Brad Stevens is already becoming famous for stressing process over results. The idea being that if players play the right way most of the time the results will come, but that one has to accept it when they do not and just keep playing the right way.

It is a philosophy that fits very well on a rebuilding team. Without the star players and an unbalanced roster results are going to be difficult to achieve, but establishing the correct process, one hopes, will lead to better results down the line. Of course, judging how a coach is performing without simply looking at the wins and losses more difficult even if it is the proper way to do it.

In terms of coaching, I think there are a couple of big things we can look at to evaluate the coach's impact. Briefly:

Line Ups; in terms of playing the best players and in the right combinations. Stevens has had to scramble on this one without an experienced healthy Point Guard or an experienced healthy Center. I think he's moved in the right direction since moving Avery Bradley off ball and putting Jordan Crawford in as Point and finally putting Jared Sullinger in the starting line up (He's simply your best player right now).

Defensive effort and execution, where I think Stevens has done very well other than the Houston game, (Of which we will never speak again).

Shot selection, probably the biggest contribution of the analytics movement to date has been to change the perceptions about shot selection to the detriment of the mid-range jump shot. This is the one I want to focus on here, using Ian Levy''s Expected Points Per Shot (Xpps) to look at how well the Celtics under Stevens have done so far. The evidence is decidedly mixed there.

Levy's Xpps calculates the expected points of a shot based on its location on the court according to NBA averages over the last twelve years. Getting the ball to the rim or to the corner three are the most efficient locations (Or the foul line, though that is heavily related to attacking the rim, as I found here ).

The image below shows both the Xpps and Actual Points Per Shot of the Celtics teams since the start of the Kevin Garnett era, via Hickory-High.

This is the table of the same data:

Team Season Actual PPS XPPS Difference ORTG Boston Celtics 2008 1.138 1.065 0.073 107.64 Boston Celtics 2009 1.142 1.058 0.084 108.07 Boston Celtics 2010 1.128 1.064 0.064 105.44 Boston Celtics 2011 1.122 1.043 0.079 104.00 Boston Celtics 2012 1.071 1.024 0.047 98.87 Boston Celtics 2013 1.085 1.033 0.052 101.10 Boston Celtics 2014 1.049 1.039 0.01 97.33

Astute observers will notice the pattern, this Celtics team has under performed the Doc Rivers lead big three teams in terms of shot selection and making. However, the trend had been decidedly down before the regime change, probably reflecting the declining abilities of the Boston players, as well as, stagnation in River's offensive sets.

That brings me to two other points, while the coach can influence shot selection, he can not control it. Many NBA players would like to get the ball to the rim, but the defense is just as intent on stopping them. Three point shots are similar, when I looked at Shot Creation previously, I noted that off the dribble threes are fairly rare. A point that has been confirmed by the SportVu data, where I found that 19% of all Pull Up attempts were for three. Pull Up corner three point attempts are even more rare given that the player has to move sideways to the basket to get to his spot for the shot. The Celtics are currently without an NBA experienced natural Point Guard, it is not certain how many corner threes they can set up per game.

To look at the Celtics roster as it exists, the table below shows the Actual Points each player had generated as of 11/17/13, compared to the league average as well as their shot selection:

Player Minutes Average PPS Actual Points Per Shot Difference XPPS Shot Making Kelly Olynyk 245 1.047 0.948 -0.108 1.055 -0.107 Avery Bradley 328 1.047 0.994 -0.007 1.001 -0.007 Kris Humphries 67 1.047 1.237 0.183 1.054 0.183 Brandon Bass 327 1.047 0.993 0.004 0.989 0.004 Courtney Lee 171 1.047 1.230 0.228 1.002 0.228 Gerald Wallace 309 1.047 1.146 -0.051 1.197 -0.051 Jared Sullinger 188 1.047 1.142 0.093 1.049 0.093 Jeff Green 361 1.047 1.100 0.021 1.079 0.021 Jordan Crawford 292 1.047 1.075 0.089 0.986 0.089 MarShon Brooks 28 1.047 0.735 -0.245 0.981 -0.246 Phil Pressey 109 1.047 0.680 -0.313 0.993 -0.313 Vitor Faverani 213 1.047 1.073 -0.053 1.126 -0.053

Khris Humphries and Courtney Lee, who should be getting more playing time, were leading the team in actual point per shot, while Gerald Wallace, Vitor Faverani and Jeff Green lead the team in Xpps. Phil Pressey can't shoot, which is a problem, teams are starting leave him unguarded. The Celtics guards as a group struggle with getting looks from high Xpps spots, which I expected since there aren't many three point shooters on the team.

Finally to see if there has been any Stevens effect, I compared the players who were in the league last year with their Xpps this year and last. I found essentially no Stevens effect.

Player 2013 XPPS 2012 XPPS Xpps Year to Year Difference Avery Bradley 1.001 1.029 -0.028 Kris Humphries 1.054 1.073 -0.019 Brandon Bass 0.989 0.959 0.030 Courtney Lee 1.002 1.039 -0.037 Gerald Wallace 1.197 1.154 0.043 Jared Sullinger 1.049 1.065 -0.016 Jeff Green 1.079 1.081 -0.002 Jordan Crawford 0.986 1.001 -0.015 MarShon Brooks 0.981 1.046 -0.065

At this point I think Stevens has been focusing on line ups, where he's made progress and defense where the results are mixed. Similarly, I would say that getting the most out of this offense in a work in process.