Joel Embiid -- The Process is now Live

[Kolkmania]

Quip/issue with advanced stats...last night CSN showed a graphic illustrating how much better we are defensively with Embiid on the court vs. when he's off. The on/off differential was staggering and in Embiid's favor.

Looking at the advanced stats over on basketball-reference.com, this does not appeared to be captured in the headline advanced stats (ORtg vs. DRtg,OBPM vs DBPM, WS or VORP) that I often see bandied about. [Of course, I can be misunderstanding them...] ORtg/DRtg differencial is -5...WS/48 of .043...BPM of 0.8...They don't appear to be capturing a player's impact on his specific team.

We watch the games closely and can see Embiid's impact. The national pundits are mostly looking at headline advanced stats in ranking and evaluating players. Nobody's out there saying that Embiid isn't having a great impact, but I don't think the stats capture just how stellar he's been for us so far this season.

Embiid's DRTG is 94.8 which is very good. The ORTG says something about the offense of the Sixers when Embiid is on the court, which is 89.5. So the differential is -5.3, but the poor offensive efficiency of the Sixers is mainly contributing to that differential. So to summarize, good defense, worse offense.

For comparison, Richaun Holmes has DRTG of 113.1. That's an indication of impact Embiid has on the defense.

The WS/BPM stats are also very dependent with the quality of Embiid's teammates and the sample size this early in the season is so small, that using any advance stat is almost worthless.

edit: Perhaps I should explain what ORtg and DRtg stand for. It's the amount of points that the team scores and concedes on average per 100 possesions with the player on the court (in this case Embiid).

I don't think that's right about O-Rating.

At least on Basketball reference, O-Rating is a player's points produced per 100 player possessions.

The reason Embiid's looks bad is that he is currently averaging way too many turnovers.

There are two ORtg's, the offensive rating for a team with Embiid in it or for Embiid alone. Not sure which one is used at basketball reference, makes sense if it's the individual one indeed. The individual one is a bit more complex, number of turnovers is certainly an aspect. Not sure what the weight is off the top of my head, have to look it up.

[phiphan]

Lowe/Windhorst discussed Embiid/Sixers today for a few minutes -- starts at about 30:00

http://www.espn.com/espnradio/playPopup?id=17954723

[Unbreakable99]

Lowe/Windhorst discussed Embiid/Sixers today for a few minutes -- starts at about 30:00

http://www.espn.com/espnradio/playPopup?id=17954723

What did they say?

[cksdayoff]

Lowe/Windhorst discussed Embiid/Sixers today for a few minutes -- starts at about 30:00

http://www.espn.com/espnradio/playPopup?id=17954723

What did they say?

embiid is a baby giraffe who needs to spread his legs to drink water from a watering hole

[CoreyGallagher]

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[cksdayoff]

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looks like ROY will be coming out of Philly one way or another. Add Simmons into the mix (will he even be eligible when he comes back?)

[CoreyGallagher]

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Embiid has played 3 games and is already ranked 58, lol.

[Ericb5]

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Embiid has played 3 games and is already ranked 58, lol.

That's awesome that they recognized him, but this is just a guess based on a small sample size, and his true ranking would be a lot higher than that. I bet next year's ranking will have him in the top 20.

I mean the idea that he is only 4 spots higher than Russell is silly. He dominates on both ends of the floor, and is 7'2.

[Los5782]

I know we're kind of past this phase of the The Process ™ , but this was uploaded couple days ago.. pretty cool.

Watch on YouTube

[LloydFree]

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Embiid has played 3 games and is already ranked 58, lol.

And there are still guys on this board trying to say the Lakers gave the the 76ers a gift by selecting Russell over Okafor. SMH.

[phifans]

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Embiid has played 3 games and is already ranked 58, lol.

And there are still guys on this board trying to say the Lakers gave the the 76ers a gift by selecting Russell over Okafor. SMH.

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

[LloydFree]

Read on Twitter

Embiid has played 3 games and is already ranked 58, lol.

And there are still guys on this board trying to say the Lakers gave the the 76ers a gift by selecting Russell over Okafor. SMH.

