top 10 teams in assists: warriors, 76ers, pelicans, wizards, nuggets, raptors, lakers, hawks, nets, bulls. Bottom 10: Celtics, Jazz, Clippers, Pacers, Hornets, Kings, Rockets, Grizzlies, Thunder, Suns, Blazers There are more playoff teams in the bottom ten, than in the top. Not saying it shouldn’t be a focus in the offseason, because it should, just found some of those teams in the bottom interesting. We were also ranked 11th in 3pt %. The stats I found concerning were steals and fastbreak points. We were at or near the bottom in both. Those are missed opportunities for easy buckets. The top 10 teams in steals are all playoff squads. So while we improved drastically on defense, we were probably too conservative. That should be an emphasis next year, and the natural next step. They established a defensive base this season. Now it’s time to take more risks. Steals lead to easy buckets. We need more easy buckets. So if we can share the ball more and be more aggressive on defense, I think you’ll see this team make another jump. And save the anti Stotts takes for the other however many threads please. Last year the problem was defense. They improved. No reason why they couldn’t improve these issues as well.
There is a bigger gap between 30th (us) and 29th, than there is between 29th and 15th. So to divide it into groups of 10 isn't doing our lack of passing justice. Utah plays a slow style that contributes to low assists. Houston has the MVP and the best ISO player. OKC is failing monumentally, due to their lack of passing. Nobody thinks McMillan is a good coach, right? Our stagnant ISO offense back then was a complaint of many.
This should really be displayed as a scatterplot, or a "box and tail" plot to really illustrate why a simple numerical ranking doesn't capture what's going on here. (It won't be me; I don't have time for that shit.)
