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Are we witnessing DeRozan at his peak or he's just having a better team around him this year than Toronto/Spurs? Or did I just forget how good was DeMar in Toronto?

He was already arguably a top 15 player in the Raptors.

At this point it is. I don't think he's ever been a top 20 player in the league (maybe 2017) but somehow this year he's actually been pretty solid and is probably in the 10-15 range. Gonna be interesting to see if he can keep it up thru the rest of this year and into next year, or it's just an outlier season.

Statistically he really doesn't look much different than he did in Toronto from 2016 till 2018 or last year with the Spurs for that matter. He had a hot start but looks like things balanced out again.

Definitely. Last 6 games have been weak but that just highlights how strong his prior performances were.

Box stats may not jump out as clearly better than previous seasons, though his TS% is higher than any Raptors season and while it's lower than the last two Spurs seasons, his usage is significantly higher.

But just look at the impact stats. +13.7 On/Off, previous career high was +3.9 and every other season was negative. Big career high in RAPM driven by an absolutely stunning turnaround in DRAPM. Most seasons his DRAPM ranges from -0.5 to -1.5; this season it's +1.4 which is good for #31 in the entire league even without a minutes floor on the stat.

Plus those sweet B2B game winning buzzer beaters. Right now DeRozan is having a career season, hopefully he replicates the first half of the season in the second half.

Considering he's in the MVP conversation, clearly yes.

durantbird wrote:Are we witnessing DeRozan at his peak or he's just having a better team around him this year than Toronto/Spurs? Or did I just forget how good was DeMar in Toronto?

He's absolutely having his most valuable season right now by a wide margin, but I think it's debatable whether it's about him being an overall more capable player. I think offensively he's savvier than ever and have no problem calling this is offensive peak, but I think the context around him has everything to do with this success, and I think Billy Donovan deserves an incredible amount of talent for finding a way to unlock impact from DeRozan that frankly Casey/Nurse & Popovich never found.

We'll see how the season ends, but I'm inclined to look at Donovan as officially a great NBA coach who can probably do great things with any coachable star. I should say that I'm shaped by what I saw during Florida's back-to-back titles with the Noah-Horford core. As a UCLA fan, I remember the way they handled the Bruins' vaunted defense, and while clearly Noah & Horford were the backbone above that, I never forgot how well the Gators worked together.

rand wrote:Definitely. Last 6 games have been weak but that just highlights how strong his prior performances were.

Box stats may not jump out as clearly better than previous seasons, though his TS% is higher than any Raptors season and while it's lower than the last two Spurs seasons, his usage is significantly higher.

But just look at the impact stats. +13.7 On/Off, previous career high was +3.9 and every other season was negative. Big career high in RAPM driven by an absolutely stunning turnaround in DRAPM. Most seasons his DRAPM ranges from -0.5 to -1.5; this season it's +1.4 which is good for #31 in the entire league even without a minutes floor on the stat.

Plus those sweet B2B game winning buzzer beaters. Right now DeRozan is having a career season, hopefully he replicates the first half of the season in the second half.

Where did you get this season PI RAPM data?

IdolW0rm wrote:

rand wrote:Definitely. Last 6 games have been weak but that just highlights how strong his prior performances were.

Box stats may not jump out as clearly better than previous seasons, though his TS% is higher than any Raptors season and while it's lower than the last two Spurs seasons, his usage is significantly higher.

But just look at the impact stats. +13.7 On/Off, previous career high was +3.9 and every other season was negative. Big career high in RAPM driven by an absolutely stunning turnaround in DRAPM. Most seasons his DRAPM ranges from -0.5 to -1.5; this season it's +1.4 which is good for #31 in the entire league even without a minutes floor on the stat.

Plus those sweet B2B game winning buzzer beaters. Right now DeRozan is having a career season, hopefully he replicates the first half of the season in the second half.

Where did you get this season PI RAPM data?

I don't know if it's PI or NPI

http://nbashotcharts.com/rapm?id=1683034232

I think hes just in a better position with more spacing TBH. Hes been a forward since he was a Spur. He was mostly a guard in Toronto. I watch Demar play and I dont see a much improved player. I guess his 3pt shot is better but he still rarely shoots them.

Derozan never correlated with the Raptors success when he was on. Lowry and bench unit always played better than Lowry and Derozan. It seems like he is definitely more important to Bulls.