A Stats Thread: What the Numbers Say About Rondo and Gay

[Bricklayer]

JUST SKIP TO CONCLUSIONS BELOW IF NUMBERS MAKE YOUR HEAD SPIN

There is a site called nbawowy.com which provides detailed info on what happens when various players, or combinations of players, are on/off the court. Given various comments both here and from Karl, Cuz, etc., I wanted to see what the numbers said about the performance of the rest of the team with and without our main guys, Cuz, Rondo, and to a lesser extent Gay and Collison.

There will be 4 stats used below. NBAwowy produces hundreds of stats, but I'm not going to reproduce the whole statistical package, and this may get cluttered as is. The four stats that will be included:

Stats Used
1) TS% -- hoary scoring "efficiency' stat taking into account FG/FT/3pt
2) %Ast -- the percentage of a player's shots that were assisted
3) Scoring Index (SI) -- an NBAwowy metric based on a general 1 to -1 scale, with a "0" scorer being a guy with 54%TS and a 20.0 usage rate. I checked numerous major players, and the accuracy of the stat was impressive at higher levels (think it breaks down for roleplayers), so I'm including it as an overall scoring effectiveness metric.
4) Team Off/Def and Net Ratings -- calculated by multiplying NBAwowy's PPP stats by 100

We'll check effectiveness of each player and the overall team through various combinations:

Part I -- Team Off and Def Ratings With and Without Our Main Cogs

Team
Overall: 106.5Off + 109.0Def = -2.5Net
w/Cuz+Rondo: 108.5Off + 106.3Def = +2.2Net
w/Cuz, no Rondo: 106.7Off + 108.4Def = -1.7Net
no Cuz, w/Rondo: 101.4Off +116.8Def = -15.4Net <--!!

w/Collison+Rondo: 107.9Off + 111.0Def = -3.1Net
w/Collison, no Rondo: 108.2Off + 109.5Def = -1.3Net
no Collison, w/Rondo: 105.2Off +108.2Def = -3.0Net

w/Cuz+Collison: 110.0Off + 108.1Def = +1.9Net
w/Cuz, no Collison: 105.6Off +105.3Def = +0.3Net
no Cuz, w/Collison: 106.1Off + 112.5Def = -6.4Net

w/Cuz+Rondo+Gay: 108.3Off + 104.7Def = +3.6Net

Part II -- Player By Player With Cuz/Rondo

Now how the "other guys" -- the non Cuz/Rondo teammates did with each guy on the floor:

Cousins
Overall: .535TS% 59.8%AST .740SI
w/Rajn: .546TS% 62.0%AST .782SI
w/DC: .529TS% 57.7%AST .808SI

Rondo
Overall: .502TS% 28.2%AST -.251SI
w/Cuz: .504TS% 29.3%AST -.285SI

Gay
Overall: .534TS% 57.4%AST .091SI
w/C+R: .583TS% 64.3%AST .219SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.049TS% +6.9%AST +.128SI

Collison
Overall: .588TS% 44.3%AST .241SI
w/C+R: .601TS% 69.5%AST .116SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.013TS% +24.2%AST -.125SI

McLemore
Overall: .530TS% 76.8%AST -.182SI
w/C+R: .558TS% 75.2%AST -.071SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.028TS% -1.6%AST +.111SI

Casspi
Overall: .587TS% 72.6%AST .161SI
w/C+R: .567TS% 85.9%AST -.119SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: -.020TS% +13.3%AST -.280SI

Belinelli
Overall: .500TS% 84.4%AST -.255SI
w/C+R: .591TS% 93.8%AST .107SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.091TS% +9.4%AST +.362SI

Cauley-Stein
Overall: .580TS% 73.3%AST -.069SI
w/C+R: .629TS% 85.3%AST .174SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.049TS% +12.0%AST +.243SI

Acy
Overall: .630TS% 74.8%AST .180SI
w/C+R: .715TS% 79.6%AST .498SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.085TS% +4.8%AST +.318SI
Koufos
Overall: .539TS% 74.5%AST -.204SI
w/C+R: .555TS% 77.8%AST -.266SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.016TS% +3.3%AST -.062SI

