I keep seeing the same lying with stats taking place and I am tired of repeating myself so I’m making a post for myself and anyone else’s sake so that we can point here next time we see a JB truther trying to lie with stats to make the case that JB is something he isn’t (namely: our second best player).
When I say “lying with stats” I am referring to cherry picking specific individual stats like ppg or number of second-team all pro selections last season. Individual stats like this are basically meaningless because they do not tell a complete enough story. Nothing is perfect, but metrics are the best thing we have in sports for determining a players value. For the NBA there are a bunch of different metrics we use. These are better than your eyes, feelings and cherry picked stats.
Before I get to the numbers, every time I bring this up I am accused of hating JB so I need to always preface this by saying I like JB and I am glad he is on the team. But the numbers don’t lie and I a not going to accept the truther reality that he is our second best player just because I like him. So let’s see who the numbers actually say are our best players:
Here are our 5 starters with their respective value and team-rank in parenthesis for the top metrics we have for the NBA.
| Player | EPM | DPM | LEBRON | BPM | WS/48 | RPM | FIC | kWPA | Average Team Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tatum | 4.7 (1) | 5.58 (1) | 4.42 (1) | 5.4 (2) | .187 (2) | 9.01 (1) | 303.1 (1) | 5.64 (1) | 1.25 |
| Porzingus | 4.0 (2) | 3.27 (2) | 3.05 (3) | 5.5 (1) | .241 (1) | 5.15 (2) | 218.8 (2) | 4.68 (2) | 1.875 |
| White | 2.0 (3) | 2.33 (4) | 2.41 (4) | 3.1 (4) | .162 (4) | 4.58 (3) | 154.9 (5) | 3.45 (4) | 3.875 |
| Jrue | 0.6 (4) | 3.7 (3) | 3.47 (2) | 0.9 (6) | .099 (7) | 4.26 (4) | 192.0 (3) | 4.21 (3) | 4 |
| Brown | 0.4 (5) | 1.83 (5) | 0.81 (5) | -0.5 (7) | .079 (8) | 3.91 (5) | 169.6 (4) | 3.08 (5) | 5.5 |
But that is just for this season. Let’s just look at a few to see historical data to see if maybe JB is just slumping this season (spoiler: he isn’t):
We know who JB is. He isn’t a rookie anymore; we have years of data telling us who he is. We love him on the team but know he isn’t our second best player. He might be the second best player on a lot of other teams, but he hasn’t been that in Boston for some time now (if ever).
#FAQ
- Do you just hate JB? No I like JB and I am glad he is on the team
- What about ? I do not care about that stat. See the table above.
- I still feel like JB is our second best player because . That isn’t a question.
- Why even go through the effort of arguing he isn’t our second best player? Why does it matter? It doesn’t. But I am sick of having the same conversation after every game. When he has a bad game, we have to see truthers say “iT’s JuSt OnE GamE”. When he has a good game we have to hear them say “WheRe ArE aLL tHe jB HatErs Now?”. Now every time I get int hat argument I can just link here and move on with my life.
I think you are misrepresenting how metrics work. We can argue order, but intuitively when you look at the rankings of any metric it will have players grouped about where you expect. Most have Jokic as the best player in the NBA and a top 10 consisting of players you expect to see there.
JB is good at scoring a lot of points but I do not consider that an elite scorer because he does it with poor efficiency. For players who average over 20 ppg JB ranks among the bottom in TS%. Metrics attempt to normalize related stats like that to quantify his offensive contribution as a single number. They do not penalize players who score a lot with elite efficiency but down pass enough. A lot of metrics also adjust by position so a PF isn’t expected to have as many assists as a guard. JB also turns the ball over a bunch, which metrics penalize heavily, rightfully so. We all witnessed his turnover problems in multiple playoffs in a row. He had games where he was turning it over more than entire other teams.