Someone mentioned that they thought that we might play better with less guards, so I decided to crunch the numbers on our four main guards: Scoot, Ant, Malcolm, and Shae. Here are the results:
4 Guards Playing:
Results: 2 wins, 8 losses (20% win percentage), -12 point differential TM PTS 109.20 OPP PTS 121.20
Players: All four played 10 games with four guards. 31.25% of total games played for Scoot, Brog and Shae, 52.63% of total games played for Ant
3 Guards Playing:
Results: 7 wins, 11 losses, (38.8% win percentage), -6.94 point differential TM PTS 106.22 OPP PTS 113.17
Players: Scoot 18 gp (56.25% of total gp) Brogdon 15 gp (46.88% of total) Sharpe 13 gp (40.63% of total) Ant 8 gp (42.11% of total)
2 Guards Playing:
Results: 3 wins, 5 losses, (37.5% win percentage), -5.13 point differential TM PTS 114.13 OPP PTS 119.25
Players: Scoot 4 gp (12.5% of total gp) Brogdon 7 gp (21.88% of total) Sharpe 4 gp (12.5% of total) Ant 1 gp (5.26% of total)
1 Guard Playing: (these games were all with Sharpe and Skylar Mays with a (un)healthy dose of Jamaree Bouyea) TM PTS 98.00 OPP PTS 116.20
Results: 0 wins, 5 losses, -18.2 point differential
Sharpe’s 5 games account for 15.63% of his total gp
Analysis: When we have three or two guards playing, we do considerably better. It’s glaring how much worse we are defensively when we have too many guards on the floor, giving up an average of 121.2 points per game to opponents in these games. While the 2 guard lineups seem to yield the best point differential, I think 3 guards is the sweet spot. When we play these lineups, we are the best defensively, holding opponents to only 113.17 ppg, which would rank 13th in the NBA.
I could look further into individual player stats, but I think they’d make this post too long. A few notes for each guard I saw in looking through the data though:
Games where Brogdon plays seem to yield the best results, and in fact, games where he plays in a 2 or 3 guard lineup, he gives us a 10-12 record and a point differential of only -3.41. Without him, we’re 0-9 with a point differential of -20.22. Yikes! I think we should brace for some truly terrible stretches if he’s gone at the trade deadline.
I think Anfernee has suffered from playing without healthy 2 or 3 guard lineups, when he plays with Brogdon in a 2 or 3 guard lineup, we’re 2-3 with a differential of -5.00, but that’s a tiny sample size. Ant’s playtime has also coincided with missing Jerami Grant (4 games missed when Ant’s playing) and Deandre Ayton (12 games missed). We’ve also played some tough opponents in that stretch. All that being said, the numbers aren’t great for him, with a -12.89 point differential in 2 and 3 guard lineups, a 2-7 record in those games (yes, both those wins came with Brogdon). Our offense in those games has been a little better than our average at 109.22 ppg, but the defense has been very poor, giving up 122.11 ppg.
Scoot and Brogdon have played relatively well together, in all lineups going 11-17 with a -6.04 point differential. Take out 4 guard games, and we’re 9-9 in those games, with a point differential of only -2.72. Scoot and Sharpe are one of our best defensive combos in this scenario, playing together in 3 guard lineups they’re boasting an average opponent ppg value of 112.38. Sadly, our offense suffers in these games, putting up only 104.69 ppg. Scoot and Ant seem to be the worst pairing for Scoot, see Ant’s numbers in 2 and 3 guard lineups (they’re all games Scoot played).
Shaedon has had the most unique hand dealt to him this year imo. He’s had to play next to Skylar and Jamaree Bouyea in some truly terrible games. But filtering out those games and 4 guard lineup games, we put up 108.41 ppg and give up 114.77, a differential of -6.36. This is a pretty average showing.
TL;DR: Brogdon is good, 4 guard lineups are bad, Ant has struggled to win games this year (not sure if it’s his fault though).
Things I would love to analyze further: using EPM’s adjusted DRTG and ORTG to get a more accurate read on lineups, adding other players to the mix like Grant and Ayton.
[Data is available here](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1fGD1yyyERdsPl6Lne6rwUTLvxtrBs8DJpLz1Xc55kFg/edit?usp=sharing)
by Arr0wmanc3r
4 Comments
Jabari Walker
Great job. I think those numbers coincide with the eye test. Bottom line is this team can’t support giving 4 guards big minutes. If we can get a consistent 3 guard rotation, it is going to help everyone. Even better if we acquire a forward with positional size.
Bouyea…. I thought Schmidtz would have known better that was rough.
I know we need to trade Brogdon but I think people are finally going to realize how much he helped our team when he’s gone