Four factors to improve rebounding

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Four factors to improve rebounding Empty Four factors to improve rebounding

Post by bobheckler Sun Sep 24, 2017 8:30 pm

http://www.csnne.com/boston-celtics/celtics-storylines-four-factors-improve-rebounding



Celtics Storylines: Four factors to improve rebounding



By A. Sherrod Blakely



Four factors to improve rebounding Celtics-storylines-rebounding-al-horford-aron-baynes




BOSTON – When Danny Ainge put the Celtics roster together last season, he knew going in that rebounding for them would be a challenge.

This season, Boston has a relatively new roster with just four players returning from a year ago.

Even with new faces, the Celtics come into the season once again being challenged to be a competitive team on the boards.

In Brad Stevens’ four seasons with Boston, the Celtics have finished no better than 15th in the league in rebounding percentage.

And the outlook this season doesn’t look all that much better.

However, hope is not totally lost.

While the road to rebounding success is narrow, there are factors that could enable the Celtics to hold their own on the glass and in doing so, position themselves to be among the top teams in the NBA this season.

Here’s a look at four factors to keep an eye on:


Four factors to improve rebounding Boston-celtics-terry-rozier-trail-blazers-21017


The Bradley Plan

A series of injuries limited Avery Bradley to 55 games last season. But when he was healthy, the 6-foot-2 guard was one of Boston’s best rebounders. Bradley, who has since been traded to Detroit, finished the season averaging a career-high 6.1 rebounds per game. As much as Bradley’s athleticism and instincts for the ball helped him be a huge impact on the boards for Boston, there was a certain amount of schematic work on the part of Boston’s bigs that allowed Bradley to have such a monster year on the glass. Often it was Boston’s bigs screening their men away from the ball that created a pathway to the glass. Knowing most shooting guards don’t do a good job of getting a body on a player when a shot goes up, the Celtics may once again be able to exploit that to their advantage. So no one should be surprised if Jaylen Brown or Marcus Smart or Terry Rozier has a huge season rebounding the ball which could go far in Boston’s goal of being a better rebounding team.



Four factors to improve rebounding Celtics_bulls_al_horford_robin_lopez_042117


Al Horford

If you’re looking for Al Horford to win you over with eye-popping numbers, you will be consistently disappointed in him. That’s because Horford’s greatest impact isn’t limited to the numbers next to his name in the final score sheet. For Horford, it’s all about the final score, which more often than not, is in favor of his team. Despite leading the Celtics with an 6.8-rebound per game average last season, it still represented a career-low for the 10-year veteran. Improved rebounding has to be an across-the-board thing, and that includes Horford, who comes into this season with an 8.7 rebound-per-game career average. But the concern is despite having a really strong career average on the boards, he hasn’t averaged more than eight rebounds per game since 2013. To his credit, Horford has managed to find other ways to contribute to winning, such as passing (he averaged a career-high 5.0 assists per game last season, which is ridiculously good for a center) or setting monster screens. That's part of what allowed Isaiah Thomas (now with Cleveland) to average 28.9 points per game, tops among all players in the Eastern Conference last season. Getting back to 8-plus rebounds might be a stretch, but Boston needs all its players – especially Big Al – to step up their rebounding.



Four factors to improve rebounding Celtics_magic_jaylen_brown_012717


Position-less basketball


Like many teams in the NBA this season, there will be a push towards playing more position-less basketball. Besides winning, the goal for every team every game is to find a mismatch and exploit it as much as possible. Playing position-less basketball has the potential to not just create advantages but also give teams that aren’t great at rebounding, a chance to be more competitive on the glass. The Celtics have a roster filled with players whose skills allow them to play multiple positions. That quality will enable Brad Stevens to tinker with combinations that involve perimeter players playing in the frontcourt or bigs, such as Horford, starting the break and finding guards in transition.



