The NBA’s Most Star-Dependent Teams

Every NBA team has its star player. But while some teams are operating with a balanced roster, which ones are relying on their biggest names to deliver the results?

A new study by Casino Guru USA examined VORP for players in every NBA team to determine each one’s star player, before comparing factors including true shooting percentage, box plus/minus, and player impact estimate to their team’s average from the current season so far; teams were scored and ranked, determining which ones are the most dependent on their star players.

Key findings

• The Dallas Mavericks rank #1 most star-dependent NBA team with a score of 100/100 – Cooper Flagg’s on/off net rating differential of +29.9 is 37.27 points higher than the team’s average of -7.37
• The Los Angeles Lakers follow in second with a score of 99/100, while the Golden State Warriors rank third, scoring 98/100
• The Utah Jazz rank as the least star-dependent team with a score of 80/100, representing the third smallest gap for PIE between their star player Jaxson Hayes (11%) and his teammates (10.16%)
• The Charlotte Hornets record the biggest true shooting percentage gap, with their star player (69.20%) exceeding the team’s average (49.08%) by 20.12 percentage points

The top 5 most star-dependent NBA teams

The Dallas Mavericks top the list as the most star-dependent team in the league, scoring 100/100. The Mavericks’ star player, Cooper Flagg, has the highest VORP on the team of 0.5 so far this season, but it’s his on/off net rating differential of +29.9 that truly stands out – compared to his teammates’ average of -7.37, this equates to the largest gap in the whole NBA of an overwhelming +37.27 points per 100 possessions.

In second place are the Los Angeles Lakers, scoring 99/100. With the team’s highest VORP of 0.6, Luka Dončić accounts for 26.84% of the Lakers’ points – that’s the second highest proportion in the league, 9.39 percentage points higher than the average star player’s rate, and a staggering 16.79 percentage points higher than the average for his teammates (10.05%).

Third place goes to the Golden State Warriors, with a score of 98/100. The Warriors’ star player Stephen Curry ranks top of the league for player impact estimate (PIE) at 21.90%, more than double his teammates’ average of 10.60%, while also leading the way for the best BPM of all teams’ star players at +14.90, a whopping +13.86 points per 100 possessions above the Warriors’ average of +1.04.

The Philadelphia 76ers take the fourth spot with a score of 96/100. 76ers players average 10.01% for the percentage of team points individually, which is the sixth-lowest rate in the league – but their star player, Tyrese Maxey, records the best rate in the entire NBA at 27.20%, leaving a gap of 17.19 percentage points between him and his teammates.

The Miami Heat rank fifth, scoring 95/100. Their star player Giannis Antetokounmpo posts the fifth-highest PIE across the NBA’s star players of 19.70%, while the rest of his team averages around half of this at 9.06%; Antetokounmpo’s BPM of +7.4 also outperforms the rest of the team’s average of -1.96 by a huge 9.36 points per 100 possessions.

The top 5 least star-dependent NBA teams

On the flip side, the Utah Jazz claim the title of the least star-dependent team in the NBA, with the lowest score of 80/100. Jaxson Hayes, the Jazz’s star player, holds a PIE of 11% - just 0.84 percentage points higher than his teammates’ average of 10.16% and the third smallest gap in the league.

The Atlanta Hawks rank second, scoring 81/100. Jalen Johnson’s VORP of 0.3 may be the highest of his teammates, but it seems that contribution is much more balanced on the Hawks’ roster; Johnson’s BPM sits at +2.30, whereas the rest of the team averages -0.62, equating to the sixth smallest gap for BPM in the league of +2.92 per 100 possessions.

Taking the third spot is the Toronto Raptors with a score of 83/100. One of the Raptors’ standout metrics from the current season is the percentage of team points without their star player, which sits at 12.73% and ranks among the top ten highest; this is just 1.23 percentage points lower than Immanuel Quickley’s rate of 13.96%, representing the second smallest increasein the league.

Sharing third place with the Raptors is the Phoenix Suns, also scoring 83/100. The Suns record the smallest gap of all teams for the true shooting percentage – star player Jordan Goodwin posts 56.50%, just 0.6 percentage points higher than his teammates’ average of 55.90%.

The final team tied for third with a score of 83/100 is the Denver Nuggets. The Nuggets rank among the top ten teams for the smallest gap between the percentage of team points, with the Nuggets averaging 13.82% compared to Nikola Jokić’s, their star player, of 18.60%.

Methodology

In November 2026, Casino Guru USA identified each NBA team's star player by examining VORP from the current 26-27 season. The following metrics for each team’s player with the highest VORP were obtained:

• Win Shares (WS) - Sourced from basketball-reference.com
• Box Plus/Minus (BPM) - Sourced from basketball-reference.com
• True Shooting Percentage (TS%) - Sourced from basketball-reference.com
• % of Team Points - Sourced from basketball-reference.com (Player PTS / Team PTS x 100)
• Player Impact Estimate (PIE) - Sourced from NBA.com
• On/Off Court Rating Differential - Sourced from NBA.com

Once these player-specific metrics were obtained, the same metrics were analyzed for every other player in each team to calculate a team average (with the star player excluded).

The team averages for each metric were then compared to their star players to calculate the gaps, and index scores were given to each team based on the overall difference in stats between the star player and the teammates’ average.

Note: A playing-time threshold of 20 minutes and minimum of three games played was applied to avoid skewed results. If more than one player recorded the highest VORP, the star player was determined by selecting the player with the highest WS, then the highest total minutes played.

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