Hypothetical Starting 5 / Rotation

[AussieWolf3]

Yeah, I think Aussie pretty much nailed it with his three tiers, with the exception of JK who belongs in the top tier of 6. He's going to play every night, like the other 5, and Bones will likely just be a guy they throw in there if the offense isn't clicking to see if he can go on a heater. How the other 4 (TJ, Clark, Lyles and Joan) fare will have a lot to do with how successful we are this season. I think we have a very good top 6, and solid contributions from the rest could mean a very good season.

I'm not sure how we can currently determine that JK is locked in a 6. At this point in his career he has been a negative impact player for all but 30 some games last year and even that depends on what metric you're using.

There is a very real possibility that by December of this year it is apparent that Shannon or even Joan is the 6th best players. Not saying likely, just that it's within a realistic set of circumstances. JK will no doubt have a role this year, there is no question about that, but it certainly possible that there a good degree of night to night fluctuation

I agree that JK is a mystery. and I would have him 6th in the top tier. But since he has played meaningful playoff minutes (like the other 5 in his tier) and was a lottery pick, I can't see ranking him at the same level as 19-year-old Joan who just started playing basketball 6 years ago and has played little other than garbage time or Bones who struggles to stay in rotations. I'm high on Joan, but I can't raise him to JK's level based on one admittedly impressive summer league game. But like I said, if Joan can give us 15 good minutes behind Rudy this season, that is really going to help us.

That's where we're missing each other. I'm not ranking anyone right now in that group because I believe it's both fairly flat and that these players roles (particularly in terms of minutes) are not nearly as settled as the first group.

I understand all the caveats about Joan, but the reality is that he could end up playing more positively impactful basketball minutes than Kuminga this year. These two in particular have such a massive bandwidth of outcomes this year that it's hard to say who is clearly better between the two. I don't know what else to say, other than the fact that JK just hasn't been a good player in his career, so I don't really care about his lottery pick status.

Reasonably JK is subbed out for Ayo in the first rotation and might not go back out until 3 or 4 minutes into the 2nd and 4th, and their could be a lot variability there depending on the matchup. How many games is he gonna close? I'm still inclined to believe that the teams best lineup is going to be Ant, Melo, Ayo, Jaden, Rudy which if true is gonna sink Kuminga's minutes.

If Shannon start proving himself this year, he's gonna be a hell of a running mate with Ayo and I can 100% see him closing games over JK, but he's got a lot to prove to get there.

Bottom line, Kuminga isn't settled at this point as anything other than a nominal starter

[AussieWolf3]

Here are the DPMs for the players in that group

Joan: +0.3
Bones. -0.1
Clark: -0.2
JK: -1.3
TJ: -1.8

*Trey's most recent season put him at -0.7*

Those bottom two are reeeeeeally bad numbers for players expected to play meaningful minutes.

DPM (or DARKO) has been documented by the nerds as the best and most predictive catch all metric that is publicly available.

You can take it all with a grain of salt but this is just another one of the metrics where Kuminga doesn't pass muster

[60WinTim]

Here are the DPMs for the players in that group

Joan: +0.3
Bones. -0.1
Clark: -0.2
JK: -1.3
TJ: -1.8

*Trey's most recent season put him at -0.7*

Those bottom two are reeeeeeally bad numbers for players expected to play meaningful minutes.

DPM (or DARKO) has been documented by the nerds as the best and most predictive catch all metric that is publicly available.

You can take it all with a grain of salt but this is just another one of the metrics where Kuminga doesn't pass muster

Are you able to provide JK's DPM for his regular season stint with Atlanta only? Because I am inclined to not hold his time in Golden State against him...

[FNG]

Here are the DPMs for the players in that group

Joan: +0.3
Bones. -0.1
Clark: -0.2
JK: -1.3
TJ: -1.8

*Trey's most recent season put him at -0.7*

Those bottom two are reeeeeeally bad numbers for players expected to play meaningful minutes.

DPM (or DARKO) has been documented by the nerds as the best and most predictive catch all metric that is publicly available.

You can take it all with a grain of salt but this is just another one of the metrics where Kuminga doesn't pass muster

Are you able to provide JK's DPM for his regular season stint with Atlanta only? Because I am inclined to not hold his time in Golden State against him...

I suspect they will be better than his GS numbers, but perhaps still not that great…thats one of the reasons we were able to get him so cheap! To be fair though, so many of the minutes Joan has played…well, practically all, were garbage time minutes. À better comparison wouid be DPMs after stripping out garbage time (like cleaning the glass does).

