Meet Nerlens Noel
Who is Nerlens Noel?
Nerlens Noel is a 28 year old, 6’11, 220 lbs center hailing from Massachusetts. The son of Haitian immigrants, he played some of his high-school ball where he was born and transferred to a basketball school for one year before reclassifying to get into college early.
Noel attended Kentucky for his college ball where he spent one season before going pro. In his one year of college, he would fall short of the lofty expectations (expectations that were unfairly high given that he followed up Anthony Davis) but he was still impressive, unfortunately, he would end his season early by tearing his ACL.
His torn ACL caused him to slip slightly in the draft but was still selected 6th and ended up in Philadelphia as part of the Jrue Holiday trade. He missed his entire rookie season recovering from knee surgery and spent 2 and a half seasons with the Process-era Sixers. He was traded away to Dallas after the arrival of Joel Embiid.
Noel spent only one more injury-riddled season with Dallas before finding a stabilizing and mostly healthy two seasons in Oklahoma City (where our own Troy Weaver got some up and close time with him) and then spent the last two seasons with the Knicks. Noel arrives in Detroit with 2 years and just under $19million left on his contract, the second season is a team option.
Outside of some brief hope in his first couple of seasons, Noel never really even approached the hype of a guy who was once considered the likely #1 overall pick, but he has cemented himself as a viable NBA big man and is making a solid career for himself.
Offense:
I’m not sure how much people realize this because Noel has been outside of collective consciousness since he left the Sixers, but the offensive end is pretty rough for Noel. He’s averaged just 10 points per 36 minutes since leaving Philly and just 7 points per 36 minutes over the last two years with New York. He isn’t a bad offensive player, the efficiency has mostly remained very good (which is to be expected from a low-usage big man but still) and he does bring some real things to the table. He is a legit lob threat and while he isn’t a shooter he can take short-range jumpers out to around 10 feet and hit floaters or hooks.
The problem is that the number of injuries may have added up to the point where he is no longer the overwhelming athlete that he was earlier in his career. He’s still a high-end athlete, but he doesn’t dunk as much as he used to and doesn’t have enough other skills to really make up for it. It’s also worth noting that some of his better per 36 numbers came as a low minutes backup.
That still sounds ok. He can catch lobs and hit occasional jumpers, what more do you need?
Not a ton, but he’s so skinny that he has never become all that good of a screener and he’s pretty much a non-passer. There are some genuinely concerning numbers where over the last two seasons he dunked with nearly half the regularity of the rest of his career. It’s possible that a clogged-up Knicks offense combined with him never really being 100% last season were responsible and he will look improved this season, but if he doesn’t then he’s probably a negative offensive player. He does the bare minimum offensively that you need from a big to keep the offense viable, but doesn’t bring much that you can’t pull a guy out of the G-League for while also turning over the ball quite a bit for someone who handles the ball so little.
What if he does look springier?
Then his lob threat makes him a true weapon offensively, at his best he was a genuinely good offensive player, not a star or someone carrying your offense but with solid creators around him he can be a weapon.
Defense:
This is where the real goods are. Noel is not as good as the numbers suggest, he is erratic and often gets out of position, his lack of muscle makes him worse on the defensive glass than you would like. He will occasionally get bullied by stronger players.
All that said, he’s still a powerhouse. Noel’s career block percentage (the percentage of shots that are blocked by a player while they are on the floor) is 5.7%, his career steal percentage (percentage of possessions you get a steal while on the floor) is 2.8%. To put into context, if you stuck that on last season’s leaderboard his block percentage would be tied for 5th with Rudy Gobert and his steal percentage would be tied for 3rd with Dejounte Murray. It’s also important to note that those numbers have not seen the decline in his offensive production. Over his last two seasons with the Knicks, his block % is 7.4%, and steals at 2.4%
As much as he is obviously not a top-5 defensive player in the league as those numbers would suggest, he is one of the best value defensive players in the league. He has excellent timing for blocks, is a menace in the passing lanes, can hold up in space against smaller guys, and is generally a strong defensive presence. As much good stuff as Isaiah Stewart does he isn’t athletic enough to reach the sort of defensive production as Noel and unless Duren is more advanced than most players his age those are the only plus defenders at either big position for Detroit.
