RealGM

Doug Moe taught: Whoever has the ball is point and everyone else moves. If you have the ball and don't have an open shot, pass the ball and move.

This Nuggets team is better equipped for that offense than maybe any team ever. The starting five are all capable of playing point to some degree. Now, if they will only MOVE, MOVE, MOVE & CUT, CUT, CUT!

Have to point out that Doug Moe was a point guard at San Antonio in his youth. As a coach, he had some outstanding point guards like Fat Lever and a Hall of Fame small forward in Alex English who could handle the ball. The motion offense was effective but Moe was famous for his lack of defined play calling and an offense that sometimes broke down when players tired and were not moving enough. Point guard play was critical to his success as a coach and more often than not, the point was feeding Alex English.

Murray is improving as a point guard but his success will depend more on his outside shooting. Malone is running a lot of plays from set formations moving Jokic around the key and using his size and ball handling as a mismatch. This is more of a pick and pop offense and because Jokic is so good at it, nearly impossible to stop.

Free Throw Attempts per game per team are an indicator of the style of play of a team. It seems obvious that most FTs come when driving to the basket or posting up and when you consider elite scorers can average over 8 FTA per game (and no, not just The Beard & Embiid) - it all made me wonder.

Top teams are at 30 FTA per game & the Nuggets are 10th at 26 - that's not terrible but with an offense that is based on motion ... it would seem it should be higher IMO. Warriors are #1 but it's a total team effort with Durant & Curry averaging 5+ each and the rest of the team averaging 20+.

Let's consider how the Nuggets are doing.

5.5 Jokic - best in his career
4.6 Millsap - consistent over his career w/best of 5.9
4.0 Harris - best in his career
3.1 Murray - about the same as last year
2.0 Barton - last three years around 3.0

While I'm not real pleased - read that "I'd love to see more", we have four players in the top-100.
28 Jokic
42 Millsap
53 Harris
87 Murray
So that's rather impressive.

Bench doesn't average as much, but that makes sense so let's look at per 36 min

Morris - around 1 FTA per 36 min
Craig - around 2 FTA per 36 min
Beasley - around 2 FTA per 36 min
Still not very good IMO.

Conclusion: This stat seems like one the Nuggets should be watching and with Jokic tossing the ball to cutters, I'd love to see more motion from everyone. That's our strength. When Morris is running the bench, he's proven to be great at tossing the ball to Plumlee - and a few others. For our bench, motion is even more important.

What we have is a team filled with fair to great passing players; so moving more and using the depth to exhaust another team should elevate our record even more. Free throw attempts per game is just one indicator of how a team with our style of play is doing and we seem to be doing fairly well, but here's to hoping it improves!

We are 22nd in FTA and that does not indicate players driving to the basket.

I do not understand why we do not have more free throws. Our best offense is so very simple; throw the ball to Jokic and cut to the basket. He is unbelievably spectacular at hitting players near the basket - even in a crowd. Jokic doesn't care if he scores any points but he'd be thrilled to have 20+ assists per game. Anyone wanting to score just needs to cut to the basket - often. He'll find them.

Moe never played defense, seems that's what's making this team successful right now. We're also down our starting SF as well as our starting SG and yet we're still winning ?? Doesn't seem like Moe's offense is what we need, I'd ask for Hawkeye Piece before Doug Moe

skywalker33 wrote:Moe never played defense, seems that's what's making this team successful right now. We're also down our starting SF as well as our starting SG and yet we're still winning ?? Doesn't seem like Moe's offense is what we need, I'd ask for Hawkeye Piece before Doug Moe

Not Moe - just his offense which is motion, motion, motion. We have too much standing around watching one-on-one plays.