RS 23/24 - Mavs @ Pistons (Sat., 7PMEST)

[Maverick41]

I don't think we played good D today. I think DET just missed a lot of open shots. Our gameplan remained the same. Sag off and help off of nonshooters which DET had a lot of. Many of those 3s were dare shots that we're lucky just didn't go in.

[joesha1698]

Every game will be close, if you let opponents score 65 per half. They need to start defend, offense is not the problem. Luka is not only scoring a lot, he's very efficient doing that.

This fast tempo basketball against inferior team is as stupid as it gets.

I don't think their playing faster tempo. I think more guys are just involved and their not waiting for Luka to walk the ball down as if their not capable of making decisions.

What are you talking about? Mavs were 30th in pace in 2021/22 and are 9th this season. This's huge turnaround. May I mention that they finished 4th in 21/22 and made WCF?

I don't mind if the pace is a little faster if their getting quality shots and looks. Now, if their taking horrible shots/ bad shots - then the ball needs to slow down. Either way, its the coaches job to monitor that. I trust Kyrie and Exum to make good decisions when Luka doesn't have the ball.

Note: To clarify I'm talking about this game not the whole season. I'm simply saying I do not mind if the pace is up a little bit as long as were getting quality shots and good decision makers have the ball - Kyrie, Luka, or Exum. As for pace in general, against certain teams we should game plant to slow it down. But in general - Kyrie and Exum should have the freedom to push the ball a little when the opportunities present themselves and you trust them to pull back when needed.

[kacey ring]

Did we really leave Luka in just to get that rebound for the triple double? Wow. Just unnecessary and obvious stat padding.

Yep. Just finished watching the game and that was pathetic.

[Mavrelous]

Did we really leave Luka in just to get that rebound for the triple double? Wow. Just unnecessary and obvious stat padding.

Yep. Just finished watching the game and that was pathetic.

I hope that's the last time they do it, health is much more important than meaningless streak, every game matters at this stage, Mavs can't afford to lose game over stupid injuries.

[Mavrelous]

Every game will be close, if you let opponents score 65 per half. They need to start defend, offense is not the problem. Luka is not only scoring a lot, he's very efficient doing that.

This fast tempo basketball against inferior team is as stupid as it gets.

I don't think their playing faster tempo. I think more guys are just involved and their not waiting for Luka to walk the ball down as if their not capable of making decisions.

What are you talking about? Mavs were 30th in pace in 2021/22 and are 9th this season. This's huge turnaround. May I mention that they finished 4th in 21/22 and made WCF?

That was due to Kidd's ineptitude offensively, he basically ran RC's PO offense in RS while underutilizing his roster (Bertans, Green, and the scrubs barely played, and that was with THJ out).
Mavs shouldn't be top 10 in pace in RS, but they shouldn't also play grind it out slow pace all season long, ideal setup is start fast, let players explore, and slow down in the last 20 games to prepare for the PO.
For the situation Mavs are in now, unable to defend, and can't afford losing, they absolutely should slow down the pace.

[41Dirk41]

We go where Luka and Kyrie carry us offensively.

Kidd is a puppet who clearly lost the team which is self-managed.

The funny thing is the plenty of people who attack Luka for his play style and no words about the man who should create offensive and defensive schemes.

It's difficult to make any single player (not named Luka or Kyrie) underperform like Kidd does.

[Bob8]

I don't think their playing faster tempo. I think more guys are just involved and their not waiting for Luka to walk the ball down as if their not capable of making decisions.

What are you talking about? Mavs were 30th in pace in 2021/22 and are 9th this season. This's huge turnaround. May I mention that they finished 4th in 21/22 and made WCF?

I don't mind if the pace is a little faster if their getting quality shots and looks. Now, if their taking horrible shots/ bad shots - then the ball needs to slow down. Either way, its the coaches job to monitor that. I trust Kyrie and Exum to make good decisions when Luka doesn't have the ball.