I don’t know, a lot of smart people really poo poo him defensively. His teams have often been better defensively with him off the floor.
Speaking as one of the overly-confident-always-want-to-be-seen-as-super-smart guys. The desire to prove that you don’t just look at a stats page is strong, given that Noel’s stats make him look like a defensive player of the year contender, know-it-alls desperately want to remind everyone that he isn’t that. The thing is, even if he is only half as good as the defensive production suggests, the production is so insane that he’s still a high-level defender. Sometimes it’s important for us nerds to just sit back a bit and accept that sometimes guys who hoard stats are still valuable.
Intangibles:
Early in his career, there was talk about him having some not-great people in his circle, and occasional questions about his work ethic. I’m not sure if most of those have quieted because he’s just not that important anymore or because he’s improved but it is fair to say that he has not made many meaningful improvements to his game since coming into the league. That said, you haven’t heard much negative about him as a teammate or locker-room presence over the past few years so we can assume he isn’t going to be a great veteran leader, but will be just fine.
Best Case Scenario:
There is a pipe-dream scenario where the Pistons overachieve this season with Noel as a seemingly important piece and he ends up as a long-term piece but that seems too far-fetched.
The best hope is that he stays healthy and is successful in a starting role to the point he sticks around the whole season while Duren/Bagley/Stewart earn more minutes from him as the season goes on, but plays well enough for the Pistons to pick up his option for next season before trading him for a small benefit next season. Getting one stop-gap season where he helps Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivey, and Saddiq Bey play with a big-man who is at least functional both ways before getting something in a trade is ideal.
Worst Case Scenario:
He’s hurt the whole time. Never plays. Obviously this is a worst case scenario with any player but given Noel’s injury history I don’t see this as a cop-out.
Upshot for the rest of the roster.
I’m a little confused on this one. Seems to me that he’s pretty clearly the guy to be the starter out of the gate, but many of the rotation predictions feature him at the back-end. So either everyone else is missing something or I am.
Regardless, he will is effectively a stop-gap who will only get minutes until the Pistons feel comfortable giving them to one of the younger guys. Whether that means Noel starts over all of them or he’s off the bench behind Stewart/Bagley but waiting for Duren to win the backup minutes, his impact on the rest of the roster should be minimal, he’s here to make sure the young guys have to earn it, but if they do he will not block them.
Verdict:
If Noel stays healthy he could be a boon for the Pistons. I really feel that his defensive upside could be meaningful while also being something other than a zero on offense. Getting him back in the Knicks trade is a tidy bit of business as it is plausible to flip him for something down the line. Noel’s team option for the following season gives flexibility to the whole situation as well. If something comes down the pipes that leaves the Pistons short on big men for next season they can keep him as a stop-gap for an extra season, while also giving him more trade value as a playoff team can view him as more than just a rental.
The injury bug is the main concern, he has effectively lost 4ish seasons to injury in the past. The good news is that even if he is hurt the whole time, it just means clearer minutes available for younger guys to develop.
Why did he never reach the hype he once had?
There was enough smoke around him having some bad actors advising him that there was most likely truth to it. But the biggest thing seems like a combination of three things.
Injuries slowly chipped away at his elite athleticism to where he didn’t stand out as much. Saying nothing of the fact that it hurt his momentum early in his career.
His body-type ended up not being able to have him put on the weight to become a real force inside at either end. If he were 15 or 20 pounds heavier with the same athleticism it would’ve gone a long way.
The offense simply never showed up. Out of college people billed him as someone who would be a defensive powerhouse and really good offensive player who could shoot and create for himself. That didn’t end up materializing in any way. He’s hit just two long-balls in his career and never shown ability as more than a finisher of plays.
If you watched the video at the start of this video, compare it to this from his rookie season.
The difference in explosion stands out, as does the lack of progress in his offensive game and the fact that he doesn’t look any bigger now than he was at 20.
The lack of offensive development can be pinned somewhat on Noel, given that he already had his competency at short to midrange jumpers in college it’s bizarre he never figured out how to improve upon it. That said, the biggest issue was a combination of injuries and not growing into his body the way he needed. Even without the injuries he either needed to get bigger to become a true force as a defensive center, or develop his offensive game to either be a power forward or a dynamite two-way center. None of that happened. But it is still a credit to him that he’s made a solid career for himself.