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I have been having a lot of debates with members in this group recently, that I think Mosley's offensive schemes leave a lot to be desired, and are very exploitable when playoff teams lock in for big games (OKC, Miami, and Knicks locked us up also recently

On the flip side of that coin, a lot of people argue that this is more of a personalle issue, and that his offense is fine and playoff ready. And the lack of 3 point shooters and and a point guard is more of an issue then his schemes and creativity.

But.... Can't it be both?

To be fair, I like Mosley as a coach, were currently in playoff position, a top 5 defense, and they mostly always play hard for him. And I do think we need better guard play and shooting (but I also am not a fan of his offense still) So this isnt a bash thread, I am just geniously curious.

So here is a poll that takes is just about his offense (his sets, the looks he is getting us, the motion in our offense etc).

Feel free to school me, but lets not make this a bash thread. We are doing well, and about to be in the playoffs hopefully, and I am grateful as a fan, and dont want to dim that light.

Yeah, it's pretty mediocre. It's very rarely that I think to myself "wow, that was a nice play by us, schematically".

Offenses in the nba in general seem kinda uninspired/monotonous in recent years, despite the high offensive efficiency numbers.

In fairness to Mose, the personnel isn't great offensively, especially the guards.

There's got to be a meme out there, from the Will Ferrell movie "Kicking and Screaming", where he coaches a little kid soccer team.

He had the same offensive scheme as Mose..."pass it to the Italian"

I refuse to vote on a nonexistent scheme.

I'm going with below average. Putting aside offensive talent, he's a players coach in only his 3rd season. He's literally a junior coach. He's top 5 as a motivator, top 10 as a defensive coach, and probably bottom 10 as an offensive coach.

Yeah, Mike D’Anthoni would make this team into juggernaut.


Not, if you had any doubt.

LONG POST AHEAD!

I don't mean it to be disparaging or a dig at anyone, but I'd legit wager that 90% of fans in general don't know what specific schemes are being ran on any given team or what constitutes as good offensive play (hint, a lot of the interesting/good ones can end in misses or a ball being fumbled, etc!) and that most teams are running similar things with waaaaaay different personnel. I'm even including myself in this % before this year.

Okay, maybe 90% is a bit harsh, more like 75% on RealGM because people watch ball here, but there's still a lot of "shot go in good, miss shot bad" discussion, and you can have SO many nice plays that don't result in a made basket because of so many different reasons. Especially in the game threads, there isn't much appreciation for the process of things, there's just a lot of anxiety and blame lol.

Question, do we collectively think Coach Spo is a bad offensive coach? Their team averages less points than us, and they have Jimmy, Bam, Jaquez, Herro, Rozier, Duncan, etc.

I voted it's average / not part of the problem because outside of specifically ran plays that people would like to see ran more, which is literally a complaint every fandom has of their coaches, for the amount of complaining I see here about roster building issues and shooting woes - if our offensive schemes are bad and our shooting/scoring personnel outside of 2 players are bad... then how can we confidently say what the ceiling is for bad offensive personnel? Nothing would ever be sufficient if we're still losing games.

I know when I start to read about people complaining about us "settling for open threes", which has been a complaint I've read quite a bit over the last few months, I know that we are absolutely cooked with our personnel at times. If there are debates about an open shot being a bad shot, that speaks volumes about our capability to shoot the ball. The only time that's truly bad is if the ball doesn't move and it's early in the shot clock or something.

I recommended this before, but if you want to see a lot of plays Mose is running and more scheme-oriented behind the scenes stuff, check out Fawzan Amer on Twitter. I'm still very much a noob myself and learn a lot from it. https://twitter.com/FawzanAmer_

Anyway, there are specific things I'd like to see us run more at times? Yes.

Can we get "cute" with certain actions and try to get specific players open? Of course.

Should we play with a bit more pace? Yes, I think we're a bit too slow, but we also invest a lot of energy in defense.

Do I see certain plays trying to be ran and get snuffed out by defenses? Yes, because we don't have the luxury of the offensive options a lot of teams have.

Our whole identity changed when we had Paolo + the shooters for a few games. It was cute, took a few teams for surprise like Denver, but the good vibes of hitting 15 threes a game and completely changing up the scheme suddenly came to a screeching halt when they realized they can put pressure on Paolo, stop worrying about the paint, and load up on all of the shooters.. the opposite of what usually happens because of having a lot of non-shooters or non-volume guys on the floor when healthy.

That alone showed me that the schemes are matching the personnel. And that if we really wanted to change, we could.. but it would be at the expense of our defense. I think it's a foolhardy decision to try to maximize below average offensive players while letting your defensive upside slip. The defense is what works for this current roster.

It's just really hard to say "I know we don't have a real lead guard or legit scoring option at the guard spot, BUT..."

Like, we legit might be the only team in the league, including lottery teams, (outside of the Wizards? And even we were clamoring for Tyus) that no team fears on a nightly basis from the guard position because they're not consistent enough. Suggs is an amazing shooter now, but he's not a consistent offensive threat quite yet if that makes sense.