Note: To clarify I'm talking about this game not the whole season. I'm simply saying I do not mind if the pace is up a little bit as long as were getting quality shots and good decision makers have the ball - Kyrie, Luka, or Exum. As for pace in general, against certain teams we should game plant to slow it down. But in general - Kyrie and Exum should have the freedom to push the ball a little when the opportunities present themselves and you trust them to pull back when needed.

Just a little faster pace? Pace was 110 yesterday.

Mavs are 7th in pace now. Nuggets are 27th. Knicks with Brunson 30th.

[Maverick41]

Imo pushing the pace works as long as its in the hands of those that make good decisions. Luka and Exum both do a good job of pushing it but pulling it back to a half court set when nothing easy is there. Kyrie forces it sometimes but he's a very good pullup shooter so it's hard to argue. It's the others that shouldn't have any business leading the break or launching wild shots. I'm especially looking at Green and THJ. Those 2 are often out of control. Open layup or open 3. If none, hold and pass the ball back to 1 of Luka or Kyrie for a half court set.

[arkuo]

Imo pushing the pace works as long as its in the hands of those that make good decisions. Luka and Exum both do a good job of pushing it but pulling it back to a half court set when nothing easy is there. Kyrie forces it sometimes but he's a very good pullup shooter so it's hard to argue. It's the others that shouldn't have any business leading the break or launching wild shots. I'm especially looking at Green and THJ. Those 2 are often out of control. Open layup or open 3. If none, hold and pass the ball back to 1 of Luka or Kyrie for a half court set.

Those two, (Green and THJ) need to be unemployed soon.

[Bob8]

Imo pushing the pace works as long as its in the hands of those that make good decisions. Luka and Exum both do a good job of pushing it but pulling it back to a half court set when nothing easy is there. Kyrie forces it sometimes but he's a very good pullup shooter so it's hard to argue. It's the others that shouldn't have any business leading the break or launching wild shots. I'm especially looking at Green and THJ. Those 2 are often out of control. Open layup or open 3. If none, hold and pass the ball back to 1 of Luka or Kyrie for a half court set.

Not if you can't defend. More possessions, more opportunities to **** it up in D. The biggest reason for success in 21/22 season was having 7th defensive rtg. I would say that being 30th in pace helped a lot there.

Mavs got a lot bigger and better defensively after the trade line. But somehow they have the worst defensive rtg in Nba in last 9 games. I believe slower pace would benefit this bigger lineups. They for sure need to change something, they traded for D and D has fallen off the cliff.

Mavs have 30th defensive rtg and 3rd offensive rtg in last 9 games and we're talking about Luka's heliocentric offense being a problem? Mavs offense is strongly correlated with Luka's great performances lately, Mavs lack of results is a product of their disastrous D.

[Maverick41]

Not if you can't defend. More possessions, more opportunities to **** it up in D. The biggest reason for success in 21/22 season was having 7th defensive rtg. I would say that being 30th in pace helped a lot there.

Mavs got a lot bigger and better defensively after the trade line. But somehow they have the worst defensive rtg in Nba in last 9 games. I believe slower pace would for sure benefit this bigger lineups.

We suck defensively irregardless of pace. This team just doesn't have the defensive togetherness or the vocal leaders that the 21-22 team did. Maybe adjusting pace can help but the bigger problem is that the coaching staff needs to adjust the defensive gameplan to fit the current team. They keep trying to employ the same exact defensive scheme for 3 years and refuse to adjust.

[Bob8]

Not if you can't defend. More possessions, more opportunities to **** it up in D. The biggest reason for success in 21/22 season was having 7th defensive rtg. I would say that being 30th in pace helped a lot there.

Mavs got a lot bigger and better defensively after the trade line. But somehow they have the worst defensive rtg in Nba in last 9 games. I believe slower pace would for sure benefit this bigger lineups.

