Everything Derozan

[DanH]

I like Masai and I've been saying this all summer. While he has easily been the best GM in franchise history, he has made some mistakes and been overly loyal to Casey imo. Plus now I think his hands are being tied by MLSE when it comes to spending hence all the money-saving moves/lack of moves this offseason. Retained the guys we need to get our ~47-55 wins (Lowry, Ibaka, DD) but didn't push for anything beyond that and shed salary.

How often as a fan base do we expect huge moves?

We are less than 6 months removed from the Ibaka trade, probably the biggest trade since Rudy Gay for this franchise. We got our 47-55 wins before Ibaka got here - I'm sure management wants to see how far Ibaka can push the team above that (and what the limiting factor is on our ceiling at that point) before adding more.

[LJ2]

Sorry, but it'd be more problematic for me if DeMar didn't think he was unstoppable on offence. Clearly he's not, but you need that mentality to be successful.

It gets him into trouble when it comes to taking very bad shots a lot of the time, but I'd prefer that attitude to what Lowry does where he completely loses confidence in his ability to play basketball. If Lowry had DeMar's mentality, this team would have a lot easier go of it in the playoffs. Sometimes you have to be overconfident to be mentally tough.

It's true, but I'm just pointing out that talking a big game and not backing it up gives his detractors fuel.

[tDotted]

I'd be more than happy to see DeMar's individual numbers go down if that means more ball movement and better decision-making to optimize more of the other players. There was a like a 3-4 game stretch after Lowry got injured, where DeMar and JV were developing some nice PnR chemistry - DD actually hitting the rolling big in traffic. And the team was finding Carroll cutting to the basket. This was all predicated on DeMar moving the ball and giving it up early.

That's one of my biggest issues. Casey has skewed to offense to such an extreme level to compensate for DeMar's lack of pace & space that it precludes running other types of high percentage basketball plays in favor of opening up driving seams for DeMar.

BINGO. I've been watching a ton of 2014 Raps games and the ball movement was consistently great for the most part. DeMar did a lot of work off the ball (he was actually CUTTING) and he played very well within the system.

I don't think it's a coincidence at all that DeMar's impact stats have taken a hit these two past seasons even though his numbers have gone up. His usage needs to come back down to where they were before.

[SkywalkerAC]

Demar's impact stats have taken a hit these last two seasons? That's news to me.

[DanH]

Demar's impact stats have taken a hit these last two seasons? That's news to me.

Nah, DeMar's been consistently almost exactly a zero impact player since his first all star season. Before then he was much worse, but since he's seen almost no change at all, if we're judging by RPM (his BPM has gone up in the past two seasons compared to the prior two).

[The Great One]

Zero impact player? i don't know what that means. Dude averaged 27ppg last year. He singlehandedly won us Game 4 last year against the Bucks. He had a monster game. Also had s huge game in G6 scoring 32 on 12/24 shooting. That's pretty impactful to me.

[tDotted]

Demar's impact stats have taken a hit these last two seasons? That's news to me.

Over the 2014 & 2015 seasons he had a +3.3 on court rating and was only a very negligible negative at -0.5 for on-off.

2016 & 2017 seasons he's had a +3 on court rating (somehow he's slightly worse on much better teams) and he's also been a bigger negative at - 5.4.

The "smoking barrel" seems to be his usage.

[DanH]

Over the 2014 & 2015 seasons he had a +3.3 on court rating and was only a very negligible negative at -0.5 for on-off.

2016 & 2017 seasons he's had a +3 on court rating (somehow he's slightly worse on much better teams) and he's also been a bigger negative at - 5.4.

The "smoking barrel" seems to be his usage.

There's an easy answer here. Casey smartened up and started using both stars consistently with the bench units. So DeMar's "off" rating went from a bunch of scrubs playing together, to Lowry ravaging opposing bench units.

[golden]

Zero impact player? i don't know what that means. Dude averaged 27ppg last year. He singlehandedly won us Game 4 last year against the Bucks. He had a monster game. Also had s huge game in G6 scoring 32 on 12/24 shooting. That's pretty impactful to me.

