Been reading for a couple years. I think about every post in that span… first time posting (hence the terrible formatting, so if someone knows how to fix that, pm me). Needed something other than the latest scandal to look at.
First off, if the season ended today, I don’t think Murph would be a first round draft pick, and I don’t think it would be wise for him to go pro. He should put his name in the hat, do the workouts, but come back to school for another year. I was curious about how Murph’s stats comparted with Draymond’s from college.
I started by comparing their college career stats (through Illinois). Bolded the ones I thought were most noteworthy.
Stat Draymond Murphy
G___145______81
GS__66_______70
MP_25______27.8
FG__3.7______4.8
FGA_8________9.6
FG%_0.467___0.497
2P__3.1______4.6
2A__6.3______8.5
2%_0.496__0.538
3P__0.6______0.2
3A__1.7______1.1
3%_0.361__0.182
FT__2.3______3.2
FTA_3.4______4.9
F%_0.687_____0.646
ORB_2_______3.1
DRB_5.6______6.2
TRB_7.6_____9.3
AST_2.9______0.9
STL_1.2______0.8
BLK_0.8______1.1
TOV_1.9______1.9
PF__2.7______3
PTS_10.5___12.9
SOS_9.75____5.28
Obviously one that sticks out is Murph’s poor shooting from behind the arc. But, I would like to argue that his 3-point percentage could increase with another offseason, similar to how to his free throw percentage increased this past offseason from 61.5% last season to 72.8% this year (upon writing this).
That got me thinking about how these two players development from freshman year to their last year in college. Most of these comparisons were not very helpful, other than change in shooting percentages, because their minutes played were so much different, it didn’t seem like a fair comparison. For example, Draymond made over 250% more 2-pointers his senior year than his freshman year, 1.2 per game vs 4.3. I suppose, I could adjust each stat for minutes played. Maybe I still will and post them later.
At the very least, their career numbers are pretty comparable, with exception to 3P%, which I concede is a big part of Draymond’s effectiveness in the NBA as an undersized big-man. To counter that, I think Draymond’s effectiveness is also due to his ability to guard big-men that have him outmatched in size. I think Murph does this pretty well. Not a perfect measure, but his Offensive boards are even better than Draymond’s.
I used the numbers from
https://www.basketball-reference.com