On Landry Fields
Another post from Anton
Landry Fields is one of my favorite players in the NBA. He doesn’t jump the highest. He doesn’t dunk the hardest. He doesn’t score the most. In fact, he doesn’t score much at all.
None of these things detract from the fact that Fields had a remarkable season. He averaged around 10 points per game, which doesn’t sound impressive, but did it while shooting 50% from the field, an extremely high number for a guard. He plays solid defense and is a willing passer, averaging 2 assists per game. Fields lead the entire league in rebounds per game as a guard, clocking in at 6.4 a game. 6.4 rebounds is an outstanding total for a shooting guard. Landry outrebounded 7-foot center Brook Lopez, Shaquille O’Neal and other starting centers, even though he is only around 6 foot 6. And Landry is doing all of this as a rookie.
Landry was drafted 39th overall in the 2010 NBA draft. Which means every single team passed over him in the draft, some doing it multiple times. And yet Landry has had a better season than almost any other rookie. ESPN’s John Hollinger has the PER stat, which is an advanced statistical formula created to measure a player’s productivity. PER has Fields as the 10th best rookie in the league this year. The wins produced measure, created by 3 professors of economics at the Wages of Wins blog has Fields producing 13.5 wins this year. How good is that? Well it would be the 13th best season by a record since 1977. Only the magical Blake Griffin had a better rookie season this year than Fields under this stat.
Why is Fields so good according to Wages of Wins? Well, wins are not just determined by points. Although people believe the players who score more are better players (leading to the ‘Derrick Rose for MVP’ consensus), it’s the players who score efficiently who are worth more. Shooting a higher percentage and getting the to free throw line are critical. It’s a large part of what makes a player like Lebron James so much better than Carmelo Anthony. Even though they both average 25-27 points per game, Lebron scored his points at a 51% clip, while Melo shot just 45.5%. Lebron produced 23 wins this year, while Melo produced closer to 10. So how does this apply to Fields?
Well, as previously mentioned, Fields is a very efficient scorer, especially for a guard. Wages of wins also highly values rebounds; simply put, more rebounds mean more shots for your team and less shots for the other team. Finally, Fields performs fantastically in another category, turnovers. He averaged 1.3 per game. If you take care of the ball, your team gets more chances to shoot.
Anyway you look at it, Fields has had a great season and is certainly one of the better players on the Knicks. Certainly, it would be fair to say that he is unappreciated, most of all by his coach. Mike D’Antoni has reduced Fields’ playing time at the most critical juncture of the season, the playoffs, in lieu of more experienced players like Roger Mason and Bill Walker. These players shot a combined 1-15 in a game the Knicks lost by 3 while Fields played just 15 minutes.
