What's Wrong With Q-Pon?
by andrew61388 on Mar 13, 2011 1:00 PM CDT
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[It's been a busy few days here at At the Hive. Paul joined the team on Thursday, Mason made his debut Friday, Will covered Marcus Thornton's return with press credentials last night at the Hive, and Matt was courtside for photography (post coming soon). Today, Andrew (who runs the excellent Hoop Dat alongside Mason) caps off an exciting week with his first post. -Rohan]
The ultimate goal of every team is to win a championship, so it’s worth asking- how does a team become a serious contender in the NBA? The answer? Home grown talent. Even big market teams like the Knicks and Lakers can’t just buy free agents and expect to win a championship. The fact is every team needs to develop their rookies to become championship contenders. Look at a list of NBA champions for the past 20 years. The only team that hadn’t drafted (note: if a team traded for a rookie before he ever played a game, I count that as them drafting that player. So, for purposes of this articles, the Lakers drafted Kobe) and developed a majority of their key contributors was the Detroit Pistons in the 2003-2004 season. Even this season, the rule holds- the Spurs drafted Manu, Tony Parker, and Duncan, the Lakers had Kobe and Bynum; heck, even the Heat drafted Wade.
So, with that in mind, I thought I’d take a look at, in my mind, the biggest disappointment on the court disappointment of this season- the lack of development by Quincy Pondexter. I strongly believe that three years from now (assuming, of course, DWest and CP3 stay in New Orleans), there is a solid chance that Q-Pon’s lack of development will be the difference between the Hornets competing for a championship and remaining first round fodder.
Maybe that’s too hard on Q-Pon. Can you really expect that much out of a late first round pick? I think the Hornets did- coming into the season, they certainly had high hopes for Q-Pon. As the only small forward behind Trevor Ariza, the Hornets projected Q-Pon playing significant minutes as our backup small forward. After easing him in during the beginning of the season, the Hornets began giving him 10-15 minutes a night in late November / early December. Things cumulated in the past week or so, with Trevor Ariza missing three games in a row with a hip injury and Q-Pon starting in his place. This should have been Q-Pon’s chance to break out and maybe claim some minutes in the playoff rotation. How’d he respond? Actually, I don’t know, cause I can’t remember him being on the court. Outside of one good dunk in a blow out loss to the Knicks, Q-Pon failed to make a single play in this time. His three starts all looked something like this- 20 minutes played, 2 points on 1 of 4 shooting, and 2 rebounds. Not exactly the stuff of champions.
His stats on the season are similarly horrible. Among qualifying players, Q-Pon sports the 15th worst PER, with a horrendous 7.83 (the league average is 15). To put this in perspective, Blake Griffin is at 22.25 and Derrick Rose is at 22.92. So the difference between an average player and Q-Pon is basically equivalent to the difference between an average player and the MVP front runner and Rookie of the Year front runner. Q-Pon also rates as the second worst rookie, just ahead of Xavier Henry.
When I initially thought of this article, I was originally going to compare Q-Pon’s rookie season to that if two other Hornets busts, Julian Wright and Hilton Armstrong. Unfortunately, there really isn’t a comparison- both were significantly better in their rookie season, with JuJu sporting an above average 15.48 PER and Armstrong a 12.15 PER.
So where do we go from here? Honestly, I’m not sure. I haven’t seen anything to really get excited about from Q-Pon. People like his defense, but my eyes tell me it’s been pretty much average. He was talked about being a great athlete coming in, but I don’t think he’s more than a B athlete, and probably more like a B-. He was supposed to be a decent shooter, but he’s shooting 32.5% from deep and 40% from the field. He has one of the worst rebound rates among all small forwards and an average assist rate. About the only good thing that can be said for his game is his turnover rate is outstanding, but that’s really a function of him disappearing on offense.
Can he recover? Anything’s possible, but I can’t find any example of a rookie playing THIS bad in extended minutes and turning it around to become a decent rotation player, much less a starter (if any reader can find an example, I’d love to know). I’m sure it’s happened, but seriously, I can’t find any. Plus, Q-Pon’s not a young 18 or 19 year old struggling to develop. He’s a 23 year old with four years of college play under his belt.
In sum, it’s looking like the Hornets have missed out on yet another chance to draft and develop a complement to David West and CP3. Between JuJu, Hilton, Cedric Simmons, plus the loss of JR Smith, Brandon Bass, and Marcus Thornton, all of the misses are really starting to add up, and if our stars decide not to sign extensions once their contracts are up because they believe the Hornets won’t be able to compete long term, we really won’t have anyone to blame but ourselves.
