We all knew that the Dallas Mavericks had a couple solid defenders on the team last year, but based on the new DRAYMOND metric, it is clear that Maxi Kleber was the best defender by a long shot. It is important that I clarify early on that this metric does not actually attempt to tell you who the best defenders in the league are, but rather the best players at fitting this stats criteria.
DRAYMOND stands for “Defensive Rating Accounting for Yielding Minimal Openness by Nearest Defender”. The idea behind this metric is basically that the players that are creating as little space between them and the shooter are doing the most based on today’s space-and-pace era of basketball.