Friday Bolts – 1.15.16

Luke Knox of ESPN.com on Big 3s: “You can see what an outlier Kanter is, producing at a high

level seen more commonly by players averaging 30-plus minutes per game. But coach Billy Donovan has used Kanter in a strategic way to maximize his rebounding and interior offensive game without letting any defensive shortcomings hurt the team. Of course, Stephen Curry is another outlier with a PER number north of 30, and the Warriors star continues to put together an MVP-worthy season. But the second member of the Warriors’ triumverate, Draymond Green, is actually less productive than Kanter. While there has been considerable buzz around Golden State this season, it’s clear that the historic output of Westbrook and Durant along with Kanter makes for something special.”

Anthony Slater on lineups: “But in reality, a change to the starting lineup doesn’t seem likely. And that’s tough to argue. OKC’s current five is in a great place. The pieces fit. The comfort has been established. The results have been fantastic. Stability, in this game, has proved important. So if rotational tweaks are to be made, they’d need to come within the game. This season, Donovan has used 216 different lineup combinations. Many of those have played an inconsequential amount of time together. Only 12 have been on the floor for 30 or more minutes.”

Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com on Durant’s all-time NBA Rank: “I know Durant has a bunch of scoring titles and an MVP on his ledger, but he might be ranked a little too high. I have no doubt he has the potential to be there. I don’t feel strongly about this, but in terms of career accomplishment this might be projecting a tad at this point.”

Westbrook and Durant still on track to start the All-Star Game together.

Russell Peddle of NumberFire: “Kanter’s Defensive Real Plus-Minus of -1.96 ranks him 73rd out of 75 centers that have played in the NBA this season, beating out only Andrea Bargnani (-2.01) and Jahlil Okafor (-2.03). The Thunder have a stellar Defensive Rating of 97.0 this season when Kanter is off the floor, compared to a whopping 105.8 when he’s on it. He allows opponents to shoot 52.5% against him at the rim on 5.1 attempts per game, which is one of the worst marks in the league. Since both PER and WS/48 factor in defense (PER a little less so), how in the world does Kanter rank so high in both when he’s essentially one of the worst defensive bigs in the Association? The answer is that he’s so ridiculously efficient on the offensive side of the ball that it barely matters.”