Grant Williams ranked as most improved player

https://hardwoodhoudini.com/2021/12/14/boston-celtics-grant-williams-improved/



Grant Williams ranked as most improved player



by Mark Nilon



Despite the fact that the 2021-22 season has been unbelievably disappointing or, at the very least the epitome of pedestrian for the Boston Celtics thus far, still, there have proven to be a handful of positives that fans can take away from the team’s first 28 games of play.

When it comes to their rotation, specifically, there have proven to be several pluses who have played admirably during the first two months of action, however, perhaps the most pleasant surprise contributor has been third-year forward, Grant Williams.


Serving as arguably the C’s most trusty shooter, per-75 possessions the 23-year-old finds himself putting up 12.5 points, 5.6 rebounds, 1.7 assists, and a block on incredibly efficient scoring splits of 51 percent shooting from the floor, 45 percent shooing from deep, and 87 percent shooting from the line.

Easily finding himself in the midst of a career-best season, it is because of his efficiency on both ends of the court that the folks at Bleacher Report believe him to be Boston’s most improved player.

His shot profile now reads like an analytical dream. If he’s not burying buckets from distance (career-high 43.2 three-point percentage, 96th percentile on spot-up shots), he is cleaning up from close range. Among players with 25-plus attempts inside of five feet, Williams’ 81.5 percent connection rate ranks second-best.

At the opposite end, his defensive versatility is shining. While he is a 6’6″, 236-pound power forward, he spends more than one-third of his defensive possessions matching up with guards, per BBall-Index.com.


His place in Boston’s blueprint for the present and future might have been murky coming into the campaign, but he has rocketed up to essential status.

On top of this, we find the power forward converting on nearly 47 of his corner 3-point attempts and boasts a stellar effective field goal percentage of 69 when in catch-and-shoot situations.

While the Boston Celtics as a collective may have come out of the gates looking rather sluggish this season, Grant Williams as an individual has been one of their true bright spots.

Despite our beliefs on what the front office may wish to do with him long-term, no one can deny that Williams has proven to be one of the team’s most trusty contributors and, in the opinion of B/R writer, Zach Buckley, this certainly warrants a M.I.P moniker.


Bob
MY NOTE:  Too early to start talking about who should win MIP but Grant has to be considered.  

Per Game
.................mpg.....fg%....3pt fg%...3pt fgas....2pt fg%....ftas.....ft%...TRB...ast...TO....ppg...OffRtg...DefRtg
2020/21--18.1----43.7---37.2-------2.0---------50.8-------.8------58.8--2.8--1.0---.9---4.7---105-----114
2021/22--22.1----51.1---45.3-------3.4---------64.3-------1.1----86.7--3.4---1.0---.6---7.5---130-----110


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Most consistently, it has to be Grant.  Al had a year off.  RWIII could be one but he's been on and off.  JT has reached superstar status so he's in a different class and measured differently.  JB?  too inconsistent to this point.  MS?  No, but you can't do without him.  Menace? No.  All the rest have been marginalized.  PP, Rich, RL, AN...not enough primetime tape to judge.  Maybe Rich on the border, but he would definitely be in there somewhere.  Did I miss anybody?  

db

P.S.  With GW, I just had an Eddie House flash.  I never had to worry about Eddie coming off the bench and not lighting it up from 3-ville EVERY SINGLE NIGHT.  Hmmmm...

dbrown4 wrote:Most consistently, it has to be Grant.  Al had a year off.  RWIII could be one but he's been on and off.  JT has reached superstar status so he's in a different class and measured differently.  JB?  too inconsistent to this point.  MS?  No, but you can't do without him.  Menace? No.  All the rest have been marginalized.  PP, Rich, RL, AN...not enough primetime tape to judge.  Maybe Rich on the border, but he would definitely be in there somewhere.  Did I miss anybody?  

db

P.S.  With GW, I just had an Eddie House flash.  I never had to worry about Eddie coming off the bench and not lighting it up from 3-ville EVERY SINGLE NIGHT.  Hmmmm...

dbrown,

The numbers really jump out at you when you look at them /36mpg.  Same player, same team, somewhat different system (Brad vs Ime), used differently (4 vs smallball 5) but the mpg are close (18 vs 22).  A year-to-year comparison on a /minute therefore is, in my opinion, a reasonable thing to do.  If you want to give some of the credit to Ime for using Grant differently, fair enough, but the shooting is the shooting.  Grant's numbers are up, significantly, in most categories but one category where his numbers are fairly flat is in fgas/36mpg.  He's taking 8.0 fgas/36mpg vs 7.8 last year, not much difference there, but he's taking 5.5 3s/36 vs 4.1 3s/36.  So he has significantly shifted his offense to the 3, and he's shooting them very well of course.


Bob


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