The Importance of Resting Ray Allen

[Rocky5000]

The All-star game is just another example of what we've been seeing all season. When Ray is well rested, he plays phenomenally, but when he's playing big minutes night after night, his numbers fall sharply. Even though this seems so clear to me, he's averaging 40 minutes a game on the road, where rest is most important. Tony Allen and Eddie House are very good replacements for Ray at shooting guard, there is no reason for him to be playing so many minutes, especially when his ankles are still recovering.

If we reduce his minutes, he might actually become more valuable to the team, and I think we'd at least see the same production. The guy just scored 28 points in only 18 minutes!

Look at these stats

SPLIT G GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% OFF DEF REB APG SPG BPG PPG
0 Days Rest 11 11 38.3 .335 .343 .929 1.8 3.0 4.8 3.4 0.9 0.1 16.3
1 Day Rest 22 22 37.8 .454 .373 .892 0.8 2.9 3.7 3.1 0.8 0.2 19.0
2 Days Rest 9 9 38.8 .427 .383 .931 1.2 3.2 4.4 2.2 1.6 0.2 19.1
3 Days Rest 2 2 39.5 .485 .444 1.000 1.5 1.5 3.0 2.5 1.0 0.5 20.5
3+ Days Rest 2 2 39.5 .565 .500 .909 1.5 3.0 4.5 3.5 1.0 0.0 20.5

If that's not a trend, I don't know what is. You could throw the all star game stats in with the 3+ days of rest. His shooting percentages are pretty much up across the board corresponding with increasing rest. Rest Ray and he plays much better. He's shooting 500 from downtown when he has over 3 days off! He only scores 16.3ppg and shoots a Antoine-esque 0.335 in back 2 back situations! But he scores 4 more points per game when he's rested. I've noticed that in many games he usually starts off pretty hot, but then cools down as the game goes in and sometimes gets a resurgence in the 4th after resting.

Tony is close to being fully recovered now and we can ride him for the last 30 games while keeping Ray well rested for the playoffs. I propose given Ray somewhere in the range of 28-32 minutes a night, with the rest being given to Tony. That's cutting 6-10 minutes off from his season average of 38.3, which might not seem like a lot, but I'm pretty sure it'll have a positive effect. Tony also gains some experience for the playoffs, gains some confidence, and would end up having about 24-28 minutes a game of playing time.

Keeping Ray healthy isn't going to make us miss the playoffs, or likely even lose home court advantage, we barely missed a beat when we lost KG.

[John Locke]

This is a very good point. And I agree in a sense.

But there is also another factor. Shooters like Ray - I mean, shooters that the defense knows about and adresses on the scouting report - need time to find the right shots. They need minutes. They need to pass up shots at certain times to get better shots at another time.

But I agree he is playing to much. Just wanted to make a counter-point.

[DorfonCeltics]

It's just unrealistic. You can't give a guy more than 3 days off in the middle of an NBA season? Look at your own stats. He's only played 4 games with 3 or more days rest and his numbers aren't that much better. It's tough to identify trends with such small data samples. I think you're reaching. Ray is doing just fine and has said as recently as last week that his body feels as good as it has felt all season.

[Rocky5000]

It's just unrealistic. You can't give a guy more than 3 days off in the middle of an NBA season? Look at your own stats. He's only played 4 games with 3 or more days rest and his numbers aren't that much better. It's tough to identify trends with such small data samples. I think you're reaching. Ray is doing just fine and has said as recently as last week that his body feels as good as it has felt all season.

I'm not saying to give him 3 days off. I'm saying to reduce the number of minutes he's playing per game so he doesn't get so worn out. I disagree that his numbers aren't that much better. His numbers with 3 or 4 days rest are a LOT better. With 0 days he's shooting only .335! Even if you throw out the longer rest periods, and just look at the 2 biggest sets. 0 days - 11 games 1 day - 22 games. There is definitely a big difference when your shooting is up over 100 points and it IS statistically significant.

I calculated the 2 sample t test and the t-value is 3.22, which gives a probability of him being better with 1 day of rest versus 0 days of rest at over 99%! To do this I assumed a SD of 0.1 for both cases, which is probably a bit large (under this assumption, 99.5% of Ray's games with zero days of rest would be from 0.035 up to .635, with one day from 0.154 up to .754, we all know Ray isn't that streaky)

[DorfonCeltics]

I'm too lazy to get all the stats but I'm pretty sure if you did the same analysis for any star player in the NBA on 0 days rest you'll see a big drop off in production. That's just the nature of the game. You always hear guys talking about how tough it is to play on the second night of a back to back. I don't think Ray is any different.

