Point Blank – May 10, 2017
Is Two Games/Six Days an edge for the Wizards…And another tour of the gloves, legs and hands on the 2017 MLB Diamonds…Tom Koehler doesn’t have the “Dutch Touch” right now (kudos to anyone that comes up with that reference point)
The second round of the NBA playoffs finally brought a little bit of drama last night after a long stretch of one-sided games, but it wasn’t exactly easy viewing – both the Rockets and Spurs were out of gas at crunch time in Game #5, combining to shoot 15-51 from the beginning of the fourth quarter on, including 6-28 beyond the arc. Some of it was good defense, but for Houston it appeared to be tired legs, the consequence of a seven-player rotation, that were missing open shots, while for San Antonio the offense struggled to find good looks with neither Tony Parker or Kawhi Leonard on the court to run the show (and Patty Mills getting worn down by the workload).
There will be more review of that game as the lead-in to #6 in Houston in tomorrow’s edition, but now the scene shifts to the Eastern Conference, and a different flow from last night because fatigue should not be an issue, the rare setting of only the second game in six days inside of a playoff series. That unusual lay-out may be a key factor in influencing the outcome, so let’s get to it.
WASHINGTON/BOSTON – Is Two Games/Six Days an edge for the Wizards
One of the items noted at the beginning of this series is that while the NBA penalized the Wizards at the start, a rather unfair Game #1 setting of playing a road afternoon game on a Sunday after closing out the Atlanta series on the road on a Friday night, there was a window of opportunity later, the chance to physically regroup because of back-to-back games that would come after two days off. They took full advantage in the first of those settings on Sunday, and I believe it may matter again tonight.
Here is the gist, and it has been talking point throughout – when it is starters vs. starters the Wizards are better, but the Celtics can make up the lost ground when the reserves are on the court. I have run the tables on the Washington bench a couple of times, and even in the Game #4 blowout the Net PP100 charts for the three reserves that played at least 10 minutes were abysmal –
Min PP100 Net
Bogdanovic 22:11 -13.0
Jennings 17:43 -19.2
Mahimni 12:58 -36.6
And that is in a game that the Wizards won by 21 anyway. The starters were fresh, which particularly showed on defense in that third quarter surge. So let’s propose something – if the starters were fresh from a favorable layoff, and did not have to exert themselves deep into the game (no one played more than Bradley Beal’s 37:19), might they again have a degree of freshness that can mean a longer court stint tonight, therefore less time from the reserves?
That may well be the case, and it means time to look at this series from a slightly different perspective. Let’s focus in on how the starters have performed, again going to Net PP100, with the overwhelming majority of these minutes coming head-to-head:
Wall 156 +8.7 Thomas 143 -11.1
Beal 150 +2.0 Bradley 135 -11.6
Gortat 138 +10.9 Horford 138 -6.7
Morris 92 +28.3 Crowder 133 +1.5
Porter 150 +10.9 Smart 122 +3.5
There is quite a story there. And note that it is awkward to use Marcus Smart because he hasn’t started, but has played 48 more minutes than the next Boston player in the rotation. Note that a significant part in the Smart positive rating is getting a fair amount of time against the Washington reserves. And of course there is the fact that Markief Morris missed time due to injury.
You can see in the minute counts the workloads that Wall/Beal/Porter have had to carry, which at another time might be a negative. Instead in playing for only the second time in six days I expect them to be able to play with a high degree of energy, and that means looking for a window of opportunity in the marketplace. That will have me focusing on the Wizards to score.
Let’s go one more step into the starters vs. starters notion, and note that much of the advantage has come from Washington’s ability to break down the Boston defense.
NetPP100 Wizards “O” vs. Celtics “D”
Wall 115.9 121.4 Thomas
Beal 116.1 119.1 Bradley
Gortat 117.1 114.3 Horford
Morris 121.5 110.0 Crowder
Porter 117.6 106.8 Smart
To put these numbers into perspective, the best offense in the NBA this season belonged to Golden State at 113.2, and the worst defense the Lakers at 110.6. And again note there that some of Smart’s good numbers come from playing against the Wizards bench.
