Posts Tagged ‘Avery Bradley’

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No Shock: KG Is A Difference-Maker On D

January 4, 2013  ·  1:06PM

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HANG TIME NEW JERSEY – Points, rebounds and assists are nice, but plus-minus is the most important stat in basketball.

Teams win games by outscoring their opponent, and plus-minus reflects how much a team has done that in a player’s minutes on the floor. If a player isn’t scoring, he can help his teammates score and also prevent the opponent from doing so.

But in basketball, with nine other guys on the floor affecting what each player does, plus-minus always needs context, and lots of it. Who is a guy playing his minutes with? Who is he not playing his minutes with?

Furthermore, sample size is important. Single-game plus-minus can help tell a story about key sequences or the impact of a player or two on a particular night. But if you really want to get a good idea of how a team performs when a player or group of players is on the floor, you’ve got to look at a large chunk of games.

At this point in the season, we can get a pretty good idea of where teams are strong and weak. Through Thursday, 224 players have logged at least 500 minutes for one team this season.

On Wednesday, we looked at the players with the biggest on-off court differential in regard to their team’s offensive efficiency. Today, we look at the defensive end of the floor.

Measuring the difference in a team’s offensive efficiency (points scored per 100 possessions) when a player is on the floor vs. when he’s off the floor, here are the league’s five biggest difference makers, as well as a pair at the bottom of the list.

For all of them, the discrepancy between their team’s defensive numbers with them on and off the floor is as much about the guys replacing them as it is about what they’re doing themselves.

1. Kevin Garnett, Celtics

On/off floor MIN DefRtg
On floor 905 96.3
Off floor 613 110.7
Diff. -14.4

Because the Celtics use a unique substitution pattern with KG, you can get a pretty clear idea of the impact he makes. No other Celtics regular has played more 63 percent of his minutes with Garnett.

You probably figured Garnett would be at or near the top of this list, but 14.4 points per 100 possessions? That’s an amazing number, and it’s an indictment on Brandon Bass (382 minutes with Garnett off the floor), Jared Sullinger (331) and Chris Wilcox (297) … and Paul Pierce (391) and Rajon Rondo (432).

It’s also an endorsement of both former Celtics center Greg Stiemsma and guard Avery Bradley, because the Celtics’ defense only fell off 0.5 points per 100 possessions when Garnett stepped off the floor last season.

Bradley’s return (he made his 2012-13 debut on Wednesday) offers some hope, but interior defense will continue to be an issue whenever Garnett rests. (more…)

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Posted in NBA.com/Stats / Comments (27) /

Blogtable: The Celtics’ Last Stand?

December 19, 2012  ·  10:28AM




Each week, we’ll ask our stable of scribes to weigh in on the three most important NBA topics of the day — and then give you a chance to step on the scale, too, in the comments below.

Week 8: Hyperventilating about Ricky | Celtics’ Last Gasp? | Missing Pieces

Have we seen the last of these Celtics as a title contender?

Steve Aschburner: Much will depend on your definition of contender, but let’s not get bogged down in details. Yes, we have seen the last of these Celtics as a serious title threat. The East isn’t any tougher but the Celtics still look stuck. They’re aging and not sufficiently backfilling with the guys (Jeff Green, Courtney Lee) who were supposed to assume bigger roles. Avery Bradley‘s return will help in a couple of ways — defensively, Kevin Garnett will have a soulmate out there and Lee should relax with a bit less pressure. But c’mon, his name’s Bradley, not Bird. It won’t be enough.

Fran Blinebury: I’m not ready yet to sweep the Celtics over the cliff just yet, though I’ll admit they’re hanging on by their finger tips. I still believe in K.G., Pierce and Rondo, but Doc Rivers has just been throwing everything against the wall with the rest of them, trying to get some consistency.

Jeff Caplan: Sorry folks, this is the end. I said it weeks ago in this space that Boston is no longer a threat. The loss of Ray Allen was a blow in more ways than one and although I’m a Jason Terry fan, I don’t think he can just step in and make everyone forget about Allen. Jeff Green has been disappointing and, well, it’s just not working.

Scott Howard-Cooper: Unfortunately, yes. I say unfortunately because the foundation of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Rajon Rondo will always have a special place in NBA history as an ultra-competitive roster that led with a ferocious will. But while the Celtics, with Allen off the current team but forever part of the title memories, can still be good, I don’t see them still being championship good.

John Schuhmann: That 3-2 lead that they held in the Eastern Conference finals just six months ago still occupies a small piece of real estate in the back of my mind, but I’m believing in the Celtics less and less as the weeks go by. They haven’t won more than two straight games in over a month and they’re 3-8 on the road. Their defense has shown some improvement, and the return of Avery Bradley should eventually get them back to being top-five team on that end. But their offense might be worse than it was last season, which says a lot. Only the Wizards have been worse offensively over the last three weeks. I still think they could get things together and get back to the conference finals, but I don’t see any way they can win another championship.

