In this week's 10 things, we reveal newfound genius from Draymond Green, startling nostalgia for the ol' catch-and-shoot midranger and an introduction to the NBA's "Yoink!" god.
1. Draymond Green, eating up space again
The Green who once averaged 14 points and shot league average from deep is gone, but the current version will do just fine. Green is shooting 60% on 2s, and attacking the rim with a snarling bounce that hasn't been there since the Warriors were the Warriors.
Defenders ignore Green on the perimeter. Green's usual counter is pivoting into lightning-fast handoffs with Golden State's best shooters; if Green's defender is sagging 15 feet away, there is no one to meet Stephen Curry on the other side of those handoffs. That is death by fire from above.
But that's only one counter, and Curry only one teammate; he's not always nearby, and those handoffs are less dangerous with Jordan Poole, Damion Lee, or Andrew Wiggins. (That sound you hear is the rest of the league trembling in fear of Klay Thompson's return.)
For the Warriors to reclaim their throne, Green has to exploit open space in other ways. He's doing that, using it as a runway for drives:
Green sometimes starts running before even catching a pass. He has made good use of the baseline, exploding into rim-runs that are hybrids between cuts and drives:
The Warriors have scored an absurd 1.41 points per possession when Green shoots out of a drive, or dishes to teammate who fires -- tops by a mile among 192 guys with at least 50 drives, per Second Spectrum. He has one of the highest assist rates and lowest turnover rates among that sample. He is drawing shooting fouls at his career-best rate, and posting up mismatches again.
Green is a basketball genius. The more talent around him, the brighter that genius shines. Better teammates require more attention, and do more with whatever advantage Green gifts them. Green in turn needs less open space to do damage.
2. It should be easier for Julius Randle and the Knicks
I'm not of the belief that the Randle-Obi Toppin pairing is a cure-all, though it could be a slightly larger part of Tom Thibodeau's rotation. Toppin is 8-of-41 from deep; he's a floor-spacer in theory only. He has improved on defense, but he's probably still below average against either big man position.
But he's so damned fast, so much more comfortable on the perimeter than New York's centers, and boy was it jarring to see Randle rampage on this pick-and-roll as Toppin flared outside:
Randle has rolled to the rim least often among 80-plus high-volume screen-setters, per Second Spectrum. That shouldn't be, even if Randle plays almost all his minutes with Nerlens Noel or Mitchell Robinson clogging the paint. Randle could still screen, slip to the foul line, and hit those guys with lobs -- or kick to shooters.
New York's offseason was aimed at adding variety on offense, and lightening the load on Randle. That has not happened in any meaningful way. Randle is still isolating and posting up a ton. He's a good passer, but he has not sustained last season's hot shooting. New York ranks 15th in scoring efficiency -- not what brass envisioned, and not good enough to compensate for a massive backslide on defense. (Randle bears some responsibility for that. He's not rotating with the same urgency, and has been alarmingly vulnerable to backdoor cuts.)
The stagnancy is really not on Randle. He leads the Knicks in assists, and that's the problem: it's not a good sign if your scoring power forward is the only guy averaging more than 3.9 assists.
Alec Burks is good, but he's not a point guard. He's averaging 2.6 assists since usurping Kemba Walker, including two goose-egg games. That 2.6 number happens to be Evan Fournier's career average. RJ Barrett is probably the most natural pick-and-roll passer in the starting five, but he's finding his place on this revamped roster.
Thibodeau is wary about starting Derrick Rose, and overtaxing him. I wonder if we've seen the last of Walker. The Knicks have time, and depth, but they're also 12-13 against the league's fifth-easiest schedule.
3. The gusto -- and rebounding -- of Cole Anthony
I'm skeptical of Anthony developing into the lead ball handler for a contender; he's on the small side for that role, without killer physical ability, and he orchestrates with a shoot-first approach. (On this Orlando Magic team, he probably should bring a shoot-first, shoot-second, and shoot-third approach.) He's averaging 20 points, but someone on every bad team will approach that number. Anthony's a solid shooter, but not a great one. He gets hung up on screens on defense.