We suck defensively irregardless of pace. This team just doesn't have the defensive togetherness or the vocal leaders that the 21-22 team did. Maybe adjusting pace can help but the bigger problem is that the coaching staff needs to adjust the defensive gameplan to fit the current team. They keep trying to employ the same exact defensive scheme for 3 years and refuse to adjust.

Look at correlation between defensive rtg and pace. 14 best teams in defensive rtg play under 100 pace, the only exception is OKC, but even OKC is playing with slower pace than Mavs. Good defensive rtg and low pace are strongly correlated. To make things even more baffling is the fact that Mavs were always good half court team, so they really doesn't need to push pace. Kidd just believes those morons from Espn more than common sense.

Mavs, for having any hope for making playoffs directly, should lower the pace as much as possible, and play Josh and THJ as little as possible.

[Maverick41]

Look at correlation between defensive rtg and pace. 14 best teams in defensive rtg play under 100 pace, the only exception is OKC, but even OKC is playing with slower pace than Mavs. Good defensive rtg and low pace are strongly correlated. To make things even more baffling is the fact that Mavs were always good half court team, so they really doesn't need to push pace. Kidd just believes those morons from Espn more than common sense.

Yes slowing down can help with defensive rating since that stat is literally very correlated to pace like you said. Slow paced teams almost always have good defensive ratings because of how that stat is calculated. Even in 21/22 we weren't some awesome defensive team. We were solid but the snail pace really helped propped our defensive rating score to make it look like better then it actually was.

Im just gonna be a broken record and say again thay the real problem is coaching. Look at Phoenix who's at #12 defensive rating with an inferior defensive team to our team. Difference is Coach Vogel is a vastly better defensive coach to Kidd. Or just better coach period.

[Bob8]

Look at correlation between defensive rtg and pace. 14 best teams in defensive rtg play under 100 pace, the only exception is OKC, but even OKC is playing with slower pace than Mavs. Good defensive rtg and low pace are strongly correlated. To make things even more baffling is the fact that Mavs were always good half court team, so they really doesn't need to push pace. Kidd just believes those morons from Espn more than common sense.

Yes slowing down can help with defensive rating since that stat is literally very correlated to pace like you said. Slow paced teams almost always have good defensive ratings because of how that stat is calculated. Even in 21/22 we weren't some awesome defensive team. We were solid but the snail pace really helped propped our defensive rating score to make it look like better then it actually was.

Im just gonna be a broken record and say again thay the real problem is coaching. Look at Phoenix who's at #12 defensive rating with an inferior defensive team to our team. Difference is Coach Vogel is a vastly better defensive coach to Kidd. Or just better coach period.

I totally agree with you about coaching, after all coach should be the one setting up the system. I'm just tired to hear how heliocentric offense is the problem, while we are playing the worst D in Nba in last few weeks after trading for better defensive players.

You can't totally change defensive schemes in last 18 games. Just lower the pace, play the best defensive players as much as possible and hope for the best.

[Maverick41]

Imo the easiest fix defensively is to just not play THJ and give his minutes to Exum and DJJ. He is easily the worst defender on this team and has been attacked defensively more then anyone the past few weeks. This team can never be decent defensively if you have all 3 of Luka, Kyrie and THJ playing big minutes. One has got to sit and THJ is the obvious man out when all are healthy and playing.

[Bob8]

Imo the easiest fix defensively is to just not play THJ and give his minutes to Exum and DJJ. He is easily the worst defender on this team and has been attacked defensively more then anyone the past few weeks. This team can never be decent defensively if you have all 3 of Luka, Kyrie and THJ playing big minutes. One has got to sit and THJ is the obvious man out when all are healthy and playing.

Thj is second worst defender. The worst defensive rtg, Mavs being 6.3 points better in D when he's off the court, has Josh. Nobody is even close to Josh's defensive numbers. You might say that those numbers are not realistic, but if you watch Josh closely, you can see a lot of energy, a lot of movement, but with very little impact.

