Evaluating NBA defense has always been the hardest part of basketball analysis. Outdated box-score stats like blocks and steals completely fail to tell the whole story, often rewarding gamblers rather than true stoppers. In recent years, advanced metrics have emerged as a solution, but even they struggle to capture the full picture. Why? Because players have far less control over the outcome of a defensive possession compared to an offensive one, making it incredibly difficult for algorithms to accurately attribute credit. Furthermore, a player’s defensive statistical footprint is heavily dependent on their specific role on the court and the era they play in.

Every single metric has its own blind spots. Some overvalue rebounding, others are too heavily influenced by team context, and some struggle to properly evaluate perimeter players.

That’s why I created DAWG, a consensus metric that blends 5 of the most respected advanced defensive metrics available today.

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LeBron, following his mythologized 2018 season, went to the Lakers, where he suffered through injuries in the 2019 season. Heading into 2020, with the Lakers acquiring one Anthony Davis, there was one question on everyone’s mind: Was The King still The King?

Now everyone (I hope) know what happened: The championship, the bubble asterisk, and the following descent into non-contention that eventually led to LeBron leaving the Lakers this year. Now, to put that into retrospective, we ask one question, the same question we asked previous to that year.

Was The King still The King? How good was LeBron in 2020?

Throughout 805 regular season minutes, 2020 LeBron led a +10.6 net team WITHOUT AD on the court and with -2 DARKO team help. Shai w/o Chet this year was +11.5 with +1.9 help.

This doesn’t include LeBron leading a +11.6 net team without AD and -2.3 DARKO team help in the offs. While removed of context and not exactly representative of anything, here’s how Bron-led lineups compared to some other notable stars.

If adjusted for team help, Bron only trails Tatum out of that selection of players; this can be seen in the graphics below:

Let’s move onto more individual stats, though, to explore how truly monstrous this version of LeBron was.

This was the best playmaking season of LeBron’s career. Just on a per game basis, he led the league in assists, potential assists, and assist points created. I don’t think that sums up the entire story, though.

On a possession basis, that’s 25.8 potential assists per 100, 2.5 potential assists per minute, with SIX POINT NINE RIM ASSISTS. This was the highest passer rating and highest box creation season of his entire career.

Oh, for reference, Magic Johnson’s passer rating and box creation for his career was 8.9 and 14 respectively. I’ll give you a chance to guess what Lebron’s was before you go to the next paragraph.

Giving you time to think…

It was 9 and 15.9. Passer rating is an all-in-one estimate of the quality of your passing while box creation is an estimate of open shots created for teammates per 100. Now, while Magic probably had better marks in singular seasons, Bron surpassed his career marks in 2020.

And then he went and averaged 24.3 potential assists per 100, 2.2 potential assists per minute, and 5.2 rim assists in the PLAYOFFS, while also adding 28.6 points per 75 on +9.2 opponent-adjusted relative true shooting.

Let’s give this a frame of reference by comparing it to other point guards through positional percentile. 99th percentile in potential assists per 100 in the regular season and then 100th in the postseason. 96th percentile in potential assists per on-ball minute in the regular season and 80th in the playoffs. And then, 98th percentile in both the regular season and postseason in rim assists.

Now, let’s do another test. Who do you think was the better scorer in the playoffs, just from a gut feeling, 2018 Kevin Durant or 2020 LeBron? Don’t think about it too much; just tell me what you think.

KD averaged 28.2 points per 75 on +5.1 adjusted relative true shooting. LeBron averaged .4 points per 75 more while being 4.1% more efficient than 2018 Kevin Durant. And he did this while passing like Magic Johnson. It’s also a lot more impressive when you consider that 43% of KD’s playtype frequencies came from creation playtypes (Iso, PNR Handler, Post-up) whilst LeBron was at 57%.

That’s enough talk on his offense though. Let’s speak on defense. While Bron did take defense off in the RS during the later parts of his career, he still put up 2.4 stocks per 100 alongside an 18.9% DRB%. But let’s get into the Playoffs.