Anderson
Overall: .469TS% 64.2%AST -.712SI
w/C+R: .345TS% 92.3%AST -1.506SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: -.124TS% +28.91%AST -.794SI

Curry
Overall: .598TS% 59.8%AST .200SI
w/C+R: .651TS% 80.0%AST .467SI
----------------------------------------------
Totals: +.053TS% +20.2%AST +.267SI

Part III -- CONCLUSIONS

1) Rajon Rondo is NOT a defensive problem....unless you take DeMarcus Cousins off the floor. Then there is a staggering collapse. In fact, Cousins and Rondo together created one of our best defensive pairings, with a Defensive Rating 2.7 better than our season mark. The entire damage to Rondo's defensive rep happened when he was out there withOUT Cousins when...holy hell. Units with Rondo on the floor without Cousins were absolutely 76ers level terrible. And you add those numbers in , and overall Rondo's D looks bad. But when he was out there with Cousins, we did about as well as we could do last year. In fact better on defense than we did with Collison and Cousins out there.

2) I really wanted to take a look at Karl's perception that Gay can't play with Cuz, and that Cuz/Gay/Rondo don't work...and it turns out to not be true at all via multiple metrics. In fact when the three of them were on the floor together, our Net Rating was +3.6. For comparison the 48-34 Hawks and Celtics were at +3.1 (ATL) and +2.5 (BOS) on the season. The 53 win Clippers were at +4.2. In other words when Cuz/Rajon/Rudy were all on the floor together, there were playing at a 50-win level.

3) Not only that, but while he got fewer shots, Rudy absolutely thrived playing alongside Rajon and Cuz with a TS% nearly 50pts higher than his overall season. Like Rondo, Rudy's perceived struggles were not when he was out there WITH Cuz+Rondo, he failed and pulled down all his numbers when he WASN'T. When Cousisn and Rondo were out there together his TS% was an excellent .583. When neither Cuz or Rondo were on the floor? A pathetic .474. That's a gulf so broad its almost impossible to misinterpret it. Gay not only works with Cuz and Rondo, he NEEDS them.

4) Almost the entire lineup thrived with Cuz+Rondo both out there, but in particular Marco (91pts higher, and a .591TS% when out there with both those guys!) Willie and Acy with 49pt and 85pt jumps in TS% and massive jumps in SI rating, and Seth Curry, who's % of assisted shots shot upward from 59.8% to 80%, and who's already very nice offensive numbers turned stellar.

5) I think Marco deserves a separate entry for that: His TS% without Cuz and Rondo = .500 (which is bad). His TS% with Cuz and Rondo both out there = .591 (which is potent). There's a defensive issue, but those numbers argue very strongly he should have been starting.

6) Surprisingly the one guy who really did NOT do well with Rondo and Cuz? Omri. He was flat better when not out there with those guys. Combined with Kosta and Collison getting relatively shrugworthy bumps, and having lower SIs as their shots were siphoned off to Boogie, and you had a fairly natural starter/bench split.

7) While Rondo may be "Cuz's PG", and indeed helped him marginally with a few more assisted hoops and a little better TS%, the real power of Rondo and Cuz together was for their teammates. This BTW was my initial hypothesis that I started this whole mess testing out. grew from there.

Part IV -- Testing The Numbers

According to those numbers, any of these lineups would really work:

Cousins
WCS or Acy
Gay
Belinelli or Curry
Rondo

In other words, a shooter at SG, and a defensive/hustle PF next to Cuz. So I went and checked each lineup:

Cuz/WCS/Gay/Marco/Rondo = played 45 minutes all season long, got destroyed 79-112
Cuz/Acy/Gay/Marco/Rondo = played 5 minutes all season long, won them 11-6
Cuz/WCS/Gay/Curry/Rondo = played 16 minutes all season long, tied 31-31
Cuz/Acy/Gay/Curry/Rondo = played 40 minutes all season long, won them 98-79

Hardly conclusive, but it is remarkable that our 4 most reasonable lineups (according to the numbers) around Cuz and Rondo collectively played barely over 100 minutes between them.



