Is Vitor as Good as We Think?

I think he's been a pleasant surprise, but then I never expected much from him.  He has been benched in the 2nd half of the last two games, however, and we rallied back.  So, what does that mean?

Remember, this is only after 3 games...


http://redsarmy.com/2013/11/05/vitor-faveranis-impact-not-as-good-as-you-might-think/


Vitor Faverani’s impact: Not as good as you might think
John - Red's Army (@RedsArmy_John)November 5, 2013


Vitor Faverani is surprising a few people with his play so far this season.  He’s putting up a very respectable 9.5 points on 56% shooting, 7.3 rebounds, and 2.8 blocks after four games.  But those numbers are skewed a bit by an 18 rebound, 6 block performance against the Bucks.

After nine blocks in his first two games, he’s got one in each of his last two.  And a 4th-quarter benching in Detroit raised a few eyebrows.  So let’s take a deeper into the number to see what Brad Stevens sees.

Let’s start with his on/off numbers.

In four games this year, Faverani has spent 110 minutes on the floor and 82 minutes off.

ON THE FLOOR
+/-..........OFF RTG..........DEF RTG
-19.2.......84.9................106.2

OFF THE FLOOR
+/-..........OFF RTG..........DEF RTG
8.2..........104.3..............96.3
via NBA

The numbers are actually a little surprising considering how well he seems to have been playing.  And, of course, the caveat with all early season statistics is that it’s early, and it will take a little while for water to find its level.  But the disparity in the on/off numbers is pretty big.
What does this mean?  Hard to say.  He’s been the Celtics starting center and the Celtics have had some pretty good first quarters this year.  They’ve done well with him on the floor at times.  You can look at this set of numbers and say “wow, they’re better without him on the floor.”  But it’s also a matter of who he’s on the floor with.

So now we break down the rotations.

The Faverani/Bass/Green/Wallace/Bradley starting lineup has played 62 total minutes together so far this season and has a defensive rating of 87.4, which is really good.   It also has an offensive rating of 80.3, which is really bad.

When you remove Bradley, that defensive rating goes up to 97.0, and the offensive rating goes up to 88.2.  So the four-man unit without Bradley, a defensive menace but, as we discussed, in a tough position as a point guard and struggling offensively, is predictably worse without him defensively, and slightly better without him offensively.

When you put Bradley back in but remove Faverani, the defensive rating goes down to 85.2, and the offensive rating is 83.9.  So without Faverani on the floor in that five-man unit, the defense gets better, but so does the offense.

The starters without Wallace:  91.0 drtg, 82.1 ortg.
The starters without Green:  87.6 drtg, 82.4 ortg.
The starters without Bass:  87.9 drtg, 78.7 ortg.

So the defensive rating with all the starters is 87.4.  It goes up, meaning the defense gets worse, when each starter is removed from the four-man unit except…. Vitor Faverani.  Removing Faverani from the four-man units results in a better defensive rating.

Removing Faverani from the four-man equation  results in the second-highest bump in offensive rating behind the loss of Avery Bradley, who, again, has struggled a lot.

At this point, the numbers are starting to tell us the same things.

Four-man rotations
Players +/-
Bass, Bradley, Green, Wallace = 2.1
Bass, Bradley, Faverani, Wallace = -2.1
Bass, Faverani, Green, Wallace = -5.4
Bass, Bradley, Faverani, Green = -6.5
The only positive +/- is without Faverani on the floor.

Let’s get down to the two-man units to see how Faverani influences the players around him.

Two-man rotations
Players +/-
Faverani/Bradley -14.8
Faverani/Bass -5.7
Faverani/Green -19
Faverani/Wallace -13.9

Not great.  That’s a bunch of negative numbers.  Made more damning when you consider Bass’s numbers with the other three starters:

Two-man rotations
Players +/-
Bass/Bradley -6.3
Bass/Green 0.5
Bass/Wallace 3.7

Bass is having a positive effect on other players.  The Celtics are better with him on the floor.  It explains why he’s got the highest +/- of the regular rotation guys.  Sullinger is second.

Speaking of which, what about when Faverani comes out of the game and Jared Sullinger checks in for him?

Two-man rotations
Players +/-
Sullinger/Bradley 9.8
Sullinger/Bass -25.7
Sullinger/Green 16.2
Sullinger/Wallace -16.4

Do NOT put Sullinger and Bass on the floor together (that number is in only 11 minutes of play, but wow, what a number).  Wow.  And Sullinger’s impact on Wallace is interesting too.  But Sullinger plays much better with the wings than Faverani does.

I’ll repeat:  IT’S EARLY!!  Statistics are subject to wild swings when the sample size is this small.  The point of this exercise, though, is to show that Faverani, while he has shown some nice flashes out there, isn’t doing as well as we would like to think.  The numbers explain why Stevens was willing to bench him against a team like Detroit and their talented big men.

But stats do only tell part of the story.  Faverani has shown that he can, in stretches, be pretty good.  He can rebound and block shots, but he’s just can’t do it consistently enough yet.  The truth of his performance lies in the combination of what our eyes see and what the stats say.