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Good stuff
From an offensive rating perspective, he hasn’t been too terrible- 103 pts/100 poss. The low PER is definitely a function of how few shots he takes.. of course, that in itself could be seen as an indictment of his aggressiveness on the floor.
That’s a good point on the lack of precedent.. much as I want to believe he can turn it around and become a regular, above-average contributor, he’s got a ways to go.
As far as a close comp, how about Arron Aflflalo? As a rookie, he put up 104 points/100 poss on 8.9 FGA per 36 minutes (Quincy is at 103 and 8.3). His defensive reputation kept him in the league, but his offensive development the past four years has been terrific.
Interesting
Interesting comparison between the two… I was just talking to Mason about this- I actually do feel like he provides good defense, but it’s tough for me to really quantify because I can never remember thinking he had made a great play or really shut someone down. At the same time, I can never remember him being on the court and thinking “man, he just can’t hang with this guy”
Still, I doubt he’s a good enough defender to stay in the league if he continues to play defense at this level of passiveness / horribleness
Too soon to make a judgment
Really doesn’t have much of an opportunity to make a big impact. Doesn’t get enough minutes. His confidence isn’t too high, but with more playing time, it could go up. He definitely needs to work hard. Shooting, ball-handling, etc. Potential is there for him to be a solid player.
Somewhat agree
True, long term, we can’t judge him based on this season
But he has gotten shots, including the three starts I mentioned, where he played so poorly that he was subsequently yanked from the rotation
Quincy is Fine
Thanks for the article. However, it’s a good example of why it’s not a good idea to base your analysis on PER.
In Quincy’s case, all that PER tells you is that he doesn’t shoot much. Hardly, a disaster. Actuaqlly, if you look at the last of the bottom 10 PER guys, they’re all role players or defensive specialists. Generally, not the worst players in the NBA.
Quincy has shwon some good flashes and he has good defensive fundamentals not to mention quite extraordinary athleticism. It’s way too early to come to a conclusion about him. It’s no problem if he isn’t part of the regular rotation come playoff time. He’s a 26th pick. I wasn’t really counting on him making a big splash this season.
His averages (40% FGs, 32% 3s and 80% FTs) are generally acceptable.
We’ll see what kind of player he becomes next season. That will be more important.
and
According to PER stats, Patrick Paterson is the second best rookie in the league.
He seems like a nice player, but yeah… PER isn’t exactly that helpful in determining player ability.
It has its positives and negatives
Nobody is going to call Patterson the second best rookie in the league on the basis of PER. He’s gotten into half of Houston’s games this year and barely logged 500 minutes.
At the same time, PER says Patterson has been very efficient while on the floor, something his phenomenal ORtg (118) and effective field goal percentages (57%) agree with. I think it’s a bit silly to write off PER as “not helpful” when it can be tremendously useful when looked at in context.
And in this case
I think while Pondexter’s role must be considered, I think that’s part of Andrew’s context for the post in the first place. One of the main reasons QP’s PER is so low is his low FGA. As Andrew notes, very few players recover from such a low range to become effective players. Whether that’s a function of their own talent, their own initial role in their respective systems (and subsequent lack of confidence/development) etc. is another question, but it doesn’t change the original claim.
Not just points
I’m not saying PER is the end all / be all of evaluating players, but it is a very good starting points, and his poor scoring ability isn’t the only thing holding him back. He can’t rebound and doesn’t really create anything for teammates.
actually
Actually, PER is an abyssmally poor starting point. Any stat that rewards more shooting regardless of FG% (ok, to be more precise, as long as a player shoots more than 30% they have higher PER the more shots they take), is a horrible stat to begin with. It’s called “Player Efficiency Rating”, but it rewards player who shoot a lot at low efficiency.
I don’t consider shots per minute as any indication at all of how good a player but PER rewards shots per minute.
If you base your analysis first and foremost on PER, you’d have to first back out the factor of how many shots a player takes at his FG% and whether or not that is appropriate given the situation. But in most analyses of players that begin with PER, that’s never mentioned at all, meaning the analysis is fundamentally flawed to begin with.
More generally, a player who shoots only when they get open without forcing things and who focusses primarily on defense but without totalling huge steal/block number (e.g., Quincy, but also players like Shane Battier, Ron Artest, etc.) will inevitably always have disproportionately low PER, and that’s what the point that PER and analyses based on it inevitably miss.
So, in a nutshell, PER gives a distorted picture of offensive ability, while also being unable to account for the bulk of defensive performance (most defensive rotations don’t result in a steal or block). But that’s what you get if you try to sum up players with one stat. While it might still have some marginal use if the analysis tries to account for the above factors, but in almost all cases, it doesn’t. That’s why PER is largely useless.
