Eddie Johnson tries to agree with Draymond and gets brutally fact-checked

[nomansland]

lol, how can you apply pressure on defense when you can't breath on a guy?

Depends on the guy. Some guys get hacked every.single.time and others draw fouls by falling over every time a hand gets waved in their face.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Whether they are from picks or not, the volume of 3-point attempts makes basketball more predictable than ever...
But there is one 3-point shooter who always looks entertaining... Anthony Edwards is mostly shooting 3s off the dribble and its hard to predict exactly when he'll shoot, because he likes to pretend that he's about to drive a lot. Plus his shooting motion is sexciting!

Thinking Basketball already killed this narrative. The amount of 3s is due to the fact that spot up shots used to be long 2s are now 3-point shots. The amount of shots taken in the paint has remained the same.

You are essentially arguing that long 2s are fun and unpredictable, while shooting a slightly longer 3s is boring and predictable.

(BTW, Today’s players also make their 3s at a higher% than ‘90s and ‘00s players made long 2s)

The “too many 3s” argument has been debunked. “Too many PnRs” has been debunked. Do you have any actual real criticisms?

2s are a lot more unpredictable than 3s, that is for certain, i just watched all of Chicago's NBA Finals games and they are more entertaining than anything i've ever seen!

Plus the 2s make defenders work a lot harder, whereas 3s often just make defenders put a hand up, and when Curry has a cold night you don't even need to put a hand up... and last season i remember hearing that Indiana were just waiting to get the ball and not even caring about defense

when you say "2s" you're putting together very different shots, just because you're not going granular enough with the data.
A long spot up two is much more similar to a spot up three than a layup. Same for the off the dribble ones.
you're too much looking at a 1-2m difference in the distance and not enough at the actual basketball move.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

This should be required watching for anyone complaining about today's game being too simple:

Watch on YouTube

This has big "the economy is fine and all you plebians just need to look at all our statistics about how good the economy is instead of complaining about costs" energy.

Yes the game is simpler when the majority of actions result in a three or a lay up attempt. You can't just point to more complex off ball actions and say "everybody has to start paying attention to that now and use that to decide if its interesting" because that's not the metric people watching use to determine whether the gameplay is simple or not.

not relying on hard data enough is what is leasing to this disaster, in the US and WW

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Game has been figured out by numbers, and most teams play very similarly, because facts tell us it is the most efficient way to play.

Most teams have always played similarly, whether or not that was a smart idea, unless they had talent to dictate that they could do something else. That's not new. People just bitch about it more because we have broader access. We were having near-identical whining conversations on Usenet in the 90s.

the difference is that those complaining on rsbp in the 90s or early 00s were right

[Ryoga Hibiki]

The real culprit was Stan Van Gundy. He's the real person who changed the entire NBA landscape since 2008/2009 with the 'stretch-4' format he introduced with Dwight Howard and Rashard Lewis down in ORL.

The NBA has been 3-pt heavy since then.

I would say Rudy T did the same for Olajuwon 15 years earlier

[nomansland]

Watching the video, it's surprising how long it took the league to figure out that if you're going to shoot a long jumper, it might as well be a 3. That makes total sense and you can't possibly argue with it. In fact it's frustrating to see those long 2's from yesteryear.

Here's a big difference though- those long 2's were kind of bailout shots. Nobody was designing an offense to get that crap. Today, offenses are in part designed to get 3's, and it can feel like too much. I personally don't find it all that boring for the reasons stated in the video but it's easy to see why that plan of attack draws criticism from old schoolers.

I'm just lucky that 90% or more of the games I watch are Nuggets games. They actually do play differently than a lot of teams and it's fun to watch.

