Thunderous Thoughts: Uncontested rebounds

Welcome to Thunderous Thoughts, your weekly look at the OKC Thunder where we intentionally let others succeed.

Last year, everyone was up in arms because Russell Westbrook grabbed uncontested rebounds off of free throw misses. In trying to discredit Westbrook’s triple-double season, people argued that Westbrook’s uncontested rebounds should not count towards his rebounding stats. Yes, this was a real thing.

Westbrook is averaging 9.6 rebounds this season. Not quite a round number, but still good enough to be among the top rebounders in the league. Most of those are, once again, uncontested. His contested defensive rebound percentage is 13.9 percent, which means his uncontested defensive rebound percentage is 86.1 percent. For the record, that’s one percent higher than last season.

(Thank you to Cole Hixon for saving me some numbers embarrassment.)

Anyone who watches Oklahoma City knows that this isn’t new. We all see Steven Adams box out his man or intentionally give up a rebound so Westbrook can grab it and push the ball forward. It’s part of the Thunder system and, for the most part, it works.

More from Thunderous Intentions

• Stealing one player from every Southwest Division team for the OKC Thunder
• Should the OKC Thunder chase after a disgruntled hometown hero?
• 3 OKC Thunder players who can step up in Aleksej Pokusevski’s absence
• Aleksej Pokusevski sidelined approximately 6 weeks with ankle injury
• Damian Lillard does not fit with the OKC Thunder

Last year, the focus was on Westbrook grabbing uncontested rebounds. This year, the focus is on Adams’ lack of defensive rebounds.

Adams is averaging 8.9 rebounds this year. 5.1 have come on the offensive end. Among qualified players, he’s the only player in the league to collect more offensive rebounds than defensive rebounds.

This had led people to speculate on what his overall rebounding numbers would be if he didn’t box out for Westbrook.

Could he average 15 rebounds a game? Maybe. I think it’s fair to say that he could average 12 rebounds per game if he grabbed every defensive board available.

Here’s the point people are missing. Yes, Westbrook takes away defensive rebounds from Adams because that’s what the system dictates. However, he gives Adams offensive rebounds.

Adams stays on the outside when Westbrook takes this shot. In seeing this, Westbrook intentionally shoots it strong, so it hits the back iron for a good bounce to Adams.

Westbrook sees that Adams is on the left side of the rim, with Howard having position. He purposely misses to that side, allowing Adams to get the offensive rebound.

Westbrook disguises this pass as a miss, just to pad Adams’ offensive rebounding stats.

Westbrook does this a lot. He intentionally goes strong on the layup, just so Adams can get the offensive rebound and putback. He tried to do this against the Nets on the game-winner, but accidentally scored.

In conclusion. Yes, Steven Adams allows Russell Westbrook to grab a lot of defensive rebounds. That hurts Adams’ defensive rebounding numbers. But Westbrook intentionally misses shots, hurting his field goal percentage, so Adams can grab offensive boards.