Nash, Amare and lessons from the recent Portland and Denver

[dantian]

Nash, Amare and lessons from the recent Portland and Denver games
I always said that we could be a real contender if Nash was willing to reinvent himself into a Stockton mode to fit the new roster and coach: half of his previous amount of ball handling time, more catch and shooting with screens, less minutes, more energy for defense and maintaining the touch for clutch shots.

The past two games, loss at Por and win vs Den, offered prime examples for this claim. In the loss, Nash committed 5 TOs plus 3 more put on others. He dribbled the ball more and had no energy for defense and no touch for clutch shots. In fact, Amare had 8 asts to zero TO, which underscored the problem even more. Had Nash forced it less and went to others more instead of dribbling it himself, we might not have been into the problem of a close game lost in last seconds.

In the win, he handled the ball a lot less, with only 3 TOs. Had energy to play Stockton-like nasty defense on Billups and Carter (who regularly torched him in the past despite our wins) and to nail down the clutch shots. The whole concept seems closer to how Stockton was used in Utah, though we need more work to get Nash adjusting to this new role. Evidence for this were the two turnovers one in each of the games that resulted from Nash trying to pass to Shaq establishing a great position under the basket. In the Por. game, Nash recognized it too late, and Shaq got a 3sec called. In the Den. one, he saw it and rushed to pass over his defender's head and got it deflected for TO and fastbreak 2pt. So, he is still to learn to get comfortable with the idea of feeding the post as the first option, with the dominant bigs like Shaq and Amare in there.

Meanwhile, Amare had 2 of his 4 TOs on passes to JR botched due to misunderstanding or imperfect angle and/or speed, none due to cornered situations or just careless throwing away many of Nash's lately are. Also, on several occasions with him semi double teamed, he could have touch-passed it to cutting Shaq but either didn't see it or wasn't sure about his ability to deliver the pass. In any way, aside from perfection, we can't complain about Amare's decisions with ball in his hands. And the way he so constantly gets double-teamed will make him learn a lot faster and better to handle those situations, well to finally reach his potential as the dominant big besides a dominant scorer.

With Shaq being Shaq, LB improving at offensive dec. making and at defense, Barnes doing great despite often being erratic, Hill defending great, and JR meeting expectation so far, I still see in this team a real contender, as long as Nash's role changes along this direction smooth enough, i.e. without further pouting to ruin the chemistry, and Amare finally learning his point-forward/center role quick enough.

One ugly issue I'm with Shaq on that I can't understand is why we play so much zone and keep doing it despite being burned badly all the time. With Nash having energy to play adequate D, let's get some def. accountability and work on man defense first, please!

[NashtyNas]

Dude, you can't ask a guy to change his whole game plan after he's used it for like 13 years. Are you KIDDING me? That's like asking Shaq to shoot 3's man. Nash IS the primary ball handler on this team, and will be until he leaves it. He CANNOT work off the ball well, because he sets up the team. Look at what happens to our offense when he's out of the game. Yeah, playing less minutes would keep him fresher to play harder defense, but seriously, we're NEVER going to find a good backup PG. It's just not for us.