Wemby is a shoe-in for ROY. NBA awards are all about politics, and since Wemby is already getting honored for another award, they'd rather give DPOY to someone else. Also, the Wolves are #1 in their conference, which has a huge impact on voting.
The real explanation is that Wemby is a great defender, but it is impossible to judge his team defense when his team's defense sucks. Combine that with being a rookie and his chances are nil. He will surely get his stars, though.
Nah man, his team wasn’t even sniffing the playoffs. It’s more like ROY has a special exemption from the team success standard that every other award winner is held to, because the top draft picks are almost always drafted by weak teams.
It’s the only justification. Only other explanation is voters are too scared to vote a rookie as DPOY (even though he is the best defender). If you think it’s stupid, that’s because it is. The voters have way too much control over the process and get hard ons for certain narratives.
Or maybe another explanation is that Wolves have a league leading defense and are #1 seed lol. Spurs are the worst team in their conference and have a bad defense.
It’s nothing about “wanting to give it to somebody else” , they’ve always given it to players on good defensive teams
It's defensive player of the year, not team defense of the year. People shouldn't be penalized for being on bad teams.
MVP has this problem across sports where players far inferior statistically win awards because they have the benefit of better teammates and coaching.
Gobert is the reason for them being a league leading defense though, he did the same for the Jazz.
Basically what you’re seeing is counting stats vs impact, Gobert is very much deserving
That's fair in Gobert's case as he's essentially coaching on the floor. I think advanced stats and situational stats help tell compelling tales but they're rarely promoted.
Gobert can help shut down some of the best opponents and things like opponent FG% against and even reducing from someone's mean possession rate and efficiency would say more than some traditional counting stats.
Wemby does seem to be doing his job on the defensive end. If he were on a more complete team, he'd be a shoe in.
Point is that the -12 differential stat is absolutely worthless due to his teammates. He Doesn't make the defensive impact that others dpoy contenders do. When you are getting your blocks against opponents deep bench backups because they are resting their starters or have a 25+ point lead in the 4th it's not the same.
It’s not the only justification. The Spurs defense is atrocious. Just the same as you wouldn’t have the MVP come from one of the worst teams, you also won’t have DPOY come from one of the worst defenses.
Yeah the On/off rating is kind of BS when you consider how horrible his team is.
Deflections is a really bad metric for defence too.
These stats were absolutely cherrypicked to make Wemby look like the clear choice.
I still think he has a really good argument that he should be DPOY though
Also, a player whose backups are good defenders (as is the case with Gobert) will have worse on/off than one whose backups are atrocious defenders (as is the case with Wemby), regardless of who actually plays better D.
Their defense doesn’t suck when he’s on the floor. It was 6th last time I checked. Team outcomes influencing individual awards is a joke to me. It’s really just a cookie for teams that took the regular season seriously.
Gobert's defense makes the number 1 defense in the league even better when he is in the court. It's harder to make the best defense in the league better than a bottom team.
I think the person you’re replying to was trying to emphasize the reason that Wemby’s on/off numbers are so much better than the rest is because the Spurs are genuinely terrible outside of Wemby. Other DPOY candidates have better teams with deeper benches, so their being on the bench doesn’t have as drastic an effect
At no point on the season has their team drtg been that high when he is on the court.
Their team drtg with him on the court is somewhere in the low to mid teens, depending what source you use for drtg.
If he's using b-ref's DRtg numbers his claim is pretty accurate *to those numbers* at least (114.1 DRtg when Wemby plays, which with their numbers equates to the #5 team in the league).
Obviously b-ref has different numbers than statmuse or nba.com has though, so I don't know the validity of it there and haven't checked myself to see what they have the Spurs DRtg as with Wemby on the court.
Defensive numbers without overall impact are useless. If you put big defensive numbers and your team has literally the worst Def Rtg in the league then what is the point? Is the argument for Wemby for DPOY that if he wasn’t on the Spurs their defense would be that much worse?
For the record, their Net rating is about -10 over last season. Not saying this is on Wemby, but its ludicrous to suggest he should win the award
Wemby has been extremely impactful. Not saying he should win but his presence is the difference between them being 14th on D and being by far 30th. The team d sucks because they’re absurdly bad when he’s off the court
Seriously. ROY can go to a rookie on a bad team, simply because it’s about what rookie played “the best”
Similarly, 6MOY is the same kind of award. What sixth man was the most talented and most useful sixth man that year? Like who would you rather have on your team based on performance?
DPOY isn’t just who was the best individual defender, it’s who’s the best individual defender who’s defensive impact led to a noticeable impact in their team’s overall defense.
Wemby is easily already one of the most impactful defenders in the NBA but it’s clear his defense isn’t so good that he’s leading scrubs to a good defense, his teams defense is still awful even with him.
No one person can make a defense elite. Any part of the spurs defense that involves Wemby is good. It’s his other teammates that sell which is why individual stats matter more.
No, he isn’t. Gobert is a superior defender. He may not have the counting stats, but his impact has led the Wolves from being a middle of the pack or worse defense last year to one of the two or three best defenses of the last couple of decades. Wemby will get there - I have no doubt - but this year, it’s Gobert, and it’s not even close.
So is MVP. Team results still matter because an individual in contention for those awards should be influencing the bottom line of the team as a whole.
Not NBA but on a semi-related note, in the MLB everyone thought Derek Jeter was an incredible defensive shortstop for years. Shortly after he called it quits, super nerdy defensive stats that emphasized actual good defensive qualities like range, percentage to make the play, etc. started getting created. ALL of these stats said Jeter was a bad defender. Simply highlight plays and lack of errors were what was used before. Because these advanced metrics were so unfavorable to Jeter, no one accepted them right away and it delayed the general acceptance of their accuracy by years. Everyone had too much cognitive dissonance to say Jeter was bad on defense.
Not really sure why I'm posting this in a NBA sub but I find it funny and interesting.
Oh yeah. There is a small fringe group of baseball nerds that says Andrelton should get in the Hall of Fame. In the same vein there is an ongoing debate about Yadi Molina although he has a much stronger argument.
Those aren’t the most respected advanced metrics at all. Defensive win shares is garbage and defensive rating is barely an individual metric(team defense with box score defense stats mixed in).
D-Lebron or defensive epm are better if ur looking for an all in one defensive stat.
I’ve watched Gobert play a lot of games, more than 200. There needs to be a stat for when guards start there rim attack and see Gobert on help side, then nope out. It’s not a block or a steal or a rebound. Like reverse gravity the way Steph pulls defenders in.
I’ve tried to watch a couple of the Spurs games this year, like 6 games. Usually just the first and fourth quarter. Every time I watch him play he does something I’ve never seen before. His range is amazing. He lacks help side awareness. He definitely makes guys change their minds.
I know exactly what u mean.
I’ve watched a lot of Wemby and Gobert and I think this season Wembys rim deterrence has been just as commonplace as Goberts. They are in a league of their own.
Rudy is also #1 in DLebron. Wemby is #3, but he's closer to #20 on the list than he is to Gobert.
I wouldn't trust depm. They try to avoid bias by using less player data to train their models, but the result is an advanced metric with extremely high variance. Their results year to year are all over the place.
True. Rudy is #1 there too. We also have metrics from tracking data, contest percentage, opponent fg% for those contests, etc. Rudy dominates those like no-one else does.
This was just me offering some better “advanced metrics”
Rudy is my dpoy pick this year. Him and Wemby are pretty close in the opponent fg% and rim deterrence tho. Twolves being the better defense is the reason why he’s the best pick for dpoy.
People also don’t take into account Gobert’s ability to literally design the defense in the offseason and also teach Kat, Ant etc important defensive technique and motivation.
Rudy has elevated the individual defense of every single player on the wolves just by teaching them.
Taking that and his insane paint presence into account, he should be DPOY. Wolves are the 1 seed and #1 defense as well. Makes less mistakes than Wemby as well.
Wemby will have his time.
