Statistical Trivia

[Mike G]

Players to have averaged 35 Pts/100 poss. while shooting .650 TS%

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35-65     yr  Pts/100  TS%   Ast%   TO%    Usg%  ORtg  DRtg
Dantley  1984   37.1  .652   16.2   12.4   28.2   126   112
Barkley  1988   35.7  .665   14.1   15.2   26.7   126   108
Amar'e   2008   36.9  .656    7.5   10.3   28.2   124   104
Curry    2016   42.5  .669   33.7   12.9   32.6   125   103
Curry    2017   37.9  .661   27.6   13.0   29.6   123   107
Durant   2017   37.5  .681   22.0   10.3   27.6   129   101

Durant with both highest ORtg and lowest DRtg. Tied for best TO%, and with 3X the assists Amar'e had.
Change from 35/100 to 25+ pts/36 min, and it's the same list plus Dantley in '83. Nobody before that.

Players with 35 pts/100 and .600 TS% and >40 Ast%

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35-60-40  yr  Pts/100  TS%   Ast%   TO%    Usg%  ORtg  DRtg
LeBron   2010  40.0   .604   41.8   12.3   33.5   121   102
Harden   2017  38.1   .605   53.8   19.0   33.9   120   109

That was LeBron's first trip over .600 and >.250 3PA rate. Career high Ast% until this season.
Last night's games are not included in these 2017 rates.
http://bkref.com/tiny/UmKKm
LeBron has more MVP Award Shares than the next 3 active players combined (Durant, Curry, Nowitzki)

[Mike G]

As of today, Anthony Davis ranks tied for 6th in career blocks through his age-23 season; behind Josh Smith, Shaq, Dwight, Ibaka, and Shawn Bradley.
Andrei Kirilenko in his first 4 seasons also had 685 blocks, and also in 281 games.
http://bkref.com/tiny/yno1Z

Of these, only Shaq and Dwight had more points at this age; only Smith and Kirilenko more steals; only Ibaka with lower turnover rates.
AD's .785 FT% ranks only behind AK's .786 -- the actual difference is .0006

Davis better than Shaq?
PER 26.7 - 26.6
WS/48 .209 - .208
BPM 4.4 - 5.0

[Mike G]

After 24 games, the Pacers have been credited with assists on .606 of their FG in 11 road games. This is .050 higher than league avg.
At home, their Ast/FG ratio is just .533 -- and this is .051 less than league norm at home.
With an away/home Ast/FG ratio of 1.14, it's as if 1/7 of home assists are not being counted.

Meanwhile, their shotblocking at home is a league-high .082 of opponents' FGA. On the road it's just .046 -- in the bottom 5 of rates.
This suggests that almost 40% of those home blocks would not be blocks in opponent venues.

League-wide, team scorekeepers are behaving pretty well these days. Ast/FG are on avg 3.4% inflated at home, while blocks are 6.6% higher (per opp. FGA).

[bchaikin]

currently the 3 players to have played the most minutes on the lakers are all reserves - jordan clarkson (728 min/3 starts), brandon ingram (673/7), and lou williams (627/0)...

[Mike G]

Lou Williams is the Lakers' top scorer, with 33% more points than anyone else; leads the team in assists; and this is in just 25 mpg.
In his last 4 games, he has 137 points in just 126 total minutes.

We recently saw an incredible mark in points per minute. Since 1983-84, most point in fewest minutes, one game:

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pts  min  player     date
81   42   Kobe      01-22-06
62   33   Kobe      12-20-05
60   29  K Thompson 12-05-16
42   27   Gervin    11-10-84
41   26   Ewing     04-13-88
40   24   Floyd     02-26-91
38   21   Q Dailey  01-28-86
36   20   Kiki      04-15-88
30   19   Durant    12-18-14
26   16   I Thomas  12-14-12
24   10   H James   04-15-97

http://bkref.com/tiny/3589P
Henry James (Atl) got his 24/10 vs the Nets in a game the Nets led by 19 after the 3rd, Atl winning by 8.
James' 10 minutes were the fewest of any Hawks player in the game, and his 24 pts led them.
(Nets dropped to 24-55; they may have been tanking.)

So Klay Thompson is the only player with more than 2 points/min AND >24 points in a game, since 1983 at least.
Karl Malone just misses the list with 61 pts in 33 min. -- a 48-pt win over a good Bucks team.

