Derrick White trade looking worse and worse every day

[BG_Spurs_Fan]

its more accurate to say something happened to his shot. He’s had a down year shooting. I kept thinking he was due to swing back up but it hasn’t happened. There must be some lingering issue that he can’t address until the off-season.

I remember Danny had a bad shooting season for his standards and in the offseason it turned out he was playing injured. He had some muscular or ligament issue. White’s thing can be the most minor thing but enough to affect balance or something. It’s just puzzling bc he’s always been streaky but he’s overdue to streak back up… heck I was just thinking if he recoups his shooting in the playoffs the Celtics will be pleased.

Still, this was a great trade for the Spurs tbh. There’s no downside here and I am surprised the Celtics gave up so much for him. That doesn’t happen without another team (or teams) bidding for him.

Wait, when has White ever been a good shooter? He's a career 33% three point shooter and even worse in the playoffs. He was a bad shooter even in the gleague (or was it dleague then?). He's also never taken too many long 2s and his % from there is also bad.

If anything, should he have a good shooting period, it'd be the outlier.

[MannyIsGod]

RAPTOR WAR and EPM are more highly regarded by scouts than those basketball reference numbers, but congrats on scouring the internets, finding one metric that helps you and ignoring 5 or 6 that don't.

Can you find RAPTOR numbers that don't mix his time with the Spurs? No. I use those all the time to make points because they are good, but if we're just trying to show how Derrick is playing with the Celtics, they aren't useful. By all means, provide numbers that show how well Derrick White is playing with Boston. I'm not cherry picking anything, I'm using easily sortable stats to make a point. And were not talking about the difference between playing OK and playing Well, we're talking about a -2 OBPM which is ing bad.

Mother er you were the one cherry picking steal percentage and other nonsense and you want to talk about me cherry picking comprehensive stats? Laughable.

[MannyIsGod]

its more accurate to say something happened to his shot. He’s had a down year shooting. I kept thinking he was due to swing back up but it hasn’t happened. There must be some lingering issue that he can’t address until the off-season.

I remember Danny had a bad shooting season for his standards and in the offseason it turned out he was playing injured. He had some muscular or ligament issue. White’s thing can be the most minor thing but enough to affect balance or something. It’s just puzzling bc he’s always been streaky but he’s overdue to streak back up… heck I was just thinking if he recoups his shooting in the playoffs the Celtics will be pleased.

Still, this was a great trade for the Spurs tbh. There’s no downside here and I am surprised the Celtics gave up so much for him. That doesn’t happen without another team (or teams) bidding for him.

When the trade happened almost everyone - me included - thought White would shoot better from the field with the Celtics. We all thought he was shooting poorly on the Spurs because the defense keyed on him more but that he'd get more open shots with Tatum and Brown on Boston. Well, he has gotten better looks, but he's struggling even more than he did here with shooting. So yeah, something is either wrong or he's just not a good shooter.

[R. DeMurre]

Can you find RAPTOR numbers that don't mix his time with the Spurs? No. I use those all the time to make points because they are good, but if we're just trying to show how Derrick is playing with the Celtics, they aren't useful. By all means, provide numbers that show how well Derrick White is playing with Boston.

Sure-- look down further on that Basketball Reference page at +/- per 100 possessions. The Celtics are +5.2 with White on the court vs White off the court. The games with the Spurs and the games with the Celtics are separate.

[MannyIsGod]

Sure-- look down further on that Basketball Reference page at +/- per 100 possessions. The Celtics are +5.2 with White on the court vs White off the court. The games with the Spurs and the games with the Celtics are separate.

Ok, now ask yourself, why is this showing something different than BPM?

[spurraider21]

Lonnie Walker has a 5.0L Engine, but his car doesn't go anywhere. Guess his cup holders are substandard.

lonnie averages 12ppg on 41% shooting. but he looks flashy sometimes. very fancy looking headlights and some good chrome bumpers

[spurraider21]

its more accurate to say something happened to his shot. He’s had a down year shooting. I kept thinking he was due to swing back up but it hasn’t happened. There must be some lingering issue that he can’t address until the off-season.

