How to improve our defense

[minimus]

We all understand that defense will be next big improvement. I would like to go a bit deeper, when we say improve defense, identifying small areas where problem lies and possible ways to fix it. Some statements that I could find

* - take pressure of bigs.
Beverly trade lines up with this concept, he can provide a PoA defense and raise intensity of our defense by fighting through screens and getting under opponent skin, make shooter uncomfortable with rear view shotblocking

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* - play big at the level. we wont hide KAT in drop scheme. we are going to to use him more to trap opponent on perimeter. I see here two important things to make it work. First is that Towns needs to improve his stamina, conditioning. This is fundamental to improve his mobility quickness. All indications that he is aware of this

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Second, because he will step out to stop PoA, he MUST to be active to disrupt passes, otherwise it will be an easy pass and dunk/layup for opponent big. I can think about Jokic using well IQ+hands

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However, this scenario requires a proper rotation from our second line defenders. Let say Towns and DLo/Beverly trap Dame high behind 3pt line. We need MCD/Vando/Edwards to step up, be aware of possible rotations.

* - we need to improve transition defense. We were 28th team in transition defense. Our players missed their matchups in transition allowing wide open threes or layups/ dunks. Here things gets tricky. One thing is definitely is team effort, and I hate DLo defense here. He was slow to get back in transition, and did not give an extra effort to stop fastbreak. He played with injury before ASB, had a surgery and was better after ASB, hopefully he can improve his conditioning and can stay healthy. Second thing, we really need to go bigger, more athletic at wings. No more Okogie, Culver, Layman, Juancho at PF. We finally have some depth at SF with Prince, Layman and MCD. Let them play! Lastly, we need to avoid dumb TOs, and bad shot attempts, i.e. reduce numbers of opponent opportunities for fastbreaks. I dont think that playing Towns + big can help here. We need a capable transition defender at PF. I also like that our offseason additions are high energy players: Prince, Beverly, hopefully Bolmaro, Wright, Knight.

* - we need to improve of defensive rebounding. We were bottom4 in terms of defensive rebounding, that was understandable because Towns missed so many games. However, we need strong team effort and help from wings, guards to clean boards. Playing MCD at SF would help, Edwards absolutely can improve his rebounding. But main improvement should come from PF position.

* - we allowed to many corner threes, it was absolutely annoying that our team routinely missed rotation which lead to wide open corner threes. As result we were dead last in opponent 3PT%. We were also bad at contesting threes, one possible strategy could be really aggressive closeouts like TOR did. Vando, Prince, Layman, Okogie, MCD, Edwards, Beverly and DLO they all have either wingspan and/or athleticism to closeout aggressively.

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P.S. My first piece of text here, after long period. Lets go Wolves!
P.P.S. I dont have access to Athletic, but recently Britt made a two-part interview with Finch. Maybe other poster can add some info from Britt article, or other places. I've heard about abandoning "solid is enough principle", making defense more personal challenge

[winforlose]

This may sound overly simplistic, but I truly believe it is the key to improving our defense. The simplest and easiest way to improve on defense is to believe you are going to make the playoffs and win the early games in the season before teams figure things out. The number one biggest obstacle to defense is effort. On offense people chase you, on defense you are running after someone else, changing speeds and fighting through screens. Worse still, offensive stats get far more fan attention and are more easily quantified than defensive stats. Also, good offensive numbers tend to get better money than good defensive stats (general practice not the rule.) All of this being true, the Wolves often played lazy defense at different times of the game either because they didn’t care about the win in the grand scheme, or because they were more interested in conserving energy to play offense and look better than to play defense and contribute to the win. However, players who feel like they have a legit chance of making the playoffs or better yet, getting good playoff seeding tend to put forth more effort on defense and tend to focus more on winning than on stat padding (again general practice not a rule.) I believe that early season success combined with relative health of our stars will lead to more effort and thus significant improvement.

[shangrila]

Take an And 1 for writing that all out.

To answer the question, I think it's in 3 parts, some of which you touched on.

Firstly, it's desire. I don't think people have wanted to play defence on this team for a while and you need to change that. Getting a guy like Beverley is a good step in that direction but more is needed. And it doesn't have to be veterans. Drafting someone like an Okogie would be fine too. Just fill out the roster with more and more players that actually value that side of the ball, until the number that do outnumber those that don't.

Secondly, it's rebounding. We need better rebounding aside from Towns and it's one of the reasons I'm not married to the idea of Naz long term. He's just not a good enough rebounder for a guy his size.

Lastly, as you pointed out, it's changing how Towns is used. He's gotten better over the years, through sheer force of repetition, at drop coverage but it's still not great. He just doesn't have the high level read ability for it, at least for now. But switching and trapping? That's more simplistic and he's got the foot speed to pull it off. Given what we saw in summer league it seems that's where they're headed which is great.