EDIT -- 60 pts in 29 min is a rate of 100 pts in 48.3 minutes -- what the Clippers average.

[Mike G]

It seems there is an explosion in prolific scorers this season. The perennial greats are still great, and there are several players who were very good and now seem to be elite.
In points per 100 possessions, the top 100 in the last 20 years are all 35.5 or better Pts/100. In 20 years, that would be an avg of 5 per year. Limited to those going 24+ mpg:

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year   #    35.5 Pts/100
1998   3   Shaq, Jordan, Malone
1999   1   Shaq
2000   3   Shaq, Malone, Iverson
2001   5   Iverson, Shaq, Stack, Carter, Kobe
2002   3   Shaq, Iverson, Jordan
2003   3   McGrady, Shaq, Kobe
2004   1   McGrady
2005   5   J O'Neal, Iverson, Amar'e, Kobe, Carter
2006  10  Kobe, Ivy, LBJ, Dirk, Wade, Melo, Gil, TMac, Pierce, Yao
2007   9   Kobe, Yao, Wade, Melo, Arenas, Dirk, TMac, Redd, Zach
2008   3   LeBron, Amar'e, Kobe
2009   5   Wade, LeBron, Kobe, Dirk, Granger
2010   5   LeBron, Durant, Wade, Melo, Kobe
2011   7   Kobe, Durant, Martin, LeBron, Wade, Melo, Rose
2012   3   Kobe, LeBron, Durant
2013   4   Melo, Durant, LeBron, Kobe
2014   5   Durant, LeBron, Melo, Westbrook, Cousins
2015   8   Westy, Durant, Harden, LeBron, Wade, Melo, Curry, DMC
2016   5   Curry, Durant, Harden, Cousins, LeBron
2017  11   Westy, DMC, I Thomas, DeRozan, A Davis, Lillard, Harden,
.          Lou Williams, Kawhi, Embiid, Durant

http://bkref.com/tiny/En1jE
Of course some of the 11 could drop off; but Durant is at 36.2, the rest >36.7
Waiting in the wings are Curry (35.3), Irving, Love, LeBron, and Butler, all >34.0 pts/100

[Mike G]

Another way to look at this year's outburst of PPG outbursts: How many years since each franchise had a higher PPG player for a season.
In a normal 2-season interval, we could expect half of team-high scorers to be in year 1, half in yr 2. But there only 4 teams with PPG leaders less than last season.
Of those remaining, 2/3 of teams should not contain their highest scorer in 3 years; but 25/26 of those teams go back further.
Language fails, so here's a table of #yrs since each team had a higher PPG by someone else:

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yrs   2016-17 PPG   pos    tm    PPG    PPG    yr     player
47   LeBron James    SF   Cle   25.5         
44  DeMarcus Cousins  C   Sac   29.1   34.0   1973   Nate Archibald
35   James Harden    PG   Hou   27.4   31.1   1982   Moses Malone
32   Carmelo Anthony SF   NYK   22.5   32.9   1985   Bernard King
29   Isaiah Thomas   PG   Bos   27.0   29.9   1988   Larry Bird
28   Damian Lillard  PG   Por   27.0   27.2   1989   Clyde Drexler
27   Anthony Davis   PF   NOP   29.7         
16   DeMar DeRozan   SG   Tor   27.8   27.6   2001   Vince Carter
15   Kawhi Leonard   SF   SAS   24.3   25.5   2002   Tim Duncan
15   Gordon Hayward  SF   Uta   22.0   22.4   2002   Karl Malone
13   Kemba Walker    PG   Cha   22.6         
11   Blake Griffin   PF   LAC   21.2   24.7   2006   Elton Brand
10   John Wall       PG   Was   23.5   28.4   2007   Gilbert Arenas
10  G. Antetokounmpo SG   Mil   23.4   26.7   2007   Michael Redd
8   Joel Embiid       C   Phl   18.4   18.8   2009   Andre Iguodala
7   Paul George      SF   Ind   21.7   24.1   2010   Danny Granger
6   Jimmy Butler     SF   Chi   24.4   25.0   2011   Derrick Rose
6   Marc Gasol        C   Mem   20.0   20.1   2011   Zach Randolph
5   Brook Lopez       C   Brk   20.4   21.0   2012   Deron Williams
5   Paul Millsap     PF   Atl   17.6   18.6   2012   Joe Johnson
4   Lou Williams     SG   LAL   18.9   27.3   2013   Kobe Bryant
3  Russell Westbrook PG   OkC   31.8   32.0   2014   Kevin Durant
3  Karl-Anthony Towns C   Min   22.1   26.1   2014   Kevin Love
3   Harrison Barnes  SF   Dal   20.6   21.7   2014   Dirk Nowitzki
3   Eric Bledsoe     PG   Phx   20.0   20.3   2014   Goran Dragic
2   Goran Dragic     PG   Mia   19.3   21.5   2015   Dwyane Wade
1   Kevin Durant     SF   GSW   25.9   30.1   2016   Stephen Curry
1   Evan Fournier    SG   Orl   17.8   18.2   2016   Nikola Vucevic
1   Wilson Chandler  SF   Den   16.9   19.5   2016  Danilo Gallinari
1   Tobias Harris    PF   Det   15.9   18.8   2016   Reggie Jackson