I remember Danny had a bad shooting season for his standards and in the offseason it turned out he was playing injured. He had some muscular or ligament issue. White’s thing can be the most minor thing but enough to affect balance or something. It’s just puzzling bc he’s always been streaky but he’s overdue to streak back up… heck I was just thinking if he recoups his shooting in the playoffs the Celtics will be pleased.

Still, this was a great trade for the Spurs tbh. There’s no downside here and I am surprised the Celtics gave up so much for him. That doesn’t happen without another team (or teams) bidding for him.

white has a better FG% this year than he did last year

[spurraider21]

boston was hot before they acquired white

boston has remained hot since acquiring white

me: theyve been doing well, but it doesnt seem like white has had much to do with it, and he hasnt been playing particularly well

sniffers: why are you saying white sucks?

[MannyIsGod]

Sure-- look down further on that Basketball Reference page at +/- per 100 possessions. The Celtics are +5.2 with White on the court vs White off the court. The games with the Spurs and the games with the Celtics are separate.

Let me walk you there, maybe start by explaining why Derrick's presence in the is completely absent from the best 2 and 3 man lineups on the Celtics.

https://www.basketball-reference.com.../2022/lineups/

EDIT: He's actually absent from the top 4 man lineups as well.

[R. DeMurre]

Ok, now ask yourself, why is this showing something different than BPM?

It happens all the time, so it's not surprising. DeRozan was the opposite. He had a positive BPM with the Spurs but a negative on-off number.

[SAGirl]

white has a better FG% this year than he did last year

I was taking about 3 pt shooting specifically

[SAGirl]

Wait, when has White ever been a good shooter? He's a career 33% three point shooter and even worse in the playoffs. He was a bad shooter even in the gleague (or was it dleague then?). He's also never taken too many long 2s and his % from there is also bad.

If anything, should he have a good shooting period, it'd be the outlier.

Hes been better than he was this season previously. It’s been pretty much the worst one he’s had.

[MannyIsGod]

It happens all the time, so it's not surprising. DeRozan was the opposite. He had a positive BPM with the Spurs but a negative on-off number.

Nah, it doesn't happen all the time.

Look at Tatum's lineups on basketball reference.

https://www.basketball-reference.com...1/lineups/2022

Now, why would the top pairing for Tatum be White and by a large margin, yet White is absent from the top 3 man lineups for Tatum?

[R. DeMurre]

Nah, it doesn't happen all the time.

Look at DeRozan's page. It definitely happens.

[MannyIsGod]

I don't have all day to walk your slow ass there so let me tell you why those raw +/- numbers look so ing good, but he still has a VORP and a OBPM with the Celtics. White is playing the majority of his minutes with Tatum. That means that he's largely benefiting from Tatum's amazing run of play over the past 2 months. So is everyone else on the court, but they also played with him when he wasn't playing at this new level. This is why Tatum/White looks so ing good compared to any other two man lineup for Tatum. Because its the only one where the entirety of the minutes played have been with Tatum playing at an amazing level. But thats where it falls apart. This is why no 3 man lineup with white is as good.

If it was White driving this, why don't we see him on literally any other top lineup? Why don't we see any other Celtics appear in White's top 2 man lineups for this season? Well, we do, we see Grant Williams show up there so its probable that Grant Williams has a good synergy with white, except they seem to both benefit from Tatum on the court as well.

This is why Raw plus minus numbers are dumb when they lack context.

[MannyIsGod]

Look at DeRozan's page. It definitely happens.

What are you talking about?

https://www.basketball-reference.com...derozde01.html

Demar's BPM show exactly what we'd expect them to show. He was a good offensive player for the Spurs, not a good defender.

[MannyIsGod]

Look at the category labeled "Regular Season: 2-man combinations" on that Tatum page you referenced.

Tatum & White are +19.7, the highest net total of any two player combo.

Uh, yes, exactly. Now read my explanation on why that is.

[R. DeMurre]

Uh, yes, exactly. Now read my explanation on why that is.

If White's no good, why doesn't Tatum's pairing with better player rate higher? Your argument is that Tatum is so good that he somehow has his best pairing with a bad player rather than with better players?

[MannyIsGod]

If White's no good, why doesn't Tatum's pairing with better player rate higher? Your argument is that Tatum is so good that he somehow has his best pairing with a bad player rather than with better players?

