Some JV Analysis

[Truthrising]

Jonas has inadvertently become a ball stopper because he takes way too damn long to make decisions. Every time he touches the ball he looks confused. He doesn't know if he should pass, shoot, or take it in. Most of the time he'll pumpfake for no reason. Amir and Patterson do a great job of making quick decisions whenever they have the ball and always know what to do with it, thus there's movement in the offense.

I guess you missed my point of the reason why Jonas is a ball stopper at this time, it could be due to the fact that he rarely ever gets any touches and when does it feels like he has to make the most use of it hence why you seeing him forcing up shots but it’s not like he’s not efficient as a post player he seems to shooting quite well within 5 ft

I think his passing will improve when they actually involve him more on offense instead of just dumping the ball and having the guards just stand there to make JV do his thing of course JV has no other option but to post up, i'm not making any excuses for JV but the guards also have to do a better job of presenting themselves open, make cuts for example and JV will pass it out, you can really tell the offense is really stagnated even when JV has the ball all the guards are just standing there, there's no communication between JV and the guards.

You are making excuses for him by saying things like "he rarely ever gets any touches and when does it feels like he has to make the most use of it hence why you seeing him forcing up shots". You're blaming Jonas' lack of good and quick decision making on the guards and Casey. Why does it have to be everyone else's fault, and not Jonas not being a good enough and quick decision maker?

When I say we need to develop his passing game, I'm not even saying we should hope he turns into a Joakim Noah. I'm hoping he becomes a Tiago Splitter at the very least. Splitter makes the fundamental passes and knows where to make the pass to keep the ball movement flowing. If he didn't there's no way in hell Popovich would be playing him. That's all I really want out of Jonas, quick decision and confident passing. If he can quarterback the entire offense with his facilitating the way Noah and Gasol can, that's just a bonus, a very welcome one.

I'm not making any excuses, that is just based on my observation and i'm sure the stats back that he doesn't get as much touches" and as I said it could be due to the fact that when he does he needs to make a move or quite possibly they expect him to make a post move, that could be a factore hence the reason why the guards just tend to stand around what else do you expect him to do? Maybe they actually have an offensive system where player move around and make cuts instead of rely heavily on iso's than I think you will see JV making more passes to cutters.

it's great and all trying to mold JV into another player which is kinda like comparing apples to oranges, Tiago is playing a different system where players make cuts and it's a system doesn't rely on iso's and guards having to stand around that much, maybe if we change our system into the spurs offensive system than perhaps we could see JV making more passes but with the players that are very ISO-centric and having a coach that has no clue how to orchestrate an offensive system to even fathom to develop a system like the Spurs I have my doubt..

[vini_vidi_vici]

While the team DRTG (-.9 Edit: sorry, -3.8) did improve, the team ORTG (-8.5) got alot worse.

We've seen some terrible scoring slumps from Lowry, Derozan, Ross, Patterson, Williams and Vasquez since Jan 1. Are we really going to lay the blame for our inefficient offense at Jonas' feet, when he is a low usage player, and while he and James Johnson were the only ones maintaining high scoring efficiencies?

I just posted how much worse everyone (except JJ) is when JV is on the court, I was just referencing the arbitrary time frame used by others and how the NetRTG is still worse during that time frame despite the improvements of tDRTG.

The team does worse with him on the floor, and the players perform worse while hes on the floor (offensively).

And @everyone, mins =/= development.

[Kabookalu]

As great of an organization the Spurs are, they haven't done a great job pairing Duncan with another solid big man after Robinson. Tiago Splitter was given more minutes than he deserved out of necessity by Popovich, Matt Bonner too, so that's not entirely correct. The player you see today in Splitter wasn't something that was as reliable even as far as two years ago.

Splitter is actually a solid defensive big man that knows how to finish at a high percentage inside. It's false to make him out to be a scrub, or else San Antonio wouldn't have resigned him. Though despite that if he didn't know how to move the ball correctly then he wouldn't even be sniffing minutes. The Spurs motion demands that every player acts in concert with each other, and that means absolutely no indecisiveness.

[Kabookalu]

I'm not making any excuses, that is just based on my observation and i'm sure the stats back that he doesn't get as much touches" and as I said it could be due to the fact that when he does he needs to make a move or quite possibly they expect him to make a post move, that could be a factore hence the reason why the guards just tend to stand around what else do you expect him to do? Maybe they actually have an offensive system where player move around and make cuts instead of rely heavily on iso's than I think you will see JV making more passes to cutters.

it's great and all trying to mold JV into another player which is kinda like comparing apples to oranges, Tiago is playing a different system where players make cuts and it's a system doesn't rely on iso's and guards having to stand around that much, maybe if we change our system into the spurs offensive system than perhaps we could see JV making more passes but with the players that are very ISO-centric and having a coach that has no clue how to orchestrate an offensive system to even fathom to develop a system like the Spurs I have my doubt..

