nate33 wrote:Illmatic12 wrote:Bonga legitimately looks like a player now, he's probably undergone the most drastic transformation of anyone on the roster. His frame looks stronger and less "teenagery", he is switching 1-5 seamlessly, is very aware and twitchy on help defense and sniffs out plays before they happen. And on offense he's using his stride length to get into the paint and threaten the rim .
I can't believe Bonga played 32 minutes, and the entire time, it looked like he belonged out there. Usually, I hold my breath while he is on the court, hoping that the other team doesn't figure out that he is useless on offense and a foul magnet on defense. But, lo and behold, he WASN'T a liability at either end of the floor!
If he keeps playing like that, he might be better than Hachimura (at least, for now). At least he is defensively aware and makes sure that anyone penetrating the lane will have to navigate over his outstretched arms. I really like that he is making the switch from a wanna-be ball-handling guard into a defensively-switchable role-playing power forward who can occasionally surprise you by putting the ball on the floor and making a play. If he can just develop a 3-ball, he'll be a real useful player in this league.
Bonga was a weird player to figure out when he first came here but the coaching staff is starting to help him understand what he does well. When he is playing aggressively he reminds me of a younger Boris Diaw type player. He can be a unique Swiss Army knife who does a lot of little things on the court for us. Especially his defensive activity , if we had 1-2 more players like him our D would be set.
Re: Hachimura - think I’ve seen you posting some stuff about his defensive numbers . To me it’s too early to judge what he’ll be defensively. He started his career off on the wrong foot - playing heavy minutes with IT, Bertans, Bryant plus they were mostly sitting in a soft 2-3 zone which doesn’t foster defensive engagement/communication the way switching does. Some players are terrible off the ball but when you ask them to switch they are more engaged . Jaylen brown is a perfect example, an absolute space cadet off-ball but everyone seems to think he’s a great defender. It’s just that they mainly ask him to switch and use his physical tools on-ball. Tatum is a bit soft in 1v1 defense , but he’s a brilliant help defender for a young wing & they use him to his strengths.
The emergence of Bonga, AP, Payton, even Mahinmi being playable and TBJ improving make this a different team defensively from the early season roster. They now have guys who can switch and guard POA - when Rui returns I’d like to see a larger sample size of him playing with this group. To me, his path to being a plus defender has to be in a switching scheme not sitting in the back of a zone. Physically I think he can switch onto bigger wings better than anyone else we have.. for ex these moves by Tatum last night probably wouldn’t have worked if Rui was defending him (bc he’s way stronger than TBJ or Bonga will ever be ):
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My overall point is if Rui has bad off-ball instincts but shows that he can use his tools to switch , he isn’t a lost cause. They just have to plan on building a Celtics-style defense and factor that into the draft/FA strategy. Atm I feel pretty adamant on wanting Sheppard to draft an athletic wing with elite team defense IQ to pair with Rui (*cough* Isaac Okoro).
