Lightning strikes the plains. The darkness, for but a brief moment, has vanished. As the storm moves in, we await the coming thunder. But there’s nothing yet. How near? How long will we wait? Then, in the back of our minds, we wonder if this was a fabrication, a complete phantasm of light, and the thunder will never reached those hallowed grounds.
2014 in review
Last year, we worried about an injury to their other star, Westbrook, and he ended up only playing 1400 minutes. To counteract his loss, Durant delivered one of the most incredible scoring seasons ever — or any type of season, really. Even though the Thunder lost just one more game than they did in 2013, there were definitely signs they were still better with Westbrook. Their offensive rating dropped by 2.7 points and their adjusted point differential by 2.5 — it was at a crazy 9.2 in 2013. To check the see how good they were with the Durant, Westbrook, and Ibaka in the game like they were for almost the entire season the year before, I calculated an adjusted point differential for games with them separately from games when at least one of the trio was sitting it out. The results? With the trio, their adjusted rating was 8.0 and otherwise it was at 5.6. Since Ibaka only missed a handful of games, that indicates the Thunder were, indeed, better with Westbrook and a rating of 8 would be one of the best we’ve in recent history. (That their rating was still better in 2013 says something about noise and other factors like having Kevin Martin as a tertiary scorer and not having Sefolosha shooting bricks.)
Westbrook’s injury also dampened win predictions for the team pretty severely. Most people over-corrected and predicted somewhere from 50 to 53 wins. Since Westbrook was only supposed to miss a few games at the beginning of the season and he had a clean history of health before that injury, that was overkill, and they won 59 despite him missing more time than expected. But he was healthy for the playoffs and they had the second seed with homecourt advantage in the finals if they had made it there. Everything was set up … and then Ibaka got injured before the conference finals versus the Spurs. Maybe they were going to lose anyway. Even with Ibaka back, they were still outscored with three of the four games at home. But it was two years in a row of bad luck in the playoffs with injuries going to formally healthy players. And you have to wonder, with Durant injured at the beginning of this season, will fortune ever be on their side?
Changes
Exit: Thabo Sefolosha, Derek Fisher, Caron Butler, Hasheem Thabeet, Ryan Gomes, Reggie Williams, Mustafa Shakur, Royal Ivey.
Enter: Anthony Morrow, Mitch McGary, Sebastian Telfair.
The Thunder, ever afraid of the luxury tax, were fine with letting Sefolosha walk even though he was their only premier perimeter defender. He was coming off a bad year shooting, but he was only 29 years-old. Fisher has left for retirement after improbably playing more minutes than Russell Westbrook. Butler was a solution to a lack of shooting on the bench, and it did not work. Everyone else was a bit player. With Durant and Westbrook in their primes, the team brought back … Anthony Morrow, a rookie who was drafted 21st overall, and a third string point guard. Morrow is honestly one of the greatest shooters ever, but he’s so poor at all other aspects of the game he’s borderline unplayable in many situations. It was a terrible summer for Oklahoma City all around. I’m reminded of the cheap Phoenix front office in the Nash-era, selling off first round picks and never investing in what could have been a championship team. (The stupidity of selling off your draft picks to save money is underrated here: rookie contracts are usually bargains and they sold off Luol Deng in 2004; Gortat in 2005 for cash considerations; traded Rondo to Boston for a Cleveland draft pick, cash considerations, and an Arby’s gift card; and Rudy Fernandez to Portland for cash and James Jones.)
Player spotlight
In Westbrook’s absence, the Thunder found an oddly fitting replacement. Now Reggie Jackson will be used to aid all the Durant-less lineups providing a scoring punch. From the bar chart below, he’s an above average shot creator with a high number of assists and a slightly below average shooting efficiency. He’s not a “pure” point guard, however, with a pretty average number of teammate points generated on drives. He is essentially Westbrook-lite as a highly aggressive scoring-first, pass-second guard who attacks the basket looking for his own shot and takes an exceedingly large number of pull-up shots.
Unlike other scoring guards on the bench, Jackson is a pretty good defender overall. Again, like Westbrook, he’s one of the best rebounders for his position and he’s a good ball thief. He not really a gambler, however, because defensive metrics generally like him overall and he has a great eFG% defense percentile score.
Jackson’s shot chart is a chaotic ink blot with a full range of colors covering most of the court. He’s a heavy volume shooter inside even though his field goal percentage there is below average, but I’ll have to point out its similarity to an all-star point guard. It’s remarkable how many facets of the game these two guys share. Jackson is the generic version of Westbrook with a lower quality and without that special edge, but he provides generally the same things.
