This year's incarnation of the Celtics features a strong offense and a mediocre defense, representing an interesting change from last year which, though comparable in win loss record, was based on a strong defense and middling offense. The only major change from last year was the addition of Al Horford. By watching, or by a quick basketball reference lookup, it is clear that rebounding is an issue for the Celtics. The mediocre defense and bad rebounding are not independent, and in my opinion both areas are generally dominated by the play of the frontcourt.
So I thought it would be interesting to look at the various frontcourt combinations used by Brad Stevens this year, using nbawowy.com, and maybe open up a discussion about the various combinations and what people think is lacking.
I looked at the five most common two man combinations this year, which altogether account for 62% of all minutes played. Notably I didnt look at combinations involving Zeller, both because including him would have increased the number of combinations combinatorially (ha), and also because I hate Zeller and hope he does not feature in our playoff rotation. Zeller has played approximately in 16% of the minutes this season.
The most common combinations are, in order of minutes played: Johnson-Horford, Jerebko-Olynyk (!), Horford-Olynyk, Johnson-Olynyk, Jerebko-Horford.
Lets start with looking at how effective each pairing has been by looking at their net rating, which is 100 times points per possession minus points allowed per possession. On a team level, this simple statistic is a very good indicator of team strength.
Celtics Overall: +2.2
Johnson-Horford: +7.9
Johnson-Olynyk: +0.3
Horford-Olynyk: +3.6
Jerebko-Olynyk: +3.5
Jerebko-Horford: +8
Right off the bat there are some interesting numbers. The strongest pairing for net rating is Jerebko-Horford. I was surprised by this, since Jerebko has looked generally useless this year. I think I have a hypothesis for this, which I will get to below. Also interesting is how strong the Johnson-Horford pairing is, since it seems that is usually not the frontcourt that closes out the games.
Here are some other interesting traits for each pair.
Johnson-Horford
Jerebko-Horford
So I thought it would be interesting to look at the various frontcourt combinations used by Brad Stevens this year, using nbawowy.com, and maybe open up a discussion about the various combinations and what people think is lacking.
I looked at the five most common two man combinations this year, which altogether account for 62% of all minutes played. Notably I didnt look at combinations involving Zeller, both because including him would have increased the number of combinations combinatorially (ha), and also because I hate Zeller and hope he does not feature in our playoff rotation. Zeller has played approximately in 16% of the minutes this season.
The most common combinations are, in order of minutes played: Johnson-Horford, Jerebko-Olynyk (!), Horford-Olynyk, Johnson-Olynyk, Jerebko-Horford.
Lets start with looking at how effective each pairing has been by looking at their net rating, which is 100 times points per possession minus points allowed per possession. On a team level, this simple statistic is a very good indicator of team strength.
Celtics Overall: +2.2
Johnson-Horford: +7.9
Johnson-Olynyk: +0.3
Horford-Olynyk: +3.6
Jerebko-Olynyk: +3.5
Jerebko-Horford: +8
Right off the bat there are some interesting numbers. The strongest pairing for net rating is Jerebko-Horford. I was surprised by this, since Jerebko has looked generally useless this year. I think I have a hypothesis for this, which I will get to below. Also interesting is how strong the Johnson-Horford pairing is, since it seems that is usually not the frontcourt that closes out the games.
Here are some other interesting traits for each pair.
Johnson-Horford
- Play at a much slower pace than all other pairings and slower than the team overall (90.8 possessions/game), the team overall plays at 94.7. Not surprising. If they were a team this would make them the slowest in the NBA.
- Has a much higher block rate than the team overall (6.6% vs. 4.9%)
- Does several things slightly better than the team, but none stand out. Altogether, however, they add up to a very strong unit.
- Struggles mightily on offense. They score 101.2 points per 100 possessions, far worse than the team rating of 112.7
- This is mostly because the shooting efficiency for this group is very poor. TS% is 52, compared to 56 for the team (true shooting percentage accounts for free throws and the fact that threes are worth 3 points)
- However, they are also very strong defensively, allowing 100.9 points per 100. For reference, the best team defensive rating in the NBA is held by the Utah Jazz 104 points per 100,
- They hardly block any shots (block rate is 2.2%) but cause more turnovers.
- They defend 2 point field goals much better than the team overall (45.5% vs 49.3%). This seems incongruous with the fact that they do not block shots.
- 2nd best offensive grouping, barely behind Horford-Johnson.
- Shooting numbers, rebounding numbers, steals and blocks all very similar to Horford-Johnson.
- Then why is this unit half as good as Horford-Johnson? This is probably the biggest standout. Opposing teams shoot a whopping 42% on threes against this group! That is on 114 attempts for those who want to think about sample sizes.
- Cause the most turnovers of any pairing.
- Defend the 3 very well - opponents shoot 30% against this group. Team percentage is 34.8%.
Jerebko-Horford
- Our second best pairing. Why is that? Here are some clues.
- Highest assist percentage (pct of made baskets resulting from an assist) at 71.4%, team is 64.4%
- Best rebounding group grabbing 48.2% of possible rebounds, team is 47.5%.
- Cause very few turnovers, but defend the three well - 30% opponent pct.
- Defend 2pt fgs well as well at 46.6%