Just How Good are Monroe & Drummond Together?

[Clarity]

Phenomenal article showing what most us have been saying all year.

Monroe & Drum are pretty darn outstanding together.

A few highlights from the article-







& the big bang-

But still seven combined years younger than Jordan and Griffin, the Drummond and Monroe combo are in a league of their own for their age. They combine for 22.8 wins produced, a significant chunk of the team's 29 wins.

Even without proper spacing around them, even in their first full seasons in new roles, even going through two new coaches, the two still made a strong argument for the best young front court in the league.

Though it's been a difficult six years, building around these two has the makings of a very bright future.

Like a ton of us & a ton of writers & analysts said last Summer before signing the dip **** twins, imagine if we had some shooters to space the floor around these guys, that thought it scary.

http://www.detroitbadboys.com/2014/5/12 ... frontcourt

[MotownMadness]

Damn, Those are some dominating statistics.

[E-Z]

I believe this man added starting front-court totals together and began ranking teams. I'd rather see him combine the totals of the players while they're on the floor together. A tough feat I'd assume. However, the wins produced is just a fallacy in the way he calculated the total. It's not exclusive for time on the floor together and that's worth mentioning above anything else.

I'm not exactly sure on how to compile statistics of exclusive two man units, however NBA.com does display the +/- of specific units on the floor. The tandem of Monroe and Drummond combines for a net negative of -170 (In contrast, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan have a net positive of 462 points). Much lower than the tandems of Smith and Monroe or Smith and Drummond. Which states an obvious point of contention; Greg Monroe struggles at the 4.

I've made my case on this before already, but I'm just no fan of compiling raw stats and delegating pipe dreams. Monroe is definitely capable of being efficient at the 4 position offensively, but coaches will have to come up with a scheme on defense to say the least. The issue could be mitigated somewhat if the Pistons' guards didn't play terrible defense on the perimeter.

[Clarity]

I believe this man added starting front-court totals together and began ranking teams. I'd rather see him combine the totals of the players while they're on the floor together. A tough feat I'd assume. However, the wins produced is just a fallacy in the way he calculated the total. It's not exclusive for time on the floor together and that's worth mentioning above anything else.

I'm not exactly sure on how to compile statistics of exclusive two man units, however NBA.com does display the +/- of specific units on the floor. The tandem of Monroe and Drummond combines for a net negative of -170 (In contrast, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan have a net positive of 462 points). Much lower than the tandems of Smith and Monroe or Smith and Drummond. Which states an obvious point of contention; Greg Monroe struggles at the 4.

I've made my case on this before already, but I'm just no fan of compiling raw stats and delegating pipe dreams. Monroe is definitely capable of being efficient at the 4 position offensively, but coaches will have to come up with a scheme on defense to say the least. The issue could be mitigated somewhat if the Pistons' guards didn't play terrible defense on the perimeter.

There is a lot of meat in that article that cant be discredited.

While it does leave many what if's, it pretty much co signs that offensively Monroe & Drum fit excellently. I dont disagree with you defensively that Monroe is a weakness, however as i've said more than a few times. If we can contain any type of dribble penetration both Monroe & Drummond will look light years better off that alone.

If you use the best 5 etc that would obviously further highlight the issues.

The Blake/Jordan comparison in +/- isnt exactly relevant. Monroe/Drum would obviously thrive with Chris Paul, JJ Reddick & Matt Barnes on the floor with them.

[E-Z]

I believe this man added starting front-court totals together and began ranking teams. I'd rather see him combine the totals of the players while they're on the floor together. A tough feat I'd assume. However, the wins produced is just a fallacy in the way he calculated the total. It's not exclusive for time on the floor together and that's worth mentioning above anything else.

I'm not exactly sure on how to compile statistics of exclusive two man units, however NBA.com does display the +/- of specific units on the floor. The tandem of Monroe and Drummond combines for a net negative of -170 (In contrast, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan have a net positive of 462 points). Much lower than the tandems of Smith and Monroe or Smith and Drummond. Which states an obvious point of contention; Greg Monroe struggles at the 4.