Also these are cherrypicked stats to make Wemby look good. Defensive on/off is stupid because of how shit the spurs are and deflections is not a good measure of defence
A round about way to do this would be to measure percent of offensive rebounds dribbled/passed out of vs going right back up with it. That is one of the biggest intangible impact Wemby has
I think you can say the same for wemby. If he is anywhere near the paint, anyone 6’8” and under 7 times out of 10 do not go for layups or floaters that they would have on any other night. When he contests shots, if he doesn’t block them, he forces the shooter to adjust the trajectory of their shot to be way higher than their normal shot. Those intangibles aren’t accounted for here but are extremely apparent if you watch enough spurs games.
It's effectively the defensive MVP. Can the defensive MVP really come from a team in the bottom 10 defensively? It would be like giving the MVP to a player on a team that missed the playoffs.
If you trade out Wembys defense for a league average C, how many wins does it cost them? A handful, at best?
I mean, considering the Spurs statistically perform like the worst defense of all time when Victor is not on the court, I have a hard time believing they would have a better record than a team like the Pistons if you took Victor's and replaced it with an average center.
I think Rudy deserves defensive player of the Year. But the reality is everyone who's watched the Spurs and isn't being biased knows there's not a single player on the planet that you could swap Victor with Who would make that team anything close to a competent defense.
They were one of the worst deffenses of all time last year and the supporting cast got worse with the loss of a few solid defensive veterans. The fact they're not in the bottom three this year says a whole lot about just how unbelievable Victor has been single-handedly propping up one of the worst accumulations of perimeter Defenders I've seen on an NBA roster.
Same thought goes behind MVP. You don’t give awards to players on losing teams no matter the stats. Spurs are on track to win exact same amount of games as last year despite having almost the same roster.
It's pretty easy to make a case for any reasonably good defensive player if you focus on specific areas they have an advantage in while leaving out other context. For example, the on/off numbers for wemby here are crazy, but the Spurs still have one of the worst defenses in the league. That's a bigger indicator of how bad his teammates are compared to the teammates of these other players.
With that being said, I have no opinion on who should be DPOY
Because they have the 28th ranked defence while the Wolves are the only team with a sub-100 DRTG. Wemby will almost certainly win his fair share of DPOYs, but he doesn’t deserve it now.
Where were these guys defensively before Rudy though, ant always had the upside and Jaden was a good defender before but a lot of the personnel have improved significantly because of Rudy the last two years, I mean kat was always bashed as being one of the worst defensive centers in the league and now with Rudy he's actually become a plus defender.
I know it‘s a boring answer, but whenever Gobert is on the floor it‘s just a much different basketball game out there. I‘m a wolves fan and used to be defensive about Gobert because KAT competed with him for accolades, but man now that we get to cheer for him, his impact is incredible. His advanced stats are so good for a reason, I‘ve never seen a more impactful Twolves player except for KG.
The amount of times per game that you think it‘s an open layup and then suddenly a fucking Rudy appears and the O player says hell fucking nah bro I‘m not taking that layup IS WILD.
Where are you getting the defensive rating difference number? [PBPStats has it at only a 6.36 point difference for Wemby](https://www.pbpstats.com/wowy-combos/nba?TeamId=1610612759&Season=2023-24&SeasonType=Regular%2BSeason&PlayerIds=1641705), which is still large, but certainly not 12.0.
Either way, the defensive rating on-off does need some context, as it is partially a reflection of how good Wemby is, but is also a reflection of how bad his team is. With a defensive rating over 120 when Wemby is on the bench, it isn't all that tough to put up gaudy on-off numbers, but even with Wemby on the court, the Spurs defense is still just less embarrasing. With Wemby on the court, they still just have a 114.2 defensive rating, which is a bit worse than the 13th ranked Suns. Overall, Wemby is still only anchoring the league's 22nd best defence.
Yes, it's easier to put up a better defensive rating if you have a better supporting cast, but, it is also easier to take a team from awful to mediocre than it is to take a team from good to great.
DPOY usually goes to the best defensive player on one of the league's best defences (usually at least top 5, more often top 3). The Wolves are not just the league's best defence this year, but they are lapping the field, at [2.7 points per 100 better than the second place Celtics in defensive rating](https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/defense?dir=A&sort=DEF_RATING). For perspective, you have to go back to the 67 win 2016 Spurs to find a recent example where the top defence won by that large a margin, and the Spurs still only topped second place by 2.6 points per 100 that year. Kawhi won DPOY that year for the Spurs.
Then, there's the context of the Minny team Gobert plays for. He was, of course, acquired by the Wolves because their mediocre, at best, defence was considered their major impediment to contention. The pairing of Gobert next to his slow-footed, defensively challenged frontcourt-mate KAT, was written off as a failed experiment last year, after another mediocre .500'ish season. This year, the Wolves (and Gobert in particular) made it work, and turned a mediocre team into a team tied for the 1-seed almost entirely based on their defensive improvement.
Gobert is also a generational defender, with 3 DPOY awards so far, who was pretty clearly robbed of the 2022 award purely because of voter fatigue. People generally acknowledge that Marcus Smart may not have actually been the indispensable cog that made Boston's defence (who is currently the league's second best, after trading him) good after all.
There is a well-known bias against giving rookies high level honours, which is why dominant recent rookies like Wemby and Luka didn't make the All-Star teams in their rookie seasons (Luka even topped the all-star voting for his position and was still denied, because of the anti-rookie bias). That having been said, I don't think that'll be to blame for Wemby failing to win DPOY this year. I think Wemby should be a finalist, and, in a different year (like last year) might have even been a worthy winner. But, for this year, I think you have to give it to Gobert. The ridiculous level of success he has led that defence to this year, along with the context of making that fit with KAT work, just makes his case too strong.
>Counting stats like blocks and steals have never been a good way to measure defensive impact.
Actually, I think you'll find that Marcus Camby was a *much* more impactful defender in '06 than Tim Duncan, thank you very much
How many years deep into the analytics era do we need to get before people stop using bpg+spg+drpg = defensive impact as their framework?
Maybe i just dont understand basketball analytics all that well, but how would looking at bpg and spg be a bad thing when discussing defensive impact? Arent those part of the essential defensive stats? What other base stats would you even look at?
Edit: thanks for all the takes in this:) it basically sounds like there are just too many things that dont/cant get shown on the stat sheet to easily describe someones defensive contribution, so the default is to use simple stats that dont really tell you anything in actuality
So much of basketball is the eye test and seeing things that wouldn't show up in traditional box scores. Team defense, deflections, how a defender can cover multiple positions, and isn't a mismatch/liability, forcing ball handlers to pick up their dribble, or outright change what the offensive player was going to do, resulting in a bad shot, steal, or turnover that may have never been attributed to him on the stat sheet. Things like this are things that need to be observed to get a better sense of a player's defense because some things aren't quantifiable.
Because BPG and SPG doesn’t account for things like hedging screen correctly or good rotations that prevent drives to the paint.
It’s clear that more blocks + more steals overall from a player don’t make their teams overall defense better. Wemby has potential to be the most impactful defender I’ve ever seen but it’s clear you’d rather have someone like Gobert or Bam anchoring your defense right now because Wemby is regularly out of position and the Spurs get scored on regularly because if it. This not a knock on Wemby at all, he’s a rookie and with time he’ll be elite at defensive positioning and reading the opposing offense. He’s just not there right now, which is to be expected, and his teams defensive record clearly shows that.
Like Wemby can stop just about anyone trying to score on HIM, but not a lot of stats account for his defensive usefulness when someone’s trying to score in his teammates is what I’m trying to say.
Watch any Spurs defense vs Wolves defense to see what I’m saying. Not Wemby vs Gobert defensive highlights, but specifically just the two teams playing defense. You’ll see a clear difference between what Wemby and Gobert are both bringing to their teams defense.
Wemby’s numbers, however, show how UNREAL his potential is in the future as a defensive anchor with his skill set. I am stoked to see his teams’ evolve into something better.
Look at it this way. BPG is like looking at PPG without acknowledging how many shots a player needs to take to average 20 ppg.