It's making excuses for him no matter how much you slice it. A system may promote different styles of basketball, but it won't absolutely completely hinder a player into only compiling 28 assists through 68 games if they were truly capable. And when Jonas has the ball, and he pumpfakes, and holds onto the ball for 2 seconds before deciding to do something, what else do you expect the guards to do? Cutting into the lane does nothing but draw even more defenders into the paint when we're trying to clear it for Jonas. The guards usually do cut to clear the strong side, and if Jonas doesn't throw the pass, then they'll run to the corner or 3 point line so that they don't get in his way.

[Darknemo2000]

It's never been about what Val is, it's about what we need him to be and how best to get him there, and many feel we are doing a real piss poor job at that in general and that's where the schism on the board comes from... everybody knows he has big holes in his game, but he sure as hell won't resolve them sitting on the bench watching.

I'm all in for JV getting more minutes in the clutch, but the stats don't lie, Casey is actually doing a good job. JV will learn as he gradually gets more minutes. Expect him to play much more next year, the 4th year is usually when prospects make the huge jump and become key players.

Why are you sure that he will gradually get more minutes? This season he is gradually getting less minutes compared to the last season...

[vini_vidi_vici]

There are 418 players who have played >= 15 MPG, JV is T412th in AST opportunities, despite that 19.0 USG%.

[TDotsfinest97]

It's never been about what Val is, it's about what we need him to be and how best to get him there, and many feel we are doing a real piss poor job at that in general and that's where the schism on the board comes from... everybody knows he has big holes in his game, but he sure as hell won't resolve them sitting on the bench watching.

I'm all in for JV getting more minutes in the clutch, but the stats don't lie, Casey is actually doing a good job. JV will learn as he gradually gets more minutes. Expect him to play much more next year, the 4th year is usually when prospects make the huge jump and become key players.

Why are you sure that he will gradually get more minutes? This season he is gradually getting less minutes compared to the last season...

Jonas will learn from his mistakes and lose pounds during the offseason, he's not getting minutes because of his conditioning not because he's a bad player.

[Gntts]

Its worse in the clutch. NBA.com clutch stats (4th/OT quarter & last 5 min & +/- 5 points)



Crazy how people on this board can't believe that Casey is so stupid as not to play JV in the clutch. They just can't fathom why an NBA coach doesn't play his "best" big in the clutch.

Its being debated to death, but long term I think Casey has to find a solution to pick/screen action. JV is still young so he has much room for improvement, but we need new schemes to hide JV more. I don't know what the answer is, but I believe Casey can/will figure this out.

So, first, if I understand well, the worst defender in the clutch is JJ?

Second, we are judging on the player based on 2.2 minutes played?

Third, can stat guys confirm that the samples that are shown here are truly representative ones?

[hsb]

As great of an organization the Spurs are, they haven't done a great job pairing Duncan with another solid big man after Robinson. Tiago Splitter was given more minutes than he deserved out of necessity by Popovich, Matt Bonner too, so that's not entirely correct. The player you see today in Splitter wasn't something that was as reliable even as far as two years ago.

Splitter is actually a solid defensive big man that knows how to finish at a high percentage inside. It's false to make him out to be a scrub, or else San Antonio wouldn't have resigned him. Though despite that if he didn't know how to move the ball correctly then he wouldn't even be sniffing minutes. The Spurs motion demands that every player acts in concert with each other, and that means absolutely no indecisiveness.

I never used the word scrub, that's harsh. But he hasn't been the player you are talking about for very long either, that's just a fantasy. Pops played him because he had to. Pops played Baynes this year for long stretches because he had to. Not because he's always been this integral factor in motion offense, he wasn't, he was clumsy at times and made mistakes.

He's reliable now, sure. The Spurs have not done a great job of getting Duncan help in terms of big men. It took a long time for Splitter to become reliable, and some of that might have to do with undeserving burn.

