Over the last 8 games the Blazers are 4-4.... Those 8 games coincide exactly with when Thomas Robinson was benched in favor of Meyers Leonard.... Interesting.
I think the 8-game record coincides with the player's acceptance of the recent media position regarding the Blazer's credibility . . .
In games he's played 10 or more minutes we're 4-3. Take out the 2 blowouts we're 2-3. Not a fan but I don't think he plays enough to blame him. In fact the stats suggest Mo Williams is the problem.
Well, both players played about equally in the MIN loss. Robinson played 4 minutes and was -14 and Leonard played 5 minutes and was +6. So, hard to blame that one on Leonard. In the other games we are 4-3. The three losses were by 1 point, 2 points and 2 points. Since Leonard wasn't in when those games were on the line, I have a hard time pinning those losses on him. The team failed to execute when those games were on the line and Leonard was on the bench. I know a lot of people here don't like Leonard and will look for any reason to hate on him, but frankly he's been outproducing Robinson. The stats show it and his coaches recognize it. Do you honestly think Terry Stotts would keep playing Leonard his 5 - 10 MPG if he thought it was costing the team wins? 82games.com just updated their database and it shows that Leonard's net on court/off court is -0.8. So, he's not really helping us, but considering how weak our second unit is, he's not hurting us all that much either. BTW, Thomas Robinson's net on court/off court is -17.8. It seems like we were winning in spite of Thomas Robinson, not because of him. Usual small sample size caveat applies. BNM
Or .... it could be that we are going through a tough spot in the schedule and can't win all the time?
BTW, the updated stats at 82games.com still show what we all see with our eyes, we have great starters, even better than last year, but our bench is still a big weakness, but not as bad as last year. Here's the net on court/off court stats for our five starters and top five bench players: Net On Court/Off Court (through January 5): Starters: Aldridge +11.0 Batum +10.1 Lillard +8.3 Matthews +4.4 Lopez +4.4 Top Bench Players: Williams - 7.3 Freeland -4.7 Wright - 7.9 Robinson -17.8 Leonard -0.8 BNM
Robinson has a bad net in 300 minutes. Leonard's in 118. Williams' and Wright's are in about 1300 combined minutes.
Yep, hence the small sample size caveat in my first post. But it is telling that all our top bench players have negative net on court/off court and all our starters are significantly positive in this regard. BNM
I wasn't really talking sample size--more that all of this "Leonard sux" and "Robinson hurts us" kind of ignore that our top two guys are blowing goats. You have proof.
I wish 82games.com updated their stats more often. I don't know of any other sites that have this same data. BNM
It seems to me that starter vs. bench on/off stats are somewhat conflated. Improving your starters will always reduce the net on/off stats of the bench, no matter how good that bench is, since substitutions will always be a downgrade. Likewise, consistently being subbed out for a horrible bench player will artificially magnify a starter's on/off value, making them look better, perhaps, than they are. Hypothetically, if we had two Aldridges, subbed them for each other, and played them equally with no other patterns (i.e. they each played with all the other players equally), they would both have net on/off stats of 0, since it wouldn't make any difference at all which one we put in at any given time. (Obviously this would be nuts. Who wouldn't play two Aldridges at the same time??) This means that (like with +/- or any other team performance stat) you have to look at the whole picture with net on/off. Who are they replacing when they go in? Who replaces them when they come out? Who else is typically playing with them at the same time? These questions contribute as much to player's on/off stat as their actual skill does.
You seem to be misunderstanding the net on court/off court stats. Perhaps you're confusing it with wins above replacement value. It's not a comparison of how player A does vs. his replacement player B. It's how does the team perform when player A is on the court vs. how does the team perform when player B is on the court. So, it's largely how do our starters perform compared to our opponents' starters and how does our bench perform compared to our opponents' benches. Of course, it's not quite that simple as we don't do line changes in the NBA like they do in the NHL. So, there is some overlap between starters playing with and against bench players, and vise versa, but for the most part starters play the bulk of the minutes and are all in at the beginning and usually the end, of most games. BNM
Unless you have a good theory as to how Robinson playing 10 minutes or so instead of Leonard in the last game somehow makes the starters able to hit the broad side of a barn, I'm going with coincidence.
Hey, it's Bob Ross! Hopefully there's a reason for having "Mostly Lost on D" Meyers Leonard on the floor.
Both a pretty mediocre as predicted. Who cares. Hope Leonard plays well so the Blazers have a chip to trade at the deadline.
