Bulls @ Rockets 7pm CT Mar. 15 2025

[dougthonus]

Tough loss. Pat at PF just doesn't work, because he's a massive liability on the glass. Williams gambled and nearly got the steal, but he didn't get back to box out Green for basically the game-winning play. We don't really have an advantage when he's the four. Just play him at the three.

We also don't really have an advantage with him at the 3 because he's not good enough to create an advantage.

I would argue we have less of a disadvantage with him at the 3.

Defensively, he's often playing the 3 anyway. I don't see him getting overpowered by 4s all the time or anything, and he doesn't keep anyone off the glass that wants to get there whether it is a guard or a forward because the problem is technique not size.

On offense, playing him with say Matas + a center doesn't strike me as any secret to unlock anything there vs playing him at PF. The guy can't dribble, doesn't make cuts, and so is basically a stand around type of guy anyway, which probably is better to have at the 4 than the 3 for the way we run the offense.

There's nothing about his game on either end that makes me think he's just consistently overpowered at the four. His problems at the four are "I'm not very good" problems not a problem with his build/athleticism/skills. If you play him at the 3, he has a whole bunch of different "I'm not very good" problems like an inability to dribble / pass / cut / create offense.

[HomoSapien]

We also don't really have an advantage with him at the 3 because he's not good enough to create an advantage.

I would argue we have less of a disadvantage with him at the 3.

Defensively, he's often playing the 3 anyway. I don't see him getting overpowered by 4s all the time or anything, and he doesn't keep anyone off the glass that wants to get there whether it is a guard or a forward because the problem is technique not size.

On offense, playing him with say Matas + a center doesn't strike me as any secret to unlock anything there vs playing him at PF. The guy can't dribble, doesn't make cuts, and so is basically a stand around type of guy anyway, which probably is better to have at the 4 than the 3 for the way we run the offense.

There's nothing about his game on either end that makes me think he's just consistently overpowered at the four. His problems at the four are "I'm not very good" problems not a problem with his build/athleticism/skills. If you play him at the 3, he has a whole bunch of different "I'm not very good" problems like an inability to dribble / pass / cut / create offense.

I think you're misunderstanding me. There's zero part of me that is arguing there's a way to "unlock" Patrick WIlliams' potential. My only point is, he puts us at a massive rebounding disadvantage when he's at the 4 and that it's less of an issue when he's playing the three because Matas or Smith or Collins at the 4 (especially in that end-of-game scenario) have a better shot of grabbing a pivotal rebound.

You can somewhat hide Williams' weaknesses when Giddey or Ball are playing but you can't with Jones.

[Indomitable]

We also don't really have an advantage with him at the 3 because he's not good enough to create an advantage.

Pat is neither a 3 or a 4 but something in between lol.

It's not that Pat is just a tweener. It's that Pat has terrible basketball IQ. If he had good basketball IQ then he'd be fine as a 3 or a 4. He's physically okay just being a wing at either position. Mentally, he just still doesn't know what he's doing and has terrible instincts on both sides of the ball.

I think it's an important distinction to realize his problems aren't related to how he's being played or what he's being asked to do, it's that he's not good enough to do all the things demanded of him to be a good player regardless of the position he plays.

Obviously we can hope this changes over time. He's been in the league along time to not come along more mentally at this point, but he's young enough that it isn't crazy to think he slowly gets better.

This is the truth. He lacks awareness and focus.