On Myles Turner, jump balls, and staying grounded

An analysis of what the tipping point should be for the Pacers on opening tips

By: Caitlin Cooper I @C2_Cooper

A little less than a month after Buddy Hield set the record for the fastest three-pointer to start a game in NBA history, the Pacers experienced another rare, though wholly opposite, occurrence during the opening tip. Whereas Hield wasted no time turning to fire from deep after catching the jump ball in shooting position, Myles Turner appeared as though time -- or rather, timing -- was none of his concern. Instead, as he stood on the center logo at eye-level with Wendell Carter Jr. in Orlando, he opted to remain standing on the center logo at eye-level with Wendell Carter Jr. in Orlando, moving only to tilt his head ever so slightly in the direction of the rafters while idly watching the upward motion of the ball and seemingly surrendering possession.

It was an odd choice, keeping his feet planted firmly on the ground, but make no mistake, it was definitely a choice. Following the initial toss, which was a dud, Turner very clearly had his mind made up, announcing his intentions for all to hear before the ball had even taken flight on the second attempt: "I'm not going to jump at that," he seems to say while flashing a wry smile.

For Turner, the non-jump was a non-event, a playful moment of protest that was met with both a few grins and perhaps momentary befuddlement. And yet, when it comes to finding small edges and/or pick-up points for increasing points per possession on the margin that aren't necessarily uniform, he might actually be onto something -- albeit unknowingly.

Regardless of who wins the tip, each team is still going to have the opportunity to start two quarters with the ball. When the Pacers control the tip, they obviously have possession to start the game, as well as the fourth quarter. Conversely, if they don't control the tip, the ball is theirs at the beginning of the second and third. In the end, it's an even divide. Carry on. Nothing to see here, right? Well, here's the thing: The Pacers aren't often evenly matched in these match-ups. At least, not when Myles Turner is the player jumping middle.

There aren't any publicly available stats for jump balls, but the results, as far as which team gains possession, are included in play-by-play feeds. Last season, Turner played in 62 games. Of those games, the Pacers gained possession, meaning they secured the ball, on only 34 percent of his opening tips. Moreover, when hand-tracking whether Turner, personally, won the tip, getting his hand on the ball and tapping it out independent of which team ultimately caught it, he fared a smidge worse, notching a win rate of 32 percent. That's because, as was the case when Hield canned the three within the first three seconds of the game against Cleveland, there were a few instances where the opposing team either tipped the ball to the Pacers or the Pacers were simply quicker to the ball. Put simply, Turner lost the tip, but the Pacers gained possession.

At any rate, despite being a world-class shot-blocker, Turner's impeccable timing doesn't exactly translate to center court against opposing centers. including when he has a height advantage. In fact, going by the height measurements listed at NBA.com (which can admittedly be wonky), the Pacers went 12-17 with Turner as the taller player, gaining possession on just 41 percent of his opening tips. The math shifts in his favor on jump balls that are the result of in-game tie ups, when players are closer together. On those plays, the Pacers posted a win rate above 50 percent, going 6-5; however, with several of the jump balls coming against smaller guards, wings, and forwards (such as Luka Doncic, O.G. Anunoby, Kelly Oubre Jr., Pascal Siakam, and LeBron James), Turner's height advantage (though he still lost out to the likes of Anunoby and James) was significantly more pronounced than what occurs at the beginning of games, when he's face-to-face with fives.

In that regard, while there may not be a factor that points to him as the favorite, there certainly seems to be a scenario in which he proves to be even more hampered. For example, look closely at this opening tip against the Los Angeles Clippers and notice how Ivica Zubac is standing open toward the ball, whereas Turner is perpendicular, with his chest and hips facing Zubac.

When he's positioned to the left of the official, he uses that stance so he can still tip the ball with his strong hand. What tends to happen in effect though is that he becomes slower to get off the floor, as his evidenced here by his losses to Zubac, Al Horford, Nikola Vucevic, Jusuf Nurkic, and several others -- none of whom are typically thought of as explosive leapers.

By the numbers, when Turner was in a closed stance, the Pacers went 9-21 on opening tips, which calculates out to an even lower win-percentage (30 percent) than his overall rate (34 percent). Compared to Turner, other centers who he was pitted against were more willing to sacrifice tapping the ball out with their strong hand in order to jump out of an open stance. Here, Joel Embiid keeps his chest facing the toss and is quicker to the ball with his left. Likewise, Robert Williams III also stays open to the official but switches hands on the way up.

As a shot-blocker, Turner is so immensely talented at turning over his shoulder and slapping away shots in recovery that he doesn't often close space at the rim with his left or stay in front while contesting shots with his weak-hand. That's fine. As he's shown, he doesn't necessarily need to be ambidextrous in that regard, but the same right-hand dominance carries over to the center circle, where it seems to impact how quickly he can elevate when requiring a closed stance. As such, while it may be gimmicky and probably would never happen, the numbers merit asking whether standing his ground, as he did against Orlando, might be a worthwhile strategy.

Just to emphasize: If he isn't going to switch hands, the chance of him winning the tip in a closed stance is far from a 50/50 prospect. Of course, the same can also be said overall, but there might be some degree of latent benefit to mixing in the element of surprise. Think of it this way: In games when Turner is positioned to the left of the official (and unlikely to win the tip), the Pacers could get wild and occasionally concede the jump with the deliberate intention of immediately throwing out some type of press defense. After all, that wouldn't be entirely out of left field for the Pacers, seeing as how they already dialed up the pressure last season against top-tier playmakers, trapping with their rim protector as far as 75 feet from the basket.

