Getting Smart with Statistics
- Thread starter JakeRae
- Start date
I didn't notice that he seems slimmer, but he looks lighter on his feet. He seems to be staying in front of people better.
But I think that they all look better since the breakdowns have kinda been eliminated.
Huh thought it was more noticeable. It looked to me for awhile there like he was a boa constrictor in the process of digesting Tremont Waters.
I see it. To me he seemed a little, shall we say, John Bagley-esque at the start of the season.
This is an old comment and Smart has been much better of late, but I just wanted to say we should be so lucky as for Smart to be the Celtics' Brad Marchand.
I've just noticed him flying around and wrecking havoc a lot more the last couple of games. More "winning plays".
Oh just so I'm clear I am in complete agreement. I love Marcus Smart and truly hope is a part of a championship team. Tatum and Brown will likely pass him, but personally Smart is my 2nd favorite Celtic of all time, with Pierce being #1 (really started getting into the NBA in '93 at age 12, so just after the Bird era). So any criticism comes from a place of love...
The NBA All-Defense guard finished the contest with six shot contests, three deflections, a loose ball recovery rate of 71.8% on defense, along with his 13 points, seven assists, four rebounds, and a steal.
When matched up on Lillard, Smart held his superstar counterpart to 1-of-5 shooting, two assists, and two turnovers
https://www.celticsblog.com/2021/4/14/22383307/boston-celtics-marcus-smart-is-proving-doubters-wrong-portland-trailblazers-nba
When matched up on Lillard, Smart held his superstar counterpart to 1-of-5 shooting, two assists, and two turnovers
https://www.celticsblog.com/2021/4/14/22383307/boston-celtics-marcus-smart-is-proving-doubters-wrong-portland-trailblazers-nba
He's definitely making it hard to evaluate what to do with him. The guy out there against Portland is a guy you only trade for a Beal-level star. The guy out there most of the year was a chucky JAG.
I guess the good news is a) he's trending up b) the team has ~15 more games and the playoffs to see whether it sustains.
That's harsh and I'm not a Smart guy. Maybe he's just another guy in the sense Harrison Barnes, Evan Fournier, Aaron Gordon are JAGs.
He just wasn't the same guy on defense while being a notch below those other guys offensively. I'd way rather have Barnes or Fournier than whomever was masquerading as Marcus until recently.
That said, credit where it's due: he's playing very well and looks like himself again defensively.
His improvement basically coincides with Jayson Tatum turning back into Jayson Motherfucking Tatum. When Jayson is pillaging opponents offensively and Marcus can go back to doing what he does best, being Dre' Green's MiniMe, he looks great.
It doesn't explain the whole season but I think a lot of the bad play in March and early April was going from TL/TT/DT to TL and nothing for 13 games. The drop off from TT/TL to Moe, Fall and Kornet is huge. The team really missed TT. If TL or TT go down for any time, it's gong to hurt a lot.
Despite a decent rookie year (33.5% from three), he was absolutely terrible early in his career, averaging 29.3% during his first 4 years (321 of 1094). 35.5% is more than adequate coming from a guy who brings everything Smart does.
He’s such a polarizing player. His last three of the game was absolute clutch. Fantastic play. The three he took from 4 feet behind the arc with 20 seconds on the clock that air balled was a totally moronic play. Thankfully, I think he’s had better shot selection this season so we’ve seen him play more within himself. The hard part with defensive specialists is that - as the announcers said - good offense beats good defense. I’m not sure having Smart defend Curry is much different than having Edwards defend Curry - the result is the same. Theoretically Smart makes him work harder, but the shots go in either way.
I mean...the shots went in in that particular game. Overall, Curry is shooting 43% this year, so you don't expect him to make 10-19 with Smart on him lol.
With great players, it's critical to put someone good on them to force them to work for their shots, even if those go in. Who knows, if Edwards is on Curry when Steph is on that kind of scorcher, maybe Steph goes for 60.
If he shot 40%, that would have been .7 point per game more, on average, over those three years.
Many people obsess over Smart’s three point shooting. As long as he takes threes within the flow of the offense, I’m ok with it. In the Warriors game, he admittedly was rushing his threes, and was 2-10 before hitting the big shot to get his team the lead late, when he had tons of time.
He had been real good lately in knowing when to take threes, and probably was pressing last night, knowing his team had to make up Jaylen’s usual 20+ points. He had been averaging 6 three attempts per game in the five game winning streak before the Warriors launchfest, hitting 48%.
I like him at 5 or 6 three attempts a game. Smart’s having his most accurate season on non layup twos, at 46.4%.
This is the important piece that people miss when arguing about incremental inc/dec in ones 3-pt shooting pct which alone has flaws. It’s one of the reasons we needed to add quality offensive players prior to the playoffs to ensure offensive flow. Fournier and Parker will be an enormous improvement in this area when taking the minutes of PP, Semi and Grant in the post-season when close-outs are harder and our bench is shortened.
0.7 points per game on the same amount of attempts isn't a small deal, though. It would move the C's point differential from 2.2 to 2.9. They'd probably have an extra win or two at this point. There were 5 games this year the C's lost by 3 or less. Smart wouldn't be scoring an extra 0.7 points per game, he'd be scoring an extra 3 points every 3rd game (statistically speaking).
If Kemba was shooting 40%, he'd be scoring an extra 1.33 points per game. Combined, that would be 2.03. That would move the C's from a 2.2 differential to a 4.23. They'd most likely be playing for a 1-4 seed right now instead of 4-8.
Regarding Smart, .355 is a far cry from 230/822, .280 he shot from the 15/16 season to the 17/18 season. Had he even shot .355 those 3 years, he would have scored an extra .96 points per game. 40% would have put him at an extra 1.53 points per.
He has his streaks but I think the .355 is close to his true talent level. Slightly below average but given the volume, he's probably closer to average. I'll always question his 3 point shot, but the question I'm asking now is far different than the one I was asking 4 years ago. I still think he could improve his efficiency a bit by improving his shot selection but I'm singing to the choir. He's actually hitting shots from all parts of the court this year though, which shows in his .411 FG% (2nd highest in his career).
.538 from 0-3, career .532 (.593, .694, .539 last 3 seasons)
.462 from 3-10, career is .355 (.301, 354, .351 last 3 seasons)
.432 from 10-16, career is .403 (.388, .400, .433 last 3 seasons)
.478 from 16-3, career .339 (.372, .357, .267 last 3 seasons)
.355 from 3, career .322 (.301, .364, .347 last 3 seasons)
Also hitting 51.7% of his corner 3s, career rate is 35.3%. They are making up a career low 13.2% of his 3PA though, career rate is 19.0%.
When comparing players to other players. When comparing players to themselves, those differences are big.
Smart shooting 35% is more beneficial than Grant shooting 40% but Smart shooting 40% vs a Smart shooting 35% isn't a small thing.
edit: Also, Parker will help but hopefully he's not taking too many 3s within the flow of the offense. He should be taking it to the hoop.
The thing about shooting is that the defensive attention it draws does not scale linearly and the downstream impact of that extra stretching of the defense is not linear either. 35% shooting is close him out territory. 40% is never leave your guy. So its not just Smart at 40% is only adding 1 point per game or whatever - an offense is an ecosystem.