Sports
Ranking the NBA's Most Underrated Players of the Last 5 Years – Bleacher Report
Today’s NBA stars are paid exorbitant amounts of money. Every game they play is televised somewhere. For the most part, every player is living out a childhood fantasy.
But some still don’t quite get their due from the fans or the media. Here, we’ll rank those who’ve best fit that description over the last five years.
This is an almost entirely subjective pursuit. There are countless definitions or criteria for underratedness, but being paid less than they should based on their impact, belittling from the media or lack of appreciation from fans are all ingredients in the cocktail.
With those factors in mind, let’s take a look at the most underrated players over the last half-decade.
Part of the lack of appreciation for Larry Nance Jr. has to do with his health. He’s averaged fewer than 60 appearances per season during his career.
The other part may be a lack of scoring, but basketball is about so much more than putting the ball in the basket. Although Nance has averaged only 8.5 points over the last five years, he does just about everything else to contribute to his teammates scoring and to make life more difficult for opposing offenses.
During this half-decade, no one matches or exceeds all of Nance’s marks for rebounding percentage, assist percentage, block percentage and steal percentage. If you lower the qualifiers a tad, the only name you add to the list is Nikola Jokić.
Nance obviously isn’t on the two-time MVP’s level, but he does so many little, unheralded things to help a team win. Even though he’s spent much of his career on losing teams, that impact still shows up in the numbers.
Nance has never had a negative net rating swing in his career. In other words, his teams’ plus-minus per 100 possessions has been better with him on the floor in every one of his eight campaigns. In the five seasons we’re contemplating here, Nance’s squads’ net ratings were 4.8 points better when he played.
He’s had only a few chances to showcase his wide-ranging skills and positional versatility (he can play the 4 or 5) in the playoffs, but Nance could undoubtedly fit on any good team and immediately help.
Kyle Anderson comes from a mold similar to Larry Nance Jr. He has no accolades to this point in his career, and he probably never will. An All-Star appearance feels like a long shot at best.
But Anderson’s 6’9″ frame, center-like 7’3″ wingspan and point guard skills make him one of the NBA’s most uniquely entertaining players.
With his length and defensive awareness, you can trust him to guard just about any position. He’s a nightmare in passing lanes, too. And his aptly named “slo-mo” offense is also helpful despite its unconventional nature.
Anderson isn’t going to leave many defenders in the dust, although his deceptiveness as a ball-handler helps him get to his spots. His jump shot won’t be on any tutorial videos. But his patience and craft as a driver and his vision and willingness as a passer make him a high-end option to run any second unit (and maybe even some starting ones).
Over the last five seasons, Anderson has averaged 8.7 points, 5.3 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 1.1 steals and 0.8 blocks in only 25.0 minutes per game while shooting a “just good enough to make the defense pay attention” 34.7 percent from three.
Jalen Brunson already should have an All-Star appearance to his name.
Although Julius Randle was the one who received an All-NBA nod last season, there’s at least an argument that Brunson was the New York Knicks’ best player. He led the squad in box plus/minus and assists per game while scoring 24.0 points with an above-average true shooting percentage.
Now, you might argue that Brunson got plenty of flowers during back-to-back postseason runs in which he averaged 23.9 points and 4.4 assists. However, he’s often been overshadowed by teammates—that was certainly the case when he played with Luka Dončić in Dallas—and the absence of accolades is glaring now.
The recognition a player deserves is often a year or two late, so Brunson may finally get that nod in 2023-24. But right now, he’s underrated.
Big men who do the dirty work and allow high-volume perimeter scorers to get all the glory will always have a place (or places) on lists like this.
Few players fit that description quite as well as Steven Adams.
His willingness to box out and allow rebounds to fall into Russell Westbrook’s lap was at least a factor in the future Hall of Famer’s triple-double averages. His finishing as a drop-off target for drivers (whether Westbrook or Ja Morant) certainly helps assist totals, too.
What really makes Adams interesting, though, is the number of extra possessions he generates for his teams.
Adams is ninth in NBA history in career offensive rebounding percentage. Over the last five seasons, Andre Drummond is the only player in the league who matches or exceeds both of Adams’ marks for offensive rebounding percentage and steal percentage.
Like everyone else featured here, Adams posts numbers that actually helps his teams’ bottom lines, too. During the half-decade in question, his squads are plus-5.5 points per 100 possessions when he plays and minus-0.4 when he doesn’t.
Trae Young’s entire NBA career is the five-year sample size we’re talking about here. And it didn’t take long for fans and pundits alike to focus more on his shortcomings than the fact that he’s off to one of the hottest starts in NBA history.
Yes, he’s small. No, he isn’t a plus defender. And sure, his shot selection can leave you scratching your head. Young’s 35.1 career three-point percentage might even be lower than a lot of people realize, too.
But even with those weaknesses, Young has been a massive plus for the Atlanta Hawks throughout his brief career.
During his five seasons, Atlanta is minus-0.6 points per 100 possessions when he plays, but it’s minus-3.7 without him. If you limit the sample to the last three years, those numbers are plus-2.9 with Young and minus-0.7 without him.
Those numbers are the result of offensive engineering that few players across history have been able to pull off. Young has had almost exclusive control of most Hawks possessions when he’s on the floor, and their offenses for his five seasons have ranked in the 89th, 99th, 99th, 97th and 93rd percentiles, respectively.
If that doesn’t convince you he belongs here, maybe a bit of history will.
Young has 8,990 points and 3,285 assists in his career. Oscar Robertson is the only other player in NBA history to match or exceed both totals in his first 353 NBA games.
All statistics via Basketball Reference or Cleaning the Glass.