Wouldn't that be preferable to this?

Admittedly, that example isn't perfect, given that Turner is pitted against Nic Claxton, who is left-handed, with both players facing off in an open stance; and yet, that almost reinforces the point. For other teams, there might be a slight advantage to starting the fourth quarter with the ball, but Turner is so rarely favored that the stronger competitive edge for the Pacers could potentially come in the form of focusing on defense (remember defense?) and potentially forcing a turnover.

Plus, even if nothing materializes at that end of the floor, the other outcome of "losing" the tip is  the opportunity to run a set play after halftime. To understand why that matters, consider the February 11 game against the Washington Wizards. In the prior meetings, Kristaps Porzingis had been assigned to either Myles Turner or Jalen Smith. With Kyle Kuzma sidelined for this match-up, however, Washington started big with Porzingis and Daniel Gafford both on the floor. By this point in the season, the Pacers had pivoted to playing four-guard lineups, with Aaron Nesmith starting in place of Smith. As a result, Andrew Nembhard's primary defender at the beginning of the game was Porzingis, which led to some early snags in the offense.

In all likelihood, the Pacers probably weren't anticipating that match-up. On the year, Nembhard was defended by guards more than 65 percent of the time. Porzingis is not a guard. He's a 7'3" center. By comparison, Nembhard was defended by centers 5.5 percent of the time. Without playing out of ball-screens or against a switch, this wasn't exactly something he had a lot of experience combating. But, knowledge is power. During halftime, there's more information available and more opportunity to game-plan around that available information. As such, look at what Indiana ran to start the second half. For point of reference, the Pacers call this play "face" and signal for it by waving their hand in front of their (yep, you guessed it) face. Here's an example from earlier in the season. There are a lot of moving parts, but the important takeaway is that normally the play is triggered by Haliburton setting a back-screen for Hield and then receiving a screen to come toward the ball. From there, he can flow into a empty-side pick-and-roll with the screener, or he can wait for Hield to come off a set of screens on the other side.

Now, spot the difference against Washington. Rather than Haliburton screening for Hield, Nembhard is screening for Haliburton. The purpose of that change is to force Porzingis to sag off from Nembhard in order to protect against the cut.

In turn, that tiny tweak makes him late chasing through the subsequent pindown, which isn't an action that 7'3" centers are typically accustomed to defending. See how that works both ways?

As an aside, it seems good to have a star player who can also play off-ball and is willing to be used as a cutter without getting a touch in order to loosen up the offense, but that's a topic for another day. What matters for this exercise is that Porzingis is being forced to defend through a maze of picks with a strategic purpose that probably wouldn't have been devised in the same way to start the game without the benefit of hindsight.

Turns out, after doing some hand-tracking, there are numbers to consider with this. On the season, the Pacers started the second half with the ball in 41 of the 62 games in which Myles Turner jumped middle. On those plays, the Pacers scored 1.073 points per possession -- a mark better than that of their overall efficiency in the half-court (0.979), which, per Synergy, ranked 23rd in the league.

Granted, that's a very tiny sample size and doesn't necessarily guarantee any direct correlation between halftime game-planning and scoring output, given that some of the points may have been tallied out of broken plays or as a result of tough shot-making, but the example with Nembhard and Porzingis is still reflective of the advantage that might be gained, as far as potential pick-up points in points per possession, for a team that has the ability to be fire with the pen and isn't likely to gain possession on the opening tip.

That said, the calculus changes during overtime, when there are fewer possessions to work with and the split between which team starts each quarter with the ball is no longer an even divide. According to Inpredictable, winning the opening tip during overtime increases the odds of winning a game by 4.2 percent. For evidence of the impact of the possession war, think back to the game against the Sixers from the beginning of January. After snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory by giving up four points off turnovers over the final 40 seconds of regulation, Myles Turner lost the tip to Montrezl Harrell at the start of overtime. That might not seem like much, but Philadelphia ended up attempting four more shots than the Pacers during the extra period. Remember, Indiana ranked last in opponent offensive rebounding rate last season, and the Sixers grabbed four offensive rebounds without committing a turnover. In effect, although they didn't score points on that first possession, winning the overtime tip contributed to them getting an added bite at the gobbled apple in what ultimately became a loss for the Pacers.

For his career, Turner has performed better from center court at the start of extra time, with the Pacers going 12-9 in securing the tip. Of the 12 in which they gained possession, they went on to win half of the games, posting a 6-6 record. Something else notable about those 12 games? Seven came with him in open stance, and when looking back at those when he was closed, he looks quite a bit different and appears to jump with a quicker twitch than what is the case now with the filled out frame that he needs to support his overall game.

All of which begs the question, what should the Pacers do in the present if there is an overtime game that would lead to him being in a closed stance? It may not happen often, but for a team that routinely gets crunched on the glass, a change might be in order, either with regard to the hand with which he tips the ball or with whom is tipping the ball. When the Pacers played the Pelicans the day after Christmas, New Orleans had Jaxson Hayes jump against Turner, even though Jonas Valanciunas started at center.

If Obi Toppin joins Myles Turner in the frontcourt, maybe the Pacers would consider trying out a similar arrangement in the event of overtime?

Whatever the case, there are certain circumstances, whether staying grounded to focus on defense and run a set play after halftime or potentially standing aside during extra time, where it might be prudent, if not also providing a slight edge, for Turner to adopt the same mindset he expressed against the Orlando Magic:

"I'm not jumping at that."