Can JaVale McGee really be the Warriors’ secret weapon?
When JaVale McGee was on the court for the Warriors during the regular season, they went to a level nobody in the NBA could compete with. According to NBA.com, they scored 121.4 points per 100 possessions and held teams to 102.7 points per 100 possessions with him in the lineup. Not only did that give him the best net differential on the team, that offensive efficiency was 8.2 points per 100 possessions better than what the Warriors averaged on the season and the latter would’ve been as good as the Jazz, the third-best defense in the league.
Some of McGee’s success screams small sample size — it’s easier for him to look better than Stephen Curry statistically in 1,899 less minutes — but it’s starting to become a trend nobody can ignore. In the first three games against the Blazers in these playoffs, the Warriors found themselves trailing by four points in the 105 minutes McGee wasn’t on the court. With him on the court, they outscored the Blazers by 51 points in 39 minutes. The Warriors ended the series averaging 132.5 points per 100 possession with McGee in the lineup while giving up only 90.3 points per 100 possessions.
Knowing what McGee’s been through to this point in his career, it’s hard to believe he’s having this great of an impact on team that is the front-runner to win the title this season. But given his physical tools and his defined role alongside Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant and Draymond Green, maybe we shouldn’t be surprised. Curry admitted the Warriors look for him too much at times because “he can do something spectacular above the rim,” which certainly isn’t something they can say about Zaza Pachulia.
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Sometimes those possessions Curry is talking about end in a telegraphed pass the other team easily picks off. More often than not, though, they end up like this:
That’s McGee — an athletic 7-footer who uses his 7-foot-6 wingspan to provide the sort of vertical spacing few other players can — at his best. When he’s surrounded by four players who can each pass, dribble and shoot, it makes the Warriors unstoppable offensively for obvious reasons. If the defense scrambles to take one of those pass, dribble or shoot options away, McGee will slip to the basket for an alley-oop.
However, back off of any of them out of fear of the alley-oop and one of them will create a high percentage shot for themselves or someone else. It’s exactly what happens to Noah Vonleh on this possession. He chooses to stick to McGee on the roll rather than preventing Thompson, a three-time All-Star who averaged a career-high 22.3 points per game this season, from getting an open layup.
McGee’s ability to roll hard to the basket can also create mismatches at the point of attack for Curry if teams decide to switch the pick-and-roll. McGee isn’t much of a threat in the post, but Curry ranked in the 93.2 percentile in isolation scoring this season. He can easily create his own shot if he gets a bigger player on him and McGee, who finished the regular season behind only Joakim Noah in offensive rebounding rate, can attack the glass against a smaller defender.
Making McGee more valuable is he knows where to position himself on offense in order to put his defender in a tricky situation. If they leave him to guard the ball handler, he’ll quickly cut to the basket for a layup or dunk. He’s second in points off of cuts in the playoffs and he’s made 11 of his 13 opportunities. In total, those possessions have accounted for 52.0 percent of his offense.
It might not look like much, but having a 7-footer who simply has the hands to catch passes on the move and finish them at a high rate is incredibly valuable on any team. It helps that McGee also runs the floor hard in transition and makes himself a huge target for quick outlet passes. Curry, Thompson and Durant are some of the best transition scorers in the NBA — they each ranked in the 70th percentile or better during the regular season —‚so their gravity often means McGee is an afterthought.
Just watch how McGee beats CJ McCollum, Moe Harkless, Evan Turner and Vonleh down the court. Damian Lillard picks up Curry out of fear of the transition 3-pointer, which leaves McGee totally unguarded for yet another alley-oop. His combination of size, speed and athleticism has always been tantalizing and he’s finally putting it to good use consistently on the Warriors with these sorts of plays.
In general, McGee’s ability to get out in transition, roll to the basket and exploit openings makes him a better fit offensively than Pachulia in the starting lineup. The question with McGee is whether or not he can hang with elite teams on the other end of the floor. He’s always been a high volume shot blocker, but he has a history of chasing blocks and getting into foul trouble. He’s also struggled defending pick-and-rolls in the past, which is a death sentence in today’s pick-and-roll-heavy NBA.
The promising news for the Warriors is McGee’s defense has improved this season. Although the Blazers had little-to-no chance winning a series against the Warriors, they have two of the best pick-and-roll and isolation scorers in the NBA. It should’ve given them a recipe to run McGee off the floor when he was in the game, but possessions like this…
…this…
…this…
…and this showed a side of him we haven’t seen much of before.
The Warriors will obviously need more of that effort from McGee moving forward because they’ll have to deal with some combination of Chris Paul, James Harden, Kawhi Leonard, Gordon Hayward and Mike Conley on their road back to the NBA Finals. They are each different threats in the pick-and-roll — Paul feasts on midrange pull-ups, for example, whereas Harden relies on 3-pointers and layups — but McGee has proven the ability to stick with dynamic guards well enough in those situations to at least earn a look against the likes of the Rockets, Cavaliers and Spurs.
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None of this is to say McGee should necessarily start for the Warriors and play upwards of 30 minutes per game for the remainder of the playoffs, either. It’s best to think of him as a star in his role off the bench. Curry, Thompson, Durant and Green have and always will do the heavy lifting, so McGee’s ability to change the course of a game in five minute stretches comes as a huge plus. It’s why he’s the perfect secret weapon for them as they look to take care of unfinished business.