Tory Miller - Becoming an Elite Rebounder?

[BuffG]

Tad talked a bit about Tory today & replacing Scott's rebounding as a team. The Buffs were a top 10 rebounding team this last year & Tory was exceptional in his role. Some stats that may surprise:

Tory has the 8th best career offensive rebounding % of any PAC-12 player since '09-10. Of returning PAC-12 players, only Thomas Welsh has a better offensive rebounding %.

Along with being elite at offensive rebounds, he was insane on putbacks in his sophomore yr. He converted 76.9% of his putbacks. For comparison, Gordon was 60.9% & Scott was 57.1% on putbacks. Miller had as many putbacks (27) as Gordon despite playing roughly half the minutes.

In terms of total rebound %, Tory has the 3rd best career rate of any returning PAC-12 player & is 22nd amongst players since '09-'10.

Obviously, these numbers could deflate in a larger role & playing more against other team's starters. However, his career minutes are equivalent to 1 season as a full-time player & his career rebounding % so far is putting him amongst the best rebounders in the PAC-12 for next season as well as the past 7 seasons.

 

[Shldr2Shldr]

If Tory can continue on his current trajectory, he is going to be a problem next year for a lot of teams. Josh was a bit more finesse in the paint, he had elite post moves and a soft touch. Tory is a bully, he will go through you if you make him. Need him to work on his shooting touch at the rim this year, his post outlet passes, and drawing contact without fouling.

There were flashes this season of what Tory can be, and if he can put that together he is going to be incredible.

 

[Goose]

Great stuff BuffG. I think the key for Tory next year is to improve his ball control. His assist rate was horrible this year (2.4%) and his turnover rate was really bad for a big man (19.4). He did start passing out of the post more around Vegas, so it gives me hope, but if he can just get that TO Rate down to a rate similar to Wes' (14.8%) it'd be huge for his development.

 

[MtnBuff]

Agree with you, Tory is strong enough to push most guys around and quick enough to go by those who can muscle with him.

One exception though to what you said. I would like to see him develop more touch on close shots but I would rather see him abandon touch at the rim and just more agressively dunk the ball every opportunity.

 

[Shldr2Shldr]

Agree with you, Tory is strong enough to push most guys around and quick enough to go by those who can muscle with him.

One exception though to what you said. I would like to see him develop more touch on close shots but I would rather see him abandon touch at the rim and just more agressively dunk the ball every opportunity.

I think Tory would rather aggressively dunk the ball every opportunity as well haha. Can't always be done though.

 

[Scotch]

Tory's play was definitely encouraging the last month of the season.

Tory and Wes are opposites with their shot arc. Tory's is a huge rainbow, while Wes' is a frozen tight rope that barely gets above the rim. Hopefully both improve on that this off season as it'd be good to have them step out of the post and hit the mid-range every now and then like Scott did.

 

[jsmilkst]

TORY SMASH

 

[Shldr2Shldr]

 

[BuffG]

Great stuff BuffG. I think the key for Tory next year is to improve his ball control. His assist rate was horrible this year (2.4%) and his turnover rate was really bad for a big man (19.4). He did start passing out of the post more around Vegas, so it gives me hope, but if he can just get that TO Rate down to a rate similar to Wes' (14.8%) it'd be huge for his development.

Where are you getting the 19.4% turnover rate? KenPom? Sports-reference has him at a 16.2% TO rate for his sophomore year. The good news is in conference play, he reduced that number to 13.5% according to sports-reference. His TO rate has steadily improved since his freshman year but I agree it's still a concern mainly because, like you said, his passing needs to improve. He's a more aggressive shot-taker than Gordon which is important because it's hard to think Gordon will all of a sudden be an aggressive low-post scorer.

Defensively, I really want to see Tory improve his rim protection. He has too much athleticism & too long of arms to justify a 2.2% block rate that has stayed flat 2 years.

Ultimately, I just wanted to show that in terms of rebounding, I don't think we should see much of a drop off. I'm expecting a top 20 rebounding team.

 

[Goose]

Where are you getting the 19.4% turnover rate? KenPom? Sports-reference has him at a 16.2% TO rate for his sophomore year. The good news is in conference play, he reduced that number to 13.5% according to sports-reference. His TO rate has steadily improved since his freshman year but I agree it's still a concern mainly because, like you said, his passing needs to improve. He's a more aggressive shot-taker than Gordon which is important because it's hard to think Gordon will all of a sudden be an aggressive low-post scorer.

Yeah, KP. That's odd. Any idea why @jgisland?

 

[BuffaloSoldier76]

Where are you getting the 19.4% turnover rate? KenPom? Sports-reference has him at a 16.2% TO rate for his sophomore year. The good news is in conference play, he reduced that number to 13.5% according to sports-reference. His TO rate has steadily improved since his freshman year but I agree it's still a concern mainly because, like you said, his passing needs to improve. He's a more aggressive shot-taker than Gordon which is important because it's hard to think Gordon will all of a sudden be an aggressive low-post scorer.

