Category: Daniel Ochefu

Wizards Roll With NBA’s Worst Bench

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Wizards bench.

With an average starting unit and the NBA’s worst bench, the Wizards are lurching toward an inevitable appointment with the 2017 draft lottery — assuming team president Ernie Grunfeld doesn’t trade the pick for the next Markieff Morris in an all-out dash for 9th or 10th.

The disastrous bench was in the works at least a couple years, as the franchise’s top strategists laid plans to have loads of cap space for an offseason in which almost half the league would be able to sign a maximum salary free agent. Their subsequent moves to restock the roster seem to reflect one of the defining characteristics of the Grunfeld era: an elite ability to misdiagnose the source of the team’s problems.

Missing the playoffs in 2015-16, according to public statements by Grunfeld and team owner Ted Leonsis, was due to injuries, a bad bench and poor chemistry caused by having so many players in the final year of their contracts. And they shoveled some blame on the coaching as well.

In reality, the Wizards were affected less by injuries last season than most teams in the league, and their bench was about average. I’ll defer to those closer to the team on the cause of whatever chemistry problems existed, although it’s worth noting that multi-year contracts haven’t seemed to fix the issue.

What’s happening this year? Their starters are (like last year) about average, but their bench is a worst in the league catastrophe. They’re the Secretariat of bad benches.

So far this season, the Wizards starters — Wall, Beal, Porter, Morris and Gortat — have a minutes weighted Player Production Average (PPA) of 135. In PPA, average is 100, higher is better, and replacement level is 45. That’s slightly better than the league average starting group (PPA: 132 so far), and ranks 12th. Not elite, but not terrible either.

The bench’s minutes weighted PPA: 28. The average bench: 66. The second worst bench belongs to Memphis, and its PPA is 44. These are the only two teams with benches that rate below replacement level. To put this in perspective, Trey Burke’s PPA this season is 28. Kevin Seraphin, who ended his Wizards career with PPA scores of 35 and 38 would be an upgrade. Kwame Brown was never this bad in Washington. Even Ike Austin (remember him?) managed a 35 with the Bullets.

The gap between Washington’s starters and bench is the third largest, behind the Clippers who have the second best starting unit and fourth worst bench, and Golden State, which has the best starters and the sixth best bench. How good are the Warriors? They’re starting five has a PPA of 211 — 32 points better than Washington’s best player.

This is the team built by Grunfeld and Leonsis, and their cherished Plan. It’s a disaster — not because of injuries or bad luck, but because of a series of poor decisions.

Player Production Average

There is some good news. Wall is having the best season of his career, Porter is producing at an All-Star level, and Beal is healthy and productive.

Marcin Gortat’s production is down, but I don’t think it’s related to aging (I’ll write about this next time). Morris has been worse than expected. To the numbers…

PLAYER GMS MPG 11/8 11/21 PPA
Otto Porter 20 34.4 173 177 179
John Wall 18 35.9 168 167 171
Bradley Beal 17 34.7 66 92 131
Marcin Gortat 20 35.4 135 146 130
Danuel House 1 1.0 119 116
Sheldon McClellan 7 11.1 478 88 81
Markieff Morris 20 31.7 67 78 59
Marcus Thornton 19 19.5 31 41 50
Kelly Oubre 19 15.5 18 17 41
Tomas Satoransky 18 16.6 18 43 29
Trey Burke 16 11.6 -48 28 28
Andrew Nicholson 14 10.1 33 35 9
Jason Smith 19 11.6 -93 -42 -23
Ian Mahinmi 1 14.0 -98
Daniel Ochefu 3 2.7 -181 -119 -117

Wizards Staggering to Start Season

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The Wizards fired Randy Wittman for this? Six games into the tenure of Scott Brooks, the team sits 14th in the East with a 1-5 record. Washington’s futility is comprehensive — they rank 23rd in both offensive and defensive efficiency.

