Where does Jaylen Brown rank now?

[The Explorer]

I don't know where he ranks, but its a big boost for him that he was one of the most mocked players last offseason; for his contract and all the jokes about not being able to go left. He heard everything and used it as fuel to quiet the haters. Conference finals MVP and finals MVP says a lot about his intangibles.

[web123888]

One of the great 2nd fiddles in NBA history and currently likely a top 15-20 player in the league.

[Cavsfansince84]

Lowry is ridiculously insultingly low. He was miles better than Brown. Here's how their teams performed with and without them in their championship years:

Regular season
Raptors with Lowry +11.2
Raptors w/o Lowry: -1.0
On/off: +12.2

Celtics with Brown: +8.2
Celtics w/o Brown: +15.9
On/off: -7.7

Postseason
Raptors with Lowry: +8.9
Raptors w/o Lowry: -5.2
On/off: +14.1

Celtics with Brown: +7.0
Celtics w/o Brown: +14.5
On/off: -7.5

So with Lowry, the Raptors were 2-3 points better than the Celtics with Brown. Without Lowry, the Raptors were 17-20 points worse than the Celtics. That's not noise. That's a massive, massive signal. And Lowry staggered much more from Kawhi Leonard than Jaylen did from Tatum. Brown played 68% of his minutes with Tatum while Lowry only played 57% of his minutes with Kawhi.

There's some validity to those numbers but this is like I've been low key saying on here for years which is that +/- until itself isn't the gospel of how good players are. Which I'm sure you'll agree with but that's how you're also using it in the above. Lowry played well in his role but Brown also played well in his. If you think Lowry was better in 2019 that's fine also but I'm just saying that +/- by itself is not a measure of which players are better. Pgs also always look better on teams that can hit shots and a team that wins a title is hitting plenty of shots.

[iggymcfrack]

Lowry is ridiculously insultingly low. He was miles better than Brown. Here's how their teams performed with and without them in their championship years:

Regular season
Raptors with Lowry +11.2
Raptors w/o Lowry: -1.0
On/off: +12.2

Celtics with Brown: +8.2
Celtics w/o Brown: +15.9
On/off: -7.7

Postseason
Raptors with Lowry: +8.9
Raptors w/o Lowry: -5.2
On/off: +14.1

Celtics with Brown: +7.0
Celtics w/o Brown: +14.5
On/off: -7.5

So with Lowry, the Raptors were 2-3 points better than the Celtics with Brown. Without Lowry, the Raptors were 17-20 points worse than the Celtics. That's not noise. That's a massive, massive signal. And Lowry staggered much more from Kawhi Leonard than Jaylen did from Tatum. Brown played 68% of his minutes with Tatum while Lowry only played 57% of his minutes with Kawhi.

There's some validity to those numbers but this is like I've been low key saying on here for years which is that +/- until itself isn't the gospel of how good players are. Which I'm sure you'll agree with but that's how you're also using it in the above. Lowry played well in his role but Brown also played well in his. If you think Lowry was better in 2019 that's fine also but I'm just saying that +/- by itself is not a measure of which players are better. Pgs also always look better on teams that can hit shots and a team that wins a title is hitting plenty of shots.

Plus/minus isn’t gospel in that there are cases where a worse player can have significantly numbers than a better player, especially over a short sample, but that doesn’t mean that you can never use it in drawing definitive conclusions here. There are a lot of contextual factors that make the comparison pretty clear.

1) Both played similar roles. Both were #2 scorers on championship teams. They played very similar minute and game loads in their respective seasons.

2) Lowry heavily staggered from the Raptors best and most impactful player, playing with him less than Brown played with Tatum meaning he was unlikely to benefit from lineup effects.

3) Lowry historically is someone whose impact outpaced their box numbers more than almost anyone in history while Brown’s impact has generally been less than his box numbers would lead you to expect. Lowry had better box numbers by BPM in both the regular season and postseason.

4) The difference between them was absolutely massive. With Lowry, the Raptors objectively played better basketball than the Celtics did with Brown. He was on a better basketball team in the minutes he played. Without those two players, the Celtics were 17-20 points better. That’s an INSANE difference. Thats comparable to the difference between one of the best teams of all-time…. and one of the worst teams of all-time. Imagine if instead of Lowry and Brown being on the bench for 30% of the minutes, they missed 30% of the games instead. Imagine the Raptors were 40-15 through 55 games while the Celtics were 36-19. Then Brown and Lowry go down and the Raptors finish the season 8-19 while the Celtics go 23-4. Would that be definitive enough for you? Because that’s the kind of delta we’re seeing here. Of course, we don’t have to pretend about what would happen if they missed games. We can always look at that data too:


5) The records with and without Brown and Lowry paint the same story about who was more crucial.

Raptors with Lowry: 47-18 (.723)
Raptors w/o Lowry: 11-6 (.647)

Celtics with Brown: 52-18 (.743)
Celtics w/o Brown: 12-0 (1.000)

Looking at the game wide data we have even more support for the idea that Brown simply didn’t impact winning for the Celtics the way Lowry did for the Raptors.

Meanwhile the case for Brown is… what? He’s taller? Takes more shots? There’s no real evidence anywhere that he’s a comparable player to Lowry, let alone a better one.

[Cavsfansince84]

Plus/minus isn’t gospel in that there are cases where a worse player can have significantly numbers than a better player, especially over a short sample, but that doesn’t mean that you can never use it in drawing definitive conclusions here. There are a lot of contextual factors that make the comparison pretty clear.

1) Both played similar roles. Both were #2 scorers on championship teams. They played very similar minute and game loads in their respective seasons.

2) Lowry heavily staggered from the Raptors best and most impactful player, playing with him less than Brown played with Tatum meaning he was unlikely to benefit from lineup effects.

3) Lowry historically is someone whose impact outpaced their box numbers more than almost anyone in history while Brown’s impact has generally been less than his box numbers would lead you to expect. Lowry had better box numbers by BPM in both the regular season and postseason.

4) The difference between them was absolutely massive. With Lowry, the Raptors objectively played better basketball than the Celtics did with Brown. He was on a better basketball team in the minutes he played. Without those two players, the Celtics were 17-20 points better. That’s an INSANE difference. Thats comparable to the difference between one of the best teams of all-time…. and one of the worst teams of all-time. Imagine if instead of Lowry and Brown being on the bench for 30% of the minutes, they missed 30% of the games instead. Imagine the Raptors were 40-15 through 55 games while the Celtics were 36-19. Then Brown and Lowry go down and the Raptors finish the season 8-19 while the Celtics go 23-4. Would that be definitive enough for you? Because that’s the kind of delta we’re seeing here. Of course, we don’t have to pretend about what would happen if they missed games. We can always look at that data too:

I think its true that Brown's role on the Celtics was much more redundant or easily compensated for than Lowry's on the Raptors who didn't have a strong ballhandler/playmaker on the team that year outside of FVV who was ok. So that is part of what shows up in the +/- imo. Keep in mind I'm not debating this from a 'Brown is so much better than Lowry pov' either. Regarding the bolded though, that's a bit of misnomer to say the least. Lowry was the Raptors' 4th leading scorer in the rs and they had a bunch of players in the 10-16ppg range then in the playoffs Siakam really emerged as their #2 with Lowry being more clearly the #3 relative to the rs while Brown was the #2 in the rs but was basically co #1 in the playoffs. That's not the same role scoring wise. He also did it very efficiently relative to Lowry or Tatum. So I think its way closer than you are saying it is. It's highly debatable that Lowry was even second banana on that team tbh though some may say the same about Brown.