Your eyes will see Vitor doing good things out there, and when he does enough of them, your eyes will gloss over the bad stuff (especially when you follow people like me on Twitter who like make jokes like Vitor Faverani getting a statue next to Bill Russell).  The stats are cold-hearted, and ignore the stretches of good we see, instead lumping everything into a blender and pouring you a bitter taste of reality.

Vitor Faverani plays well at times, but overall, he’s having problems just like the rest of the team.  I wouldn’t be surprised to see some adjustments from Stevens.




bob



.

Bob;you forgot to mention some stats.
1-He is taking only6 field goals per game
2-He is shooting 56.0 %
3- The team is last in total assists with only 14.3
4-His point guard is taking over 13 field goals and is dening the ball to him all the time.
5-His team is first in turnovers with over 23 per game.
My question will be..Is he surrounded with good players?

No.

Then what does this say about Olynyk?


KJ

international wrote:Bob;you forgot to mention some stats.
1-He is taking only6 field goals per game
2-He is shooting 56.0 %
3- The team is last in total assists with only 14.3
4-His point guard is taking over 13 field goals and is dening the ball to him all the time.
5-His team is first in turnovers with over 23 per game.
My question will be..Is he surrounded with good players?

international,

Just to be clear, I didn't write this post, I just copy-and-pasted one I found.  When I inject my own comments I either put them at the very top of the page before the body of the article like I did with this one, or I put them at the end after my name so that other readers can read the article without being influenced by my opinion from the opening, in bold, citing "MY NOTE:".  If I want to stress something in the body of the article, I comment at the top of the page that "the BOLDS are mine" and then BOLD those points.  If anything longer than a phrase or a sentence is in italics, it's probably not me saying it, I put other peoples' articles in italics to distinguish them from my own thoughts.


bob


.

OK Bob,no problem.What really bother me is that instead of being happy with the adquisition of this player,some people(I am not talking about you)waste their time looking for negative things about him.I am very disappointed with those Celtics fans who are happy because Boston is 0-4 and they say that tanking is good.

international wrote:OK Bob,no problem.What really bother me is that instead of being happy with the adquisition of this player,some people(I am not talking about you)waste their time looking for negative things about him.I am very disappointed with those Celtics fans who are happy because Boston is 0-4 and they say that tanking is good.

I agree....and find a real ignorance in the idea of tanking. As it relates to the NBA - IT DOES NOT WORK.

Only one team in history has won a championship after winning the lottery - and that was a red herring. The Spurs were a good team but lost a lot after David Robinson got hurt for an entire season. They won the lottery, got Tim Duncan and then the Admiral came back and they had a formidable team right away. This is usually not the case and teams that hit rock bottom in the NBA rarely become viable (see Cleveland, Washington, heck - see the Celtics for the 20 years between titles.)

People suggesting the Celtics tank are ignorant and not really Celtics fans anyway.

mrkleen09 wrote:

international wrote:OK Bob,no problem.What really bother me is that instead of being happy with the adquisition of this player,some people(I am not talking about you)waste their time looking for negative things about him.I am very disappointed with those Celtics fans who are happy because Boston is 0-4 and they say that tanking is good.

I agree....and find a real ignorance in the idea of tanking.  As it relates to the NBA - IT DOES NOT WORK.

Only one team in history has won a championship after winning the lottery - and that was a red herring.  The Spurs were a good team but lost a lot after David Robinson got hurt for an entire season.  They won the lottery, got Tim Duncan and then the Admiral came back and they had a formidable team right away.  This is usually not the case and teams that hit rock bottom in the NBA rarely become viable (see Cleveland, Washington, heck - see the Celtics for the 20 years between titles.)

People suggesting the Celtics tank are ignorant and not really Celtics fans anyway.

Agree completely

I think we all competed at some level in SOMETHING and unless I was playing Tittleywinks, Candyland or Shoots and Ladders with the kids I wanted to win........and above that I TRIED to win.

Unless a couple players are point shaving and have $$$$ on it (and that has happened refs included) no one steps out on that floor to intentionally loose any game. Our play in the 4th quarter has cost us 3 potential wins but that is because we just are not that good...........yet. With Rondo we win at least 2 of those perhaps.

Management might have a long term goal of not being very competitive in a particular year with the "Hope" of catching lightening in a bottle the next year but even then they are NOT loosing intentionally.


beat

International, Mrkleen and Beat,

I hope it's obvious that you're preaching to the choir when it comes to my views on the "tanking" crap. I put it in the same category as Hollinger's "pop stats" as far as credibility is concerned.

Sam

I would like to add that a true Celtic fan who saw players like Russell,Havlichec,Cowens,Dennis Johnson,Larry Bird ,Garnett and many others who wore the uniforms with pride,and wanted to win each and every game has to be angry with this crap of tanking.

international wrote:I would like to add that a true Celtic fan who saw players like Russell,Havlichec,Cowens,Dennis Johnson,Larry Bird ,Garnett and many others who wore the uniforms with pride,and wanted to win each and every game has to be angry with this crap of tanking.

I can only imagine these guys response to being asked to loosing even 1 game on purpose.

Would be sort of like Cowens response to the ref when he called a charge on him for brushing Mike Newlin. ( think all of us here know the "rest of the story"

beat