The First 6 Games in Stats

[Bricklayer]

We are about to get a change here tonight, so thought I'd post these funsome stats before they got changed along with the lineup.

Team Stats, and NBA Ranks, This year vs. Last
HmPts: 92.3pts NBA Rank: 28th / Rank '12-'13: 10th
HmFG%: .420 NBA Rank: 26th / Rank '12-'13: 19th
HmFT%: .798 NBA Rank: 6th / Rank '12-'13: 11th
Hm3pt%: .302 NBA Rank: 25th/ Rank '12-'13: 12th -- need to bring back Reke for some shooting
FTAs/Gm: 21.5 NBA Rank: 20th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- Cuz 7.0/gm; IT 5.8/gm; Grevis 2.5/gm; nobody else above 1.3/gm
3ptA/Gm: 21.5 NBA Rank: 14th / Rank '12-'13: 10th
OppPts: 100.2 NBA Rank: 17th / Rank '12-'13: 30th -- Smartball
OppFG%: .474 NBA Rank: 27th / Rank '12-'13: 28th -- new coach talks defense, old roster still sucks at it
Opp3pt%: .420 NBA Rank: 29th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- Smart defensive genius?
RebDiff: -5.4 NBA Rank: 28th / Rank '12-'13: 27th -- guess just adding coach who says its important not a roster fix
Assists: 18.2 NBA Rank: 27th / Rank '12-'13: 15th -- huh? dumping ballhog Reke for "pure" PG did not fix???
Steals: 8.7 NBA Rank: 14th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- leading steal guy? Our center (2.2). 2nd leader? Our PF (1.3)
Blocks: 3.3 NBA Rank: 30th / Rank '12-'13: 28th -- did not address, did not magically fix self
Turnovers: 16.0 NBA Rank: 20th / Rank '12-'13: 16th

Stat 1: Positional PER
PER is a dubious "stat". Its not even a stat. Its mushing together stats. But in some broad sense it can be amusing. Such as this:

Kings position by position PER:
C - 19.9
PF - 9.5
SF - 9.4
SG - 9.4
PG - 20.6

Holy doughnuts Batman! Average for per is 15.0. If you hit 10 you kinda suck. 3 of our 5 entire positions have somehow managed to average under 10.0 PER.

Cousins PER btw is 27.8, good for 5th in the league. ITs is 24.3, 14th.

Stat 2: Opponent fouls by position
What's that you say? Well, just a random stat I stumbled across that was again amusing. Here are the fouls committed by Kings opponents at each position:

C - 7.8
PF - 2.5
SF - 3.5
SG - 2.8
PG - 3.7

If that don't say it all.

 

[ESP47]

It's no surprise at this point. Smart's run and gun style of play definitely masked a lot of offensive deficiencies this team has. Namely shooting. But really, who cares? It's the difference in winning say 30% of your games vs. 25%. Either way you still suck.

What gets me is allowing opponents to shoot 42% from 3. You'd be ecstatic to have 1 player on your team that could shoot 42% from out there. The Kings allow every player on every team to shoot 42%. That's insane. It's a product of not having Tyreke and our PG's getting broken down on nearly every single play.

The fouls don't surprise me either. You have Cousins and Thompson playing the same position for most of the game. They've been two of the most foul prone big men since they've entered the league.

At this point I'm just hoping we can get a top 3 pick next year and start a new era with a rookie superstar/Cousins/McLemore.

 

[Kingster]

The Kings have got to get that FT% down. Then at least they'd be consistent.

The rebound and 3 pt defense pops right out at you. Rebounding is athleticism + effort. I'm 100% sure we don't have the athleticism and the effort is more like 50-50. Regarding our defense, if you watch the games you see some dumb-a$$ stuff, like Vasquez running away from his man (who has the ball) at the 3 point line; and Thompson running away from his man to double cover a guard that is being covered just fine, only to find that the man he just left (Robinson) is left with an open 18 footer, which he buries. I can just imagine what Vivek, the MIT grad, is thinking when he watches this idiocy. There is still a lot of cleaning up to do by the coaching staff, but most of these guys just need to be gone.

