Hard data on Murray's defense (split from the T-Wolves [Game] thread)
- Thread starter The_Jamal
- Start date
Keegan is 1-4 versatile on defense. Numbers back that up and his film backs that up. He's verging on unicorn territory as a big wing defender. I just don't remember many dudes his size with his defensive versatility. Like McDaniels? Prime Ben Simmons? Klaw?
sactowndog
All-Star
baloney. He couldn’t come close to stopping Vassell or Booker. Look I love Keegan. I bet someone people would rank him above Sabonis as the most important King.
but his differential among starters is 2.2 so the not sure what numbers you are looking at. One reason is he is forced to guard players routinely too quick for him because the Kings have no one else.
https://www.nba.com/stats/players/defense-dash-overall?StarterBench=Starters
sactowndog
All-Star
post data to substantiate your claim.
Telemachus
Starter
https://www.nba.com/stats/players/isolation?PerMode=Totals&TypeGrouping=defensive&dir=A&sort=PPP
Keegan is at the 92.6th percentile in defending isolation in terms of points per possession allowed at 0.64 PPP. This is 27th in the NBA among players who have defended at least 10 isolations...but 5th for players who have defended at least 30 isolations:
RJ Barrett, 30, 0.60
Kyle Anderson, 49, 0.61
Herb Jones, 32, 0.63
Kevin Durant, 61, 0.64
Keegan Murray, 75, 0.64
As you can see, he is the best in the NBA among players who have defended at least 75 isolations this year, and on top of that he draws the iso assignment, as only 9 players have defended more isolations - and all of them are bigs except Luka and Keegan, so most of those are probably picking up a guard who has penetrated to the paint, whereas Keegan typically picks up these assignments starting at the perimeter.
His FG% allowed in iso is vanishingly small - 24.6% - but his overall numbers only put him at that 92.6th percentile because he does give more than his share of fouls/FTs in those situations. He fouls in iso 14.7% of the time, while Rudy Gobert on similar attempts fouls only 3.8% of the time - I'll leave it up to the eye test to determine whether Keegan really fouls in iso defense 4x as frequently as Gobert.
Edit - I see Telemachus put up a tweet with similar data that is from pre All-Star break while I was writing. Keegan's numbers have slumped a bit, but still are top notch.
macadocious
Starter
There's NO PoA defense in here is what you're trying to say?
I'm sorry but Keegan entered the NBA as a finished product and at 23 he is definitely too old to improve.
I would have called him a stretch 4 predraft too.
However, literally his entire NBA existence has him being a perimeter "big wing" and he's now evolved to basically taking the toughest defensive assignment every night with true 1-4 defensive versatility. And just pure eye test and the few games he's missed this year, our defense just utterly crumbles without him on the floor. Along with the bevy of stats posted in this thread.
Defensive numbers aren't perfect yet but I think a "feel" of when you watch the team defense without a guy still really matters. Get that same feeling when Keon is on the floor that our defense just jumps up a notch or two.
ockingsfan
Starter
If only coach Brown had 2 defensive stoppers he could put on the floor at the same time...... wait, what???.... we do have that on our team?!?!?!
Makes you wonder what a starting lineup with Keegan and Keon would do defensively to the opposing team.
He didn't really have a classification entering the draft which is why he was virtually ignored as a top 5 selection and we were widely mocked for picking him as another LOLKANGZ move.
I think the issue is a lot of folks still haven't wised up and appreciated him for the really promising 2-way player he is. And I don't even think he's shown all he can do yet either.
ShastaKingsFan
All-Star
Well, we just watched it. They jumped out to a nice lead on the #1 seed and ended up winning the game, without Fox
Again, just eye test watching him, but he's been able to flex onto guys like Mitchell/Steph/Luka with tremendous success. Does he shut them down? No, but no one does. I think he absolutely puts a better effort on them than virtually most of the league.
That's sort of the frustrating part of trying to analyze defense. The stats are all very "eh, this sort of works" while offensive stats are at the point you don't even have to watch a single minute to know who's impactful or not. You have to find the right mix of a bunch of different defensive numbers and a lot of film time.