Defensively, I really want to see Tory improve his rim protection. He has too much athleticism & too long of arms to justify a 2.2% block rate that has stayed flat 2 years.

Ultimately, I just wanted to show that in terms of rebounding, I don't think we should see much of a drop off. I'm expecting a top 20 rebounding team.

Wasn't a lot of the problem due to his exuberance in the early season with his passes out of the post? If I recall correctly, there were several occurrences in the non-conference where Tory was passing out of the post and it looked like he was firing a howitzer directly through the recipient's hands, directly out of bounds, and embedding into the stadium's concrete steps. It seemed to me that after a few games of that, he really stopped trying to pass out of the post unless absolutely necessary until late in the season when he passed with much more touch. I hope I'm remembering that properly. If I am, that should point to a good trend for him going forward.

 

[BuffG]

Wasn't a lot of the problem due to his exuberance in the early season with his passes out of the post? If I recall correctly, there were several occurrences in the non-conference where Tory was passing out of the post and it looked like he was firing a howitzer directly through the recipient's hands, directly out of bounds, and embedding into the stadium's concrete steps. It seemed to me that after a few games of that, he really stopped trying to pass out of the post unless absolutely necessary until late in the season when he passed with much more touch. I hope I'm remembering that properly. If I am, that should point to a good trend for him going forward.

Hard for me to remember it that specifically, but it does seem by all accounts that his TO rate has steadily decreased.

 

[MtnBuff]

I think Tory would rather aggressively dunk the ball every opportunity as well haha. Can't always be done though.

He is a very enthusiastic dunker at times, I have also though seen plenty of times when he was right at the rim and still tried a gentle little lay in or 6 inch shot, including a few that bounced around and came off.

 

[jgisland]

Yeah, KP. That's odd. Any idea why @jgisland?

KenPom uses ToRate as personal per possession turnovers - so Tory turns the ball over on 19.4% of possessions HE uses
Sports reference uses TOV% - which is an estimated % of turnovers per 100 possessions. So Tory turns the ball over 16.2 times per 100 possessions.

It's really just 2 different ways of looking at the same thing. Either way, 19.4% or 16.2% isn't good for a big man that doesn't dribble much.

 

[BuffG]

KenPom uses ToRate as personal per possession turnovers - so Tory turns the ball over on 19.4% of possessions HE uses
Sports reference uses TOV% - which is an estimated % of turnovers per 100 possessions. So Tory turns the ball over 16.2 times per 100 possessions.

It's really just 2 different ways of looking at the same thing. Either way, 19.4% or 16.2% isn't good for a big man that doesn't dribble much.

It isn't but Tory's progression in TO rate has been similar to Wes so far & sports-reference has his in-conference ratio at 13.5%. Could you or someone else tell me what KP has for his sophomore in-conference TO rate?

 

[Goose]

It isn't but Tory's progression in TO rate has been similar to Wes so far & sports-reference has his in-conference ratio at 13.5%. Could you or someone else tell me what KP has for his sophomore in-conference TO rate?

Tory had a 26.8% TO Rate his frosh year and 19.4% last year.

Wes had a 23.5% TO Rate his frosh year, 18.6% last year and 14.8% this year.

So Tory's is a little higher, but it's not unreasonable to say he could be following the Wes pattern.

Side note - assist rates:

Tory - 3.3% frosh, 2.4% soph

Wes - 7.6% frosh, 9.0% soph, 8.9% jr

I think Tory's assist numbers were hurt his frosh year by who he played with (mostly bench guys, whereas Wes got the starters), but I still would like to see that improve.

 

[BuffG]

Tory had a 26.8% TO Rate his frosh year and 19.4% last year.

Wes had a 23.5% TO Rate his frosh year, 18.6% last year and 14.8% this year.

So Tory's is a little higher, but it's not unreasonable to say he could be following the Wes pattern.

Side note - assist rates:

Tory - 3.3% frosh, 2.4% soph

Wes - 7.6% frosh, 9.0% soph, 8.9% jr

I think Tory's assist numbers were hurt his frosh year by who he played with (mostly bench guys, whereas Wes got the starters), but I still would like to see that improve.

I was asking for in-conference TO rate from KP. Sport-ref has Wes at 21.8% frosh yr & 17.3% soph yr. They have Tory at 23.1% frosh yr & 16.2% soph yr. More importantly, his in-conference rate this yr was reduced to 13.5%.

Going by either site, Tory's frosh-to-soph jump is more impressive as an improvement than Wes. We're talking about ~1% difference on their soph TO rate by both sites & Tory made the bigger jump. Overall, they're quite similar.

On assist rate, I've always rated Wes as a plus passer before he even played at CU. I don't have high hopes for Tory in that area.