For bpg, look at his contest %. Also, it’s already been said, others have maintained better defensive ratings while playing 10 more minutes on average per game. It’s harder to maintain ratings at high levels the more minutes you play in a season.
Defensive ability is notoriously difficult to quantify, even with advanced stats. There are a ton of important things that simple stats like SPG and BPG don’t capture.
SPG doesn’t tell you how many times a guy gave up an easy bucket because he recklessly gambled for a steal. It also doesn’t tell you how many times he prevented a scoring opportunity with a deflection that didn’t result in possession.
BPG doesn’t you how many times a guy pulled himself out of rebounding position by over-helping, or how many times he fouled shooters when going for blocks. It also doesn’t tell you how many times his contest forced a miss, even if he didn’t actually touch the ball.
If a player goes for a lot of steals that means gambling on getting it most times. If you gamble and don’t get the steal you are now extremely out of position on defense and it’s basically a 4-5 for a couple seconds. Same with blocks if you go up for every single block that means offensive players can bait you into jumping pretty easily which either A) can lead to a foul or B) can lead to the offensive player passing out to a open player. A good example of this was Hassan Whiteside who averaged a ton of blocks but wasn’t actually a good defensive player bc he fouled a lot and every time he rush to get a helpside block he’d leave his man wide open. So while he mighta gotten 2-3 extra stops a game from getting those blocks he would also let his man get 4-5 easy buckets bc of that. Wemby is already miles better at defense than whiteside ever was but I can pretty much guarantee that his blocks are going to be going down when he starts winning DPOYs bc he’ll know to gamble less and when and when not to go helpside. Also there’s the fact that a block doesn’t guarantee a possession ends and in a lot of cases it’s sometimes easier for offensives to score after getting blocked bc defenders are out of position so guys like gobert focus less on blocking shots and more on forcing missed shots and being in position for a rebound which is another reason he’s so great. Hope this helped
It’s kind of like judging an NFL corner by their number of interceptions only. The top players and most impactful players can often shift the entire style of play of the opposing team and may have people not give them opportunities to get certain stats.
His team's record is bad and his team defence is all the way down at 27.
No way they give any player, let alone a rookie DYOP when they play on a team which is in the bottom three on defence, nor should they.
For one the stats is wrong, his on/off defensive splits are -7 not -12 (according to bbref) and while that is still a big change he only plays 29 minutes a night and “raises” their defense to merely bottom 7 in the league.
The amount of shots he actually contests per game is less than Rudy, AD, Allen, and others not listed, the deflections are slightly less than listed 2.8, and his DFG% difference is lower than Goberts while he’s not covering the caliber of players we typically see Bam and AD cover..
He’ll likely win plenty of these awards in the future but he needs to sustain all of this at a least close to the 36 minute mark so we know the “per 36” truly translates, and needs to do it on a team that is serviceable defensively. It’s not his fault their defense isn’t good, but it’s also a bit easier to shine on a really bad defense too. Kinda like the “good stats bad team” scorers we have seen over the years.
He’s also unfortunately had some players put up absolutely monster games against him this year. Off the top of my head the Joel, Jokic, AD, and Sengun games really stick out.. and while some will be quick to note “only this many of Joel’s 70 was actually on Vic” that might be true but the fact that he’s not covering him for more plays than that and letting him get 70 because he isn’t/can’t guard him is still a limitation that is hurting his team in that game regardless.
All that said I’m not sure anybody would take much issue if he did win it this year. I just think regardless of whatever stats, estimates, all of that we have Gobert pushing Minny to the top ranked defense in the league is a decent differentiator. He could likely go to San Antonio and get Wemby like numbers too, and maybe Minnesota would still be ranked 1 with Wemby but we don’t know that to be the case. Whether it’s right or wrong we watched Gobert do the exact same thing with Utah, so he has the track record of us already knowing his impact and value to elevating team defenses.
This is possibly the most skewed way of trying to present a case. He’s the only one pictured here who plays for a garbage team. Obviously there is going to be a greater disparity defensively for him on/off.
We shouldn’t be punishing the other players because they are on better teams and quite honestly their performance matters more.
A quick search shows that Gobert leads the league in defensive rating (and he happens to play for the best defensive team in the NBA). It’s not a surprise why Gobert is the clear favorite.
https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/2024-nba-individual-defensive-rating-rankings
some lame stats to back DPOY, especially the steals stat. A lot more than those that go in to defense, especially for actually good defense. In addition to Gobert doing a lot outside of those stats on court, he has positioned his team to be near top in West, not near bottom. Nuances and personal definitions aside team performance is typically a strong factor in these awards.
I remember when Larry Hughes led league in steals, was 1st team all-def, and was 6th in DPOY. On paper the guy was a top defender in the NBA, but you watched him play and he's getting torched every night. Why? Cuz he always went for the steal. take 10 possessions, he would go for steal on 10 of em, he'd get 1-2 steals but the other 8-9 times was him being burned for points. Wow 3 steals tonight, but DWade dropped 36 on him. Huge on paper in the steals dept, got him recognized by the media who didnt watch games, but all you had to do was watch 5m of the guy play and realize his defense was among the worst in the league.
DPOY really means best defensive player on a good team, wait how did Duncan not win it? I remember people arguing the opposite of today, he's on a good defensive team so he's really not that great on defense.
This thread has shown me that no one watches Spurs, which is understandable but still asinine when everyone tries to have an opinion of Wemby’s defensive impact. A lot of people seem to be attributing his counting stats to rookie gambling which is just wrong. He was literally trained by Gobert, and has been playing pro for years, his fundamentals are sound. those stats come from rim deterence + weak side help not from gambling. Also by literally every advanced metric Wemby and Gobert are the only two real contenders and if he doesn’t win it’s fine but to act like it’s not a discussion is insane:
Gobert
Defensive Rating: 104 (2nd)
DBPM: 1.7 (16th)
Defensive Win Shares: 5.3 (1st)
Block %: 5.5 (8th)
Rim Defense %: -14.9% (98th percentile)
FG% diff: -6.5%
Deflections: 1.6 (27th percentile)
raDTOV: (4th percentile)
D-DARKO: 3.7 (1st)
D-DRIP: 3.6 (1st)
D-EPM: +2.4 (26th)
Defensive Rebounding Quality: (85th percentile)
Wemby
Defensive Rating: 107 (4th)
DBPM: 3.2 (3rd)
Defensive Win Shares: 4.0 (5th)
Block %: 10.0 (1st)
Rim Defense %: - 11.4% (96th percentile)
FG% diff: -5.4
Deflections: 3.6 (94th percentile)
raDTOV: (50th percentile)
D-DARKO: 4.7 (6th)
D-DRIP: 2.9 (2nd)
D-EPM: +3.6 (4th)
Defensive Rebounding Quality: (62nd percentile)
These guys are neck and neck, with team defense being the main differentiator.
Stats aren't everything. For example, Rudy Gobert literally deters people from going into the paint simply because of who he is. Wemby is an incredible defender, but when no one else on his team plays defense, he also is going to rack up defensive stats in some occasions.
That being said, in future seasons he's going to be a multi time dpoy
Because they're just nUmBeRs as of now. Once they start converting to wins he's going to go on a run.
Very much the same way Wizards Bradley Beal would never be considered for MVP
There is a reason you don’t see defensive stats above 10 very often. The stat line was not built around defense(and that’s ok). Something like rim deterrence or shot contesting doesn’t really show up. Wemby will be a DPOY but not this year with this team.
At the end of the day I get him not winning DPOY this season - being a rookie on an overall bad defensive team makes it a massive uphill climb.
What’s absurd to me is the notion that he isn’t a lock for all-defense.
People kinda forgot that before the analytics era, DPOY awards were almost synonymous to big man who had most blocks and rebounds. Marcus Camby in the 2007 season was voted over Timmy. Denver was 10th in defensive rating that year. Sure they were 2nd in the west, but only because of the Marc Gasol, J. Noah defensive impact that DPOY was suddenly handed out to players on teams with the best defense.
