Random Jayhawk Player Breakdown 1

This is a new segment for the off-season in which a Kansas player will be randomly selected to have an in-depth statistical breakdown of his career as a Jayhawk. Since 1994, that is the last 30 seasons, there have been 172 players to appear in a regular season game wearing the crimson and blue. In our initial installment, the random player selected is…

Darrell Arthur

Not a bad first random selection! Darrell Arthur played for the Kansas Jayhawks in the 2006-07 and 2007-08 seasons. For simplicity, we will refer to the former season as ’07 and latter as ’08. Arthur came in as a highly-touted true freshman and left after his sophomore year to enter the NBA draft. He was selected 27^th overall in the 2008 NBA draft and played in 9 seasons for the Memphis Grizzlies and Denver Nuggets. He played in 503 NBA games and averaged 6.5 PPG over his NBA career. But this write-up is about his college career, and this is where we will now focus.

2007 season

According to College Basketball Reference’s RSCI Top 100 rankings, Darrell Arthur came in as the #11 prospect in his class. He was in the same incoming class as Sherron Collins and Brady Morningstar. Arthur played in all 38 games and produced the following traditional stats:

Arthur came in and performed right away. In his first collegiate game he scored 12 points with 6 rebounds and 3 blocks. The next game, the upset loss to Oral Roberts, Arthur scored 22 on 10/16 FG’s. He would put up his season high in points the next game, a bounce-back win against Towson, with 26 and 8. He had 19 and 9 in the team’s big win in Vegas against that great defending (and eventual) champion Florida Gators team. And while he struggled some during conference play, he was still a very positive player. His best conference game was against Iowa State where he had 15 and 11.

For a freshman to come in and produce, particularly during a time when KU had Julian Wright, Darnell Jackson, and Sasha Kaun; shows the level of play Arthur brought to the floor. He forced Self to play him by how good he was.

Arthur’s advanced stats, calculated by Basketball Reference, are as follows:

Arthur’s shooting was excellent, scoring efficiently by getting close baskets while having a solid mid-range game. His usage shows that he was a scorer, not someone who shot well only due to shot selection. Frosh Darrell Arthur could score. His rebounding percentage was fine for a freshman. His win share of 4.8 was fourth on the team that season, however his WS/40 was the team’s best. There’s an argument to be made here that he deserved more minutes. All of KU’s four bigs were good enough to start elsewhere, which made it tough to find more playing time.

Arthur’s value stats, which incorporate the most information and are thus the most accurate, show this:

This indicates that Arthur added 2.19 points of value per game above that of a bubble-player, with value added nearly equally between offense and defense. Arthur didn’t get routinely torched on defense (as some underclassmen do), and had active hands to not only grab rebounds but also get steals and force turnovers.

On a per-possession basis, Arthur’s value was the team’s best in ’07 at +6.61 points above bubble per 100 possessions. This is more evidence arguing in favor of Arthur’s playing time. Arthur’s best game of the season, and in fact the best outing of anyone that season, is estimated to be his performance against Towson. He had a +13.52 score, opponent-adjusted.

2008 season

Julian Wright, the team’s starting power forward the year prior, left for the NBA draft, which provided an opportunity for Arthur to start at that position his sophomore year. He would do just that, playing in all 40 games and starting in all but one (senior night). Along with his freshman year, his sophomore campaign’s stats are represented below:

Arthur’s stats increased across the board, aside from small drops on blocks/steals. He was the second-leading scorer behind Brandon Rush and second-leading rebounder behind Darnell Jackson. His shooting and scoring abilities increased as his minutes grew, leading to a more-efficient season that was also much more productive.

Arthur’s season high was 23 against Baylor, the team he almost went to. While he never touched the 26 he scored the season prior, he was a more reliable double-figure scorer, putting up 10+ points in 28 of 40 games. His most important game as a leading-scorer was his 20-point performance against Memphis in the 2008 National Championship game.

