FanPost

Some Food for Thought on Kyrie Irving

So, I initially began writing this as a comment, but this wall of text got way out of hand.  Now, it's here so I hope you enjoy.

Getting out from under Lebron's limiting shadow.

Kyrie Irving currently wants out of Cleveland because he feels Lebron's presence is limiting him as a player, and that Kyrie needs his own team to really thrive.

However, Kyrie currently has the 9th highest Usage% in the NBA at 30.8%. This is the highest Usage of his career, even pre-Lebron, and is higher than Lebron’s current Usage%. With a rate this high, how much more does Kyrie really expect to get in his own environment? The top-5 in Usage% are (beginning with the highest rate), Westbrook, Cousins, DeRozan, Harden, Thomas and these range from Westbrook’s 41.7% to IT’s 34%. If Kyrie doesn’t have enough control or involvement in Cleveland, any team taking Kyrie has to be ready to accept an equally high or even high Usage% than Kyrie currently takes up.

Yet, even with this incredibly high Usage%, surely Kyrie is productive with the lion’s share of the ball in Cleveland over LBJ, right?

Well, when it comes to Win Shares, Kyrie isn’t even in the top-20 (Lebron is 6th, even with his lower Usage%). Westbrook, Harden, and IT are all in the top-10. The only other two left off of that list are DeRozan and Cousins. This is also true for Win Shares Per48.

Box Plus/Minus continues this trend with Kyrie not making the top-20, barely managing half of #20 Marc Gasol’s 4.1 BPM with Kyrie at 2.5 BPM. Those other high Usage% players? Westbrook, Harden, IT, and Cousins all made the list, while again DeRozan failed. Lower Usage Lebron, however, made this list again at #4, despite Kyrie having a larger share.

This trend trifecta is complete with Value Over Replacement Player again leaving Kyrie Irving out of the top-20, regardless of his top-10 Usage%. Westbrook, Harden, Cousins, IT and even James (at #3) all make this list, while again DeRozan and Kyrie Irving fail to make the cutoff. Kyrie’s 2.9 VORP is barely half of IT’s 4.8 VORP.

Finally crashing this nose dive, Player Efficiency Rating also fails to see Kyrie make the top-20. However, here all five higher Usage% players, Westbrook, Harden, IT, Cousins, and even DeRozan make this list while Kyrie cannot. Lebron? The King and his lower Usage% still manage to come in at #6 in PER.

"BUT LEE4, MANY CUMULATIVE ADVANCED STATS UNFAIRLY ACCOUNT FOR DEFENSE WHEREAS KYRIE IRVING IS A TOP-10 OFFENSIVE TALENT", I hear you inappropriately shouting.

Well, let’s focus solely on Offensive Box Plus/Minus, Kyrie’s bread and butter. Kyrie does make this list, at #15 with a 4.8 OBPM, but still well behind Westbrook’s 10.9, as well as IT, Harden, and James. Cousins also made this list but came in behind Kyrie, and of course, no DeRozan sighting. It's the same story with Offensive Win Shares, where nearly the same thing plays out, but this time Kyrie only manages to come in at #17, behind everyone again except for Cousins and DeRozan.

While it's slightly off topic, there is a positive case to be made for Kyrie in Assist%. No, Kyrie is not top-20. Bledsoe is with 31.1% which is good for the #20 spot. Kyrie only posted a 29.7%, but pre-Lebron Kyrie did post Assist%‘s between 31.6% and even up to 36.5%. Kyrie’s 36.5% would have been good for #9 on last season’s list! So, a Lebron-less Kyrie could jump back to that, which would technically be better than Bledsoe's current facilitation. The draw back here is that Kyrie posted that 36% mark his rookie season and has regressed each year since; even before Lebron arrived. These numbers are trending the wrong direction for a playmaker.

What does this tell us?

Well, at best Kyrie is already getting a higher Usage% than his teammate, Lebron. With that Usage Kyrie fails to be top-20 in Win Shares, Box Plus/Minus, Value Over Replacement Player, and Player Efficiency Rating. Making matters somewhat worse, Kyrie’s offensive claim to fame still barely manages to make him top-15 in specifically offensive stats of Offensive Box Plus/Minus and Offensive Win Shares.

Kyrie is already a top Usage player, but not a top production player… even strictly offensively while removing his defensive dead weight.

Make of this information what you will. The only conclusive point I can make from all of this is that Advanced Stats truly do hate Toronto’s DeRozan. Yet, DeRozan is a throwback type of player, unfriendly to the modern way the game is played today. No one expects to see DeRozan on these lists because his style isn’t conducive to these stats, creating his success elsewhere. This same defense cannot apply to Kyrie Irving, as his game should thrive under these various analytics and they don’t. Moreover, it isn’t just because of Kyrie's inability to defend that prevents him from making these lists, because Isaiah Thomas cannot play defense, either, but he still manages to counterbalance his game enough to shine through.

Kyrie doesn’t shine through, and it isn’t because he doesn’t have the opportunity. And all of this goes without considering that NBA Advanced Stats generally suffer from the criticism that they don't take defense into account sufficiently enough, a fact that should help Kyrie Irving look better under this type of analysis.

I'm not saying any of this necessarily means we should or shouldn't make a trade for Kyrie Irving, but none of this looks very good, either.

Yeah, this was way too long for a single comment.

All stats from...

https://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2017_leaders.html

https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/i/irvinky01.html