Analysis: Triple-doubles no longer a rarity in the NBA
AP Basketball Writer
It’s the 3-point era in the NBA. The massivesalary era. The LeBron James era.
It’s also the triple-double era.
If it seems like tripledoubles are happening more often than ever, that’s because they are — by a huge margin. On average, the NBA has seen someone put up at least 10 of this, 10 of that and 10 of those in one out of every seven games this season.
The rate of them happening is up 47% over last season, plus represents a staggering increase of nearly 700% over how often they occurred just nine years ago — when there were 18 in the entire 2011-12 season.
They happen with amazing regularity now. That doesn’t mean everyone is enthralled.
“I get it. They’re nice, round numbers and people get into those things in sports,” New Orleans coach Stan Van Gundy said. “But I’ve never really been one who thought a whole lot of the whole triple-double thing.”
He’s right. Some of them don’t seem to have much of an impact on the game.
Then there’s what Russell Westbrook — the tripledouble king — did Monday night.
Westbrook had 35 points, 14 rebounds and 21 assists to lead Washington to a win. It was only the third time someone had that many points and that many assists in an NBA game; throw in the rebounds, and Westbrook’s night was unprecedented.
“He does things I’ve never seen and I’ve been in this league for 30 years,” Washington coach Scott Brooks said. “He’s a winner.”
If people are bored by the triple-double, it might be Westbrook’s fault. He’s been making them seem like nightly happenings for years.
The reasons for the rise leaguewide in triple-doubles are many, but two of them are clear: the “freedom of movement” emphasis in officiating favors the offensive player, so that means more points and more assists. So, too, does the increase pace of play, which also leads to more rebound opportunities. There are about eight more possessions and eight more shot attempts per team as compared to nine years ago, and every possession leads to a statistic of some sort.
“To me, they’re such arbitrary numbers,” Van Gundy said. “What, if you get 10, 10 and 10 that’s better than 35, nine and nine? ... There’s a big difference between 15 points and 35 points. There’s a big difference between 10 rebounds and 18 rebounds. And there’s a big difference between 10 assists and 17 assists. So, to say a triple-double is a measure of a great game, I don’t know.”
This will be the fifth consecutive year that the NBA has seen players collect at least 100 triple-doubles; there were 99 this season through Monday and 551 in the last five seasons, with this one only barely past the halfway mark. Westbrook leads the league with 16 already, followed by Denver’s Nikola Jokic and Brooklyn’s James Harden with 12 apiece, then Dallas’ Luka Doncic with nine.
Put another way, we’ve seen as many triple-doubles in the last five years as in the 15 seasons before that combined.
Even some players seem less-than-impressed by them these days.
“I could care less about a triple-double,” Miami’s Jimmy Butler said after he had one in last season’s NBA Finals. “We play this game to win.”