RealGM

NASH PASSES, TEAMMATES MAKE SHOTS
Nash passed the ball on 62 percent of his pick-and-roll plays last season and his teammates shot 51 percent on those passes. He passed the ball on 54 percent of his isolation plays last season and his teammates shot 51 percent on those passes.

Nash passed the ball to spot-up shooters 389 times on pick-and-roll plays last season, the most such passes in the league.

KOBE MAKES OPEN SHOTS
Of the 337 players with at least 15 unguarded catch-and-shoot jumpers last season, nobody was left open less often than Kobe. Only 35.2 percent of his catch-and-shoot jumpers were unguarded.

When Kobe was left open, he shot 51.3 percent, which ranked 11th of the 113 players with at least 75 unguarded catch-and-shoot jumpers last season. It was the highest such percentage of the nine Lakers players with at least 20 attempts last season.
http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/post/_ ... -great-duo

Nothing going on so I decided to post this article. Enjoy.

nash is going to make the offense so fun to watch.

Nash is going make Kobe's efficiency so much better. That's for sure!

Interesting....can't wait to see them in action. Nash is going to do so many things for us, it's perfect really. IMO the biggest impact he'll have is in the locker-room.

Last year, after trading Lamar and then Fish we had a serious vacuum of leadership. Like Kobe told Nash about himself, he likes to lead by "cracking the whip".

When Fisher was gone, there was essentially nobody to step into the role of emotional leader. Pau seems to me like a great teammate, a kind, compassionate guy who genuinely cares. But he's not a true leader. He's not an alpha dog. He's too sensitive for that. What he is, however, is a great leader's best advocate. A guy who will follow a leader with genuine zeal, it's where he excels. To me more and more, Pau will step into the role of Lamar.

The emotional leader should be able to hold Kobe accountable as well, but Pau never commanded that sort of respect from Kobe. The balance was tipped. This lead to Andrew Bynum and Metta trying to step into some sort of leadership roles for the sake of the younger players, but as we saw with Bynum: it was the inmates running the asylum.

But now with Nash, I think we've got a guy who brings the team to an equalibrium. It let's Kobe slip into his natural place as field marshal. It let's Pau focus on his game, rather than having to be the guy to rein in Kobe. It gives Metta another guy to look up to. It brings another presence in to help Bynum pull his head from his ass.

There is once again, a balance in the force.

Was a good read, and I agree. Having the ball in Nash's hands will allow Kobe to move freely and not take as many contested shots. He also no longer has to be the sole creator/leader on the court and can, at times, take a back seat and allow Nash to work his magic.

Even without this article Kobe & Nash just sounds deadly!

i want to see what happens in the clutch. if we still see kobe ball like we have for the past decade, im going to lose my mind.

I have a feeling Kobe will still take contested shots just because he likes taking them.

Nash always makes teammates better no matter what, I think Kobe's PPG will decrease because Bynum and Gasol will get more shots, and Nash can get you 15 ppg as well

The thing I'm most excited about Nash is his leadership. We really missed a voice in the locker room since Fisher and Odom departed. Kobe leads more by example than vocally. I hope Nash can bridge that gap and keep things more in order.

KobeoverLebron wrote:Nash always makes teammates better no matter what, I think Kobe's PPG will decrease because Bynum and Gasol will get more shots, and Nash can get you 15 ppg as well

His PPG might not go down too much since his FG% will go up with the open shots Nash can get him, i think he should still get at least 25 ppg.

Kobe and Nash have the potential to be a great duo if Kobe buys in and sacrifices his own game.

If he doesn't and decides to go "Game 2 OKC" where he feels he has to do everything down the stretch of close games then this is a big ass waste. I'm going to assume that Nash is smart enough to put the ball in the hands of the right person regardless.

crazyeights wrote:Interesting....can't wait to see them in action. Nash is going to do so many things for us, it's perfect really. IMO the biggest impact he'll have is in the locker-room.

