Scheduled
Oklahoma City Thunder at Cleveland Cavaliers
2026-27 · Regular season
Raptors force 21.8 turnovers a game and visit the Clippers, who commit 21.0: what six games of turnovers have meant since 2014-15
Toronto’s plus-7.5 turnover margin is the fourth-best six-game start since 2014-15, and the Clippers commit the most turnovers in the league. History says both gaps usually shrink by about three quarters, and early turnover margin says little about winning.
In this article
The Toronto Raptors have forced 131 turnovers in six games, 21.8 a game. The league average through Sunday’s 92 games is 16.2. The Los Angeles Clippers have committed 126, or 21.0 a game, the most in the NBA.
On Monday night the Raptors play the Clippers at Intuit Dome. Toronto turns opponents over more than any other team, and the Clippers give the ball away more than any other team. Toronto also commits only 14.3 turnovers a game, which gives it a turnover margin of plus-7.5, the best in the league by almost three a game. The Clippers are at minus-3.8.
Six games is a small sample, and turnovers swing a lot from night to night. To see how much an early turnover gap usually lasts, we went through the game logs of all 360 team-seasons from 2014-15 through 2025-26 and compared each team’s first six games with the rest of its season.
The numbers that stand out
- Only three teams since 2014-15 had a bigger turnover margin after six games than Toronto’s plus-7.5: the 2024-25 Thunder (plus-9.0), the 2014-15 Raptors (plus-8.8) and the 2014-15 Clippers (plus-7.8)
- The Clippers’ 21.0 turnovers a game are 4.8 above the league average. Only 10 teams since 2014-15 were that far above it after six games
- Opponents have scored 28.2 points a game off Clippers turnovers, the most in the league. The average is 19.1
- Since 2014-15, the correlation between the first six games and the rest of the season, measured against the league average, is 0.49 for turnovers committed, 0.41 for turnovers forced and 0.43 for turnover margin
- A team’s turnover margin over its first six games has had almost no link to its winning percentage the rest of the way (0.11). Its point differential over the same six games has a link of 0.55
- Toronto led the league in turnover margin in 2020-21, 2021-22 and 2022-23 and was second last season, when it went 46-36
The turnover margins so far
| Team | Record | Turnovers committed | Turnovers forced | Margin per game |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Toronto | 3-3 | 14.3 | 21.8 | +7.5 |
| Atlanta | 3-4 | 14.6 | 19.3 | +4.7 |
| Philadelphia | 6-1 | 12.7 | 17.3 | +4.6 |
| Boston | 5-1 | 15.3 | 18.3 | +3.0 |
| San Antonio | 4-2 | 13.7 | 16.3 | +2.7 |
| Orlando | 2-4 | 17.2 | 14.0 | -3.2 |
| Milwaukee | 1-5 | 16.7 | 13.0 | -3.7 |
| Utah | 1-5 | 17.7 | 13.8 | -3.8 |
| LA Clippers | 1-5 | 21.0 | 17.2 | -3.8 |
| Charlotte | 3-4 | 18.7 | 14.1 | -4.6 |
Regular season through Sunday’s games, per game. Includes team turnovers. League average 16.2 a game.
Turnovers always run high early in a season. Last season teams averaged 15.4 a game over their first six games and 14.5 for the full season, and this season has started sloppier than any in years. That is why the comparisons below use each team’s gap to the league average rather than raw totals.
What six games of turnovers have meant
A correlation of 1 would mean the first six games predicted the rest of the season perfectly, and 0 would mean they predicted nothing. Turnovers sit in the middle, about as steady as free-throw shooting and far steadier than three-point shooting by opponents, which was close to zero. A simple fit through the 360 seasons suggests a team keeps only about a quarter of its early gap.
| Group after six games | Teams | First six games | Rest of the season | Stayed on the same side |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Committed 4 or more above average | 19 | 5.1 above | 0.7 above | 13 of 19 |
| Forced 5 or more above average | 13 | 5.9 above | 1.1 above | 10 of 13 |
| Margin of plus-4.5 or better | 21 | +5.8 | +1.2 | 15 of 21 |
| Margin of minus-3.5 or worse | 36 | -4.9 | -1.2 | 28 of 36 |
Regular seasons 2014-15 through 2025-26, per game, against each season’s league average.