There are four key team stats that determine who wins and loses in the NBA. Here’s where the Wizards rank so far on offense:

  • Shooting (eFG): 23
  • Turnovers (tov%): 26
  • Offensive rebounding (oreb%): 12
  • Free throw rate (FTM/FGA): 16

On defense:

  • Shooting (defensive eFG): 30
  • Turnovers (defensive tov%): 9
  • Defensive rebounding (dreb%): 12
  • Free throw rate (dFTM/dFGA): 14

Don’t get too encouraged by their top ranking in defensive turnovers. Forcing turnovers isn’t necessarily an indicator of defensive effectiveness. In the NBA, defense is overwhelmingly about shot defense. And the Wizards are dead last in that category so far.

Remember the old days when Wizards fans wanted Wittman fired because the team took two-point jumpers instead of threes? Welcome to the new Wizards, same as the old. So far this season, they’re 28th in three-point attempt rate, but have attempted the fourth most two-point jumpers.

On defense, they’re still keeping opponents out of the paint (they have the fourth lowest defensive at-rim attempt rate), but they’re allowing the second highest opponent three-point attempt rate, and the worst opponent 3FG%.

Back to those four key stats for a moment: while there are four, they’re not created equal. Dean Oliver, who first wrote about these factors in a comprehensive manner, determined these approximate historic weights: shooting 40%, turnovers 25%, rebounding 20%, free throws 15%.

In recent years, those values have shifted, according to my analysis. Last season, shooting was worth about 55%, rebounding 18%, turnovers 15%, and free throws 12%.

This is a long and tortured way of saying the Wizards are bad where it matters most. Being worst in shooting differential and 25th in turnover differential overwhelms their decent rebounding and break-even free throw rate.

Player Production Average

Player Production Average (PPA) is an overall rating stat I developed that credits players for things they do that help a team win and debits them for things that hurt the cause. PPA is similar to other linear weight rating metrics such as John Hollinger’s PER, David Berri’s Wins Produced, Kevin Pelton’s VORP, and the granddaddy of them all, Dave Heeren’s TENDEX.

PPA is pace neutral, and weighs a player’s performance per possession against the performance of his competitors season by season. While PPA falls into the category of linear weight metrics, the actual values for each statistical category floats a bit from season to season based on league performance.

PPA is pace neutral, accounts for defense, and includes a “degree of difficulty” factor based on the level of competition a player faces while on the floor. In PPA, 100 is average, higher is better, and replacement level is 45. Read more here.

Want some good news, look at Otto Porter, John Wall, and (to a lesser extent) Marcin Gortat. The first two have been highly productive so far. Gortat is the team’s only other above-average performer through six games — although his production has been markedly lower than it was last season.

Wall and Porter offer an interesting contrast. Wall’s high PPA is built on volume — he makes LOTS of plays, both good and bad. He uses more than a third of the team’s possessions when he’s in the game, and he’s racking up rebounds, assists, steals and blocks at a prolific rate. He also sports an astronomical turnover rate (7.8 per 100 team possessions).

Porter is all efficiency. He makes the few shots he attempts. He grabs rebounds at a decent rate, plays solid defense, and avoids turnovers and fouls.

The bad news: everyone else. Markieff Morris and Bradley Beal have been terrible, the bench just about useless.

Ernie Grunfeld’s Plan B offseason acquisitions are off to a rough start. Ian Mahinmi is sidelined with injury, Trey Burke has been the next Eric Maynor (but worse), and Jason Smith has been…well…Jason Smith. Tomas Satoransky needs more time to figure out the NBA game.

The numbers:

PLAYER GMS MPG PPA
Sheldon McClellan 2 3.0 478
Otto Porter 6 34.3 173
John Wall 5 34.4 168
Marcin Gortat 6 36.2 135
Markieff Morris 6 34.0 67
Bradley Beal 6 34.8 66
Andrew Nicholson 5 14.0 33
Marcus Thornton 6 17.0 31
Tomas Satoransky 6 13.8 18
Kelly Oubre 5 15.0 18
Trey Burke 6 11.5 -48
Jason Smith 5 10.0 -93
Daniel Ochefu 1 4.0 -181