Wolves Season in Review: Kevin Martin

This is Part Twelve of the Wolves Season in Review player capsules. We’ll be looking at every player that finished the season on the Wolves roster, excluding ten-day contract signees. We’re starting with the players that played the fewest minutes and working our way up the roster to those that logged the most playing time. Today’s featured player is Kevin Martin.

Similar to Chase Budinger, Kevin Martin was brought in a couple of years ago to play for former head coach Rick Adelman. Each were comfortable in Adelman’s system and had the most effective years of their respective career on his Houston Rockets teams.

The Wolves overpaid the veteran shooting guard, inking him to a four-year deal worth nearly $28 million with the fourth year being a player option. The biggest issue was the age of a player that already was a defensive liability, and we indeed saw Martin’s defense slip this year in his age-31 season.

Flip Saunders has made it known that he thinks Martin improved his defensive effort this season, but the numbers simply don’t bear that out. Basketball-Reference.com’s Defensive Box Plus/Minus has Martin at a career-worst -3.9 on the season, and he also finished with negative Defensive Win Shares for the first time ever, too.

Martin started the season red hot before injuring his wrist in the ninth game of the year, a 37-point performance in a win over the New York Knicks that came on the heels of a 34-point game versus Dallas.

He did not return until January 28 and hoisted less than 15 shots in a game only twice in his first 16 games back. Martin had more than a green light and mostly delivered, although his three-point percentage sat at just 33.3% over that span.

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The biggest issue for Martin this season (other than defense, of course) was a steep decline in free throw rate. There were probably a number of factors that played into the decline, not the least of which would be the lack of games played with a true point guard to get him into scoring position. But factoring in the nature of playing with a recovering fractured wrist, the lack of talent surrounding Martin, and the simple fact that it was his age-31 season, and the lack of free throw attempts makes some sense.

It’s a bit troubling that Martin’s usage rate was 26.6%, his highest since his final year in Houston. And with that, his free throw rate dropped a career-low .309. Not a great mix, which led to a Win Shares per 48 Minutes of just .069, the worst since Martin’s rookie year.

Martin could easily be moved in the off-season, although Saunders has said time and time again that he feels like Martin is an important piece of the roster moving forward. Indeed, he’s the only reliable long-range shooter on the team and there is certainly a place for him for that reason alone.

On the other hand, the contract is excessive and Zach LaVine‘s natural position is shooting guard, not to mention that Andrew Wiggins will see minutes there with Shabazz Muhammad at the small forward spot.

Saunders is still straddling the line behind rebuilding/tanking and competing for a playoff spot. At the same time, if Wiggins makes the second-year jump that many project him to make and Ricky Rubio and Nikola Pekovic are reasonably healthy, then keeping Martin makes a lot of sense.

Anything could happen in regards to Martin this off-season, but he’s quickly becoming a large enough liability on the defensive end of the floor that his offense won’t often outweigh that negative impact. Look for him to spend one more year with the Wolves before picking up his player option in the summer of 2016.

At that point, Saunders may look to move Martin, but I wouldn’t expect it to happen in the calender year of 2015. He’s still a valuable enough piece that he’ll almost certainly start the upcoming season as the Wolves’ starting shooting guard despite some of the issues he experienced in 2014-15.

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