Speights offensive producti...

The first chart is the straightforward stats:


The obvious difference here is that Speights is the only one not playing heavy minutes. All of the others came into their age 22 season with at least 2 years of experience, whereas Speights was just coming off of his rookie year. As such, they had more NBA experience and were playing larger roles with their team. Both Zach Randolph and Al Jefferson saw their minutes nearly double that year, which was their 3rd year with the team.

Taking a look at per minute productivity (per 36 minutes):


This shows Speights relation to the others on purely per-minute productivity. Now, reader bewarned, this is not attempting to say that Speights will maintain his productivity when he makes the jump from 24 minutes to 36. This is only meant to show how productive he is on the time he is on the court.

Obviously, Amare is worlds ahead. That was the season Amare put it all together and exploded for 26 points per game for the 62 win Suns. The major thing to take into consideration is who Stoudemire was playing with. Not only did he have a great pick and roll point guard in Nash, but the floor spacing provided by Joe Johnson (over two made three's per game at 47.8%) and Nash really helped open up the lane for dives to the basket. When you contrast that with the talent Speights is playing with, his efficiency is quite amazing.

Other than that, Speights is producing at a per minute clip as well as any of those young bigs.



Once again, Speights rates as the second most productive of the group in terms of PER, has the second highest offensive rating, and the second highest efficiency in terms of true shooting percentage.

One would expect Speights per minute productivity and efficiency to drop as his playing time, touches, and usage increases, although this isn't always the case. Al Jefferson's PER actually rose in each of his first 5 seasons, and Zach Randolph's didn't take a drastic dip as he became the focal point of the Blazers. That being said, it's hard to expect an increase from Speights current 24 minute per game productivity to starters minutes without taking at least some hit in both per minute and efficiency. Still, he's outpacing the rest of the group to the point where he could take a sizable hit and still be on par with them.

Next, taking a look at the progression of Randolph and Jefferson, the two most comparable in that they came into the league receiving spot minutes and grew into star players. This includes two years, the year before their breakout year and their breakout year, and shows their PER and TS% for those two years.



Both of these players received greater increases in playing time than Speights will when/if he receives starters minutes, yet both more or less maintained their per-minute productivity (with Jefferson drastically increasing), and while Randolph took a slight dip in efficiency, Jefferson actually increased his efficiency with usage. If Speights does see his playing time increase to where he's playing 35+ minutes per game it's probably not expected (and certainly not required) to keep a TS% in the 60's. Mid-50's will be more than in line for a player of his usage and skillset.

The rebounding stats from the previous image (the advanced stats) are interesting. Speights is far and away the best offensive rebounder of the group, and even the number he put up during his rookie year (11.6%) would place him right near the top of the group. He's also the second worst on the defensive boards, and this is after a sizable improvement from his dreadful rookie season in that respect (16.3%).

This entire post needs to be taken with a grain of salt and not taken out of context. I'm not saying Speights is a better offensive player than anyone in this group, nor am I saying that I expect him to take the jump in his 3rd season that Randolph and Jefferson both took. It also needs to be stated that at this point Speights is 13 games into his season and his stats can be highly influenced by a cold stretch he is almost bound to have. That being said we are looking at a very skilled and productive offensive player at this point.

And you know what? We need more from him than that. For all the skills these players provide, they all are exceedingly difficult to build a team around. Champions are built around great 2-way big men, something none of these players have shown the capability to provide. I have much more faith in Speights developing into a 20 point per game scorer (which at this point I would almost be surprised if he didn't do) than I do in him turning into an average (or above average) contributor at the defensive side of the court. That's the area I'm going to be watching with the most interest for the remainder of the season.

There's a time in all young, defensively challenged big men's careers that their deficiencies are overlooked for the gaudy stats they can put up. If Speights is forever going to be a defensive sieve, is there any chance the Sixers should look to sell while his value is high? Or can he turn around his defensive shortcomings ? Should Speights be starting at this point? If so, who with? Should he be the focal point of the team in half court sets? Interested in hearing your opinions. I'll provide my opinion on those in an upcoming column.