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

Hmmm, instead we selected a mediocre Center you can't build with.

[phifans]

:noway:

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

Hmmm, instead we selected a mediocre Center you can't build with.

You can build with everyone. You just can't build around them.

[TTP]

And there are still guys on this board trying to say the Lakers gave the the 76ers a gift by selecting Russell over Okafor. SMH.

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

Russell crushed it in preseason and was an elite prospect. I'm expecting him to have a breakout year. His potential and present are both significantly better than Okafor's.

[phifans]

And there are still guys on this board trying to say the Lakers gave the the 76ers a gift by selecting Russell over Okafor. SMH.

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

Russell crushed it in preseason and was an elite prospect. I'm expecting him to have a breakout year. His potential and present are both significantly better than Okafor's.

Your expectation doesn't change his present performance. We'll see how he does at the end of the season. Right now your comments just make no sense since his performance suggests the opposite of your expectation.

[TTP]

Russell has been below average so far this season. Scoring 16.6 per game with a TS% of 47.5 ( 36.7% fg, 32.3% 3pg) and 4.8asts/3.2tovs
Not a great pg you want to build with.

Russell crushed it in preseason and was an elite prospect. I'm expecting him to have a breakout year. His potential and present are both significantly better than Okafor's.

Your expectation doesn't change his present performance. We'll see how he does at the end of the season. Right now your comments just make no sense since his performance suggests the opposite of your expectation.

What makes no sense? He was better than Okafor last year, and even with the numbers you quoted, he's been better than Okafor this year. He was great in the preseason as well on high usage (part of present performance).

[phifans]

What makes no sense? He was better than Okafor last year, and even with the numbers you quoted, he's been better than Okafor this year. He was great in the preseason as well on high usage (part of present performance).

He was not better last year and is not better this year either considering the different role they play and preseason means nothing.

[LongLiveHinkie]

Saw an article by Kurt Helin today that was complimentary of Embiid, but there was a line in it that said something like "he's still raw, he moves really stiffly and he needs work on his jumper" and that was the second time I heard a national guy say that. I'm like do these guys even watch Embiid play or are they just regurgitating false information?

Two of Embiid's greatest strengths are his fluidity and his jumper. The dude is shooting 40% from 3 for a 7'2 big man. I mean, c'mon.

[TTP]

What makes no sense? He was better than Okafor last year, and even with the numbers you quoted, he's been better than Okafor this year. He was great in the preseason as well on high usage (part of present performance).

He was not better last year and is not better this year either considering the different role they play and preseason means nothing.

Yeah we're just going to have to agree to disagree then.

RPM (arguably the best advanced stat)
Russell: -3.66, 60th out of 71 qualified PGs
Okafor: -5.28, 59th out of 59 qualified Cs

On/off points per 100 possessions split (per nbawowy)
Russell: -4.6
Okafor: -10.0

BPM
Russell: -1.8
Okafor: -4.1

VORP
Russell: 0.1
Okafor: -0.8

They both had miserable situations and awful surrounding players. They were similar age (Russell was 3 months younger). Don't bother citing PER - it's an awful stat that doesn't value defense and intangibles and rewards empty scorers. Russell, while not great, was better when considering useful advanced metrics.

If numbers aren't enough for you, consider that the NBA Rank that you quoted has Okafor at rank 146 and Russell at rank 62. If people truly thought Okafor had the better year, they would be a lot closer given that they're similar age and similar draft position.

I would give up Okafor and the Lakers pick for Russell in a heartbeat and I'd be shocked if the Lakers would even consider it.

[TTP]

Saw an article by Kurt Helin today that was complimentary of Embiid, but there was a line in it that said something like "he's still raw, he moves really stiffly and he needs work on his jumper" and that was the second time I heard a national guy say that. I'm like do these guys even watch Embiid play or are they just regurgitating false information?

Two of Embiid's greatest strengths are his fluidity and his jumper. The dude is shooting 40% from 3 for a 7'2 big man. I mean, c'mon.

I'm not familiar with the guy but a lot of writers are just lazy and regurgitate whatever misinformation they hear. He's obviously incredibly agile and athletic for his size and is well above average in shooting touch for his position.