Now that the dust has settled on the Marcus Smart trade, and we all had a chance to get the emotions out [(and watch highlights of all of our favorite Smart moments)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=difg1ERWZfU) I wanted to take a look at the numbers.
I’ll be using a combination of BBall Ref, Thinking Basketball’s stats database (for his patrons) and [NBA.com](https://NBA.com)’s tracking data courtesy of Second Spectrum.
# Marcus Smart as a playmaker
One of the commonly said reasons for Boston’s success after moving on from small volume scoring guards like Kemba Walker was Marcus Smart’s improvements as a playmaker.
In **2021-22** our offensive rating (points you score per 100 possessions) was 2 points better with him on the court. Now obviously, on-off numbers for single players can be noisy as a lot of it depends on who you play with, so let’s take a look at the raw numbers.
**2020-21** (the post bubble season) was the first year where his raw numbers show a difference. He increased his assists per game by nearly 1 from 4.9 to 5.7 while only playing 1 extra minute per game. His turnovers also only increased by 0.3 per game.
However, I think that this season is more down to variance. He *did* make 5 more passes per game but his potential assists only went up by 0.6 from an 8 to an 8.6 which can be explained away by the extra passes.
Back in **2021-22** under a new coach and now the lone guard on the floor, his numbers really take a jump.
While only making 1 extra pass per game, Smart increased his potential assists to a 10.2. *But* his raw assists per game barely moved, why could that be? Well let’s take a look at who Smart passed it to the most. Obviously, Jayson Tatum and then Jaylen Brown.
From 2020-21 to 2021-22, Tatum got more passes from Smart (2 more) and Brown received under 1 extra per game but they both shot the ball considerably worse on passes from Smart. Tatum’s FG% on passes received by Smart dropped by 3% which can partially be explained by him taking almost an extra 3 off of Smart passes compared to the previous season, but Brown’s FG% dropped 7 points while the amount of 3’s he took stayed the same.
So, in **2022-23** Smart managed to break 6 assists per game without meaningfully increasing his turnovers. He increased his potential assists slightly and the team was better at putting the ball in the hoop because he managed to increase his numbers while actually decreasing his passes per game.
Conclusion: Marcus Smart was a pretty decent playmaker for us, and our offense is better with him on the court.
# Marcus Smart’s deficiencies as a playmaker
He’s not perfect. I honestly wouldn’t even say he’s a “good” playmaker in the traditional sense. He doesn’t have 8-9-10 assists per game like a lot of historical poor scoring, good playmaking guards did.
I think this is partially due to his ***bad*** play as the pick and roll ballhandler.
Marcus Smart has historically turned the ball over a **LOT** in the pick and roll.
In **2021-22** Smart was 7th worst in turnover frequency (22.9%) in the pick and roll out of players with at least 100 possessions as the ballhandler. The people in worse than him are guys like Jalen Suggs, Eric Gordon, Josh Giddey etc. He also was awful at scoring, with 0.70 points per possession.
In **2022-23** while scoring better out of the PnR (1.02 PPP) he still turned over the ball 20% of the time good for 15th worst in the league.
Our new player Kristaps Porzingis is not elite as a roll man numbers wise. He scored 1.18 PPP as the roll man last year which was middle of the pack (for reference, Embiid had 1.23 on the highest volume in the league by far). But it should be noted that he was playing on a Wizards team with mediocre playmaking where he was one of the two main offensive threats, so I’m actually willing to bet that those numbers would improve with us.
The other issue that actually kills us in the playoffs are his mind boggling turnovers.
[Seriously think back to how often you’ve seen him try stuff like this that he clearly isn’t good enough to do with any consistency](https://www.nba.com/stats/events?CFID=&CFPARAMS=&GameEventID=407&GameID=0042200301&Season=2022-23&flag=1&title=Smart%20Bad%20Pass%20Turnover%20(P2.T7)). He is a *decent* lob thrower but he thinks he’s Trae Young out there lol.
# Enter the Buffalo
Alright so Derrick White’s raw numbers obviously don’t say that he’s as good a playmaker as Smart, because he wasn’t asked to be. But if you remember, Smart missed 11 straight games in January-February of 2023 and White became the lone playmaking guard so let’s see how he did.
White’s numbers still weren’t as good as Smarts. He nearly had the same amount of raw assists (5.8 to 6.3) but his potential assists were 1.5 off from Smarts while actually making more passes. ***BUT*** White also had to function as the 3rd and sometimes 2nd scorer over this period so he still wasn’t being asked to playmake as much as Smart.
Do also note that our ORTG was every so slightly higher with White on the court last season compared to Smart (120.1 and 120.4).
# White in the PnR
I can really only look at this year for White and be fair. Two years ago he was on a bad SAS team and then never really got to fit in 100% here.
White is more middle of the pack in terms of turnover % in the PnR (16%) on higher volume of attempts than Smart, so its quite fair to say even the coaching staff realized that White is better for us in the PnR has the ball handler.