 

[Gary]

Six games is not really enough to go on, but there are some trends here that worry me.

 

[HighFlyingMonkey]

The defensive struggles were largely expected. Ultimately, we are starting 3 minus defenders (Vasquez, Thornton, Patterson) and the other two aren't good enough to make up for the rest (Cousins, Salmons).

Rebounding problems were also largely expected. We have plus rebounders at PG and C, but other than that its minus across the board.

The major problems are that we are completely selling out all aspects of the team to put veteran shooters around Cousins. We've sold out the defense, we've sold out rebounding, and we've sold out perimeter playmaking (Vasquez over IT) so that Cousins can post up consistently. Unfortunately, while Cousins has got his numbers, double teams have proven to grind everything to a complete halt. Nobody is making open shots. Nobody is creating against compromised defenses.

Lets see what lineup changes can bring.

 

[Section 101]

We are about to get a change here tonight, so thought I'd post these funsome stats before they got changed along with the lineup.

Team Stats, and NBA Ranks, This year vs. Last
HmPts: 92.3pts NBA Rank: 28th / Rank '12-'13: 10th
HmFG%: .420 NBA Rank: 26th / Rank '12-'13: 19th
HmFT%: .798 NBA Rank: 6th / Rank '12-'13: 11th
Hm3pt%: .302 NBA Rank: 25th/ Rank '12-'13: 12th -- need to bring back Reke for some shooting
FTAs/Gm: 21.5 NBA Rank: 20th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- Cuz 7.0/gm; IT 5.8/gm; Grevis 2.5/gm; nobody else above 1.3/gm
3ptA/Gm: 21.5 NBA Rank: 14th / Rank '12-'13: 10th
OppPts: 100.2 NBA Rank: 17th / Rank '12-'13: 30th -- Smartball
OppFG%: .474 NBA Rank: 27th / Rank '12-'13: 28th -- new coach talks defense, old roster still sucks at it
Opp3pt%: .420 NBA Rank: 29th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- Smart defensive genius?
RebDiff: -5.4 NBA Rank: 28th / Rank '12-'13: 27th -- guess just adding coach who says its important not a roster fix
Assists: 18.2 NBA Rank: 27th / Rank '12-'13: 15th -- huh? dumping ballhog Reke for "pure" PG did not fix???
Steals: 8.7 NBA Rank: 14th / Rank '12-'13: 13th -- leading steal guy? Our center (2.2). 2nd leader? Our PF (1.3)
Blocks: 3.3 NBA Rank: 30th / Rank '12-'13: 28th -- did not address, did not magically fix self
Turnovers: 16.0 NBA Rank: 20th / Rank '12-'13: 16th

Stat 1: Positional PER
PER is a dubious "stat". Its not even a stat. Its mushing together stats. But in some broad sense it can be amusing. Such as this:

Kings position by position PER:
C - 19.9
PF - 9.5
SF - 9.4
SG - 9.4
PG - 20.6

Holy doughnuts Batman! Average for per is 15.0. If you hit 10 you kinda suck. 3 of our 5 entire positions have somehow managed to average under 10.0 PER.

Cousins PER btw is 27.8, good for 5th in the league. ITs is 24.3, 14th.

Stat 2: Opponent fouls by position
What's that you say? Well, just a random stat I stumbled across that was again amusing. Here are the fouls committed by Kings opponents at each position:

C - 7.8
PF - 2.5
SF - 3.5
SG - 2.8
PG - 3.7

If that don't say it all.

I'll take the top 3 starters in each position for PER for my 15 and you can pick from the rest. Guess which team will win?

I notice you pointed out the steals. How about acknowledging the steals leader. Someone this board said didn't play any defense when in fact he's one of the top defensive PG's.

