Rookies' statistics thread

Six or seven games into the season, let's see how the rookies are measuring up.

Well, so much for the 2011 draft class being a terrible class and the lock-out hurting rookies with the lack of a training camp. Many of them are playing outstanding basketball. For now, I will profile the top 3 rookie guards of interest (at least for me) from what we've seen so far: Kyrie Irving, Marshon Brooks, and Ricky Rubio.

Kyrie Irving:

Code:

Season    Age  Tm  Lg G  MP  PER  TS% eFG% ORB% DRB% TRB% AST% STL% BLK% TOV% USG% ORtg DRtg OWS DWS  WS WS/48
2011-12    19 CLE NBA 6 155 21.1 .513 .459  3.7 13.2  8.3 38.4  1.4  2.5 13.6 28.1  107  103 0.4 0.2 0.5  .159

The 1st overall draft pick is absolutely measuring up to the hype so far. His TS% leaves a lot to be desired and is especially hurt by the fact that he can't finish inside, shooting only 41% from close range shots. However, he's pretty solid as a jump shooter, taking 63% of his shots there and hitting at a .438 eFG%. He could also improve a lot on drawing fouls to help his TS%. He takes and makes a lot of shots evidenced by his high usage rate. What's most impressive about his game so far to me is that he is able to keep his turnover rate very low at 13.6 while still keeping a high usage rate. This is atypical of a rookie point guard and bodes well for him in the future. His main skill, of course is his passing abilities with a high 38% assist percentage. All of this adds up to a very stellar 21.1 PER. His defense, at this point, as very suspect as his team allows 9.8 points/100 possession more when he's on the court. Rookie point guards tend to struggle defensively early on as they try to keep up with the speed of the NBA game, especially if you don't have overwhelming athleticism or size like Irving. It'll be interesting to see if he can ever develop as a defender. He looks to be everything he was hyped up to be so far with plenty of room for improvement.

Marshon Brooks:

Code:

Season    Age  Tm  Lg G  MP  PER  TS% eFG% ORB% DRB% TRB% AST% STL% BLK% TOV% USG% ORtg DRtg OWS  DWS  WS WS/48
2011-12    23 NJN NBA 7 163 23.1 .534 .494 11.0  5.9  8.5  7.7  2.0  1.0  6.1 28.1  113  114 0.5 -0.1 0.5  .134

Well, Brooks going into the season was getting a lot of hype by being compared to Kobe and being predicted as the steal of the draft. So far, it's looking like he's just that. Brooks does only one thing on the court and does it well: score. He's absolutely shameless in taking shots. With his 28% usage rate and 7.7% assist percentage, you know he's going to shoot when he gets the ball. When he does shoot, he shoots well and mostly on jumpers. He's shoots jumpers on 80% of his shots and hits .438 eFG% on them. This is a shame because when he does take it to the hole, he does very well, shooting 67% from close. His TS% somewhat sub-par at .534 because he does not seem to draw a lot of fouls. He should look to drive more and stop settling for jump shots to be a more well-rounded scorer. The downside is that he's an atrocious defender as his team allows a whopping 11.6 pts/100 possession more when he's on the floor. He's going to have to pick it up at that end of the court if he really wants to deserve the Kobe comparison. His scoring prowess puts him at an eye-popping 23.1 PER, but that number overrates him quite a bit due to his lack of defense. Overall, he's absolutely the steal of the draft and there must be a lot of teams regretting it right now.

Ricky Rubio:

Code:

Season    Age  Tm  Lg G  MP  PER  TS% eFG% ORB% DRB% TRB% AST% STL% BLK% TOV% USG% ORtg DRtg OWS DWS  WS WS/48
2011-12    21 MIN NBA 6 166 17.3 .634 .605  0.7 14.2  7.6 40.2  1.8  0.4 29.0 16.3  113  101 0.4 0.2 0.6  .170

First of all, F--- OHMSS.

Now that that's out of the way, Ricky Rubio is finally here. After probably the weirdest break between being drafted and his NBA debut (playing two years in Europe to come back for a lock-out), it's safe to to say that Ricky is here to stay. It's easy to get caught up with his dazzling dribble and passing abilities, but let's look at some numbers for now. Rubio's numbers are somewhat of a head-scratcher because it is so extreme in every which direction. Most surprisingly, he's shooting crazy well. He doesn't take a lot of shots but when he does he makes them. Of the 38 shots he's taken this season, 81% of them were jumpers and he hit a ridiculous .588 eFG% on them. He also has not missed a shot from close (7/7). This makes for a stellar .634 TS% and it could even be higher if he could draw some fouls, which he does not. It's inevitable that these hot shooting numbers will come down to earth, but it's looking good for a player who has always been bashed as being a poor shooter. Rubio's bread and butter, of course is his play-making skills. His assist % is a sky high 40.2% and he does it with style: no-look, behind-the-back, pin point kind of passes. This flair seems to come at a cost, however, as he turns it over WAY WAY too much at an equally sky high 29.0 turnover rate. He can only improve from this point on as he gets used to the NBA game and maybe tone down on going for the spectacular every time. All of this adds up to a very solid 17.3 PER. I suspect there will be lots of changes in his numbers as his shooting comes down to earth and he improves his turnovers but he's showing the world why exactly there was so much hype around him. He also seems to be a very stellar defender as his team improves 7.2 points/100 possession when he's on the court, but Ridnour deserves half of the credit on that for being a terrible defender. All in all, Rubio looks legit and I am ready to hop on the bandwagon.



Disclaimer: there's a very good chance all of this is going to look very stupid by season's end as we've only played a few games, but hey, it's fun.

 

Well, he actually gets a lot of minutes with the starters as he plays 23 mpg. It's not like he's replacing world-beaters either. Something called a "Sundiata Gaines" and Damion James are who he's replacing. Like I said, I'm sure his defense is not as bad as the numbers show, but he's going to have to show a lot more in the future to convince me that he's not a bad defender. He's probably just tired from shooting every chance he gets.