Brandon Roy is a good basketball player, a very good basketball player. I just want to get that out of the way before we get into the meat of this post. In no way am I saying he is anything less than that. However, I do have an issue with calling him underrated. The guy has made the All Star game two years in a row, he's pretty much a media darling and ESPN take every opportunity to let everyone know just how good he is.
features Roy, and Hollinger makes the argument that Roy is the 7th-best player in the league (behind LeBron, Wade, Paul, Kobe, Dwight Howard and Tim Duncan). Take a look at the article, we'll discuss after the jump.
First, I don't disagree with Hollinger's opinion. Roy's numbers have been amazing this season and he's taken great strides in several key areas. That's not what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is where Andre Iguodala should fall on this imaginary list, because every word Hollinger writes about Roy's exceptional play applies to Iguodala as well.
Before we talk about how the two players are alike, however, let's talk about how they're different. In a nutshell, Roy is a better jump shooter, Iguodala is a better finisher. Roy is a slightly better ballhandler, Iguodala is a slightly better rebounder.
Now, let's use Hollinger's article to guide our discussion.
One thing he's (Roy) added this season is a vastly improved ability to get to
the rim and finish, something he and McMillan credit to an offseason
strength program. Roy is shooting 56.9 percent in the immediate basket
area, a phenomenal mark for a guard, and has taken 42.0 percent of his
attempts from that distance this season -- compared to only 34.2
percent last season.
First of all, I'm not sure where Hollinger is getting these numbers. The best I can come up with is 82games.com, and the numbers don't match, but they're close. Let's use 82games, here's
Roy's profile. They have him with a 59.3% eFG from the inside (dunks, layups, tips), on 35% of his attempts (eFG is an advanced stat which takes field goals, three pointers and free throws into account). Impressive numbers, without a doubt. Now let's look at
Andre Iguodala. Andre's numbers in the same categories? 71.4% eFG on 35% of his attempts. Absolutely unbelievable numbers.
Similarly, he's (Roy) drawn .397 free throw attempts per field goal attempt this season, compared to .297 last season.
Again, Hollinger's math appears to be off here.
Basketball-reference.com has 356 free throws attempted and 957 field goal attempts. That works out to .372 FTA/FGA. Iguodala has attempted 347 free throws and 808 field goals. Which gives him a .429 FTA/FGA ratio. Both numbers are excellent for a wing, Iguodala's number is just more excellent.
As a scorer, Roy separates himself from Iguodala from the line (nearly 10% better), from three (over 8% better) and in advanced stats, his eFG is 8% better on jumpers. What does that advantage equate to in terms of efficiency as a scorer? Well, Brandon Roy averages 1.33 points per shot, Andre Iguodala averages 1.32 points per shot. Not much of a difference there.
If you look at the box scores, or the traditional stats, Roy is scoring 4.7 more points/game than Iguodala. What you wouldn't notice, however, is that he also takes 3.4 more shots per game. If Iguodala matched Roy in shots attempted (17.1 per game), and kept the same level of efficiency, he'd be averaging 22.5 points/game. Roy averages 22.7.
I'm going to run through some more advanced stats from 82games.com,
BasketballValue.com and Basketball-Reference.com in bullet form now:
Stat - Roy / Iguodala- Offensive Rating (points per 100 possessions) - 123 / 110
- Defensive Rating (points allowed per 100 possessions) - 111 / 105
- Passing Rating - 8.6 / 9.6
- Rebound Rating - 14.4 / 16.3
- Block Rating - 1.3 / 1.4
- Hands Rating - 21.8 / 19.4
- Adjusted Plus/Minus (2-year) - 3.76 (4th on the Trailblazers) / 13.58 (4th in the entire league)
- Offensive Win Shares - 7.5 / 3.4
- Defensive Win Shares - 1.4 / 3.1
- Total Win Shares - 8.9 / 6.5
- Hollinger PER - 24.13 / 18.17
When you look at the full statistical picture, you can see how heavily raw scoring is weighted in Hollinger's PER equation. You can't discount scoring, especially not when a guy is doing it as efficiently as Brandon Roy is, but a difference of 5.96 in PER seems a tad outrageous for these two players.
I'm not saying Hollinger was wrong, Brandon Roy may very well be the 7th-best player in the league. I guess my contention is that if Roy is #7, where does that put Iguodala? He can't be that far behind.
"Roy is a slightly better ballhandler"
I'd say significantly better.
roy is a great ballhandler, but iguodala has gotten pretty damn good. i don't think there's a huge difference. the part of iguodala's game that has improved the most, and made him such an offensive threat, is his ability to get to the basket. largely due to his improved ballhandling, he's almost impossible to stop from getting to whatever spot he wants to get to on the court.