 

[twslam07]

I'll take the top 3 starters in each position for PER for my 15 and you can pick from the rest. Guess which team will win?

I notice you pointed out the steals. How about acknowledging the steals leader. Someone this board said didn't play any defense when in fact he's one of the top defensive PG's.

He did acknowledge the steals leader and it wasn't our PG...

How about you acknowledge who you talk about when you post.

 

[Capt. Factorial]

I notice you pointed out the steals. How about acknowledging the steals leader. Someone this board said didn't play any defense when in fact he's one of the top defensive PG's.

Honestly I don't know if you're talking about Thomas (4 total steals in 6 games) or Vasquez (2 total steals in 6 games), but neither is in the top three on our team (Cousins 13, Patterson 8, Thornton 7). Hard to hang one's hat on those numbers when you're looking for one of the top defensive PGs (e.g. Rubio 27, Paul 23, Carter-Williams 21...) I mean, among guards who have played at least 100 minutes, IT is tied for 72nd-best in steals-per-36! Wow! Top defensive PG!

 

[Glenn]

Incredibly depressing thread, Brick. You could break down all those stats into w/l record and that would say it all.

 

[Section 101]

Honestly I don't know if you're talking about Thomas (4 total steals in 6 games) or Vasquez (2 total steals in 6 games), but neither is in the top three on our team (Cousins 13, Patterson 8, Thornton 7). Hard to hang one's hat on those numbers when you're looking for one of the top defensive PGs (e.g. Rubio 27, Paul 23, Carter-Williams 21...) I mean, among guards who have played at least 100 minutes, IT is tied for 72nd-best in steals-per-36! Wow! Top defensive PG!

I was referring to the NBA steals leader. The guy averaging 3.38 steals a game. He's also number 4 in assists at 8.9/game. And number 1 defensive PG on your ratings.

 

[Tetsujin]

I was referring to the NBA steals leader. The guy averaging 3.38 steals a game. He's also number 4 in assists at 8.9/game. And number 1 defensive PG on your ratings.

Please don't tell me that you decided to beat the whole Ricky Rubio dead horse again.

 

[twslam07]

I was referring to the NBA steals leader. The guy averaging 3.38 steals a game. He's also number 4 in assists at 8.9/game. And number 1 defensive PG on your ratings.

What would be the relevance of bringing him up? We're discussing our team and how it's performing. Quit trying to derail the conversation. Besides the guy is shooting 32% from the floor. At least Thornton is not at that level

 

[Kingfanpaul]

Hopefully this first 6 games is our rock bottom, I mean heck, you can't get much worse. If we're lucky, the lineup change tonight sparks a little turnaround.

 

[swisshh]

Some similar stats, but there's a lot of visual differences. Team is getting better shots this year. Other teams are working harder for shots against the Kings this year. Due to some guys falling off a cliff play-wise, things have still been ugly.

 

[blackice]

In most of the Kings' players case, habits don't die hard. You see the same ones being made. The front office should of got rid of some of the dead weight before the season kicked off because I'm sure if we as fans knew they were incompetent you would think Pete would have a clue. Here's hoping to a active trade deadline and it also helps to bring in players that are all ready defensive minded or are willing to be and just need that extra push, you can't expect shooters and chuckers to buy into playing defense very much.

 

[Capt. Factorial]

Please don't tell me that you decided to beat the whole Ricky Rubio dead horse again.

Somehow I thought Section was thinking about our team, but I guess that's what that was.

We really need one of these:

 

[Gary]

Somehow I thought Section was thinking about our team, but I guess that's what that was.

We really need one of these:

That's kinda neat..

 

[Kingster]

Honestly I don't know if you're talking about Thomas (4 total steals in 6 games) or Vasquez (2 total steals in 6 games), but neither is in the top three on our team (Cousins 13, Patterson 8, Thornton 7). Hard to hang one's hat on those numbers when you're looking for one of the top defensive PGs (e.g. Rubio 27, Paul 23, Carter-Williams 21...) I mean, among guards who have played at least 100 minutes, IT is tied for 72nd-best in steals-per-36! Wow! Top defensive PG!

