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og15 wrote:

KyletheDingbat wrote:I went to a bunch of games in Blake's Clipper years and I can say, he got way more timid in his second year, and wouldn't really shake it til maybe the '15 season. His rookie year he was a wrecking ball. After that, most often when he got the ball he'd pause, standing straight up, and seem to not know what to do with it. It was super frustrating to watch, because when he just caught and went, he was destructive. I think that hesitancy tied into his rebounding.

His rebound rate in year one and two were almost identical, 16.4 per 100 vs 16.1 per 100, actually even grabbed more offensive rebound in the second season 4.9/100 to 4.5/100, but he played fewer minutes 38 down to 36.2 and the team had some more guys like Reggie Evans competing for rebounds.

Similarly his scoring rate actually the same, but again, minutes and pace. Rookie year 30.7 pts/100, sophomore year, 30.8 pts/100.

Well it's the eye test then, he certainly seemed more timid his second year.

og15 wrote:

dhsilv2 wrote:His DRB% was 26.9 and 25.1 in his first two years. his next best was 2016 at 22.3. So yeah he did drop off as a defensive rebounder. So the people with the per 100's or whatever else...he did drop off.

DJ makes perfectly good sense though.

His second season, his DRB% went down, then his ORB% went up slightly, hence TRB% was 18.6 vs 17.8 which is a general year to year type fluctuation.

After that, DJ's more prominent role,.playing more on the perimeter, everyone but DJ tanking offensive rebounds for transition defense, implementing Blake leaking out and sealing his man at the front of the rim in transition and leaking to 3/4 court to push the ball, more focus on man and help defense vs just going to get the board. All those things played some part in his rebounding dropping.

Makes sense. I suspected as such, just was odd to me when I was looking as his career

SinceGatlingWasARookie wrote:The best of Blake’s Dunking game was heavily based on jumping. Blakes jumping steadily declined. He was wearing out his body.
A lot of guys do their best jumping when they are young.

Leaping ability isn't super important to rebounding. Most rebounds are taken below the rim anyway, and that's why we have seen many dudes like Reggie Evans and Danny Fortson over the years grinding away for position and rebounding very effectively.

Griffin's biggest deal was a sharp decline in offensive rebounding after his first two seasons. Obviously, his defensive rebounding declined some as well, but not to the same extent. He fell off a cliff as an offensive rebounder, and that made a big difference. This correlates nicely with first an increasing proportion of his shots taken from 16-23 feet, and then a massively rising 3PAr. You shoot that much from the outside, you stop rebounding as effectively on the offensive end. Easy correlation there. Keep in mind that he averaged 7.5 DREB36 as late as 2016, but he never averaged 2.0+ OREB36 again after 2014. He average 6.5 DRB36 after his first two seasons after averaging 8.0 over the first two. He averaged 3.2 ORB36 over his first two seasons and 1.9 thereafter. He played 37.2 mpg over his first two seasons and 31.8 mpg thereafter.

It's pretty easy to see where the rebounding decline comes from.

I saw every game. It's cuz He didn't play defense.

Injuries. Eventually falling in love with the three pointer. He went from not even 1 a game, to two a game for a season and then started taking like 5 a game afterwards.

Throughout Blake’s early career, he was a guy that just forced his way to the bucket at high speed with little regard for the damage his body would take. He hit the hardwood on almost every play. He learned to take fewer gambles with his body as he matured and that reduction in effort and energy came with reduced rebounds.

Also, DJ out-hustled him most of the time on rebounds when Blake was clearly the superior athlete.