9 Historically Impressive Starts to the 2014-15 NBA Season
It's never too early to start making history.
Only time will tell if these nine impressive beginnings to the 2014-15 season will actually end up in the NBA record books, but they're all noteworthy while we work with such small sample sizes. The players and teams involved are putting together achievements that either have never been seen before or haven't occurred for decades.
Again, there's no guarantee these hot and noteworthy starts last throughout the year. Some players and teams could fizzle as the scouting reports get out, while others will wear down and be forced to play lesser roles or fewer minutes. Others still will just regress to the mean.
But let's have some fun while it lasts and hope that these nine keep rolling on for quite some time.
Note: All stats, unless otherwise indicated, come from Basketball-Reference.com and are current through Tuesday, Nov. 18.
Rajon Rondo with the Assist-Rebound Combo
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Point guards aren't supposed to be this good at both passing and rebounding. It's a blend of skills that really shouldn't exist, and it allows strange anomalies like Rajon Rondo to emerge as remarkably effective players who can't help but draw historical comparisons.
As ESPN Stats & Info tweeted on Nov. 3 after the Boston Celtics point guard had suited up in three games, "Rajon Rondo is the 1st player since Magic Johnson in 1983 w/ at least 35 assists & 25 rebounds in his team's 1st 3 games of a season."
That pace hasn't exactly slowed.
Through eight appearances, Rondo is averaging 11.6 assists (the top mark in the NBA) and 8.4 boards per game. That gives him a total of 93 dimes and 67 rebounds, a combination that hasn't been matched or exceeded through eight games since Basketball-Reference.com's Play Finder's initial search limit of 1985-86. Literally no one else has produced that pair of accomplishments.
Unfortunately, game logs are incomplete in 1983, so we can't see whether Magic Johnson matched him. But based on the known data, we can guess that he averaged around 13.3 assists and 10.3 rebounds per game through eight contests, so it seems like a pretty safe bet that he did.
Nonetheless, kudos to Rondo for bringing his unique brand of basketball to the modern era.
Lance Stephenson Crashing the Boards
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Rajon Rondo isn't the only backcourt member dominating on the glass.
Lance Stephenson is actually proving his superior, averaging 9.2 rebounds per game during the opening portion of his first season with the Charlotte Hornets. It's one of the very best per-game averages by a backcourt member in any era, especially when pace of play and rebounding opportunities are factored into the equation.
Thanks to some dominant work on the defensive glass, Stephenson has a total rebounding percentage of 15.6 percent, indicating that he alone has grabbed that percentage of the available missed shots while he's on the floor. To put that in perspective, it only takes a 17.4 total rebounding percentage to break into the league's top 20 right now.
Throughout all of NBA history, Stephenson is the first player qualified as a guard to produce a total rebounding percentage on the right side of 15. No one has maintained that rate over the course of a full season, although Rondo is coming close this year as well.
In fact, just five completed seasons have seen a guard pull in at least 13 percent of the available rebounds:
- Magic Johnson in 1981-82: 13.7 percent
- Magic Johnson in 1982-83: 13.0 percent
- Darrell Walker in 1989-90: 13.4 percent
- Fat Lever in 1989-90: 13.6 percent
- Jason Kidd in 2006-07: 13.2 percent
Stephenson may be struggling to connect from the field, and he's seemed to be a rather poor fit for Steve Clifford's offense in Charlotte thus far. But at least he's doing something better than any other guard in NBA history.
Anthony Davis' Stocks Are Soaring
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Not only is Anthony Davis' stock soaring as he elevates up the ranks of the NBA faster than a rocket ship piloted by Matthew McConaughey in an attempt to save humanity, but his stocks are soaring as well.
In this case, stocks, a term Grantland's Bill Simmons coined long ago, refer to the combined blocks and steals a basketball player produces.
For Davis, it's a large number.
Through Nov. 17, the unibrowed big man was leading the league in both steals and blocks, averaging 2.3 and 4.0, respectively. That's insane in and of itself, even if his game against the Sacramento Kings pushed him slightly out of the lead in thefts and dropped his rejection average to a meager 3.9. But leading the league is often just a reflection on the talents at that point in time and doesn't properly encapsulate the historic awesomeness of the feat. After all, Davis is defying comparison at the tender young age of 21.
The last time a player averaged two steals and four blocks per contest over the course of a season came back in 1992, when David Robinson achieved the feat for the San Antonio Spurs. He was 26 years old at the time. Before that, Hakeem Olajuwon did so with the Houston Rockets during his age-27 season in 1989-90.
No one else has managed to couple those two statistics together. In fact, the aforementioned players and Gerald Wallace are the only ones to average at least a pair of each defensive stat for a full campaign.