Last year, after trading Lamar and then Fish we had a serious vacuum of leadership. Like Kobe told Nash about himself, he likes to lead by "cracking the whip".

When Fisher was gone, there was essentially nobody to step into the role of emotional leader. Pau seems to me like a great teammate, a kind, compassionate guy who genuinely cares. But he's not a true leader. He's not an alpha dog. He's too sensitive for that. What he is, however, is a great leader's best advocate. A guy who will follow a leader with genuine zeal, it's where he excels. To me more and more, Pau will step into the role of Lamar.

The emotional leader should be able to hold Kobe accountable as well, but Pau never commanded that sort of respect from Kobe. The balance was tipped. This lead to Andrew Bynum and Metta trying to step into some sort of leadership roles for the sake of the younger players, but as we saw with Bynum: it was the inmates running the asylum.

But now with Nash, I think we've got a guy who brings the team to an equalibrium. It let's Kobe slip into his natural place as field marshal. It let's Pau focus on his game, rather than having to be the guy to rein in Kobe. It gives Metta another guy to look up to. It brings another presence in to help Bynum pull his head from his ass.

There is once again, a balance in the force.

agree with all of this.

it was the mental side of the game that was the hindrance for the Lakers last year. some of that is Kobe living by the sword, some of that is the loss of D-Fish. i think you nailed it w/ Pau, Bynum and Metta stepping into 'leadership' positions. Pau is not an alpha, Kobe doesn't respect him, and he would never take Kobe on. that's how i see it, and that has been a major problem for the entire team, IMO (i realise that this is also everyone else's opinion). Ron absolutely needs another guy to 'look up' to. he needs to be affirmed. we've all seen how he play when Kobe is mad it him. if he can play confident, in control and with an edge he can be a major contributor for this team (30+ minutes). Andrew is a brat, but he's extremely talented. i don't think he's a bad kid, but i do think he's immature and that he doesn't play hard enough on every possession (someone made a comment in another thread about him not getting back on defence - that alone is enough for me to want to give him up for Dwight). both these guys will automatically respect Nash. if he can engage any of these guys at a time when Kobe might previously have withdrawn, as well as holding Kobe accountable for his play on this offensive end (or just literally taking the ball out of his hands, ha), the pick-up would be worth it on that alone.

that and he controls an offence as well as anyone in the league, is a GOAT candidate shooter/playmaker blah blah etc. etc.

my prediction is that kobe will still take the same amount of shots, except that this time, most of them are open shots or catch and shoot kind of shots. less off the dribble, less forced shots.

40 % of the plays are nash doing his thing
40 % of the plays are kobe doing his thing
20 % post up for bynum

kobe may be the scoring champion.

If Kobe is the scoring champion then something is definitely wrong.

dockingsched wrote:i want to see what happens in the clutch. if we still see kobe ball like we have for the past decade, im going to lose my mind.

yep

I don't care about Kobe's volume or production, I care about efficiency...

If he leads the league in scoring, but is shooting a high percentage fine... Same if he takes most of the shots in the 4th, I don't care...

What will make me start following another sport is if he's still dribbling down the clock in Isolation and if Pau and Bynoward aren't getting any shots.

With Nash, even in the half court, we should be scoring with plenty of time on the clock... No matter who eventually takes the shot.

I'd also like to see Nash shoot quite a bit too... His shot is a thing of beauty.

im excited to see the nash/pau/bynum pick n pop/ roll theyll have going between the 3 of them. when nash runs a pick and roll he'll always have the option of passing it to the roll man in bynum, taking the shot himself, or passing out to the pop man in gasol. that right there should be one of our go to plays next season. once bynum learns how to pick and roll, that is.

Forget the pnr with the bigs, i wanna see some kb nash pnr's... who will the double off of? trap kb? hell pass to open nash then the help D will come and its lob city to one of the bigs. Ppl are already talking about how nash will be a liability on D however the laker's D is predicated on how well their offense flows. Once they score everyone is set on D.