[NoStatsGuy]

What the statistics show don't really seem to pass the eye test. And, to some degree, as far as "boring" is concerned... I'm having difficulty disagreeing with Green. Your mileage may vary, but seeing the game in this current state isn't all that interesting to me. While it does have some exciting times here and there, the amount of chucking is absurd.

i think the main difference is shaq and chuck are well aware, they are there for the entertainment value and not for sound analysis.

draymond green and many posters here think they are actually giving good basketball takes

[og15]

The real culprit was Stan Van Gundy. He's the real person who changed the entire NBA landscape since 2008/2009 with the 'stretch-4' format he introduced with Dwight Howard and Rashard Lewis down in ORL.

The NBA has been 3-pt heavy since then.

I would say Rudy T did the same for Olajuwon 15 years earlier

There were a few coaches tinkering, but other coaches / teams don't want to deviate unless someone wins it all.

Don Nelson was doing the small ball thing and would do a lot of unconventional stuff.

O'Brien had the Celtics launching three's

D'Antoni with the Suns, small ball and 3's.

Orlando with Stan, they always say they stumbled into it because he originally planned to start Tony Battie at he 4, but he got injured, so Turk became a starter and they were a 4 out team.

...but it wasn't until the Warriors won it all and won 73 games that everyone was like, okay, this actually works, works.

Watching the video, it's surprising how long it took the league to figure out that if you're going to shoot a long jumper, it might as well be a 3. That makes total sense and you can't possibly argue with it. In fact it's frustrating to see those long 2's from yesteryear.

Here's a big difference though- those long 2's were kind of bailout shots. Nobody was designing an offense to get that crap. Today, offenses are in part designed to get 3's, and it can feel like too much. I personally don't find it all that boring for the reasons stated in the video but it's easy to see why that plan of attack draws criticism from old schoolers.

I'm just lucky that 90% or more of the games I watch are Nuggets games. They actually do play differently than a lot of teams and it's fun to watch.

Yes and no. There were many offenses set up with off ball action to get a 16-20 foot open mid-range jumper, of course you can counter an overplay with a drive. Think of how someone like Rip was used in the Pistons offense.

A lot of pick and pop actions with your shooting big man was for a long two.

The percentage of shots that were combined long mid range + 3PT is still similar to what we have now, so of course it wasn't just mainly bail out.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

The real culprit was Stan Van Gundy. He's the real person who changed the entire NBA landscape since 2008/2009 with the 'stretch-4' format he introduced with Dwight Howard and Rashard Lewis down in ORL.

The NBA has been 3-pt heavy since then.

I would say Rudy T did the same for Olajuwon 15 years earlier

There were a few coaches tinkering, but other coaches / teams don't want to deviate unless someone wins it all.

the funny thing is that the Rockets did win it all.
maybe the importance of Horry's spacing was not as obvious because at the time there was he shorter 3 point line.

[og15]

I would say Rudy T did the same for Olajuwon 15 years earlier

There were a few coaches tinkering, but other coaches / teams don't want to deviate unless someone wins it all.

the funny thing is that the Rockets did win it all.
maybe the importance of Horry's spacing was not as obvious because at the time there was he shorter 3 point line.

After the 3 line went back, everyone immediately dropped in attempts again, sooo...

[dhsilv2]

"A factor ( i.e. shot diversity at the end of a possession) involved in a complicated process or situation( i.e. scoring the basketball)". It actually perfectly matches that definition you so helpfully posted. And indeed there can be multiple factors involved in the same complicated process or situation.

It does make sense. I'm getting from you that no one else's definition is valid but yours and if that's how you feel then I'll leave it at that.

Saying the end of a complex set of actions is all that matters is pretty wild. It ignores everything the defense does adn everything they offense is trying to do. It's leaving 95% of what's happening out of the equation.

I agree with you it's not all that matters. In the same way that all the off ball movement and screens that happen before the shot goes up isn't all that matters.

So just pointing at the increase in complexity of one part of the game doesn't invalidate the fact that another part of the game is getting simpler. Two things can be happening from different perspectives

No...this is just stupid. The game is 48 minutes. The determination of complexity it the entirety of the 48 minutes. The point Ben made was that people are only looking at one point and not what leads to it. He wasn't saying we should ignore EITHER. But the game has always mostly been long jumpers and shots in the paint. That's just the nature of the game.

