Rebounding Rates and the 2014/15 “J.J. Hickson All-Stars”
At first glance, the rebounding column in the box score seems like a relatively straightforward indicator of how good of a player’s rebounding ability. Increasingly, however, I’ve come to believe that how many rebounds a player gets has very little to do with how good of a rebounder they are. The difference between the top and bottom quartile of defensive rebounders among big men is only about two defensive rebounds per 36 minutes, and a lot of factors goes into whether or not you grab those two extra rebounds that has nothing to with providing value to a team. Stealing rebounds from teammates, or diligently boxing out and allowing your guards to pick up the rebound, can quite easily increase/decrease a player’s rebounding totals by an extra board or two without having any effect on the game. And chasing boards recklessly without boxing out can often be harmful to a team.
Chris Bosh is the most often wrongly criticized player who comes to mind here– Bosh has averaged fewer than six defensive rebounds per 36 minutes over the past three seasons, and the number of times he’s been called ‘soft’ around the basket during that time reflects a poor understanding of what he provides on the boards. In aggregate, the Miami Heat have rebounded better with Bosh on the court over his five season tenure with the team, and in a couple of years by a significant margin. Clearly if the Heat rebound better with Bosh on the court, he can’t be doing everything wrong.
At the other end of the spectrum, we have a player like J.J. Hickson. For his career Hickson has averaged 7.4 defensive rebounds and 11.0 rebounds per 36 minutes, ranking him 24th and 19th respectively among active players. On the court the slightly undersized big man looks prolific rebounder– flying around the floor and pulling down boards at a high rate. However in six of his seven NBA seasons, Hickson’s teams have rebounded better with him off the floor, which should give pause considering Hickson is near the top-10 in rebounding rates every season. Over the past 3 seasons with Hickson on the court, his teams have rebounded 3.7% worse on the defensive end, equivalent to the difference between the 5th ranked Jazz and 23rd ranked Raptors in defensive rebounding rate last season.
From the 2014-2015 NBA season, I compiled a list of players who averaged 7 or more rebounds per game, but whose teams rebounded better without them on the court on the defensive end by a margin of at least 1 percent (aptly name the J.J. Hickson all-stars of the year).
The most surprising player on the list is Andre Drummond, who averaged 9.6 defensive rebounds per 36 minutes (the fourth highest mark last season) And in his three seasons, overall the Pistons have actually rebounded slightly better with Drummond off the court.
The Pacers have typically improved tremendously on the offensive glass with Roy Hibbert on the court, while defensively there hasn’t been much of a difference. Last season that changed, and the Pacers rebounded better on both ends of the court even though Hibbert averaged a career high 7.2 defensive rebounds per 36 minutes.
The anti-J.J. Hickson star of the NBA over the past few seasons has been Marc Gasol. Gasol didn’t even actually make the filter, since he wasn’t one of 51 players who averaged 7+ defensive rebounds per game. However the Grizzlies rebounded 3.6 percent better with him on the floor on defense, which is a higher number than any of the players on the list above. This is especially impressive considering his replacement last season, Kosta Koufos, is a solid rebounder.