Do you think it’s fair to say that out of the 7 guys this season who have played meaningful minutes, jalen has been the worst? Most of what you’ve saying isn’t what I’ve actually said or implied though, kinda just making up stuff to push your narrative (which is fine).
No buddy, I don't know how to explain it to you more. This stat does not even tell you who's a better or worse player, it's never alleged to do so. The league wide rankings are even more mickey mouse than our internal team rankings. You're just trying to squint super hard to find something you want to find. Further, before you randomly jump to "why don't we choose the players with the top 7 minutes" you have to first determine if the stat is doing what you're saying at all. It's not. So why would I skip this step and jump to your next one? There's no basis for it. If this stat is saying Jalen Green is the worst player on the roster or rotation, it's also saying Amen Thompson is the 3rd worst of the people getting big minutes. You can't deny that.
He started with a short good stretch of 5-7 games and then came dreadful November and below average December. You can double check that was his historically worst November, also November in general was not his month. November is my lucky month, that is why I am pretty focused on it.
You are right, his hot streak was in October. I kind of ignored October because I've always thought of NBA seasons starting in November. He started to fall off a cliff in November. He did have a few of his signature hot games in December.
He has the overall flair of Cali surfer boys......loving warm weather and even though Texas is a hot state. There are some weeks and months under 40-35 degrees Fahrenheit during winter months which is not warm. Michael Jordan was also an enigmatic player who took it out on gambling, baseball, double retirement... but on the court he was the best and a dope businessman.
His individual defense improved but so has the team's. The Rockets finished last year 9th in defense and are currently 4th. Jalen Green is both a better defender than his last year self, but the Rockets with Tari and especially Amen stepping up is overall a better defense, so Jalen still looks relatively bad. For me personally, if Amen hadn't shown such quick growth recently, I would be fine with letting the Jalen Green experiment go on as long as they're not trading for an actual star. But Amen gives the Rockets another player to develop on-ball. And I really want to see how well he can break down defenses alongside 3 high level shooters and Sengun. So personally, I hope the Rockets starts pivoting away from Jalen to Amen starting next year if there's no further growth.
This is a logic fallacy. There is context. The extremes in this stat tend to weigh down players that play with the extremes. In other words, the extremes tend to be causes, and the stats for other players are correlation. This isn't perfect, but it is better than the opinions of fans just shouting at one another. To look at Amen, one would need to remove Jalen Green's minutes to check to see if minutes with Green are the reason Amen Thompson is 3rd worst. A quick look at Amen's on off without Green and non-rotation players shows the Rockets are 15 points better per 100 possessions with Amen than without when Green and non-rotation players aren't in the game. Conversely, Jalen Green's on off without Amen and non-rotation players shows the Rockets are 1.5 points better per 100 possessions with Green than without when Amen and non-rotation players aren't in the game. I find this interesting. It would suggest the Amen and Green are bad fits as the Rockets are better with one of them than neither of them, but signficantly worse when both are on the court versus one or none. I would not have guessed the numbers would say Green does better without Amen while watching.
That's a list of Jalen's 3p shooting percentage for each game this season. I'll let you draw the line between good bad and indifferent - how many of each?
Maybe. Though, that would explain why Amen and Green are a bad fit offensively as Amen is not a shooter, but I'd say the offense with the two of them is still in the good range. That would not explain why the Rockets defense falls apart when Green is in the game which is a much bigger issue. I'm amazed at how bad the numbers look for the Rockets when Green is in the game. I knew they weren't good as it seems like almost every game there is a run late in the 1st, early 2nd in which the Rockets shut down opponents right after Green is replaced since JSJ got hurt. When it comes to Green vs Amen (and/or Sengun), I'm going full tilt with Amen. It is up to Green to fit with Amen.
My concern is we need to be a much better 3 point shooting team if we want to get anywhere in the playoffs going forward. A lineup of FVV-Jalen-Brooks-JSJ-Sengun doesn't have the 3 point power to win in the playoffs. JSJ and Brooks are our best 3 point shooters. Sengun and Amen can't shoot it at all. FVV has been a good 3 point shooter in his career, just not good this year. Jalen is hot and cold.
I forgot this was a discussion about defense. I guess the question then is, Who are Amen's replacements playing with Green? How do those lineups fit better with Green defensively? If we assume that Amen is one of the top defenders on the team, then whoever replaces him when he sits would not be better than him individually. It has to be something about fit, or the stats are just coincidental fluctuations.
Ever notice how when Jalen is shooting well, everything else seems to fall into place? Jalen gets a large majority of his minutes with FVV, Brooks, Jabari & Sengun - Brooks is shooting 39% on the season, Jabari 35.4% and FVV 34.4%, Jalen 35% ....Of the regular rotation players, that's 4 of the top 5 shooters on the roster. #'s 1,2,3 & 5 (Tari is #4).
If Jalen had shown a high level of passing ability over these past 4 years, I would be inclined to agree with you. But right now it's clear Amen is the better decision-maker with the ball so I'd rather him having the ball instead.
Yeah, this has been my beef with those who use "gravity" as a measure of Jalen's impact. Drawing the defense is only useful if he could make the right pass to open teammates. But his assists number is quite low for a guy with the ball so much. And the eye test also suggests that he often doesn't make the right decision with the ball.
The question is about impact i think, and how good they are. The metrics HATE jalen. He's down below 200th now in EPM and has horrendous on/off and +/- numbers. You can look at that as either "metrics are stupid and wrong", "metrics are missing something about specifically jalen and are wrong about him", or "he's been bad this season".
I was responding to @Joe Joe's comment about how the metrics seem to suggest that Green has better defensive on/off when playing without Amen then when playing with Amen. That's indeed an interesting phenomenon.