The lesson, as always, is to avoid trying to run offense on the side of the court that Davis is occupying. It's a bad idea.
More Anthony Davis
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You thought we were done with Anthony Davis? Think again.
We've only talked about his defensive stats, after all. Not the fact that he's in the top three for both scoring and rebounding during the early stage of the season, asserting his unique brand of dominance on virtually every facet of the game. He's producing effortlessly, and the result is a set of numbers that can only be called legendary. Or synonyms, of course.
Davis has produced a mind-numbing 36.1 player efficiency rating thus far, which rather easily leads the league. Brandan Wright is in second place at 28.2, while Stephen Curry (27.3), DeMarcus Cousins (27.2) and Dirk Nowitzki (26.1) round out the top five.
However, it's a bit of an unfair comparison for the rest of the league. After all, Davis' mark, as it currently stands, would topple Wilt Chamberlain's all-time record. The big man posted a 31.82 PER in 1962-63 with the San Francisco Warriors, and while it's withstood the test of time for over five decades, it's now very much in danger.
The same is true of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's 0.3399 win shares per 48 minutes, the all-time record he set in 1971-72 for the Milwaukee Bucks. Davis is earning 0.346 at the moment.
Quite simply, we're looking at one of the best, most valuable seasons in the lengthy history of the Association, assuming Davis can keep up the ridiculous pace he's set for himself.
Chris Paul's Godly Assist-to-Turnover Ratio
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I maintain that Chris Paul is more of a point god than a point guard.
Through his first nine appearances for the Los Angeles Clippers, Paul has recorded 88 assists while only coughing the ball up to the opposition 13 times. That makes for quite the sparkling ratio, as he's managed to produce 6.77 times more assists than turnovers.
Amazingly enough, that's actually the result of some slippage. The LAC floor general began the season in even more stellar fashion, recording 28 dimes and just one giveaway through his first three outings.
But even factoring in his regression, how many players have managed to average 9.8 assists per game and only cough it up 1.4 times during the typical outing? Gilbert Arenas actually joins Paul in the club thanks to his work with the Washington Wizards in 2008-09, though that doesn't exactly count since he only played in two games all season.
No one has managed to maintain those numbers for a full season. So let's make the requirements a bit less stringent.
Prior to this 2014-15 campaign, only eight qualified individual seasons in NBA history had seen a player average at least eight assists and fewer than two turnovers per game: John Stockon, Muggsy Bogues (five times) and Jose Calderon (twice).
Could Paul make it nine?
Golden State Warriors Winning in Spite of Turnovers
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The Golden State Warriors haven't been able to keep a hold on the ball for too long. Considering the rock often appears to be covered in grease, it's astounding that Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson have still managed to splash in so many triples.
Ten games into their season, the Dubs have turned the ball over 17.9 times per 100 possessions, which is an insanely high number for any team. Not only does that put Golden State right at the bottom of the pile in 2014-15, but it puts the squad on pace to have one of the 12 worst turnover percentages in NBA history. Earlier in the season, the Dubs were actually on pace to top the 1976-77 Denver Nuggets in this ignominious category, but they've managed to work on their control at least a little bit.
Now, you might ask, what's so impressive about such a feat?
The impressive part is that the Warriors are still winning games. They've gone 8-2 during the opening salvo of this 2014-15 campaign, overcoming the turnover woes to put together a top-10 offense during Steve Kerr's first season in charge. Of those 11 teams above them on the leaderboard, only four have produced winning records.
"Most of those turnovers are coming in the first two passes of a possession," Kerr told NBA.com's David Aldridge. "So it's the decision making. It's not that we're passing so much that we're overpassing. Most of our turnovers are just rebound, throw it out of bounds, or one dribble, and throw it off somebody's foot. So we're just trying to get better execution-wise, and it's going to come."
That said, it's easy to hope they keep this up. After all, it's not like the Dubs have had any trouble winning games.
Dallas Mavericks' Unstoppable Offense
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The Dallas Mavericks cannot be stopped.
Only the Golden State Warriors have a better effective field-goal percentage. The New Orleans Pelicans are the lone team turning the ball over less frequently. And while the Mavs have struggled to get to the foul line and are only average on the offensive glass, it's been enough to put together one of the best offenses in NBA history.
That's not an exaggeration, and it's the result of a scorching set of games, even while Chandler Parsons struggled to adjust to his new teammates. Dirk Nowitzki has been flat-out fantastic, draining everything he looks at, even if he hasn't done much damage in the paint. And it's not as though his teammates have drawn too much iron, either.
