncing back from a 0th percentile outcome last season with a 90th percentile outcome this season.
2. Hornets zagging with steals over blocks
The Hornets are currently rocking the fourth best point differential in the league (+7.1) despite being in the same division as the two top differentials. Given their team make up of hyper-elite backcourt players (Murray / Lou / Semi / Clarkson) and lack of depth in their frontcourt (Willy did not record a block last sim, so he's stuck on 1 for the entire season), I would expect to just see them shooting the absolute shit out of the ball and outscoring opponents. But that's not the case - they're actually possession monsters. Despite none of Murray / Clarkson / Lou being exceptionally TO efficient (Murray isn't bad for this generation of SLN but 2.1 TOs aint nothin), they lead the league in steal differential by a preposterous amount (4.1, the Nuggets are second at 2.2, the Knicks are third at 1.5 - the difference between 1st and 2nd is the same as the difference between 2nd and 12th), and as a result lead the league in TO margin (4.8, 2nd is Clippers at 3, another insane delta) and FGA differential, with the +5.4 FGAs equating to double that of the 4th best Hawks.
A couple takeaways here: firstly, Jonathan Isaac is unbelievable - we know that possessions are usually created by the bigs, and with so few quality bigs in tow for Jack, a lot falls on Isaac's capable, Atlassian shoulders. Secondly, this Hornets team is proving that you can be successful without having any stud blockers (they're 5th worst in blocks and 9th worst in block differential) as long as you have exceptional stealers and good TO efficiency.
3. How unlucky are the Clippers?
The Clippers are turning in one of the most unfortunate seasons in recent memory. They're +6.9 on the season, good for the 2nd best differential in the West (and 5th best league wide), and yet they're just 12-11, one game over .500, despite having played 14/23 games at home. This isn't rocket science, but I expect the Clippers to maintain their point differential and start racking up wins sooner rather than later - they're winning possessions at at an amazing clip (7th in rebound differential, 4th in steal differential, 2nd in TO differential), but are falling victim to a career worst shooting season from Kyrie (inexplicably, given his A+ outside), and the worst shooting year from Fultz since his rookie season. With no reason to expect either of those trends to continue, the Clippers are due for massive regression in the second half of the season, and I expect them to finish towards the top of the table by year end.
4. Tankathon
Assuming Wemby decides to come out in this year's draft (certainly not a given), this lottery will be the highest-leverage lottery since the infamous 13-1 jump in 2004. The Nets are putting on a tanking clinic, despite rookie PG Scotty Pippen Jr. actually playing admirably (may see his body washed up in the Swamp if he keeps this up). They're actually not losing possessions at as poor a rate as you would expect for a -18 team - they're currently 4th worst in FGA differential at -2.4, behind the Rockets / Raptors / Cavs and just ahead of the Blazers / Nuggets / Magic, all of whom are competing - but man do they suck at shooting, with a -5.5% FG% differential that other tankers can only dream of. Other front runners for the Wemby sweepstakes are the Rockets, who sport the second worst point differential at -14.8, lead the league in minus FGA differential, and aren't too far behind the Nets in FG%. These two rosters will likely be the ones duking it out for top odds by the end of the season, and both teams could desperately use an injection of superstar talent. The Nets have some interesting pieces between the aforementioned Pippen Jr., Jabari Smith, and Cam Thomas, but Zion is tank-commanding this team to -17.8 in the final year of his rookie deal. And in Houston, a Wemby pairing with Paolo could be the heir to the championship winning Curry / Blake / TMac Rockets that dominated in the front court.
Other (dis)honorable mentions in the tanking race include the Raptors, who are shooting the ball just efficiently enough behind Okoro and Amen to prevent them from the true cellar, a trade I'm sure Jwoo is happy to make, and the 76ers, who have the 4th worst point differential in the league in LeBron's penultimate season. The 76ers don't actually do anything terribly - they're actually neutral in block differential and 3PPG (in fact, they take 2 more threes on average than opponents per game), a result of LeBron's corpse propping up an otherwise barren roster.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... id=0#gid=0
The Suns not being #1 in FTA differential was not on my bingo card
We got so much green in our row and yet we are so much ass
Celtics ah the balls
Not enough assists
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mantypas/CavsCzar
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- Posts: 2009
- Joined: December 20th, 2023, 12:06 pm
nothing like the stats also saying we stink! (go cavs)
FOR THE LAND - believe!
I have stared at this for a while and the best I can come up with is a Hanessian from Atlanta
Or the final Hanessian in the bloodline
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