Why the Mavs are Potentially Much Better Already...

[mavsluvr]

You may be right, but there is a LOT of data that says otherwise and points to JR as the single largest on-court issue over the course of the entire season and thousands of minutes.


 

Yes, as I stated, KP is the elephant in the room because of his salary and how he has not lived into the expectation of being the second star. For whatever reasons, the Mavs seem to be currently choosing to see if coaching and system change and improved health is enough to change the dynamics with him. 


And back to the data: There is much more data that suggests there is more hope with a future KP fit than there was with JR. JR had a few good lineups, but the overall data screamed that he was not a good fit on this team and with Luka. 

Over the course of 3,461 minutes JR was a team worst -6.3 on/off (next closest was -3.4). In the last 15 regular season games with a reduced role in place he was still -5.2 on/off. In the playoffs for anyone who played more than 50 minutes, he was a team worst -33.6 on/off. Large role, small role, regular season, playoffs...it didn't matter, JR playing was consistent with the team's performance being at its worst.

We agree that JR was not a good fit with the team. 

You can't judge whether a player was his team's "worst problem" by on-off numbers. The fact that JR was a part of some very successful lineups for a large number of minutes would seem to be an indication that he was also required to play in some horrible lineups that had very poor defensive performances as a group. If the coaching/analytics staff had thought he was 100% negative and the team's worst problem, they would have just taken him off the floor altogether. 

On-off numbers also do not result in a ranking of what the team's worst problems are -- a player could play ten minutes the whole season and have the roster's worst on-off number in those ten minutes. That doesn't mean that guy is the team's worst problem. 

I submit that JRich should have been traded, but that he wasn't close to important enough to be the team's worst problem. Also, that turning him into a trade exception didn't solve anything, or make the team at all better at this point. It may turn out to have been a step in the direction of acquiring better talent, and I hope it is, but so far, as far as an on-court difference, we're still waiting. 

I don't have a problem with the Bullock signing, but don't view him as a replacement for Richardson's position at all. They didn't have to trade JR to get him, and the playmaking they had hoped to get from Richardson is not a feature of Bullock's game, as far as I know. 

If the front office gets credit for the Richardson trade, I think it is that they accomplished it without attaching an asset. Actually, the on-court team isn't any better for the trade, at this point. They could have taken him off the floor as a coaching decision.