Historical look at point guard height as a predictor for NBA success

Photo courtesy Utah Jazz.

Trey Burke has had a rough welcome to the NBA in his first three Summer League games in Orlando: shooting just 9 of 41.  He’s struggled finishing inside and had problems getting the same separation for jump shots he created in college. But whether good or bad, there is little fans can draw from these three lone games to project whether Burke will live up to his hype (favorite for Rookie of the Year, characterization as the best point guard in the draft. etc.).

But that question—just how good can Trey Burke be?—has become the crux of the upcoming season of hope, as well as the Jazz’s future. Like the businessman who controls the corporation’s purse strings, much of what will happen on the court next season for the Jazz will go through Burke.

This first Summer League game showed the liabilities that cause some to question Burke’s ceiling in the NBA: his lack of height and explosiveness make it hard to finish near the hoop, result in contested jump shots, and put him at a disadvantage against bigger, heavier point guards.  Some of these difficulties will certainly be resolved as Burke adjusts to the NBA game, but will Burke’s stature prove a significant and permanent liability?

Let’s see what the numbers say.

Consider every rookie point guard since 1990 to play 20 or more minutes per game.  (Note that I characterized their career ability level–bench, starter, etc.–according to peak quality of play and not style.  Thus, dynamic bench players like Bobby Jackson and Leandro Barbosa are listed as starters, because I think their games at their best were at the level of a respectable starter in the league.)

That’s 61 players.  Trey Burke will become number 62 this season, and he’s not the only one six foot or shorter.  Historically, how has height affected point guards in their rookie season and beyond?

The tables below explore this question.  I focused on rookies who played 20 or more minutes a game both because Jazz fans want to know what to expect from Trey Burke long term based on his rookie performance (no one wants to wait to draw conclusions) and because I assume a height disadvantage would be most noticeable in a rookie year, when a player is adapting to superior NBA athletes.

Trey Burke: Starter, Star, or All-Star?

Does height have a bearing on developmental potential?  Historically, yes.  What the numbers suggest is a mixed bag when it comes to implications for Trey Burke.

First, the good news.  History suggests that a 6’0” guard who earns 20 minutes per game or more his rookie season will develop into at least a passable starting caliber player 75% of the time.  Statistically speaking, there is little difference between the prospects of a 6’0” point guard and someone 6’2” when it comes to becoming a starter.

There is less correlation when it comes to all-star status, which is also good news for Burke.  Since 1990, it has been extremely difficult for players under 6’0” to become all-stars, indeed, no point guard has done it.  6’0” appears to be something of a threshold; from 6’0” to 6’4”, most every height has between a 38% and 47% chance of becoming an all-star, with taller players having a slight advantage.

This suggests Burke’s height: 1) is unlikely to be a major hindrance in his development as a passable starter; and 2) has about as good a shot of becoming an all-star as any other point guard, regardless of height.

Now the bad news.  There is a clear correlation between increasing height and a player’s likelihood of achieving stardom, which I define as a top three role on his team for the purpose of this analysis.  In the last two decades plus, the taller a team’s point guard, the more likely he has developed into a top two or three focal point of the team.  Generally speaking, the players who manage to buck this trend have an excellent chance of becoming all-stars.

So height’s relation to point guard upside is something of feast or fast (not famine).  History suggests that Trey Burke will probably become a starting caliber point guard.  If he wants to be better than that, he will have to beat the odds.  If he is one of those high achievers, the chances are good he will be able to retire from basketball with the title “all-star” attached to his name.

Is Trey Burke Truly Short for His Position?

Statistically, the claim that Burke is short for a point guard is only somewhat true.  The following table shows the breakdown of all these rookie point guards grouped by height.

75% of these point guards have been between 6’0” and 6’4”; players shorter or taller are the major outliers.  36% are either 6’0” or 6’1”, and 47% are 6’1” or shorter.  Given Burke’s long arms and good if not great athleticism, I doubt he is at a physical disadvantage against most of the 6’1” point guards in the league.  Physically, he’s likely right in the meaty middle of the bell curve for point guard stature.

How Quickly Will It Take Burke to Get up to Speed?

Burke is an early favorite for Rookie of the Year.  Many, including a hoard of hopeful Jazz fans, are anticipating he’ll hit the court running much in the way Damian Lillard did last year.  Lillard posted a stellar 19 points, 6.5 assists, and 3.1 rebounds last season, earning a personal efficiency rating (PER) of 16.4.  (PER is a measure of per-minute production standardized so that the league average is 15, and is one of the single statistics commonly used to represent a player’s overall quality of play.)

Lillard is 6’3”, though.  Will Burke’s height create a greater adjustment period than Lillard experienced, hampering Burke’s ability to perform at a high level his rookie reason?  The statistical verdict: Nope.  The following chart lists the average PER for these players at each height in their rookie year.

Strange that three of the four highest averages are for heights beneath 6’1”, but there you go.  Apparently, the shorter point guards who earn enough trust to play 20 or more minutes as rookies are really prepared to contribute right away.  Six of the 20 rookies who posted average or above PERs were 6’0” or shorter.  Those players make up only 25% of the total population, but they account for 30% of the average or above PERs.

The numbers say the shorter guys are, if anything, MORE ready to play efficiently as rookies than their taller counterparts.

Conclusions

The past 23 seasons of NBA basketball suggest that Trey Burke’s height may be a limiting factor in his development and ultimate potential as a player, but not as significantly as some suggest.  These 61 rookie point guards are not a huge sample size to draw from, particularly when subdivided by height, but they are the closest peers to Burke available: rookie point guards good enough to earn significant minutes on the court right off the bat.

The numbers suggest that Burke’s height may be a legitimate obstacle to his rising from Jazz starter to star prominence on the team.  Whether this is because height limits effectiveness on the court or the perceptions of the teams themselves limit opportunity and status is not clear.  Likely, there is some of both going on.  Teams want prototypical 6’3” point guards because they’ve been very successful and they’ve been successful because teams look for players who fit that profile.  Take the chicken or the egg, your pick.

Projecting Burke’s career based solely upon his height is foolish, either to condemn or exalt.  He is very much more than his stature. Height is a part of Trey Burke, not the whole of him.  The numbers suggest that Burke’s height may sometimes prove an obstacle to meeting Jazz fans’ hopes and his own goals—he publicly declared he thinks he can become an all-star—but they also show stature deficiencies like his are far from impossible to overcome, even in a rookie season.  Add the entire package that is Trey Burke to those odds, and you have what looks like a solid bet and a very good NBA player.