...
>> One of the main reasons QP’s PER is so low is his low FGA. As Andrew notes, very few players recover from such a low range to become effective players.
In this case, “recovering” might just be an issue of shooting more. Even if he shoots the same FG%, if he shoots more, he will partially recover to a higher PER. That was one of the reasons why MT had such a high PER—while a Hornet this year, he shot almsot twice as often as Quincy, at exactly the same FG%.
Further, a player can easily be an effective player wihout ever “recovering” from a low PER. Players like Shane Battier and Ron Artest never really “recovered” from low PERs in their careers, but nobody would claim they were ineffective players.
A more valid analysis might be one that compares Quincy to such players and other similar ones, if you have to start with PER. But in the cases of those players, PER isn’t a very relevant stat, so we come back to the issue of why start with it at all?
You're way underselling the stat
I’ve said a bunch of times that I don’t use it one bit to measure defense, so Battier/Artest/etc examples are strawmen.
Even if QP shoots the same FG%, if he shoots more, he will partially recover to a higher PER.
This is it exactly. You’re making a huge, flawed assumption that QP should be expected to have a similar FG% as his shots go up. As many, many studies have shown, there’s a diminishing returns effect associated with increased usage. Just because a player shoots x% when taking y shots per game doesn’t mean he’ll sustain x% when taking y+5 shots per game. The premise of PER is that there’s value to shot creation. Sure, we can debate over whether too much credit is attributed therein. But I don’t agree with your stance of writing off a stat for using “shots per minute” in any capacity at all as “fundamentally flawed.”
It’s easy to say that if Quincy shot as often as Thornton, he’d have a similar PER. But the reason Thornton was so good was he was able to create those shots for himself while maintaining efficiency.
In general, my response here is a bit more forceful than it probably needs to be. I do agree with your assertion that if Quincy were to shoot just a bit more, his PER would increase to a range where players “have” recovered. But I think your critique of PER, while ultimately rooted in the reality (possible overrating of FGA), is much too black and white. There is value in it, and it can be used as a starting point given the context of other offensive efficiency stats (ORtg, shooting%, adj. +/-) and defensive analysis.
As long as
The only assumption I’m making is that Quincy shoots better than 30%, which I think you’d agree is all but guaranteed.
As long as he does that, his PER would get better.
so it again comes down to how much a player’s PER is due to him shooting less or more than he should. Very hard to answer that question, whcih is why PER isn’t good at measuring offense.
For what it's worth
and I can’t argue stats and measures with much competence but I will say that it looks to me like the numbers cited in the article represent Pondexter’s play this season. I feel like (and based on what seems to me to be the context of the article) the pertinent issue is predicting Pondexter’s future play. Can PER measure (or project, or can it’s measurements be used to project) a player’s future performance with significant accuracy?
He had a couple of nice moves to the basket in yesterday's game
Seems to have a nose for offense, I don’t know if I would write him off just yet. Pretty cool when the camera panned to the bench late in the game and caught him pretty excited, he was pounding on Beli pretty fierce.
Without Getting Too Much In Advanced Stats
Just going off the eye test, Pondexter’s best moments have come in garbage time this season. He has shown signs of being a capable player but I don’t think he’ll ever be a starter on a championship level squad. Unless he undergoes a radical transformation over the next couple of years, he won’t necessarily do much for the team. I think the Hornets had high hopes for him, but it’s fair to say he hasn’t delivered (as you did). Even when given a starter’s position, he’s done absolutely nothing out there. I said it before and I’ll repeat it here, I really don’t feel comfortable with him getting consistent minutes in the rotation come playoff time.
"You play to win the game."
Agreed
Agreed with everything you say- I don’t think the plan was ever for him to get playoff rotation minutes, but at this point I’m wondering if he’s got enough potential to get rotation minutes next season
I know
there are folks who are ready to see some results with Pondexter now but he seemed to take time to develop at the college level and I’m kind of willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that it may take time for him to develop at the NBA level.
I understand that the team may not have the luxury of spending a couple years to develop him but I’m not quite willing to throw in the towel. (Collison, for all the praise last year, hasn’t exactly been lighting it up this season)
Maybe the disappearing act comes from him taking a backseat, trying not to make a mistake while he figures things out … ?
Great point
Maybe the disappearing act comes from him taking a backseat, trying not to make a mistake while he figures things out … ?
Really agree with this
I totally agree too. I believe, come next year there wil be a more ascertive Q-Pon. He has the tools and will have the role next year. I still believe in him.
by berlinhornets on Mar 14, 2011 5:56 AM CDT up reply actions
Yeah I feel like that's why he was drafted ...
