The other day I got roasted by a reader who suggested my take on the Celtics plus or minus numbers from Game 1 was less than earthshaking. Point taken. I'm new to these particular stats. Still, the Celtics won the game by 21, and the Celtics were +29 with Garnett and -8 without him.
As much as everyone has been praising our bench, this surprised me. It also surprised me that Garnett was the top plus or minus guy, because, as I pointed out last week, Pierce was our top plus-or-minus guy during the regular season (and was again in Game 2).
Not discouraged by the criticism, I delve into the same territory again, this time for the Lakers. Now here we have something truly interesting. Kobe's was plus 3 in game 1, a game that the Lakers won by 14. So that means without Kobe, the team was plus 11. In game 2, Kobe was a plus 13 in a fifteen-point win. Plus thirteen was fourth best on the team, even though Bryant went for 49 points.
In Game 1 the Lakers bench registered an over all minus, while in Game 2 they registered an over all plus, with even two bench players eclipsing Kobe in the plus category. In Game 1, the Celtics bench scored 36 points, and registered an overall plus, but drifted downward in minus territory for game 2.
I won't draw any conclusions from these numbers as I did last time, but as I study them, I do expect to start spotting trends as the playoffs move forward.
2 comments:
The Lakers will wilt when they face a team that plays defense.
I will definitely be curious to watch what happens.
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