Introduction

The first time an NBA rookie checks into a game marks the end of a long, grueling journey. Just as inevitable is the humbling “welcome to the league” moment that follows. Whether it’s Kobe dunking on Dwight or Yao, Rip Hamilton hanging 44 on LeBron, or Kevin Durant showing Julius Randle every move he’s got, every rookie gets that lesson sooner or later.

I wanted to see which player has “victimized” rookies the most this year.

Process

First, we have to define a “victimization”. I took it to be one of three direct actions:

• stealing from a player
• blocking a player
• getting fouled by a player and subsequently shooting free throws
  • Unfortunately I can’t include non-shooting fouls that happened prior to the bonus because play by play doesn’t list the fouled player.

We can filter NBA play-by-play data and use the fact that the opposite actions happen at the exact same in-game time (a turnover to a steal, a missed field goal attempt to a block, and a foul to a free throw attempt) to create a table where one column lists the perpetrator and another lists the victim.

Results (as of February 12)

First, let’s take a look at the players that have put rookies through the wringer most often.

This list is dominated by players who are able to get rookies to foul them. Next, let’s see the opposite side: which players have been victimized by rookies most often.

Luka shows up second in the negative top-5 after topping the leaderboard in the positive top 5. A lot of these players play heavy minutes and thus have more opportunities to play against rookies, so let’s take a look at normalizing per 36 minutes. We will also filter for players who have played at least 50% of their team’s games and at least 12 minutes per game to alleviate small sample size concerns. First, the positive events per 36:

Doncic and Harden remain from the raw-totals top 5. Penda is the “polar bear in Arlington, Texas” meme in this top 5, being a rookie himself and only playing 13.7 minutes a game.

Now, the negative events per 36:

Cole Anthony is the only one to average over 1 negative rookie victimization event per 36 minutes. We’ve got another rookie showing up here in Dylan Harper. Finally, let’s take a look at net events per 36 to see who’s dishing it but not taking it.

The “Welcome to the League, Rook” Award

Austin Reaves is your lead rookie victimizer per 36, while also playing at least 10 minutes more per game than anyone else in the top 5.

The “The Future is Now, Old Man” Award

Cole Anthony brings up the rear in net rookie victimization events per 36. Nique Clifford is third from the bottom while also being a rookie himself.

Hope y’all enjoyed reading! Here’s a link to a Google Sheet, as well as a GitHub link!