[Truthrising]

I'm not making any excuses, that is just based on my observation and i'm sure the stats back that he doesn't get as much touches" and as I said it could be due to the fact that when he does he needs to make a move or quite possibly they expect him to make a post move, that could be a factore hence the reason why the guards just tend to stand around what else do you expect him to do? Maybe they actually have an offensive system where player move around and make cuts instead of rely heavily on iso's than I think you will see JV making more passes to cutters.

it's great and all trying to mold JV into another player which is kinda like comparing apples to oranges, Tiago is playing a different system where players make cuts and it's a system doesn't rely on iso's and guards having to stand around that much, maybe if we change our system into the spurs offensive system than perhaps we could see JV making more passes but with the players that are very ISO-centric and having a coach that has no clue how to orchestrate an offensive system to even fathom to develop a system like the Spurs I have my doubt..

It's making excuses for him no matter how much you slice it. A system may promote different styles of basketball, but it won't absolutely completely hinder a player into only compiling 28 assists through 68 games if they were truly capable. And when Jonas has the ball, and he pumpfakes, and holds onto the ball for 2 seconds before deciding to do something, what else do you expect the guards to do? Cutting into the lane does nothing but draw even more defenders into the paint when we're trying to clear it for Jonas. The guards usually do cut to clear the strong side, and if Jonas doesn't throw the pass, then they'll run to the corner or 3 point line so that they don't get in his way.

i'm sure he'll do better passing out of the post given more time and opportunity, it doesn't necessarily would reflect on the scoreboard in terms of getting an assist but he'd be the initial guy to create ball movement to move it the open guy.

Yes I do agree he should get better in terms of passing it out but i've also mentioned the guards needs to do better of not just standing around more often than not instead of just clearing out when JV has the ball and besides the point he has been rather effective working in the post shooting at a high percentage close to the basket so I don't know why you're so critical of why he shouldn't be receiving more touches?

[Undefeated]

Teams are pushing him further away from the basket and you can't just demand the ball like 15 feet from the net and start backing down from there. He needs to put in work this off-season on getting the seal down low. Then it wouldn't be force feeding him possessions for the sake of doing it, but rather getting him the ball when he's in a position to punish the defender. He also has garbage hands on anything other than balls directly thrown to his chest, rendering him useless to run with the typical Vasquez/Lou PnR.

With how defenses are designed to load up the strong-side it's almost impossible for any big to get a clean seal directly on the block with all the bodies in the paint disrupting passing angles for an accurate post feed to be delivered without it being tipped; even DMC has to resort to facing up from 12-15 feet to initiate his move and you would think he would have no issues maintaing deep post position against frequent inferior post defenders. To counter this, the bigs need to rim run because that's the only way they'll be directly in the paint for a quick seal and score one-on-one effectively without any help defense set since the defenses objective is stop the ball first not allowing any penetration during the early strike. Or flex screen actions forcing his man to recover late. Very rarely do the Raptors do any of this so JV isn't going to be put in a good position to post-up (he does make an effort to rim run after stops but doesn't get the ball enough in these situations). Just a few examples:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcS1g9ksXao[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1v3Dz1VvUg[/youtube]

[vini_vidi_vici]

Its worse in the clutch. NBA.com clutch stats (4th/OT quarter & last 5 min & +/- 5 points)



Crazy how people on this board can't believe that Casey is so stupid as not to play JV in the clutch. They just can't fathom why an NBA coach doesn't play his "best" big in the clutch.

Its being debated to death, but long term I think Casey has to find a solution to pick/screen action. JV is still young so he has much room for improvement, but we need new schemes to hide JV more. I don't know what the answer is, but I believe Casey can/will figure this out.

So, first, if I understand well, the worst defender in the clutch is JJ?

Second, we are judging on the player based on 2.2 minutes played?

Third, can stat guys confirm that the samples that have are shown here are truly representative ones?

1) The team DRTG is worse.
2) 47 total mins, and the entire league is SSS if thats the argument (only 5 players have played >= 150 Mins in the clutch).
3) I dont know what to confirm, if what he said, corresponds with the picture, than yes.

[deeps6x]

Its worse in the clutch. NBA.com clutch stats (4th/OT quarter & last 5 min & +/- 5 points)



Crazy how people on this board can't believe that Casey is so stupid as not to play JV in the clutch. They just can't fathom why an NBA coach doesn't play his "best" big in the clutch.

Its being debated to death, but long term I think Casey has to find a solution to pick/screen action. JV is still young so he has much room for improvement, but we need new schemes to hide JV more. I don't know what the answer is, but I believe Casey can/will figure this out.

Really? After 3 seasons, it seems that Casey doesn't have a clue about how to 'figure this out'.

While I agree with what the stats are saying about his game, I have to wonder if the Chicago author is just trying to get MU to let him go so Chicago can sign him cheaply.