Sekou Smith: I hate to say it, but I believe so. They just don’t look like they have the energy for one last run. I take Doc Rivers at his word when he says he’s coaching a “.500 team and we play like that.” I expected more. I thought with the way they finished last season that the Celtics, and not the Spurs, would be the seasoned bunch that showed up this season looking like they spent the offseason bathing in the Fountain of Youth. They’ve only shown flashes of that ability. I saw them live on opening night in Miami and walked away feeling good about my preseason prediction that they would remain the biggest threat to the Heat this season. Not anymore.

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Early Run Of Injuries Taking Its Toll

November 16, 2012  ·  1:42PM


HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – The Dallas Mavericks signed journeyman big man Eddy Curry out of desperation at the center position with Chris Kaman injured. When he returned, Dallas cut Curry and signed out-of-work Troy Murphy because power forward took top billing on the depth chart with Dirk Nowitzki rehabbing from surgery.

The Minnesota Timberwolves, down four starters and six rotation players to injury, signed Josh Howard off the street Thursday. The Toronto Raptors are reportedly looking into unemployed 3-point shooter Mickael Pietrus to plug into their injury-depleted roster.

Entering just the third week of the 2012-13 season, injuries — many to some of the game’s biggest and brightest stars — are the overwhelming story line as overworked team medical staffs are on 24-hour notice.

Both conferences can field a veritable All-Star team, position-by-position, of players that have recently returned from injury, were injured prior to the season or are injured now.

The West: Steve Nash, Ricky Rubio, Eric Gordon, Shawn Marion, Chauncey Billups, Kevin Love, Nowitzki, Andrew Bogut.

The East: Derrick Rose, Rajon Rondo, John Wall, Kyle Lowry, Dwyane Wade, Danny Granger, Amar’e Stoudemire, Andrew Bynum, Nene.

Yet that’s hardly all of the NBA’s wounded. Here’s more of those who have been, still are or just got injured: Gerald Wallace, Gerald Henderson, Mario Chalmers, Devin Harris, A.J. Price, Nikola Pekovic, Kirk Hinrich, Grant Hill, J.J. Barea, Brandon Roy, Chase Budinger, Anthony Davis, Steve Blake, Brandon Rush, Darrell Arthur, Channing Frye, Landry Fields, Iman Shumpert, Alan Anderson, Luc Richard Mbah a Moute and Avery Bradley.

When Minnesota came to Dallas earlier this week with five players out (and Pekovic’s sprained ankle in the third quarter would make it six), coach Rick Adelman engaged in something of a “Who’s on First” rapid-fire Q & A with beat writer Jerry Zgoda.

Jerry: Who’s your backup 3 and your backup 2?

Rick: We don’t have a backup 3. I’m going to start Malcolm (Lee) tonight at the 2 and bring Alexey (Shved) off the bench at both spots. And then at the 3, I don’t know, we’re going to slide somebody there.

Jerry: Have to play AK (Andrei Kirilenko) 48 minutes?

Rick: I don’t want to do to that. We don’t need to wear him out, too.

Jerry: Can you get five or six (minutes) out of (assistant coach Terry) Porter?

Rick: I don’t think so.

A year ago, the worry around the league was how an abbreviated training camp following the hasty resolution to the lockout and then a compacted, 66-game schedule would affect player health. With a full, month-long camp this time around and a complete slate of eight preseason games, this spate of injuries is as unexpected as unfortunate.

Entering this weekend’s games, only the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder among the league’s 30 teams boast clean injury reports, and 22 list more than one injured player.

When the Mavericks play the Indiana Pacers tonight, they expect to get Marion back after a five-game absence with a sprained left knee. Nowitzki will remain out as will Indiana’s Granger. For Dallas, it’s been a strange run of not only playing shorthanded, but facing teams with at least one starter sidelined. They played, in order: Toronto (Lowry), New York (Stoudemire), Charlotte (Henderson), Minnesota (Love, Rubio, Roy, Budinger) and Washington (Wall, Nene).

“The league’s not going to stop and wait for you,” Adelman said the other night about his team’s rash of injuries. “A lot teams are having the same issues with major injuries. As a coaching staff you can’t coach the people that aren’t there. You only can coach the people that are there.”

And so it goes in a very strange first month in the NBA.

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Blogtable: Slow Starters In Trouble

November 7, 2012  ·  10:44AM

Each week, we’ll ask our stable of scribes to weigh in on the three most important NBA topics of the day — and then give you a chance to step on the scale, too, in the comments below.