Jackson’s aggression can be seen in the playlist below versus the elite defense of the Indiana Pacers. He nails a pull-up long two-pointer in the first video when he’s isolated — that’s one of his strongest tendencies. The real treasure is the second video where he zig-zags around the Indiana defense and finishes over exceptional rim protector Ian Mahinmi with ease. The third video is another pull-up and this time it’s a three. You have to play him for the drive where he’s most dangerous, and this gives him more space on those shots. The fruit of his efforts on defense is shown in the fourth video: a fast break dunk. In the fifth video, he scores on Mahinmi again inside, and this time it’s on a circus shot falling backwards. And lastly, he uses a typical pick and roll to free himself for a shot from 18 feet.
On defense, Reggie Jackson is a quick athlete with fast hands who picks up steals and harasses the defense in multiple ways. In the first video, he picks Oladipo’s pocket. In the second video, although Jameer Nelson has aged, it’s impressive how he’s completely unable to get around Jackson even with a pick and he coughs the ball up when he’s stopped in his tracks. His lateral quickness explains the positive scores from defensive metrics. The last video is a good example of the disruption of his fast hands, swiping the ball on what should be a simple play.
Given how often as Westbrook has been criticized for his decisions, it’s fitting and cosmically comic that they unearthed the Westbrook clone of Reggie Jackson. The Thunder will be relying on him until Durant comes back, and with the evidence we have about how he plays with Russell — it was the most successful duo featuring Jackson with in the top 20 duos by minutes played — they’ll be able to hold down the fort.
2015 projected
Make use of time, let not advantage slip;
Beauty within itself should not be wasted:
Fair flowers that are not gather’d in their prime
Rot and consume themselves in little time.
– Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis
Surprisingly, the Thunder are breaking up one of the most coming starting lineups we’ve seen in ages: Westbrook-Sefolosha-Durant-Ibaka-Perkins. Alas, Perkins improbably still has his job, while Sefolosha is gone after one bad shooting season. Perkins is still a great post defender and sets some of the hardest and best screens, but he has reached embarrassing levels most everywhere else. My ratings tag him as -5.5 on offense, which is insane for a starter on a contending team. He was a limited player in Boston, but at least he could finish shots inside. Last season he shot 48.8% inside of three feet, which is something you’d typically only see from an athletically limited short point guard, not a center who takes three shots a game. By the numbers alone, it’s enough to drag a league-leading offense to league average levels. Durant and Westbrook are incredible, distinct dynamic offensive forces, and Perkins is the anchor slowing them down.
According to NBAWOWY.com, over the past two years when Durant, Westbrook, and Perkins have shared the court the team has scored at a rate of 109.6 points per 100 possessions with a true-shooting percentage of 56.1. That is, indeed, high-performing. Yet when their star duo were on the court without Perkins, this rate ballooned to an absurd 119.7 points with a 60.1 TS%. Since there were 1946 minutes in total, it cannot be written off as a fluke. For perspective, the Clippers led the league with a rating of 112.9. The Thunder were worse defensively without Perkins, but those lineups included a lot of “smallball” with Durant at power forward and overall the effect was smaller than on offense.
What’s frustrating is that Oklahoma City is a cheap franchise and one that skirts under the tax line to save a few million rather than splurge and go all-in for a title. They famously sold off Harden because they feared what he’d do to their spending. What’s egregious, then, is that they haven’t used the amnesty on Perkins because that would keep them even further away from the tax and they’d save money on whatever amount the bid is from another team in the amnesty auction. (He does still have value in certain situations, and a contending team could pick him up as insurance against someone big like Dwight Howard or Al Jefferson.) Given how small his production is now, there is no issue of a “lost value” here because you’re already losing value by playing him. The Thunder do remarkably better with Collison at center and could perform just as well but probably better with Adams at center too along with a cheap backup. Instead they let their only perimeter defender go and the little offensive firepower they have with Durant injured will look worse with Perkins mucking things up at center.
