The defense has been astounding. When I was doing my roster analysis earlier in the offseason, I thought that Scottie Brooks would have this team playing better defensively; mostly a product of a full training camp and preseason. Nobody could have expected this type of turnaround. Last season this team finished 20th out of 30 teams in defensive rating. This year we are fourth. The roster hasn't changed much, and I'm not sure how much of this is a credit to Brooks and how much is an indication of PJ Carlesimo's crappiness.
To put this into perspective, the Seattle Sonics hadn't finished in the top half of the league in defensive rating since 1998, George Karl's final season coaching the team. The franchise has been in the bottom third of the league all but two of the last ten years. We're starting to see some indication of what Sam Presti had in mind: a long, rangy, versatile team that can be ultra disruptive on defense. And this is without any inside presence.
Other than the defense:
- Kevin Durant's 3pt% is down but he's scoring at about the same efficiency as last season thanks to free throw shooting. He's increased his production in other areas, pretty much every area. He's even starting to block shots regularly. I expected KD to regress a bit this year ..
- Russell Westbrook is fairly close to what I had him pegged for in the offseason. His A:TO ratio is 1.87 or so, which is a decent improvement. I hope he can get it up to 2:1 which would make this season a success for him IMO. He started off the year shooting well but has tailed off. He's much more efficient on inside attempts; but he's shooting a lot more jump shots (which he is equally [in]efficient at this year). Russ should be using his abilities much like Tony Parker uses his.. get to the rim and make plays. It's been mixed but at least he's shown tangible improvement. He's been very uneven on defense.
- Jeff Green hasn't filled into the PF spot as a lot of us hoped he would. He's been mostly underwhelming, and has regressed in some areas. Most notably his three point shot. Unlike KD, he isn't making up for that in other areas and his scoring efficiency is not good for his position. Very weak on the boards. His defense has been OK I think, especially when he's not at a huge size disadvantage.
- Nenad Krstic has also been a mixed bag. He's working the pick and pop game well with Russ and when his shot is good he's a real asset.
- James Harden has also been mixed for me. I like his skill set and think he's going to be fine, but he's been fairly inconsistent with his shooting.
What do you guys expect the next quarter of the year? Will Presti make a move at the deadline, will we remain at or above .500 through the next tough portion of the schedule?
) figures out how to run the team and make smart sound decisions. Also more Harden would help the offense as well.