Washington has averaged 115.5 points per game in regulation in this series, yet the markets are only projecting a 105.5 tonight. For some added perspective, the Wizards rang up 116 and 121 in the last two games despite Wall only shooting 15-44. I will have #519 Washington Team Total Over (8:00 Eastern) in pocket, this one carrying value to 106, and in addition to the factors already detailed also acknowledge the possibility of some late scramble points, something that has only been a factor once in this series.
Item: It is time to talk MLB Defense, today the Bad
Now that all of the teams have at least 30 games under their belts we are at the time of the season in which the current defensive numbers have enough sample size to begin taking a close look. Yesterday the focus was on the teams that have played the best in the field so far, using PADE (Park-Adjusted Defensive Efficiency), a rather generic but also a trustworthy statistic in that it does not rely on human judgment (as noted yesterday, all of those various zone-ratings trackers bring food for thought, but are difficult to trust just yet).
Today it is time to look at the bottom of the list and there are some surprises, not only with each of these teams having had a major drop from 2016, but some of them rather epic falls.
26. BLUE JAYS (#4)
27. TIGERS (#17)
28. INDIANS (#10)
29. GIANTS (#8)
30. BREWERS (#18)
Might some of this be attributed to the fact that it is still a bit early in the campaign? Yes. In the case of San Francisco there has also been a spike in ground balls from the pitching staff, and while ground balls are good in general (a ground ball never goes over the fence for a HR), they do impact these tables at a slight negative. And of course losing Brandon Crawford truly stings.
The team that rings the bells of alarm is Detroit – not only rating poorly here, but doing so with MLB’s lowest rate of ground balls (36.8%, no other team lower than 41.3), which has actually helped the Tigers here just a bit.
In the Sights, Wednesday MLB…
I believe the gap is wider between the Cardinals and Marlins than some surprising Wednesday morning market perceptions, and in particular the gap between Lance Lynn and Tom Koehler. So with as low as -107 available in the early trading it will be #905 St. Louis (7:10 Eastern) going into pocket, with value up to -115. The Miami psyche appears to be a bit fragile right now, seeing a big lead get away late last night part of a 3-11 slide, while the Cardinals should have a spring in their steps, waking up in first place with a five-game win streak.
I wasn't enamored with what I saw from Lynn across his first two games, but that can certainly be excused for a guy returning after missing all of 2016. Since then it has been a 4-0/0.72 in which he has thrown as well as any time in his career, and in terms of command note that his current BB% would match a career best, and his GB% is at a career high. And with only 14 pitches each needed from Trevor Rosenthal and Seug Hwan Oh last night the bullpen is well-set, neither of them having worked on Monday.
The biggest story here may be Koehler, a journeyman at best who has been far from his best in 2017. At 1-1/5.40 through six starts, and a career 36-49/4.21, there can be a yawn attached to him, but a deeper look shows warning signs. There are 110 pitchers that have worked at least 30 IP so far and Koehler rates #108 in FIP, which is bad enough, but also much like getting past 30 games matters in terms of defense, it also allows for the first looks at DBF (Difficulty of Batters Faced). Koehler just happens to be #99 on those charts, which means that he has put up bad numbers despite facing an extremely weak schedule.
Koehler’s problem is that he doesn’t have the pop to get the ball past hitters, which means that he has to rely on control, especially keeping the ball down, but his BB% is the second-worst of his career, and the GB% at a career-low. Want to know where it really gets bad for a career nibbler when he is losing his stuff? Koehler’s O-Swing% is down to 18.2. And where does that rate among those 110 pitchers? You may have already guessed it, #110. Baseball allows him to play pinball on a given night, and hope that the balls are hit within range of gloves, but there just isn’t much in the Koehler repertoire right now.
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