Blogtable Week 2: The Knicks | Slow starters | Too soon to panic?

Which slow-starting team will have the hardest time getting back on track: Boston, Denver or the Lakers?

Steve Aschburner: The Lakers. Let’s not forget, they’re supposed to be on a different, higher (though not necessarily faster) track than the other two. Boston has new pieces but still needs Avery Bradley healthy in order to reach its full potential. Denver knew it faced a grueling start, with its first three games (and 17 of 23) on the road. That means 35 of its final 59 at home. But the Lakers have both a huge learning curve and stupid-intense pressure (especially on coach Mike Brown) to win 60-65 games. In terms of fitting personnel, they look like they’ll be more 2010-11 Miami than 2007-08 Boston. And key guys are older and injury-susceptible.

Fran Blinebury: I’m not ready to write any of them off so quickly, but the Nuggets have the toughest task because they don’t have veteran All-Stars or the so-called institutional knowledge that comes with having been through the wars previously. (more…)

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Rivers Plans To Mix And Match

October 19, 2012  ·  11:57AM

 

BROOKLYN – In the first three seasons of the KG era, the Boston Celtics’ starting lineup was constant.

Rajon Rondo, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Kendrick Perkins. That’s what you expected to see when you arrived at the arena or turned on your TV to watch the Celtics, and that’s what you got. Over those three seasons, that group started 214 of a possible 304 games and played 4,172 minutes together, which was 1,709 more than any other lineup around the league over that time. And they were very, very good.

Most used lineups, 2007-08 through 2009-10, including postseason

Team Lineup GP MIN OffRtg DefRtg NetRtg +/-
BOS Rondo, Allen, Pierce, Garnett, Perkins 214 4,172 109.2 95.5 +13.7 +1,063
ATL Bibby, Johnson, Williams, Smith, Horford 161 2,463 105.1 104.7 +0.4 +5
OKC Westbrook, Sefolosha, Durant, Green, Krstic 99 1,674 102.5 105.8 -3.3 -86
UTA Williams, Brewer, Kirilenko, Boozer, Okur 109 1,615 109.9 106.7 +3.2 +100
NOH Paul, Peterson, Stojakovic, West, Chandler 83 1,548 112.9 102.5 +10.4 +325

OffRtg = Points scored per 100 possessions
DefRtg = Points allowed per 100 possessions
NetRtg = Point differential per 100 possessions

Then Perkins blew out his knee and was eventually traded. Over the last two seasons, the Celtics’ starting lineup wasn’t nearly as consistent, with Glen Davis, Nenad Krstic, Shaquille O’Neal, Jermaine O’Neal and Brandon Bass taking turns as the other big man next to Garnett. And after Bass finally became the starting power forward in the second half of last season, Avery Bradley replaced Allen at the two.

This season, there could be even more flux in the Celtics’ lineup. First of all, Bradley is out to start the season, still recovering from shoulder surgery. But beyond that, it may just be that Doc Rivers decides to mix and match. (more…)

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Celtics’ Bradley To Allen: Thanks, Ray!

August 8, 2012  ·  1:27PM

Some of the more impassioned, green-blindered NBA fans in Boston are cranky about veteran shooting guard Ray Allen’s decision to leave and crankier still toward Allen for opting to sign as a free agent with the rival Miami Heat, who have put the Celtics down the past two springs.

Avery Bradley, though, approaches it from a different direction. He might have mixed feelings about Allen no longer being with the Celtics – it does, after all, further clear the way for Bradley’s rising role — but he has only warm fuzzies toward the man himself, regardless of his new address.

Without Allen’s generosity to a young, unproven backcourt player, this whole storyline might be playing out different. And Bradley appreciates that, as related by ESPNBoston.com’s Chris Forsberg.

“Ray was a great tutor,” said Bradley, who struggled with his ability to generate offense early in his NBA career but blossomed last season as he became more confident in his jump shot.

“I’m sad that he’s gone, but we all wish the best for him. But he definitely meant a lot. He helped me out every single day. Sometimes I’d just be working out and he’d be watching on the side. He’d get up and tell me what I needed to work on, or tell me how I can be more consistent. I really thank him for that.”

Bradley shot a mere 34.3 percent from the floor during his rookie season, and those struggles trickled into his second season, particularly as the Celtics worked to develop him as a backup point guard.

Once the team put the focus on Bradley as a shooting guard, he flourished. His confidence grew as he utilized his cutting ability to generate easy hoops, and his jump shot — something coach Doc Rivers swore he showcased during the team’s practices — soon followed.

(more…)

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Report: Allen decides to leave Celtics, joins Heat

July 6, 2012  ·  10:23PM

The Big Four are no more. At least not in Boston.

