APBRmetrics

Giddey and Dort with raw team +/- on court about 3.5X worse than 3rd worst.

Starters first stint was only -35pts / 48 min. tonight.

Giddey and Dort went to -19s on court before cutting that by 50% by halftime. Then back to -20 at end of 3rd quarter.

They end up only slightly better and among 3 worst.

Thunder move to 7th for draft lottery ping pong balls. 24th best team right now.

A win by Pacers tonight would move Thunder to 6th position for lottery draw by current record. 5th position for draw is realistically the best they can be. Final draw position and actual draw can still vary a lot. Actual draw could be from first to low 20s.

Saric with Thunder thru 6 games, team and career best 77% ts%, 87% from 2, 93% FT. Team and career worst TO% at 19%. Near career best defensive rebounding rate, career low assist rate. Tied for low on steals, no blocks yet. 2nd highest usage. 2nd best BPM estimate of career at fractionally positive, Good for 6th on team and slightly ahead of Muscala's mark.

I'd probably try to retain but unclear if either or both sides will want to. Sign n trade or sign then trade in 6 months are other modest possibilities.

We'll see what Thunder get at PF from alternatives next season vs. him. Good chance it will be less than Saric does away from Thunder or on it.

Jalen Williams, lower shooting efficiency including from 3, half the rebounding, 1 point less on BPM this season (more than 2pts less than Saric on offense, 1 PT better on defense).

Omoruyi had a near -5 BPM, worst on team. Worth giving him a shot? Probably not, except as a tank aide.

Next worst on BPM, Mann.

Dort 4th worst. 2nd highest salary on team, about replacement level BPM estimate.

Dieng? 3 first rounders to obtain, then given under 300 minutes so far. 3td worst BPM. Never mentioned. SF, PF or both? Probably SF.

Use the open 2 way spot? Haven't used Sarr yet.

Other than a K Williams at center lineup tested a non-significant 76 minutes, Coach D has spent the season to date without producing a single other positive lineup used more than effectively half a minute per game. All about the random, still unknown quality dink lineups. What a waste.

Only 1 positive quad much more than 2.5 minutes per game and just +0.2. Tested about 8 minutes per game... so that meh rating may well be accurate and not that promising.

The most promising trios over 5 minutes per game are Giddey - J Williams - K Williams, SGA - J Williams - K Williams and SGA - Dort - K Williams, with the last one being the far best of the trios. Starting lineup rarely included K Williams and less unlikely to do so next season.

Battle of the Dink Kings: Coach D, 631 lineups used. Popovich, 631.

Thunder use the open 2 way spot on Jared Butler. I believe I was very very high on him in 2021 draft (higher than anyone I saw, if I recall correctly). Disappeared from view. Pressure on Mann and maybe more.

Ok, found the history:

I had Butler 9th. (One person in draft twitter consensus had 6th.) Consensus was 17th and Vecenie had 17th. Actual draft was 40th, apparently because of health concerns.

Value still to be determined.

Butler 20th in draft class on BPM in very limited trial with Jazz.

(Vecenie had Bouknight 9th. Currently 50th in draft class on BPM. I didn't like Bouknight. I hedged on consensus though and gave him 25th spot. By 2022 I was much less interested in "prominent" or consensus draft views.)

On games & minutes:

8 Thunder players have played 80+% of games but none over 95%.

8 more over 35% of games.

4 at or very near 30 plus minutes per game. Everyone else less than half the game.

To play 16, you have to rotate games & minutes.

Do similar next season or not? I don't know what they will do. But uncommon to play more than 12 substantially, especially better teams. As more and more draft picks arrive, more and more of current players will likely leave one way or another. As top players are identified there will likely be less and less time for others. Will have to keep pushing players down & out. Perhaps without adequate / "fair" testing. Unless lots of draft picks get traded or pushed further into future.

Going to be lots of frustration & disappointment. I dunno how much there has already been in recent years but it will be more. How that will affect team mood & chemistry will be something to watch.

Minute division will be tense. Money distribution even more so.

This time will be seen from the future as simpler days.

Will Thunder seek a young veteran big by free agency or trade? Probably not. But some consideration could be given to B Clarke, Okongwu, M Wagner, Ayton, Bol Bol... It varies by player whether it would be to start or backup. For talent or just decent value.

Starters first stint tonight- about -80pts / 100p.

Played just 10 minutes previously and was very bad. So typical Coach D selection.

Should hit 700 lineups played next game. 800 by season's end likely. 900 possible.

By Darko projections converted to "fair salary", I Joe and Jalen Williams are huge bargains. Giddey only worth 75% of current salary. Dort, less than 50%. SGA, a bit more than his actual.

Poku, in bottom 8% and calculated at worth -$840k.

Jazz win. Thunder tied for 12th in west.

Joe and Williams are a credit to the Thunder scouting and development staff.

Williams was nowhere on my lottery radar pre-draft.

Moreover, it must be excruciating for PHI to have let Joe go.

I would have added Omoruyi to this list, but unfortunately OKC chose to waive him (after giving him a standard contract 16 days earlier?) despite the promise he showed this season.

Omoruyi has been worth negative dollars on DARKO fair salary.

So far with Pistons, his efg% is down but ts% up because of big increase in ft rate. 3pt fg% is way up but 2pt fg% is way down. Offensive rebounding is a strength but defensive rebounding has plummeted to an absurd low. Steals way down. Assists stay very low.

I dunno what to expect from him or how much is determined by role, whatever assigned in either place. BPM remains very low.

I am not bothered by his departure. I was more questioning of his arrival. Seemed like a low probability, time killing development project for people that overly like working on development projects. Contributed to the massive mix of dink lineups.

The search for a bigger Dort. A deeply flawed model. A overly fetishized archetype for the Thunder, judging by results instead of concept.

Was amazing with SGA & Dort in brief run. Only 2 starts. Too often in rando dink lineups. None over 11 minutes for season. Slap dash lineup management. 277 minutes divided across 94 lineups. Shocking, insane, undisciplined, illogical, unacceptable rando bull. Anything over 20 lineups for a deep bench player and you have no plan and don't know or care what you are doing. Imo.