Alright, that's enough to chew on now. If you want to play, go to NBAwowy (and its crappy, clunky, error prone interface) and run searches to your heart's content.

 

[kingsboi]

so based on your calculations and numbers, Rondo's defense solely lies on whether Boogie is on the floor or not? if that's the case, what happens when Boogie picks up two quick fouls and has to sit out for a long duration, does Rondo go and coast from there? even though he has Trill back there playing goalie.

 

[Padrino]

so... these stats more or less bear out the notion that demarcus cousins actually makes his teammates better? puts a dent in a particular kind of narrative, doesn't it?

 

[VF21]

so... these stats more or less bear out the notion that demarcus cousins actually makes his teammates better? puts a dent in a particular kind of narrative, doesn't it?

Blasphemy!!

 

[Bricklayer]

so based on your calculations and numbers, Rondo's defense solely lies on whether Boogie is on the floor or not? if that's the case, what happens when Boogie picks up two quick fouls and has to sit out for a long duration, does Rondo go and coast from there? even though he has Trill back there playing goalie.

It is bizarre. Its a total collapse too. Not only defensively, but offensively. So huge you can't pin it all on one player actually. I was trying to think of reasons. I can see part of it -- Rondo is a roleplayer. he thrives next to stars. Take the star away and... but the numbers were so extreme I was reaching for more. Does he just give up without Cuz? Say screw it, my job is the big guy? Does our need for him to be a scorer without Cuz cause him to lose defensive focus? I really don't know. But that number was the one that caused me to do a double take and post a little teaser warning in the other thread that there was something peculiar about Rondo's defensive numbers. It is a stark and dramatic difference, and in btoh cases, supported by plenty of minutes to avoid sample size issues: Cuz and Rondo played 1785 minutes together, and Rondo played 751 without him.

 

[LPKingsFan]

2) I really wanted to take a look at Karl's perception that Gay can't play with Cuz, and that Cuz/Gay/Rondo don't work...and it turns out to not be true at all via multiple metrics. In fact when the three of them were on the floor together, our Net Rating was +3.6. For comparison the 48-34 Hawks and Celtics were at +3.1 (ATL) and +2.5 (BOS) on the season. The 53 win Clippers were at +4.2. In other words when Cuz/Rajon/Rudy were all on the floor together, there were playing at a 50-win level.

Nice compilation. But this caught my eye. Is this the right comparison to make? I don't know if comparing the net rating of our best three guys to another team's number quite fits. Wouldn't you expect their best players to have a higher net rating together than their team net rating? Ideally, you'd want to see how our top 3 compare to their top 3.

If you want to look at the Clippers, Griffin/Jordan/Paul were +13.5.

(numbers from basketball reference, which I'm assuming are close enough to the site you used for meaningful comparison)

 

[Capt. Factorial]

It is bizarre. Its a total collapse too. Not only defensively, but offensively. So huge you can't pin it all on one player actually. I was trying to think of reasons. I can see part of it -- Rondo is a roleplayer. he thrives next to stars. Take the star away and... but the numbers were so extreme I was reaching for more. Does he just give up without Cuz? Say screw it, my job is the big guy? Does our need for him to be a scorer without Cuz cause him to lose defensive focus? I really don't know. But that number was the one that caused me to do a double take and post a little teaser warning in the other thread that there was something peculiar about Rondo's defensive numbers. It is a stark and dramatic difference, and in btoh cases, supported by plenty of minutes to avoid sample size issues: Cuz and Rondo played 1785 minutes together, and Rondo played 751 without him.

I think the eye test would have said that Rondo had a lot of trouble keeping his man in front of him this year, and one of Cousins' biggest strengths defensively (if not the single biggest) would again by the eye test be picking up and stopping the guard drive. When a guard gets around our perimeter defense, Cousins does a very good job of cleaning that up. Koufos and WCS, not so much (though I hold out hope that WCS will improve). So those numbers do make some sense to me, though I'd have guessed that Rondo's defensive raw values were worse than they are.

