Should OKC Fire Billy Donovan for Struggles?

The Thunder are 8-12 in the season despite having a Big 3

Coming into their 2nd season in the post-Kevin Durant era, the Oklahoma City Thunder looked like a team who are about wreck havoc in the league after landing Paul George and Carmelo Anthony in two separate deals that assembled another Big 3 in the Western Conference alongside Russell Westbrook.

However, things haven’t been well for the Thunder after 20  games into the current season as they fell to 8-12 which ties them for the 10th and 11th places with the Los Angeles Lakers. And despite the amount of talent that this team has, the Thunder are currently on a 3-game losing streak after dropping another game against the Orlando Magic, 121-108.

The question looms now: Should the Thunder smash panic button and fire Billy Donovan?

While it’s unfair for the fans of the Thunder to blame Billy Donovan, alone, for the struggles of their team, if the front office wants to turn things around and prevent making themselves become the league’s laughingstock, change must be done. And it should start from the top. Now, this pundit on wheels isn’t saying that Billy Donovan should be fired. But, if you look at the numbers offensively, the Thunder are 23rd in the league in points per game, and 27th in the league in field goal percentage. And that’s pretty bad for a team that has three players who are known as heavy scorers.

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Defensively, Oklahoma ranks number 2 in the league in terms of limiting the opposing team’s output. However, will that be enough to keep Billy Donovan at the helm?

Conclusion

Firing Billy Donovan MIGHT be the first step towards turning things around in Oklahoma. While success doesn’t happen overnight, the Thunder must realize that they want to fully-utilize their Big 3, they will have to find a coach who can make 3 stars work together as one, solid unit. And in their 20 games, so far, Billy Donovan hasn’t done that, yet. 

By the Numbers: Thunder Drop Third Straight, Loses to Sacramento

Another super team loses to another bad team

The Kings were limited to 10 points in the first quarter but came back and won the game.

When you see a team with Russell Westbrook, Carmelo Anthony and Paul George playing together, what do you expect? A win. Almost every single game. 

Why? All three of them have the capability to score 40 to 50 points at ease. Russell Westbrook alone, can notch a triple-double almost single night as we saw last season which enabled him to win his first MVP award.

So technically speaking, the Oklahoma City Thunder is a super team. Or are they?

Right after the first quarter when Sacramento only managed to score 10 points, they roared back before halftime and took the lead for good. And when the Thunder were making a late push, the Kings were able to hold on as they finally scored their second victory of the season after beating the Thunder, 94-86. 

So what happened? Below are the numbers:

Too Many Missed Shots

• Carmelo Anthony: 4 of 17 
• Paul Geroge: 4 of 16
• Russell Westbrook: 7 of 21

If you want a simple explanation as to why the Thunder lost to the worst team in the Western Conference, just look at how horrible their field goal shooting was. Against the Kings, the Thunder only made 29 of their 86 field goal attempts- that’s a 33% field goal shooting, folks.

They were also miserable from beyond the three-point line as Oklahoma City only hit 10 of their 27 attempts from deep. Both Carmelo Anthony and Paul Geroge shot 3 of 9 from deep while Russell Westbrook went 2 of 8 from that area. 

In contrast, Sacramento shot 46% from the field, made 37% of their attempts from long distance and, 91% of their free throws.

More Points from Turnovers

Sure, the Kings had 23 turnovers compared to OKC’s 17 but the Kings were more aggressive in turning those Thunder turnovers into points as they held a 19-8 advantage in points off turnovers. Mind you, the Thunder were uncharacteristically called for 3 shot clock violations in the third quarter alone. All in all, Russell Westbrook had 7 of the Thunder’s 17 turnovers. He’s the MVP, right?

Conclusion

With a record stands at 4-6 which puts them at 12th place in the West, this is something that we don’t expect from a team that has three All-Star caliber players in their starting line up. While chemistry might be the issue for the Thunder’s early struggles, it’s still early for the rest of the league to call the team-up a bust but Oklahoma needs to work things out from their end because if not, it might cause Billy Donovan his job.