I've made my case on this before already, but I'm just no fan of compiling raw stats and delegating pipe dreams. Monroe is definitely capable of being efficient at the 4 position offensively, but coaches will have to come up with a scheme on defense to say the least. The issue could be mitigated somewhat if the Pistons' guards didn't play terrible defense on the perimeter.

There is a lot of meat in that article that cant be discredited.

While it does leave many what if's, it pretty much co signs that offensively Monroe & Drum fit excellently. I dont disagree with you defensively that Monroe is a weakness, however as i've said more than a few times. If we can contain any type of dribble penetration both Monroe & Drummond will look light years better off that alone.

If you use the best 5 etc that would obviously further highlight the issues.

The Blake/Jordan comparison in +/- isnt exactly relevant. Monroe/Drum would obviously thrive with Chris Paul, JJ Reddick & Matt Barnes on the floor with them.

Those stats are not exclusive to front-court tandems on the floor. Meaning, he's counting rebounds, points, blocks, steals, etc, and most importantly wins-produced when Monroe might be paired with Smith, or Drummond is paired with Jerebko. In other words, the stats are vague and misleading in the context he's using them.

In regards to +/-, the NBA's stats differentiate all two man units, illustrating that Griffin and Jordan's +/- is not exclusive for any other player on the floor with them; assuming we take Chris Paul for example. The unit of Chris Paul and Blake Griffin sports a higher +/- than any other 2 man unit on the team, so his impact of not being on the floor is noted.

Ironically in Detroit's case, 2 man units featuring Jennings, Stuckey, Singler, and Smith are higher than any unit featuring Monroe or Drummond. I would take it with a grain of salt since, most of these units are more than likely playing against the bench of another team. One way or another, their production produced a net negative.

Just to go even further on the supposed front-court tandem, Monroe allowed an effective field goal percentage of 58.7% at power forward, while he produced at 49.4%. Monroe turned the ball over more at the 4, blocked fewer shots, and scored fewer points at that match-up. The inverse was entirely true when he played center (once again with a grain of salt since he more than likely played against bench units when Drummond was off the floor).

[Notanoob]

I believe this man added starting front-court totals together and began ranking teams. I'd rather see him combine the totals of the players while they're on the floor together. A tough feat I'd assume. However, the wins produced is just a fallacy in the way he calculated the total. It's not exclusive for time on the floor together and that's worth mentioning above anything else.

I'm not exactly sure on how to compile statistics of exclusive two man units, however NBA.com does display the +/- of specific units on the floor. The tandem of Monroe and Drummond combines for a net negative of -170 (In contrast, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan have a net positive of 462 points). Much lower than the tandems of Smith and Monroe or Smith and Drummond. Which states an obvious point of contention; Greg Monroe struggles at the 4.

I've made my case on this before already, but I'm just no fan of compiling raw stats and delegating pipe dreams. Monroe is definitely capable of being efficient at the 4 position offensively, but coaches will have to come up with a scheme on defense to say the least. The issue could be mitigated somewhat if the Pistons' guards didn't play terrible defense on the perimeter.

Those +/- numbers are just raw +/-, which really isn't that useful. They're subject to a lot of noise and frequently don't show you what you really want to know. Without checking, I assume that the majority of the lineups featuring Drummond and Monroe together also include Smith at SF, yes? And if they don't feature him, they're in much smaller sample sizes-probably too small to draw a real conclusion from them.

Even if someone somehow got us some AMP data on lineups featuring Monroe and Drummond but no Smith, vs Smith and Drummond but no other PF, I don't know if it'd be worth the effort. Those kinds of statistics are far from perfect even over the course of thousands of minutes-we're working with a much smaller sample here.

I suspect that this Monroe vs. Smith debate will simple remain divided by opinion-do you think that Monroe will improve enough on defense to become the better frontcourt partner with Drummond, or do you think that his defense won't improve enough and Smith will be the better partner?

I fall into the first camp, but even if I didn't, I would prefer to keep Monroe simply because I'm already sick of watching Smith play on offense. I cannot stand his stupidity and stubbornness. It's simply mind-boggling. I cringe every time I see him get the ball.

[DCintheD]

When are we gonna hire a gm already? Lionel hollins is the man for this job and he won't get hired until a gm hires him. Lionel hollins will not last on the market for much longer.

