https://youtu.be/sr8Y836Q2Sk
OFFICIAL DTB STATISTICAL FINDING OF THE DAY: Jakob Poeltl, who has averaged 17 MPG per game over the course of his career, is sixth in his draft class in TOTAL win shares. Not win shares per 48, but raw absolute win shares. He’s tied with Jamal Murray on the list, and he’s ahead of players like Jaylen Brown and Brandon Ingram. This is perhaps the biggest indictment of the win shares stat that I have ever seen, and I am suddenly filled with a profound sense of abandonment, because win shares is the only advanced stat that I kind of understand, and I use it all the time when trying to figure out which players are good and which players are doodoo. Obviously Poeltl, who is a low-volume, high-efficiency scorer who provides zero floor spacing, is less valuable than Jaylen Brown. If he was more valuable he would play more minutes than he does. Duh.
I think we’re past the point where we can reasonably hope for Jakob Poeltl to develop any basketball-related skills other than catching stuff near the rim and putting it in. This is year five for him, and his jumpshot is still basically nonexistent. There’s plenty of big guys who have put together successful careers despite a lack of any outside scoring, so that, by itself, is not a huge problem. But I sort of feel like he was drafted ninth overall because there was some hope that he would eventually develop some semblance of offensive skill. Maybe I’m wrong and he was drafted by the Raptors to just catch bunnies near the bucket.
Now you’ll have to excuse me as I retreat to my chamber to weep tears of bitter sorrow in mourning of the death of win shares as a credible stat.