Why the Spurs’ midrange stars are more efficient than you think

Soobum Im-USA TODAY SportsIndividual efficiency is a tricky thing to contextualize. You need to account for play type, opponent, lineup fluctuations, and a dozen other wrinkles that influence how well a team scores when a particular player touches the ball. For hot takes and Twitter spats, it’s easier to revert to shooting metrics like effective field-goal and true-shooting percentage or lean on more nebulous catch-alls to affirm what our eyes and the box scores are telling us, and conversations usually end there.

DeMar DeRozan has been breaking bad.And yet, it feels like we need to work towards a better-rounded idea of efficiency, if only to make sense of how an elite offense and its…