Thoughts on Celtics rebounding (we're the best!)

[bawstin]

I've been curious about the celtics team rebounding numbers because individually it looks like everybody's having an off year:

KG is down to 10.1 after averaging 12.8, 12.7, 13.5, 13.9 and 13.5 over the last 5 years.

Pierce is averaging 5.6 after averaging 5.9, 6.7, 6.6, 6.6 and 7.6 over the last 5.

Perkins is averaging 5.5 which is lower than I expected.

Was it just sharing the rebounds, or were we really struggling?

I should have googled sooner, it was easy to find (ESPN). ESPN doesn't sort on the column that I was most interested in: total percentage. So I pasted it into a spreadsheet and sorted. We're first in the league guys! Here's the top 6:

0.526 Boston
0.515 Philadelphia
0.514 Houston
0.514 Washington
0.513 San Antonio
0.513 Los Angeles

We also lead the league in rebounding differential:

+4.2 Boston
+2.5 Washington
+2.5 Philadelphia
+2.5 Houston
+2.4 Los Angeles
+2.2 San Antonio

.526 doesn't seem like a lot but hey, we're .026 over .500 and the next best team is only .015 over .500. +4.2 also doesn't seem like a lot but the next best team is only +2.5.

Finally, if a rebound is worth roughly 1 point in a basketball game, then about 4 points of our league-leading 13 point average margin of victory can be attribute to our superior rebounding. The rest can be chalked up to the physical attractiveness and intelligence of the fan base.

[MaxwellSmart]

we are the best team....shhhh, don't tell anyone!

[threrf23]

We have a number of god defensive rebounders...

If we have a void its arguably offensive rebounding where we could at least stand to improve.

Another reason why Big Baby is important. Only 4 rebounds yesterday to complement his 20 points....but 3 offensive boards. His offensive rebounding % is 15.8, the team's is 31.3% when he's in the game. Garnett's is 6.5%, Perk's is 7.7%, Pollard's is 8.8%.

Also, no need to get ahead of ourselves on this subject...part of the reason we have such good rebounding #s is because our defense forces more missed shots than any other defense - and defensive rebounds are always more plentiful than offensive ones.