2010-11 Season Review: Josh Powell

Previously: Kirk Hinrich, Jeff Teague, Marvin Williams, Jason Collins, Jamal Crawford, Joe Johnson, Josh Smith, Al Horford, Rick Sund, Larry Drew

Quite predictably, Josh Powell was a complete disaster, needing only 653 minute of court time to turn the team's point differential from positive (+50 when Powell didn't play) to negative (-117 when Powell was on the court).

In his previous two seasons, the Los Angeles Lakers were outscored by 8.4 and 5.7 points per 100 possessions with Powell on the floor. Last season, the Hawks were outscored by 8.9 points per 100 possessions with Powell on the floor. It was worse than that during the competitive portion of the schedule, as Powell played 90 minutes with a plus/minus of just -2 over the final four games of the season, games which the Hawks did not try very hard to win.

By his standards, Powell had a decent offensive season, scoring 12 points per 36 minutes while approaching 50 TS%, and getting 9% of available offensive rebounds. Even on a team that featured Mike Bibby and Jamal Crawford, Powell's embarrassing defense stood out. His method of defending the pick-and-roll by running hard toward the half-court line, past both ball-handler and screener, and setting his hips perpendicular to the baseline beggarded belief. To Powell's credit, despite frequently having his back turned to potential defensive rebounds, he did manage to equal Marvin Williams' DR% over the course of the season.

Powell earned credit for his locker room presence in Los Angeles, so it should be noted that he was twice suspended (for one game each time) by Larry Drew, not counting the game he missed after getting arrested for a moving violation on the way to Philips Arena.