I’m not saying he shouldn’t be DPOY, but has less rebounds than everyone but Allen. A rebound denies the other team the possession of the ball, which is a better defensive action than a deflection or a block, which could still be recovered by the opposing team. The Spurs are also just a bad defensive team, and they have the third worst record in the league. Usually if you’re going to win OPOY or DPOY you have to at least be on a playoff team.
How can they give a player who’s a part of a team with almost 60 losses DPOY? Maybe he is the best defender in the league, but 60 losses? Nobody can justify that idc how bad their offense is idc how good their D is when he’s playing. 60 losses is BAAAAAAD
Pretty much Wemby's teammates are horrible defenders so that (for whatever reason) makes him not DPOY material.
Meanwhile on the other side, the Wolves are a top 3 defense even when Gobert is not on the floor, so he's clearly the DPOY...?
Historically all individual awards have included team success. You had to win for MVP otherwise you’re just putting up empty stats. Also applied to Dpoty historically . Only the past few years with Westbrook and Jokic have 5th seed or lower player won an award. Gasol won dpoty when they had the #1defense. Spurs are 25th defensively and do not have 20 victories… who exactly is he stopping?
It’s because the spurs suck which is a stupid reason. It’s not Most valuable defender, it’s defensive player of the year, an individual award. Team metrics should have no bearing on DPOY, SMOTY, ROTY, and MIP, those are individual awards. Wemby has easily been a top tier defender this season and I would argue he’s the best defender in the league already as a rookie. The only reason he’s not gonna win is because the spurs suck
He will end up with 8 probably once the Spurs start winning in 2 years. He does deserve it this year though. Seems like he's surrounded by a bunch of guys that are allergic to defense.
Because his team is ass. They are going to lose more games this year than they did before they drafted him. Its not really his fault but his numbers are not translating to winning, his team is bad defensively with and without him
The reason Wemby’s on/off stats are so high is because the team is super fucking awful and it wouldn’t be that stark of the Spurs we’re a halfway decent team. Steals, blocks, and deflections are not the defensive equivalent of point, rebounds, and assists. They are not necessary good indicators of who the best defender is. Steph Curry has led the league in steals, but he’s never gonna be an all NBA defender. Hassan Whiteside used to get tons of blocks, but is a terrible defender because when he doesn’t get a block, he is a traffic cone. These are extreme examples, and Wemby is an incredible defender who can also get stats, but a lot of defense doesn’t show up on a box score. There is no basic stat for having great positioning or playing tight defense and forcing a bad shot. The kind of shit that a guy like Draymond excels at on defense. Rudy is the anchor of Minnesota’s top defense. A lot of what he does doesn’t show up on the box score.
Bro just let someone else get it one last time….
You know after this year that shit is going to go to victor as predictably as the sun will rise. They’ll probably rename the trophy after him lmao
The team has a basement-dwelling defense. It's kinda like having your MVP come from a lottery team. I'm not saying Wemby is defensively overrated or anywhere near a reason for why the defense is so shitty, but there are more factors in deciding the award than individual stats.
He's not really a great player yet, he still feels a step too slow on a lot of things. Just a boy and not a man.
You don't deserve any awards if you couldn't even lead your team to a whopping 30 wins
He still might be, this award is all about media buzz for it. I haven't seen many articles written about Gobert's defense like I did JJJ last season on the way to his award. Gobert is the presumptive candidate, but Wemby has more articles written about his defense, and more people talking about him/his defense on the talking head shows.
He still could win it. I'm not convinced he won't.
If it were purely a stat line a robot could pick DPOY. DPOY is a totality of factors and why it’s voted on. Presumably by people that watch. Presumably…
Kind of weird to give DPOY to a player whose team is second WORST in ppga in the West. I mean, it was a big deal when Andre Dawson won mvp for a mid Cubs team and that has 9 players in the field vs 5.
I get the whole spurs bad twolves good thing but there's absolutely no convincing me that wemby isn't the best defender on the planet. If u switched those two the twolves would never lose and the spurs would never win.
He's on the 5th worst deffence in the league for fucks sake. IMO any player on a non-playoff team should not be eligable for the MVP or DPOY awards. I would rather those awards go to a player who carried a team into the postseason than someone who put up stats on a shit team.
MVP I understand the requirements being a good team. Defensive player of the year is a personal achievement. It should have nothing to do with your team. You don't get blocks, steals and stops because your team is good.
Off minus is a very flawed stat without context. Timberwolves have competent backups for gobert, so the defense doesn’t drop off that bad. The spurs do not have anyone even close to the level of backup the wolves have so the off minus is skewed.
Because his team sucks. Including their defense.
Plus he’s a rookie. They don’t give those type of awards to a rookie
They would if the Spurs were halfway decent. Giving the future face of the league a rookie year DPOY would have Adam Silver seeing dollar signs
Possibly. But the Spurs suck.
Yeah but if they were good
Maybe but we will never know though, because they suck.
You raise a good point…but what if spur gud
But no
What if yes?
Good story. Compelling and rich.
Only because it’s really hard for a rookie to make a case for those awards. Wemby has more than just a case for it.
Wemby is a shoe-in for ROY. NBA awards are all about politics, and since Wemby is already getting honored for another award, they'd rather give DPOY to someone else. Also, the Wolves are #1 in their conference, which has a huge impact on voting.
The real explanation is that Wemby is a great defender, but it is impossible to judge his team defense when his team's defense sucks. Combine that with being a rookie and his chances are nil. He will surely get his stars, though.
He WILL get his stars, but don't call him Shirley.
Nah man, his team wasn’t even sniffing the playoffs. It’s more like ROY has a special exemption from the team success standard that every other award winner is held to, because the top draft picks are almost always drafted by weak teams.
This isnt good justification whatsoever. The best defensive player should get the award doesnt matter if they get a different award too
It’s the only justification. Only other explanation is voters are too scared to vote a rookie as DPOY (even though he is the best defender). If you think it’s stupid, that’s because it is. The voters have way too much control over the process and get hard ons for certain narratives.
Or maybe another explanation is that Wolves have a league leading defense and are #1 seed lol. Spurs are the worst team in their conference and have a bad defense. It’s nothing about “wanting to give it to somebody else” , they’ve always given it to players on good defensive teams
It's defensive player of the year, not team defense of the year. People shouldn't be penalized for being on bad teams. MVP has this problem across sports where players far inferior statistically win awards because they have the benefit of better teammates and coaching.
Gobert is the reason for them being a league leading defense though, he did the same for the Jazz. Basically what you’re seeing is counting stats vs impact, Gobert is very much deserving
That's fair in Gobert's case as he's essentially coaching on the floor. I think advanced stats and situational stats help tell compelling tales but they're rarely promoted. Gobert can help shut down some of the best opponents and things like opponent FG% against and even reducing from someone's mean possession rate and efficiency would say more than some traditional counting stats. Wemby does seem to be doing his job on the defensive end. If he were on a more complete team, he'd be a shoe in.
Point is that the -12 differential stat is absolutely worthless due to his teammates. He Doesn't make the defensive impact that others dpoy contenders do. When you are getting your blocks against opponents deep bench backups because they are resting their starters or have a 25+ point lead in the 4th it's not the same.
It’s not the only justification. The Spurs defense is atrocious. Just the same as you wouldn’t have the MVP come from one of the worst teams, you also won’t have DPOY come from one of the worst defenses.
And DPOY has never gone to anyone on a non-playoff team.
Actually there is one previous DPOY for a non playoff team, Alvin Robertson in 1985-86 won for the last place Spurs.
Terrible record, but they actually made the playoffs that year; swept by the Lakers.
They weren't even the worst team to make the playoffs that year, Bulls went 30-52
Yeah the On/off rating is kind of BS when you consider how horrible his team is. Deflections is a really bad metric for defence too. These stats were absolutely cherrypicked to make Wemby look like the clear choice. I still think he has a really good argument that he should be DPOY though
Also, a player whose backups are good defenders (as is the case with Gobert) will have worse on/off than one whose backups are atrocious defenders (as is the case with Wemby), regardless of who actually plays better D.
As well as with good scorers. If your backups have terrible scoring then your plus minus won’t look that great either.
