Would You Rather – Poll

[FNG]

This is an interesting comparison of two talented combo guards who both have negative net ratings on basketball reference for this season and their careers, and also negative on/off ratings this season (although Player A had very good on/off stats with SAS the past two seasons due to his elite defense)...and each of them has a significant flaw in his game in an aspect of the game that I value highly. Player A is an elite defender who has not found a way yet to become an efficient scorer (career TS% of only 52%), and his offensive inefficiency unfortunately has held him back early in his career. Player B is having a very good shooting year compared to his career stats, but his very poor defense has resulted in his negative rating both this season and for his career.

This season I would say Player B is having the better offensive season, and Player A is having the better defensive season. I guess I would take Player A this season, but it's not a clear verdict. My overall conclusion though is that I'm a fan of players who both score efficiently and have a positive impact on the defensive end of the court, so I would not choose to have either player on my roster.

[Carlos Danger]

I'm a VORP guy, so I went with Player A which is a little higher than Player B.

[FNG]

I'm a VORP guy, so I went with Player A which is a little higher than Player B.

Yeah, as I mentioned in my post above, each player has a significant flaw that is still holding them back at age 26...DLo's defense and Murray's inefficient shooting. But I think Murray makes up for his poor shooting (52% career TS% :-( ) with his disruptive defense (he was close to making the all-defensive team last season) and that's why his VORP is slightly higher. But neither one is a consistently effective 2-way player for my taste, and it shows up in some of their deeper value analytics.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

This is a comparison of two very talented combo guards who both have a clearly positive impact on their respective teams.

As most of you are aware by now, thanks to spoilers (ugh), Player A is Dejounte Murray and Player B is D'Angelo Russell. I was browsing various sites and noticed how close they were in several catch-all's. I thought it would be interesting to provide a statistical snippet of their seasons to date and see how the board currently felt about them both, especially considering they were both discussed quite a bit this past off-season.

At this point, the poll shows Player A -- or Dejounte Murray -- leading the poll, albeit slightly, and that's a fair outcome depending on your statistical preferences. However, would any of you trade Player B -- D'Angelo Russell -- and multiple first-round picks for the former? I certainly wouldn't think so... unless you had a strong bias against the name alone.

Also, this blind poll likely would have been a blowout had I used C.J. McCollum, Kyle Lowry, Mike Conley Jr., Monte Morris, or Tyus Jones -- and for good reason. The grass is not always greener!

[Q-is-here]

This is an interesting comparison of two talented combo guards who both have negative net ratings on basketball reference for this season and their careers, and also negative on/off ratings this season (although Player A had very good on/off stats with SAS the past two seasons due to his elite defense)...and each of them has a significant flaw in his game in an aspect of the game that I value highly. Player A is an elite defender who has not found a way yet to become an efficient scorer (career TS% of only 52%), and his offensive inefficiency unfortunately has held him back early in his career. Player B is having a very good shooting year compared to his career stats, but his very poor defense has resulted in his negative rating both this season and for his career.

This season I would say Player B is having the better offensive season, and Player A is having the better defensive season. I guess I would take Player A this season, but it's not a clear verdict. My overall conclusion though is that I'm a fan of players who both score efficiently and have a positive impact on the defensive end of the court, so I would not choose to have either player on my roster.

Aren't we all though? The problem is that it's really freakin' hard to find these kinds of players. In fact, can you name a Wolves starting point guard that was a plus defender and scored efficiently from the past, oh, 15 years? Or better yet, can you name 4 or more existing starting NBA PGs that are both efficient scorers and plus-level defenders? Cuz I don't think I can.

[Q-is-here]

This is a comparison of two very talented combo guards who both have a clearly positive impact on their respective teams.

As most of you are aware by now, thanks to spoilers (ugh), Player A is Dejounte Murray and Player B is D'Angelo Russell. I was browsing various sites and noticed how close they were in several catch-all's. I thought it would be interesting to provide a statistical snippet of their seasons to date and see how the board currently felt about them both, especially considering they were both discussed quite a bit this past off-season.

At this point, the poll shows Player A -- or Dejounte Murray -- leading the poll, albeit slightly, and that's a fair outcome depending on your statistical preferences. However, would any of you trade Player B -- D'Angelo Russell -- and multiple first-round picks for the former? I certainly wouldn't think so... unless you had a strong bias against the name alone.