That isn't just some tiny issue that can be hand-waved away with a "but" statement. It's like attaching on ankle weights versus other similarly talented runners and then wondering why it's harder for you to keep pace over time.

Mosley has done a good job I just thought it was odd for the front office to not add shooters at the deadline when we clearly needed more but if Weltman just decided to keep the young group together, not risk messing with chemistry and hope the easier schedule would be enough to position us well for the playoffs then I can sort of understand.

But still going forward the team has to be more aggressive in making basketball focused moves because Paolo and Franz' talent demands it.

Small aside, I'm also hesitant to call it "good" because the ingredients are not there yet in terms of expecting a good offense from a modern guard rotation and more consistent bench shooters. I think there are maybe 2-3 coaches that could work offensive wonders (like, 114 ppg ) with this group, but it would be at a huge expense to our defense.

Message Boar wrote:
Offenses in the nba in general seem kinda uninspired/monotonous in recent years, despite the high offensive efficiency numbers.

I agree with this, the ridiculous shooting ability of today's NBA players has dumbed down the game.

Alot of the creativity and nuance of the game that I liked watching has been replaced by "well he can bust that btch from 30 feet"

I think he runs a lot of plays that cater to his personnel. They do a decent job of creating space for players despite being a horrid shooting team. But, it's really hard to judge beyond that. The team is 25th in 3FG%. We're dead last in 3PFG attempts. And despite being top 5 in FT attempts, we're bottom 3 in FT%. The team can't shoot. They get good open shots, but it often leads to a brick or turnover because the players themselves are overpassing to get a shot at the rim that they're more comfortable with.

My thing is that Mosley is a junior coach. He can't be a goat at everything already. I'll be honest, I don't really know how to evaluate a coach's offensive coaching ability outside of him coaching a good offense and I'll be the first to admit our young team doesn't have good offensive players. But yeah, I have no reason to believe Mosley is an above average offensive coach.

I don’t. I understand the personnel he has make it hard but we need a more creative offensive coach. But I can’t blame any coach we have a team full of non shooters.

Mosley has the worst rotation of PGs in the league in terms of offensive skills and lacks reliable shooters, so it's pretty hard to blame him for the offense being subpar. When Ingles still had juice in his legs and was running the point, the offense looked really good in these minutes which shows the important of personnel. There isn't a set of some secret plays which will make our guards better shooters and ballhandlers or would make this very young team stop committing dumb turnovers. Of course Mosley can be better, but given the personnel he has and their age it makes total sense to focus on defense for now.

ORLMagicGirl15 wrote:I don’t. I understand the personnel he has make it hard but we need a more creative offensive coach. But I can’t blame any coach we have a team full of non shooters.

That's what I'm talking about, use our guards to tackle the opposing defense to the floor and clear the path for Paolo and Franz. Mix some football in there, be creative, don't put them in those open shots situations.

I say average. Magic were top 10 in Offense over last 10 games. That is not below average. I think people just nit pick due to their own bias within their own vision.

BadMofoPimp wrote:I say average. Magic were top 10 in Offense over last 10 games. That is not below average. I think people just nit pick due to their own bias within their own vision.

I agree it's average but last 10 games schedule was very easy , 7 games against below .500 teams, Cavs without Mitchell, Knicks in first game without 3 starters.

At the end of a day it's hard to run better offense with roster that is mainly built on defense and defense only. Banchero and Franz have to do whole lot on offense, rest of a team is mostly just defensive role players.

So-so... he is doing what he can with the tools he has been given with.

ITs not really his fault we miss a lot of FTs. Or that guys like Gary and Ingles, supposedly good 3pt shooters, are too scared to let fly everytime they are open.

pepe1991 wrote:

BadMofoPimp wrote:I say average. Magic were top 10 in Offense over last 10 games. That is not below average. I think people just nit pick due to their own bias within their own vision.

I agree it's average but last 10 games schedule was very easy , 7 games against below .500 teams, Cavs without Mitchell, Knicks in first game without 3 starters.

At the end of a day it's hard to run better offense with roster that is mainly built on defense and defense only. Banchero and Franz have to do whole lot on offense, rest of a team is mostly just defensive role players.

These guys are all young and developing. Once they can get the simpler game concepts down to perfection, they can learn new shyt.

I don't care how much of a Globetrotters 'Sweet Georgia Brown" weave they run through to begin the set, ultimately it ends up with Franz or Paolo on the perimeter, with a live dribble, making something happen. The transitions off of a miss sometimes get some nice cuts, etc but, in the half court...it's always the same.

MIA has such superior ball movement, throughout the roster, in the half court...it's clearly a team directive. UTA with Q. Snyder had it too, but ATL hasn't had the same offensive efficiency...maybe Trae's a black hole...maybe Paolo & Franz are too. Doesn't mean they don't pass or can't rack up tons of assists (Trae does)...but it certainly changes the personality of the offensive scheme.