34 Giannis Numbers

Not long ago, when Giannis highlights and stories started showing up on national websites, you could easily find some version of this in the comment section:

This guy is incredibly overhyped. He's athletic and interesting, but can we wait until he actually does something significant before we crown him a future All-NBA player? I don't ask for much, either dominance at lower levels or even a full game of brilliance at this one. However, he's done neither. As of now, he's a non-difference maker on the worst team in the league, playing in the worst conference in recent memory.

The rise of this sentiment arose in reaction to people who were excited about individual moments of brilliance from a player who was averaging seven points and two assists per game. At the time, Giannis did not have the numbers to suggest superstardom, but you were unlikely to go out of your way to take a stance like the person quoted above if you were watching the Bucks every night. No one was crowning him right then and there, but Giannis let you see the future, if you bothered to pay attention.

Now, Giannis is so full of numbers that it was hard to limit this story to just 34 of them. Now, he passes the eye test and has the numbers to match. Which of course simply means that people will start to question Giannis if he does not carry the Bucks to the playoffs, and then if he does not make the second round. Eventually, they will say he is not clutch or he is not a leader, and then they will say he cannot win a championship and then that he cannot win two championships. If we are lucky, and it seems we could be…

Here they are:

That is his assist-to-turnover ratio after All-Star Weekend – better than twice as good as what he put up (1.12) before the break.

With Giannis on the court, the Bucks posted an offensive rating of 106.4 (coincidentally, this was the league average). With him off the court, the Bucks were at 100.4 (this was slightly worse than the Lakers and slightly better than 76ers).

Despite a sharp increase in offensive responsibilities and production, Giannis posted a career-best turnover percentage of 14.8. His turnover percentage has dropped from 19.4 to 15.6 to 14.8 over his three seasons. (It is more educational to look at it this way rather than per game turnover numbers, which have gone up largely due to increased minutes.)

Seconds in the shot clock. At times, whether the Bucks were down by 12 in the second quarter or up by 8 in the first quarter, Giannis would let the ball roll as far as possible, to midcourt perhaps, on the inbound. In the half-court offense (after the other team has scored), having more shot clock to work with is always a good thing. Like most of the little things, Giannis gets this.

Giannis held opposing offensive players to 1.8 percent below the normal field goal percentage of the shooter. Similar to his first two seasons, opponents shot better than average against Giannis on threes and on long twos, while shooting far below average closer to the hoop, including -8.8 percent within five feet of the hoop.

Giannis ran 193 miles during games this season, eighth-most in the NBA. That adds up to 2.41 miles per game.

Giannis shot 57.3 percent from the field off passes from pal Jabari Parker, his highest field goal percentage on passes from any individual player. Meanwhile, Parker received far more passes (and made far more field goals as a result) from Giannis than anyone on the team.

He scored 350 points in transition, 10th-most in the NBA. Among players in the top-50 in points in transition, only LeBron James (73.3 percent) had a better field goal percentage in transition than Giannis (67.9 percent).

Giannis averaged 3.9 points off turnovers per game, seventh-most in the league.

Most of the shots Giannis attempted this season came from within three feet of the basket (50.9 percent). And he took even fewer shots from the midrange than the previous season.

Giannis made 4.6 field goals per game in the restricted area, fourth-most in the NBA behind LeBron James, DeMarcus Cousins and Andre Drummond, and just ahead of DeAndre Jordan and Dwight Howard. Teams cannot stop him close to the basket. This relates to the next one.

Free throws made. Giannis increased his free throws attempted and made on a per-minute basis. Most stars get to the line a lot, and Giannis should be in the top-10 sooner rather than later. For now, he ranked 23rd in free throws made and 21st in free throw attempts.

Free throw percentage. League average was 75.7 percent, and he shot 74.1 percent the previous season, so there is room for improvement here. If he is going to spend a lot of time at the line, this is important. Giannis was in the 80s going into December but struggled a bit at the line in the final three months of the season, when he excelled at just about everything else.

Giannis was just as likely to score 26+ points as he was to be held to single digits in points. He had 12 games of each. Prior to this season, he had scored 26+ points in a game twice and had been held to single-digits in points 74 times. He is good now.

Giannis posted a 23.1 PER following All-Star Weekend. To put that in perspective, a 23.1 PER would have ranked 12th-best in the league over the course of the full season.