After losing Harden, Kevin Martin was a splendid replacement with his shooting abilities. Martin was used to being a primary scorer early in his career, and off of those two his opportunities were so much easier. But, of course, they let him go, and since then the Thunder have been cycling through different guys with little luck for that tertiary scorer role. Reggie Jackson has been the only success, but he was supposed to be their backup point guard. It’s too early to give up on Lamb though: he’s a Sefolosha-esque long-armed shooting guard, but he has a lot of promise as a high volume outside shooter. Andre Roberson is already good on defense, but without Durant it’s hard to have a limited offensive player on the perimeter unless the frontcourt is devoid of Perkins and probably Adams, too. Anthony Morrow is averaging 43% from three-point range and 89% from the line for his career, but there’s a reason he’s been on four different teams in the past three seasons.
Even with the mess on the wings and the inexplicable starter in Perkins, this is still a good team. Ibaka’s generally overrated on defense and underrated on offense. Having a shotblocker who can hit knock midrange shots and expand his range to the three-point line is a rare commodity that complements the other two stars. He’s flanked by Nick Collison, an excellent, smart defender who acts as the requisite glue guy on offense, setting screens, passing to the right spots, and finishing when necessary. Some people dismiss his gaudy plus/minus stats, and some of this might be an artifact from how bad Perkins, but we can’t ignore it: according to basketball-reference, the Durant-Jackson-Perkins trio was +3.8 per 100 possessions in 652 minutes of action. That’s decent yet disappointing considering Durant is involved and Jackson was one of their best players. When you insert Collison into that trio in place of Perkins, it ascends to a comically high +17.8 in 436 minutes, which would put even the ’96 Bulls to shame.
Steven Adams might be their long-term solution at center. He already has that kind of Andrew Bogut-like tenacity to play physical inside, and there are some encouraging signs. He attacks the offensive glass hard, but he’s a good positional rebounder on defense, helping to box out opponents. He has the size and hands to play defense around the rim, and performing well at such a young age bodes well for the future. All they need at center is someone who doesn’t kill them on offense — someone who can catch passes inside when he’s open or free Durant/Westbrook with picks.
Without Durant, those supporting characters will be promoted, but small forward is probably their shallowest position. Their wings are more comfortable as shooting guards, and Perry Jones is typically the guy who steps in to fill Durant’s slot. A lanky guy who out of college only had his frame and looming threat of potential working for him, he looks usable right now because of his defense, but he’s still a pretty limited offensive player. Needless to say, the difference between Durant and Perry Jones at small forward is vast. The Thunder basically have no plan B without Durant for a few games in a row, though why should they? You can’t replace a guy like that and your resources are better spent elsewhere since there’s no way you win a title without him. And last season, Durant played like virtually no one else in history every has considering the full range of his powers.
Compared to the league average, Durant’s shooting efficiency and high volume of shots gave his team the third biggest boost in points per possession since 2001. What he did last season was absurd, and we would have been more impressed if LeBron hadn’t redefined how we think of modern NBA players. Durant combines dead-eye shooting accuracy on the perimeter with some of the best finishing skills in the league and an amazing foul-drawing ability that’s made all the more dangerous with his touch at the line. At 6′ 11″ with the wingspan of a center but the driving ability of a small forward, he gives credence to the expression “like a machine” because it’s incredulous this guy is human. And please note, these are all compliments. Durant seems like a nice kid, and from when I knew him as a potential draft pick for my Blazers back in 2007 I had always heard of him as a hard worker who loved basketball. He was given a gift with his frame, and he’s capitalized on it. Let’s just hope his health won’t be an issue for a long time after this ordeal.
Meanwhile, Westbrook can now be Westbrook to the n-th degree. His injury left no psychological scars because set career highs in usage rate and shooting efficiency. He also had his best defensive rebounding season yet and one of the best ever for his position. It’s no surprise he rated so well in grabbing contested rebounds.
Summary
At full strength, the Thunder will possess enough firepower to go toe-to-toe with any team in the league. A few weeks without Durant will chop off some wins, but the combination of Westbrook and a solid defense will keep them afloat. What helps this season, and what raises the variability of their possible outcomes, is all the youth on the roster. They have several young players who could have breakout seasons. And at the very least, the experiment of Westbrook without Durant will be fascinating: via NBAWOWY.com, in the past two seasons when Durant wasn’t on the court Westbrook’s usage rate was 44.8 on a healthy 55 TS% in 327 minutes. That makes Iverson look like Ibaka.
Though the only thing that matters now for them is the title. No more waiting. Durant’s 26. Ibaka’s 25. So is Westbrook. The time is now.
Wins: 55
Losses: 27
Conference rank: 3rd
League offense rank: 4th
League defense rank: 10th
Edited 10/27/14