LeBron has the 9 highest PPG years for the Cavs. The most recent higher one was 7 yrs ago.
Davis has the franchise high PPG for the Hornets/Pelicans, and Walker has the highest for the Bobcats/Hornets, in those franchise histories.

[Mike G]

Three teams this year have 3 players averaging 20+ PPG -- The Cavs (Irving is #2), the Warriors (K Thompson is #3), and the Wolves -- Wiggins, Towns, and LaVine, all in the 21-22 range. In each case, their Big 3 have scored 59-62% of their points.
Here are the best #2 scorers, #3, and so on per team. Not filtered for # of games played.

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#    player         tm    PPG       #    player        tm    PPG
2   Stephen Curry  GSW   24.4      
3   Kevin Love     Cle   21.9      10   Jamal Murray   Den   9.0
4   Nick Young     LAL   14.3      11   Richaun Holmes Phl   6.9
5   Marcus Morris  Det   13.2      12  Hollis Thompson Phl   5.7
6  Justise Winslow Mia   11.8      13  Reggie Williams NOP   5.0
7   James Johnson  Mia   10.6      14   Archie Goodwin NOP   5.0
8  Josh Richardson Mia   10.1      15   Alexis Ajinca  NOP   4.5
9   Dario Saric    Phl    9.1      16   Anthony Brown  NOP   3.8

Does not include yesterday's games.

And here are the lowest PPG for scoring rank on a team:

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#    player         tm    PPG      #    player        tm    PPG
2   Nicolas Batum   Cha  14.2      8 Shaun Livingston GSW   4.8
3   Greg Monroe     Mil   9.3      9   Bobby Portis   Chi   4.2
4   Ty Lawson       Sac   7.9     10   Shabazz Napier Por   3.2
5   Andre Roberson  OkC   7.2     11   Jakob Poeltl   Tor   2.4
6   JaVale McGee    GSW   5.9     12   Fred VanVleet  Tor   1.4
7   Andre Iguodala  GSW   5.7     13   Bruno Caboclo  Tor    .6

[Mike G]

Player-seasons of at least 30 points, 10 rebounds, and 3 assists per 36 minutes; minimum 1000 min.

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30-10-3    yr     Pts    Reb   Ast
Baylor    1962   31.0   15.1   3.8
Cousins   2017   30.2   10.8   3.6
Westbrook 2017   32.6   10.7  11.2

http://bkref.com/tiny/xs4sh

Baylor qualifies 3 times at 29 Pts/36
At 2.5 Ast/36, Wilt is in once (1963).
Relaxing Reb/36 to 9.0 adds nobody.
At 29-10-2.5, we get Karl Malone 1990.

Pts/36 of 29 or 30 is the elite part of the mix. Drop it to 25-10-3, and we have 24 such occurances.
Kareem has 5 such seasons, Cousins and Baylor each have 4; Pettit, Wilt, Shaq, and Malone 2 each; McAdoo, Love, and Westbrook once (incl. this year).

Other years with 2 such players: 1961 and '62 (Baylor and Pettit), and 2014 (Cousins and Love).