The main thing to take away is that this is a good analysis of JV's flaws and he really needs to improve on some aspects of his game. If he can't do this, ... sorry JV, but you are trade bait.


Now, the tough call... what should MU do? Obviously, offer an extension, as JV is still a coveted asset. But if he offers too much, suddenly he might not be worth the $$$ the team would be paying him.

I think one thing MU really needs to do is find a better coach to integrate the big man into the offence and defense. And maybe get him some summertime coaching to work on his D, passing, steals and rotations.

He is less than we had hoped, but still far, far from a 'Don't Extend Him' bust that the author implies.

[cammac]

While the team DRTG (-.9 Edit: sorry, -3.8) did improve, the team ORTG (-8.5) got alot worse.

We've seen some terrible scoring slumps from Lowry, Derozan, Ross, Patterson, Williams and Vasquez since Jan 1. Are we really going to lay the blame for our inefficient offense at Jonas' feet, when he is a low usage player, and while he and James Johnson were the only ones maintaining high scoring efficiencies?

One thing I have noticed is that many game in the 1st Jonas puts up both good offensive number and rebounds yet many time he is left with a huge - because of the inefficient shooting of the other starter's. Then he sit and maybe the starters heat up in the second and bring there - back or they play against 2nd stringers which Jonas rarely does so the is a magnification of his numbers/

Look Jonas is far from perfect but much also has to do with team-mates.

[vini_vidi_vici]

Teams are pushing him further away from the basket and you can't just demand the ball like 15 feet from the net and start backing down from there. He needs to put in work this off-season on getting the seal down low. Then it wouldn't be force feeding him possessions for the sake of doing it, but rather getting him the ball when he's in a position to punish the defender. He also has garbage hands on anything other than balls directly thrown to his chest, rendering him useless to run with the typical Vasquez/Lou PnR.

With how defenses are designed to load up the strong-side it's almost impossible for any big to get a clean seal directly on the block with all the bodies in the paint disrupting passing angles for an accurate post feed to be delivered without it being tipped; even DMC has to resort to facing up from 12-15 feet to initiate his move and you would think he would have no issues maintaing deep post position against frequent inferior post defenders. To counter this, the bigs need to rim run because that's the only way they'll be directly in the paint for a quick seal and score one-on-one effectively without any help defense set since the defenses objective is stop the ball first not allowing any penetration during the early strike. Or flex screen actions forcing his man to recover late. Very rarely do the Raptors do any of this so JV isn't going to be put in a good position to post-up (he does make an effort to rim run after stops but doesn't get the ball enough in these situations). Just a few examples:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcS1g9ksXao[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1v3Dz1VvUg[/youtube]

Good stuff UD.

One thing ive noticed they have gotten away from (atleast they used last year) was horns action JV on the weakside, AJ on the strong side, with a simple AJ screen at the elbow and dropping JV into the post (strong side) before he can get pushed off the block. Lately all they use it for is guard action, but thats anecdotal because I havent got to watch too many games 2+ times to watch for sets, and usually just ball watching the first viewing.

Again, im not too concerned with any of this really hah, all that concerns me is the D right now.

[ATLTimekeeper]

Jonas has inadvertently become a ball stopper because he takes way too damn long to make decisions. Every time he touches the ball he looks confused. He doesn't know if he should pass, shoot, or take it in. Most of the time he'll pumpfake for no reason. Amir and Patterson do a great job of making quick decisions whenever they have the ball and always know what to do with it, thus there's movement in the offense.

He has the ball for a minute a game, totally in the range of normal (and right around Amir's time of possession) for a C, and actually on the low end for any C with that amount of post-ups. C'mon, this is just another "sounds about right" arguing point that doesn't really hold up. His points per half court touch is ridiculously high, easily leads the league. That's because he puts points on the board for the few times he actually gets the ball.

To give you an example on scoring attempts only 3.5% of his touches last longer than 6 seconds. If he's killing the offense, it's not pump fakes and indecision. (Also of note: he's not killing the offense, it's still a very good 104.5 with him on the floor). If he's efficient with the ball when he gets it, and he's not taking up too much time of the clock, there's probably a different reason the team sags a bit when he's in.

I wasn't a big fan of the premise of the article. The team actually played really well with him being a lone net negative this year. And when they went on their biggest losing stretch after the all-star break, he was actually one of the better Raptors. So is he really killing the team? He's improved the defense since January almost as much as James Johnson has, by the author's own preferred measurement.

