NBA teams hate nothing more than making decisions with limited information, but when it comes to critical calls on young, potential-laden talents, they have to do it all the time.
That's because the current rookie contract structure proscribed by the collective bargaining agreement forces organizations to make commitments to (or cut loose) players who've only just barely shown how good they might someday become. First-round selections are eligible for massive extensions after just three seasons in the league.
If teams think they've got a star, it behooves them to lock that asset down immediately. The problem is that most rookie seasons are a feeling-out process, which doesn't provide much insight. In fact, the vast majority of rookies are not valuable contributors; last year, Nikola Mirotic and Jordan Clarkson were the only rookies to post player efficiency ratings above the league average.
Maybe a second season offers more clarity, and perhaps a third helps even more. But in many cases, three-year veterans are just 21 or 22 years old. With unfinished products like that, teams have no choice but to decide based on potential instead of demonstrated production.
The Toughest Upcoming Decisions
Take Toronto Raptors center Jonas Valanciunas as an example.
Three seasons in, he's 23 years old and has shown signs of substantial improvement. His per-minute scoring and rebounding averages have all trended up, and his field-goal percentage peaked at 57.2 percent last season. A monster on the block and a terrific free-throw shooter for a big man, Valanciunas looks like a potential max-salary player.
There are those qualifiers, though: Looks like. Potential.
Valanciunas is not yet fully formed, and there are serious questions about key areas of his game, as Grantland's Zach Lowe observes: "He’s a potent enough post scorer to draw double-teams but laughably bad at passing out of them. Building him into a plus defender, both at the rim and in open space, will be arduous."
Max money for a big man who can't defend the rim yet? One the Raptors generally don't even use as a focal point and bench routinely in fourth quarters, making it even harder to judge him? That's a big bet, but one the Raptors must consider making, because the risk of letting a still-developing Valanciunas get away is too great...if he develops.
Harrison Barnes started all 82 games for the NBA champion Golden State Warriors as a 22-year-old, and he, like Valanciunas, is eligible for an extension until Oct. 31. Many wrote Barnes off after he cratered in his second season, but Barnes was put in better positions to succeed (read: he wasn't asked to score in isolation anymore) last year. A big, athletic wing who defended power forwards and centers in the playoffs, Barnes also hit 40.5 percent of his three-point shots in 2014-15.
Do you know how many 22-year-olds in NBA history have started 82 games and hit at least 40 percent of their threes before Barnes?
Just one: Klay Thompson, whom the Warriors signed to a hefty extension just last summer after nearly trading him. That move paid off. Thompson is now an All-Star making less than the max as the salary cap steadily rises—a tremendous value for the Warriors.
There are plenty of encouraging signs, but if the Warriors are going to spend huge money on Barnes, they'll need to know more.
Will he ever be able to create his own shot? Can he become a better wing defender? Is there hope for improvement in his ability to draw fouls?
As a fourth or fifth option on a rookie deal, Barnes is a huge value. But if the Warriors are going to pay him like a star, they'll need to believe he can be much better than he's been.
Impersonal Numbers, Personal Hardships
With limited on-court information, where can teams turn for help?
Big data can be of service, cold and ignorant of the specific details as it is.
For example, in Stumbling on Wins, Dave Berri and Martin Schmidt established an aging curve for the average NBA player. The gist, via WagesofWins.com, is that players don't typically peak until they turn 25.
So even if we cut out context entirely, many teams still have to make commitments (or not) to players who won't fully realize their potential for years. And when you add in all the variables like the player's minutes, role and fit in the locker room—all of which will most likely change in some way between age 23 and 25—the unknown outweighs the known to an increasingly frightening degree.
And what about injuries?
Those can be red flags and opportunities all rolled into one. The Warriors committed to Stephen Curry at a time when ankle problems legitimately threatened his career, giving him a four-year, $44 million contract that is now one of the NBA's most team-friendly deals.
That gamble worked out, which makes it easy to forget just how great a leap of faith it was at the time. Curry hadn't flashed anything approaching MVP form after playing just 26 games in 2011-12. He shot the ball just fine, but was a poor defender and nowhere near the ball-handler or leader he eventually became.
It won't be long before the Philadelphia 76ers and Utah Jazz find themselves in a position much like the one the Warriors faced three years ago. With Joel Embiid and Dante Exum likely to miss the entire 2015-16 season because of injury, their teams will have precious little information to weigh.
Assuming both are healthy enough to play in 2016-17, the Sixers and Jazz will have just one season to judge when extension time comes around. Exum's rookie year wasn't instructive because he was just 19, and Embiid has yet to take the floor in a game.
Are the Sixers perhaps more willing to gamble because Nerlens Noel got past an ACL injury (and a lost season) to play exceptionally well in his first healthy year? Does that make them more willing to gamble on Embiid, who easily could have been the top overall pick in his class if not for the injury concerns that plagued him even then?
Imagine the payoff of inking Embiid to a below-market deal, and then watching him grow into a franchise centerpiece. Then imagine the heartbreak of committing to him for what turns out to be a career destroyed by injury.
Finally, imagine the headache of facing that decision with, at most, one season of play to judge.
The Risks and Rewards
With rookie extension candidates, waiting to make the call isn't fatal. Restricted free agency comes the summer afterward, and teams can match any offer their player receives on the market. The problem, of course, is that bargains aren't nearly as easy to come by in that scenario.
If a player has a strong fourth campaign (or a strong third if he's a second-rounder like, say, Draymond Green), the rest of the league will notice. That elevates the starting point of negotiations and opens up the incumbent team to match a max offer from the outside.
That setup actually incentivizes gambling on rookie extensions, but the payoff only comes if teams guess right about their players' potential.
It's ironic that in an increasingly data-driven league, so many of a team's most important decisions come down to some combination of gut instinct and first-person observation.
And sometimes, it's just blind faith, as Warriors general manager Bob Myers explained at Curry's MVP ceremony:
I remember about four years ago sitting in a doctor’s office with Steph and I think our trainer and doctor, and he had hurt his ankle, and he rolled it without stepping on anybody’s foot and everybody was discouraged and frustrated. We didn’t have any answers.
I remember sitting there looking at Steph and thinking, and I didn’t know him that well at the time, that this is not how it’s supposed to be for this guy. This isn’t right and this isn’t fair. It doesn’t take long after meeting him to know that he’s a special person. I remember thinking that day, this can’t be how his career goes. This isn’t how it’s supposed to be.
Myers trusted what he had seen of Curry, and he believed that potential would become production. But there was no way for him to be sure—not even close, really. He made a critical decision on feel, as much as raw information.
Every team in the league faces choices like that one, and handling them right—even if it takes a scary combination of careful study and guesswork—will mean the difference between success and failure.
All stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com unless otherwise specified.
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Source: Grant Hughes http://ift.tt/1h3Nm02
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