[E-Z]

I believe this man added starting front-court totals together and began ranking teams. I'd rather see him combine the totals of the players while they're on the floor together. A tough feat I'd assume. However, the wins produced is just a fallacy in the way he calculated the total. It's not exclusive for time on the floor together and that's worth mentioning above anything else.

I'm not exactly sure on how to compile statistics of exclusive two man units, however NBA.com does display the +/- of specific units on the floor. The tandem of Monroe and Drummond combines for a net negative of -170 (In contrast, Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan have a net positive of 462 points). Much lower than the tandems of Smith and Monroe or Smith and Drummond. Which states an obvious point of contention; Greg Monroe struggles at the 4.

I've made my case on this before already, but I'm just no fan of compiling raw stats and delegating pipe dreams. Monroe is definitely capable of being efficient at the 4 position offensively, but coaches will have to come up with a scheme on defense to say the least. The issue could be mitigated somewhat if the Pistons' guards didn't play terrible defense on the perimeter.

Those +/- numbers are just raw +/-, which really isn't that useful. They're subject to a lot of noise and frequently don't show you what you really want to know. Without checking, I assume that the majority of the lineups featuring Drummond and Monroe together also include Smith at SF, yes? And if they don't feature him, they're in much smaller sample sizes-probably too small to draw a real conclusion from them.

Even if someone somehow got us some AMP data on lineups featuring Monroe and Drummond but no Smith, vs Smith and Drummond but no other PF, I don't know if it'd be worth the effort. Those kinds of statistics are far from perfect even over the course of thousands of minutes-we're working with a much smaller sample here.

I suspect that this Monroe vs. Smith debate will simple remain divided by opinion-do you think that Monroe will improve enough on defense to become the better frontcourt partner with Drummond, or do you think that his defense won't improve enough and Smith will be the better partner?

I fall into the first camp, but even if I didn't, I would prefer to keep Monroe simply because I'm already sick of watching Smith play on offense. I cannot stand his stupidity and stubbornness. It's simply mind-boggling. I cringe every time I see him get the ball.

The duo of Monroe and Drummond do sport a net positive of 12 points when Smith is not at small-forward. However, like I've stated, these units have to be taken with a grain of salt, as such minutes may be against the bench of their opponents. So, yes +/- are subject to noise, probably much less than the very raw compiling of plain rebounds, blocks, and points. It is safe to say that all statistics are subject to noise, and require proper context to be of any real use to anyone.

Also to answer your question, the combination of Monroe and Drummond can work. There's just much less room for error for them to succeed. Monroe's inherent weakness is defending stretch forwards, and just about every team in the league starts one. That's mostly the only real obstacle in the way of this tandem finding success. I see no easy solution.

[ImHeisenberg]

Lionel hollins will not last on the market for much longer.

Don't worry, he'll be on the market for quite some time. That's why he was passed over for every opening he interviewed for last summer. He's not a remarkable coach. He's old school, and out-dated.

[aad]

Well josh smth said he had to fly back to detroit to have a meetng with tom gores and they met for two hours and gores and gores told him that he will not be traded and he will be back in detroit next season He couldnt delete that post from me because I screen shot it this time but so far its still up on his page

[Clarity]

Also to answer your question, the combination of Monroe and Drummond can work. There's just much less room for error for them to succeed. Monroe's inherent weakness is defending stretch forwards, and just about every team in the league starts one. That's mostly the only real obstacle in the way of this tandem finding success. I see no easy solution.

To this point, our problem isnt any different than most peoples problems. Griffin, Aldridge, ZBo, Love etc cant defend either. Defensively our Monroe/Drum issue isnt any different than Griffin/Jordan. Jordan is just a more experienced defender than Drum & the Clipps can stop some dribble penetration which all minimize Griffin's defensive weakness.

All this thread was co signing was another example of frankly the borderline dominance of Monroe/Drummond offensively as a tandem.

