3 Thunder players who are underperforming, 4 exceeding expectations at the All-Star break

Kenrich Williams is underperforming

While the Oklahoma City Thunder have slowly built a young core through the draft, rotating veterans in and out and accruing draft assets, one of the few constants has been the impact of forward Kenrich Williams when he takes the court. While that's not untrue this year, Williams' production has largely fallen off of a cliff.

For the season the Thunder are outscoring opponents by 96 points when Williams is on the court, so he's hardly tanking their changes. Yet that ranks only eighth on the team and is a step down from his impact last season, when he was often playing with even worse teammates.

In the 2020-21 season, when Williams stepped onto the court the Thunder were +9.9 points per 100 possessions better than when he sat. That rose to +13.8 two seasons ago, shoring up the defense on a bad team and propping up lineups nearly on his own. Last year it fell to +4.9, and this year it is only +1.5.

Part of that shift is that the players around Williams have improved, but part of it is that his offensive impact has been more muted. He is playing just 14.9 minutes per game, and his shots inside the arc are nearly nonexistent. When you add in that Williams is possibly the worst free-throw shooter in the league (30 percent this season on microscopic volume) it makes sense why Williams is avoiding the inside of the arc, but it's limiting his value and his offensive impact.

He hasn't been able to stave off players such as Aaron Wiggins for playing time, and even Lindy Water III is replacing him in the rotation at times. Williams has at times been the perfect glue guy, but he's losing some of his stickiness thus far this year.