Weaknesses
Waiters has raw ability, but he does not have efficiency. He shot under 40 percent from the field last season, which is fairly atrocious shot-making. Some of that is due to all the threes Waiters takes, but much of it has to do with his low 42.1 percent mark from two-point range.
Waiters shoots a lot of long twos, which are essentially the least efficient shot in the game. By simply taking a few steps forward or backwards on some of those shot attempts, Dion’s advanced numbers might look better.
Right now they’re awful. Waiters has never hit 100 in offensive rating for a single season, meaning he scores under one point per possession on offense. Value over replacement player and box plus/minus have Waiters as a negative contributor to his team in each of his NBA seasons.
A lack of efficiency and consistent defense explains those numbers. Waiters isn’t unathletic and he looked better on both offense and defense in the postseason, but four years is a more useful sample size than 18 games.
There is upside to Dion Waiters’ game, but a lot of it has yet to be realized.
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