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A couple of deffensive shot charts

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stitches

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A couple of defensive shot charts

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Those are two of the most impressive defensive shot charts I've seen. There are very few players in the league that are on a similar level - from the bigs Ibaka, Bogut and Hibbert, from the perimeter defenders - only Roberson.
The average eFG% for the league is 50.5%, Rudy allows 44% and Elijah allows 43%(Elijah is actually the lowest I've seen for perimeter defender in the league). Some other notables: Kawhi - 49%, Iguodala - 48%, Chris Paul - 50%, Klay Thompson 48%, Khris Middleton - 47%, Andre Roberson - 44%(!!!). Interesting thing about Jimmy Butler who was considered one of the best perimeter defenders - the energy he spends on offense this year has turned him into a below average defender(at least when it comes to contesting shots) this year - from allowing only 46% efg last year, to allowing 53% this year.

From the bigs - Cousins 46%, Whiteside 46%, Henson 45%, Favors 45%, Ibaka 44%, Bogut 44%, Hibbert 43%, DeAndre Jordan 48%...

Anyways, my point was - I really, really hope we keep Millsap at least as a situational option/end of bench guy.
 
Nice find. Millsap plays some tremendous defense. I hope he stays too, simply because there's not really another guy on the team that can play perimeter defense as well as he can.

Of course, the drawback is that his offensive shot chart probably looks the exact same.
 
Great post! Everybody talks about Gobert, but great point on Elijah. I think the Millsap work ethic will continue to develop other elements of his game just like we saw with Paul.
 
LazyD said:
Nice find. Millsap plays some tremendous defense. I hope he stays too, simply because there's not really another guy on the team that can play perimeter defense as well as he can.

Of course, the drawback is that his offensive shot chart probably looks the exact same.
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Just checked Chris Johnson, he's actually pretty good too(allows 45% efg), but his sample size is much smaller(thus susceptible to noise) and most of his minutes are against subs and/or in garbage time, while Millsap had a ton of responsibilities guarding some of the best perimeter players in the league.

If I were Millsap I'd concentrate on working on catch and shoot 3p and I'd try to make a living on those. He turns the ball over a ton when he drives and he's not a good finisher around the rim. The problem this year with him was that in a lot of games he was put into the situation that required him to create offense. I think if he's not required to do that and he plays with other playmakers on the floor, he will probably be more efficient offensively.
 
stitches said:
Interesting thing about Jimmy Butler who was considered one of the best perimeter defenders - the energy he spends on offense this year has turned him into a below average defender(at least when it comes to contesting shots) this year - from allowing only 46% efg last year, to allowing 53% this year.
Click to expand...

Great reason for us not to worry too much about Rudy becoming an offensive force. I'd rather he continue to expend his energy making an impact on the defensive end and let others take a bigger offensive role.
 
stitches said:
Just checked Chris Johnson, he's actually pretty good too(allows 45% efg), but his sample size is much smaller(thus susceptible to noise) and most of his minutes are against subs and/or in garbage time, while Millsap had a ton of responsibilities guarding some of the best perimeter players in the league.
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Yeah...it'd be interesting to see similar shot charts that give standard deviations above/below the expected field goal percentage of the actual players guarded. It's probably also worth mentioning that Millsap's high foul rate helps him here. That is, his aggressive defense makes his defensive FG% look good, but also gives opponents more free throws and limits Millsap's minutes/role.
 
vegas said:
Great post! Everybody talks about Gobert, but great point on Elijah. I think the Millsap work ethic will continue to develop other elements of his game just like we saw with Paul.
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How much more can he improve though? He's what, 27? And I would imagine he's been working on his shot for a few years now. He's a nice defensive piece off the end of the bench, but I'm not expecting him to ever be more than that. Just doesn't seem likely.
 
Howard said:
How much more can he improve though? He's what, 27? And I would imagine he's been working on his shot for a few years now. He's a nice defensive piece off the end of the bench, but I'm not expecting him to ever be more than that. Just doesn't seem likely.
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I don't know how much I would expect of him either, but I do not lack faith in Quin whatsoever... How old was his brother Paul when he went to Atlanta and developed a more consistent outside shot?
 
Mongoose said:
I don't know how much I would expect of him either, but I do not lack faith in Quin whatsoever... How old was his brother Paul when he went to Atlanta and developed a more consistent outside shot?
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Paul was always a post player, Elijah has always been a wing. Big difference there.
 
