Advanced stats highlight the Warriors outrageous depth

Truly a 12-deep team.

When the Golden State Warriors failed to land a marquee player like Paul George or Lauri Markkanen in the offseason, and were unable to re-sign their free agent homegrown Hall of Famer in Klay Thompson, they pivoted to something less flashy but perhaps equally valuable: depth.

The Warriors stacked up depth upon depth upon depth, so much so that their first offseason addition, Lindy Waters III — brought in explicitly to be a key bench piece — was squeezed from the team’s laughably-large 12-man rotation.

When Steve Kerr announced the 12-man rotation, he said that he “couldn’t justify” taking two players out of the mix. And after 10 games — 10 games which see the Warriors tied atop the Western Conference, despite playing just three times at home — it’s nearly impossible to argue with Kerr.

Golden State’s depth has played a few roles. It’s allowed Kerr to manipulate lineups based on matchups, such as in Sunday’s win over the Oklahoma City Thunder, in which neither starting center Trayce Jackson-Davis nor prized backup Kevon Looney played after Chet Holmgren was injured five minutes into the game. It’s allowed him to keep everyone fresh, helping them run teams off the court with constant substitutions. And it’s kept all their core players warm, confident, and ready to contribute.

But 12-man rotations are rare for a reason, and it turns out that reason is fairly simple: it’s not very common to have 12 players worth playing. The Warriors, however, do. And the stats highlight just how true that is.

With the 10th game in the books, I decided to take a look at how Estimated Plus-Minus (EPM) views the Warriors. EPM, an all-in-one stat designed by the brilliant minds at Dunks & Threes, is considered by many (myself included, but also people far smarter than I am) to be the best all-encompassing stat in basketball. As with all stats, EPM needs some context and salt taken alongside it, except when it proves the point we’re trying to make. And it certainly proves the point I’m trying to make.

Here’s where the Warriors 12 rotation players stack up when ranked next to the other players in the NBA, with their offensive and defensive percentiles listed (it should be noted that EPM is a predictive stat, so it also includes players who haven’t played this year, such as Joel Embiid and Kawhi Leonard — you can read about their methodology here).

No. 9 — Steph Curry (98th percentile offense; 78th percentile defense)
No. 43 — De’Anthony Melton (87th percentile offense; 93rd percentile defense)
No. 72 — Draymond Green (60th percentile offense; 98th percentile defense)
No. 103 — Buddy Hield (92nd percentile offense; 7th percentile defense)
No. 121 — Gary Payton II (60th percentile offense; 96th percentile defense)
No. 126 — Jonathan Kuminga (77th percentile offense; 75th percentile defense)
No. 138 — Andrew Wiggins (79th percentile offense; 63rd percentile defense)
No. 157 — Moses Moody (74th percentile offense; 69th percentile defense)
No. 167 — Kevon Looney (72nd percentile offense; 69th percentile defense)
No. 168 — Trayce Jackson-Davis (81st percentile offense; 34th percentile defense)
No. 173 — Kyle Anderson (43rd percentile offense; 94th percentile defense)
No. 175 — Brandin Podziemski (70th percentile offense; 72nd percentile defense)

For the most part, that matches the eye test. Curry is elite on offense and underrated on defense. Green and Payton are elite on defense and underrated on offense. Melton is underrated everywhere. Hield and TJD are all-offense and Anderson is all-defense. Kuminga, Wiggins, Moody, Looney, and Podziemski are quality players on both ends. It all mostly makes sense, even if there’s plenty of room to pick nits (I think most Warriors fans would probably say that the metric is underrating Wiggins’ defensive contributions).

But what stood out to me is the number next to Podziemski’s name: 175. By EPM, the worst of the Warriors’ 12 rotation players is still the 175th-best player in the league.

There are 30 teams in the NBA, which means that, on average, each team has 5.8 players in the top 175. The Warriors have more than double that. That’s staggering, and it’s even more shocking when you look at it compared to all the other teams. Here’s a breakdown of all 30 teams by how many players they have in the top 175:

12 players: Warriors
11 players: None
10 players: Thunder
9 players: Celtics
8 players: Cavs, Grizzlies, Magic
7 players: Hawks, Rockets, Wolves, Pelicans, Knicks
6 players: Nets, Mavericks, Nuggets, Heat, Suns, Kings
5 players: Pacers, Clippers, Sixers, Spurs, Raptors
4 players: Bulls, Lakers, Bucks, Wizards
3 players: Hornets, Pistons
2 players: None
1 player: Blazers, Jazz

Obviously not all players in the top 175 are created equal. The Bucks, Lakers, Bulls, and Wizards all have four players, for instance, even though for the Bucks that means Giannis Antetokounmpo (No. 3) and Damian Lillard (No. 10) and for the Lakers Anthony Davis (No. 13) and LeBron James (No. 21), while the Wizards highest-ranked player (Alexandre Sarr) is down at No. 91, and the Bulls (Lonzo Ball) at No. 98. You don’t need EPM to tell you that the Warriors are lacking in a secondary star to pair next to Curry, and it’s unclear if their elite depth is enough to overcome that.

But elite depth it certainly is, and for now it’s winning the Warriors a whole lot of games. Mike Dunleavy Jr. had no choice but to pivot in that direction, and the early returns suggest that he nailed that task.