Don’t have a ton of time for fancy prose — not with friend of the blog Ben Becker inviting himself to be a guest blogger next week and filling my inbox with questions.
So…here’s this week’s Player Production Average (PPA) update. PPA is a metric I developed that credits players for things that contribute to winning and debits them for things that don’t — each in proper proportion. PPA is pace adjusted, accounts for defense and includes a degree of difficulty factor. In PPA, 100 = average, higher is better and 45 = replacement level. PPA is a per minute stat.
| PLAYER | GMS | MPG | LW | PPA |
| Trevor Ariza | 66 | 36.0 | 154 | 151 |
| Drew Gooden | 13 | 17.5 | 152 | 148 |
| Marcin Gortat | 70 | 32.9 | 147 | 145 |
| John Wall | 71 | 36.8 | 146 | 144 |
| Trevor Booker | 61 | 21.1 | 116 | 116 |
| Nene Hilario | 49 | 30.1 | 103 | 101 |
| Bradley Beal | 62 | 34.4 | 88 | 90 |
| Andre Miller | 17 | 14.3 | 75 | 81 |
| Martell Webster | 67 | 28.4 | 84 | 81 |
| Jan Vesely | 33 | 14.2 | 69 | 68 |
| Chris Singleton | 22 | 11.0 | 40 | 40 |
| Kevin Seraphin | 47 | 11.8 | 40 | 36 |
| Garrett Temple | 66 | 9.4 | 23 | 22 |
| Glen Rice | 11 | 9.9 | 21 | 20 |
| Eric Maynor | 23 | 9.3 | 8 | 8 |
| Otto Porter | 31 | 8.3 | 3 | 3 |
| Al Harrington | 24 | 15.0 | -2 | 1 |
Unsurprisingly given the team’s record during their recent series against the Western Conference, the production of their top players was down a little across the board. Nothing major — just…the kind of thing to be expected when they face some tougher competition than they get in the East.
I don’t know how much Martell Webster’s back is bothering him, but his production is way down this season. Last season, he posted a career-best PPA of 114. This season, he’s back down at his career level. This is cause for concern.
Also, I’ve heard/seen folks in a variety of places refer to the Wizards as a “young team.” But….not so. They’re right at the league average in age, but their rotation at this point is older. I’ll probably look at this in greater detail next week, but consider this:
- The team’s plan was “build through the draft,” but only three of their rotation players (Wall, Beal and Booker) were selected by the Wizards.
- Those same three players are the team’s only rotation players younger than league average.
- Once Nenê returns they’ll have more rotation guys age 30 or older (four) than they do under age 26 (three).
The team does have young players on the roster, but they’ve been decidedly unproductive this season — for much of their careers for most of them.
In keeping with Wizards tradition, Al Harrington currently rates as the NBA’s least productive PF (minimum 300 minutes). Last season, that title was held by Jan Vesely.
The First Draft by Kevin Broom 