Kelly Olynyk, Boston Celtics big man, was one of the top driving centers last season

http://www.masslive.com/celtics/index.ssf/2016/09/kelly_olynyk_boston_celtics_bi.html



Kelly Olynyk, Boston Celtics big man, was one of the top driving centers last season




Boston Celtics big man Kelly Olynyk was one of the top centers in drives per game last season. ((Charles Krupa / Associated Press))


Tom Westerholm | twesterh@masslive.com By Tom Westerholm | twesterh@masslive.com


on September 14, 2016 at 3:00 PM






Note: As the season approaches, we will release a series of pieces based on one interesting stat from members of the Boston Celtics roster. First up: Kelly Olynyk.

Player: Kelly Olynyk

Stat: 2.2 drives per game in 2015-16, tied for third among NBA centers

This season will be an important one for Kelly Olynyk. The big man has demonstrated a truly intriguing set of skills — including dead-eye 3-point shooting, passing and excellent basketball IQ — as well as some real limitations, including his wing span and defensive potential.

But as Olynyk approaches restricted free agency next offseason, he'll have plenty of opportunities to demonstrate exactly how valuable he can be on a team that's expected to win plenty of games.

One area in which the Celtics will lean on him for production is floor spacing, which Olynyk has proven very capable of doing, both as a shooter and as a big man who can pump fake and put the ball on the floor.

The latter is occasionally a source of frustration for Celtics fans — while Olynyk is capable of getting to the rim and scoring, he shot an excellent 40.5 percent from 3-point range last season. When he pump fakes and drives, he's often passing up a high-efficiency shot.

But Olynyk is fairly effective as a driver, and he goes to that particular part of his game frequently. In fact, only two centers drove more than Olynyk last season — DeMarcus Cousins (who drove a staggering 8.0 times per game, which is in line with many guards) and Jahlil Okafor (2.7 drives). Nikola Vucevic also finished with 2.2 per game, tying Olynyk.


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Olynyk shot just 45.1 percent on his drives — better than Cousins (43.4 percent), but worse than Okafor (53.0) and Vucevic (54.5). He was, however, much more versatile on his drives — 23.1 percent of his drives resulted in passes, considerably more than most centers who drove more than once per game. Interestingly, one of the centers who passed more than Olynyk out of drives was his new front-court mate Al Horford, who drove and dished 36.7 percent of the time.

It's worth noting, of course, that 2.2 drives per game — despite Olynyk's high ranking among big men — is a very low percentage of a team's offense and a small sample size. For reference, Isaiah Thomas drove the ball 11.7 times per game last year, tied for the highest rate in the NBA.

But Olynyk's versatility brings a fun wrinkle into the Celtics' offense — two of the team's centers can put the ball on the floor, attack and collapse the defense, and given that both are good passers, both will be able to find shooters on the wing. In other words, both will occasionally be able to act like de facto point guards, which might free up Thomas — the team's actual point guard, and pretty clearly the team's best scorer — to score both in catch-and-shoot and driving situations himself.

A couple more interesting notes:

Olynyk was actually third in center drives two years ago as well and shot quite a bit better (51.3 percent), while passing less (18.7 pass percentage). That dip in field-goal percentage could be due to a few things. First, the sample size is small enough that about 10 misses here or there could make up the difference between 2014-15 and 2015-16. Second, Olynyk battled through shoulder injuries last season, which could have limited him, especially on aggressive plays around the hoop.

Of all centers who drove more than once per game, Olynyk had the highest overall assist percentage of all but two — trailing just Boris Diaw and Horford (Diaw's numbers, it should be noted, were ludicrously high).

Frank Kaminsky — who is often compared to Olynyk — also drove quite a bit, but he might want to chill. The rookie shot just 32.7 percent from the field on drives, and he was a bit of a black hole — passing just 9.4 percent of the time when he drove.


bob


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IT/Jaylen Brown/Crowder/Olynyk/Horford = Domination

This is a very important year for KO just like it was for Sullinger last year.

He needs to stay healthy and he needs to play with a high level of consistency.  I do not see a lot of upside here.  The article is kinda stupid as it relates to him driving to the rim (after the pump fake)  Most of the time he looked horribly awkward doing that.

He needs to do what he can do best    Shoot the damn ball when he is open.  He is fighting for a new contract but let's be clear.  He is a rotation player and does not have the talent to be a starter at either the 4/5 positions.    Nevertheless he can become a consistent rotation player.  

dboss

Has there been a recent Celtic player who has drawn as much criticism over the last 10 years?

Up to this point, dboss may have said it best when he said that "he is a rotation player".

But, "only" being a quality rotation player is a good place to be in the NBA compared to where most of us fall in our NBA careers.

And being a 40% 3 point shooting 7 footer would normally be a good thing, but there's only one other out there, and Kelly's not him, so therefore KO sucks.

With Horford this year it will be the first year Olynyk has ever played with a center better than himself, which means he can actually play extended PF minutes for the first time.

If Dirk or Anthony Davis never got to play with a decent center, they would have been derided as hopelessly weak rim protectors/enforcers, even if they put up great advanced stats like Olynyk has always done at C.

wideclyde wrote:Has there been a recent Celtic player who has drawn as much criticism over the last 10 years?

Up to this point, dboss may have said it best when he said that "he is a rotation player".  

But, "only" being a quality rotation player is a good place to be in the NBA compared to where most of us fall in our NBA careers.

