As Rashard Lewis continues to deliberate between choosing the Seattle SuperSonics’ offer of $60 million guaranteed over seven years with $15 million in incentives and the Dallas Mavericks’ offer of $15 million over three years and the implicit promise of more money to come, there is little for fans to do but wait. It seems that nobody really knows what he will end up deciding, leaving fans on both sides pessimistic. (See Dawn Santoiani’s column today at Hoopsworld.com, where she writes, “If Lewis decides to take the Sonics’ offer (and that looks very likely since he has yet to jump at the Mavs’ money) . . .”. I find it unlikely that even the two organizations know whether they will have Lewis next season . . . does even Lewis know?

The fact is that this leaves fans in a waiting state with little to do. There is a reason the SonicsCentral message boards have been so quiet of late. But blank copy doesn’t make for much of a column, and while my editor is an understanding guy, he’s not that understanding. So I had to find something to analyze.

Remember back in February when so much was being made of the Sonics’ record without Vin Baker? Well, in much the same manner, looking at how the Sonics played when Lewis was injured last season might give us a better understanding of what the team would look like and play like next season if he leaves for Dallas. While the roster will not be exactly the same, it will be fairly close. The main changes will leave Baker and Earl Watson out with Kenny Anderson, Calvin Booth, and perhaps Vitaly Potapenko inheriting those minutes. Then, there is the thorny injury to Vladimir Radmanovic, who missed the first half of the 10-game stretch in late March and April where Lewis was injured. Even after returning, Radmanovic was clearly not the same player he had been pre-injury. But we’re not performing brain surgery here; I think the roster makeup is close enough that a fair comparison can be made.

If you can remember all the way back to the end of the Sonics’ regular season (and haven’t yet blocked out some of the bad memories), Lewis was injured early in the second half of the Sonics’ March 27 96-82 win against the Memphis Grizzlies. That night, I wrote, “It became readily apparent that his injury was serious as Lewis remained supine, eventually requiring two teammates to get to the locker room. What was most disturbing about Lewis' injury was that the fourth-year forward had been playing his best basketball of the season, with 28 points and 14 rebounds against Utah on Monday night, and 12 points and eight rebounds during the game's first half.”

Lewis would miss the final 10 games of the season (in addition, he missed another game earlier in the month against the Los Angeles Clippers, but I’m going to leave this out of my analysis for the sake of consistency/coherence). Although the Sonics had previously been rolling along, winning five out of six to ensure at least a .500 record, including a showdown for playoff positioning with the Utah Jazz, they struggled without Lewis. At first, they were able to pull off two of their biggest wins of the season back-to-back, upending a pair of hot teams in the San Antonio Spurs (at KeyArena) and the Portland Trail Blazers (in the Rose Garden). But when the calendar turned to April, the Sonics fell apart, losing six out of eight games.

The Sonics’ April performance was disappointing considering that, while they had to take on top teams like San Antonio (a second time), Dallas, and the Los Angeles Lakers, they also lost seeming cupcakes to lottery-bound Houston, New York, and Phoenix.

So what was the culprit? The statistics provide a surprising answer -- defense. Though Lewis is known as a subpar defender, his absence proved detrimental to the Seattle defense. Using points per game, this is not quickly evident, with the Sonics allowing 95.9 points per game in the 10-game stretch without Lewis and 94.5 points per game the rest of the season. But a more rigorous analysis quickly shows that opponents had the green light to score. Using possessions, opponents went from 88.3 points per 100 possessions to 92.8 -- an enormous difference over the course of 10 games.

This difference is backed up by opponent field-goal percentage. Over the first 72 games of the season, the Sonics held the opposition to 44.5% shooting from the field, a strong mark. Over the last 10 games, this slipped to 47.8%, which would have ranked the Sonics amongst the league’s worst teams over the course of a full season.

What are some possible explanations for these defensive lapses? One potential advantage of having Lewis in the lineup defensively is that, at 6-10, Lewis possesses a height advantage on almost any opposing small forward. His replacement, the 6-5 Desmond Mason, has a better defensive reputation but is better suited to defending shooting guards and can at times be overmatched against small forwards.

