Quantifying how bad Kyrie's defense was last season

[jpotter33]

Those DFG% statistics are extremely problematic and should not be used in any way to define a player as a bad defender nor a good one.  What the cameras do is nothing more than mark the closest defender as responsible for defending the shot attempt.  Many times a help defender is just as responsible if not more so for the quality of shot attempt that was taken and many times the closest defender was not responsible for the result at all. 

If you stick Kyrie on the Warriors playing with an entire team of solid help guys and the ultimate help guy in Draymond his numbers would be far far better.  Kyrie was surrounded by some very poor help defenders in Cleveland, not saying he is great by any stretch but the way a player defends or is able to defend is highly dependent on who he is on the floor with.  He will certainly be a lot less problematic than I.T. was.

This is all really important to remember. These stats alone do not prove anything about Kyrie's defense.

On the flip side, let's not forget context. When IT was on the floor last year, he was usually guarding the worst offensive player (who wasn't a big) on the opposing team. Do you think being constantly given the worst player to guard affects IT's defensive stats? If IT had to cover everyone Kyrie was asked to cover last year, my guess is IT's DFG% numbers drops below Kyrie's.

Kyrie needs to improve on defense, absolutely. But there is no question in my mind he was a more effective defensive player last season than IT was and will continue to be going forward.

TP. Was getting ready to argue these exact things, but no point in repeating them when both of you covered them so well.

People need to rely more on the eye test for comparing defense. I'm not sure after these past playoffs how anyone can make the argument that Kyrie is worse defensively than IT when literally every single team abused and gameplanned around IT's defense due to how poor it was and his overall size.

We've also seen Kyrie play high-level defense for periods of time, which isn't something you can say about IT. During their title run, Kyrie's defense was actually really impressive.

So we know he can play at least average defense, but it just has to be cultivated in an environment that actually cares and focuses on playing good defense.

[Moranis]

That is why I'm still iffy on the trade: Kyrie needs to be a legit top 2 MVP candidate in order to justify the package.

I disagree, I think the Nets pick simply has to land outside the top 5-7 picks. If we weren't going to resign IT which seems obvious, then 2 role players and a tier 2 prospect for an Olympian closer on an NBA champ who won all star MVP at age 21 (!) is a pretty [dang] good trade for us.

Except we traded with our chief rival who was coming apart at the seams.  If IT and Crowder work out well this season, Lebron may well decide to stay.  We could end up looking up at the Cavs for the  next 3 or 4 seasons.

With a top prospect learning from Bron to make our lives miserable in the future.

Cleveland's salary next year is already at around $128M if they keep Lebron. That includes letting Rose, Calderon, Green, and Frye walk. Do you know what the luxury tax ramifications would be (with the real killer being the repeater tax) if they spend ~$35M/yr on IT and the BKN pick??

Simply stated, if Lebron miraculously decided to stay, re-signing IT is just not an option. And, if Lebron moves on, I don't see why Cleveland wouldn't drop as much salary as possible to rebuild. That also includes letting IT walk.

When Lebron's presence makes your team hundreds of millions of dollars more valuable, you can afford to appease him.  I think their salary for next season is closer to $115 million, isn't it?

he was talking about the 18/19 season, but the 17/18 season they are at 138 million (with Thomas, Crowder, and Zizic).  I assume they will cut Tavares and Felder who have non-guaranteed contracts but that doesn't save much.  The season after that i.e. 18/19, with James opting in they are at 128 million without Thomas or the BKN pick.  If you add Thomas at say 30 million and the BKN pick at 5 million, that makes the team salary astronomical, especially if James opts out and then re-signs at more than 35 million (which he could).  That said, that would likely be the last year of that problem as 19/20 the only guaranteed contracts they have are Love, Thompson, Crowder, and Osman (with Zizic having a team option).  Korver and Smith are partially guaranteed that year.  So they could theoretically ride out the 18/19 season and then enter 19/20 below the tax line even with James, Thomas, and BKN (though they would be over the cap and wouldn't have much wiggle room to add to the team).  They could add some vets or young guys to fill out the roster and would still have a pretty darn good team with Thomas, ?, James, Love, Thompson, Osman, Zizic, BKN. 

[Rosco917]

At least Irving at 6-3 has the tools to improve his defense, IT at 5-9 isn't growing.

Six inches in basketball is a world of difference when talking about the same position.

[jambr380]

That is why I'm still iffy on the trade: Kyrie needs to be a legit top 2 MVP candidate in order to justify the package.

I disagree, I think the Nets pick simply has to land outside the top 5-7 picks. If we weren't going to resign IT which seems obvious, then 2 role players and a tier 2 prospect for an Olympian closer on an NBA champ who won all star MVP at age 21 (!) is a pretty [dang] good trade for us.

Except we traded with our chief rival who was coming apart at the seams.  If IT and Crowder work out well this season, Lebron may well decide to stay.  We could end up looking up at the Cavs for the  next 3 or 4 seasons.

With a top prospect learning from Bron to make our lives miserable in the future.

Cleveland's salary next year is already at around $128M if they keep Lebron. That includes letting Rose, Calderon, Green, and Frye walk. Do you know what the luxury tax ramifications would be (with the real killer being the repeater tax) if they spend ~$35M/yr on IT and the BKN pick??

Simply stated, if Lebron miraculously decided to stay, re-signing IT is just not an option. And, if Lebron moves on, I don't see why Cleveland wouldn't drop as much salary as possible to rebuild. That also includes letting IT walk.