Clyde I am with you on that.  KO can shoot the rock.  The Rotation needs that from him.  So as I said shoot the damn ball.

dboss

On a scale from 1 - 10, Kelly will ptobably never be better than a 6 man-to-man and perhaps a 7.5 on help defense (BBIQ matters hugely on help defense, just ask athletically-challenged Larry Bird, who was named All Defense 2nd team 2x on the strength of his help defense, NOT his man2man).  Defense, however, is only one side of the ball.  IT is a MUCH bigger defensive liability than Kelly but offsets that by being Mighty Mouse on offense. Kelly needs to be more aggressive on offense to offset his mediocre defense too.  If he is more assertive on offense, and the offense is run through him more as a result, that will free up IT to be more of a pure shooter.  Brad has said that he likes to run our offense through our bigs.  With the addition of 4x All-Star Al Horford, Kelly is now our 2nd best offensive big.  He has to play like it.

Kelly isn't the scorer Dirk is but he is a comparable rebounder and defender, and Dirk is going into the HOF anyway.  Kelly needs to up his 14.3 fgas/36mpg (17.7pts/36) another fga or two and, more importantly, get to the line more.  That is what driving will do for him and that is what the topic of this thread is about.  


bob


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If KO played 30 MPG would his production go up down or remain the same in terms of efficiency across the board.

dboss

dboss wrote:If KO played 30 MPG would his production go up down or remain the same in terms of efficiency across the board.

dboss

Tough question to answer. But here are some things to ponder.
He's now 25 years old - and has a 3 year average of 20.8 minutes per game - which places him between the 7th and 8th player on a team in term of minutes played - and to move up to 30 minutes per game would rank him as a player with the 3rd most minutes on a team - now that's a big jump for a player, age 25, with a career average of only 20.8 minutes. Also consider that his current stats, were for the most part, compiled at the expense of the other teams bench. I would love to see him blossom into another Kevin McHale - but that's for day dreaming. And no one should expect Bird or Nowitzki like numbers - especially when you understand that their 35.0 plus minutes per game had them playing against the iron every night.

swish

cowens/oldschool wrote:bob I would never compare them, but since you did Bird for his career avg 10 rebounds a game, while he wasn't a great shot blocker, as his rebounding numbers attest he was very physical, similar to earth bound defensive studs Charles Oakley and Paul Silas, KO is the direct opposite of those guys and his defense is even worse, much worse than Dirks.

Cow,

As usual, you make fruit salad.  The thread is about Kelly's driving (offense) and you talked about defense.

1.  Kelly is averaging 8.1 rebounds/36 minutes.  Bird averaged 9.4 rebounds/36 minutes.

2.  The game in Bird's era was closer to the basket than today's NBA.  Closer to the basket means closer to the rebounds.

3.  Charles Oakley couldn't shoot 3s and NEVER drove (the topic of this thread).

4.  Neither Bird nor Oakley had to defend, and rebound, against centers.

5. No. His defense is not worse than Dirk's and Dirk doesn't have to defend centers like Kelly does.


bob


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cowens/oldschool wrote:I don't care how many drives a game he has.....he sucks and is soft all over.

What a useless stat.

The one thing about Cowens is that we always have to drag his opinion out of him.

I don't care if it's an opinion I agree with or not; I always love the bottom-liners.  Cut the details, just give it to me straight.

You've still got it Richie!

I believe that Ainge was quoted as saying that Olynyk would be a "contributing" player on the night he was drafted. So far, Ainge is right on with that prediction, and with that prediction Olynyk might be one of Ainge's better picks in the last bunch of years.

wideclyde wrote:I believe that Ainge was quoted as saying that Olynyk would be a "contributing" player on the night he was drafted.  So far, Ainge is right on with that prediction, and with that prediction Olynyk might be one of Ainge's better picks in the last bunch of years.

Clyde,

Ainge also said, on Kelly's draf1t day, that Kelly would play PF in rhe NBA.  Zeller was clearly considered inadeqate at center considering short and fat Sully started, Zeller got Coaches-DNPs and Kelly played minutes at back up center, NOT the position Danny drafted him to play and NOT the position Dirk has EVER been asked to played.


bob


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bobheckler wrote:

wideclyde wrote:I believe that Ainge was quoted as saying that Olynyk would be a "contributing" player on the night he was drafted.  So far, Ainge is right on with that prediction, and with that prediction Olynyk might be one of Ainge's better picks in the last bunch of years.

Clyde,

Ainge also said, on Kelly's draf1t day, that Kelly would play PF in rhe NBA.  Zeller was clearly considered inadeqate at center considering short and fat Sully started, Zeller got Coaches-DNPs and Kelly played minutes at back up center, NOT the position Danny drafted him to play and NOT the position Dirk has EVER been asked to played.


bob


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Olynyk's name is sure being connected quite often, in one way or another, to Nowitzki - especially since its likely that he will be seeing considerable time at the power forward slot this year - but at this point in time lets not go over board on just how successful he will be away from the basket. Nowitzki has certainly mastered the outside game and now it looks like Olynyk is going to have to sharpen up his total outside game - and other than his 3 point accuracy, he's got a long way to go.

Last 3 years (FG%)
From 3' out to the 3 point line - Olynyk averages .326
Nowitzki averages .476

From the 3 point land - Olynyk averages .373
Nowitzki averages ..376

Not a fair comparison I know - but boy that .326 is awfully ugly, especially when he figure's to have rather lousy rebound numbers to go along with a suspect mid range game. Even his 3 point numbers could suffer now that he will be facing BIGS that are more at home playing perimeter defense. I sure hope that those past lousy numbers will not be an accurate predictor of the future. We shall see.

swish