[minimus]

This may sound overly simplistic, but I truly believe it is the key to improving our defense. The simplest and easiest way to improve on defense is to believe you are going to make the playoffs and win the early games in the season before teams figure things out. The number one biggest obstacle to defense is effort. On offense people chase you, on defense you are running after someone else, changing speeds and fighting through screens. Worse still, offensive stats get far more fan attention and are more easily quantified than defensive stats. Also, good offensive numbers tend to get better money than good defensive stats (general practice not the rule.) All of this being true, the Wolves often played lazy defense at different times of the game either because they didn’t care about the win in the grand scheme, or because they were more interested in conserving energy to play offense and look better than to play defense and contribute to the win. However, players who feel like they have a legit chance of making the playoffs or better yet, getting good playoff seeding tend to put forth more effort on defense and tend to focus more on winning than on stat padding (again general practice not a rule.) I believe that early season success combined with relative health of our stars will lead to more effort and thus significant improvement.

I think I've heard that Finch touched this topic in Britts interview. Confidence is such an important thing for young players. Continuity between last season and upcoming season is very important. I also noticed that our team management have scheduled a defined plan for this offseason for players: Ant and Reid were practicing with US Olympic team before they suffered injuries, MCD, Nowell, Wright, Knight played in SL, Bolmaro, Okogie played in Olympic games. Now Finch said that whole team will be practicing together after Sep.6, so two weeks before official NBA camps will be opened. This is a key thing that we missed last season, when all young players could use SL, JMac, Rubio and Juancho missed preseason work, were out of shape at the beginning of the season. I wonder if last season early results were kind of destined to be awful because of lack of team work, team-first mentality.

[minimus]

Firstly, it's desire. I don't think people have wanted to play defence on this team for a while and you need to change that. Getting a guy like Beverley is a good step in that direction but more is needed. And it doesn't have to be veterans. Drafting someone like an Okogie would be fine too. Just fill out the roster with more and more players that actually value that side of the ball, until the number that do outnumber those that don't.

I agree, going from Rubio, Juancho, Culver to Prince, Beverly is clearly step in this direction. I also wonder how Beasley can help us. He missed a lot of games, but was improving as defender, he is awful at positioning, but effort is there. So I feel it like we have three new players Prince, Beverly, Beasley who all shoot 40% from three. Also a huge factor here that they replace three bad shooters (Culver, Rubio, Juancho). It also might be that better shooting will elevate our defense at some degree, for instance if we make an open three we have higher chance to get defensive stop in next possession, if we miss a wide open three badly it will result in fastbreak AND opponent would likely pack the paint (hence get rebound) when we shoot three next time

Secondly, it's rebounding. We need better rebounding aside from Towns and it's one of the reasons I'm not married to the idea of Naz long term. He's just not a good enough rebounder for a guy his size.

Yes, we need a 3rd string C, because Reid and Towns share same strengths and weaknesses. The void at PF also affect this situation, because let say Siakam or Simmons would help here immediately.

Lastly, as you pointed out, it's changing how Towns is used. He's gotten better over the years, through sheer force of repetition, at drop coverage but it's still not great. He just doesn't have the high level read ability for it, at least for now. But switching and trapping? That's more simplistic and he's got the foot speed to pull it off. Given what we saw in summer league it seems that's where they're headed which is great.

Yes, thank you for this point about SL. I was thinking about the same. Our SL team played great defense! Isaiah Miller and Wirght as PoA defender, Knight as mobile big, and MCD as help defender. Unfortunately, at national media level no one from this team got recognition, neither MCD nor Nowell are in first or second SL team. Which is ridiculous given that fact that these two players won against CHI, SAS and PHI.

[Dewey]

This defensive talk is 5th grade material … every year there’s some rant like it’s new information - yet it’s all the same. Some (players, coaches, organizations, etc) are committed to it and some are not. Period.

[packforfreedom]

It's great having you back minimus.

another thing that was really affecting our defense was KAT's constant foul trouble. He was starting the games overly active on defense and commiting stupid fouls which were limiting his ability to defend for the rest of the game. Because I think, he's a willing defender and not that bad either. For him a big part it's about channeling his intensity.

[minimus]

It's great having you back minimus.

another thing that was really affecting our defense was KAT's constant foul trouble. He was starting the games overly active on defense and commiting stupid fouls which were limiting his ability to defend for the rest of the game. Because I think, he's a willing defender and not that bad either. For him a big part it's about channeling his intensity.

Oh yeah, I also remember those stupid moving screens that he sets. He constantly pickups 1-2 those fouls at the beginning of the game.