When Lebron's presence makes your team hundreds of millions of dollars more valuable, you can afford to appease him.  I think their salary for next season is closer to $115 million, isn't it?

Hoopshype is missing both the salaries of Korver and Osman, which are guaranteed (for just over $10M) as well as Tavares and Felder. I understand the latter two may not be in Cleveland's long term plans, but they are essentially minimum salary players anyway.

I prefer Spotrac for player/team salary figures. It is a much more comprehensive website...I just hope that it is as accurate 

http://www.spotrac.com/nba/cleveland-cavaliers/yearly/cap/

And, yes, I think that ownership should be willing to spend more to appease Lebron, but that has seemingly been a point of contention up to this point. I'm also just not sure IT and Crowder (instead of Kyrie) will be enough to keep Lebron around.

[byennie]

Do you know what DPRM contains in it's "formula"?

It doesn't look purely at production and results. It includes things like height, age, and the prior year's RPM. Seriously, look it up. It's not an accurate measurement of anything other than the biases of the formula's creator.

Do you? Or are you looking at FiveThirtyEight where they factor that into *projections*?

https://www.basketball-reference.com/about/bpm.html
http://deadspin.com/just-what-the-hell-is-real-plus-minus-espns-new-nba-s-1560361469

Kyrie beats IT by a clear margin in every advance defensive metric. Cherry picking FG%, the type of thing these metrics were made to improve on, is intentionally using worse data.

[Dino Pitino]

Kyrie beats IT by a clear margin in every advance defensive metric. Cherry picking FG%, the type of thing these metrics were made to improve on, is intentionally using worse data.

TP. Amen. Intentional.

[byennie]

Thing is, I love me some IT. But, the defensive argument, the playoffs argument, they are both real.

Kyrie has played almost 2000 playoff minutes with a DBPM of -0.2. In ~13000 regular season minutes, it is -1.5.

IT checks in at -2.7 (regular season/ ~13000 minutes) and -1.5 (playoffs/ 860 minutes).

Kyrie is a bad defender, yes, but IT is measurably and significantly worse, and the difference is larger in the playoffs.

How about we just continue thinking IT is amazing, and also be excited about Kyrie being a potential upgrade. Crazy idea, I know.

[RLewis35]

IT was literally the WORST PG on D in the entire league last year...

To have an argument over a player that CAN'T be worse is ridiculous.

Based upon what? Back up your argument.

The eye test makes it clear.  We all watched the Celtics playoffs. No one in the NBA is targeted on D like Isaiah was.

[Roy H.]

Still, there are a slew of holes in Irving’s game that should give teams pause, including some that have been sidestepped in recent years as he’s had less responsibility on his plate with James as a teammate. Aside from durability — Irving’s had his fair share of injuries, including a fractured kneecap in the NBA Finals two years ago — defense is chief among them. Opposing teams had no issue targeting Irving, who’s often flat-footed or a step slow in pick and rolls and in 1-on-1 scenarios, this past season.



He was one of 10 guards this past season to surrender 50 percent shooting or better from the floor in 1-on-1 situations.  3 And while most point guards throughout the league are thought to be pretty weak defensively, Irving’s offense-defense balance is particularly lopsided. In NBA history, there have only been six player seasons in which a guard had a usage rate of 30 percent or more (meaning the percentage of a team’s plays that end with that player shooting or turning the ball over) while logging 1.5 defensive win shares or fewer.  4 Two of those six campaigns belong to Irving, including this past season, according to Basketball-Reference.com.

That was the case despite Tristan Thompson manning the painted area well, holding foes about nine percentage points beneath their average. In other words: You need to have a decent rim protector, if not a great one, in order to stop teams from taking advantage of Irving’s porous defense. Having good wing stoppers, which the defensively challenged Cavs lacked against Golden State, would obviously help, too.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/fivethirtyeight.com/features/kyrie-irving-wants-to-be-a-no-1-but-hes-better-as-a-sidekick/amp/

[Granath]

19th percentile in the pick and roll.
12th percentile in in isolation.

Those are the stats, folks. Irving was terrible on defense by virtually any measurement. Whether or not he's as bad - or possibly worse - than IT isn't really encouraging any way you cut it. Saying he's somehow slightly better is the very definition of [dang]ing with faint praise.

https://www.fanragsports.com/cavaliers/porous-pick-roll-defense-kyrie-irving-killing-cavaliers/

I'm a believer in Brad, so I'm hoping he can come through here and get Irving to D up. Because if he can't, we just moved all of those assets for a slightly younger and taller version of IT.

[BostonClamCrowdah]

Good enough to get to the finals 3 years in a row

LBJ didn't do it alone

[CelticsElite]

point guard defense is overrated. look at harden and what he has achieved. 2nd in mvp.

[Granath]

Good enough to get to the finals 3 years in a row

LBJ didn't do it alone

Lebron made the finals 8 times now, 5 without Irving. The first year he really did do it alone and he stretched the 2015 series to 6 games without Irving or Love. I think it's safe to argue that with or without Irving, Lebron had a better-than-even odds of heading to the Finals.   

[safecracker]

Good enough to get to the finals 3 years in a row

LBJ didn't do it alone

Actually, he kind of did. Check out the Cav's record when Lebron sits out. It's not a pretty sight.

[Rondo9]

I think people know that Kyrie is not a good defender, but neither was Thomas and theoretically, Kyrie can get better under Stevens. I think that's what Danny is hoping for.