What’s up everyone. Hope you’re having a good holiday. I know it’s a bit late but I have some of my feedback from the Nuggets vs. Pelicans game. I will be including a highly proprietary methodology of how I grade players, and associated notes about their play. For clarity’s sake, I watch every possession. If a player does something good, they get a positive point. If they do something really good, or multiple good things in the possession, they get two positive points. If they do something bad, they get a negative point. If they do something really bad, they get two negative points. The spread and ratio between those two things is something I calculate, along with the relationship between that and their minutes and I’ll show the entire array at the end
Deandre Jordan
With 11 positves to 3 negatives in 10 minutes, Deandre was pretty effective in this game. Say what you will about his age, but Deandre Jordan is an NBA Center. He may not be the most mobile. He may not have a jump shot. What he does have though, is the ability to provide a rebounding presence for the team with a high floor, the ability to set solid and effective screens which create space advantages for others and the awareness to be able to finish plays and pass out of the midpost. In particular, and I will elaborate more in his segment, I think he provides the physical prescence that makes Peyton Watson at the 4 more palatable.
Spread: 8
Ratio: 3.67
Spread per minute: .8
Grade: A-
Julian Strawther
With a score of +16 to -7, Julian was… okay. Honestly, I don’t have too much to say about him. He struggles defensively, and his shot hasn’t found it’s consistency but was okay in this one, if a bit low impact relative to the minutes he got.
Spread: 9
Ratio: 2.29
Spread per minute: .45
Grade: C
Peyton Watson
Watson was hyper efficient in terms of his impact in this game. 5 negative points to 26 positive in 18 minutes. He makes lots of momentum shifting plays: multiple defensive efforts, big blocks, and defense to offense plays that do a lot towards winning. I think he’s doing an especially effective job on opposing guards and perimeter scorers. Where he sometimes struggles is when he has a weight disadvantage and that occurs most often when he’s attacking the rim, in post defense and box out scenarios.
Spread: 21
Ratio: 5.20
Spread per minute: 1.17
Grade: A
Russel Westrbook
Russell, much like Peyton but on even high volume, is at an elite work rate and for every mistake he is making on the court, there are multiple great plays he’s making in response. With 11 negative points and 46 positive in 36, Russ is always going to have his imprint on the game. If anything, my critique around him is that he’s probably being used too much to some degree. Right now, he’s closing games like he’s a starter and despite overall great performances, there are consistently moments where his specific limitations can hamstring the team late in his stints and especially at the end of games.
Spread: 35
Ratio: 4.18
Spread per minute: .97
Grade: A
Jamal Murray
17 negative and 46 positive points for Jamal in this one. For as much consternation as there has been this season, he is very much aligned with his usual performance patterns. After a start to the season that makes you question if he’s really an NBA player, he transitions month by month towards something resembling a borderline all-star and that doesn’t seem to be any different this year. Right now, I’d say he’s at a point of being solid. There are still defensive limintations that come from his lack of quickness and lapses in focus but he’s not nearly the sieve he was early in the season. I wouldn’t say he can get anywhere he wants at any time either, but he’s now able to take advantage of the opportunities presented to him. This includes difficult shots late game and late shot clock situations.
Spread: 22
Ratio: 4.18
Spread per minute: .54
Grade: B
Christian Braun
7 negative and 32 positive points for Christian, I have a sneaking suspicion that the back injury that held him out for a few games isn’t completely resolved. He looks just ever so slightly less eplosive on the defensive end, and a bit more conservative in how he is playing offensively. I wouldn’t worry though because it’s also coming with a consistency of decision making that leads to very few mistakes over the course of a game for him.
Spread: 22
Ratio: 4.57
Spread per minute: .64
Grade: B
Michael Porter Jr
10 negative and 18 positive score for Mike in this one. He only played 23 minutes and didn’t see the floor in the fourth quarter or overtime. I will say that, just evaluating the time he saw, he was the least impactful Nugget in the terms of impact rate. He looked active in well rounded in his approach to the game, and he did end up missing out on the best stretches of Nuggets basketball as a team so correlation vs causation may be a question there. Most specifically though, he was involved in a lot of defensive lapses in concert with Nikola Jokic, who we will also get to in this one.
Spread: 8
Ratio: 1.80
Spread Per Minute: .35
Grade: D+
Aaron Gordon
I want to preface this with the fact that Aaron Gordon isn’t playing badly. That said, I do think Aaron’s age will catch up to him over the next three to five years. That isn’t to say it will happen all at once, but rather we’ll start to see it on nights like this. 9 negative and 25 positive marks in 35 minutes for Aaron and the general appearance is that he’s a little slow, especially when covering shiftier, quicker players and a little less active than we’re used to in terms of how he dominates the game.
Nikola Jokic
Nikola is one of the best players in the league, if not the best. This was a game that he began in a low gear. He looks somewhat worn down, in that we are seeing a lot of coasting in little ways early in these games: plays he chooses not to challenge on defense, stretches he won’t choose to create in isolation. It’s difficult for me not to this as a product of the long run of going to the playoffs every year, of playing international basketball last year, and of the level of play he had to elevate to just to keep the Nuggets afloat through the first quarter of the season. All that said, 20 negative and 53 positive marks for Jokic in 43 minutes. Did everything he absolutely needed to for the win in this one.
Spread: 33
Ratio: 2.65
Spread per minute: .77
Grade: B+ on the Jokic scale
And so that’s it for Nuggets vs. Pelicans. Check out my scoring table below. Again, I keep it pretty simply. You get one positive mark for a good play, two for a great play or multiple in the same posssesion and the opposite for negative plays and mistakes.
Thanks for reading and I look forward to Nuggets vs Suns back to back up for you, likely tomorrow evening.
