Washington Wizards: Ramon Sessions Needs To Play More
The Washington Wizards need to shake things up to make a playoff push, and Ramon Sessions has earned an increase in minutes.
The Washington Wizards are 5-5 in their last 10 games, and have a lot of winnable games coming up in the next month or so. Sitting only 2.5 games out of the eighth spot in the Eastern Conference (and only four games out of the sixth spot), Washington has a very good shot at making the playoffs if they catch any sort of groove. There’s one thing that can help them do that.
Until Bradley Beal is able to return (which there is no definite timetable for that), the Wizards need to utilize Ramon Sessions, who’s quietly been very good in his limited time on the floor this season.
Sessions is only playing about 21.1 minutes per game this season, but in that time is averaging 9.9 points on 7.1 shots per game, in addition 2.8 assists and 2.5 rebounds. His Per 36 numbers translate to 16.9 points, 4.8 assists and 4.2 rebounds, per Basketball-Reference. Those stats aren’t exactly eye-popping, but let’s take a deeper look.
The Wizards are 5-1 when Sessions scores 15 or more points. If he can be consistent at all when given 27-28 minutes per game, the Wizards could be a better team. Without Beal at the shooting guard position, that steady production from Sessions is something Washington really needs to utilize. But who should lose minutes then?
Taking a look at the Wizards’ best five-man units on Basketball-Reference, there is one lineup that stands out by far, when it comes to point differential per 100 possessions.
That’s the lineup of John Wall, Sessions, Garrett Temple, Marcin Gortat and Jared Dudley, which has an incredible +30.5 net rating, which has only logged about 33 minutes together on the court. That’s not the biggest sample size, but it’s enough to get some telling numbers per 100 possessions.
That lineup shoots, rebounds, assists and defends better (and turns the ball over less) than any other lineup for the Wizards that’s played more than 20 minutes together — and it’s 18 points better than the next best lineup in net rating.
The only difference in this lineup from the Wizards’ usual starting line-up is Otto Porter being replaced by Sessions. I don’t believe that Porter should lose his starting position at this point, but he’s averaging 33 minutes per contest while Sessions only gets about 21. Those minutes need to even out quite a bit.
The Wizards would be fine pushing Temple to the small forward position while Wall and Sessions run the backcourt. Washington doesn’t have the talent to play big anyway, especially when most of the successful teams around the league are going small.
The Wizards have shown spurts of being a great fast break team as well. They’re currently second in the league in percentage of points scored in the fast break (17.9), trailing only the Warriors (18.1), per NBA.com. Wall’s incredible speed and vision makes it a necessity for him to have guys alongside him to run the floor and get out in transition.
Sessions has scored 25 percent of his points on the fast break this season, per NBA.com, which is the second most of any Wizard, behind Temple. That’s a big deal for a team that scores almost 20 percent of their points in transition.
The Wizards can tire out a lot of teams with Wall, Temple and Sessions running the floor in transition, and have a great shooter in Dudley to trail the break. These are the kinds of lineups that head coach Randy Wittman needs to be utilizing while the Wizards slowly become fully healthy again.
More hoops habit: Every NBA Team's Best Bargain Contract
Drew Gooden isn’t productive, Dejuan Blair flat out isn’t good and Nene seems to have lost interest in the game of basketball. The Wizards need to play the cards they’ve been dealt if they want to make the playoffs this year. Sessions isn’t exactly the Holy Grail, but he’s earned more playing time until Beal is healthy.