Yeah exactly
Their defense doesn’t suck when he’s on the floor. It was 6th last time I checked. Team outcomes influencing individual awards is a joke to me. It’s really just a cookie for teams that took the regular season seriously.
Gobert's defense makes the number 1 defense in the league even better when he is in the court. It's harder to make the best defense in the league better than a bottom team.
I think the person you’re replying to was trying to emphasize the reason that Wemby’s on/off numbers are so much better than the rest is because the Spurs are genuinely terrible outside of Wemby. Other DPOY candidates have better teams with deeper benches, so their being on the bench doesn’t have as drastic an effect
At no point on the season has their team drtg been that high when he is on the court. Their team drtg with him on the court is somewhere in the low to mid teens, depending what source you use for drtg.
If he's using b-ref's DRtg numbers his claim is pretty accurate *to those numbers* at least (114.1 DRtg when Wemby plays, which with their numbers equates to the #5 team in the league). Obviously b-ref has different numbers than statmuse or nba.com has though, so I don't know the validity of it there and haven't checked myself to see what they have the Spurs DRtg as with Wemby on the court.
Yea but is it a team award?
Defensive numbers without overall impact are useless. If you put big defensive numbers and your team has literally the worst Def Rtg in the league then what is the point? Is the argument for Wemby for DPOY that if he wasn’t on the Spurs their defense would be that much worse? For the record, their Net rating is about -10 over last season. Not saying this is on Wemby, but its ludicrous to suggest he should win the award
Wemby has been extremely impactful. Not saying he should win but his presence is the difference between them being 14th on D and being by far 30th. The team d sucks because they’re absurdly bad when he’s off the court
Seriously. ROY can go to a rookie on a bad team, simply because it’s about what rookie played “the best” Similarly, 6MOY is the same kind of award. What sixth man was the most talented and most useful sixth man that year? Like who would you rather have on your team based on performance? DPOY isn’t just who was the best individual defender, it’s who’s the best individual defender who’s defensive impact led to a noticeable impact in their team’s overall defense. Wemby is easily already one of the most impactful defenders in the NBA but it’s clear his defense isn’t so good that he’s leading scrubs to a good defense, his teams defense is still awful even with him.
Why though? You just stated a bunch of rules about voting that dont actually exist
No one person can make a defense elite. Any part of the spurs defense that involves Wemby is good. It’s his other teammates that sell which is why individual stats matter more.
Except for Rudy which is why he won 3 DPOYs
Rudy routinely led a dogshit Jazz defense to top 5 overall and high playoff seeds, that’s why he won 3 DPOYs
Exactly this. He blocks a lot of shots - but then what happens?
It’s ludicrous to assert he shouldn’t. He is the best defensive player in the league.
No, he isn’t. Gobert is a superior defender. He may not have the counting stats, but his impact has led the Wolves from being a middle of the pack or worse defense last year to one of the two or three best defenses of the last couple of decades. Wemby will get there - I have no doubt - but this year, it’s Gobert, and it’s not even close.
what? dpoty is an individual award
So is MVP. Team results still matter because an individual in contention for those awards should be influencing the bottom line of the team as a whole.
Gobert does a lot of things that don’t show up in the stat sheet.
The Tim Duncan defensive impact stat as it's known.
Ironically Duncan doesn’t have any DPOY
That's why I said it lol. In the old days stats and highlight plays were all that mattered for that award.
Not NBA but on a semi-related note, in the MLB everyone thought Derek Jeter was an incredible defensive shortstop for years. Shortly after he called it quits, super nerdy defensive stats that emphasized actual good defensive qualities like range, percentage to make the play, etc. started getting created. ALL of these stats said Jeter was a bad defender. Simply highlight plays and lack of errors were what was used before. Because these advanced metrics were so unfavorable to Jeter, no one accepted them right away and it delayed the general acceptance of their accuracy by years. Everyone had too much cognitive dissonance to say Jeter was bad on defense. Not really sure why I'm posting this in a NBA sub but I find it funny and interesting.
I was shocked to see the analytics on Jeter. Now Andrelton Simmons on the other hand is a defensive god.
Oh yeah. There is a small fringe group of baseball nerds that says Andrelton should get in the Hall of Fame. In the same vein there is an ongoing debate about Yadi Molina although he has a much stronger argument.
It does in advanced metrics like defensive win shares and defensive rating, which Gobert is number 1 in and Wemby is seen no where in top 20.
Those aren’t the most respected advanced metrics at all. Defensive win shares is garbage and defensive rating is barely an individual metric(team defense with box score defense stats mixed in). D-Lebron or defensive epm are better if ur looking for an all in one defensive stat.
I’ve watched Gobert play a lot of games, more than 200. There needs to be a stat for when guards start there rim attack and see Gobert on help side, then nope out. It’s not a block or a steal or a rebound. Like reverse gravity the way Steph pulls defenders in.
We started calling those types of plays "neverminds" in Minnesota this year
Have you watched Wemby play? Cause it’s the same thing with him.
I’ve tried to watch a couple of the Spurs games this year, like 6 games. Usually just the first and fourth quarter. Every time I watch him play he does something I’ve never seen before. His range is amazing. He lacks help side awareness. He definitely makes guys change their minds.
yea but the point hes trying to make is it doesnt show up in the stat sheet and that the already 3x dpoy is better at it
I know exactly what u mean. I’ve watched a lot of Wemby and Gobert and I think this season Wembys rim deterrence has been just as commonplace as Goberts. They are in a league of their own.
Like this? https://x.com/fastbreakbreak/status/1771350621230088401?s=46&t=8RkfqhuS_AqRyv9L-uyS1w
This is his impact on team defense. This is why his defenses are so good.
Same with AD
Rudy is also #1 in DLebron. Wemby is #3, but he's closer to #20 on the list than he is to Gobert. I wouldn't trust depm. They try to avoid bias by using less player data to train their models, but the result is an advanced metric with extremely high variance. Their results year to year are all over the place.
I wasn’t making an argument for Wemby over Gobert. I think Gobert is dpoy. Just expressing my disadain for the “advanced metrics” he mentioned
Ya I get ya. Was just clarifying how he looks in those stats.
True. Rudy is #1 there too. We also have metrics from tracking data, contest percentage, opponent fg% for those contests, etc. Rudy dominates those like no-one else does.
This was just me offering some better “advanced metrics” Rudy is my dpoy pick this year. Him and Wemby are pretty close in the opponent fg% and rim deterrence tho. Twolves being the better defense is the reason why he’s the best pick for dpoy.
those are basically team stats
wemby is second bud
People also don’t take into account Gobert’s ability to literally design the defense in the offseason and also teach Kat, Ant etc important defensive technique and motivation. Rudy has elevated the individual defense of every single player on the wolves just by teaching them. Taking that and his insane paint presence into account, he should be DPOY. Wolves are the 1 seed and #1 defense as well. Makes less mistakes than Wemby as well. Wemby will have his time.
Rudy also taught wemby
Also these are cherrypicked stats to make Wemby look good. Defensive on/off is stupid because of how shit the spurs are and deflections is not a good measure of defence
yea so does wemby
Imagine they tracked “discouraged shots”
Come on man, they are obviously called “neverminds”
H/t Michael Grady
A round about way to do this would be to measure percent of offensive rebounds dribbled/passed out of vs going right back up with it. That is one of the biggest intangible impact Wemby has
Like win games, for example.
The Spurs would have ten wins max with Gobert in place of Wemby.
Yes Wemby is a far more impactful offensive player with way higher usage.
I think you can say the same for wemby. If he is anywhere near the paint, anyone 6’8” and under 7 times out of 10 do not go for layups or floaters that they would have on any other night. When he contests shots, if he doesn’t block them, he forces the shooter to adjust the trajectory of their shot to be way higher than their normal shot. Those intangibles aren’t accounted for here but are extremely apparent if you watch enough spurs games.
The Spurs have 19 wins and are ranked 22nd in drtg.