[rlee]

Shockingly Insightful News: In the NBA, if a team doubles the scoring output of its opponent over a significant early portion of a game, it is quite likely to wind up winning!!!!!
Read it here from Elias Bureau:
The Magic jumped out to a 51–25 lead midway through the second quarter. Including Orlando’s win Monday night, NBA teams that score 50 points before giving up more than 25 points are 201–1 over the last 20 seasons, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. The only loss over that span was suffered by the Magic, in the last game in which they took that kind of lead. On Jan. 26, 2012, Orlando led Boston 52–25 and suffered a 91–83 defeat.

[Mike G]

I guess the Magic broke their streak of losing games in which they have a >50-25 lead.

There's still just one final score with a team doubling the output of their opponent: Ind 124-59 Por, on 2-27-98.
http://bkref.com/tiny/Tac7W
The Blazers had just beaten the Bulls in Chicago -- one of only 4 home losses for the eventual champs. It was their first win over the Bulls with Jordan since game 4 in the 1992 Finals, an 0-10 streak.
So they followed their best game in years with the worst game in history.

[Mike G]

Just 13 players in NBA/ABA history have by age 28 reached 12,000 points, 2500 rebounds, and 2500 assists in RS, and with ORtg/DRtg > 1.03 -- Oscar and West and these guys:

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per100:    years     Pts   Reb   Ast  ORtg  DRt
Erving    1972-79   30.3  16.5   5.6   111   97
Magic     1980-88   24.3   9.3  14.0   119  104
Drexler   1984-91   28.3   8.4   7.9   114  105
Jordan    1985-92   41.5   8.1   7.7   121  104

Garnett   1996-05   27.9  15.3   6.3   110  100
Kobe      1997-07   35.4   7.5   6.5   112  105
McGrady   1998-08   33.5   9.3   7.1   108  103
LeBron    2004-13   36.9   9.7   9.3   116  102

Durant    2008-17   36.9   9.6   5.1   117  105
Westbrook 2009-17   32.8   8.8  11.6   109  105
Harden    2010-17   32.4   7.2   8.0   118  106

For Dr. J, that's 5 yrs in the ABA + 3 NBA
LeBron is 3rd in everything.
http://bkref.com/tiny/eQl31
I'm guessing that Oscar and West would meet the 1.03 O/D ratio.

[Mike G]

Who's the weakest MVP in NBA history? I wondered if it could be Derrick Rose?
Here's a ranking of MVP winners in terms of their career Win Shares and VORP, from b-r.com
Ranking formula = (WS +2.5*vorp)/2
The top 400 career VORP players average 2.77 times as many WS as their VORP.
Among mvp winners, the ratio is 2.26; so I went with 2.5 coefficient to equalize their weight.
MVP winners since 1974 on the left; top never-mvp's on the right.

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WV    mvp's    WS  VORP     WV  not mvp  WS VORP
245  K Malone  235 103     186  Stockton 208  66
244  Kareem    273  86     167  Kidd     139  78
242  LeBron    201 113     166  Reggie   174  63
238  Jordan    214 104     162  Paul     151  70
215  Duncan    206  89     162  Drexler  136  76
213  Garnett   191  94     152  Pierce   150  62
205  Barkley   177  94     152  Payton   146  63
190  Robinson  179  81     150  Pippen   125  70
183  Shaq      182  74     145  R Allen  145  58
182  Nowitzki  200  66     134  P Gasol  134  53
178  Hakeem    163  77     131  Wade     117  58
176  Kobe      173  72     128  Vince    121  54
175  Magic     156  77     128  Marion   125  52
173  Bird      146  80     125  Parish   147  42
138  Moses     167  43     122  Dantley  134  44
118  Erving    106  52     115  Nance    110  48
117  Durant    119  46     115  Ho Grant 118  44
105  Iverson    99  44     114  Ewing    126  41
104  Nash      130  31     112  McGrady   97  51
90   Curry      80  40     111  Brand    110  45
78   McAdoo     89  27     111  Wilkins  118  42
76   Cowens     86  26     111  Lanier   117  42
46   Walton     39  21     110  Ginobili 103  46
30   D Rose     33  11     109  Sikma    113  42

These are regular season only. Some oddities for players whose VORP only goes back to 1974, but their WS go back earlier.

[Mike G]

Rose picked up 13 of his 33 (to date) career Win Shares in his MVP season, 2010-11. That's 39% of his career WS.
He got 6.0 of his as-yet 10.5 VORP, 57%

It's not really his fault that he won MVP or got injured or failed to recover any semblance of his all-NBA form. But even that one year, did he even arguably deserve to win it?