Well, you could also say Iguodala is a significantly better rebounder. If you look at the ratings from 82games.com, they're in the same neighborhood for both stats, that's why I said slight advantage. In jump shooting, Roy has a significant advantage. In finishing at the hoop, Iguodala has a significant advantage. That was the point.
By the way, here are the percentages on inside shots for some other guys, just so we can see where Iguodala and Roy stand against their peers:
Iggy: 71.4%
Roy: 59.3%
Rondo: 64.7%
LeBron: 70.9%
Wade: 64.1%
Kobe: 65.9%
Ginobili: 67.7%
Tony Parker: 60.4%
Rip Hamilton: 65.6%
Devin Harris: 53.7%
Vince Carter: 56.1%
Granger: 58.5%
Carmelo Anthony: 55.5%
Chris Paul: 63.1%
Iguodala is atop that list, let's check out some bigs:
Dwight Howard: 63% (and 22% of his attempts are dunks!)
Tim Duncan: 62.4%
Garnett: 74.1% (28% of all shots)
Yao: 61%
Al Jefferson: 62.9%
Shaq: 68.6% (21% of his attempts are dunks)
Aldridge: 62.4%
Bosh: 60.3%
Only Garnett converts at a higher percentage on shots in the lane, and he doesn't shoot as many in the lane as Iguodala.
if he can improve his jumper, iguodala can be a top 10 player in the league
absolutely.
One more stat on Roy. In games where he has taken 20 or more shots, the Blazers are 3-10. Make of that what you will.
Iguodala also has better court vision than Roy - he just sometimes has bad decision making - but dude can find an open man very well - just the pass doesn't always work - but i still think he could work at it.
I think crap like this is all hype - Roy came in as the savior of the blazers - Iguodala came is as Iversons back up man - and then brand came in - and andre miller - no one sees it as 'iguodalas team' - when it really is - whereas the blazers sort of went out of their way to jettison everyone preventing roy from being the heart of the team
Plus the blazers are everyones darling.
Who cares if Iguodala gets the recognition - some of us (and not all of you here because some of you were ready to jettison him earlier this year) - Philadelphia is a great town for unrecognized talent - mostly because the fanbase tends to fail to appreciate it as well - Iguodala had the slam dunk contest stolen from him - an all-star appearance stolen from him this year - just use it as fuel to kick some ass and get brand back healthy and beat the crap out of people next season :)
Just keep in mind that inside shooting stat includes dunks on fast breaks. Probabaly the best stat on 82games is "close shots" which are inside shots that are not dunks or tips. Iguodala is .575, which is still very good.
Roy is .568, about as good when you take out all of Iguodala's dunks (many of which are on fast breaks that require no particular touch.)
I wouldn't discount his dunks any more than i'd discount roys break away lay ups - even on a break away it's not given - people flub dunks all the time...do the inside shooting stats include 'lay ups' on fast breaks as well or only dunks?
It's just by location on the floor. Finishing is finishing, as far as I'm concerned. It doesn't distinguish between dunks in the half court, dunks over someone on the break, layups in traffic, layups on the break. It is what it is. If anything, Roy's 2% dunks screams afraid of finishing with authority to me.
The Sixers lead the league in fast break points. Iguodala deserves credit for this, but if you are talking about his inside scoring touch you can't really count wide open break away dunks. I have no idea if Iguodala gets a lot more of these to pad his inside shooting stats, but I guess he does.
I'm not really talking about scoring touch, I'm talking about finishing. If you want to penalize Iguodala for his team's proclivity for fast break scoring, then you have to apply the same thing to Roy.
Portland is a half-court team, with multiple weapons on the floor at all times. This leads to many, many more open looks for Roy. Not to mention the fact that they have a big who unclogs the lane in Aldridge, and effective three point shooters surrounding Roy, all of which open up the lane for drives. Iguodala has none of those luxuries.
The reason why Roy is hyped more than Iggy is because people pay more attention to the offensive side of the game and Roy is just a much better offensive player than Iggy at this point. When Roy has the ball you know he can take it to the hoop almost at will and if he draws a foul you know chances are he'll make his free throws. I can't say the same for Iggy.
If Iggy can just improve his free throw shooting he'd be a much better offensive weapon. Until I reach the point when I want the ball in Iggy's hands every time the game is on the line, I won't consider him one of the best individual players in the league.
But honestly does it matter? It doesn't bother me that other people don't appreciate Iggy as much as I do. Yes I wish he improves certain things but overall it's great to have him playing for the Sixers.
After all, for about a decade we had one of the best individual players in the league but we were still not much closer to winning the NBA title. (Did anyone really think we had a realistic chance in '01?)
I did after game 1 :)
I never did
then again i also said trade him as soon as the rat jumped ship