NBA Fantasy Trends: Stats: Hornets Buzz

The Hornets had a pretty good 24 hours. After going 1-8 to start 2016, Kemba Walker scored a franchise- and career-high 52 points in the win over the Jazz on Monday. Secondly, the other good news came on Tuesday morning with the team announcing Michael Kidd-Gilchrist has been cleared for full contact from his shoulder injury in the preseason. The big question is: When MKG comes back, what happens then?

The Hornets have been starting P.J. Hairston at small forward this season, but that only accounts for about half the game. The other big piece in the small forward puzzle is starting shooting guard Nicolas Batum, who is logging around 15-17 minutes at small forward to help fill the void. That also opens up the 30 minutes or so at shooting guard, which is where Jeremy Lamb and Jeremy Lin come in. Marvin Williams also logged nine minutes at small forward on Monday. Lin has been logging all of his minutes at shooting guard right now while Lamb has been hurt, so Lin will be moving back to point guard more and bump Brian Roberts out of the rotation.

So all that said, MKG’s 25-27 minutes are going to come from basically every wing and even Frank Kaminsky because Marvin will be logging almost all of his minutes at the four now. Plus, the Hornets did use MKG at the four, but that may be less likely to happen. The Hornets offense is built on the stretch four, so Kaminsky and Williams should be soaking up all of the PF minutes — unless maybe the Hornets are up big and want to use MKG on defense. The Hornets are almost never using Kaminsky at the five, so MKG’s return may not hurt Cody Zeller. Of course, they could opt to use Kaminksy for spacing in that regard, too. Although, his low-post D has been a major issue.

On the actual scoring output side of things, there shouldn’t be a big change. MKG only had an 18.3 usage rate last year, so there should still be plenty of scoring chances for Kemba and Batum.

OK, so bottom line stuff for season-long fantasy: Kemba and Batum are fine; Lamb, Lin, Marvin, Hairston and Kaminsky should play less; and Cody Zeller should be playing a similar amount upon MKG’s return. As for MKG, he doesn’t have a very fantasy friendly game with sub-par percentages with really just points and boards. Unless you have an IR spot or you’re in a really deep league, he isn’t a great add.

So we gotta touch on Kemba’s 52-point, 47-minute gem on Monday. He had a 45.5 usage rate in the entire game, including a 54.0 usage rate in the two overtime frames. Chances are not many people used him in DFS because Walker was in a pretty bad slump in 2016 before Monday. Here’s his shot chart in the nine previous games before the explosion:

Not good. He was just 6-of-28 on two-point shots beyond three feet and he was 20 percent below league average at the rim, too. Walker has actually been a lot better on two-point shots these days. His shots attempted at the rim are up 2.6 percent up from last year and he’s made a career-high 55.4 percent of them on the year. Of course, the big reason for his success been his 37.6 percent from deep. All that spacing in the offense has really helped him and he’s on track for a career year. Here’s what his shot chart looked like from yesterday:

It’s really not that impressive, which is a testament to what a usage rate and minutes over 45 can do for scoring. He has second-round value on the year in season-long and should remain in the top 30 going forward. His season is for real and he should be viewed as a high-end DFS guy when the matchup is right. And again, MKG’s return shouldn’t hurt him.

So how about someone not playing well? Twitter loves it when the mainstream teams flop and it’s magnified 10x when it’s LeBron James. The King had a career-low minus-34 and his 34-point loss was the worst of his career. As far as net ratings go, LeBron had a minus-47.7, which was the fifth-lowest of the team. Here are all the ratings and minutes for the Cavs from yesterday:

Mozzy! Ewwwwww. It’s pretty obvious he has no business being in the first unit and that “good” trade with Denver last year doesn’t look so hot.

Perhaps nobody has been more disappointing lately on the Cavs than Kevin Love. It’s probably fair to assume Love has been affected by Kyrie Irving’s return.

Here’s what Love’s shot chart looks like in his last 10 games:

Oof. What happened to him being a low-post guy? He’s 21 percent below league average at the rim, 12 percent below league average in non-restricted area paint shots and 9.4 percent below league average in midrange in that span. LeBron talked about running more offense through Love, but his assists are also down a tad in that span.

So what did his shot chart look like before this cold stretch?

Not nearly as bad. He put up a 56.4 true shooting percentage with a 24.2 usage rate in the first 29 games of the year. Not surprisingly, his usage rate has dropped to 20.0 in his last 10. Coincidentally, Love was assisted on 75.7 of his shots in the cold stretch and that same number in the first 29 games of the year. So it’s not like he’s getting getting the ball in different situations — his shot distribution is somewhat similar in those two shot charts above, too.

He just isn’t making jumpers right now, which is obviously a major problem for a stretch four. Here’s a look at his closest-defender stats from the first 29 games (top) and the last 10 (bottom):

The big problem is him missing open shots, so that’s an encouraging sign going forward. Of course, not even the biggest Love doubter thinks he’ll make 33.3 percent from the field going forward. So is really just Kyrie?

Last season, Love put up a respectable 43.8 field goal percentage and a 21.1 usage rate in 1,442 minutes with LeBron and Kyrie last year. This year? It’s a 37.3 field goal percentage and a 20.4 usage rate. Yes, his field goal percentage during this horrific slump is actually much worse than all of his minutes with Irving on the year. That’s another slightly encouraging sign.

Love isn’t going to be this bad and the Cavs will try to make it work. I wouldn’t say I’m a Love fan in fantasy, but he is kind of a buy-low player because the national media is killing him and lowering his perceived fantasy value.

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