"Guess Who?" – Battle of the Double-Double Centers
December 16, 2009 by Staff
Filed under All Sports
Time for a little “Guess Who?”
I’ll try to do this frequently throughout the basketball season. It’s a little, well-known game, in which I will give you two players’ stats without identifying them, and then I will shockingly reveal who these players are, underlying the glaring blinders we put on when we see certain names on the backs of NBA jerseys.
Anyway, here are today’s pair of players, both whom play the Center position—sort of.
Player A:
Points per Game: 18.2
Rebounds per Game: 12.7
Assists Per Game: 1.6
Shooting Percentage: 63.3%
Turnovers per Game: 3.3
Blocks per Game: 2.0
Steals Per Game: 1.0
Free Throw Percentage: 58.4
Minutes per Game: 34.3
Player B:
Points per Game: 18.1
Rebounds per Game: 10.2
Assists Per Game: 2.5
Shooting Percentage: 57.3%
Turnovers per Game: 2.5
Blocks per Game: 0.4
Steals Per Game: 1.2
Free Throw Percentage: 75.2%
Minutes per Game: 34.5
Any clue as to who is who?
Well, let’s start with Player A. That’s Dwight Howard. The All-Star center is having another All-Star caliber season. However, his numbers and his overall performance pail in comparison to what he was doing on the court just a season ago. Howard’s points are down by 2 a game, he takes 3 less shots per game, his free throw percentage is down, his blocs are down by almost an entire block per game, he turns the ball over more and is averaging 1.2 fewer rebounds than a season ago. Still, no one is laughing at his 18 and 12, but that’s a far cry from the 21 and 14 he was producing for most of last year.
As for Player B, he was the only player in the NBA with more double-doubles than Howard last season, and yet very few people are aware of that fact. Player B is David Lee of the New York Knicks, who despite playing out of position has pretty comparable numbers to that of Dwight Howard. Of course, Howard is far more effective on the defensive side of the ball, but as far as offensive production goes, they are neck and neck and Lee has gotten significantly better on the defensive end of the floor.
Lee’s 18 and 10 are quite impressive, especially since he doesn’t get nearly the same kind of attention Howard gets within the scheme of his own offense. Lee’s shooting percentage is 6-percentage points lower than Howard’s, but Lee steps out takes the 17-footer this season, making him a much more versatile offensive option. The fact that Lee is scoring the same number of points as Dwight Howard is even more amazing, and he’s doing it with fewer turnovers and with significantly fewer offensive rebound opportunities in comparison to that of Howard’s. While Howard is erasing a 1.6 more shots per game than Lee, Lee is slightly better at stealing the ball and averages 1 more assist per game than Howard.
I’m not giving you this comparison to say that Lee is even remotely as valuable as Dwight Howard. But the stats don’t. When it comes to quantifiable stats, so primarily offensive performance, Lee is right there with Howard in terms of putting the ball in the hole and helping his teammates. Howard’s player efficiency rating of 24.04 is much higher than that of Lee’s 20.94 due to Howard’s superior rebound rate, but Lee makes some of that up with his lack of turnovers and ability to pass the ball to some degree.