Because Tatum wasn't playing at this level all season. Look at Tatum's splits, he's got an ORating of 130 in ing March! 130! He was 115 and 114 in the previous two months, but he started the season badly. 96, 102, 111 were the ratings in the first 3 months of the year. So yeah, Smart/Tatum etc aren't as good as White/Tatum because they played minutes with him in October and November not just half of Feb and March.

Its pretty damn clear some of you haven't watched the Celtics play at all this year. And thats fine, but thats why you shouldn't act like you know whats driving their success.

[R. DeMurre]

What are you talking about?

https://www.basketball-reference.com...derozde01.html

Demar's BPM show exactly what we'd expect them to show. He was a good offensive player for the Spurs, not a good defender.

Right, but his overall BPM is in the positive, and his overall +/- per 100 possessions is in the negative. You questioned how those two stats could be different, and said it doesn't happen. It does happen, and in White's case, it's the reverse.

[MannyIsGod]

Right, but his overall BPM is in the positive, and his overall +/- per 100 possessions is in the negative. You questioned how those two stats could be different, and said it doesn't happen. It does happen, and in White's case, it's the reverse.

Oh I know how they are different, my question was rhetorical. They are different because the OBPM is geared towards the individual's impact where as +/- is the team's impact while the individual is on the court. If you put DeRozan on the floor with 4 people who aren't good or aren't good fits, then yes of course his +/- suffers. Thats the whole reason we have metrics like BPM which teases out the individual impact out of the group stats.

So when I asked you why White's were different I was trying to lead you to the answer that White's group stats like raw +/- look good due to others, not due to his impact, which is why his OBPM is bad. Everyone else also does well with an MVP level Tatum, but White less so. That's why while with Boston, White's value is barely above that of a replacement level player (VORP of 0.1).

[R. DeMurre]

So when I asked you why White's were different I was trying to lead you to the answer that White's group stats like raw +/- look good due to others, not due to his impact, which is why his OBPM is bad. Everyone else also does well with an MVP level Tatum, but White less so. That's why while with Boston, White's value is barely above that of a replacement level player (VORP of 0.1).

Right-- it makes sense that White's raw +/- is in the positive, playing on a good winning team. But if you look at those two different categories (on-court +/- vs on-off +/-) it shows that the Celtics are +5.5 when he's on the court vs when he's off the court. It's possible to attribute this to a situation where, say, maybe a guy like Pritchard, Nesmith, or Grant is dragging the numbers down, but I kinda doubt that. The vast majority of the numbers are coming from the starters, and White's on/off difference shows that the team performs better when he's on the court as opposed to off. If he was generally playing poorly, wouldn't the Celts be posting better numbers when the starters were playing together, without White dragging them down?

[exstatic]

Because Tatum wasn't playing at this level all season. Look at Tatum's splits, he's got an ORating of 130 in ing March! 130! He was 115 and 114 in the previous two months, but he started the season badly. 96, 102, 111 were the ratings in the first 3 months of the year. So yeah, Smart/Tatum etc aren't as good as White/Tatum because they played minutes with him in October and November not just half of Feb and March.

Its pretty damn clear some of you haven't watched the Celtics play at all this year. And thats fine, but thats why you shouldn't act like you know whats driving their success.

March...wasn't that just after White showed up?

[slick'81]

Man,alot of arguing for someone who will never be a spur again

[MannyIsGod]

Right-- it makes sense that White's raw +/- is in the positive, playing on a good winning team. But if you look at those two different categories (on-court +/- vs on-off +/-) it shows that the Celtics are +5.5 when he's on the court vs when he's off the court. It's possible to attribute this to a situation where, say, maybe a guy like Pritchard, Nesmith, or Grant is dragging the numbers down, but I kinda doubt that. The vast majority of the numbers are coming from the starters, and White's on/off difference shows that the team performs better when he's on the court as opposed to off. If he was generally playing poorly, wouldn't the Celts be posting better numbers when the starters were playing together, without White dragging them down?

Yes, they would be. And they are. That's the point of White's absence from any of the top lineups!

Jesus Christ man I've ing laid it out for you. I've drawn you a map. i've walked you to the answer. I've held your hand the whole way. This is hopeless.