[Maverick41]

Imo the easiest fix defensively is to just not play THJ and give his minutes to Exum and DJJ. He is easily the worst defender on this team and has been attacked defensively more then anyone the past few weeks. This team can never be decent defensively if you have all 3 of Luka, Kyrie and THJ playing big minutes. One has got to sit and THJ is the obvious man out when all are healthy and playing.

Thj is second worst defender. The worst defensive rtg, Mavs being 6.3 points better in D when he's off the court, has Josh. Nobody is even close to Josh's defensive numbers. You might say that those numbers are not realistic, but if you watch Josh closely, you can see a lot of energy, a lot of movement, but with very little impact.

I'm not surprised at all that Green is the worst statistically defensively. I think he's overrated defensively and it's almost comical how much he gets clobbered on screens. I count the number of those like the way I count Powell get hit in the face. It's uncanny how often it happens.

But he is still better then THJ defensively. Green gets torched because he's often the POA defender and forced on the either the best or 2nd best creator through most of the season. THJ on the otherhand never is and teams actively try to get switched onto him. He's food for opposing offenses.

If there's one thing I'm sure we can agree on is that these 2 should never play together when healthy. They are atrocious defensively when these 2 are on the court together.

[Archx]

Imo the easiest fix defensively is to just not play THJ and give his minutes to Exum and DJJ. He is easily the worst defender on this team and has been attacked defensively more then anyone the past few weeks. This team can never be decent defensively if you have all 3 of Luka, Kyrie and THJ playing big minutes. One has got to sit and THJ is the obvious man out when all are healthy and playing.

Thj is second worst defender. The worst defensive rtg, Mavs being 6.3 points better in D when he's off the court, has Josh. Nobody is even close to Josh's defensive numbers. You might say that those numbers are not realistic, but if you watch Josh closely, you can see a lot of energy, a lot of movement, but with very little impact.

I admit Josh hasn't been that impressive on defense this year but i'd still rather have him in the game than the erratic roller coaster ride that is THJ.

Though if you check lineups, the best lineup to at least 100 min would be Doncic, Green, Irving, Lively, Washington with +10.5. Tall, athletic lineups like i said in earlier posts work great with Luka. But the absolute best lineup would be with Exum and DJJ instead of Green and PJ at +66, but it's a smaller 26 min sample size.

[Bob8]

Imo the easiest fix defensively is to just not play THJ and give his minutes to Exum and DJJ. He is easily the worst defender on this team and has been attacked defensively more then anyone the past few weeks. This team can never be decent defensively if you have all 3 of Luka, Kyrie and THJ playing big minutes. One has got to sit and THJ is the obvious man out when all are healthy and playing.

Thj is second worst defender. The worst defensive rtg, Mavs being 6.3 points better in D when he's off the court, has Josh. Nobody is even close to Josh's defensive numbers. You might say that those numbers are not realistic, but if you watch Josh closely, you can see a lot of energy, a lot of movement, but with very little impact.

I admit Josh hasn't been that impressive on defense this year but i'd still rather have him in the game than the erratic roller coaster ride that is THJ.

Though if you check lineups, the best lineup to at least 100 min would be Doncic, Green, Irving, Lively, Washington with +10.5. Tall, athletic lineups like i said in earlier posts work great with Luka. But the absolute best lineup would be with Exum and DJJ instead of Green and PJ at +66, but it's a smaller 26 min sample size.

I don't see any lineup with at least 100 minutes. That's the biggest Mavs problem this year and statistically small sample size.

[41Dirk41]

I agree with Bob, even a good coach (so not Kidd ) can change defensive schemes in last 18 games and makes the team significantly better.

Slow down the pace, put balanced lineups on the court and take rebounds.
Offensive is not a problem with Luka and Kyrie.

Green is barely playables right now, THJ is a bad defender but at least he is an elite spot up shooter and he can scores points from the bench.

Josh is on path to be next Dwight Powell. Ouch.