I'm a big fan of Nurkic. BUT, I don't think he would give us anything that Zizic can't give us, and I think we need a center with much better lateral quickness than he has.
Not sure we can pencil in Zizic for 16/11 (what Nurkic averages in starter minutes) the way you could with Nurkic.
On the turnover issue - isn't that one of the more fixable problems someone could have, especially at age 22?
Heck, Terry Rozier is older than Nurkic and his flaws are far more worrisome.
He's also cost-controlled for this year and next.
I think if the price is right (meaning Rozier and a non-lottery draft pick or two), it's a good move. Helps our rotation, carries little long-term cost.
Can we pencil Nurkic in for that production? Extrapolating per-36 numbers seems extremely optimistic. He's yet to average above 8.6 points or 6.2 rebounds.
I'd be fine with paying a modest price, but I think we should limit our expectations.
I didn't extrapolate per-36 numbers. Those are his numbers (15/12 actually) when he plays starter minutes (30-39).
Even if you look at more reasonable number for a player with his physical profile, when playing 20-29 minutes he averages 11 and 8.
Taking the entire spectrum of minutes played, his per-minute production does not decline when he plays more minutes.
Well, as an actual starter he's averaging 9.8 points and 7.3 rebounds.
This year, he's played 30+ minutes in only one game. It stands to figure that he gets more minutes when he's playing well, so projecting any stat line based upon the limited numbers of games he gets extended playing time seems faulty.
I'm using his career totals, not his numbers this year.
And I understand the selection bias on minutes, but the data don't support it. If that were true, his per-36 figures would be better when he plays more. They're the same.
And if you take the starter numbers you quote above (which are, at least on a game-by-game basis, not subject to the "plays more minutes when playing well" bias), they come out to...you guessed it. 15 and 12 per-36.
Zero evidence that his productivity changes based on minutes played. Or starting vs. not. None.
Like anyone who understands what per-36 numbers are for, I'm not projecting performance. I'm describing it.
And if you want to say "yeah but he'd never play more than 20 minutes," fine. But then the question is whether Zizic's per-20 performance would match Nurkic's.
And just to get out of the weeds: I love Zizic and hope he ends up a better player than Nurkic. Perhaps he'd come in at age 21 and give us 10 and 7 in 22 minutes a game. I'm just saying that it's a lot to expect of someone who's never played a minute of NBA ball.
He's played 30+ minutes seven times in three years. How much do those numbers tell us? There's zero evidence that he's regularly going to put up 16 / 11 while playing 30+ minutes. That's my quibble. I have no idea what Zizic will average, but holding him to numbers that are almost entirely fictional seems unfair.
Who said we'd want to play him 30+ minutes? I never said that. You think Zizic will in his first year? Jeez.
Again: I'm talking about his actual production. Which is a known quantity. We know what he produces in the NBA when he starts, when he comes of the bench, when he plays a lot of minutes or a few. And he's been equally effective in all those scenarios. That's what the numbers say. I'm just saying it's a level that would be on the high end for a typical unproven rookie big man in the NBA.
Sigh. I guess I'll give up. I mean per-36 minute numbers are just a reference frame to gauge productivity. They are never a prediction about what a player will do in 36 minutes, or how many minutes he will or should play. It seems like an easy concept to understand, to me anyway.
1. Do you stand by this statement?
Not sure we can pencil in Zizic for 16/11 (what Nurkic averages in starter minutes) the way you could with Nurkic.
You defined "starter's minutes" as 30+ minutes, and cited his numbers from 7 games over 3 years.
2. His production isn't steady. In the vast majority of his games, he's played 19 or fewer minutes. In those games, he's shot 39%.
I don't need to "stand by the statement." It's an empirical fact. Again: the "starter minutes" figure is for reference. It makes the numbers easy to compare across players. But no, it isn't based on 7 games. That figure also describes his performance over all categories of minutes played, whether you take his production at lower minutes and scale it up for reference, or look at his production at higher levels of minutes. It's a convenience because without any notion of per-minute production, saying a player averages "10 and 7" contains zero information.
And I only mentioned the fact that he actually maintained that level of production in the 30+ category because YOU brought it up, arguing that his per-36 numbers might not apply at higher levels of minutes. Which is demonstrably not true. In a small sample to be sure, but there's no evidence of a decline. Nor should the issue of "extrapolating" to higher minutes be discussed at all, anyway. His production is what it is, you don't need to extrapolate anything to describe it.
As to the second point, I don't know why you're talking about his shooting percentages in one category. He shoots 52% from the field when he plays 20+ minutes, in 52 career games, and the figure you refer to applies to 79 games which is not "vastly more" under any definition I can think of. (His points and rebounds in that bin, by the way, are 15 and 12 in per-36 terms.) You can split the numbers up other ways too and see differences. He shoots 47% as a starter and 45% as a reserve. He shoots 62% on Tuesdays and 43% on Saturdays. And?
Again, the point is simple: Nurkic has a record of production. It's about two full seasons' worth in the NBA.
And if you look at his production on the admittedly simple bases I mention, it's rare for young players to do what he has shown he can do. There are 3-4 such players per year, I checked. And based on that I'm saying it's on the high end. That's it.