Why Can’t Bismack Biyombo Help The Magic Defend?
Bismack Biyombo is supposed to be an all-defense quality center. Why hasn’t he helped Orlando’s defense?
Let’s get this out of the way first: we’re not here to discuss “Bismack Biyombo’s contract.” Biyombo’s contract does not, in fact, participate in basketball games, but fans have a tendency to consider it all the same when thinking about how well he is playing. Make no mistake, the contract, totaling a cool $68 million over four years, finishing after the 2019–2020 season, is not kind to the Orlando Magic’s cap sheet. Still, it’s easy to imagine a player is performing worse than he actually is if they’re not living up to the contract they’re being paid.
Certainly, Biyombo isn’t performing up to the standards you’d imagine for the highest-paid player on the team, but it’s important to look past that and try to understand what’s actually going on here. Worst-case scenario, everything’s his fault and he’ll continue to eat up cap room for three more seasons and the Magic inexplicably get relegated to the D-League, but it’s entirely possible — probable, even — that there’s larger issues in play.
Let’s start with the basics. Biyombo is playing a similar number of minutes as last season, in a similar backup role behind a similar offense-first center (though as we’ll see, Nikola Vucevic in many ways looks like the better defender this season). His rebounds and blocks are down from the last few seasons, whether you count per game, per minute, or per possession. This isn’t a trivial dropoff, either: his block rate is by far the lowest of any season of his career, and his rebounding is at its worst since his sophomore season in ‘12-’13.
Plus-minus stats tell a similar tale. Based on regular on/off numbers from NBA.com, Orlando’s defense improves when Biyombo’s not on the court. Vucevic, on the other hand, looks like the Magic’s best defender by this metric, posting the Magic’s best defensive rating when he plays, and leaving the team with the worst defense while he’s on the bench. Team defensive rebounding is down with Biyombo on the floor, too.
Of course, this could all be circumstantial. Getting to spend most of your minutes with Aaron Gordon or Elfrid Payton is a very different experience from playing with Jeff Green or D.J. Augustin. Unfortunately, other advanced statistics don’t do him many favors, either, even the ones that try to account for these circumstances. ESPN’s Real Plus-Minus (which rated him very highly last season) suggests Biyombo is barely a positive on defense at a +0.66, a low mark by center standards. Basketball-Reference’s Box Plus-Minus is friendlier, pegging him at +2.1 DBPM, just a shade lower than his +2.3 last season.
Again, Vucevic rates better by either metric, and anecdotally, many people who watch the team regularly will tell you that’s not a fluke. Sometimes, like against Steven Adams, Vucevic will be outmatched and Biyombo needs to get more playing time, but on many occasions it’s Vucevic who has to take on the matchups that Biz, or previously Serge Ibaka, couldn’t handle, like Brook Lopez. Vucevic isn’t pinning the ball to the backboard with regularity, but he tends to be in the right place at the right time, something that’s not always true of Biyombo.
It’s clear that there’s a problem, but the “why” of the matter is more difficult to settle. The obvious place to look is the part of the court Biyombo is supposed to help the most, around the rim. Per NBA.com’s tracking data, Biyombo is allowing opponents to shoot 52.4% by the basket, a relatively high percentage, especially by his own standards (nearly league-best 45.2% last season). That’s a big enough difference that it probably matters at least a little, but the NBA’s defended field goal percentage data tends to be unreliable, so there isn’t always a lot of stock to put into it.
More interesting, though, is the number of shots they suggest he attempts to defend: 5.8 per game this season versus 6.8 last season, in a similar number of minutes. There’s some evidence that his presence is dissuading opponents from shooting in the paint: per NBAwowy, opponents take about 30% of their shots in within 3 feet of the rim while Biyombo is on the court, and about 33% when he’s not. On the other hand, that was also the case last season with Toronto, albeit to a slightly lesser extent.
The more important trend is likely a league-wide phenomena. As coach Frank Vogel is well aware of and has discussed several times this season, small-ball and spacing is becoming a bigger and bigger part of the game, and the presence of shooting centers is dragging defenders away from the basket. As evidence of the phenomena, Vucevic is also defending fewer close-range shots each game, suggesting that he, too, is being forced away from the rim.
One more factor beyond Biyombo’s control: opponent 3-point shooting. Opponents are shooting almost 2% better from long-distance when Biyombo’s playing this season, and on a basic level you’d expect that he wouldn’t have much to do with that, being the center, even if he matches up against more stretchy big men these days. We’re also learning more and more that opponent 3-point percentage tends to be fairly uncontrollable, that preventing 3-point attempts is more important than the percentage your opponents shoot. In other words, Biyombo might just be unlucky, and that 3-point luck isn’t something that’s captured by plus-minus stats.
So what does all this mean for him, and for the Magic moving forward? For one, it suggests that the Vogel will need to adapt his defensive schemes to the NBA’s modern style, that what he used in Indiana won’t work quite the same as it does now. Biyombo can’t just be a paint anchor anymore…instead, he needs to find a way to help him become mobile, to be in two places at once rather than the “conservative” style he preferred before.
Vogel’s defense focused on defending screen plays 2-on-2 while helping as little as possible, so the other 3 players can keep home on shooters, but that gets more difficult when the opposing screener can pop all the way out to the 3-point line.
It also suggests that Biyombo really relies on better perimeter defense for his talents to shine, much the same as Ibaka. Ibaka shared many of these same problems, including a bad defensive rating, the inability to consistently defend the rim, and tension related to facing more and more shooting. In a small sample size, it also looks like he’s dealing with those problems better in Toronto than in Orlando, and while part of that may be the motivation that comes with playing for a conference contender, part of that also comes from playing with better perimeter talents.
Both Payton and Augustin suffer from the inability to contain ball handlers, especially in pick-and-roll situations. When that happens, it forces Biyombo into really tough situations, often where he’s compelled to come out and hedge against the ball handler. The Magic are particular susceptible to pocket passes in the paint, when Biyombo, Vucevic, or Ibaka has to step up to defend one attacker, allowing another one to cut in right behind them, often their original assignment. That breakdown originates with the guards and wings, and it may be why Ibaka does so much better next to the likes of Cory Joseph, Patrick Patterson, and DeMar DeRozan, good-to-great perimeter defenders at their positions.
Throw in that contract from the start of this whole discussion, and it’s clear that the Magic can’t really afford to move on from him, not very easily. Instead, if they want to be successful, they’ll need to tailor their defensive style to him. Frank Vogel’s defensive reputation suggests he should be able to make it work with an offseason to figure it out, but it may be up to the front office — whoever happens to be in charge of it this summer — to make everything finally fit together.
