Two hours and a little earlier, Dylan Windler had not imagined that he was about to reluctantly enter history.
1:06 To end the close game between Cleveland and Indiana, Windler tried to pass a ball to Colin Sexton, the Cavaliers’ back line partner. Sexton tried to shake off the annoying wasp known as TJ McConnell. The 185-inch Njes, who was not selected in the draft, carved his way into the league with a lot of heart and perseverance, and eventually became an important part of the Pacers ’rotation. In this delivery, too, as in many before it, McConnell had something to say. He got the ball out of Sexton even before the Cleveland star took control of it. This was Timothy John McConnell’s 10th steal – the first player in the current millennium to record a triple-double of points, assists and steals.
Until a few years ago, Triple Double would have made headlines. These days it’s almost routine – one that only exceptional cases like McConnell’s break. Because today, the NBA is less about quality, but about quantity. Only in the middle of last week was a new record set, when 5 players recorded a triple double that night. While we were admiring, only a few days passed and the record was broken, with 6 players: two guards who only a year ago collaborated together (James Harden, Russell Westbrook), another coordinator who sometimes acts as a power forward (Ben Simmons), two players starring in both face positions (Drymond Green, Domantas Savonis), and the best point center in the league (Nikola Jokic).
In all, by the night between Thursday and Friday, 90 Triple Doubles were recorded in the NBA season that barely crossed the 40-game mark for the team. How unusual is this? Let’s just say the peak for an entire season, one of 82 games, stands at 127 Triple Doubles, and could turn into a cloud of dust within a few weeks. And go know what the next season will look like, assuming the players are already vaccinated, the schedule will work out and it will be possible to play 82 times a season. So how did the statistical achievement that was once a sign of honor, become an event you might miss if you just blink at the wrong time?
Blame Westbrook
In a small country in the Middle East he has already been teased with every possible curse, his team is faltering at the bottom of the East and in a last attack of a close game, against one of the worst defensive teams in the league, he just handed out the last ball this week. But who said Russell Westbrook has left no mark on the Washington Wizards: he is already second in the club’s all-time triple-doubles – an achievement that took him less than two months to reach. Soon he will also overtake Darnell Walker, with 15 of those, and move up to first place. Will it help the Wizards reach the playoffs? For play-in? Blessed is the believer. Until then, Westbrook can be blamed for something else – for being a “party” to Triple Doubles, making the statistical achievement trendy. Maybe, some would say, too trendy.
In recent years we have become accustomed to this spectacle, especially in the merry days of Oklahoma City, where Westbrook recorded three consecutive seasons with a triple-double average, an unprecedented achievement. The Thunder players focus on boxing out, letting Russ jump to the rebound. When he gives a potential assist player and the same player misses or dares to deliver himself, it is better for a player who has failed not to cross his eyes with the angry Westbrook.
On the other hand, it seems that in those years when Sam Presti and coach Billy Donovan placed their fate in Russ’s hands, those numbers came with a bonus on the side: in the vast majority of cases where Westbrook recorded a triple-double, the evening ended in victory. Statistical analysis of the Nylon Calculus site at the time showed that an attack that Westbrook starts with a rebound defense is the Thunder’s best chance to make a basket. And in this case, good shows from a statistical point of view: when the explosive guard takes the ball and flies down the field at 70 mph, the defenses in front have a hard time responding and placing a proper guard in front of the energy bomb.
Westbrook rode the statistical achievement all the way to the MVP title which was rare, as the Thunder finished only sixth in the West that season. The mediocre roster players around him contributed their share in these triple doubles, and were rewarded with their friend winning the prestigious individual title, and sweeping them to the playoffs. Everyone was happy. And the rise in the Triple Doubles all over the league around them has started to bring inflation in the field. The 127 cases recorded in the 2018/19 season were a new record and came from 37 different players. This season, 25 players have already recorded the achievement, including the Rockies and those who were former bench players in the recent past. But Russ is not the “culprit,” if at all one can speak in such terms. He is just the pinnacle of this phenomenon.
Lower, slimmer, more athletic
Earlier this week, RunRepeat basketball analyst Dmitry Churchic published the results of a fascinating study he conducted on nearly 4,400 players who have played in this league (Click here for the full study). According to the findings, the average height of the league players, 1.98 meters, is the lowest since the beginning of the 80s, as is the percentage of league players who are shorter than 2.06 meters, a percentage that now stands at 72%; However, the average height for the coordinator, 1.90 meters, is the highest in the history of the league. At the same time, the BMI, computer body mass index, indicates that only 38% of league players are considered overweight (in the case of NBA players it is mostly muscle, and still is), the lowest percentage in 15 years.
