Mason Plumlee's rise during Kevin Garnett's absence

Editor’s note: This was a guess post from Justin Becker of FantasyBasketballMoneyLeagues.com. You can follow him on twitter at @NBAFantasyInfo, and you can follow the Fantasy Basketball Money Leagues Google+ Page. For more NBA basketball news visit FantasyBasketballMoneyLeagues.com, a fantasy basketball blog.

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The Brooklyn Nets suffered a big loss when they lost All-Star center Brook Lopez to a season ending injury back on December 20. They ended 2013 with a 10-21 record, but Jason Kidd’s crew have turned it around in 2014. With that being said, Kevin Garnett has also been injured and hasn’t played since February 27. Yet the Nets zoomed to a 12-4 record in March with an unlikely man in the middle: rookie Mason Plumlee.

Plumlee was the Nets first rounder in 2013 as the 22nd overall pick out of Duke University. While Plulmlee had a decorated career at Duke, he started the season at the bottom, and was even predicted to end up in the D- League. Before the All-Star break, he was only playing 15.6 minutes per game, but that has increased to 21.2 in March after taking over the starting center spot, and he’s been having the time of his life ever since.

In a report by the NYPost.com last month, Mason Plumlee said:

“It’s been good. When you’re out there in the starting lineup with those guys you don’t really have to do much on the offensive end, I can just focus on defense, because all those guys can put the ball in the hole. I’ve just got to get them open.”

The Nets sure did put the ball in the net last month. Especially since they had no Brook Lopez and then no Kevin Garnett, Jason Kidd played Plumlee and applied small ball. The result was less post plays and more shots from the outside. As Plumlee said, all he had to do was get them open. Here is the increase in three-point makes when Plumlee was inserted to the starting line-up:

                                                   March        February

Joe Johnson	2.4	1.8
Deron Williams	2.2	1.2
Paul Pierce	2.2	1.6
Marcus Thornton	1.9	0.5
Mirza Teletovic	1.5	1.5

From 6.6 makes in February, it increased to 10.2 in March. That’s around 10+ points per game for the Nets. The result? They went 12-4 in March.

As for total points scored, the increase in outside bombs resulted in the increase of their total point production per game:

October	November	December	January	February	March
94.0	95.9	98.1	98.6	97.3	103.4

In the first two games of April, they were scoring 105.0 points per game.

Plumlee stepped up his game and had a 192% increase in his total assists and 171% increase in his total rebounds from February to March.

According to Alex Raskin of the Wall Street Journal, before the Nets March 17 encounter with the Suns:

“The real advantage of having Plumlee on the floor, as opposed to Lopez, is how the rookie fits with Williams. The 29-year-old point guard has never publicly complained about playing with Lopez, but he has repeatedly stressed his preference for playing at a faster pace—similar to Kidd. So it's not surprising that the Nets' offense has been better when Williams shares the floor with Plumlee than with Lopez”

For the sake of this article, let us switch Brook Lopez with Kevin Garnett. The Nets play faster with Plumlee than with KG. Based on pace statistics, the Nets are averaging 94.13 possessions with Plumlee, and are only averaging 92.3 with KG. And talking about offensive efficiency, the Nets are scoring 105.4 per 100 possessions with Plumlee, compared to only 99.4 per 100 possessions with Garnett.

Not to take anything away from the great KG, the Nets are better defensively with him at 100.6 points allowed per 100 possessions, compared to only 106.4 with Plumlee. That being said, that’s not on Mason though, because from the start of the season, and especially after Brook Lopez went down, the Nets have always been in the 29th spot overall in the league in rebounding.

But the Nets make up for that with Jason Kidd’s brand of defense. In a report by the Wall Street Journal last February 6, coach Kidd had this to say:

"When you have active hands, deflections, steals, that means everybody is in tune defensively. When deflections are down, steals are down…[the opponent] can move the ball [from] A to B."

If we broke down the Nets offense, only 16.5% of their total points in November were off opponents turnovers. In March, it increased to 19.8%. By the end of March, the Nets were only 2nd to the Miami Heat in the entire NBA for Opponents turnover per possession at 16.7%.

And because the Nets force turnovers, the percentage of fast break points over their total points has increased from 9.1% in November to 10.4% in March. So the Nets offset their rebounding woes by playing active defense. And with a mobile big man like Plumlee, they ran more.

Even with all of this, Mason Plumlee was the first to admit that they need KG back:

“But at the same time you want him back. That’s our rock, and you don’t want to go too long without him”

The Nets are 14-6 with Plumlee as a starter, 1-0 in Feb, 12-4 in March and 1-2 in April. Plumlee has increased all his numbers after the All-Star Break, and it’s not just the regular stats that are going well for him.

Plumlee has the highest in PER (18.04) amongst rookies, and better than Garnett (13.31). He also has the highest win shares (3.5) among current rookies. Definitely, he’s been a difference maker, but Plumlee is humble to say that he owes it to his teammates:

“Paul has been great. Those guys all give you confidence. If you have a guy that’s done it for so long that’s like, ‘Look, you can do this. I need you to do this and you can do it,’ it just gives you confidence.” Plumlee told the NYPost last March 16.

In the same interview, he also paid tribute to his coach:

“[Kidd] is the same way. …. Him saying, ‘All right, Kevin is out, you’re starting,’ that’s showing confidence. Really, it’s just filling that role they need me to. That’s the biggest thing. It’s not, ‘Oh, I need to wait a year or whatever.’ They need me now, so I have to be ready.”

And he’s been ready. The top Rookie of the Year candidates are Michael Carter-Williams and Victor Oladipo, but while Mason Plumlee is going to the playoffs, these two rookie studs are going fishing. It may take their teams a couple of years to get to the playoffs. Meanwhile, Mason Plumlee will have the opportunity to play with the big boys in the postseason.

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