At the podium after their Game 5 loss to the Golden State Warriors, Oklahoma City Thunder stars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook were asked a question about their opponent, two-time MVP Stephen Curry.
"Do you think that he's underrated as a defender?"
Westbrook didn't answer. He just giggled.
But whether intended as a slight or not, his laughter at the question cemented the notion that the Thunder's All-Star point guard doesn't think much of his opposing number defensively.
Could Russ be wrong?
Advanced statistics suggest the original question might be on to something. Curry deserves more credit for his defense than he has gotten.
Cross-matching somewhat overblown
Durant, who did take the question as Westbrook looked on, noted that Curry "doesn't guard the best point guards," though he did add Curry was part of the rotation of several players defending Westbrook.
It's true that Warriors coach Steve Kerr has another good option for defending point guards in backcourt-mate Klay Thompson. Still, player-tracking data shows that doesn't happen as often as Durant might think.
In fact, during the regular season Curry started possessions guarding the other five point guards who made the All-Star Game more than 50 percent more frequently than Thompson.
(Other players also started a number of possessions as the primary defensive matchup because Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston are options, because Curry and Thompson were on the bench or because of matching up with the nearest player in transition.)
Durant might have been influenced by the fact that Westbrook was the one exception to the rule. And in this series Thompson has defended Westbrook a little more often than Curry, though they've split those duties nearly equally: 141 matchups for Thompson, 131 for Curry.
Opponents may try to do too much against Curry
A few years ago, ESPN's Henry Abbott noticed something funny about journeyman forward Steve Novak, who was then with the New York Knicks. Despite Novak's poor defensive reputation (and accompanying team performance), he was remarkably effective at stopping isolation plays. After watching the film, Abbott theorized that low-scoring opponents were so excited to get matched up with Novak that they took bad shots trying to beat him.
Curry is no Novak by reputation, but ESPN Insider's Amin Elhassan co-signed a similar theory about Curry and the numbers generally back it up.
The 37 players who Curry defended as a primary matchup at least 50 times during the regular season averaged 19.4 field-goal attempts per 100 possessions over the course of the season. With Curry on them, that jumped to 20.5 per 100. (Note that this includes plays where Curry may eventually have switched on another player.)
Intriguingly, those shots didn't go in very often. Weighted by their number of shots against Curry, this group of players posted an effective field-goal percentage (eFG) of 48.4 percent. On plays with Curry as a primary matchup, they actually shot an effective 43.5 percent -- turning them into the equivalent of Jarrett Jack (43.4 percent eFG) as shooters.
Obviously that has something to do with Golden State's strong team defense, but Curry was a factor too.
Curry makes plays defensively
Curry led the league in steals per game this season, though a handful of other players came up with more on a per-play basis. Indeed, the original question after Game 5 was about Curry coming up with a key steal on Durant in the fourth quarter of Game 5.
Steals get a bad rap because it's possible to accumulate them without being a good defender. However, when defenders can come up with steals without breaking the game plan defensively, steals are incredibly valuable because they often turn into easy baskets on the other end. The Warriors averaged 1.23 points per possession after steals this season, as compared to 1.13 points on all other types of possessions.
Curry is also a surprisingly good defensive rebounder for his size. Among point guards who saw at least 1,000 minutes of action, he ranked eighth in defensive rebound percentage. In this series, he has been the third-best defensive rebounder among Golden State regulars behind big men Andrew Bogut and Draymond Green.
Add it up and box-score estimates peg Curry as a good defender for a point guard. Box plus-minus, which weights statistics based on how well they predict players adjusted plus-minus impact, rates Curry as average or better defensively among all players each of the past three seasons -- which is excellent when you consider that point guards are typically weakest defensively of any position.
Warriors defend better with Curry
Of course, box-score stats measure only a small part of what happens defensively, and even player-tracking data is noisy and incomplete. Because of those limitations, I think the most powerful measure of defensive is a player's impact at the team level.
Even after adjusting for the quality of the defenders around him, including Thompson and defensive player of the year runner-up Draymond Green, plus-minus measures show Curry as a strong positive presence at the defensive end.
As a result, ESPN's real plus-minus (RPM) rates Curry a point per 100 possessions better than the average player defensively. Again, that's better than it sounds because big men tend to rate better defensively than guards and vice versa.
So Curry actually ranks among the top-10 point guards -- and, for what it's worth, just ahead of Westbrook, who got more votes for the NBA's all-defensive teams.
Given his modest stature and athleticism, Curry may not look like our vision of a dominant defender. But the strides he's made at the defensive end of the floor have played a role in his development into a MVP, just like his growth as a scorer and passer.
A wide variety of metrics show Curry as a positive presence on defense and, yes, underrated at that end.