NBA Advanced Matchups: Sunday, April 19th
Welcome to the NBA Advanced Matchups, presented by Ohnjz. I’ll be taking you deep into the depths of NBA advanced stats to uncover the top plays in each NBA slate (with four or more games). We’ll consider a broad spectrum of metrics here, including SPORTSVU player and shot tracking, play type data, individual defensive metrics, and my personal favorite, Ohnjz’ bad-jokes-and-snarky-comments-per-article. As always, this work is meant as a guide to help you hone in on what advanced stats would suggest are some of the top plays – but it’s ultimately up to you to decide how to build your lineups.
MINDFULNESS
Before we dig into the Advanced Matchups, we’ll take note of the team and game situations that can impact our decision-making each day.
BLOWOUT CONCERNS
| ROAD TEAM | HOME TEAM | FAVORITE |
| CELTICS | CAVALIERS | CAVALIERS -11.5 |
| NETS | HAWKS | HAWKS -10 |
UNDER THE MICROSCOPE
THE CLIPPERS FRONTLINE
C DEANDRE JORDAN
It’s hard to ignore DJ’s beastliness the last time these teams met:
• 26 points (8-11 FG, 12-26 FT), 18 rebounds
That pounding was good for nearly 60 FPTS. But the most intriguing part of DJ’s performance wasn’t the 18 rebounds – it actually wasn’t anything he did at all. It was the Spurs hack-a-Jordan strategy. The Spurs sent DJ to the line a whopping 26 times in their last meeting. And yes, DJ shot horribly (making just 12 of those 26 attempts)… but that’s still an extra 12 points that he had no business making.
Any points you get with Jordan are usually just gravy on a base of heavy rebounding and blocks; when teams use the Hack-a-Jordan strat, it shoots Jordan’s ceiling through the, um… ceiling. If the Clippers can get out to a lead in this game, we’ll likely see the Spurs go back to the most hated strategy in the NBA. Jordan needs to be considered in tournaments on that possibility alone.
CLEMENTINES
Bite-sized takes on additional players.
•CAVS PG KYRIE IRVING
While teammate LeBron James has both a high floor and elite upside in this series (due to the factors discussed above), I’m not sure the same can be argued for Kyrie Irving. The worry for Kyrie is that unlike traditional PG’s, he is heavily scoring-dependent…
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Take Your Game to the Next Level!
Each day when there are four or more games, Ohnjz will bring FanDuel & DraftKings Incentives members Advanced Matchup breakdowns for that day’s NBA games. These data-driven breakdowns will provide you insight & analysis you can’t find anywhere else. Enjoy!