[FinnTheHuman]

I kinda gotta be the contrarian and say this: if everything is a relevant factor, then nothing is a relevant factor, and playing against modern nba offenses means you have to give something up. If you're scheming to take pressure off bigs, you're probably allowing more corner 3's which you name as another problem. Or if you're scheming to trap with KAT instead of dropping him, then suddenly rim protection and rebounding suffers.

I kinda feel like the scheme shouldn't be too complex, inflexible and counter-intuitive, because that's how things fall apart. Ease of execution should be the name of the game, make our players rely on their athleticism and on their defensive instincts while not having to think about a gazillion of tactical micro-decisions, and adjust the basic schemes based on what the opponent is doing with the particular lineup that's out there for them. Drop KAT if we're playing against bad shooting teams, trap with KAT and send help if we're playing against some elite scorers, do the obvious stuff basically. My 2 cents

[minimus]

I kinda gotta be the contrarian and say this: if everything is a relevant factor, then nothing is a relevant factor, and playing against modern nba offenses means you have to give something up. If you're scheming to take pressure off bigs, you're probably allowing more corner 3's which you name as another problem. Or if you're scheming to trap with KAT instead of dropping him, then suddenly rim protection and rebounding suffers.

I kinda feel like the scheme shouldn't be too complex, inflexible and counter-intuitive, because that's how things fall apart. Ease of execution should be the name of the game, make our players rely on their athleticism and on their defensive instincts while not having to think about a gazillion of tactical micro-decisions, and adjust the basic schemes based on what the opponent is doing with the particular lineup that's out there for them. Drop KAT if we're playing against bad shooting teams, trap with KAT and send help if we're playing against some elite scorers, do the obvious stuff basically. My 2 cents

Totally agree, we need this kind of versatility when we speak about team defense. I also believe that change of personnel might help here. If you have players who can guard only one position it is difficult to implement many defensive tactics.

[KGdaBom]

The best way I can think of to improve the D is trade for Simmons.

[winforlose]

This may sound overly simplistic, but I truly believe it is the key to improving our defense. The simplest and easiest way to improve on defense is to believe you are going to make the playoffs and win the early games in the season before teams figure things out. The number one biggest obstacle to defense is effort. On offense people chase you, on defense you are running after someone else, changing speeds and fighting through screens. Worse still, offensive stats get far more fan attention and are more easily quantified than defensive stats. Also, good offensive numbers tend to get better money than good defensive stats (general practice not the rule.) All of this being true, the Wolves often played lazy defense at different times of the game either because they didn’t care about the win in the grand scheme, or because they were more interested in conserving energy to play offense and look better than to play defense and contribute to the win. However, players who feel like they have a legit chance of making the playoffs or better yet, getting good playoff seeding tend to put forth more effort on defense and tend to focus more on winning than on stat padding (again general practice not a rule.) I believe that early season success combined with relative health of our stars will lead to more effort and thus significant improvement.

I think I've heard that Finch touched this topic in Britts interview. Confidence is such an important thing for young players. Continuity between last season and upcoming season is very important. I also noticed that our team management have scheduled a defined plan for this offseason for players: Ant and Reid were practicing with US Olympic team before they suffered injuries, MCD, Nowell, Wright, Knight played in SL, Bolmaro, Okogie played in Olympic games. Now Finch said that whole team will be practicing together after Sep.6, so two weeks before official NBA camps will be opened. This is a key thing that we missed last season, when all young players could use SL, JMac, Rubio and Juancho missed preseason work, were out of shape at the beginning of the season. I wonder if last season early results were kind of destined to be awful because of lack of team work, team-first mentality.

I think it all came down to KAT getting hurt. We were playing pretty well and winning and then KAT goes down and the guys know the season is over. Confidence is big on offense, but defense is effort. If you think you are going to lose anyway, you will be much less likely to go all out. The team who wants it more usually gets it. That is why good teams who underestimate bad teams often get upset. One of my problems with Ryan is he didn’t get the guys hungry before games. A coach needs to keep his team ready and make them believe this is their year. Hopefully our guys are nice and hungry and with Finch intense and in their face, I am much more confident they will be game ready. Also, if you believe Ant, they love the extra intensity from their coach and the fact that he will hold them accountable (as much as NBA coach can with the teams big names.)

[Klomp]

This post has nothing to do with scheme, but I just had a thought about how fun it would be to see a defensive lineup of Beverley / Edwards / Bolmaro / McDaniels / Towns. I know people will sneer at the thought of Edwards and Towns in a defensive lineup. But think about the on-ball abilities of Beverley, McDaniels, and even Bolmaro, which will give Towns an easier time on the back end and would allow Edwards to play free safety and sniff out passing lanes. On offense, you run it through Edwards and Towns with Beverley and McDaniels as spacers so that won't kill you too much either.

[SmokeyPaw]

Krawczynski in a recent article in the Athletic said that Turner told him that he was going to initially focus on running back on defense.