Do I want Ray to be fresh for the playoffs? Hell yeah! Has he played too many minutes this year? Possibly. Will limiting his minutes for the remaining 32 games truly affect his playoff performance? I'm not so sure about that. Ray is just starting to get healthy from his ankle surgeries. I would say that is a bigger reason for Ray's struggles this year.

[Rocky5000]

I'm too lazy to get all the stats but I'm pretty sure if you did the same analysis for any star player in the NBA on 0 days rest you'll see a big drop off in production. That's just the nature of the game. You always hear guys talking about how tough it is to play on the second night of a back to back. I don't think Ray is any different.

Do I want Ray to be fresh for the playoffs? Hell yeah! Has he played too many minutes this year? Possibly. Will limiting his minutes for the remaining 32 games truly affect his playoff performance? I'm not so sure about that. Ray is just starting to get healthy from his ankle surgeries. I would say that is a bigger reason for Ray's struggles this year.

That's true. I didn't look to see how all players vary, but Ray's performances just really stick out in my mind. He seems to either have a really good game, or a really bad game and more often than not those good games come when he's had some time to rest.

I think Pierce's stats are more what you'd usually expect from a player like Ray. His shooting percentages are pretty flat with him shooting a little bit worse when unrested, but actually better from downtown.

SPLIT G GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% OFF DEF REB APG SPG BPG PPG
0 Days Rest 11 11 38.5 .430 .466 .866 0.4 4.9 5.3 4.9 1.7 0.4 22.4
1 Day Rest 26 26 37.5 .445 .382 .825 0.8 5.0 5.8 4.5 1.4 0.4 20.4
2 Days Rest 9 9 38.7 .471 .290 .800 1.0 4.6 5.6 6.2 1.4 0.4 18.6
3 Days Rest 2 2 40.5 .379 .133 .882 0.0 7.0 7.0 3.5 1.5 1.0 19.5
3+ Days Rest 2 2 37.0 .529 .455 .750 0.0 3.5 3.5 3.5 0.5 0.5 23.5

[sully00]

This concept is a little overrated. Doc limits Ray to about 30 mins or less on either side of a back to back which will also affect the splits (my guess just from watching the games is that Ray goes long on the first night and Paul short which is likely reflected in their stats). He also has already sat out 4 games.

I think that Ray is just starting to hit his stride I think the last thing he will want is his mins cut.

[Rocky5000]

This concept is a little overrated. Doc limits Ray to about 30 mins or less on either side of a back to back which will also affect the splits (my guess just from watching the games is that Ray goes long on the first night and Paul short which is likely reflected in their stats). He also has already sat out 4 games.

I think that Ray is just starting to hit his stride I think the last thing he will want is his mins cut.

If you look at the splits I posted, you'll see that what you claim isn't true. Ray and Paul both play 38+ minutes with 0 days rest, otherwise known as the second game of a back to back. I wish that Doc did do something like you suggest, but Ray is clearing being overplayed.

[sully00]

This is were stats lie a little bit. The C's have played 11 back to backs, on the short side, whether the first or second game Ray is avg 33 mpg. Included in that are 4 times that Doc just ignored the idea and played Ray right around 40 per game in both ends. In those situations, only two were since Nov. and the back to back was coming off of 3 days rest and going into another day or two.

In Ray's weakest month of the season, Jan, he played in one back to back on the 4 and 5th the whole month.

Look I don't want Ray to avg over 40 mpg but I expect him to play around 37-38 because he always has. I think the other thing to understand here is this is about Ray as well. He has given up a lot personally coming to this team. Making this All Star team was important to him. He pretty much needs those mins to find those 15 attempts a game. I think that Doc and the coaching staff will look to find him as well as Paul more rest., at the same time understand that you aren't the only one looking at the stats the players do to.

[tombattor]

All this talk is moot. If he shows any semblance of injury or fatigue, they will undoubtedly rest him. Regardless, once we have the playoff and some seedings clinched, we'll see all 3 get a lot of rest down the stretch. I think rest is important, but I'm certain it will be given in due time. Now is not the time though...

[GuyClinch]

Well let's be real - they don't play alot of D in all-star games. So it's hardly surprising a dead-eye shooter could thrive. I don't think the all-star game represents some need to rest Ray Allen. Ray Allen gets enough rest right now.

Pete

[UGA Hayes]

Nice post. The upside to this is that come playoff time Ray should hypothetically play better b/c there is generally more off days.

[cfan79]

I think the Big 3 should be playing about 30 minutes each. We can still win games with them playing that many minutes.