“Shady”’s advanced stats show a bump across the board, with a slight decline in usage. His win share increased by a full win, with a slight downtick on the per-40 metric. More minutes mean more concern with foul trouble, fatigue, etc. so this downtick isn’t anything alarming. The manipulation of the numbers indicate that he was heavily relied upon to be a leading player and that he performed.

Next graphic will show Arthur’s value stats.

In playing more minutes yet staying offensively productive and defensively agile, Arthur increased his per game value score to over +3.00. On a per-possession basis, he was second on the team at +7.26 per 100 possessions (Mario Chalmers). He was the team’s MVP for 8 games, including the National Championship game. On an opponent-adjusted score, Arthur’s best game in the 2008 season was against Texas in the Big 12 Tournament championship game, when he was +13.42 against the Longhorns.

As many KU fans know, Arthur was going to commit to Baylor before changing his mind and going with Kansas, due to a dream he had of Kansas winning the national championship. Arthur’s career is highlighted by this game. While Chalmers had the highlight shot to tie it in regulation, Darrell’s play throughout kept Kansas in it and helped lead the comeback charge. He hit an 18’ jump-shot to cut the 9-point lead to 7 with 1:57 left. He had a clutch basket with 1:00 left to cut the deficit to 2. And he added a dunk off a Chalmers feed early in OT to put KU up 4.

Summary

Let’s get to the ultimate question, which is how do we judge Arthur’s career at Kansas when compared to other Jayhawks? This can get tricky as there’s different ways to think about it. College basketball is different than other levels, in that those who are very good will move on sooner and play fewer than 4 seasons. If we take Arthur’s sophomore season: 12.8 PPG, 6.8 RPG, and a +3.08 Adj. PPG +/-; we see a good season that is nevertheless bested by numerous bigs in the Self-era: Perry Ellis, Wayne Simien, Thomas Robinson, Marcus Morris, Markieff Morris, Cole Aldrich, etc. Each of these players, in terms of Wins Above Replacement, had better Kansas careers than Darrell Arthur. For reference, Arthur’s career WAR is calculated to be 8.35. The worst of the above list is Markieff Morris at 9.75. Simien is up at 19.27 WAR.

But most of these names had their breakout seasons as upperclassmen and added their most value later in their careers. Since Arthur wasn’t around for potential junior or senior seasons, we don’t really have an apples-to-apples comparison regarding careers.  

If we look only at a player’s freshman and sophomore years, we get a comparison of how good Arthur was while at Kansas compared to other underclass PF’s and C’s.

Here we see Arthur better than the others over their first two seasons. He was better than Williams-era stalwarts as well; namely LaFrentz, Collison, and Gooden.

If we look at all positions, only Devon Dotson (11.51 WAR) tops Arthur when looking at all KU players’ freshman/sophomore years over the past 30 seasons. Arthur’s production as an underclassman is 2^nd best of any Jayhawk over the past 30 seasons. This seems noteworthy for someone who can get overlooked when fans are devising their dream lineups. Incidentally, Devon Dotson is in the same boat when it comes to great KU guards.

Regarding all time seasons and Adj. PPG +/-, Arthur’s 2008 sophomore campaign is 49^th and his 2007 freshman campaign is 80^th (out of 426 player-seasons). These two years were very good but not great seasons when looking at all-time performances. When we look only at sophomore years, Arthur’s season is either 6^th or 7^th best (depending if Simien’s 2003 injury-plagued season is counted) out of 98. His frosh season was 9^th best out of 119.

If one thinks of Darrell Arthur as one of KU’s great power forwards, he isn’t in the wrong. However, if we are just counting what a player did at KU, and recognize that players who stay for 4 years can have more of an impact than those that only play 1 or 2, we’d place Arthur as 33^rd in career WAR out of 172 (81^st percentile). Sandwiched in between Tyshawn Taylor and Travis Releford.