The fact that steals are equated with defensive prowess and Rubio is the leader of that category must give anyone pause. Immediately you should sit up and question how valid is the proposition of steals = defense when a guy who can't keep a sheep in front of him is the league leader. I guess if I couldn't keep a sheep in front of me I'd play in space, play the angles and go for the steal statistic. Steals are a crappy indicator of defensive prowess, unless they are combined with other indicators like common sense and your own eyeballs.

 

[KingMilz]

Whenver you see lots of red on something it's never a good sign, that looks pathetic at best, I said it before I will say it again this is the first time in my life I have watched basketball and 90% of the time it's 2 on 8.

 

[Section 101]

Somehow I thought Section was thinking about our team, but I guess that's what that was.

We really need one of these:

Maybe you should try reading Bricks' post again since he was the one bringing up past players first.

 

[swisshh]

Brick's lamenting over Reke being gone when Reke has had a terrible year was pretty odd. I wasn't sure if it was a joke or not.

 

[Bricklayer]

Brick's lamenting over Reke being gone when Reke has had a terrible year was pretty odd. I wasn't sure if it was a joke or not.

Given that absolutely nothing that the haters have said would happen when Reke left has in fact happened -- we are shooting worse, scoring worse, passing worse -- and almost everything I worried would happen has happened -- we have no second option in the lineup, no two way guard, no guard who can defend, nobody who can attack the hoop -- it would probably be best if you didn't go there. I've been quite nice about avoiding I told you sos over my career here. But I will never avoid commenting on irony.

And trying to bring up Ricky Rubio is just flat sad 5 years later. This would be the Rubio who has played in 106 career NBA games in 4+ years and shooting a career .356? Maybe somebody can come along and trump the sadness by mentioning that we could have had Steve Nash instead of Peja.

 

[Tetsujin]

And trying to bring up Ricky Rubio is just flat sad 5 years later. This would be the Rubio who has played in 106 career NBA games in 4+ years and shooting a career .356? Maybe somebody can come along and trump the sadness by mentioning that we could have had Steve Nash instead of Peja.

Don't need to go back that far. We could have had Rondo rather than the Doubs

 

[Capt. Factorial]

Maybe you should try reading Bricks' post again since he was the one bringing up past players first.

 

[swisshh]

Given that absolutely nothing that the haters have said would happen when Reke left has in fact happened -- we are shooting worse, scoring worse, passing worse -- and almost everything I worried would happen has happened -- we have no second option in the lineup, no two way guard, no guard who can defend, nobody who can attack the hoop -- it would probably be best if you didn't go there. I've been quite nice about avoiding I told you sos over my career here. But I will never avoid commenting on irony.

And trying to bring up Ricky Rubio is just flat sad 5 years later. This would be the Rubio who has played in 106 career NBA games in 4+ years and shooting a career .356? Maybe somebody can come along and trump the sadness by mentioning that we could have had Steve Nash instead of Peja.

Team is actually passing better and running the offense for better shots. IT and McLemore are hitting the outside shot, but the rest aren't. The defense looks better at times, and the way they're playing possessions is smarter. Statistically it doesn't matter since certain guys are just giving up already. Honestly, the better looking offense and defnese has more to do with the coaching change than personnel.

This is not an I told you so situation for you. Reke is having all the same issues he had here over in New Orleans. Constant foot problems, not conducive to winning and he's having an even worse season despite having better talent around him.