He seems like the kind of guy a team’s management (hopefully not our’s … ) lets go of for a flashy dunker or an experienced veteran only to see him sign with the San Antonio Spurs and develop into a borderline all-star in two or three years…
Pondexter's Biggest Problem
Is that Q-Pon is such a horrible nickname and people still insist on using it. Poor Pondexter.
"You play to win the game."
My Two Cents
My belief is that if you have actually watched the majority of Hornets games, you can’t honestly say you’re very optimistic about Q-Pon’s potential. I largely agree with Andrew’s analysis, but any advanced metrics aside, what has he done in non-garbage time so far this season? Besides make a corner 3 here and there, almost nothing. Granted, apart from the standard rookie mistakes, he hasn’t done much to hurt the Hornets, but he does close to nothing to help them either. Thus far, he seems to be a below average shooter, a below-average passer, and a horrendous rebounder. I do think that defensively, however, he will come around and be an above-average on-ball defender after he learns the NBA game. Don’t get me wrong, I really want to see him succeed and prove me 100% wrong, but as of now, the big picture is not promising.
I disagree with the idea that you need a lot of homegrown players to win a ring
It stands to reason that the best player on most teams is homegrown. Teams don’t like to get rid of talent so when a player develops, they will keep hold of him. The fact that most of the contenders have a homegrown star or two is meaningless. The best player on most bad teams is homegrown as well (T-Wolves, Warriors, Kings, Clips. Wizards, to name a few).
However, the teams that have won championships recently have been able to do so by acquiring significant outside help. The Lakers got Gasol, Artest, and Odom from elsewhere and the Celtics signed Allen and Garnett (and picked up most of their bench too). The exception is the Spurs, who are indeed the model for every other organization. I’m not saying that developing homegrown talent is not beneficial, but it has not been the reason teams win championships.
thing with the lakers is
They have more financial means than most to buy the players they want. Boston traded way a lot of their homegrown talent acquire the players they have now. Also one of the main reasons for bostons success is that they have KG a defensive force and a defensive minded coach that the players have bought into. Most teams though that don’t have the financial means of boston or LA have a better chance winning with homegrown talent than overpaying for freeagents. But I think his point is that for the middle and smaller market teams they need to draft talent around their stars to win. If they don’t, it is not that easy to make trades that will boast them back up. If we chose better players we would not have to go out and fight for free agents.
+1
Perfect reply. For the large market teams with deep pockets, they may have the ability to buy their way out of trouble through free agency or other means. For the mid to small market teams, however, succeeding in the draft is imperative to future success.
by GeauxHornets on Mar 14, 2011 12:49 PM CDT up reply actions
That's true...
But that’s not at all how the author phrased it. He even provided the perfect counterexample to your argument: Detroit, which I would not consider a particularly big market, didn’t develop its own players and yet won a ring.
Does anyone remember DWest rookie year
I do..he was horrible…he literally could not avoid tripping over his own two feet, and he had no discernible offensive game. Remarkable improvement after that.
Too early too leap to conclusions on QPon, although I agree he has yet to show a lot…I think he is still trying to figure out his role with the team.
By the way, Mark Spears of ESPN predicted today that “he would not be surprised” if the Hornets were owned by Larry Ellison and in San Jose within 5 years. Spears is terrible, and it makes me laugh when legitimate media lords it over the blogosphere. He has no basis on which to make the claim, nor did he cite any. He might as well have been predicting the weather in Metairie Louisiana on June 1 2016.
Disagree about West
He played 13 minutes per game in his rookie season and averaged by far his best rebounding numbers of his career at 4.1 per game (when you take into account his low minutes played, thats extraordinarily high, especially for him). Sure, he didn’t score much (3.8 ppg), but he shot 47.5% from the field and his PER was right around 16. His only bad season was his second season, but he only played 30 games thanks to injuries so I don’t even take those numbers seriously.
by GeauxHornets on Mar 14, 2011 11:00 PM CDT up reply actions
UW fan here...
I watched Q-Pon in college so I don’t pretend to have watched him this year. I actually haven’t seen him play since the Sweet 16 game with the Huskies.
I just wanted to make the point that it took him quite awhile to adjust to the college game out of high school and he made a huge jump in effectiveness his Senior year. We always thought he was talented but to be honest I never thought he would put it all together and he did for his Senior year. Flashes of brilliance have always been around though. You guys would be able to answer if those are around from time to time and if they are then I wouldn’t worry too much about it.
He might just be one of those guys that takes awhile to adjust to the next level. I think the thing his game needs the most is confidence so as long as you are seeing flashes of brilliance I think you can hold out hope for his future. I hope he does well because he is a great guy.
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