I agree that he's improved tremendously and he absolutely locked Mitchell down like I've never seen but it's also easier to notice when he does that vs. noticing when he gets lit up by a guy like Vassell. He's already a better defender than I ever expected him to be but I don't have him anywhere close to that upper tier yet.
I think working with Fox all summer is the #1 reason for his ISO defense improvement. I mean how can you not improve when you're spending your summer defending one of the fastest players in the league in nothing other than ISO situations? Navigating screens, playing passing lanes and help defense will take more time to develop.
reptilexcq2
Bench
What a transformation. Kudos to Mike Brown's preaching of helping Murray growth.
I mean, Vassell is a 20 PPG scorer on 58% TS, so let's not pretend it's Mateen Cleaves out there lighting up Keegan. He's still good.
That's also what's tough about evaluating defense. If you see Vassell hit like 3-4 shots over Keegan, that sticks out in your mind as him getting lit up (I don't actually know the numbers, but just as an example). But maybe in the macro, he still defended him ok over the course of the game where he was the primary defender.
KingsFanSince85
All-Star
This might sound crazy to some, but I kinda see Keegan Murray as the KINGS version of Scottie Pippen.
I'm not suggesting he will end up as a top 50 player like Scottie Pippen or be a vital part of winning 6 titles, but I definitely see some similarities.
They are of similar height and weight. They both entered the league at 22, with Keegan being slightly ahead of where Pip was after season #2.
Of course, we know how crazy of an athlete Pippen was and what an elite defender he became. While Keegan isn't the athlete Pippen was, I think his defense can develop to a level somewhat close to Pippen (sans the crazy athleticism) if he continues his current path.
Remember, Scottie Pippen didn't really begin to become recognized league wide as a defensive stalwart until his 4th and 5th seasons in the league. Keegan is still only in year 2.
Offensively Keegster doesn't display the highlight reel dunks that Pippen did, but he has already shown to be at least as good a perimeter threat, if not more dangerous, and is still developing the other parts of his offensive game. Whether he gets it all figured out eventually or not, the tools are there.
IMO, by year 4 or 5 Keegan just might be close to the same level of a 2-way player Scottie had developed into. To me he's a bit Scottie Pippen mixed with the demeanor of Tim Duncan.
ockingsfan
Starter
Yes, that was one game out of necessity since Fox was injured and Davion in the starting line up just doesn't work.
I want to see Brown go to a starting line up with Keegan and Keon along with Fox and Domas every game and see what happens:
PF Barnes
SF Keegan
S Domas
SG Keon
PG Fox
Srzly
G-League
I’m curious about this lineup as well. Perimeter defense would be nasty with the option to switch just about everything.
Hard to leave Kevin out though, unless he is having an off shooting night.
Could you get away with the below if Barnes if having an off night as well?
Fox
Kevin
Keon
Murray
Sabonis
gunks
Hall of Famer
Somebody may have mentioned it already, but when you think about how good Keegan's defensive impact is already BEFORE having that rep with the refs, it's only going to get better once they start treating him as a legit defender.
He gets taken out of a lot of games with tiky tack BS calls. Hopefully those become rarer once he's more established as one of the leagues premier defenders.
Then again, he does play for the Kings so the zebras may always hate Keegan.
He gets taken out of a lot of games with tiky tack BS calls. Hopefully those become rarer once he's more established as one of the leagues premier defenders.
Then again, he does play for the Kings so the zebras may always hate Keegan.
ockingsfan
Starter
That's a possibility too, but slotting Keon in at SG keeps us from giving up a size advantage in the starting line up and HB has been more consistent from 3 than Huerter has been this year.
Super-quick back of the envelope calculation suggests that Keegan ISO D would happen somewhere closer to 2-3% of all defensive possessions, I'd definitely lean towards the higher number (and maybe even bump it to 4%?) if you want to only look at half-court possessions, since by definition you're not playing ISO D on a fast break.
Certainly there is a lot more to dig into, but obviously he is very good (to me surprisingly so) on ISO D.
I was thinking it was James Ham? The same type of assumptions and premature conclusions. James Ham concluded before Keegan even played a game yet that he was a PF, and could only guard PFs. Also that his ceiling was Harrison Barnes or Marvin Williams.
Similar threads
- Locked
- Poll
