5 NBA stars who lost their shine because of analytics

#1 Rajon Rondo

Rondo with the Boston Celtics

Even though he recently had 25 assists in a game for the New Orleans Pelicans and has somewhat revived his career, he is still nowhere close to his time with the Celtics when he was a contender for the title of the best point guard in the league. In his 4 All-Star seasons in Boston, he averaged 12.4 ppg, 10.8 apg, 4.7 rpg and 2.1 spg on a 51% true shooting percentage.

In his 2015-2016 season with the Sacramento Kings, he averaged 11.9 ppg, 11.7 apg, 6.0 rpg, and 2.0 spg on a 51% true shooting percentage. Despite his numbers being almost identical to his All-Star years, why don't many teams want him anymore? The Bulls waived him to just get him off the roster. What could've caused that?

Well, let's take a look at Celtics' offensive ratings during Rondo's last few years with the team: With Rondo: 102.3, Without Rondo: 104.1. With Rondo on the floor, the offense stagnated because the opposing teams crunched the numbers to find out the best way to defend Rondo, which is to NOT defend him. He never really had a jump shot and he was dreadful from the free throw line, so the defenders just sagged off him and clogged his passing lanes. This made him very inefficient and ineffective as a playmaker and many teams realized that a point guard like Rajon Rondo isn't worth having anymore.