 

[jalfa]

The fact that steals are equated with defensive prowess and Rubio is the leader of that category must give anyone pause. Immediately you should sit up and question how valid is the proposition of steals = defense when a guy who can't keep a sheep in front of him is the league leader. I guess if I couldn't keep a sheep in front of me I'd play in space, play the angles and go for the steal statistic. Steals are a crappy indicator of defensive prowess, unless they are combined with other indicators like common sense and your own eyeballs.

while it's true that steals cannot generally be equated with good defence (otherwise James Harden would be a top 6 perimeter defender, which is about as far from the truth as it gets), Rubio is actually one of the better PG defenders in the league. he doesn't generally get burned much, fights through screens decently and puts his length to good use, bothering shooters and defending passing lanes. the major knock on him is that not only can't he shoot worth a damn, but he's also really bad at finishing at the basket, to the degree that you really only have to play him for the pass, once he gets by the first line of defence.

 

[kingsfan101]

Hopefully this first 6 games is our rock bottom, I mean heck, you can't get much worse. If we're lucky, the lineup change tonight sparks a little turnaround.

Hopefully, but I fear it might get worse.

We've played almost all our games at home, and have been largely free of injuries (I know Landry's been out, and our projected starting SF has barely played. However, I didn't consider any of them to make a HUGE difference. Salmons play though is forcing me to revise that opinion), after a huge offseason, which gave a lot of energy to the fans, and should have given some to the team. In short, apart from the product on the court, pretty much everything has gone right.

Once the show gets on the road, things might get worse.

 

[jalfa]

Hopefully, but I fear it might get worse.

We've played almost all our games at home, and have been largely free of injuries (I know Landry's been out, and our projected starting SF has barely played. However, I didn't consider any of them to make a HUGE difference. Salmons play though is forcing me to revise that opinion), after a huge offseason, which gave a lot of energy to the fans, and should have given some to the team. In short, apart from the product on the court, pretty much everything has gone right.

Once the show gets on the road, things might get worse.

while, yeah, sure, there's been a lot of home games, the schedule has still not been the easiest. they've had the Warriors and Clippers, likely two teams that'll end up with home court advantage in the playoffs, the Blazers, currently the team with the second best record in the West and a strong playoff contender, twice and a Hawks team that might yet have a shot at the playoffs in the East. they've been competitive in most of the games, despite two-three of the five starters mostly refusing to play and all the other issues facing this roster. I haven't found the start to this season all that disappointing, at any rate.

 

[Bricklayer]

Hopefully, but I fear it might get worse.

We've played almost all our games at home, and have been largely free of injuries (I know Landry's been out, and our projected starting SF has barely played. However, I didn't consider any of them to make a HUGE difference. Salmons play though is forcing me to revise that opinion), after a huge offseason, which gave a lot of energy to the fans, and should have given some to the team. In short, apart from the product on the court, pretty much everything has gone right.

Once the show gets on the road, things might get worse.

Been known since the schedule was released that just like last year, we were either going to start fast or have no chance. Have the most home heavy schedule in the league during the first month. Then things get dire. As far as strength of schedule, its been kind of a mixed bag just because while we've played good teams and not so good teams, the good teams haven't been who you might have predicted, and neither have the not so good. The Clippers and Golden State and Atlanta are about who you thought they were, but the Nets and Denver were supposed to be good. The Blazers were supposed to be bad.

 

[Dime Dropper]

while it's true that steals cannot generally be equated with good defence (otherwise James Harden would be a top 6 perimeter defender, which is about as far from the truth as it gets), Rubio is actually one of the better PG defenders in the league. he doesn't generally get burned much, fights through screens decently and puts his length to good use, bothering shooters and defending passing lanes. the major knock on him is that not only can't he shoot worth a damn, but he's also really bad at finishing at the basket, to the degree that you really only have to play him for the pass, once he gets by the first line of defence.

Yeah, Rubio actually is a pretty good defender, and not just because of steals, which are NOT an indicator of defensive prowess. But it's easier to rely on stereotypes rather than actually watching the games... He's a Euro, therefore he can't stay in front of anyone and must apparently resort to focusing on steals because staying with his man is a lost cause. Or something. Makes sense.

Still pretty stupid to bring him up now, though. Predictable however.