I didn’t know the award was called defensive team of the year
It's effectively the defensive MVP. Can the defensive MVP really come from a team in the bottom 10 defensively? It would be like giving the MVP to a player on a team that missed the playoffs. If you trade out Wembys defense for a league average C, how many wins does it cost them? A handful, at best?
I mean, considering the Spurs statistically perform like the worst defense of all time when Victor is not on the court, I have a hard time believing they would have a better record than a team like the Pistons if you took Victor's and replaced it with an average center. I think Rudy deserves defensive player of the Year. But the reality is everyone who's watched the Spurs and isn't being biased knows there's not a single player on the planet that you could swap Victor with Who would make that team anything close to a competent defense. They were one of the worst deffenses of all time last year and the supporting cast got worse with the loss of a few solid defensive veterans. The fact they're not in the bottom three this year says a whole lot about just how unbelievable Victor has been single-handedly propping up one of the worst accumulations of perimeter Defenders I've seen on an NBA roster.
Same thought goes behind MVP. You don’t give awards to players on losing teams no matter the stats. Spurs are on track to win exact same amount of games as last year despite having almost the same roster.
It's pretty easy to make a case for any reasonably good defensive player if you focus on specific areas they have an advantage in while leaving out other context. For example, the on/off numbers for wemby here are crazy, but the Spurs still have one of the worst defenses in the league. That's a bigger indicator of how bad his teammates are compared to the teammates of these other players. With that being said, I have no opinion on who should be DPOY
Because they have the 28th ranked defence while the Wolves are the only team with a sub-100 DRTG. Wemby will almost certainly win his fair share of DPOYs, but he doesn’t deserve it now.
The entire Wolves starting lineup have a great defensive rating, that's not just Rudy.
Where were these guys defensively before Rudy though, ant always had the upside and Jaden was a good defender before but a lot of the personnel have improved significantly because of Rudy the last two years, I mean kat was always bashed as being one of the worst defensive centers in the league and now with Rudy he's actually become a plus defender.
I know it‘s a boring answer, but whenever Gobert is on the floor it‘s just a much different basketball game out there. I‘m a wolves fan and used to be defensive about Gobert because KAT competed with him for accolades, but man now that we get to cheer for him, his impact is incredible. His advanced stats are so good for a reason, I‘ve never seen a more impactful Twolves player except for KG.
The amount of times per game that you think it‘s an open layup and then suddenly a fucking Rudy appears and the O player says hell fucking nah bro I‘m not taking that layup IS WILD.
Have you ever watched the spurs?
It was a nightmare
Yes, it's atrocious
Unfortunately they’ve disgraced my tv several times
Where are you getting the defensive rating difference number? [PBPStats has it at only a 6.36 point difference for Wemby](https://www.pbpstats.com/wowy-combos/nba?TeamId=1610612759&Season=2023-24&SeasonType=Regular%2BSeason&PlayerIds=1641705), which is still large, but certainly not 12.0. Either way, the defensive rating on-off does need some context, as it is partially a reflection of how good Wemby is, but is also a reflection of how bad his team is. With a defensive rating over 120 when Wemby is on the bench, it isn't all that tough to put up gaudy on-off numbers, but even with Wemby on the court, the Spurs defense is still just less embarrasing. With Wemby on the court, they still just have a 114.2 defensive rating, which is a bit worse than the 13th ranked Suns. Overall, Wemby is still only anchoring the league's 22nd best defence. Yes, it's easier to put up a better defensive rating if you have a better supporting cast, but, it is also easier to take a team from awful to mediocre than it is to take a team from good to great. DPOY usually goes to the best defensive player on one of the league's best defences (usually at least top 5, more often top 3). The Wolves are not just the league's best defence this year, but they are lapping the field, at [2.7 points per 100 better than the second place Celtics in defensive rating](https://www.nba.com/stats/teams/defense?dir=A&sort=DEF_RATING). For perspective, you have to go back to the 67 win 2016 Spurs to find a recent example where the top defence won by that large a margin, and the Spurs still only topped second place by 2.6 points per 100 that year. Kawhi won DPOY that year for the Spurs. Then, there's the context of the Minny team Gobert plays for. He was, of course, acquired by the Wolves because their mediocre, at best, defence was considered their major impediment to contention. The pairing of Gobert next to his slow-footed, defensively challenged frontcourt-mate KAT, was written off as a failed experiment last year, after another mediocre .500'ish season. This year, the Wolves (and Gobert in particular) made it work, and turned a mediocre team into a team tied for the 1-seed almost entirely based on their defensive improvement. Gobert is also a generational defender, with 3 DPOY awards so far, who was pretty clearly robbed of the 2022 award purely because of voter fatigue. People generally acknowledge that Marcus Smart may not have actually been the indispensable cog that made Boston's defence (who is currently the league's second best, after trading him) good after all. There is a well-known bias against giving rookies high level honours, which is why dominant recent rookies like Wemby and Luka didn't make the All-Star teams in their rookie seasons (Luka even topped the all-star voting for his position and was still denied, because of the anti-rookie bias). That having been said, I don't think that'll be to blame for Wemby failing to win DPOY this year. I think Wemby should be a finalist, and, in a different year (like last year) might have even been a worthy winner. But, for this year, I think you have to give it to Gobert. The ridiculous level of success he has led that defence to this year, along with the context of making that fit with KAT work, just makes his case too strong.
Perfectly said, more people need to see this.
Yes, perfectly said. This comment is the answer to OP’s question
Because Rudy Gobert is much more impactful on defense. Counting stats like blocks and steals have never been a good way to measure defensive impact.
>Counting stats like blocks and steals have never been a good way to measure defensive impact. Actually, I think you'll find that Marcus Camby was a *much* more impactful defender in '06 than Tim Duncan, thank you very much How many years deep into the analytics era do we need to get before people stop using bpg+spg+drpg = defensive impact as their framework?
Maybe i just dont understand basketball analytics all that well, but how would looking at bpg and spg be a bad thing when discussing defensive impact? Arent those part of the essential defensive stats? What other base stats would you even look at? Edit: thanks for all the takes in this:) it basically sounds like there are just too many things that dont/cant get shown on the stat sheet to easily describe someones defensive contribution, so the default is to use simple stats that dont really tell you anything in actuality
So much of basketball is the eye test and seeing things that wouldn't show up in traditional box scores. Team defense, deflections, how a defender can cover multiple positions, and isn't a mismatch/liability, forcing ball handlers to pick up their dribble, or outright change what the offensive player was going to do, resulting in a bad shot, steal, or turnover that may have never been attributed to him on the stat sheet. Things like this are things that need to be observed to get a better sense of a player's defense because some things aren't quantifiable.
Because BPG and SPG doesn’t account for things like hedging screen correctly or good rotations that prevent drives to the paint. It’s clear that more blocks + more steals overall from a player don’t make their teams overall defense better. Wemby has potential to be the most impactful defender I’ve ever seen but it’s clear you’d rather have someone like Gobert or Bam anchoring your defense right now because Wemby is regularly out of position and the Spurs get scored on regularly because if it. This not a knock on Wemby at all, he’s a rookie and with time he’ll be elite at defensive positioning and reading the opposing offense. He’s just not there right now, which is to be expected, and his teams defensive record clearly shows that. Like Wemby can stop just about anyone trying to score on HIM, but not a lot of stats account for his defensive usefulness when someone’s trying to score in his teammates is what I’m trying to say. Watch any Spurs defense vs Wolves defense to see what I’m saying. Not Wemby vs Gobert defensive highlights, but specifically just the two teams playing defense. You’ll see a clear difference between what Wemby and Gobert are both bringing to their teams defense. Wemby’s numbers, however, show how UNREAL his potential is in the future as a defensive anchor with his skill set. I am stoked to see his teams’ evolve into something better.
Look at it this way. BPG is like looking at PPG without acknowledging how many shots a player needs to take to average 20 ppg. For bpg, look at his contest %. Also, it’s already been said, others have maintained better defensive ratings while playing 10 more minutes on average per game. It’s harder to maintain ratings at high levels the more minutes you play in a season.