DanH is talking about "net" impact. He's a great individual scorer, but because of his flaws on offense and weak defense, he gives back a lot of what he contributes on offense. Of course, DeMar's going to have a huge PPG impact, because the system has been designed to maximize his game to provide him with space and open up driving lanes for him and Lowry. Unfortunately, for the offense to create space for DeMar we end up running less high percentage plays, like cutters or hitting rolling bigs or other plays like non Lowry/DD catch & shoots as a first option. This also contributes to lowering DeMar's "net" impact.

[Shaolin Fantastic]

Zero impact player? i don't know what that means. Dude averaged 27ppg last year. He singlehandedly won us Game 4 last year against the Bucks. He had a monster game. Also had s huge game in G6 scoring 32 on 12/24 shooting. That's pretty impactful to me.

He's going by on-off court stats where we defend significantly better with DeMar off the floor and only get a little worse on offense. And RPM which has never rated him highly (he's 10th in oRPM which is ok, and 77th in dRPM, 23rd overall).

It can be dicey to use those stats to say a player has "zero impact". Especially with a "stagger" player like DeMar (or Kyrie actually to an extent). DeMar, by design, plays a lot of his minutes with Lowry off the floor; we stagger the two of them so one is on at all times, so they only play about 2/3 of their minutes together. Since Lowry is the best and highest impact player, those 12-13 minutes that Lowry is on and DeMar isn't can make his "off" numbers for the team look very good (but bad for him). This is because these are those Lowry+Bench units typically playing against other benches and annihilating them.

He's not a zero impact player though, that's not the right conclusion to draw from the data given. DeRozan's value comes in that he can handle very high usage with good efficiency and put up high production games. This allows the team to stay afloat when Lowry is not on the court (hence why we're a slightly positive netRTG with Lowry off and not much worse). So he does impact games significantly, and the team would be much worse without him, just not as much worse than it'd be without Lowry.

However with players like DeRozan, even absent Lowry you can have a good team. But you need to be an elite defensive team (think Iverson's Sixers). Then someone like him, even though he doesn't elevate the entire team, can produce enough for you offensively that your oRTG tips over your dRTG by a good amount and you win games. This is what we saw when Lowry was injured. DeMar ramped his production up to give us a good offense while he was on the floor (110 oRTG with him on from Feb 24th - April 4th, which is like a top 5-7 offense) and it was putrid when he wasn't (101 oRTG), and the team as a whole was playing at a very high level defensively (4th best defensive team in the league for that time period with a 103 dRTG) although better with him off the floor obviously because Powell is a superior defender.

[golden]

He's going by on-off court stats where we defend significantly better with DeMar off the floor and only get a little worse on offense. And RPM which has never rated him highly (he's 10th in oRPM which is ok, and 77th in dRPM, 23rd overall).

It can be dicey to use those stats to say a player has "zero impact". Especially with a "stagger" player like DeMar (or Kyrie actually to an extent). DeMar, by design, plays a lot of his minutes with Lowry off the floor; we stagger the two of them so one is on at all times, so they only play about 2/3 of their minutes together. Since Lowry is the best and highest impact player, those 12-13 minutes that Lowry is on and DeMar isn't can make his "off" numbers for the team look very good (but bad for him). This is because these are those Lowry+Bench units typically playing against other benches and annihilating them.

He's not a zero impact player though, that's not the right conclusion to draw from the data given. DeRozan's value comes in that he can handle very high usage with good efficiency and put up high production games. This allows the team to stay afloat when Lowry is not on the court (hence why we're a slightly positive netRTG with Lowry off and not much worse). So he does impact games significantly, and the team would be much worse without him, just not as much worse than it'd be without Lowry.

However with players like DeRozan, even absent Lowry you can have a good team. But you need to be an elite defensive team (think Iverson's Sixers). Then someone like him, even though he doesn't elevate the entire team, can produce enough for you offensively that your oRTG tips over your dRTG by a good amount and you win games. This is what we saw when Lowry was injured. DeMar ramped his production up to give us a good offense while he was on the floor (110 oRTG with him on from Feb 24th - April 4th, which is like a top 5-7 offense) and it was putrid when he wasn't (101 oRTG), and the team as a whole was playing at a very high level defensively (4th best defensive team in the league for that time period with a 103 dRTG) although better with him off the floor obviously because Powell is a superior defender.

