Vitor Faverani Shows Some Upside

http://espn.go.com/boston/nba/story/_/id/10031187/vitor-faverani-get-chance-find-groove-boston-celtics



Vitor Faverani shows some upside
Despite inconsistencies, Celtics center clearly worth team's investment
Updated: November 24, 2013, 7:43 PM ET
By Chris Forsberg | ESPNBoston.com

The first 15 games of Vitor Faverani's NBA career have been every bit the roller coaster we probably should have anticipated as the 25-year-old Brazilian import gets acclimated to his new professional environment.



Scott Halleran/Getty Images
Contrary to expectations, Vitor Faverani's strengths have been rebounding and defense.


Faverani emerged as the Boston Celtics' starting center to begin the regular season and, by Game 2, Vitor Fever had infected much of Celtics Nation as he went for 12 points and 18 rebounds against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Just as quickly as he broke through, Faverani regressed, and by Game 7 he was shuffled out of the starting lineup in favor of fellow rookie Kelly Olynyk. El Hombre Indestructible has seen inconsistent playing time recently, but his ride could be back on the climb.

Faverani turned in 11 points on 4-of-6 shooting with five rebounds over 14 minutes in Saturday's 94-87 win over the Atlanta Hawks. Faverani was plus-10 in his floor time, and after the game coach Brad Stevens noted how it was "good to see Vitor back at it."

With Olynyk sidelined for what Stevens suggested could be a couple of weeks with a sprained right ankle, Faverani is going to get another chance to find the consistency that he has lacked to this point.

Faverani is averaging 5.9 points, 5.3 rebounds and 2.7 blocks over 17 minutes per game. Boston's only pure center, the 6-foot-11 Faverani has shown offensive versatility (range to the 3-point line) while being a consistent rebounding presence at the other end of the floor.

Faverani leads the team with a total rebound percentage of 17.4 percent (ranking him in the top 25 in the league among qualifiers). He's grabbing 21.8 percent of defensive rebounds available during his floor time (only Kris Humphries and Jared Sullinger have better numbers on the Celtics) and a team-best 12.6 percent of offensive caroms.

Faverani has been a solid one-on-one defender, according to individual defensive data logged by Synergy Sports. He's allowing 0.717 points per play, which ranks him in the 85th percentile among all players. Among centers with at least 75 possessions defended, Faverani sits seventh in the league (one spot behind Indiana's Roy Hibbert).

Faverani also has been a solid rim protector. He owns the fifth best block percentage in the league (5.6 percent, putting him a fraction of a point ahead of Oklahoma City swatter Serge Ibaka), according to Basketball Reference. SportVU's player-tracking data shows that Faverani is allowing opponents to shoot just 43.3 percent at the rim -- a number that's not quite up to Hibbert's otherworldly 35.3 percent, but puts Faverani ahead of the likes of Dwight Howard (44.7 percent).


The numbers lie a little bit. Faverani is still adjusting to Boston's help defense system and has a propensity to get caught out of position. During Saturday's game, he misplayed Paul Millsap on the baseline, essentially letting him sneak by, and poor Jared Sullinger ended up on a poster for Faverani's transgression as Millsap delivered a violent one-handed jam with Sullinger scrambling to help.

Even still, the Celtics own a defensive rating of 98.8 points per 100 possessions during Faverani's 255 minutes of floor time (3½ points better than the team's season average). In the 465 minutes that Faverani has been on the bench, that rating bloats to 104.2.

Not surprisingly, Boston's rebounding numbers are decidedly better with Faverani on the floor (total rebound percentage is 50.3 when he's on; 47.6 when he's off) but turnovers spike, pace dives and the team's offensive rating slips (92.6 vs. season average of 95.7).

All of which is somewhat surprising because Faverani's offense was billed as being ahead of his defense when the Celtics signed him to an ultra-reasonable three-year, $6.3 million contract. At the moment, he's one of the least efficient players on a team that is anemic offensively. Faverani is averaging 0.807 points per play, per Synergy data (28th percentile overall) and he's struggled in the post, generating most of his points off cuts and putbacks.

Despite the ups and downs, it's clear the Celtics have something in Faverani and, given the typical price tag of serviceable centers in the NBA, he's a steal.

As we tend to note with every Celtics player, it's hard not to wonder what the return of Rajon Rondo will do for Faverani, who arrived with a reputation for liking to run the floor (though he's had only six chances to finish possessions in transition this season, according to Synergy). Which way this roller coaster ultimately trends remains to be seen, but as Faverani gets more comfortable with the NBA game, it seems fair to assume he'll do more climbing than falling.



bob
MY NOTE:  Vitor's game has two glaring weaknesses:  team defense and setting picks.  He is good offensively inside and can hit 3s.  Somewhat strangely, I have only seen Vitor hit 3s from straightaway, which are the furthest and are considered to be the most difficult.  I suppose that's a good thing since, if he misses, he's already halfway back on defense, but it is odd that's his spot.  He rebounds very well, both offensively and defensively.  He is a good, physical man-to-man defender.  If you bring the ball to him, either man-to-man or drive to him, he is a good shot blocker.  Where his learning curve is still quite steep is in defending pick-and-rolls and give-and-gos.  He doesn't step out on the ball.  Nevertheless, I think the key word when talking about Vitor is 'patience'.  He's only 15 games into his NBA career.  Yes, I know he has been playing pro ball for a long time, but it's a different kind of pro ball.  New league, new refs, new rules, new style.  What I cannot understand, however, is why a guy whose nickname is "El Hombre Industructible" doesn't set bone-rattling picks.  Or any picks, really, he just sort of creates a breeze at the defender as he rushes past him.  Vitor needs to watch how Sully sets them, or even Bass and Hump.  Other than that, for what we're paying him and that he's a rookie, signing Vitor was a coup for Danny.  He's on a 3 year contract.  We're not even 1/4 of a season through the first year.  This is a player who was eligible for the 2009 draft and wasn't even drafted, not even considered worth a 2nd round pick.  He is worth more than your average 2nd rounder now and he's going to get better.  This is a development year.  Patience.


