Washington Wizards: Is Bradley Beal scoring too much?

Bradley Beal has been scoring a lot for the Washington Wizards this season. But to what end?

When the final buzzer sounded in the United Center on Sunday, February 23, Bradley Beal finished the game with a career-high 53 points. The scoring spree pushed him into sole possession of second place on the franchise’s all-time scoring list and made him one of just three players since 1946 to record multiple 50-point games in a Washington Wizards/Bullets uniform.

All that, and the Wizards still lost to the lowly Chicago Bulls 126-117, finishing the season 1-3 against one of the East’s least competitive teams. After their win over the Wizards, the Bulls improved to just 20-38.

Hypothetically, if you hear that your team’s best player dropped 53, you’d think they probably walked away with a W. But that wasn’t the case for the Wizards against the Bulls, and it hasn’t been the case for most of the season.  In fact, the Wizards have lost in nine of Beal’s top ten scoring performances this season:

• 53 points @ Chicago: LOSS
• 47 points @ Milwaukee: LOSS
• 46 points vs Houston: LOSS
• 44 points @ Boston: LOSS
• 44 points @ Minnesota: WIN
• 43 points vs Golden State: LOSS
• 42 points vs Orlando: LOSS
• 40 points @ Atlanta: LOSS
• 38 points @ Miami: LOSS
• 37 points @ Toronto: LOSS

Beal’s been an unstoppable scoring force all season long, but the production isn’t leading to wins.

In games in which Beal scores 40 or more points this season, the Wizards are 1-7. In games with 35 or more points for Beal, they’re 4-10. And in games where he scores at least 30 points, they’re 11-13, not even .500.

From those numbers, it would seem that Beal’s scoring actually hinders the Wizards’ success. Or at least they are more successful when Beal isn’t doing all of the scoring. But a closer look at all of his scoring totals, not just the huge ones, tells a different story. In the Wizards’ 35 losses this season, Beal has averaged 28.9 points per game. In the 20 wins, he’s scoring 30.8 points per game. Plus, he’s averaging almost a full shot attempt more in victory than defeat; 22.8 field goal attempts in wins to 21.9 in losses.

So it’s not as simple as more scoring, less winning. And why would it? Having your best player — arguably one of the league’s best scorers — scoring a lot shouldn’t hurt your team. But it does when it’s at the detriment of others.

With John Wall sidelined for the better part of the last three seasons, Beal has been forced to develop as a playmaker. And he has. Since the 2016-17 season, Beal has nearly doubled his assists per game average (up from 3.5 to 6.0) and his assist percentage has shot up from 16.2 back in 2016-17, to 28.4 this season.

When comparing the wins to the losses this season, it’s Beal’s playmaking (or lack thereof) that stands out. The one time this season the Wizards won during a 40-point performance from Beal, Beal also added ten assists. In the seven losses, he averaged 5.7 assists while scoring 40 or more. The same pattern is there in the wins and losses during Beal’s 35- and 30-point performances.

On the season, Beal is averaging a career-high 6.0 assists per game. When he scores 30 or more points and the Wizards win, he averages an even better 6.7 assist per game. During games when Beal scores at least 30 and the Wizards lose, though, he’s been averaging a much-worse 5.4 assists per contest.

So Beal putting up huge point totals doesn’t doom the Wizards, by itself. But when he’s doing it at the detriment of his teammates and forcing shots during long stretches of late-game hero ball, it does. And we’ve seen that twice in two games since the Wizards returned from the All-Star break.

Beal’s affinity to find his own shot regardless of his teammates particularly hut them in their 113-108 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers in which Beal finished 1-10 from behind the three-point arc. But it was on display as things wound down in Chicago, too, as players not named Bradley Beal slowly became obsolete, through no fault of their own.

Rui Hachimura, especially, saw himself fade out of the game plan despite an impressive eight-point, six-rebound first half vs Chicago. After an impactful first 24 minutes, Hachimura only had two shot attempts in the second half. Hachimura might not always be the victim, but it’s not the first time we’ve seen that this season.

After dropping 53 points in a loss, Beal left Chicago without talking to reporters. The frustration is mounting, and it’s understandable. Losses to Cleveland and Chicago after the break are awful for their playoff push. But some perspective is necessary.

It was a bad loss to these same Chicago Bulls earlier this season that had Beal yelling for a culture change. Finger-pointing can only go so far until the one begging for a change has to start implementing it, himself.