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Player R.J. Barrett

rome8180 said:
So we're just discounting his TS% being 11% lower than Harden's?
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Interesting to look at Harden's college numbers again. He was a better FG shooter (.506 career) and worse FT shooter (.755) than I expected based on how he plays now.
 
For a Barrett floor, I wouldn’t compare him to an 81% FT / 35% 3pt shooter. Floor implies guaranteed minimum performance, and to say Barrett will definitely reach the level of a good NBA shooter is pretty crazy. I think saying Barrett’s floor is this season’s Westbrook, an All-NBA player, is ironically more reasonable than comparing him to Mitchell. Unfortunately, comparing any prospect to that particular All-NBA player is an insult at this point.
 
He can be a pretty terrific NBA player with his other attributes - versatility, playmaking, rebounding. I really think he'll work his ass off to improve his shot, but it will be a long road to get north of 80% at the line.
 
Now far enough away from the season to feel comfortable taking another look at the 'is RJ the best freshman wing* of K's tenure at Duke?

Name PPG, RPG, APG, A/TO, TS%, 2%, 3%, FT%, ORtg, OBPM DRtg DBPM RgtDif** BPM
RJ 22.6 7.6 4.3 1.34 .532 .529 .308 .665 110.1 5.3 95.9 2.4 14.2 7.7
Tatum 16.8 7.3 2.1 0.81 .624 .452 .352 .849 111.4 3.5 97.8 4.1 13.6 7.5
Ingram 17.3 6.8 2.0 1.00. .552 .442 .410 .682 114.7 4.6 104.4 2.9 10.3 7.5
Winslow 12.6 6.5 2.1 1.17 .572 .486 .418 .641 115.2 5.1 92.8 5.3 22.4 10.4
Jabari 19.1 8.7 1.2 0.52 .558 .473 .358 .748 115.0 4.3 99.3 2.3 15.7 6.6
Deng 15.1 6.9 1.8 0.82 .551 .513 .360 .710 advanced stats not available on Basketball reference from that era...

So RJ dominates in counting stats being # 1 in PPG & APG, and #2 in rebounds.
RJ is a mixed bag at intermediate stats being #1 in A/TO ratio & in 2%. On the flip side he is 6th (ie last) in TS% & 3% and 5th in FT%.
RJ's advanced stats are also a mixed bag being #1 in OBPM, #2 in DRtg & BPM, but #3 in RtgDif, #5 in ORtg and #4 in DBPM.

Accepting that the counting stats at which he blows everyone away no longer count for anything, the advanced stats suggest that he was 2nd to Winslow. However, it is somewhat problematic to compare advanced stats of players with dramatically different usages like RJ and Winslow - it would be like arguing that TThornton (.450 3% as a senior) was a better shooter than JJ or Luke.

*for the purposes on this comparison I am treating Zion and Bagley as post players because they split their time at the 4 and 5 at Duke while the players I included all split their time at the 3 and 4.

**RgtDif is just ORtg - DRtg to capture the net benefit of a players offensive and defensive contributions.

niveklaen said:
RJ .504 2p%, .335 3p%, 4.0 apg, 2.8 t/o 7.4rpg, 22.7ppg
Tatum .452 2p%, .352 3p%, 2.1 apg, 2.6 t/o 7.3rpg, 16.8ppg
Ingram .442 2p%, .410 3p%, 2.0 apg, 2.0 t/o 6.8rpg, 17.3ppg
Winslow .486 2p%, .418 3p%, 2.1 apg, 1.8 t/o 6.5rpg, 12.6ppg
Jabari .473 2p%, .358 3p%, 1.2 apg, 2.3 t/o 8.7rpg, 19.1ppg
Deng .513 2p%, .360 3p%, 1.8 apg, 2.2 t/o, 6.9rpg, 15.1ppg

...thought that I would update these numbers since they were dismissed out of hand last time because we were only 10ish games into the season.

RJ still way ahead of the others in assists and A/TO ratio while offsetting his bad (and worsening) 3p% with better (and improving) 2p%

we are underselling RJ because he happens to be playing next to a god, but he is arguably the best of our OAD wings (yes, I am treating Zion and Bagly as posts for this purpose...)
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Also, Tatum's TS% is not .624. It's .566. looked it up because I knew there was no way it was that high if he only had an offensive rating of 111. His 3pt percentage is also lower than you're listing here.