Overall, Giannis finished with an 18.8 PER. That marked the second straight season that he increased his PER by exactly 4.0, going from 10.8 to 14.8 to 18.8. Another increase of 4.0 next season would be incredible. Incredibly, it feels possible.

After missing the season opener due to a suspension stemming from decking Mike Dunleavy Jr. in the Game 6 home loss to the Bulls the season prior, Giannis went on to play all but one of the remaining 82 games. In three seasons, Giannis has played 238 of 246 regular season games.

Five triple-doubles ranked Giannis fourth in the NBA, behind Russell Westbrook (14), Draymond Green (13) and Rajon Rondo (6). Notably, all five of his triple-doubles took place after All-Star Weekend.

Giannis led all NBA players in personal fouls with 258. Now, the fouls leaderboard is dotted with star names (and defensive standouts) like Draymond Green, Andre Drummond, Andrew Bogut and Paul George. Committing a lot of fouls is not inherently bad, particularly if you can master the art of committing 10 fouls per game but only getting called for four. Some of the best defensive teams (like the Celtics) also fouled a ton. Giannis cut down on fouls as the season progressed though, and that feels like a good thing. He fouled out of seven games, but five of those occurred before January. And on a per-minute basis, he actually fouled slightly less this season than the previous year.

Giannis did cut down on offensive fouls, going from 49 last season to 31. And that is in over 300 additional minutes, along with having the ball in his hands a lot more.

The Bucks played four games on the black Fear The Deer court in those black Fear The Deer uniforms. Giannis was to be feared in these games. He averaged 24.2 points, 10.0 rebounds and 6.0 assists, including two triple-doubles.

For the third straight season, Giannis shot better from the field in the second half (53.2 percent) than the first half (48.5 percent).

Giannis went nearly two years without making more than a single 3-pointer in a game. Then on April 5 against the Cavaliers, he made 2-of-4 from deep. Three days later, he hit 4-of-5 from beyond the arc, the first (and so far, only) time he had ever made that many in a game. Overall, Giannis shot just 25.7 percent from long range, but he made at least one in each of the final six games of the season, including the two aforementioned, hinting at improvement next season.

His usage percentage climbed to 22.3, up from 15.0 and 19.6 in his first two seasons, respectively. That number ranked a close third on the team behind Greg Monroe (23.5) and Khris Middleton (23.0). He figures to lead the team in this category next season and beyond.

Giannis shot 48.7 percent on post-up opportunities. This remains a relatively small part of his offensive game, but it is an encouraging number as far as conversion rate, right up there with masters like LaMarcus Aldridge and Kevin Love, who of course attempt these far more often. The problem for Giannis is that he was prone to turnovers in these post-up situations, turning it over on nearly a quarter of his post-up possessions.

Giannis dunked 141 times, ranking sixth in the league. He followed five centers (DeAndre Jordan, Dwight Howard, Nerlens Noel, Hassan Whiteside, Anthony Davis). Next on the list? Jabari Parker, with 129.

He also converted 141 of 145 dunk attempts. This gave him the second-best dunk conversion percentage among players ranking in the to-50 in dunks.

The Bucks played a lot of back-to-backs, and Giannis held up quite well, averaging 16.2 points, 8.3 rebounds and 4.4 assists (almost identical to his overall numbers) on zero days of rest in 20 games.

Giannis attempted (a team-high) four half-court shots, and made none. He continues to care not about how that effects his shooting percentages, which is one of those small yet monumentally enjoyable things about Giannis.

You have probably seen these numbers before. Good. These are good numbers. These are the numbers Giannis averaged after All-Star Weekend in terms of points, rebounds and assists per game.

Most of these are offensive numbers, but Giannis also set a career-high with 1.2 steals per game. This was also a career-high on a per-minute basis.

Likewise, he set a career-high with 1.4 blocks per game. Again, this was a career-high on a per-minute basis as well.

The Bucks went just 11-17 after All-Star Weekend in spite of Giannis emerging as star. The good news is that despite that record, when Giannis, Jabari Parker and Khris Middleton shared the court after All-Star Weekend the Bucks outscored their opponents by 32 points overall. And that three-man group played more minutes together than any other.

Reminder: Giannis was age 20 and 21 this season. Improvement is plausible.

(Gracias to basketball-reference.com and stats.nba.com for the stat magic.)