[Kabookalu]

To give you an example on scoring attempts only 3.5% of his touches last longer than 6 seconds. If he's killing the offense, it's not pump fakes and indecision. (Also of note: he's not killing the offense, it's still a very good 104.5 with him on the floor). If he's efficient with the ball when he gets it, and he's not taking up too much time of the clock, there's probably a different reason the team sags a bit when he's in.

All and those reasons somehow disappear when Jonas isn't on the floor? 104.5 with him on the floor is actually solid, however it's also the lowest amongst all of our players sans the end of the bench guys that don't play at all. Whatever the reason is, we're a better offensive team with Jonas off the floor.

[team edward]

So basically there is a method to Coach Casey's madness?

Yes. In that he understands playing Jonas when it matters will contribute to losing games.

It's simple, isn't it? He's too slow to play Casey's defensive schemes. We have to alter the defence to support his lumbering arse. Replace him with Javale, and say hello to the second round.

[MVP-]

With how defenses are designed to load up the strong-side it's almost impossible for any big to get a clean seal directly on the block with all the bodies in the paint disrupting passing angles for an accurate post feed to be delivered without it being tipped; even DMC has to resort to facing up from 12-15 feet to initiate his move and you would think he would have no issues maintaing deep post position against frequent inferior post defenders. To counter this, the bigs need to rim run because that's the only way they'll be directly in the paint for a quick seal and score one-on-one effectively without any help defense set since the defenses objective is stop the ball first not allowing any penetration during the early strike. Or flex screen actions forcing his man to recover late. Very rarely do the Raptors do any of this so JV isn't going to be put in a good position to post-up (he does make an effort to rim run after stops but doesn't get the ball enough in these situations). Just a few examples:

I definitely agree with you on how defenses are designed nowadays but like how many times do we see JV demand the ball in the middle of the lane thinking he has some type of play then pouting when he doesn't get the ball? It's the dumbest thing ever, like literally 3-4 defenders would converge on him immediately leading to a turnover.

It's hard for JV to do what Blake did in the first video because well, he's usually the one who gets the defensive rebound and Casey is constantly only the guys to run (which btw I think is stupidest because we never ever score a quick basket on what is essentially on 5v4 that isn't in our favour, thus just wasting energy half sprinting to get the ball over the mid-court line just to realize we're not in a position to quick strike) so he's already behind the play which would mean the 3 other guys have to load up one side and JV who isn't let's say, Usain Bolt, has to essentially do like a 40-yard dash to establish quick position like Blake did.

Honestly, I think the best way to get JV more opportunities are:

1. For him to be smarter in the way he crashes the offensive boards. Dude is constantly right below the rim even when he knows our guards are liable to jack it up from the perimeter.
2. In the starting lineup, it has to be DD that initiates the PnR. I just watched a video from last season highlighting all of JV's dunks and Demar assisted on 15/80 of them which is 19% (most of them came from offensive putbacks either from Demar/Lowry driving or following his own miss, and a surprisingly low amount from that famed "big-to-big" Matt like JOs to in-game)
3. He puts work in on the free throw line jumper, because it's hard for him to be the roll guy in the Vas/Lou PnR because he doesn't have the best hands in traffic so the FT line jumper would be golden.
4. For whatever reason, Lowry and co. don't really look to throw lobs to him this season, probably because he appears to have lost a step athletically this season, which I still debate is mostly from fatigue from the summer he had for Lithuania and not because he's "fat". So let's get back to throwing him lobs, he's an effing giant in there.
5. I would actually like to see him double pump-fake to really mess up the defender, JV has shown the ability to put the ball on the floor and nobody really tries to get in his way (Amir is super sneaky when he does, usually sets an "illegal screen" masked as a sort of "box-out" to seal his man to get JV the open lane).
6. Stop comparing him to DMC offensively (directed to his STANS). DMC is liable to wreck you with range out to 18 feet, abuse you in the post with incredible footwork/his ridic skill+strength combo or just drive right past you for a nasty finish. Also, DMC is the polar opposite on his effect on his team, the Kings become an absolute train wreck the second he hits the bench.

P.S. I'd love to hear your thoughts on my ideas/ramblings on what we can do to potentially improve the situation.

[Kabookalu]

4. For whatever reason, Lowry and co. don't really look to throw lobs to him this season, probably because he appears to have lost a step athletically this season, which I still debate is mostly from fatigue from the summer he had for Lithuania and not because he's "fat". So let's get back to throwing him lobs, he's an effing giant in there.

When Lowry was still playing like the best player in the east I recall him throwing a lot of lobs to Jonas. It's died down since he turned into Beno Udrih.