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2010-11   PER    WS   WS/48  BPM  VORP   W%
LeBron   27.3   15.6  .244   8.6   8.2  .707
Paul     23.7   13.9  .232   6.4   6.1  .561
Rose     23.5   13.1  .208   5.9   6.0  .756
P Gasol  23.3   14.7  .232   5.3   5.6  .695
Dwight   26.1   14.4  .235   4.8   5.0  .634

The almighty Team Win% did it.

Rose doesn't actually show up in the list of players who have hit 6.0 vorp in a year, so he must be a bit under.
http://bkref.com/tiny/xNyRh
These others have done it more than once; MVP winners again on the left:

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VORP > 6.0    
11  LeBron    6   Drexler
10  Jordan    6   Pippen
10  Malone    4   Paul
8   Barkley   3   Harden  
8   Bird      3   Wade
8  Robinson   3  Westbrook
7 + Kareem    2   Brand
7   Garnett   2 + Frazier
6   Magic     2 + Lanier
4   Duncan    2   McGrady
3   Curry     2   Payton
3   Durant
3   Erving
3   Shaq
3   Hakeem
2   Kobe
2   Nowitzki
1 + McAdoo

Hitting 6.0 just one time: Arenas, Blaylock, Carter, Francis, Ho Grant, Penny, G Hill, Kidd, Kirilenko, Kawhi, Lever, Love, Lowry, Marion, Noah, Alvin Robertson, and Webber.
Cowens, Walton, Moses, Iverson, and Nash also miss the list, among MVP winners.

Other than Moses, those MVP's also never reached Rose's peak of 13 Win Shares:

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WS > 13
12  Malone     9  Stockton
11  LeBron     5   Paul
11  Jordan     3   Ewing
8  Robinson    3   Dwight
6 + Kareem     3   Wade
6   Bird       2   Billups
6   Duncan     2   Brand
6   Nowitzki   2   Dantley
6   Shaq       2   P Gasol
5   Barkley    2   Harden
4   Kobe       2   Marion
4   Durant     2  Moncrief
4   Garnett    2   Amar'e
4   Magic
4   Moses
3   Curry
2   Erving
2 + McAdoo
2   Olajuwon

18 others have collected 13+ WS in a single season since 1974.

[Mike G]

Most of these are ensemble teams. Ivy's Sixers not so much, though some role players had career years.

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'74 Bos    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP
Havlicek  17.4   9.7  .151   2.7   3.7
Cowens    16.6   9.3  .134   2.6   3.9
P Silas   14.5   7.7  .141   1.3   2.2
JJ White  14.0   7.3  .108  - .1   1.6
Nelson    16.1   5.9  .162  - .1    .8


'77 Por    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP
Walton    22.9  10.2  .215   7.0   5.1
M Lucas   18.3   8.7  .147   1.8   2.7
Twardzik  16.3   7.5  .186   4.2   3.1
Gross     16.2   7.4  .159   3.7   3.2
Steele    16.3   5.2  .148   1.5   1.5


'01 Phl    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP 
Iverson   24.0  11.8  .190   4.8   5.1
Lynch     12.4   6.5  .118   2.3   2.9
McKie     15.1   5.9  .118   1.9   2.4
T Hill    12.4   5.5  .111  -1.7    .2
Ratliff   16.3   5.2  .138   3.3   2.4


'05 Phx    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP
Amar'e    26.6  14.6  .243   3.4   3.9
Marion    21.7  12.5  .191   4.9   5.5
Nash      22.0  10.9  .203   1.7   2.4
J Johnson 15.1   7.6  .112   2.3   3.5
Q Rich    13.6   5.8  .098   1.9   2.8


'06 Phx    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP
Marion    23.6  14.6  .214   5.3   5.9
Nash      23.3  12.4  .212   3.7   4.0
Diaw      17.3   8.9  .149   3.1   3.7
Bell      12.9   6.8  .110   1.8   2.8
J Jones   13.2   4.0  .110  - .3    .7


'11 Chi    PER   WS   ws/48  BPM  VORP
Rose      23.5  13.1  .208   5.9   6.0
Deng      15.5   9.9  .149   2.2   3.4
Noah      18.8   6.7  .205   4.9   2.8
Boozer    18.8   5.8  .149    .7   1.3
R Brewer  13.8   5.4  .147   1.8   1.7