Wizards Doppelgangers: The Ancients

In the classic mode of a franchise finished with rebuilding, and ready to repeat their overwhelming success of the previous season, the Washington Wizards went out this offseason and got older. Yes, I’m sure they’d much prefer if we all thought of it as adding “veterans,” and that’s a fine way of looking at it, if you like.

Understand, I’m not against “veterans,” I’m just aware of the reality that athletes over 30 years old typically do two things: get hurt and get worse. Hopefully, Father Time will give the Wizards a reprieve until the summer of 2016 when Kevin Durant is a free agent.

It could happen.

Last week, I ran the Wizards young backcourt (John Wall and Bradley Beal) through my statistical doppelganger machine. Today, let’s look at the oldsters Washington has added in recent years: Nenê, Marcin Gortat, Paul Pierce, Andre Miller, Drew Gooden and Rasual Butler. (Please take a look back at that link above for notes about the method.)

The good news is that these doppelgangers were pretty good players. Nenê had the second highest peak PPA behind Elton Brand’s 224. He also peaked about a year later than the average for this group. Frank Brickowski and Clifford Robinson each peaked past 30.

But, Nenê’s production has slipped the past couple years, as has his availability, and there isn’t much reason to think he’ll regain something close to that peak performance. His comps offer an ideal optimist vs. pessimist test: five of his ten most similar players performed better the following season, give performed worse.

Obviously, Gortat isn’t really an “ancient.” He’s just 30 years old, he’s played relatively few minutes for a player his age, and he’s a fitness fanatic. But, eight of the ten most similar seasons to the one Gortat posted last year were followed by a less productive season.

If I throw out the two least similar seasons from Laimbeer, each of the 10 seasons most similar to Gortat last season were followed by a season that was less productive. Bright side here: it’s not like these comps became catastrophic failures. In general, they remained productive…just not quite as good.

Gotta say that Pierce’s set of doppelgangers may be the weirdest assemblage of players I’ve gotten from The Machine. I think the challenge here is that not very many players even last to age 36 (plus), so the pool is shallow. Note that Pierce’s most similar player has a Sim Score lower than the 10th most similar for Wall, Beal, Nenê and Gortat. In other words, the list above are kinda similar, but not super close.

Overall, this is a terrific group of players that tended to peak young (around age 25-26 — Pierce peaked at 24), but had long-lasting careers. As would be expected for a group of mid-30s athletes, most declined the following season. However, most remained decent players for another year or two.

Miller’s comps are an interesting assemblage of good-to-great players. I was surprised to see Muggsy Bogues make the list, primarily because I’d forgotten the 5-3 Bogues played so many seasons. Just about everyone on this list had a good career, but…as should be expected for a group this old — all 10 either declined or were out of the league completely the following season.

For Gooden, I wonder whether these comps are particularly meaningful given that he was signed late in the season and played in fairly few games. This group basically split between those who declined the following season and those who got better. The net effect is that the group average was “about the same.” So, it could be a case of lather-rinse-repeat with Gooden this season — albeit with more total minutes.

Last up for today: the 15th man, Rasual Butler. You’ll notice this list is heavy on Eric Piatkowski, which isn’t exactly a great thing. Piatkowski hung around into his late 30s for some reason I don’t remember. Perhaps he had a contract that was being passed around. Perhaps he’s a really nice guy. There wasn’t much reason to keep him because of his on-court performance.

Otherwise, it’s mostly swingmen who peaked at the level of an average starter (Rashard Lewis excepted) and then declined. In limited minutes, Butler will probably play a little above replacement level this season. I’d have preferred this roster spot went to someone younger and with potential to improve.

Tomorrow: the rest of the roster.