 

[funkykingston]

I think the eye test would have said that Rondo had a lot of trouble keeping his man in front of him this year, and one of Cousins' biggest strengths defensively (if not the single biggest) would again by the eye test be picking up and stopping the guard drive. When a guard gets around our perimeter defense, Cousins does a very good job of cleaning that up. Koufos and WCS, not so much (though I hold out hope that WCS will improve). So those numbers do make some sense to me, though I'd have guessed that Rondo's defensive raw values were worse than they are.

That's what I saw. Rondo depending on Boogie to play goalie. Willie is still learning and Koufos, while a very good post defender, doesn't wrangle guards like Cuz. It doesn't hurt that Cousins is one of the best in the NBA at drawing charges either.

It didn't help that Karl's defensive scheme funneled guys into the middle of the lane, putting a lot of strain on the bugs defensively. It does point out how underrated DMC's defense is and how much improvement he's made on that end.

Nice compilation. But this caught my eye. Is this the right comparison to make? I don't know if comparing the net rating of our best three guys to another team's number quite fits. Wouldn't you expect their best players to have a higher net rating together than their team net rating? Ideally, you'd want to see how our top 3 compare to their top 3.

If you want to look at the Clippers, Griffin/Jordan/Paul were +13.5.

(numbers from basketball reference, which I'm assuming are close enough to the site you used for meaningful comparison)

That jumped out at me too. If a good team has a net rating of between +3.5 or to +4 you'd expect their best lineups to be significantly above that and some of their lineups with primarily bench players to be significantly below it.

Unless you're more of a no-star system team like the Hawks or Raptors or just ridiculously deep & talented like the Warriors.

 

[Bricklayer]

Nice compilation. But this caught my eye. Is this the right comparison to make? I don't know if comparing the net rating of our best three guys to another team's number quite fits. Wouldn't you expect their best players to have a higher net rating together than their team net rating? Ideally, you'd want to see how our top 3 compare to their top 3.

If you want to look at the Clippers, Griffin/Jordan/Paul were +13.5.

(numbers from basketball reference, which I'm assuming are close enough to the site you used for meaningful comparison)

You know, I don't know. I do know it seems to depend a lot on particular team makeup. A lot of teams don't even rally have a "Big Three" to compare (and actually Collison kinda blurs ours a bit too). The Clippers have star power, and of course they also don't have deadweight starters. but when you get numbers that huge out of a trio, and your overall numbers are nowhere near that level, that tells you that eeither they weren't playing many minutes together, or everybody else on the roster was failing,. HARD.

On the Hawks, Milsap, Horford and Teague were only +3.5
On the Raptors DeRozan, Lowry, and Val were +4.8

On the other hand on the Celtics Thomas, Bradley and. Crowder were +7.4

Some teams just above us:
Rose + Butler + Pau were -2.2.
Harden + Howard + Ariza were +0.9

+3.6 while supporting a deadweight SG position and a muddled PF spot doesn't seem out of line for a winning team at all.

 

[Gilles]

Arguably the biggest disappointment of the season seems to be lack of impact from Gay-Rondo pairing with Cuz on the bench. Gay did so well in the second part of 14/15 season with Miller on the floor, though that might have been Rudy playing PF most of the time, so it would seem that a guy, who can give him the ball in the spots Rudy likes, should have a profound effect on him, but that never became a thing. In fact drop-off in Rudy's efficiency next to Rondo with Boogie on the bench was comparable to just putting complete non-shooter on floor and asking Rudy go create all by himself.

Everyone was much worse without Boogie than with him, weirdly except James Anderson, but that's most likely because of a clean split: minutes with Boogie were against starters, and it was during a stretch of free falling, while his non-Boogie minutes were versus benches.

Another note: WCS was not really impacting defense as while he was making defensive plays, his impact on team defense was quite a big negative.