He is not a great PnR scorer. He had 0.94 PPP on them. This was around players like Bradley Beal and Trae Young though, so obviously PPP can’t tell the entire story. He’s in the top half of the league at getting to the line on these as well.
# One final small advantage that Derrick White has
Everybody hates isolations here, but when the clock is ticking down and you need to create something against an elite defense it’s an important skill to have.
And man oh man **Marcus Smart SUCKS in isolation.**
He can’t score on them, which is no surprise he has never been a good scorer outside of his few spots (such as the post bullying smaller guards). But damn even I was surprised when I saw these numbers.
Of players with at least 50 isolations last year (Smart had 52) Marcus Smart turned the ball over THE MOST while also being one of the worst scorers in isolation at 0.77 PPP.
Derrick White only had 31, he turned it over on only 2 of them and also was a poor scorer at 0.87 PPP. But at least he wasn’t turning it over a quarter of the time lol.
# TL;DR or: What does this say?
I think these numbers tell me these things.
1. We are going to run a ton of pick and roll this year
2. Marcus Smart has serious deficiencies and a turnover problem despite being a decent to good playmaker (depending on your opinion)
3. Derrick White can probably develop into at least as good a playmaker as Smart given a bigger role and now being the 4th scorer instead of the 3rd
4. Our offense can be a lot more dynamic next year.
5. I also didn’t mention this, but I do believe that some of the reason that Smart appeared so much better than White to the naked eye as a playmaker is because we had supernova shooting to start last season, and didn’t shoot nearly as well in that short stretch where White was the main guy.
by Plies-
9 Comments
I feel like doing more pick & roll was sort of a given when you get one the best pick setters in the league
Now that Porzingis is with us, I feel like playmaking of Smart is somehow may not be that needed. He could post-up mismatch opponents making it much easier to open up lanes should Kp gets doubled. Surely hope Mazz design plays and not let KP just stands and wait for 3’s.
And yes I think Derrick White could do what Smart does except of course switching up bigs.
I just think they are both different types of playmakers. Derrick White is a lot more of a connective playmaker. He’ll get the ball and swing it or he’ll get the ball and go and make smart decisions. Meanwhile, Smart is more of a director playmaker, obviously he isn’t an elite floor general in that aspect, but he did a good job getting people involved.
I think some of it has to do with White’s handle being weak or he doesn’t have that much confidence in it. But even with that, he is a huge bonus to the offense just based off being an elite connective piece. But I’m not sure if he is a lead playmaker.
I do think Tatum will have to make another playmaking jump.
Love the analysis.
Marcus was just too ball-dominant for his lack of scoring and ballhandling ability. We’ll be in a great spot if Derrick White become our poor man’s Tony Parker on offense. He doesn’t have Parker’s finesse but his agility and BBIQ can get him there
I think one thing that White can improve is the pace. Both Smart and Tatum’s first instinct as playmakers is to move slow and methodical. It works for Tatum because
1.) he’s a phenomenal scorer
2.) he draws so much defensive attention
But it’s also something that can be limiting when the shot isn’t falling, and especially for the rest of the guys on the floor.
We were at our best with Smart when he would run the ball up the court and keep the pace moving. He was great at this late in the Philly series. But whether it was his defensive intensity, or just his natural pace, moving fast wasn’t what he generally did.
White is the opposite. He just goes, makes super fast decisions and almost always makes the right play.
The sludginess late in games killed us repeatedly.
I think Smarts tendency to go slow sort of magnified Tatum’s tendency to go slow, and almost created a negative feedback loop. White may or may not be the remedy for that, but I do think it has the potential to improve that flaw in the offense.
Jaylen is also one of the best transition scorers in the league, and I don’t think we took advantage of that quite enough. If we can get White moving fast and early, we may have more opportunities to let Jaylen exercise one of his best skills.
JT been running PnR fine, and with Zinger setting screens itll be easier
My main gripe with losing Smart is how much he see others up with or without the ball. He had a knack for setting off ball screens or running dribble handoffs when the offense was struggling. He wasn’t the best at drive and kick or pnr but he was great at everything else in my eyes.
Marcus Smart was a bench player that was a spot starter in 2021 and the Celtics just never signed another point guard so he became a starter by default.
He is a great bench player
Marcus is a very high risk high reward playmaker, the passes that work are so flashy that it’s hard to not feel like he’s elite in the moment, but then he will also get too confident with it and just make a crazy pass with no clear lane that obviously gets deflected in traffic for a turnover.
I think the most underrated part of his game was how well he could abuse 1v1s with guards in the paint, and although he definitely started going to it more in recent times I think it was still underutilized. Dude is legit an interior scoring threat with his shooting touch inside 10 feet.
DWhite also has great inside scoring though, so I am really excited to see him take a starting PG role with the full faith of the team behind him. As well as Pritchard. Imagine if PP just balls the fuck out off the bench this year and by the end of the season our starting lineup is Pritchard/White/Brown/Tatum/Porzingis. With Brogdon Horford Hauser and Timelord getting to play a casual 15-20mpg and stay healthy, Luke and Blake there to fill even more frontcourt minutes when needed.