Originally Posted by
DukeCO2009
I can't help but think that a lot of Z's contributions are a product of circumstance--ie: his being on the court with other good players. He was, if I may, less than stellar tonight. While he had one huge tip-in, his work on the glass was weak and he once again played small. He's decent in spurts and fills his role nicely when his minutes are limited, but to say that he "gets entirely too much crap" is a bit off base if you've ever seen him play. Mason should absolutely get more minutes than Zoubek at this point in the season, just as Miles should have played more than Z last year. Aside from passing (which is debatable), there's not a single thing Brian does better than Mason right now. You can give me all the per-40 stats you want; I've seen quite enough of Brian's missed layup-->grab his own board (causing DBR to go balistic about his offensive rebounding prowess)-->get stripped/turn it over to put too much stock into them. As I said, Z is valuable when he fills his role, but when he plays enough minutes to foul out he's getting too much burn IMO.
There is so much of this that's incorrect it's hard to know where to start. But what the hey...
First, and simplest, Zoubek has 66 offensive rebounds on the season. Precisely 6 of those have been off his own misses. Even if you exclude those (not sure why you would, since even if you miss, it's better that you grab the rebound than not, but I'll play your game for argument's sake), he has the best offensive rebounding percentage of anyone in the ACC by a large margin. In raw terms this season, he has more offensive boards than Trevor Booker, Deon Thompson, Ed Davis, Gani Lawal, Derrick Favors, and Dwayne Collins. They've all played at least 470 minutes; Brian has played 316. He's been a monster on the offensive glass all season long.
Second, Brian does essentially everything on defense better than Mason right now. It's not really debatable. He has a very intuitive sense of where to be on the court, how far to hedge, how to help, etc.
Third, Zoubek is shooting 62.2% from the field. That's good. Mason's shooting 45.2%. That's less good.
Fourth, Brian did more tonight than just the tip-in (which was a good play). He had two nice post plays early in the first half where he avoided shot blockers with good angles to the basket and pump fakes and converted layups. In 13 minutes, he was 3-4 from the floor, grabbed a couple offensive boards, and had 2 assists to his 1 turnover (the moving screen, which admittedly kills me every time he does it).
Finally, I've tracked +/- on a possession basis since Zoubek's freshman year. In every one of those seasons, the margin for the team while Brian is on the floor is better than the team's overall margin. That's been true both in ACC play and on the season overall. 4 years of the same data is mroe than just luck or playing with good players.
I'm beginning to think that Zoubek is the most under appreciated player we've had in a long while. Maybe it's because he looks a little clumsy. Maybe it's because he's not a power center. Maybe it's just because we assume any 7-footer should be an automatic 20/10 guy, and are disappointed that he's not. But the guy is an extremely valuable player for us, end of story.
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