Bron averaged 2.9 stocks, 0.7 fouls drawn, and 0.4 relative forced turnovers per 100, alongside a 3.2% Stop% in the playoffs.

Other advanced statistics also show LeBron was a good defender in the 2020 season: his Rim Defense stood out in particular when compared to players in his position as expected since it is LeBron.

Rim Points Saved per 100 possessions : Rim points saved through shot contesting per 100 possessions.

dTS : A lineup-adjusted +/- estimate of how much this player changes opponent shooting efficiency. Positive means the lineup suppresses opponent shooting better.

DRAPM : The defensive component of a player's regularized adjusted plus-minus. Higher means stronger defensive impact.

This is combined with an ungodly 25.6% DRB%. In comparison, 2024 Luka had a 21.8% DRB% in the playoffs. 2017 Westbrook had a 21.7%. Jokic, one of the best defensive rebounding CENTERS EVER, put up 26.3% in the 2023 playoffs.

This version of LeBron might just be the best rebounding point guard ever. So what happens when you pair that with him being a +12.5 rts in transition that offs?

Looking at his impact metrics also portrays just how good he was this season:

DPM : Predictive impact metric estimating player impact on expected team scoring differential per 100 possessions, with teammate/opponent effects controlled.

RAPM : Estimates a player's total two-way impact by isolating individual contribution from lineup data, controlling for teammates and opponents. Higher means stronger overall impact.

A complete wrecking ball on both sides of the floor in 2020. LeBron James in 2020 was still the best in the world and has a very good argument to remain the highest peak of the 2020s decade.

but it turns out:

The superpower to the Laker’s best Austin and Luka lineups: TO suppression is severely undercut with their biggest offseason work

10 players have been traded for control over 4 picks or more in the last 10 years. Sorted by basically player quality: Kevin Durant, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Anthony Davis, James Harden, Paul George, Rudy Gobert, Donovan Mitchell, Mikal Bridges, Desmond Bane, Dejounte Murray.

It’s funny or perhaps all but too logical that the success of these trades can be seen almost as a sliding scale: the most successful 4+ pick trades have the best of players being traded to them and the worst of which have the worst players being acquired. So where does Walker Kessler fit on this continuum of quality?

Ranked by 2yr RAPM from their point of trade: Giannis Antetokounmpo 2026 (7.3), Rudy Gobert 2022 (5.9), KD 2023 (5.7), Paul George 2019 (4.7), James Harden 2021 (4.3), Anthony Davis 2019 (3.4), Dejounte Murray 2021 (1.4), Desmond Bane (-0.2), Donovan Mitchell 2021 (-0.7)

Walker Kessler posted a 2yrRAPM of -0.6 in 2026 and the year prior(taking away his injured 2026) posted a worst in group -1.3.

That is awful compared to the field of similar asset acquisition costs and Walker Kessler also struggles with that which made the Lakers good last year (recall the oTOV value).

Walker has benefits: 1.7 2yr RAPM oREB value in 2026 (although 2025 was way down at 0.4) and he’s a 2+ dTS influence player(excellent rim protector).

But these benefits only exist at the cost of other components of the team.

He had a negative effect on virtually all of his teammates from 2023-2025 in TS%(measure of shooting efficiency), Rim frequency(opposing bigs can just sit at the rim), and teammate TO%(indicator that his lack of shooting likely hampers spacing and ergo their TO rates spike)

Contrary to popular belief, Luka cannot actually teach non-shooting rollers how to finish if they already don’t know how to and most of all he may not be able to suppress their roll man TOs that much.

He will be very helpful in replacing the lost offensive possessions from a Smart’s TO economy by grabbing misses off the rim and will replace the defensive impact of basically every departing Laker combined by being one of the league’s 5 best rim protectors.

High Offensive Rebounding x High 3PA lineups kill: LaMelo Moussa pairing was the best offensive duo in the NBA…

Walker provides this template by being an elite offensive rebounder.