The result is a red-hot offensive rating that sees Dallas score 117.3 points per 100 possessions. It's a mark that, if maintained, would have the Mavericks take down the 1986-87 Los Angeles Lakers' all-time best offensive rating of 115.6, but context makes this squad even more impressive.
ORtng+, as broken down and explained here, factors in the league-average offensive rating to account for inherent changes in the year-by-year relationship of offense and defense. Those Lakers actually come in as the No. 15 offense of all time with an ORtng+ of 106.74. It's actually the 2003-04 Mavericks in the pole position with a 108.94 ORtng+, meaning they were 8.94 percent better than the league-average offense that year.
But so far, these current Mavericks have an ORtng+ of 110.97. They're 2.03 points better than the older iteration, which is larger than the gap between the 2004 squad and the tail end of the historical top 10.
Nowitzki, Monta Ellis and Co. aren't just putting together the league's best offense; they're on pace to blow the rest of NBA history out of the water.
Kyle Korver Is a Shooting God
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Kyle Korver is infallible from beyond the arc.
Long viewed as one of the best three-point marksmen in the Association, Korver has been en fuego throughout the opening nine games of the Atlanta Hawks' 2014-15 season. He's taken 5.7 downtown attempts per game, the most since his sophomore season with the Philadelphia 76ers, and he's knocked down a career-high 56.1 percent of them.
That's an insane, unfair combination.
Korver's gravity completely affects how defenses set up against the Hawks, as they can't possibly leave him wide open, and he still manages to work around one screen after another and find himself with enough room to let fly.
Throughout all of NBA history, there's a very limited group of qualified shooters who have made over half of their attempts from downtown. Heading into this year—2014-15 currently has both Korver and Tony Parker gaining entry, though the latter has taken far fewer attempts—only eight times had an individual joined the club:
- Tim Legler in 1995-96: 52.2 percent on 3.2 attempts per game
- Jason Kapono in 2006-07: 51.4 percent on 3.1 attempts per game
- Steve Kerr in 1995-96: 51.5 percent on 2.9 attempts per game
- Detlef Schrempf in 1994-95: 51.4 percent on 2.2 attempts per game
- Steve Kerr in 1994-95: 52.4 percent on 2.1 attempts per game
- Kyle Korver in 2009-10: 53.6 percent on 2.1 attempts per game
- Steve Kerr in 1989-90: 50.7 percent on 1.8 attempts per game
- Jon Sundvold in 1988-89: 52.2 percent on 1.4 attempts per game.
Korver is taking 2.5 more shots from beyond the arc than anyone who qualifies for the list, and the list is already misleadingly long. After all, four of the eight entires came when the league shortened the three-point arc in the mid-'90s.
But let's look at this another way.
The highest percentage by any player in NBA history who took at least five three-point attempts per game came last year, when Korver himself hit 47.2 percent of his tries. He's on pace to shatter that mark.
Kobe Bryant's Usage
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This is a familiar sight.
Kobe Bryant has jacked up plenty of shots during his age-36 season, leaving no doubt whatsoever that he's the one and only featured player on the Los Angeles Lakers. In fact, he's lofted 23.8 attempts per game en route to scoring a league-best 27.4 points per contest. Additionally, he's taken 8.6 free-throw attempts during the typical outing and coughed the ball up three times whenever he suits up.
It all adds up to an astronomical usage rate of 37.9 percent, which is rather easily the highest figure produced by any player on one of the Association's 30 teams. DeMarcus Cousins is in second with a 33.0 usage rate, and LeBron James' 30.8 brings in the rear end of the top five.
As you might have guessed, we need historical comparisons here.
The top figure in NBA history is 38.74, set by, you guessed it, Bryant back in 2005-06. Deadspin's Albert Burneko breaks down how crazy it is that the shooting guard was actually on pace to top his own record, though a more restrained effort against the Atlanta Hawks has since pushed him behind the pace:
"At 36, Kobe is chucking more than Michael Jordan ever did. More than Allen Iverson ever did. More, even, than 27-year-old, peak-of-his-athletic-gifts Kobe Bryant did, back in that bananas 2005-06 season we all remember as the year he didn't even pretend to care about anything other than scoring as many points as he could. If the NBA season ended right now, his current 25.2-shots-per-36-minutes pace would be the highest in over 30 years; his true shooting percentage, meanwhile, is 40 points lower than that of any other player who has attempted more than 23 shots per 36 minutes in the three-point era.
"
Let's take it one step further.
The highest usage rate by a qualified player in his 30s, heading into this season, came back in 2001-02: Michael Jordan's 36 percent for the Washington Wizards.
Bryant is going to absolutely shatter that mark at his current rate.
