Highs and Lows:
Coincidentally, most of Felton’s best performances came in losses. On November 15th, Felton scored a season-high 15 points on 7-11 shooting in a 103-99 loss to Portland. Felton’s best plus/minus came the third game of the season, when he was a game-high +23 in a 115-113 loss to Minnesota.
In fact, three of Felton’s four highest box score plus/minuses came in losses. On the contrary, other than Felton’s season high scoring night against Portland, his next four highest scoring performances all came in wins.
Another clear trend from this past season was that the Thunder were more successful when Felton was racking up assists. Felton’s season-high ten assists came in the Thunder’s biggest blowout win of the season, a 37 point drumming of the Lakers in January.
When Felton recorded at least five assists, the Thunder were 10-1. For a bigger sample size, when he had at least four assists, the Thunder were still an impressive 18-5. On the other end, when Felton didn’t record an assist, the Thunder were 3-4.
In the playoffs, Felton naturally saw his role diminished. His minutes dropped from 16.6 a game to 13.2. He only played four minutes in the Thunder’s miraculous 25-point comeback win in-game five. Felton probably should have played more, especially down the stretch in lineups with Westbrook.
He was one of only a few players who wasn’t afraid to shoot the ball. In the series, he shot 7-14 from three-point range. Having him out more, would have helped spread the floor and prevented Westbrook from jacking up highly contested shots.
Community Involvement
Like all Thunder players, Felton was deeply involved in the local community. Here’s a video of him at a Thunder Holliday Assist Event.
https://twitter.com/okcthunder/status/937891249880817664
Felton also made an appearance at the OKC Zoo along with some of his teammates.
All in all, Felton was a valuable member of this team, not just as a player, but as a veteran presence and mentor. For all we know, his halftime speech may have ignited the game five comeback.