.

One good thing is that he's had the opportunity to play quality minutes.



KJ

One way to look at Vitor's performance is to measure it against Greg Stiemsma's output this season (for the New Orleans Pelicans).

Vitor has played in 16 games and has averaged 16.8 MPG, while Greg has played in 8 games and has averaged 15.4 MPG, so their time on the floor per game is reasonably close. I don't whether Greg's missed games were due to injury or were DNPs. But their minutes per game are close enough to make "per game" stats a pretty fair comparison:

Points per game: Vitor 5.8, Greg 2.0
Two-point shooting percentage: Vitor 47.3%, Greg 50.0%
Three-point shooting percentage: Vitor 36.4%, Greg: What's a three-point shot?
Free throws taken per game: Vitor 1.7, Greg 0.5
Free throw shooting percentage: Vitor 63.0%; Greg: 50.0% (based on only 4 FT; career percentage 73.8%)
Rebounds per game: Vitor 5.1, Greg 4.6
Blocks per game: Vitor 1.2, Greg 1.0
Turnovers per game: Vitor 1.6, Greg 1.1

Vitor is more offensively minded, in terms of both volume of points and and FG shooting range. In the long run, Greg is probably the better free throw shooter—but he only gets to shoot less than one-third as many as Vitor. Greg protects the ball a little better. One unrecorded stat in which Greg probably outperforms Vitor involves number of "real" picks set. One unrecorded stat in which Vitor probably outperforms Greg is offensive versatility and activity. The only defensive stat shown involves block per game, and they're pretty similar in that respect. If someone else wants to look up Synergy's data on defensive performance for each of them, be my guest; I'm not a big fan of that stat because (like the +/- stat) it is so dependent on whom the player is playing with at any given time.

Based on these stats and some observation, on balance, there's not a lot of difference between the two. Perhaps the biggest difference is that in his third NBA season, Greg appears to have maxed out his potential while Vitor hopefully has additional improvement in his future.

But, right now, I think it's safe to say that the Celtics have at least found a replacement center backup for Greg Stiemsma. Now all they need to do is pluck an all-star center starter off the nearest low-hanging tree branch.

Sam

sam wrote:One way to look at Vitor's performance is to measure it against Greg Stiemsma's output this season (for the New Orleans Pelicans).

Vitor has played in 16 games and has averaged 16.8 MPG, while Greg has played in 8 games and has averaged 15.4 MPG, so their time on the floor per game is reasonably close.  I don't whether Greg's missed games were due to injury or were DNPs.  But their minutes per game are close enough to make "per game" stats a pretty fair comparison:

Points per game: Vitor 5.8, Greg 2.0
Two-point shooting percentage: Vitor 47.3%, Greg 50.0%
Three-point shooting percentage: Vitor 36.4%, Greg: What's a three-point shot?
Free throws taken per game: Vitor 1.7, Greg 0.5
Free throw shooting percentage: Vitor 63.0%; Greg: 50.0% (based on only 4 FT; career percentage 73.8%)
Rebounds per game: Vitor 5.1, Greg 4.6
Blocks per game: Vitor 1.2, Greg 1.0
Turnovers per game: Vitor 1.6, Greg 1.1

Vitor is more offensively minded, in terms of both volume of points and and FG shooting range.  In the long run, Greg is probably the better free throw shooter—but he only gets to shoot less than one-third as many as Vitor.  Greg protects the ball a little better.  One unrecorded stat in which Greg probably outperforms Vitor involves number of "real" picks set.  One unrecorded stat in which Vitor probably outperforms Greg is offensive versatility and activity.  The only defensive stat shown involves block per game, and they're pretty similar in that respect.  If someone else wants to look up Synergy's data on defensive performance for each of them, be my guest; I'm not a big fan of that stat because (like the +/- stat) it is so dependent on whom the player is playing with at any given time.

Based on these stats and some observation, on balance, there's not a lot of difference between the two.  Perhaps the biggest difference is that in his third NBA season, Greg appears to have maxed out his potential while Vitor hopefully has additional improvement in his future.

But, right now, I think it's safe to say that the Celtics have at least found a replacement center backup for Greg Stiemsma.  Now all they need to do is pluck an all-star center starter off the nearest low-hanging tree branch.

Sam

sam,

Other unrecorded stats are 'shots intimidated' and 'penetrations prevented'.  I haven't watched any of Steamer's play this year, but I know he was pretty darn good at challenging shots and forcing the shooter to change them mid-shot.  I also know he was better at jumping out at the ball when it was coming off his man's pick and preventing the curl into the paint.

Yes, Vitor is more advanced than Steamer offensively, especially in the paint where Steamer was really weak (although Steamer did have a very good mid-range shot).  I read somewhere that players in Europe usually retreat on pick-and-rolls, staying with their man rather than jump out on the ball.  I don't know if that's true, hopefully international will read this and educate me on that, but either way that's an area Vitor needs to "beef up" on.

Other than that, I agree, we have found a replacement for Steamer, and I'm glad we have him.  If we're lucky Danny will find us a defensive-minded center that will tutor Vitor on the finer points of NBA team defense and then he'll become a real force.  We have Vitor for 3 years, minimum, so there's time.


bob


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