Though Mason was elevated to the starting lineup, he played only five more minutes per game on average than he did the rest of the season. So perhaps the explanation lies in the players who took Lewis’ minutes, most notably Peja Drobnjak. Drobnjak moved into the starting lineup before Lewis’ absence and played heavily down the stretch, logging an average of 28 minutes per game (as opposed to about 18 over the course of the season). Drobnjak is a poor individual defender because of his lack of foot speed, and increased Drobnjak playing time could certainly explain some defensive struggles.

It is also possible, of course, that the defensive troubles have nothing to do with Lewis’ absence. The Sonics played lockdown defense in defeating the Spurs at the Key; perhaps they struggled in April because of fatigue or lack of mental focus.

In addition to falling dramatically on defense, the Sonics suffered a slight offensive drop-off without Lewis, going from 93.3 points per 100 possessions to 91.7. Though their shooting percentage remained strong, actually improving from 46.8% to 47.4%, they still were not as effective. The main culprit here is fairly easy to spot. Though the Sonics’ three-point percentage also improved (up from 37.8% to 38.6%), it was not as significant a part of the team’s arsenal with players like Mason, Drobnjak, and Ansu Sesay taking the minutes of Lewis, a very good three-point shooter. Over the final ten games, the average amount of threes made per game by Seattle dropped sharply from 6.25 to just 3.9. Though that doesn’t seem like a significant difference, it was enough to make the Sonics’ offense slightly less effective.

Breaking the numbers down on an individual basis, there is not nearly as much of interest in the games Lewis sat out as there was in those without Baker. The main players affected, quite naturally, were Mason and Drobnjak.

Stepping up as the team’s third option offensively, Mason’s overall average of 16.2 points per game on 48.5% shooting during the 10-game stretch is, on its face, quite impressive. The field-goal percentage is especially so, a 2% improvement on Mason’s season shooting. But the numbers are not as imposing as they should be given that Mason had his best two offensive games of the season down the stretch, scoring a career-high 39 points against the Clippers as the Sonics clinched a playoff spot and then tossing in 33 little more than a week later as Seattle ensured itself the seventh seed.

The other eight games were not anywhere near those prime-time performances. Without them, Mason averaged 11.6 points per game -- below his season average -- on woeful 37.7% shooting.

It’s difficult to get a coherent idea of what Mason might do next season out from the shadow of Lewis and in the starting lineup given his Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde performance last April. Part of the reason for the inconsistency might have been an increased reliance on his jumper. As a larger part of the offense (only Gary Payton took more shots than Mason’s 13.6 per game in Lewis’ absence), Mason might have had to force more perimeter attempts he would not normally have taken.

Playing starter’s minutes, Drobnjak put up solid primary numbers of 10.4 points and 5.2 rebounds per game. But it’s quite clear that any ‘improvement’ is only superficial; his per-minute averages in both categories are right on his season numbers, and his shooting percentage only slightly improved (Drobnjak was almost automatic at the free-throw line down the stretch, but I don’t think we can credit Lewis’ absence for that.)

All in all, the picture painted by the 10-game stretch the Sonics played without Lewis late last season is not a pretty one. Without Lewis and with no apparent replacement on the horizon (the Sonics would have only their “million-dollar” exception with which to sign a free agent and have shown little if any willingness to negotiate a sign-and-trade), Seattle looks like a .500 team at best. The growth of players like Mason and Radmanovic could change that, as the duo emerging to replace Lewis as the second option offensively would be a huge difference. And if Mason’s size does prove to be a problem defensively, next season shifting the 6-10 Radmanovic to small forward and Mason back to the bench would be an option. But it would take an extremely optimistic view to see a Lewis-less Sonics in the playoffs next season.

Hopefully, we won’t have to worry about projecting that.

Kevin Pelton has served as beat writer, columnist, editor, copy editor, and webmaster for SonicsCentral.com since its inception. He also writes a weekly column for Hoopsworld.com and is a student at the University of Washington in his spare time. The Candid Corner is updated every Monday. Kevin can be reached at kpelton08@hotmail.com. All opinions expressed in this column are solely the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of other columnists or the SonicsCentral.com staff.

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