Good post. Your numbers confirm the eye test for that nice stretch of games without Lowry where DeMar was playing a great overall floor game, with a good mix of attacking, deferring and defense.

Somehow, when you add Lowry back into the equation, they end up excluding their teammates again, and both of them stop playing defense. I wonder if Lowry is the bigger culprit, with Casey being powerless to reign him in to play a more team oriented game?

[Shaolin Fantastic]

Good post. Your numbers confirm the eye test for that nice stretch of games without Lowry where DeMar was playing a great overall floor game, with a good mix of attacking, deferring and defense.

Somehow, when you add Lowry back into the equation, they end up excluding their teammates again, and both of them stop playing defense. I wonder if Lowry is the bigger culprit, with Casey being powerless to reign him in to play a more team oriented game?

Not sure what the reason is. I do think that it's more problematic for Lowry to play poor defense than DeMar though. DeMar is usually guarding the least dangerous of the two wings, not really a player who will kill us. Lowry is typically guarding opposing point guards. On many teams this is the other team's best or second best player, particularly true for our biggest rivals: Cleveland (IT), Washington (Wall) and Boston (Kyrie). DeMar would likely be on J.R. Smith, Porter and Jaylen Brown or Smart against those teams. Good players, but not guys that can kill you really. Although DeMar's lapses can lead to breakdowns in the team's defense as a whole, at which point it affects everyone, not just his matchup.

[special1]

Zero impact player? i don't know what that means. Dude averaged 27ppg last year. He singlehandedly won us Game 4 last year against the Bucks. He had a monster game. Also had s huge game in G6 scoring 32 on 12/24 shooting. That's pretty impactful to me.

Demar being a "Zero Impact player" is solely an opinion based on valuing certain stats over others.

Demar is a team leader. Look what happened when Lowry went down and the amazing stretch of games he had..... Look at the series vs. The Bucks in 2017 playoffs. Look at the past 4 years and him making 3 all-star games and Team USA and now All-NBA..... lol

A lot of people with better basketball acumen obviously disagrees with that kind of talk.








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[DanH]

Demar being a "Zero Impact player" is solely an opinion based on valuing certain stats over others.

Demar is a team leader. Look what happened when Lowry went down and the amazing stretch of games he had..... Look at the series vs. The Bucks in 2017 playoffs. Look at the past 4 years and him making 3 all-star games and Team USA and now All-NBA..... lol

A lot of people with better basketball acumen obviously disagrees with that kind of talk.








Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Keep in kind when I speak of impact, I explicitly exclude production. DeMar is a heck of a producer. But without high impact teammates around him, that's not getting you anywhere. The good news is, we have a star impact guy who fits great beside DeMar and who can't handle being the primary producer.

It's not a bad thing, under this team construct. But it is exactly the sort of thing we should be aware of - for conversations like the Irving talk of late, for example.

[golden]

Keep in kind when I speak of impact, I explicitly exclude production. DeMar is a heck of a producer. But without high impact teammates around him, that's not getting you anywhere. The good news is, we have a star impact guy who fits great beside DeMar and who can't handle being the primary producer.

It's not a bad thing, under this team construct. But it is exactly the sort of thing we should be aware of - for conversations like the Irving talk of late, for example.

Raps were 14-7 without our "impact" player, Lowry. It was an easier schedule, but still that is clearly a major impact being made by DeMar - without Lowry. As Shaolin pointed out, the "team construct" without Lowry made an adjustment in style to have more ball movement, better decision making and better team defense. Your ongoing thesis seems to be that this team will completely fall apart without Lowry, but that doesn't necessarily hold water. The Raps and DeMar seemed to play more like a team and better defense when Lowry was out, but lost that chemistry when Lowry returned.

Case in point: using your impact stats, heading into the playoffs the Raps should have been championship-level dominant if you could simply add the numerical impact that Lowry is supposed to bring and subtract Joseph. But it doesn't exactly work that way on the court because of chemistry.