[dhsilv2]

There were a few coaches tinkering, but other coaches / teams don't want to deviate unless someone wins it all.

the funny thing is that the Rockets did win it all.
maybe the importance of Horry's spacing was not as obvious because at the time there was he shorter 3 point line.

After the 3 line went back, everyone immediately dropped in attempts again, sooo...

A lot of that was personnel. I remember the horrors of guys like Zo shooting 3's in those years being a reason to push back. Of course fast forward and now if a big can't shoot 3's they're looked at as limited.

[cupcakesnake]

The data says it was generally more of a waste of a possession to run those plays for non stars or non optimal in that skill players, but it did add variety, that is true.

So yes, there is less variety in what certain role players are encouraged to do on the court, and I can certainly understand people feeling that they want the variety, but you can't expect teams to choose any variety that isn't going to match the results of less variety ,because they are trying to win, not look pretty.

Optimization doesn't necessarily mean more interesting. The problem for teams is that everyone knows the data, so you can't decide to start doing stuff for variety and fun while your offense lags behind.

Hate to cherry pick a few lines from a longer post that I mostly agree with, but I disagree with the above.

The only "less variety in what certain role players are encouraged to do on the court" is shooting distance. Even there, really all that's been taken away from them is shooting long 2s (please take a step back and get the extra point), and weak post up threats posting mismatches.

The shooting thing I feel should be obvious. Similar plays that were run for long 2s now have to be 3s. No big difference. All long range shots. The post up thing is a little more complicated. A few factors are:
- There are fewer obvious post up targets. We simply don't see as many 6'0" guards anymore, and most of the ones in the league are absolutely unpostable fire hydrants like Kyle Lowry, Chris Paul, and FVV.
- Defenses adjusted a while ago to make posting up harder for anyone. An efficient post up option now means you not only have to be able to score on your defender, you have to pass out of multiple defensive coverages. The passing has to be sophisticated because help isn't simply coming from the nearest 3-point shooter anymore.

However, role players on most teams are being asked to do more than ever. Sure less role players are allowed to call their number for an iso or post up, but they have to do a million little things in a complicated offense as a screener, playmaker, movement shooter. So many role players these days have strong ball handling.

There's no real evidence that the NBA has become more homogenous. Pick & roll dominance has replaced post dominance, and threes have replaced long 2s. Posting and long 2s don't represent more variety when they were being used just as heavily. Looking past those 2 stylistic trees at the broader forest, NBA offenses have more variety than ever. Look at Boston's offense (5-out) vs. Memphis (no pick & roll) vs. OKC (Shai attacking + a million cuts to put you in constant short rotation) vs. New York's (KAT and Brunson-ccentric actions with 3 wings making plays) vs. Indiana (push pace, get into Siakam hub action with Hali orchestrating) vs. Denver (Running everything you can get out of Jokic passing) vs. Dallas (pre Luka trade, helio ball). I think the burden of proof is on the old heads. Someone breakdown 6 90s offense and enthrall me with the variety!

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Saying the end of a complex set of actions is all that matters is pretty wild. It ignores everything the defense does adn everything they offense is trying to do. It's leaving 95% of what's happening out of the equation.

I agree with you it's not all that matters. In the same way that all the off ball movement and screens that happen before the shot goes up isn't all that matters.

So just pointing at the increase in complexity of one part of the game doesn't invalidate the fact that another part of the game is getting simpler. Two things can be happening from different perspectives

No...this is just stupid. The game is 48 minutes. The determination of complexity it the entirety of the 48 minutes. The point Ben made was that people are only looking at one point and not what leads to it. He wasn't saying we should ignore EITHER. But the game has always mostly been long jumpers and shots in the paint. That's just the nature of the game.

