NBA Power Rankings: Ranking All 30 Starting Point Guards

 27.  Trey Burke — Utah Jazz

Passer Rating: 119.12 (24th)

Per-36 minutes:  15.3 points, 5.2 assists, 3.2 rebounds, 1 steal, 2 turnovers. 36.8% field goals, 31.8% 3-pointers, 75.2% free throws.

True Shooting Percentage:  45.5% (26th)

Player Efficiency Rating:  12.6 (25th)

Real Plus-Minus:  -2.7 (23rd)

Wins Above Replacement:  -0.48 (24th)

When projected starter Dante Exum went down with a torn ACL this summer, all eyes switched to Trey Burke. As the former starting point guard before Exum progressed, Burke struggled to find efficient stretches in his game. His 76 games (and 43 starts) as a sophomore actually resulted in poorer shooting from all areas than his rookie season. After watching a kid get drafted into a situation that needed a point guard, you hate to see an impediment in his success.

Some of the reasoning behind Quin Snyder’s decision to start Exum midway through last year was the offensive ball movement it gave them. During Burke’s time on the floor last season, he took nearly 16 shots per 36 minutes, and racked up a usage rating of 23.9%. While it may sound silly to paint a negative image around that, it must be understood:  Burke controlling the ball to this extent had a backfire affect — it meant the ball wouldn’t be in the hands of Utah’s best player, Gordon Hayward, as much as you’d like. On the contrary, Exum provided more selfless, standardized play for Snyder. He took half as many shots as Burke per 36 minutes (8.2) and didn’t let his usage rating exceed 14%.

There were a ton of gray clouds hanging over Utah when Exum was ruled out for the season, but much of that was because of their February-April spree that still hangs in everyone’s mind. Exum in the starting lineup was one of the reasons the Jazz climbed to 38 wins out of nowhere, and the initial thought was that a major injury would keep them out of the playoff hunt for 2015-16.

Nonetheless, there are a couple benefits of having Burke. For starters, he’s naturally just a better offensive player than the underdeveloped Exum. Even as he dominates the ball on some possessions, Burke is still a more trusted scorer for Utah’s perimeter play. With a defense that’s making strides toward its peak with Rudy Gobert and Derrick Favors, you have to put enough capable point-producers on the floor to complement it. Burke does that more than Exum, as his PER was still almost twice as high as Exum’s in a disappointing year. The 12.6 PER mark for Burke was still below league-average, but Exum’s 5.7 was the worst among all qualified point guards — by a mile.

Additionally, Burke is able to get inside majority of the defenses to draw fouls and generate free points. His free throw rate was .144 last season, which was also nearly double the percentage of time Exum reached the charity stripe (0.77).

If you kept close tabs on Utah after the All-Star break, it was evident that Burke still had a compelling argument to be on the court.

With the lineup including four constant names (Gordon Hayward, Joe Ingles, Derrick Favors, Rudy Gobert), the most effective fifth man of those lineups …. was Burke:

Net difference from opponents (per 100 possessions):

• With Burke — +12.4% in effective field goal percentage, +16.9 in points, and +6.5 in assists
• With Exum — +0.1 in effective field goal percentage, +0.3 in points, and -0.4 in assists

Without looking attentively at the film, one could conclude that Utah may not be in serious trouble without Exum, the long-term starter for Snyder.

However, it’s the brutal individual defense that sets Burke back a few levels, and that’s why he finds himself in the high 20’s. As the lineup results detail, though, it may not matter if Burke is borderline terrible at stopping his man in the pick-and-roll. You just don’t want to put that much pressure on the bigs, though. They’ll have to work out the kinks defensively to figure out a strategy in the first month of the season. Either that, or throw a much more physical and adept guard in the starting group to keep the defense alive.

** Cough ** Alec Burks ** Cough **

Next: One Mean, Green Guard