= Points Points Points

However when combined with his 18th percentile scoring TO% and his very weak rollman finishing from his last healthy season worries abound. He’s an excellent rim protector but his dTOV(-1.4) and dREB(-0.5) imply that the rim protection is coming at the cost of better TO forcing and defensive rebounding.

Hard to exactly pin down his value as a player at this moment but he certainly sits among the Mikal Bridges to Dejounte segment of the quality continuum and seeing as how the Lakers have 0 tradeable first round picks for 7 years and the nearest to unlock is in the 2028 offseason, this team has gone all out on this.

The Lakers will be better than last year. And they will also be very very good perhaps even one of the five best teams in the NBA. But if they fall short, they will have little to no ammo to reload with. And if that’s the case then this trade has to make you the best team in the league to be worthwhile because it’s your last crack at the apple… and this probably doesn’t.

On the night of June 22nd, 2026, the casual basketball fan and rabid NBA Twitter user were both eyeing the account of NBA Insider Shams Charania. The trade rumors that swirled around the Bucks’ superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo for years were coming to a head, with the Celtics and Heat publicly in the market. This post isn’t about Giannis, though -- before the shoe dropped and Giannis was confirmed to the Heat that night, Shams broke another piece of news. Julius Randle was out of Minnesota in a “salary dump,” a trade that frees up money to sign other players. Fans theorized regarding what the Wolves were up to for the next hour before it was announced that the Wolves’ midseason acquisition, guard Ayo Dosunmu, came to a contract agreement with the Wolves. The five-year, $112 million contract secured Ayo’s future with the team while still leaving a small gap to fill from Randle’s departure. The side plot to the Giannis trade came out of what appeared to be nowhere and neatly resolved itself before bedtime.

Two days later, rumors regarding the Hornets’ star guard LaMelo Ball being traded began to pick up steam. These rumors seemed unfounded at first, given that the Hornets had just come off of their best season in over a decade and had an exciting young core -- LaMelo was able to generate action for sharpshooters Kon Knueppel and Brandon Miller alongside making threes of his own at a good clip. This formula nearly led them to their first playoff appearance since 2015. However, not even twelve hours later, Shams woke up the NBA world with the bombshell that LaMelo was headed to the twin cities in exchange for Minnesotan and cultural icon Naz Reid and draft capital. The sudden nature of this trade incited more division over who ‘won’ the exchange than the Giannis trade, which had been percolating for years.

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It’s been 48 hours since the start of the 2026 Free Agency, and the NBA Offseason couldn’t be more chaotic. With star players getting traded in complete madness and massive contracts being signed across the board, the landscape of the league is shifting rapidly.

Out of the 126 Free Agents on our radar, 57 have already found a new home or extended their deals. But before analyzing the early winners, the steals, and the overpays, we need to establish exactly how we are evaluating this market.

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Five years removed from their second title in franchise history, and 13 years after drafting the player who came to define their modern era, the Milwaukee Bucks officially moved on from Giannis Antetokounmpo. It is unusual for a player who became the center of a franchise’s identity to be moved in the midst of his prime. But with the constant speculation by the media, it almost felt inevitable. He arrived as a raw teenager, grew into an MVP, gave the Bucks a title, and turned a small-market team into one of the league’s defining programs of the decade. That physical development can’t be understated however, how many times have we seen front offices and fans alike asking why their raw and skinny prospects can’t just do what Giannis did. His development was truly an outlier that Milwaukee should be proud of and one that will remain hard to replicate for years to come.

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(This article is a deep dive expanding on our "Biggest 2026 Playoffs Risers and Droppers" post. If you missed it, check it out on @tipoffball on all platforms)

Playoff basketball has always been a different beast compared to the Regular Season. The intensity skyrockets, rotations shrink and arenas atmosphere heat up.

Teams go from an exhausting 82-game marathon to a high-stakes sprint. The dynamic completely shifts from facing a different opponent in a different city every other night, to a tactical chess match where you play the exact same team at least four times in a row. Every possession matters, and the cost of a single bad game is incredibly high.

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