Also, this blind poll likely would have been a blowout had I used C.J. McCollum, Kyle Lowry, Mike Conley Jr., Monte Morris, or Tyus Jones -- and for good reason. The grass is not always greener!

DLO has been on fire for two months now (or about 25 games) after a very slow start and we wouldn't be .500 without his shooting coming around. It's probably why we haven't heard much from D-Loser of late....hard to troll a player that is shooting the ball so damn well.

I think most of us DLO skeptics - and I'm one of them - have just assumed he'd inevitably cool off and go into a shooting funk again and revert to his usual mediocre efficiency levels. But it hasn't happened yet.

[FNG]

This is an interesting comparison of two talented combo guards who both have negative net ratings on basketball reference for this season and their careers, and also negative on/off ratings this season (although Player A had very good on/off stats with SAS the past two seasons due to his elite defense)...and each of them has a significant flaw in his game in an aspect of the game that I value highly. Player A is an elite defender who has not found a way yet to become an efficient scorer (career TS% of only 52%), and his offensive inefficiency unfortunately has held him back early in his career. Player B is having a very good shooting year compared to his career stats, but his very poor defense has resulted in his negative rating both this season and for his career.

This season I would say Player B is having the better offensive season, and Player A is having the better defensive season. I guess I would take Player A this season, but it's not a clear verdict. My overall conclusion though is that I'm a fan of players who both score efficiently and have a positive impact on the defensive end of the court, so I would not choose to have either player on my roster.

Aren't we all though? The problem is that it's really freakin' hard to find these kinds of players. In fact, can you name a Wolves starting point guard that was a plus defender and scored efficiently from the past, oh, 15 years? Or better yet, can you name 4 or more existing starting NBA PGs that are both efficient scorers and plus-level defenders? Cuz I don't think I can.

Fair questions, Q. Although I would broaden your search to "guards" rather than just PGs, because Murray is clearly playing more SG than PG, and Russell has said before that he considers himself a combo guard. If you broaden the search to "guards", we can find several who fit the criteria.

Like I said though, it's an interesting comparison. Both are relatively high-profile guards in the league, but oddly both have negative net ratings on basketball reference, both for this season and for their careers. That makes one curious about why they have such poor net ratings, and I think most would agree it is due to DLo's poor defense and Murray's inefficient scoring. In addtion while both are creative distributors, they rank very low in A:To ratio...Murray is 45th in the league and DLo is 64th.

The question that was posed was who would you rather have on the Wolves right now, and I think "neither" is a fair answer. The Wolves have two elite scorers in KAT and Ant plus a remarkably efficient scorer when he gets the ball in the right place in Rudy. And we have a borderline elite defender and developing scorer in Jaden. So as many of us have said before, our 5th piece shouldn't be someone who looks to score first. Ideally it should be someone who plays very good defense and looks to get the other 4 players involved, and I don't think that is either of these two combo guards. But if I had to pick one, the answer clearly would be Murray because of his far superior defense and more favorable contract.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Kyle Anderson:
14.5 PTS, 7.3 AST (2.7 TOV), 8.3 REB, 2.3 STL, 1.6 BLK
51.3 2P%, 42.0 3P% (2.3 3PA), 77.2 FT% (3.6 FTA) -- 53.8 eFG%, 58.1 TS%

RPM: -1.59
EPM: +1.3
eW: 3.0
BPM: +1.5
VORP: 0.9
RAPTOR: +1.6
WAR: 2.3
WS (WS/48): 2.4 (.110)

*39 GP, 24 GS, 26.5 MPG


Jordan McLaughlin:
12.1 PTS, 10.7 AST (2.3 TOV), 5.0 REB, 2.5 STL, 0.3 BLK
62.5 2P%, 23.5 3P% (5.6 3PA), 100.0 FT% (1.5 FTA) -- 48.5 eFG%, 52.2 TS%

RPM: -1.64
EPM: -0.7
eW: 0.3
BPM: +0.3
VORP: 0.2
RAPTOR: +2.0
WAR: 0.7
WS (WS/48): 0.6 (.102)

*18 GP, 0 GS, 15.9 MPG

It's not a great one-for-one comparison with D'Angelo Russell or Dejounte Murray because of differing roles and playing time, but here you go. There's the "neither" option.

