The Comedian wrote:White is a lot more than “a guy who won’t lose you anything” on the defensive end. Every advanced stat has him as one of the best defensive guards in the league.
The three point shot thing doesn’t matter, because everyone knows he’s a much better shooter from three than he’s shown here. It’s a cold streak, eventually it will correct, as it almost always does.
He has done everything at a high level except shoot, and everyone knows that will come around, considering the shots he’s taking are great looks. I care much more about everything else, as opposed to one extra shot going in per game.
His value over replacement level player in Boston has been 0.0, which is also a career worst for him as a player in the NBA.
So something must matter, or he must be dramatically underperforming his time here when generally that range is between 0.9-1.4 for him in his career.
So surely something about his performance matters, somehow that's a dramatic underperformance for him the minute he put on a Celtics shirt. You can claim it to be offense or defense, but you don't get 0.0 VORP for no reason when typically you're 0.9-1.4 for your career since your second season in the league (as a rookie he was 0.2 which was still better than his Boston VORP performance so far).
Me saying he needs to get back up to his career averages to be a positive player or he would be replaced in the off season isn't a dramatic statement here. He's not like one of the guys we signed off the street as a post trade addition that you would expect to be close to the average level for a replacement level player in the league.
And yeah I expect him to turn it around, but I would argue he wouldn't just get to his career average when he does. I'd argue looking closer at his performance for the last 2 times he was on a team surrounded by players that were a top 10 in offense (and let's be frank here in his time here in Boston Tatum has go super nova and we've been far better than just top 10 so it's been extremely easy street for a role player like him out there) he hasn't shot merely career average when he's on easy street like he is with this team and those Spurs teams, he's shot FAR better than that. He picks his spots, we should be expecting around 46% from the floor and 33% from 3 overall because he knows how to pick his spots and doesn't play above his skill level on a talented team with the defensive attention completely off him.
But so far, shooting his career worse is what I would suspect is what's killing him. Putting up career worst shooting numbers, career worse VORP numbers, career worst assist percentages, career worst offensive box plus minus, career worst PER, ect ect ect.
We all know he's better than this as a player, this is a 2 way player kind of in the mold of an Avery Bradley (but better playmaking skills and a little worse 3 point shooting). But right now, what he's shown for this team... he isn't. And if this is something he can't turn around well then... you don't earn through poor play a 0.0 VORP on a team that might very well end up with the best record in the East, let alone one who's star has lifted this team to putting up one of the best overall numbers in the league during the time he's been playing here, and not likely be replaced by a player looking to jump ship in the summer for the MLE and take over your minutes.
If we perform in the playoffs anywhere near what we're doing now we're going to be a destination location for players looking to make their mark on a winning team. And if he doesn't somehow stop having a career worst performance because he can't figure out how to work with this team, then we'll get people that will who are desperate to play with Tatum and make it deep in the playoffs living off the gravity Tatum's presence on the floor creates. Right or wrong Stevens trading multiple picks is a clear sign he's going all in on the team now and not caring about down the road. He's not going to wait around or fall into any kind of sunk cost fallacy if a player simple fails to live up to expectations and he can get better options for his stars.
Again in all probability this has to turn around, no one has this much bad luck in a trade. But until it does it's fair to say White is starting a clock on himself on this team to keep his minutes. Pritchard, Grant, Theis all would love to get on the court more now and next year we'll have another player desperate for minutes and potentially in the mold of a Tyus Jones.
But like I said let's hope his last 2 games were the breakout he needed to get back to where he needs to be on a team like this. He shot 40% from the floor and 50% in the last two games. Defensively I don't think anyone has any real complaints. Hopefully seeing the ball go through the hoop now is what starts him back on the path. We need him to perform soon so we get the guy we need in the playoffs and the one we traded for. And we should expect that's who we'll get, if not that's on White. Role change or not it isn't like he's in a completely foreign system that is asking him to do more than he's capable of.