[AussieWolf3]

Here are the DPMs for the players in that group

Joan: +0.3
Bones. -0.1
Clark: -0.2
JK: -1.3
TJ: -1.8

*Trey's most recent season put him at -0.7*

Those bottom two are reeeeeeally bad numbers for players expected to play meaningful minutes.

DPM (or DARKO) has been documented by the nerds as the best and most predictive catch all metric that is publicly available.

You can take it all with a grain of salt but this is just another one of the metrics where Kuminga doesn't pass muster

Are you able to provide JK's DPM for his regular season stint with Atlanta only? Because I am inclined to not hold his time in Golden State against him...

His DPM actually fell from by -1.0 from GS to ATL

[60WinTim]

Once Finch settles in on a starting lineup, we know he's going to stick with it for long time (i.e. months) to let it percolate and become the best it can be. And there is no mystery as to what that starting lineup will be: Melo, ANT, Jaden, JK and Rudy. There are two other obvious "next up" players: Ayo (that's why TC brought him here) and Beringer (because he will regularly get most, if not all, of the minutes behind Rudy). That's a top 7 players right there which seem pretty damn obvious to me. The next players up gets a bit more subjective, but my bet is TJ and Lyles to round out Finch's 9-man rotation.

Hopefully, the top 9 are so successful that Clark, Bones and others get a bunch of garbage minutes...

[Coolbreeze44]

Here are the DPMs for the players in that group

Joan: +0.3
Bones. -0.1
Clark: -0.2
JK: -1.3
TJ: -1.8

*Trey's most recent season put him at -0.7*

Those bottom two are reeeeeeally bad numbers for players expected to play meaningful minutes.

DPM (or DARKO) has been documented by the nerds as the best and most predictive catch all metric that is publicly available.

You can take it all with a grain of salt but this is just another one of the metrics where Kuminga doesn't pass muster

Are you able to provide JK's DPM for his regular season stint with Atlanta only? Because I am inclined to not hold his time in Golden State against him...

I suspect they will be better than his GS numbers, but perhaps still not that great…thats one of the reasons we were able to get him so cheap! To be fair though, so many of the minutes Joan has played…well, practically all, were garbage time minutes. À better comparison wouid be DPMs after stripping out garbage time (like cleaning the glass does).

This is another perfect example of why metrics should be used to support an argument, not be your argument. Statistics can lie and you can always find one to back up whatever position you're taking.

[Monster]

The evolution of this team over the last few years is quite honestly fascinating on several levels, one of them being the shape of the rotation.

Two years ago was the famous, "we've got 8 starters" which funny enough has born out with NAW becoming a starter for ATL, Naz likely starting in Charlotte and Donte staring last year. That team's rotation was, to the chagrin of many, incredibly inflexible.

This last season there were 6 players with clear spots in the rotation and then I sharp drop off in talent and a confused rotation --- before the trade.

This year there is a clear top 5 and what looks to be a flatter distribution of talent after that. Here's what I mean:

The clear top 5
Ant
LaMelo
Jaden
Rudy
Ayo

The murky middle:
Kuminga
TJ
Joan
Clark
Lyles
Bones

The rest
Evans
Williams
Rocco

I think some (many?) will disagree with my assessment that there isn't a meaningful difference in talent or impact from Kuminga to Bones, but based on what we know right now Bones was more impactful for the Wolves last year than JK was for ATL.

It will be really interesting to see how the minutes fall. It's very likely that Kuminga is more of nominal starter and Ayo ends up with more minutes, perhaps significantly more, but that would be a departure from what we've seen from Finch.

From what I see Finch has a clear core of players and a decent toolbox of additional players around them, and it will be absolutely necessary for him to correctly deploy that toolbox to best augment and compliment the core.

I think this is a very good post I like how you framed everything. I think that the thing I would distinguish is maybe saying Bones may have been more impactful for the Wolves in the regular season than Kuminga was between the warriors and Atlanta. It's easy to make a case he was pretty impactful for the Hawks in one way shape or form but it's also a bit of a smaller sample. Bones played his way out of some minutes in the playoffs but it was also partly Conely playing really well that got him some of those minutes. Still having those 2 guys on the roster for a combined what less than 9 million is pretty good! I think having Kuminga in your Murky Middle is good. I think he still has a decent floor or being rotation but still we need to see a guy that's kinda bringing something every night.

I also add while I don't think you were looking this deep I think Pullin should be added to the Murky middle. Maybe you could put Freeman there also or in with "the rest" but it seems to me Pullin has done enough to make it look like he could do something if he was given some minutes.

Edit: I see you added some statistical info for your position on Kuminga. Like I said him being in the Murky middle category I like. One thing we can agree on is that his relative size and experience are something we need compared to a bench guard.

Have you trademarked Murky Middle?! Lol