When the players are much more athletic, fast and talented, and the coordinators approach the other positions in height so that many of them can catch a return ball and run with it from coast to coast – the game itself is faster. To this is added the amount of threes that is increasing so much that throughout the league are already starting to think of ways to limit them. In the 2017/18 season alone we crossed the 10-point 3-point average per team, and this season we are already at almost 13 of those, with almost 35 shots. In the 2012/13 season alone threes accounted for less than a quarter of the amount of field shots taken, and this season we are fast approaching 40%. Even with opening power forwards, 40% of field shots are taken across the arc.
The accelerated pace of play leads to more shots from the field – 88.3 per evening today, the most since the late 80s, which means there are also more rebounds to share. Then, who picks them up? When the ball is thrown from three but does not go in, according to the Nylon Calculus website, there is only a 17% chance of falling within a meter of the ring – the area where most face players struggle for the rebound – and a 41% chance of falling three to six meters from the ring. That’s where the outside players are. And when the ball does come in? Peter Lim of Northwestern University found that 82% of the three shots come from an assist, not as a result of an individual operation, so the number of group assists is also approaching 25 per night, a figure that was last seen in the 80s.
Another study, by Ahmed Chima, published on The Spax last season, suggests that players are more “aware” that they are close to a triple double and thus less likely to miss it. That means they will stay on the floor for another attack or two to take the rebound or deliver the missing assist, and only when they get it will they go down to rest and start thinking about the next game. The so-called, if we are already around, will not jump for a rebound?
More accurate, less lost
All of these figures may just divert attention from a wonderful thing that has been happening in recent years. This league is exploding with talent, with two emphases: internationalism, and versatility. In the last All-Star, the selection of only 12 players in each region was already almost impossible, and it was possible to form a team that would run for the championship only from players who were not selected to participate in the All-Star Game. And if they had decided to make a game between the US and the rest of the world, it is not at all certain that a team of Yannis Antokompo, Luka Doncic, Simmons, Jamal Marie, Shay Gilges Alexander, Joel Ambide, Yukic, Rudy Guber, Savonis, Bam Adbaio, Pascal Siakam and Nikola Wojciech – would have lost to the Americans, while the internationals make up only about 25% of the league’s players, but are responsible for 47% of the first 90 triple doubles recorded this season.
The players’ talent is also reflected in their ability to lose fewer balls – the frequency of losses has dropped in recent years to a historic low of only about 12.5% of attacks – and also in shooting ability. The total field percentage this season, which stood at 46.5% as of Thursday night, is the highest in the league in 25 years; In threes, the league stands at 36.706%, and threatens to break the all-time record, which stands at 36.687% from the 1995/96 season, when the arc of the three was closer to the basket. And in the penalties? We currently stand at 77.8%, a figure that if maintained, will become an all-time high.
These players come with a diverse skill set – both fundamentally and physically – and are absorbed into advanced, worldwide and science-based development departments that know how to identify them at a young age, sometimes pass them through international camps or the Development League, and reach their full potential. Churchich noted that 53% of the league’s players above 7 feet – 2.13 meters – are international today. They function in a variety of positions, roles and styles, and after Dirk Nowitzki and Pau Gasol broke the dam a decade and a bit ago and brought championships, even the best teams in the world are no longer afraid to give the wheel to players who come from overseas.
Assuming Anthony Davis prefers to play as a power forward, it can be said with confidence that the three best chins in the world today – the candidates for MVP Jukic and Ambide, and growing around whom the defense of the best team in the league was built – are international. Yannis, the MVP for the past two years and a player who can dribble twice from half to the dunk, began to flourish when he was placed to play as a coordinator. And fulfilled they; Alexei Fukushevsky, Oklahoma City’s slender Serbian rookie, became this week at 19 and a bit the youngest player to finish a game with at least 20 points, 10 rebounds and 5 threes.
So where will this inflation go? In a league where almost every team finds itself playing long minutes with 5 players around the arc of the three, the pace only increases and players at heights that do not fit the chin in the Israeli national league, such as PJ Tucker, Drymond Green or Bruce Brown, play under the basket; In a league where threes become a doomsday weapon a must-have in Arsenal; In a league that looks faster, more talented, more athletic every year – it seems the only thing left to do is keep counting, and let the records break, again, and again, and again.