So most teams kept the same direction, but the size shrank fast. The 19 sloppiest starts were 5.1 turnovers above the league average and finished the rest of their seasons only 0.7 above it. Just two of them, the 2024-25 Jazz and the 2021-22 Rockets, went on to commit the most turnovers in the league, and both won 20 games or fewer.
The biggest early turnover margins since 2014-15
| Team | First six games | Rest of the season | Final record |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2024-25 Thunder | +9.0 | +5.0 | 68-14 |
| 2014-15 Raptors | +8.8 | +0.9 | 49-33 |
| 2014-15 Clippers | +7.8 | +1.5 | 56-26 |
| 2014-15 Mavericks | +7.2 | +3.1 | 50-32 |
| 2021-22 Clippers | +6.8 | -0.7 | 42-40 |
| 2019-20 Bulls | +6.3 | +2.4 | 22-43 |
| 2021-22 Bulls | +6.3 | -0.3 | 46-36 |
Turnovers forced minus turnovers committed, per game. 2019-20 season shortened.
Only the 2024-25 Thunder kept most of their edge. They finished the season with the best turnover margin of any team in the sample, plus-5.3, and won the title. The 2014-15 Raptors, the closest match to this Toronto team, fell to plus-0.9 the rest of the way and still won 49 games. Of the 21 teams that started at plus-4.5 or better, 17 finished with winning records.
The sloppiest six-game start in the sample belonged to a champion. The 2014-15 Warriors committed 22.5 turnovers a game over their first six, 8.1 above the league average. They were slightly below average the rest of the way and won 67 games.
Toronto: the steals are real, the record is 3-3
The Raptors are averaging 12.7 steals a game, second only to New Orleans. Scottie Barnes has 13 in six games, Ja’Kobe Walter 10 and Jamal Shead nine. Toronto forced 27 turnovers in a 135-92 win over Chicago on opening week and has forced 20 or more in five of its six games.
It has not been enough to win every night. The Raptors forced 24 in a 117-94 loss to Minnesota and 24 more on Sunday in a 131-125 loss to the Lakers, when Luka Dončić scored 45 despite seven turnovers of his own. Toronto’s point differential of plus-7.8 is seventh in the league, which history says is the better guide to where a team is headed.
There is a franchise habit behind the start. Since 2014-15 the Raptors have finished in the top two in turnover margin six times, more than any other team, and they had the best margin in the league three seasons in a row from 2020-21 through 2022-23.
The Clippers: three nights with 24 or more
Los Angeles had 26 turnovers against the Lakers on Oct. 23, 26 against Oklahoma City on Oct. 25 and 24 against the Lakers on Oct. 28. Darius Garland, who has carried the offense with Bradley Beal, Brandon Ingram and Max Strus out, has 31 of the team’s 126.
Sunday in San Francisco was the exception. The Clippers had 14 turnovers, their fewest of the season, and forced 15. Kris Dunn had seven steals, a career high, and is averaging 3.0 a game, tied for second in the league behind Zion Williamson.
The Clippers have been one of the league’s more careful teams for most of the last decade, never ranking higher than ninth in turnovers committed in any of the last five seasons. History says the 21 a game will not last, but the teams that started this far behind usually stayed on the wrong side of the turnover battle: 28 of 36 teams at minus-3.5 or worse finished the rest of the season below even.
What’s next
Toronto plays at the Clippers on Monday at 10 p.m. ET, 5 a.m. Tuesday in Cairo. Charlotte, last in turnover margin, hosts Detroit at 7:30 p.m. ET, and Atlanta, second in turnover margin, plays at Indiana at the same time. Philadelphia, which commits the fewest turnovers in the league at 12.7 a game, hosts Chicago at 7:30 p.m. ET, 2:30 a.m. Tuesday in Cairo.
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