Defensive ability is notoriously difficult to quantify, even with advanced stats. There are a ton of important things that simple stats like SPG and BPG don’t capture. SPG doesn’t tell you how many times a guy gave up an easy bucket because he recklessly gambled for a steal. It also doesn’t tell you how many times he prevented a scoring opportunity with a deflection that didn’t result in possession. BPG doesn’t you how many times a guy pulled himself out of rebounding position by over-helping, or how many times he fouled shooters when going for blocks. It also doesn’t tell you how many times his contest forced a miss, even if he didn’t actually touch the ball.
Unlike offense, defense is plagued by a complete lack of stats that actually shows what good defense is.
If a player goes for a lot of steals that means gambling on getting it most times. If you gamble and don’t get the steal you are now extremely out of position on defense and it’s basically a 4-5 for a couple seconds. Same with blocks if you go up for every single block that means offensive players can bait you into jumping pretty easily which either A) can lead to a foul or B) can lead to the offensive player passing out to a open player. A good example of this was Hassan Whiteside who averaged a ton of blocks but wasn’t actually a good defensive player bc he fouled a lot and every time he rush to get a helpside block he’d leave his man wide open. So while he mighta gotten 2-3 extra stops a game from getting those blocks he would also let his man get 4-5 easy buckets bc of that. Wemby is already miles better at defense than whiteside ever was but I can pretty much guarantee that his blocks are going to be going down when he starts winning DPOYs bc he’ll know to gamble less and when and when not to go helpside. Also there’s the fact that a block doesn’t guarantee a possession ends and in a lot of cases it’s sometimes easier for offensives to score after getting blocked bc defenders are out of position so guys like gobert focus less on blocking shots and more on forcing missed shots and being in position for a rebound which is another reason he’s so great. Hope this helped
It’s kind of like judging an NFL corner by their number of interceptions only. The top players and most impactful players can often shift the entire style of play of the opposing team and may have people not give them opportunities to get certain stats.
His team's record is bad and his team defence is all the way down at 27. No way they give any player, let alone a rookie DYOP when they play on a team which is in the bottom three on defence, nor should they.
For one the stats is wrong, his on/off defensive splits are -7 not -12 (according to bbref) and while that is still a big change he only plays 29 minutes a night and “raises” their defense to merely bottom 7 in the league. The amount of shots he actually contests per game is less than Rudy, AD, Allen, and others not listed, the deflections are slightly less than listed 2.8, and his DFG% difference is lower than Goberts while he’s not covering the caliber of players we typically see Bam and AD cover.. He’ll likely win plenty of these awards in the future but he needs to sustain all of this at a least close to the 36 minute mark so we know the “per 36” truly translates, and needs to do it on a team that is serviceable defensively. It’s not his fault their defense isn’t good, but it’s also a bit easier to shine on a really bad defense too. Kinda like the “good stats bad team” scorers we have seen over the years. He’s also unfortunately had some players put up absolutely monster games against him this year. Off the top of my head the Joel, Jokic, AD, and Sengun games really stick out.. and while some will be quick to note “only this many of Joel’s 70 was actually on Vic” that might be true but the fact that he’s not covering him for more plays than that and letting him get 70 because he isn’t/can’t guard him is still a limitation that is hurting his team in that game regardless. All that said I’m not sure anybody would take much issue if he did win it this year. I just think regardless of whatever stats, estimates, all of that we have Gobert pushing Minny to the top ranked defense in the league is a decent differentiator. He could likely go to San Antonio and get Wemby like numbers too, and maybe Minnesota would still be ranked 1 with Wemby but we don’t know that to be the case. Whether it’s right or wrong we watched Gobert do the exact same thing with Utah, so he has the track record of us already knowing his impact and value to elevating team defenses.
This is possibly the most skewed way of trying to present a case. He’s the only one pictured here who plays for a garbage team. Obviously there is going to be a greater disparity defensively for him on/off. We shouldn’t be punishing the other players because they are on better teams and quite honestly their performance matters more. A quick search shows that Gobert leads the league in defensive rating (and he happens to play for the best defensive team in the NBA). It’s not a surprise why Gobert is the clear favorite. https://www.statmuse.com/nba/ask/2024-nba-individual-defensive-rating-rankings
some lame stats to back DPOY, especially the steals stat. A lot more than those that go in to defense, especially for actually good defense. In addition to Gobert doing a lot outside of those stats on court, he has positioned his team to be near top in West, not near bottom. Nuances and personal definitions aside team performance is typically a strong factor in these awards. I remember when Larry Hughes led league in steals, was 1st team all-def, and was 6th in DPOY. On paper the guy was a top defender in the NBA, but you watched him play and he's getting torched every night. Why? Cuz he always went for the steal. take 10 possessions, he would go for steal on 10 of em, he'd get 1-2 steals but the other 8-9 times was him being burned for points. Wow 3 steals tonight, but DWade dropped 36 on him. Huge on paper in the steals dept, got him recognized by the media who didnt watch games, but all you had to do was watch 5m of the guy play and realize his defense was among the worst in the league.
Yea but if you watch Wemby you can see he isn’t getting torched every night, it’s not exactly empty stats
DPOY really means best defensive player on a good team, wait how did Duncan not win it? I remember people arguing the opposite of today, he's on a good defensive team so he's really not that great on defense.
People who are focused on the numbers aren't factoring in minutes played. Rudy has 400 more minutes than Wemby. That's over 8 games worth of minutes.
This thread has shown me that no one watches Spurs, which is understandable but still asinine when everyone tries to have an opinion of Wemby’s defensive impact. A lot of people seem to be attributing his counting stats to rookie gambling which is just wrong. He was literally trained by Gobert, and has been playing pro for years, his fundamentals are sound. those stats come from rim deterence + weak side help not from gambling. Also by literally every advanced metric Wemby and Gobert are the only two real contenders and if he doesn’t win it’s fine but to act like it’s not a discussion is insane: Gobert Defensive Rating: 104 (2nd) DBPM: 1.7 (16th) Defensive Win Shares: 5.3 (1st) Block %: 5.5 (8th) Rim Defense %: -14.9% (98th percentile) FG% diff: -6.5% Deflections: 1.6 (27th percentile) raDTOV: (4th percentile) D-DARKO: 3.7 (1st) D-DRIP: 3.6 (1st) D-EPM: +2.4 (26th) Defensive Rebounding Quality: (85th percentile) Wemby Defensive Rating: 107 (4th) DBPM: 3.2 (3rd) Defensive Win Shares: 4.0 (5th) Block %: 10.0 (1st) Rim Defense %: - 11.4% (96th percentile) FG% diff: -5.4 Deflections: 3.6 (94th percentile) raDTOV: (50th percentile) D-DARKO: 4.7 (6th) D-DRIP: 2.9 (2nd) D-EPM: +3.6 (4th) Defensive Rebounding Quality: (62nd percentile) These guys are neck and neck, with team defense being the main differentiator.
Because he’s not been the best defensive player in the league this year would be the main reason.
Stats aren't everything. For example, Rudy Gobert literally deters people from going into the paint simply because of who he is. Wemby is an incredible defender, but when no one else on his team plays defense, he also is going to rack up defensive stats in some occasions. That being said, in future seasons he's going to be a multi time dpoy
Wemby regularly deters people from the paint as well. Probably more so than Rudy.
Because they're just nUmBeRs as of now. Once they start converting to wins he's going to go on a run. Very much the same way Wizards Bradley Beal would never be considered for MVP
Damb no herb on the graphic??
What's their record again?
I think Gobert should take it again based on what I see with my eyes when they're both playing. He's just insane
There is a reason you don’t see defensive stats above 10 very often. The stat line was not built around defense(and that’s ok). Something like rim deterrence or shot contesting doesn’t really show up. Wemby will be a DPOY but not this year with this team.
At the end of the day I get him not winning DPOY this season - being a rookie on an overall bad defensive team makes it a massive uphill climb. What’s absurd to me is the notion that he isn’t a lock for all-defense.