Koufos without perimeter defensive personnel wasn't a factor at all as he wasn't able to hold down the fort, when Boogie was on the bench.

Acy on the floor without Boogie meant absolute disaster - worst 400 minutes of the season for the team at -16 points per 100 possessions.

Thing is these statistical snippets have limited value, since we know, that Kings will have completely different system next year, so it's hard to predict, how everyone will look in it. This is the reason for having the HC before the start of evaluation process as the coach should have the best understanding, what works or doesn't work for him most of the time.

 

[KingsFanGER]

Interesting stats, but as far as I remember Rondo often played more like an off the ball defender with the freedom to roam the passing lanes when paired with our starting unit. Most often it was Ben's dutie to check the opponent most dangerous guard, while Rondo was assigned to the lesser perimeter threat.
As soon as he was in there with more of the reserves his role changed and he was forced to guard someone.
To come away with the notion, that Rondos D is no problem as long as he is paired with DMC goes completely against the eye test and confuses the hell out of me.
Either I'm blind or these metrics have some kind of flaw and most likely the flaw is, that they are based on the box score. But how do you measure staying in front of your man, the quality and quickness of closeouts, the ability to pick up a favourable matchup in transition before the opponent gets a wide open layup or corner three via the boxscore?

 

[Gilles]

Speaking of Benny he was one of the 3 guys along with Boogie and Casspi, who ended the season with + as in team scored more with him on the floor than it allowed. Last year only Boogie and Collison (likely aided by not playing the worst part of the season) did it, but BMac was 3rd as well. That's it: Ben was second most valuable player on this team!

 

[VF21]

Speaking of Benny he was one of the 3 guys along with Boogie and Casspi, who ended the season with + as in team scored more with him on the floor than it allowed. Last year only Boogie and Collison (likely aided by not playing the worst part of the season) did it, but BMac was 3rd as well. That's it: Ben was second most valuable player on this team!

And with that post, you totally and completely destroy the credibility of statistics.

 

[Gilles]

You don't know a thing about Kings basketball!

Actually Ben has his uses and he's still only 23 y.o.. And I'm listening to a Pacers podcast, where the host said "you can probably give Vogel Stephon Marbury and Andrea Bargnani and he could still squeeze top-10 defensive team out of that", so I wonder, what would happen, if BMac ever played for such a guy. If Mclemore can be used to acquire a starter, good, but he's still more valuable than an open roster spot.

 

[Siranthony]

Nice write up. The thing is how can you take the numbers seriously?

When did the team really decide to play? When where they tanking because they where mad at the coach? Did they play better together because they are friends and slack when other players where on the floor? Did they have better numbers the 8 games before the all stars where selected, and worse numbers after? Turn overs, rebounds and free throws aren't really mentioned. Did players tank the first quarter and pump up they're numbers the rest of the game only to lose at the end?

How much did a certain players attitude and meddling have on the win total even though he had very good numbers?

The players who's numbers did not fall as much when DMC was off the floor probably tried harder all the time (and trying not to be involved in politics) would be my guess.

Also I'd be curious to see the numbers at the end of the season when the starers where intentionally held out and we still won.

 

[KingMilz]

We really need to focus more on Wins/Losses over 82 games which will decide if you get into the playoffs or not imo. The current group and core has not shown they can do it.

 

[Gilles]

Nice write up. The thing is how can you take the numbers seriously?

When did the team really decide to play? When where they tanking because they where mad at the coach? Did they play better together because they are friends and slack when other players where on the floor? Did they have better numbers the 8 games before the all stars where selected, and worse numbers after? Turn overs, rebounds and free throws aren't really mentioned. Did players tank the first quarter and pump up they're numbers the rest of the game only to lose at the end?

How much did a certain players attitude and meddling have on the win total even though he had very good numbers?

The players who's numbers did not fall as much when DMC was off the floor probably tried harder all the time (and trying not to be involved in politics) would be my guess.

Also I'd be curious to see the numbers at the end of the season when the starers where intentionally held out and we still won.