Four factors to improve rebounding Celtics_baynes_070917



Aron Baynes

Baynes has established himself as one of the better defensive centers while playing limited minutes (15.5 per game last season with the Pistons). But Baynes is also a pretty good rebounder whose impact on the glass goes far beyond the 4.4 boards per game he averaged last season. Here’s what you have to keep in mind when it comes to rebounding. The actual rebounding numbers that players register aren't nearly as telling as to what their rebounding percentage. And the role that Baynes will play in all likelihood will be similar to what we saw from Amir Johnson with the Celtics last season. So, it makes sense to compare Baynes’ rebounding impact to what Johnson delivered last season. Baynes played about five minutes less per game (15.5 to Johnson’s 20.1), but averaged just 0.2 rebounds less than Johnson. Baynes had a better rebounding percentage of .158 compared to Johnson’s .125. Baynes also had the edge in defensive rebounding percentage (.206 to .169) and offensive rebound percentage (.108 to .084). How much Baynes will help on the boards remains to be seen. But based on what he has done in the past, his presence should be a plus for Boston when it comes to rebounding. And let’s face it. They need as many hands on deck as possible when it comes to rebounding.




bob
MY NOTE:  He's right about Horford.  We cannot count on this from him, he isn't going to overwhelm people in any one statistical area, he's a facilitator.  

It's hard to compare last year's team to this year's because of all the new faces, including some who have never played in the NBA before.  We can compare a few, however.  

Morris is a slightly worse rebounder than Crowder, but was that because Drummond was such a good rebounder he hogged the boards?  And how will Baynes do?  His rebound/minute last year was .2861, clearly better than last year's team average of .1743/minute and better than Amir's .2278/minute and Kelly's .2333/minute.  So, how many minutes Baynes gets is important.  If he replaces Amir's 20.1mpg (he averaged 15.1mpg last year, so that should be an easy upgrade) we should gain rebounds (furthermore, his points/minute are almost as good as Amir's, and he didn't have Kyrie and Hayward and Brad setting him up for scoring opportunities).  This is the 2nd article that Blakely has singled out Baynes, and I agree.  We need him to be what he is, and that's a brute.  Rebound and put his body on people, everything else is gravy.  

Hayward needs to rebound better than he did in Utah.  Quinn Snyder had Gobert and Favors to do the dirty work for him, now Hayward needs to stick his nose in more.

Jaylen Brown's was .1639.  Bradley's was .1833.  If Brown gets Bradley's minutes he needs to improve his rebounding to fill that hole from Bradley's departure.

Theis averaged .2305 rebounds/minute last year in Germany.  If he gets Jonas's 15.8mpg then we should gain rebounds because Jonas averaged .2194 rebounds/minute, good for .18 more rebounds/game.

Terry Rozier averaged .1805 rebounds/minute last year, slightly better than the team average .1743.  So giving him more minutes improves our rebounding.  I would have thought his rebound/minute numbers would have been better than that, to be honest.

If Kyrie plays the same number of minutes as IT did last year, and rebounds at the same rate/minute as he did last year in Cleveland, we'll gain about half a rebound/game.  

An X-factor will be how well toothpick Jayson Tatum can rebound the man's league NBA.  If he can rebound as well /minute as Kelly, we're good.

Last year we were 26th in rebounds/game (yuck!) but the difference between 26th and a very respectable 10th was only 1.9 rebounds/game, 43.9 vs 42.0 (A cautionary note:  10th place was held by the league's worst team, the Brooklyn Nyets, so maybe rebounding isn't as important a factor as some others?).  So, if you were wondering why I was bothering doing all that math to figure out the /minute differences it's because the difference between shit and top 10 is only 1.9 rebounds/game.  The differences between IT and Jonas and Amir vs Kyrie and Theis and Baynes is about 1.86 rebounds/game right there and we're within statistical rounding difference. We just need Brown and Hayward to step up a bit to fill the holes left by departing players.
 




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bobheckler
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