A little bit of analysis now that we're 10 games in

[Omega Atrocity]

So now that the Charlotte Hornets have played 10 games, it makes some sense to start looking at some stats and see how we're doing thus far. I'm going to start off with some team stats, and I'll go into player stats after that.

Team Stats:

Well lets start with the only stat that really matters, which is wins and loses. We're looking at 3rd in the east here as of 11/17 before any of the games tonight at 7-3. Not that it will translate, but the pace we are on currently is 57.4 wins, which would be really damn good!

As you can see there the Hawks game we play next will be big, it's at home against a team ahead of us in the standings. Hopefully we show up, and not just in the 3rd quarter. Speaking of that, we have been absolutely unbelievable in the 3rd quarter so far this season.

Man, the Hornets have an astronomical net rating of 37 in the 3rd quarter! For the uninformed, net rating is a teams point differential per 100 possessions (which adjusts for pace). For comparison sake, the highest net rating in the league last year was the Spurs who had an 11.5 net rating. Now keep in mind that was for the whole game not just the 3rd quarter and the fact that it was over an entire 82 game season. As you can see by the chart above, we rank really well in third quarter stats. 

One last big thing I want to draw attention to here is about a particular lineup that we have. It is, in fact, the lineup that we closed the game with in the 4th quarter against the Timberwolves on Tuesday: Kemba / Belinelli / Batum / Kaminsky / Zeller. This lineup is currently third in the league in net rating, and probably the best for what you want to see at the end of games.

Here are a few facts that I found while researching a little bit that were of interest to me before we move on to player stats. The Hornets are:

• 4th in net rating, 4th in defensive rating, and 11th on offensive rating
• 7th in three pointers attempted per game 
• Leading the league in two areas Steve Clifford preaches ad nauseam (Defensive rebounding and low turnovers). I believe it would be the 4th season in a row leading the league in these two categories (Note: I did not look this up, just recalling from memory).
• 3rd in both assist percentage and assist ratio, basically meaning a very high percentage of our points come from assists, which speaks to how well we pass it.
• 4th in opponent field goal percentage from inside 5 feet. I'd like to credit this to Hibbert, but he's missed half of our games so far. We are doing a very good job of protecting the rim.

Player Stats:

So this has to start off by me talking about Kemba Walker right? The man has been unreal this season and is well on his way to being an all-star and probably all-nba if he keeps this up for the whole season. Here is a look at how he is doing compared to his career, along with a look at the advanced stats of him versus the best players in the NBA. His PER is exceptionally high at 29.1, an improvement 20.8 from a season ago.

He's shooting 48% (!!!) from three so far this season, that's amazing and probably a little bit unsustainable. All his stats are very impressive, even compared with the best players in the league. 

Now I want to talk about minutes, because none of our guys is really getting run into the ground, which is a good sign. They are below, along with all the other stats from all the players on our team:

There are some additional things I want to note here as I wrap this up

•  As well as we are playing our two four men are shooting 35% and 31% from the three, which has to go up, as they are better shooters than they are showing so far. Kaminsky is shooting it quite well from the field despite this, which goes to show how much he has improved from last season. 
• Ramon Sessions is shooting 16.7% from three. As I'm sure we remember Lance Stephenson's pathetic 17.1% from the three point line in 2014-15 qualifies as the worst season ever (you have to shoot 100 to qualify). C'mon Ramon, you have to do better, not just to avoid this awful record, but people are diving so far under screens on him it's ridiculous. He is a career 31% shooter, even shooting 36% in his most recent stint in Washington, so I do expect this to improve.
• Batum hasn't been especially good, and I expect him to improve a fair amount

So that's all i have everyone, I hope you got some enjoyment out of this, as I enjoyed researching all of these stats quite a bit. Look for me to do another one after 10 more games are played!

[iBBB]

Great post and research. Thanks. Waiting for the update after tonight's win :)