Team ORtg accounts for rebounds/TOs/FTs as you either keep/lose possession with off.reb./TO or score at some rate with FTs. Late wins weren't against a quality opponents or against a lot of defensive effort, so numbers there are really noisy, so someone like Seth, who will now get a closer look from the rest of the league might get a feeling that honeymoon is over next season.
Anderson is the only one, for whom lineups without Boogie played better than with him.

 

[IfAt1st]

Nice to see some number-crunching, data, and observation to combat the media narratives that are dominating the Kings fanbase.

BTW - those numbers support my belief that Rondo can play OK defense when he wants to (i.e. when Cousins is on the court and the Kings are being competitive).
I'd be interested in Rondo's defensive stats when the games were close. (<8 points)

 

[ESP47]

Rondo is out chasing butterflies while teams are draining three's on us. You can post up all the statistics you want but in the end, his incredibly physically and mentally lazy play ends up costing us on the defensive end. This team was a part of a ton of pointless games and games where they gave almost no effort so I'm not going to put much stock into what the stats say when these guys are on or off the court.

I doubt Rondo will be back anyway so the point is most likely moot.

 

[gilly420]

How many times did we get our butts kicked in the first quarter and give up 35+ points? Pretty sure Cousins and Rando were out there for the majority of the first quarters where we routinely got rolled.

 

[kupman]

So all we really need to do is keep DMC out of foul trouble and on the floor more than 35 minutes per game and we should be good. Sounds pretty easy. And here I thought bigger changes needed to made. I had no idea how close we are to having a team that does not embarrass us on a routine basis.

 

[gunks]

Always dig these stat threads. Thanks for the rundown Brick!


And holy hell, Karl said Rudy couldn't play with Cuz?

Rudy can ONLY play with Cuz. Dude sucks when he has to be the main guy on offense.

Karl really did **** up in every way possible while he was here. Had to be dementia.

 

[peacelate]

There seems to be something missing in lineup stats.

NBA.COM lineup stats shows the lineup of Casspi, Collison, Rondo, Cousins and Gay (3rd most used lineup) posted a DEF RTG of 100.7. I think at one point. Karl was crucified by all of us for using small ball lineups.

 

[jcwkings]

I don't need stats to tell me Rondo ho hums his way on defense more than he should. Takes plays off or becomes obsessed with playing "free safety", leaving his man or sagging off them way too much to try and get in passing lanes and get deflections. Don't get me wrong he has great instincts but the gamble more often than not fails and leads to open shots or a defense trying to recover.

 

[Gilles]

There seems to be something missing in lineup stats.

NBA.COM lineup stats shows the lineup of Casspi, Collison, Rondo, Cousins and Gay (3rd most used lineup) posted a DEF RTG of 100.7. I think at one point. Karl was crucified by all of us for using small ball lineups.

It was 103.7, which would still be impressive, but that lineup played only 268 possessions, which is a really low number to draw conclusions.

 

[Jerichoholic]

It is bizarre. Its a total collapse too. Not only defensively, but offensively. So huge you can't pin it all on one player actually. I was trying to think of reasons. I can see part of it -- Rondo is a roleplayer. he thrives next to stars. Take the star away and... but the numbers were so extreme I was reaching for more. Does he just give up without Cuz? Say screw it, my job is the big guy? Does our need for him to be a scorer without Cuz cause him to lose defensive focus? I really don't know. But that number was the one that caused me to do a double take and post a little teaser warning in the other thread that there was something peculiar about Rondo's defensive numbers. It is a stark and dramatic difference, and in btoh cases, supported by plenty of minutes to avoid sample size issues: Cuz and Rondo played 1785 minutes together, and Rondo played 751 without him.

It is interesting that the main premise and discussion of this thread is about the importance of Cousins, a selling point to keep him. Similar to one of your earlier threads which showed the difference in scoring for the team when Cousins is on and off the floor and compared that to other star players in the league. I believe only Stephen Curry was more important to his team. We know that Cousins is the best player and the best scorer on this team, that much is obvious. I think the more important part of these stats that you are showing how we are overpaying some very mediocre and overrated players on this team, namely Gay and Rondo.