What site are you using? Anyone with a 62% TS is probably going to have an offensive rating north of 120.
 
It's weird for me to judge Barrett. A lot of people compare him to Wiggins. I don't see that, but his shooting is also so bad. However, unlike Wiggins, Barrett isn't a stiff offensively. He has a good feel for the game and has a great change of pace/direction with the ball in his hands. He's a skilled player, far more skilled offensively than Wiggins and he has a natural feel which helps his offensive IQ. But he can't shoot, at all. His FT% and 3pt% is so worrisome to me.

I think his playmaking ability is going to continue to improve, he showed well there at Duke and IMO felt he got better as a playmaker later in the season. This is a huge plus considering his size. If he could improve his numbers on the three ball and at the line, he would really be a force in the NBA. I just don't know if he's going to make those improvements, he has a long way to go with how bad those numbers are.

I've seen Knicks fans on reddit question whether or not Duke's spacing was the fault for Barrett's poor 3pt shooting. I think this is certainly possible but it's impact is minimal at best in his individual case due to how bad his free throw shooting is. Reddish at 77% FT and 33% from 3pt has a stronger case of being negatively impacted by Duke's poor spacing than Barrett does, imo.
 
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rome8180 said:
Also, Tatum's TS% is not .624. It's .566. looked it up because I knew there was no way it was that high if he only had an offensive rating of 111. His 3pt percentage is also lower than you're listing here.

What site are you using? Anyone with a 62% TS is probably going to have an offensive rating north of 120.
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You are correct, not sure how I botched that , typo?

I used basketball reference as a source.
 
Slap the Floor said:
It's weird for me to judge Barrett. A lot of people compare him to Wiggins. I don't see that, but his shooting is also so bad. However, unlike Wiggins, Barrett isn't a stiff offensively. He has a good feel for the game and has a great change of pace/direction with the ball in his hands. He's a skilled player, far more skilled offensively than Wiggins and he has a natural feel which helps his offensive IQ. But he can't shoot, at all. His FT% and 3pt% is so worrisome to me.

I think his playmaking ability is going to continue to improve, he showed well there at Duke and IMO felt he got better as a playmaker later in the season. This is a huge plus considering his size. If he could improve his numbers on the three ball and at the line, he would really be a force in the NBA. I just don't know if he's going to make those improvements, he has a long way to go with how bad those numbers are.

I've seen Knicks fans on reddit question whether or not Duke's spacing was the fault for Barrett's poor 3pt shooting. I think this is certainly possible but it's impact is minimal at best in his individual case due to how bad his free throw shooting is. Reddish at 77% FT and 33% from 3pt has a stronger case of being negatively impacted by Duke's poor spacing than Barrett does, imo.
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A lot of Barrett's threes were wide open. He also has never shot well at any level. Was Duke's poor spacing influencing his high school FT%? People can be so bullheaded.

And yes, Wiggins is a poor comparison. It's being made simply because he's black, Canadian, and a wing projected to go high in the draft. He's much more comparable to DeRozan, imo. A slasher who can't shoot threes but creates well for others. The big difference is that DeRozan is an elite midrange and FT shooter.
 
Barrett is also a horrendous defensive player, which is hard to evaluate since some Duke players are just fine defensively once they get to the NBA and into a different system, but some remain terrible. I think most people gloss over this problem with Barrett because he works so hard and is so competitive, and presumably if you combine that with his raw physical gifts, he should become a good defender. That's fine, but I would also consider the possibility that he may remain one of the worst defenders in the league when judging his floor/ceiling.
 
With the revisionist history put out the last two months by media outlets, duke-forum posters, Knicks fans, and analysts, i'll be the brave one to say I don't think RJ will be anything more than an above-average starter in the league at his peak.
 
What makes me want to believe differently is the DraftExpress stuff. They're usually not way, way, way off about a prospect (unless everyone else is, too), so now I'm more willing to wait and see on Barrett. I don't think anyone in the smart crowd was saying Okafor was going to be great in the NBA, though that crowd was probably around 1/100th the size it is today during the Okafor draft buildup.
 
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