But Anthony is good, and more than that, he's a delight -- overflowing with ultra-competitive, puffed-chest bravado. He carries himself as if he is the best player on the floor. He backs it up with effort, toughness, and late-game shotmaking. That kind of fire-breathing courage inspires teammates. It makes a rebuilding team believe -- really believe -- it can compete.
Anthony's spirit is embodied by his ferocious rebounding. He loves barging into big man territory, and uprooting larger humans with textbook boxouts. He can flat out go up and get it:
Anthony has rebounded 17.7% of opponent misses. Some power forwards would love to reach that number. It trails one Ricky Rubio season for the highest rate ever among players listed 6-2 or shorter, per Basketball-Reference.
Anthony is crafty, with lots of moves and countermoves -- he rejects picks more than any ball handler, per Second Spectrum -- and a penchant for start-and-stop baseline drives.
The Magic have scored 109 points per 100 possessions with Anthony, and an unthinkable 92.7 when he sits -- eight points below the Oklahoma City Thunder's league-worst offense. Sprinkle some salt on those numbers; with Markelle Fultz and now Jalen Suggs injured, the Magic don't have a backup point guard. Terrence Ross, Orlando's bench spark for what seems like 20 seasons now, is shooting 30% on 3s.
Regardless: It's impossible not to love Anthony.
4. Where is Spencer Dinwiddie?
The feel-good vibes have faded. The Washington Wizards are 5-8 since that 10-3 start, and needed overtime Wednesday to outlast the tanktastic Detroit Pistons -- the last cupcake before the league's easiest schedule turns daunting. The Wiz are 15-11, but minus-20 -- a worse point differential than all but the Knicks, Pistons, and Magic in the East. Projection sites have them much lower than 50/50 to make the playoffs.
Depth can carry teams through portions of the regular season, but on some nights, you need your star shot-creators to lift everyone. That is where Dinwiddie (and to a lesser extent Bradley Beal) have fallen short.
Beal will be fine. He's a star, and he's surging. Dinwiddie is coming off an ACL tear; he deserves time. Washington banking early wins afforded some, but it might be running short.
Dinwiddie is shooting 34.7% on 3s, and a concerning 43% on 2s. He has the usage rate of an average starter. Only 21% of his shots have come at the basket -- low for his position, and 10 to 15% below Dinwiddie's pre-injury share. His free throws have plummeted.
Dinwiddie just looks out of sync. He's passing up some open 3s to drive into nothingness and launch awkward floaters:
His decision-making can confound:
That lob isn't there; an easy kickout to Beal is staring Dinwiddie in the face. (Dinwiddie has always been wild as a lob passer.)
Opponents have outscored the Wiz by 3.2 points per 100 possessions with Dinwiddie on the floor. (Beal-Dinwiddie minutes have actually been worse than the Dinwiddie-only stints, but both have been bad. The Wiz are winning Beal-only segments.)
Dinwiddie will be better. The Wiz need him to get there soon.
5. Kelly Oubre Jr., and the art of the roll-turned-pop
This little twist is available to screen-setters of any size -- provided they can shoot:
The initial hard roll gets defenders back-pedaling, and most can't reverse momentum in time to challenge quick-hitting 3s. The defense might rotate assignments, but smart offenses pass and drive ahead of those rotations.
Paul George and Reggie Jackson pull the same trick for the LA Clippers:
(The Clippers have pried open good shots by having guards -- Jackson, Eric Bledsoe, and Luke Kennard -- screen for George.)
Is it time to start talking up Oubre as one of Tyler Herro's competitors for Sixth Man of the Year? Oubre is averaging 16.7 points on a career-best 46% shooting -- 38.5% on 3s, 56% on 2s. He has averaged 25 points over Charlotte's past eight games, including 85 combined over the past three in which the Hornets played with half a roster.
Oubre rounds out Charlotte's center-less lineups; the Hornets have blitzed opponents by eight points per 100 possessions when Oubre plays without any traditional bigs, per NBA.com. That balloons to 11 points when LaMelo Ball is also on the floor. (P.S. Yes, expect Charlotte to inquire about Indiana's big men -- specifically Myles Turner.)
Oubre didn't fit in Golden State, but he has been a boon in Charlotte -- another smart move for the Mitch Kupchak regime.