Think about it, these two are the other parts of our "Big 3". These are the stars of our team, they are supposed to carry the load. However in reality they are almost worthless without Cousins on the floor, they depend on him, just like everyone else on the team, they are no better and contribute no more than anyone else when you factor in minutes and shots. There are plenty of players that we could get that would be cheaper and play well when Cousins is with them, everyone plays well when Cousins is with them. As a bonus these new players might actually to contribute something when Cousins is not with them. They might bring more skills with them than we currently have. Rondo is a great play maker who rebounds well for a guard, but is below average in most other areas, I would also expect his shooting to come back down to normal next year too, just based on career averages. What about Gay? What does he bring to the table? Good mid-range shooter who can have success posting up once in a while. Outside of that, poor in most other areas. I don't even need to bring up McLemore and what he brings or doesn't bring.

We need to build around Cousins and Cauley-Stein, get three new players to surround them with. Then build a bench that can thrive without the help of star players, one that can build it's own identity. We might have some of those players in Collison, Curry, and Casspi, if we keep Curry of course.

 

[andjel]

numbers tell the story of averages.

The eye test memorizes the extreme repeated fails.
Belli curling from the block and bricking shot, Rondo standing in no-mans land with his guy wide open or not fighting through the block, Cuz complaining and slumbering slowly back, Anderson having anything to do with the ball, Guy dribbling in the final seconds of the game, Ben being wide open, KK having open dunk and opting for missing lay-in ...

It is great to have numbers to give a big picture that the above events are exceptions, not rules, but I understand if it is difficult sometimes to ignore those memories.

 

[peacelate]

It was 103.7, which would still be impressive, but that lineup played only 268 possessions, which is a really low number to draw conclusions.

I'm still seeing 100.7 for that lineup. If the numbers are correct, it was the 3rd most used lineup this year in terms of minutes, so it's not exactly a small sample compared to other lineups.

 

[kingsboi]

It is bizarre. Its a total collapse too. Not only defensively, but offensively. So huge you can't pin it all on one player actually. I was trying to think of reasons. I can see part of it -- Rondo is a roleplayer. he thrives next to stars. Take the star away and... but the numbers were so extreme I was reaching for more. Does he just give up without Cuz? Say screw it, my job is the big guy? Does our need for him to be a scorer without Cuz cause him to lose defensive focus? I really don't know. But that number was the one that caused me to do a double take and post a little teaser warning in the other thread that there was something peculiar about Rondo's defensive numbers. It is a stark and dramatic difference, and in btoh cases, supported by plenty of minutes to avoid sample size issues: Cuz and Rondo played 1785 minutes together, and Rondo played 751 without him.

I just can't believe that these statistics tell the whole story. I see plenty with the naked eye and what I saw was Rondo being more of a free safety, looking for steals and passing lanes. Hey, maybe we just need to accept that he has great anticipation for the pass and reading the teams plays before they occur and accept the fact that he is either unable or unwilling to play man defense any longer. He is a top notch athlete, so I can't sit here and blame it on conditioning but more so that it comes in spurts and that's all you can go by.

 

[Bricklayer]

I just can't believe that these statistics tell the whole story. I see plenty with the naked eye and what I saw was Rondo being more of a free safety, looking for steals and passing lanes. Hey, maybe we just need to accept that he has great anticipation for the pass and reading the teams plays before they occur and accept the fact that he is either unable or unwilling to play man defense any longer. He is a top notch athlete, so I can't sit here and blame it on conditioning but more so that it comes in spurts and that's all you can go by.

People keep on saying the free safety thing like that doesn't have a value on its own.

Perhaps Rondo's free safetying, along with his nearly league best PG rebounding, let him have a defensive impact beyond just staying in front of his man.

But the gap between that impact with and without Cuz is the interesting thing, although really its so huge there has to be more going on there than just Rondo.