Analysis: Individual Stats after 2 Games

Since Pomeroy hasn't posted individual stats yet on his site (as of this writing), I thought I'd put up some numbers after the 1st two games. Caveats:

• SMALL SAMPLE SIZE: only 2 games played, so the significance of these stats is sketchy, at best (there's a reason why KenPom doesn't have his posted).

• METHODOLOGY: I make no warranty on these numbers. I hope I've done all of the calcs correctly, but I've certainly made a math error or two before. I do know that Pomeroy and I get slightly different numbers for team stats, due to differences in how we calculate team possessions. I use the method listed on his website, but he is apparently using something else these days. The differences there are negligible, however, and hopefully that's also true for these individual stats. I did make a change from the original formulae that Dean Oliver published for calculating possessions and ORatings, but I think Pomeroy would have made the same correction (it involves the factor to convert FTs to possessions used).
  

Offense

##	Player Name	% Min		% Poss		O Rat	PPWS	eFG%		OReb%	TO%	A Rate
21	Sapp, Jessie	65.0%		27.8%		130.7	1.47	75.0%		2.4%	21.9%	19.6%
3	Summers, DaJuan	61.3%		17.7%		98.2	1.08	54.2%		5.1%	22.0%	1.7%
2	Wallace, Jonathan	60.0%		19.1%		154.6	1.44	73.3%		2.6%	6.9%	15.0%
55	Hibbert, Roy	57.5%		34.7%		119.4	1.22	60.0%		19.0%	11.9%	2.5%
33	Ewing, Patrick	56.3%		12.3%		93.8	1.00	50.0%		8.3%	34.5%	5.2%
1	Macklin, Vernon	50.0%		10.8%		132.2	1.00	50.0%		12.5%	0.0%	2.0%
5	Rivers, Jeremiah	48.8%		6.8%		87.3	0.75	37.5%		0.0%	23.9%	3.9%
15	Freeman, Austin	43.8%		22.3%		85.1	0.92	46.2%		3.6%	24.3%	2.7%
4	Wright, Chris	37.5%		29.8%		66.6	0.91	40.0%		4.2%	42.6%	3.1%

Defense

##	Player Name		DReb%	Bl Rate	St Rate
21	Sapp, Jessie		14.3%	0.0%	1.2%
3	Summers, DaJuan		11.1%	2.6%	2.6%
2	Wallace, Jonathan		2.8%	0.0%	2.6%
55	Hibbert, Roy		10.3%	16.8%	1.4%
33	Ewing, Patrick		4.5%	2.9%	4.2%
1	Macklin, Vernon		6.8%	9.7%	1.6%
5	Rivers, Jeremiah		5.2%	0.0%	1.6%
15	Freeman, Austin		9.7%	0.0%	0.0%
4	Wright, Chris		11.3%	0.0%	4.2%

Quick comments:

• I cut off players with less than 20% of available minutes played (sorry, Messrs. Crawford, Wattad and Jansen).

• Sapp has been using a lot more possessions than last season (27.8 vs. 18.7), but thanks to his hot outside shooting (5-9 3pt), this has been a good thing. He may be making his case for taking up the slack from Jeff Green's departure. He won't continue to shoot this well, but his turnovers should come down a bit as well. He's also leading the team in defensive rebounding, which won't keep up.
  

• Summers is starting off the season a bit like last season, making turnovers without assists to go along. Otherwise, he's not using as many possessions as last year, but is otherwise playing just as you'd expect. Frankly, I'm most interested in seeing his defense improve this season.

• Wallace can't keep this up. It's just not possible. It's not his shooting (6-10 3pt, 2-5 2pt) that is so extraordinary, but his lack of turnovers that have his ORating so high. Last season, Wallace turned it over on 24.8% of the possessions he used, worst on the team other than Rivers. Of the ~15 possessions that ended due to Jon so far this season, only one was from a turnover. I'll be thrilled if he can just keep his TO Rate below 15%, more than double where he's at now.

• For all those who've clamored for 3 seasons for the guards to pound it inside to Hibbert, you're finally getting your wish. He's shooting 60% from the floor (15-25 2pts.), which is actually down from last year, and he's still making great decisions (only 12% TO Rate), cleaning up the offensive glass and protecting the paint (17% block rate!).
  

• Ewing has 3 turnovers and is 0-2 from 3pt. Otherwise, he's doing exactly what you'd want. I'm not worried, as he's only played 45 minutes (small sample size, people).

• Warning: TVBP (thinly-veiled brag post). I said last season that Macklin is making the case for more playing time with his tempo-free offensive stats. Good old Vern is not letting me down with no turnovers, strong offensive rebounding and mostly smart shooting (4-7 2pt.; 0-1 3-pt (!?)). If he just leaves the outside shooting to his teammates and pounds the defensive glass a bit harder, he'll be fine. His % Poss needs to come up, but that may be more difficult.

• Rivers is still struggling with his shooting, but he's taking care of the ball a lot better than last season. He gets his minutes because of his defense anyway (see Gene Smith), and he's only taken 4 shots so far, so there's no reason to worry here.

• The freshmen are playing like, well, freshmen. Freeman is struggling from the outside (2-8 3-pts.) and Wright is turning the ball over far too much (6 TOs in 14 possessions used). Frankly, I expected no better, and hope that they can continue to get quality minutes so they can develop in time for conference (and post-season) play.