[Q00]

Well josh smth said he had to fly back to detroit to have a meetng with tom gores and they met for two hours and gores and gores told him that he will not be traded and he will be back in detroit next season He couldnt delete that post from me because I screen shot it this time but so far its still up on his page

Interesting. Post the screenshot when you get a chance

[aad]

Well josh smth said he had to fly back to detroit to have a meetng with tom gores and they met for two hours and gores and gores told him that he will not be traded and he will be back in detroit next season He couldnt delete that post from me because I screen shot it this time but so far its still up on his page

Interesting. Post the screenshot when you get a chance

I will post it now how do I post it?

[Q00]

Well josh smth said he had to fly back to detroit to have a meetng with tom gores and they met for two hours and gores and gores told him that he will not be traded and he will be back in detroit next season He couldnt delete that post from me because I screen shot it this time but so far its still up on his page

Interesting. Post the screenshot when you get a chance

I will post it now how do I post it?

Upload the picture file to this site, and then it will give you a web link to post it here.

http://postimage.org/

[E-Z]

Also to answer your question, the combination of Monroe and Drummond can work. There's just much less room for error for them to succeed. Monroe's inherent weakness is defending stretch forwards, and just about every team in the league starts one. That's mostly the only real obstacle in the way of this tandem finding success. I see no easy solution.

To this point, our problem isnt any different than most peoples problems. Griffin, Aldridge, ZBo, Love etc cant defend either. Defensively our Monroe/Drum issue isnt any different than Griffin/Jordan. Jordan is just a more experienced defender than Drum & the Clipps can stop some dribble penetration which all minimize Griffin's defensive weakness.

All this thread was co signing was another example of frankly the borderline dominance of Monroe/Drummond offensively as a tandem.

Monroe has more trouble away from the basket at the 4 than any of those players you mentioned. I'll rank their defensive eFG% allowed overall at power forward from best to worst. Along with their rankings defending the pick and roll, and spot up jump shots.

Aldridge 48.5%
Griffin 50.1%
Randolph 50.2%
Love 52%
Monroe 58%

Aldridge is ranked 140th defending the P&R, 70th defending spot ups.
Griffin is 56th in P&R defense, 129th defending spot ups.
Randolph is 65th in P&R defense, 284th defending spot ups.
Kevin Love is 70th in P&R defense, 150th w spot ups.
Monroe is 120 in P&R defense, 234th w spot ups.

Each of these players except for Monroe produce a net positive PER at the power forward position per 48 minutes.

Love 11.8
Griffin 9
Aldridge 7.5
Randolph 1.9
Monroe -2.9

All of the players produce a net positive playing center.

[Pharaoh]

I feel like a VG but:

You're looking at individual defensive numbers when it's a 5-man game!

How is the spot up data tracked? Are those bigs directly responsible for stopping those spot ups, has a switch occured, has a guard come off multiple picks and is now free and clear, has a guard squirmed around multiple screens before spotting up and these bigs are now "responsible" for closing out?

On PnRs I'd ask similar questions: how many of the made baskets do you blame on the guard for defending poorly, leaving the big to defend a guard...or making it difficult for the big to rotate back to his man?

"Analytics says Reddick is a poor defender because he doesn't produce steals but if I tell him to chuck the roll man he'll do it every single time"

"Analytics says Redick is a poor defender but if I tell him to send Ray Allen baseline on every drive he'll do it every single time"

SVG once asked if the stat heads knew and understood every single team's defensive system....because if you don't understand how teams want to defend in all situations then you can't blame a player for the break down.

Data doesn't mean squat if it's compiled out of context

Sent from my GT-I9300 using RealGM Forums mobile app

[E-Z]

I feel like a VG but:

You're looking at individual defensive numbers when it's a 5-man game!

How is the spot up data tracked? Are those bigs directly responsible for stopping those spot ups, has a switch occured, has a guard come off multiple picks and is now free and clear, has a guard squirmed around multiple screens before spotting up and these bigs are now "responsible" for closing out?

On PnRs I'd ask similar questions: how many of the made baskets do you blame on the guard for defending poorly, leaving the big to defend a guard...or making it difficult for the big to rotate back to his man?

"Analytics says Reddick is a poor defender because he doesn't produce steals but if I tell him to chuck the roll man he'll do it every single time"

"Analytics says Redick is a poor defender but if I tell him to send Ray Allen baseline on every drive he'll do it every single time"

SVG once asked if the stat heads knew and understood every single team's defensive system....because if you don't understand how teams want to defend in all situations then you can't blame a player for the break down.

