Wild Stats Show How Important Lakers' Dorian Finney-Smith Has Been Since Joining The Franchise

When you think of the Los Angeles Lakers making a midseason trade this season, everyone will automatically default to their acquisition of Luka Doncic. However, the Lakers kicked off trade season with a late-December acquisition of defensive forward Dorian Finney-Smith for D'Angelo Russell. While the Doncic trade is expected to be the one to bring home a title, it seems that can't be possible without Finney-Smith.

A fan podcast 'Lakers Exceptionalism' shared the advanced defensive numbers of Dorian since joining the Lakers in December. Safe to say, it shows how much the team might end up relying on the 31-year-old in the Playoffs.

"Dorian Finney-Smith is the #1 rotation player in the NBA this season in Defensive Positional Versatility, per Basketball Index. Leaderboards tool. No player has a more balanced workload defending PG, SG, SF, PF, C. A true 1-5 defender with how he's used."

The stats show that DFS has the most balanced workload amongst all defenders in the NBA when it comes to guarding all five positions on the court, with percentage data showing exactly how much of his time he spends guarding players at each position.

% Of Time Guarding Point Guards: 21.05 %

% Of Time Guarding Shooting Guards: 21.75 %

% Of Time Guarding Small Forwards: 15.55 %

% Of Time Guarding Power Forwards: 21.85 %

% Of Time Guarding Centers: 19.80 %

Finney-Smith is 6'7", 220 pounds. He's become the Lakers default POA option and his size allows him to be deployed against virtually any player in the NBA. 

His effectiveness as a defender wanes against wing players like shooting guard and small forward due to Smith not having the speed to match up, but he's one of the most consistent defenders when it comes to matching up with bigs. He's in the 70th percentile of defensive efficency against power forwards and centers, something plummets to the mid-30s when we look at wings positions like SG or SF.

Smith is surprisingly effective against point guard and ranks in the 65th percentile against them. That could be due to him maximizing his lateral movement and size to guard smaller players on an island with the understanding help defenders will converge if the guard gets the drop on Smith for a drive to the rim.

Dorian isn't an All-Defense caliber player anymore, but he's one of the most intelligent defensive players in the NBA right now. Nobody knows that better than Doncic, who's seen Smith lock up players for years when they were teammates on the Mavericks. 

Finney-Smith might not be effective like he was four years ago, but he can still be effective enough to not buckle under the pressure of big Playoff moments and changing defensive assignments. He's averaging 7.7 points and 3.7 rebounds in 40 games this season since joining the Lakers. He's also shooting 38.6% from three as a floor-spacer.

Smith has played a lot of minutes at center off-late, proving his versatility might be the what gets him consistent minutes with Redick unwilling to change the starting forward duo of LeBron James and Rui Hachimura. But Finney-Smith will find a place in the rotation due to the unique and multi-faceted impact he can have on the court.