GVC said:
Yeah...it'd be interesting to see similar shot charts that give standard deviations above/below the expected field goal percentage of the actual players guarded. It's probably also worth mentioning that Millsap's high foul rate helps him here. That is, his aggressive defense makes his defensive FG% look good, but also gives opponents more free throws and limits Millsap's minutes/role.
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Yah, true... That's something I've noticed too. He fouls a lot(4.8 per 36, damn that really is a ton), but I'm not sure if most of his fouls are on shots(i.e. resulting in free throws)? The next highest on the Jazz(from regular rotation) are Rodney at 4 per 36(that's a lot too) and Favors at 3.3 per 36. I wonder if some of it is the "rookie treatment" by refs and if we might expect those to drop a bit simply by them becoming more recognizable names in the league and then by some more by them getting experience and learning how to avoid some of those fouls.

Doublea said:
How about exum's?
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Interestingly enough, Dante and Rodney's defensive shot charts are not as good as we might expect:

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Do you see the area around the right elbow for Dante? I think this one is misleading, I remember at least 3 extremely well defended shots, prayers, from opponents there that simply went in... and would probably miss 9/10 times(there was one against the Nuggets, one against Young of the Nets, one banked shot against ... the Kings if I'm not mistaken). Again, as GVC noted - it'd be interesting to see some error bars on those, but I don't think they are available.

Rodney's allowed eFG% is 53%, and Dante's is 52%.

For what is worth, from my searches through the database, it seems like being a great perimeter defender(I kind of hesitate to use that word when it comes to those stats specifically, because it's more a stat about contesting shots than overall defense... maybe perimeter contester would be more appropriate) is harder than being a great defensive big. There are a ton of bad perimeter defenders and not so many bad bigs(I would guess them not having to defend the 3 as much and defending worse 3p shooters has something to do with it).

BTW Trevor Booker comes out as pretty good at contesting shots pretty much everywhere(except corner 3s) on the floor(not only in the restricted area, where his efficiency might be influenced by the presence of Rudy and Favors). His allowed eFG is 45% - again pretty awesome.

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NUMBERICA said:
Paul isn't and wasn't ever really a post-player.
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Ok, you're right. What I meant is that he played a position/role where an outside shot isn't vital. Elijah has played on the wing since at least college, I would imagine he's worked on his shot more than Paul at the age of 27.
 
stitches said:
Yah, true... That's something I've noticed too. He fouls a lot(4.8 per 36, damn that really is a ton), but I'm not sure if most of his fouls are on shots(i.e. resulting in free throws)?
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Whether on shots or not, they help the opposing team get into the penalty and inflate (deflate?) Millsap's defensive stats. From watching the games, however, he definitely commits some unnecessary fouls. Love his hustle/aggression regardless.

stitches said:
Again, as GVC noted - it'd be interesting to see some error bars on those, but I don't think they are available...For what is worth, from my searches through the database, it seems like being a great perimeter defender(I kind of hesitate to use that word when it comes to those stats specifically, because it's more a stat about contesting shots than overall defense... maybe perimeter contester would be more appropriate) is harder than being a great defensive big. (There are a ton of bad perimeter defenders and not so many bad bigs(I would guess them not having to defend the 3 as much has something to do with it).
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Error bars isn't what I meant. The graphs you provided don't have a legend, so I'm not exactly sure what the colors represent. What I'd like to see is graphs that provide a better measure/visualization of how the player ranks relative to other players (by percentile, standard deviations from the mean, whatever), and how that translates to points saved and changes in win percentage (that is, both the relative value and absolute value of the player's defensive contribution). Correcting/controlling for opponent quality would also help.
 
GVC said:
Whether on shots or not, they help the opposing team get into the penalty and inflate (deflate?) Millsap's defensive stats. From watching the games, however, he definitely commits some unnecessary fouls. Love his hustle/aggression regardless.

Error bars isn't what I meant. The graphs you provided don't have a legend, so I'm not exactly sure what the colors represent. What I'd like to see is graphs that provide a better measure/visualization of how the player ranks relative to other players (by percentile, standard deviations from the mean, whatever), and how that translates to points saved and changes in win percentage (that is, both the relative value and absolute value of the player's defensive contribution). Correcting/controlling for opponent quality would also help.
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Oh I see, yah, makes sense... Here's the legend about the visualization(they don't have percentile stats and SD and they don't have explanation of how much above and below average each color represents):
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stitches said:
Oh I see, yah, makes sense... Here's the legend about the visualization(they don't have percentile stats and SD and they don't have explanation of how much above and below average each color represents):
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Yikes. That's worse than I thought it would be. All we know is that a player is an unknown amount above or below an unknown measure of "average" against an unknown caliber of opponent. Super useful...
 
Elijah reminds me a lot of Tony Allen. To me it seems like a lot of his fouls come from his his refusal to be screened. I think he is an asset as a perimeter defender off the bench, especially if we are to make the playoffs. Until we can find someone who can defend as well as he can and have a better offensive game, I think he should stick around.
 
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