Data doesn't mean squat if it's compiled out of context

Sent from my GT-I9300 using RealGM Forums mobile app

The rankings are provided by Synergy Sports, and there's video footage for each statistic. It gets ugly for anything dealing with Monroe outside of the paint. Part of equation is team defense, there's a clear lack of communication between everyone defensively.

Smith, for example took the self-proclaimed mantle of "weak-side helper" in just about every P&R, or dribble hand-off that involved Monroe. Even when the situation never called for it. Secondly, Jennings and other guards rarely attempted to cut the middle lane off from penetration whenever screens occurred. The lack of such communication led to inadvertent ball reversals to the weak-side of the floor for near impossible close-outs from all of Detroit's bigs, Monroe included.

Defending spot-ups aren't exclusive to other forwards and centers, but all players after a defense collapses. In other words, front-court players aren't ranked very high unless the defense is by design or they're freak athletes. Monroe and Randolph are well beneath their peers in this area as you can tell.

However, Monroe usually hangs back and attempts to guard the paint too often in P&R's to compensate. This leaves the pick and pop, a weapon he is simply out of position to defend. Even when he closes out, he's no immediate threat to the shooter.

Also, statistics cannot account for how many times the defense breaks down from penetration allowed in P&R's. It's quite fair to assume that Detroit's defense collapses quite often even if Monroe doesn't allow his man to score immediately on the initial pass.

[Defor]

If what aad say is factual then Gore must be an idiot. Not that I didn't already know that but this leaves no room for doubt. Before I was never sure where Dumars left off and Gore began , but come on Smith is a cancer and has to be removed. I'm not saying Monroe is the answer at the 4 , but it would be nice to see him and Drummond play toghether for forty games , with the right personnel and coach,to see what they can do once and for all.

[Defor]

Should have mentioned this above , not claiming your lying aad I just don't trust everything posted online. Sorry for the double post

[Notanoob]

The duo of Monroe and Drummond do sport a net positive of 12 points when Smith is not at small-forward. However, like I've stated, these units have to be taken with a grain of salt, as such minutes may be against the bench of their opponents. So, yes +/- are subject to noise, probably much less than the very raw compiling of plain rebounds, blocks, and points. It is safe to say that all statistics are subject to noise, and require proper context to be of any real use to anyone.

Also to answer your question, the combination of Monroe and Drummond can work. There's just much less room for error for them to succeed. Monroe's inherent weakness is defending stretch forwards, and just about every team in the league starts one. That's mostly the only real obstacle in the way of this tandem finding success. I see no easy solution.

Even with context, +/- and adjusted versions of it can fail to explain things or match up with what you can see on the court. Indeed, all stats need context to be useful at all, but I figured that I'd just point it out to everyone reading that there is no need to take +/- stats as gospel.

Monroe's foot-speed limits him as a defender, and he lacks stellar defensive instincts; this is something I'm sure we're all aware of. However, it is no impossible to become a good defender with these limitations.

First, he does have at least a few physical assets- his height and length. These allow him to contest shots well (assuming that he makes his rotation in time) and get steals (something we already have seen him do regularly; he has quick hands).

But essentially ever since he's been in the league, he's had poor coaching defensively with not much in terms of a discernible system, or help from the rest of his team. The guard defense ahead of him has always been terrible and/or lazy. Prince was the only veteran on the squad who really was a smart defender, but he was not much of a teacher or a leader. On top of this, he also spent the majority of his time at center until this season-and there clearly was no system or perimeter defense ahead of him, even worse than in previous seasons. I suspect that with another year of seasoning at PF and better coaching with a real defensive system he can become a perfectly passable defender, switching and making rotations and everything. He will never be capable of defending PFs as well as Smith can (although he was poor this year, IMO, even at PF, also probably due to a lack of system or perimeter defense), but that isn't required of him. Solid team-defense out of Monroe would be fine.

To have a great defense, we'll have to improve the supporting cast, unless Drummond becomes a Howard-level defensive anchor, but that was the plan anyways.