I remember a hilarious discussion almost 20 years ago, I think in the InsideHoops forum, about Dirk vs Garnett.
The argument someone brought up was that Garnett was better than Dirk 99% of the time, as the only thing Dirk was better at was shooting and it was lasting only like 2 seconds for 20 times a game.
And it was the guy who was publishing a lot mixtapes at the time, kblaze. Long way to go from him to ElGee, as a basketball influencer.

[dhsilv2]

I agree with you it's not all that matters. In the same way that all the off ball movement and screens that happen before the shot goes up isn't all that matters.

So just pointing at the increase in complexity of one part of the game doesn't invalidate the fact that another part of the game is getting simpler. Two things can be happening from different perspectives

No...this is just stupid. The game is 48 minutes. The determination of complexity it the entirety of the 48 minutes. The point Ben made was that people are only looking at one point and not what leads to it. He wasn't saying we should ignore EITHER. But the game has always mostly been long jumpers and shots in the paint. That's just the nature of the game.

I remember a hilarious discussion almost 20 years ago, I think in the InsideHoops forum, about Dirk vs Garnett.
The argument someone brought up was that Garnett was better than Dirk 99% of the time, as the only thing Dirk was better at was shooting and it was lasting only like 2 seconds for 20 times a game.
And it was the guy who was publishing a lot mixtapes at the time, kblaze. Long way to go from him to ElGee, as a basketball influencer.

oh man, the forum was a zoo back in the day. Haven't been there in a years. I can't even imagine.

[Special_Puppy]

What the statistics show don't really seem to pass the eye test. And, to some degree, as far as "boring" is concerned... I'm having difficulty disagreeing with Green. Your mileage may vary, but seeing the game in this current state isn't all that interesting to me. While it does have some exciting times here and there, the amount of chucking is absurd.

True Shooting is as high as its even been. There's less chucking than ever before

[TorontoBarneys]

"Fact-checking" is such low testosterone behavior. It's like you're that stereotype of the person who calls out someone's spelling mistake.

The overall statistics could say that PnR's are down across the board, but that particular person's experience might have been different to the point where he felt he needed to share it openly. People who feel the need to "dunk" on others in open forums probably haven't been **** by their wives in years.

Someday, you will be embarrassed that you were like this.

You were an internet forum moderator. Nothing I do will ever be as embarrassing.

[Nate505]

Thinking Basketball already killed this narrative. The amount of 3s is due to the fact that spot up shots used to be long 2s are now 3-point shots. The amount of shots taken in the paint has remained the same.

You are essentially arguing that long 2s are fun and unpredictable, while shooting a slightly longer 3s is boring and predictable.

(BTW, Today’s players also make their 3s at a higher% than ‘90s and ‘00s players made long 2s)

The “too many 3s” argument has been debunked. “Too many PnRs” has been debunked. Do you have any actual real criticisms?

Yes, and it's true. Long 2s are far better than more 3s. Mostly due to the point value to the shot. When a team gets hot from 3, the only way to combat that is to get hot from 3, and the game becomes a non-stop 3 point chucking fest that's horrible.

The "Too many 3s" argument has not been debunked. The 3PA literally are the highest they've ever been. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is more subjective than objective. I detest it, but hey, some people love it.

[SkyBill40]

What the statistics show don't really seem to pass the eye test. And, to some degree, as far as "boring" is concerned... I'm having difficulty disagreeing with Green. Your mileage may vary, but seeing the game in this current state isn't all that interesting to me. While it does have some exciting times here and there, the amount of chucking is absurd.

i think the main difference is shaq and chuck are well aware, they are there for the entertainment value and not for sound analysis.

draymond green and many posters here think they are actually giving good basketball takes

They offer a player perspective, often with a ridiculous but jovial tone. I can live with that. But if they were asked serious questions and expected to provide meaningful answers that were experience based, I don't doubt they would be willing to do so. But as we both know, the game has changed significantly from the time in which either of those two played, so perspective is going to be just that.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Watch on YouTube

Garnett deserves some serious praise for this