The question recently arose concerning the degree to which Stephen Curry and Draymond Green feed off each other – that is have an output improving synergistic effect (not the same as two snakes feeding off each other by simultaneously eating each other’s tails). I decided to look at a few numbers regarding lineups with and without them, and see what I could grind out. The table below shows my results.
Curry and Green are top players in the NBA, so the team doing well when they are on the floor and better when both are is no surprise. I was surprised, however, by how bad the GSW plus-minus per 48 minutes was when neither Green nor Curry are on the floor, -9.9. Would GSW really lose games by an average of almost 10 points without them? Considerations of garbage time make it hard to be conclusive, but the numbers appear to say GSW would lose a substantial number of games without them. (They are clearly underpaid.)
Regular season
Lineups with |
% of time |
FGM /48M |
FGA /48M |
FG% |
3PM /48M |
3PA /48M |
3P% |
PTS /48M |
+/- /48M |
Curry and not Green |
5.4% |
42.4 |
94.1 |
0.451 |
13.2 |
35.0 |
0.377 |
115.9 |
6.3 |
Green and not Curry |
8.3% |
41.0 |
84.5 |
0.485 |
9.0 |
23.9 |
0.375 |
108.4 |
9.4 |
Green and Curry |
63.2% |
44.3 |
87.5 |
0.507 |
15.6 |
36.2 |
0.432 |
121.4 |
19.4 |
Not Curry and not Green |
23.1% |
36.9 |
82.7 |
0.447 |
7.6 |
20.2 |
0.373 |
95.3 |
-9.9 |
I was also a little surprised that the team’s plus-minus was 50% better with Green and not Curry than with Curry and not Green. (However, this is in alignment with their salaries.) Unsurprisingly, the team’s plus-minus is at its highest when both are on the floor. However, the interesting question is how synergistic this is – together, are they more than the sum of the two parts (two players). This is actually a complex question to answer. However, I will do a pair of simplistic but indicative calculations.
The sum of their separate plus-minuses was +15.7 points while the plus-minus with them together was 19.4, 24% more. With Curry and not Green, GSW outscored opponents by a factor of 1.057 (115.9/(115.9-6.3)). Green and not Curry had a factor of 1.095. The product of the two factors is 1.157. This would estimate a plus-minus for the combination of a plus-minus of +16.0. The actual of +19.4 points was 22% more.
These two calculations each suggest a synergistic improvement effect of the combination of Green and Curry on the order of a fifth. Together, these results are consistently positive and large enough to strongly indicate a significant synergistic effect exists although its magnitude is less certain.
ANNEX
Regular Season Totals
Adding up lineup numbers for minutes is a problem because their time on the court is reported in whole minutes, rounding errors can accumulate including from the many lineups playing less than half a minute. The result is underreporting of time. So, in the main table, I provided a percentage of time.
Lineups with |
MIN |
FGM |
FGA |
3PM |
3PA |
PTS |
+/- |
Curry and not Green |
207 |
183 |
406 |
57 |
151 |
500 |
27 |
Green and not Curry |
321 |
274 |
565 |
60 |
160 |
725 |
63 |
Green and Curry |
2437 |
2251 |
4443 |
794 |
1840 |
6164 |
985 |
Not Curry and not Green |
890 |
685 |
1533 |
140 |
375 |
1767 |
-184 |
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