[Coolbreeze44]

You know what? I've been wrong for a long time now, terribly, terribly, wrong. I've had an epiphany thanks to threads like this and me finally coming to my senses. There are only a handful of NBA players you would ever consider trading Russell for. Luka, Giannis, Lebron, KD, Joker, Embiid, Steph, and maybe Tatum. Let's just be happy we got him so cheap and he wants to play here. Where would be without the guy? I hope the brinks truck gets backed up to his front door, and the sooner the better. I'm a DLO guy, now and moving forward!!!!!!!!!

[Monster]

This is an interesting comparison of two talented combo guards who both have negative net ratings on basketball reference for this season and their careers, and also negative on/off ratings this season (although Player A had very good on/off stats with SAS the past two seasons due to his elite defense)...and each of them has a significant flaw in his game in an aspect of the game that I value highly. Player A is an elite defender who has not found a way yet to become an efficient scorer (career TS% of only 52%), and his offensive inefficiency unfortunately has held him back early in his career. Player B is having a very good shooting year compared to his career stats, but his very poor defense has resulted in his negative rating both this season and for his career.

This season I would say Player B is having the better offensive season, and Player A is having the better defensive season. I guess I would take Player A this season, but it's not a clear verdict. My overall conclusion though is that I'm a fan of players who both score efficiently and have a positive impact on the defensive end of the court, so I would not choose to have either player on my roster.

Aren't we all though? The problem is that it's really freakin' hard to find these kinds of players. In fact, can you name a Wolves starting point guard that was a plus defender and scored efficiently from the past, oh, 15 years? Or better yet, can you name 4 or more existing starting NBA PGs that are both efficient scorers and plus-level defenders? Cuz I don't think I can.

Fair questions, Q. Although I would broaden your search to "guards" rather than just PGs, because Murray is clearly playing more SG than PG, and Russell has said before that he considers himself a combo guard. If you broaden the search to "guards", we can find several who fit the criteria.

Like I said though, it's an interesting comparison. Both are relatively high-profile guards in the league, but oddly both have negative net ratings on basketball reference, both for this season and for their careers. That makes one curious about why they have such poor net ratings, and I think most would agree it is due to DLo's poor defense and Murray's inefficient scoring. In addtion while both are creative distributors, they rank very low in A:To ratio...Murray is 45th in the league and DLo is 64th.

The question that was posed was who would you rather have on the Wolves right now, and I think "neither" is a fair answer. The Wolves have two elite scorers in KAT and Ant plus a remarkably efficient scorer when he gets the ball in the right place in Rudy. And we have a borderline elite defender and developing scorer in Jaden. So as many of us have said before, our 5th piece shouldn't be someone who looks to score first. Ideally it should be someone who plays very good defense and looks to get the other 4 players involved, and I don't think that is either of these two combo guards. But if I had to pick one, the answer clearly would be Murray because of his far superior defense and more favorable contract.

I agree with FNG these guys are interesting comparison. A couple things.

Q in a good post said Russell has been on fire the last 2 months. It's worth pointing out that Russell's poor shooting earlier in the season was 3 point shooting. He was shooting a career high on 2 point shots before he heated up. Obviously he is shooting even better from 2 the last 2 but it's interesting.

Russell continues to take fewer shots and is taking the fewest shots either per 36 minutes or per 100 possessions in his entire career and his efficiency is high? Coincidence? The efficiency is uncommon for Russell and as a guy who likes Russell I expected him to drop off too just like I expected him to get on track from 3 earlier in the season. The taking fewer shots is different too. I think Russell should get credit for dialing things back like pretty much everyone wanted him too.

FNG you said Murray's salary is lower. Yes but he is only signed for 1 more season then what is his salary going to be? Max money? Will Russell end up costing less over time than Murray? I'd say Murray is overall a better player but he will cost more. I think you would agree that it wouldn't be worth it. Q said there are only so many 2 way point guards and you made a good point that you could expand it to guards. Of course I would say it all depends on who you consider a PG or a guard. For example I consider Lebron a PG.

In the NBA probably more than the other major sports such a significant amount of value of a player is what they can do compared to their salary. Everyone on this board agrees Russell is not worth his current salary and also agree he will need to take a pay cut this offseason. Russell with his recent play is probably earning himself some more money this offseason especially if he doesn't drop off significantly the rest of this season or has another disaster playoff series. Lol Could the Wolves be able to resign Russell to a contract that appropriately put his salary and his contributions in line? Maybe. Some people believe regardless Russell just isn't the right guy for this roster and that's a fair position to take. I'm honestly kind of on the fence on that. It certainly depends on so many factors including what salary Russell will ultimately get. We can't expect every player to fit perfectly together.