6. The startling nostalgia of a sudden catch-and-shoot midranger
I jolted upright upon seeing this shot with the same astonishment I might experience if I spotted a tiger in my backyard:
This is like time-traveling to the 1980s, when all 10 players meandered inside the 3-point arc. You don't see long catch-and-shoot 2s anymore unless they are the direct result of a pick-and-pop. As Seth Partnow has noted, not all midrange jumpers have vanished; superstars still take lots of pull-up 2s, and Al Horford/LaMarcus Aldridge types drift to that area on pick-and-pops.
But the random kickout catch-and-shoot 2 from a 3-point specialist is a rarity. I smiled seeing one.
7. Two Boston backup forwards heading different directions
For the Celtics to hit their ceiling -- and that has very much not happened -- one backup would have to step into somewhat of a void at power forward: someone who could break up the Al Horford/Robert Williams III duo if it proved clunky, and spare Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown some bruising.
Grant Williams has become that player. He's shooting 42.4% from deep, with an even split between short corner 3s and longer bombs. He has hit 36% on above-the-break 3s, and there's a huge and underrated difference between corner-3 specialists and stretch bigs who shoot from everywhere. The everywhere types do more stuff from more places as screen-setters, cutters, and handoff hubs.
Williams looks more comfortable working off the bounce when defenders run him off the arc. He sees the floor well, and he's converting inside the paint: a ridiculous 83% at the basket, and 40% on floaters.
Williams is a brick wall with nimble feet on defense. He can guard every position. If this shooting is anything resembling real, Williams is a heavy-minutes rotation player and maybe even a fifth starter on the right team.
On the other hand: After every Romeo Langford stint, I find myself asking, What would you say ... you do here? He barely shoots, though his 15-of-36 mark on 3s is encouraging after Langford went 10-of-45 combined over his first two seasons. He has 37 career assists, and even if he were a good playmaker -- maybe he is! -- he's not involved enough to show it.
He's solid defensively, though not on Williams' level. He's battling Aaron Nesmith and Payton Pritchard on the fringes of Boston's rotation. Those two haven't lit the world on fire, but at least they do things. You notice them. (Also enjoying a bounce back: Josh Richardson.)
Langford is 22, so there's time. Still: This is disappointing return on a lottery pick. The five players taken right after Langford haven't amounted to much yet, but the sixth -- Matisse Thybulle -- haunts Boston some. The Celtics traded the rights to Thybulle for Carsen Edwards and Ty Jerome. (They did pick Grant Williams two spots below Thybulle, and had so many first-round picks that it was going to be hard to roster all of them.)
8. The Clippers' offense and the burden on Paul George
This was the fear among those of us who pegged the Clippers for the play-in tournament: What would happen to an offense built around incredible jump-shooting without its centerpiece superstar?
Welp. The Clips are an average jump-shooting team after scorching last year -- the result of some expected regression and the absence of Kawhi Leonard. They still don't get to the rim or the line. They rank 23rd in offensive rebounding. They try to run, but they are terrible at it; only the Dallas Mavericks, who seem allergic to transition play, produce fewer points after opponent turnovers, per Inpredictable.
The Clips have fallen to 20th in turnover rate, and 27th since Nov. 1. George is coughing up a career-worst 4.3 per game. His somewhat loose handle, rickety under pressure, has always been the main reason George functions best as a No. 2 ballhandling option. Even last season, the Clips' turnover rate spiked when George played without Leonard. (A hidden part of Leonard's value is rarely turning it over while shouldering a gargantuan burden.)
With Leonard out, George has to force it. This is the cost. The Clips rank 26th in points per possession, and the four teams below them -- the Thunder, Magic, Pistons, and Houston Rockets -- are not trying to win.
George is down to 42% shooting overall and 32% from deep. His diet of 3s is tougher with Leonard out. George is shooting just 28.7% on 4.8 pull-up 3s per game -- the most he has ever taken. This is the first season in which George has attempted more pull-up 3s than catch-and-shoot attempts; in some prior seasons, he jacked almost twice as many catch-and-shoots.
The Clips have scored a hideous 92.9 points per 100 possessions when George plays without Reggie Jackson -- seven-plus points below the 30th-ranked offense. (The Clippers' offense has cratered when both Jackson and George sit, which is probably something Tyronn Lue should avoid.)
