Nylon Calculus: The NBA’s best low-reaching rebounders

As more NBA teams move towards small ball and nontraditional lineups, getting rebounding from everywhere is increasingly important. Who are the NBA’s best rebounders, inch for inch?

What makes a great rebounder? Smart positioning is important. Having strong box-out technique, top-tier bounce, and good hands also help. There’s one more trait so obvious it might not have even crossed your mind — height.

The NBA’s three all-time leading rebounders are, in order: Wilt Chamberlain (7-foot-1), Bill Russell (6-foot-10), and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (7-foot-2). Outside of the generational outliers — think Dennis Rodman or Charles Barkley — rebound leaderboards are almost always populated by the league’s tallest players.

Which makes sense. Rebounding requires being the first one to grab a ball that ricochets off of a 10-foot-tall rim. In the race for the rebound, the tallest players get a head start.

But rebounding ability isn’t best measured by total rebounds. Raw rebound totals don’t account for the number of opportunities a player has to rebound the basketball, or for the times when a player’s box out clears the way for teammates to grab the ball. To address these concerns, we use rebound rate (also called rebound percentage) and % Team Reb When Box Out.

Rebound rate is the percent of all missed shots that a player rebounds while on the court. % Team Reb When Box Out is the percent of the time a player’s team gets the rebound when that player boxes out.

The 2019-20 NBA regular-season leader in rebound rate (min. 2,000 possessions) was Cleveland Cavaliers’ center Andre Drummond, who snagged 22.9 percent of all missed shots while he was on the floor. Drummond also finished fifth in % Team Reb When Box Out, at 94.8 percent (min. 100 box outs).

Drummond is 6-foot-10, making it easier for him to grab a board than, say, 6-foot Kyle Lowry. Focus only on players Lowry’s size, however, and the Raptors guard looks like a glass-cleaning machine: his 6.6 percent rebound rate led the league among players 6-foot or shorter.

Players like Lowry deserve credit for doing their best in a category inherently stacked against them. Here’s an attempt to give them that credit, an ode to the “short kings” who rebound well for their shortened stature.

How are the NBA’s best rebounders by height?

“Short king” probably isn’t the most accurate descriptor for these guys. After all, every player on this list stands at least 3 inches taller than the average American male (5-foot-9) and at least 5 inches taller than this vertically-challenged author (5-foot-7). But I’m sticking with it.

Memphis Grizzlies guard De’Anthony Melton stands out on the graph. Melton ate up 8.7 percent of all misses while he was on the court, more than 1.5 times higher than the next-best player at his height (Damian Lillard — 5.3 percent).

At every height, the best rebounders tend to be heavier than the worst, as hefty frames help players establish and hold position when boxing out opponents.

The Golden State Warriors rebounded 96.1 percent of all missed shots when Eric Paschall boxed out, the highest mark in the league. Paschall is only 6-foot-6. Let’s also give a hand to P.J. Tucker, who somehow managed to finish 12th in total box outs at 6-foot-5 and 35 years old.