Post by eric on Jun 17, 2019 17:26:10 GMT
Let's look at the last two marquee bigs to join LeBron James from .500ish teams.
Chris Bosh generated .176 WS/48 in the five years before joining Miami (his third through seventh years in the league) and .173 in his first three years there, and his Defensive Win Shares per 48 minutes improved from .045 to .072. He didn't take threes until later (3% and 5% of his FGAs respectively) but he shot 46% on long twos before and 47% after. Finally, he was +7.0 on/off before and +7.2 after. Overall, there was no change in his production.
Kevin Love generated .216 WS/48 in the four years before joining Cleveland (his third through sixth years) and .165 his first three years there. His Defensive Win Shares per 48 minutes also improved from .055 to .065. He shot 37% on threes before and 37% after. Finally, he was +7.2 on/off before and +7.3 after. Overall, there was some decline in his production.
Anthony Davis from his third to seventh year has generated .224 WS/48, slightly ahead of Kevin Love. He takes more threes than Bosh and way more long twos than Love, but shoots worse than each of them from both at 40% and 32% respectively, and is showing no real sign of improvement as those values in his last year were 34% and 33%. If the last two players are an indication we should expect him to decrease in Offensive Win Shares produced and stay the same in jump shot efficiency, which runs counter to a widely accepted narrative that LeBron gets better looks for his teammates.
Both Bosh and Love saw increases in DWS/48 and no change in on/off, which is no surprise considering LeBron was an All-Defensive player from 2009 to 2014 and Hedo Turkoglu and Corey Brewer weren't.
But LeBron isn't All-Defensive anymore.
And his defensive on/offs have been declining since 2015.
So the most likely outcome is that Anthony Davis sees slight decline in his production, perhaps to the .200 WS/48 range.
So what?
So if he plays 2700 minutes at that level and LeBron plays 2700 minutes at his post-Miami average of .215 WS/48, that adds up to 23 wins at the cost of $64.5m. Their veterans last year totaled 14.4 WS in 7261 MP, or a slightly under league average .095, and if they can stretch that production for 14280 minutes that'll be worth 28 wins for a total of 51, which should make the playoffs given the #8 seed last year in the West was 48.
If on the other hand they end up with the Michael Beasley / Rajon Rondo / Lance Stevenson ilk of .05 WS/48 players to fill out the excess 7019 minutes (and Kyle Kuzma falls in that category right now) they total 45 wins, which is probably on the bubble, although as recently as 2016 it would be good for a #5 seed in the West.
Adding Kemba Walker doesn't change the scenario that much because his recent WS/48 of .145 isn't that much better than the .095 figure, so his 2700 minutes only brings the first total from 51 to 54. Plus, it will probably be more difficult practically to acquire league average talent since his salary would bring the Big Three bill to at least $95.1m (if signed directly by LA), leaving them very little soft cap room. The second total goes from 45 to 50 wins, however, which all but guarantees the playoffs.
.
They're definitely not title contenders, and they probably won't even make the playoffs without bringing in a third star, and if LeBron or Davis suffers serious injury (or in LeBron's case age-related decline) even .500 might be a stretch.
Chris Bosh generated .176 WS/48 in the five years before joining Miami (his third through seventh years in the league) and .173 in his first three years there, and his Defensive Win Shares per 48 minutes improved from .045 to .072. He didn't take threes until later (3% and 5% of his FGAs respectively) but he shot 46% on long twos before and 47% after. Finally, he was +7.0 on/off before and +7.2 after. Overall, there was no change in his production.
Kevin Love generated .216 WS/48 in the four years before joining Cleveland (his third through sixth years) and .165 his first three years there. His Defensive Win Shares per 48 minutes also improved from .055 to .065. He shot 37% on threes before and 37% after. Finally, he was +7.2 on/off before and +7.3 after. Overall, there was some decline in his production.
Anthony Davis from his third to seventh year has generated .224 WS/48, slightly ahead of Kevin Love. He takes more threes than Bosh and way more long twos than Love, but shoots worse than each of them from both at 40% and 32% respectively, and is showing no real sign of improvement as those values in his last year were 34% and 33%. If the last two players are an indication we should expect him to decrease in Offensive Win Shares produced and stay the same in jump shot efficiency, which runs counter to a widely accepted narrative that LeBron gets better looks for his teammates.
Both Bosh and Love saw increases in DWS/48 and no change in on/off, which is no surprise considering LeBron was an All-Defensive player from 2009 to 2014 and Hedo Turkoglu and Corey Brewer weren't.
But LeBron isn't All-Defensive anymore.
And his defensive on/offs have been declining since 2015.
So the most likely outcome is that Anthony Davis sees slight decline in his production, perhaps to the .200 WS/48 range.
So what?
So if he plays 2700 minutes at that level and LeBron plays 2700 minutes at his post-Miami average of .215 WS/48, that adds up to 23 wins at the cost of $64.5m. Their veterans last year totaled 14.4 WS in 7261 MP, or a slightly under league average .095, and if they can stretch that production for 14280 minutes that'll be worth 28 wins for a total of 51, which should make the playoffs given the #8 seed last year in the West was 48.
If on the other hand they end up with the Michael Beasley / Rajon Rondo / Lance Stevenson ilk of .05 WS/48 players to fill out the excess 7019 minutes (and Kyle Kuzma falls in that category right now) they total 45 wins, which is probably on the bubble, although as recently as 2016 it would be good for a #5 seed in the West.
Adding Kemba Walker doesn't change the scenario that much because his recent WS/48 of .145 isn't that much better than the .095 figure, so his 2700 minutes only brings the first total from 51 to 54. Plus, it will probably be more difficult practically to acquire league average talent since his salary would bring the Big Three bill to at least $95.1m (if signed directly by LA), leaving them very little soft cap room. The second total goes from 45 to 50 wins, however, which all but guarantees the playoffs.
.
They're definitely not title contenders, and they probably won't even make the playoffs without bringing in a third star, and if LeBron or Davis suffers serious injury (or in LeBron's case age-related decline) even .500 might be a stretch.