Free agent guard Ray Allen agreed to sign Friday evening with the Miami Heat, ending his five-year run in Boston that was highlighted by two Finals trips for the Celtics, including the 2008 championship. Allen chose Miami over Boston, Memphis and Minnesota, giving the Heat a potentially lethal perimeter option to go along with LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh next season.

The 37-year-old Allen visited Miami Thursday and left town Friday morning after being courted by the Heat organization. He was supposed to visit the Clippers on Friday, but that visit was cancelled after Los Angeles agreed to terms with free agent guard Jamal Crawford on Wednesday. Allen never met with the Grizzlies or Timberwolves.

The Celtics had been optimistic that they’d be able to re-sign Allen after agreeing to terms last week with Kevin Garnett on a three-year deal and reaching terms on Thursday with forward Brandon Bass.

Allen took less money to go to Miami. All the Heat had to offer was the taxpayer’s exception that starts at $3.09 million next season and can go out a maximum of three years and $9.5 million. Boston had offered a two-year, $12 million deal, and the Grizzlies were willing to give Allen their full non-taxpayer mid-level exception that starts at $5 million next season and can go out as long as four years.

(more…)

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Posted in Free Agency 2012 / Comments (878) /

Source: Heat, Clips, Grizz Pursuing Allen

July 3, 2012  ·  7:53AM




HANG TIME CAPITAL BUREAU –The Boston Celtics’ hopes of keeping Ray Allen will have to wait a few days.

The 36-year-old free-agent guard will visit the Miami Heat on Thursday and the Los Angeles Clippers on Friday, according to a source, and listen to their pitches.

Allen is also being pursued by the Memphis Grizzlies, who are seeking a replacement for free agent guard O.J. Mayo. The Grizzlies didn’t tender Mayo a qualifying offer last week, making him an unrestricted free agent. Memphis will offer Allen its $5 million exception.
Allen had conference calls on Monday with the Grizzlies, as well as the Heat, Clippers and Minnesota Timberwolves, according to the source. But Allen is not currently scheduled to make visits to Memphis or Minnesota.

The Heat can only offer Allen their mini mid-level exception that starts at $3.09 million next season, the same exception Miami used last year to sign free-agent forward Shane Battier. The Clippers have their full mid-level available at $5 million. Boston has offered Allen a two-year deal for $12 million.

Miami will no doubt entice Allen with the opportunity to win another ring, as he did in 2008 with the Celtics and as the Heat did this past season. He would be a perfect fit for the Heat, given the team’s success at spacing the floor during the playoffs and The Finals with LeBron James drawing attention in the post. But Allen is still looking for a starting job; he was not happy when he lost his starting spot in Boston to Avery Bradley after suffering an ankle injury that required surgery, and it’s not clear if the Heat would be willing to alter its starting lineup for him. (more…)

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Celtics Hopeful On Allen, Green

July 1, 2012  ·  11:11PM




At last February’s trade deadline, Boston Celtics president Danny Ainge sounded like he was ready to break up the team’s vaunted Big Three of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen to start over in 2012-13, either rebuilding around Rajon Rondo or dealing Rondo and starting over altogether. But a few months later, the Celtics look like they are determined to keep the band together and make another run at a championship next season with their veteran core.

The Celtics, according to sources, are increasingly optimistic they’ll be able to re-sign unrestricted free agent forward Jeff Green to a new contract, and are also more hopeful now they can keep Allen in the fold instead of losing him to the Miami Heat. The final decision is Allen’s, of course, and he’ll weigh offers from several teams (including the Heat and Grizzlies) in the next few days.

But Boston is hopeful that the last few days’ worth of events, starting with Garnett’s decision to agree on a three-year extension, combined with the selection of Jared Sullinger and Fab Melo in last Thursday’s Draft and the team’s strong showing in the East finals, will convince the 36-year-old Allen to accept the team’s two-year, $12 million offer.

That offer is more than what Miami, which only has its mini mid-level exception starting at $3.09 million, can offer Allen. The Grizzlies have their full mid-level exception starting at $5 million, however, and want to sign Allen to replace O.J. Mayo, the now-unrestricted free agent that Memphis did not tender with a qualifying offer last week. The Celtics had initially targeted Mayo as a primary free agent possibility, but now believe he’s going to get more money elsewhere. Several other teams, including the Pacers, are interested in him.

(more…)

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Shaqtin’ A Fool: Playoffs II

June 1, 2012  ·  8:05AM



Shaq looks back at the last week of the playoffs and finds some special moments that demand Foolish accountability. Pau Gasol, Avery Bradley, Tiago Splitter, Keyon Dooling and the infamous Fat Philly Fan all are nominated for this week’s Shaqtin’ A Fool play.

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