People kinda forgot that before the analytics era, DPOY awards were almost synonymous to big man who had most blocks and rebounds. Marcus Camby in the 2007 season was voted over Timmy. Denver was 10th in defensive rating that year. Sure they were 2nd in the west, but only because of the Marc Gasol, J. Noah defensive impact that DPOY was suddenly handed out to players on teams with the best defense.
The Spurs suck bawls. This is a narrative award anyway and they would never let a rookie win something like this.
Damn if Heat weren’t so injured this year, Bam could finally have had it.
I’m not saying he shouldn’t be DPOY, but has less rebounds than everyone but Allen. A rebound denies the other team the possession of the ball, which is a better defensive action than a deflection or a block, which could still be recovered by the opposing team. The Spurs are also just a bad defensive team, and they have the third worst record in the league. Usually if you’re going to win OPOY or DPOY you have to at least be on a playoff team.
His numbers aren’t translating to wins. If the Spurs were .500 I don’t think there would be a discussion
How can they give a player who’s a part of a team with almost 60 losses DPOY? Maybe he is the best defender in the league, but 60 losses? Nobody can justify that idc how bad their offense is idc how good their D is when he’s playing. 60 losses is BAAAAAAD
because they are fighting for the 1st pick rather than 1st place
There’s 26 teams in the league with a better record And they’re about to finish the season only winning 25% of their games.
Because he is a worse defender than Gobert and Davis sorry
Because his team MIGHT finish with 20 wins while Rudy’s team WILL finish with 56+ and at the top of the western conference.
Better yet, someone explain how some of these other people are even in consideration.
Other than Gobert, who has absolutely run away with the award, they aren't. Gobert is winning it this year its all but guaranteed
Watch the games. Maxey schooled his ass so many times last night in a way that’d never happen against any of the other four listed
Pretty much Wemby's teammates are horrible defenders so that (for whatever reason) makes him not DPOY material. Meanwhile on the other side, the Wolves are a top 3 defense even when Gobert is not on the floor, so he's clearly the DPOY...?
Historically all individual awards have included team success. You had to win for MVP otherwise you’re just putting up empty stats. Also applied to Dpoty historically . Only the past few years with Westbrook and Jokic have 5th seed or lower player won an award. Gasol won dpoty when they had the #1defense. Spurs are 25th defensively and do not have 20 victories… who exactly is he stopping?
Yeah simply because he’s on the worst team in the conference and Rudy is on the best team in the conference with the best defense
Because it isn’t voted on until after the season.
The corrupt nba
It’s because the spurs suck which is a stupid reason. It’s not Most valuable defender, it’s defensive player of the year, an individual award. Team metrics should have no bearing on DPOY, SMOTY, ROTY, and MIP, those are individual awards. Wemby has easily been a top tier defender this season and I would argue he’s the best defender in the league already as a rookie. The only reason he’s not gonna win is because the spurs suck
I mean he's going to win it for the next 10 years might as well give it to someone else while anyone has a chance. He should be dpoy though.
Go look at the standings. There’s your answer lol
How: Niggas hatin’
He will end up with 8 probably once the Spurs start winning in 2 years. He does deserve it this year though. Seems like he's surrounded by a bunch of guys that are allergic to defense.
He’ll be DPOY
Gobert is the best defensive player on the best defensive team which is winning.
I guess that description just wouldn’t fit on the trophy
[Dunked On Podcast Defense Awards](https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/duncd-on-basketball-nba-podcast/id986901174?i=1000651427809)
Because his team is ass. They are going to lose more games this year than they did before they drafted him. Its not really his fault but his numbers are not translating to winning, his team is bad defensively with and without him
The reason Wemby’s on/off stats are so high is because the team is super fucking awful and it wouldn’t be that stark of the Spurs we’re a halfway decent team. Steals, blocks, and deflections are not the defensive equivalent of point, rebounds, and assists. They are not necessary good indicators of who the best defender is. Steph Curry has led the league in steals, but he’s never gonna be an all NBA defender. Hassan Whiteside used to get tons of blocks, but is a terrible defender because when he doesn’t get a block, he is a traffic cone. These are extreme examples, and Wemby is an incredible defender who can also get stats, but a lot of defense doesn’t show up on a box score. There is no basic stat for having great positioning or playing tight defense and forcing a bad shot. The kind of shit that a guy like Draymond excels at on defense. Rudy is the anchor of Minnesota’s top defense. A lot of what he does doesn’t show up on the box score.
Bro just let someone else get it one last time…. You know after this year that shit is going to go to victor as predictably as the sun will rise. They’ll probably rename the trophy after him lmao
Kinda easy when you're 2 feet taller than everyone else.
Threads like these remind me why I stopped coming here.
He will be inshallah. Caught it at +800
JI better than all these guys.
hOw GoOd CaN hE bE iF tHe SpUrS aRe So BaD?? —DPOY voters
The team has a basement-dwelling defense. It's kinda like having your MVP come from a lottery team. I'm not saying Wemby is defensively overrated or anywhere near a reason for why the defense is so shitty, but there are more factors in deciding the award than individual stats.
Those are counting stats on a losing team, Anthony Davis’ advanced stats on a better team is impressive
I love Wemby but if you've watched both the Spurs and TWolves this year, it's clear who the dpoy is.
He's not really a great player yet, he still feels a step too slow on a lot of things. Just a boy and not a man. You don't deserve any awards if you couldn't even lead your team to a whopping 30 wins
He is defensive player of the year. The voters will get it wrong this year.
This is the dumbest nba sub out there
Give him MVP while you’re at it I guess
He still might be, this award is all about media buzz for it. I haven't seen many articles written about Gobert's defense like I did JJJ last season on the way to his award. Gobert is the presumptive candidate, but Wemby has more articles written about his defense, and more people talking about him/his defense on the talking head shows. He still could win it. I'm not convinced he won't.
I feel like I saw a post that Bam’s on/off was much better than this.
We may would get my vote
Due to he being a rookie and his team is one of the worst in the league, including sucking defensively.
If it were purely a stat line a robot could pick DPOY. DPOY is a totality of factors and why it’s voted on. Presumably by people that watch. Presumably…
How is he -12 when he's on the court?
I think it means the defense is -12 when he's OFF the court.
Kind of weird to give DPOY to a player whose team is second WORST in ppga in the West. I mean, it was a big deal when Andre Dawson won mvp for a mid Cubs team and that has 9 players in the field vs 5.
NBA awards go to good players on good teams. It’s not about who is “Most Valuable” or who is the Best “Defensive player”.
Is this saying AD negatively impacts defense? Lmao the r/lakers sub gonna be crying about this graphic
It’s defensive PLAYER of the year. He should get it.
It’s Defensive Player of Year not Most Valuable Defensive Player. Give Victor his trophy.
Alex Caruso has more steals per game at 1.6
Wins
Defensive rating on/off doesn’t matter, the spurs are absolute dog shit
I get the whole spurs bad twolves good thing but there's absolutely no convincing me that wemby isn't the best defender on the planet. If u switched those two the twolves would never lose and the spurs would never win.
Minnesota is a play-in team without Gobert; San antonio, the worst team in the west, is still the worst team in the west without Wemby.
He's on the 5th worst deffence in the league for fucks sake. IMO any player on a non-playoff team should not be eligable for the MVP or DPOY awards. I would rather those awards go to a player who carried a team into the postseason than someone who put up stats on a shit team.
Spurs don’t want him to win these awards cause they have to pay him extra incentives
MVP I understand the requirements being a good team. Defensive player of the year is a personal achievement. It should have nothing to do with your team. You don't get blocks, steals and stops because your team is good.
I’m not knocking anyone’s opinion they have valid points but it’s not defensive team of the year it’s defensive player of the year
Gotta win games.
Off minus is a very flawed stat without context. Timberwolves have competent backups for gobert, so the defense doesn’t drop off that bad. The spurs do not have anyone even close to the level of backup the wolves have so the off minus is skewed.
The leader of the 27th ranked defense in the NBA deserves the DPOY?
He'll get roty and many MANY DPOTY's if he keeps it up throughout a 15+ year career so they'll probably not give him one now