Getting Marcus Morris and Nicolas Batum back should stabilize things. The backup center battle between Serge Ibaka and Isaiah Hartenstein is worth watching -- including the connected question of whether Ibaka can still steal time at power forward.
The Clippers are 14-12 with the league's No. 4 defense. They are above the play-in, and you know Leonard is watching to see if they have a realistic pathway to the Finals -- something that might entice him to return. On the flip side, the Clippers have played 17 home games and a league-low nine roadies.
9. The cross-match post-up
Team defense and offense are not separate entities. Possessions flow without interruption. What happens at one end influences the other.
Part of the value in big, switchy defenders carries over to offense: if a rangy wing defends a smaller guard, that size mismatch might persist to the other end.
The Nuggets often stick Aaron Gordon on star guards so their other starting forward -- Michael Porter Jr., and now Jeff Green -- can take bigger players. When those guards can't extricate themselves from Gordon in semi-transition, he bulldozes them.
Gordon also knows when defenders are criss-crossing in the open floor, trying to find their preferred matchups, and outsprints them. It helps having Nikola Jokic lofting hit-aheads and post entries.
(Jokic is averaging 26 points, 13 rebounds, and 7 assists on 58% shooting. He leads the league in pretty much every advanced statistic. He has missed only five games, and the depleted Nuggets are dead without him. If Denver cracks the West's top six, he'll have an MVP case.)
Gordon was an inefficient post-up chucker in Orlando, but his back-to-the-basket game works in Denver; the Nuggets have scored 1.2 points per possession when Gordon shoots from the post, or kicks to a teammate who launches -- sixth among 76 guys with at least 15 post touches, per Second Spectrum.
Gordon shoots on about 80% of his post-ups -- third-highest among those 76 players. That sounds greedy, and sometimes it is, but it also indicates Gordon is selective about posting up in the first place.
The Toronto Raptors weaponize Scottie Barnes' size the same way:
(Sincere apologies to CJ McCollum, who is having a bad week. Take it as a compliment that opponents use elite defenders on you!)
Barnes has jacked shots on almost 73% of his post-ups -- eighth-highest in that sample. He has shot poorly on them, but it's a skill he should and will acquire.
10. Patty Mills: YOINK!
Any die-hard fan of peak-era "The Simpsons" -- loosely defined as 1991-1996 -- has made "yoink!" part of their vocabulary. Through some glorious happenstance, the show's writers decided "yoink!" was the go-to exclamation characters used whenever they swiped something that wasn't theirs. I have no idea why "yoink!" is perfect for this circumstance. It just is. Some bits of genius cannot be explained.
(For the record, the all-time best "yoink!" was voiced by Mark McGwire.)
Patty Mills is the NBA's "yoink!" god, and he specializes in snatching the ball from opponents right after they've rebounded a Nets miss -- and then pogo-sticking for layups all in one motion. It's incredible. This is "yoink!" incarnate:
I mean, what? By the time Beal realizes he no longer has the ball, it's in the basket.
This was not a one-off:
Where would the East-leading Nets -- ravaged by injuries and, umm, vaccination requirements, starved for shooting around their two stars -- be without Mills? He has hit 45.6% from deep, including a scalding 50% on above-the-break triples. Mills is averaging a career-high 12.5 points. His churning, turbocharged off-ball movement makes Mills a perfect fit around James Harden and Kevin Durant. He's undersized, but he grinds on defense.
Mills is a workable fill-in for Kyrie Irving in lineups featuring Harden, Durant, Joe Harris, Mills, and one big man -- groups that figure to close some games once Harris returns from injury. LaMarcus Aldridge starts at center, but both James Johnson and Nicolas Claxton have emerged as candidates for that final spot. Aldridge is a good enough shooter that he can play with Johnson in bigger alignments.
The Nets are plus-9.5 per 100 possessions with Mills on the floor, and minus-7.3 when he sits. Mills won't score enough to leapfrog Herro in the Sixth Man of the Year race, but he belongs in the conversation -- assuming he doesn't start too many games to qualify. And if Herro (and other candidates) slump, maybe, just maybe, Mills "yoinks" that trophy away.