hardenASG13 wrote:dhsilv2 wrote:hardenASG13 wrote:
Gobert being a zero on offense and being as slow as he is on defense hasn't exactly helped the last few games.
Just because I don't make outrageous claims, like Gobert was the best player for Minnesota in game 1 (where Edwards had 43 points and Gobert had 6. If you've ever played in a basketball game, you'd know if a guy has 43, he had a better game than someone who scored 6) or that Mutumbo was more valuable to the 01 sixers than Allen Iverson, doesn't mean all I value is points. I understand Jokic creates for others. I also understand his team was unconscious shooting the ball from 3 last night, and always having 5 guys who can shoot it from outside on the court is an advantage for them this series, as opposed to Minnesota who often has two non shooters out there when Gobert and McDaniels are playing.
I've called for Jokic to look to score more, and he did last night. It was amazing.
Gobert isn't slow at all...he's one of the most mobile big men at his size we've seen. I just don't even know how to respond to just obviously false statements.
And meanwhile the Nuggets don't have 5 guys who can shoot at all times. The biggest reason they lost game 1 was the inability to use Gordon which was heavily the work of Gobert. Gordon has responded by confidently taking 3's despite being a 30% shooter from out there and it's working.
Now all your "Bro" talk aside with the 40 points stuff. I do agree that Gobert has a small negative impact on offense. He however is far more than making up for it on the defensive end. The problem as ANT very clearly laid things out...it's just REALLY hard to beat a team when their offense has a guy like Jokic who just doesn't make mistakes in terms of decision making. As long as the Nuggets are able to avoid turnovers and protect the ball, the Wolves are going to either need cold shooting or absolutely perfect defensive execution to win this series. As I laid our before, ANT can drop 40 a game...that won't win them the series. They have to win on defense, that's what got them here, and that's where they have to win. And defense is always a team effort, and with the wolves it's a team effort built around Gobert.
But if their defense can stop Denver either way (I don't expect Denver to continue shooting it like that), won't they need to play better offensively to win this series?
The Nuggets don't have 5 guys who can shoot at all times? Who do they play who isn't a threat to shoot. Why have they benched watson, who is a defender?
Do you think Gobert had a better game than Edwards in game 4 with his positioning and stuff? It's just as outrageous as saying he did in game 1.
The difficulty to evaluating defense is that you can do all the right things and have more or less impact game to game. Game 1 Gobert was central to forcing turnovers which as we know have variance. Jokic could have taken better care of the ball for example, but Goberts length and the non shooter in Gordon not being able to draw more attention lead to Jokic forcing things and sometimes just getting sloppy with the ball. Game 4, Gobert was fine, but the results weren't the same. We see similar things with offensive players where someone like Curry can have a 20 point game but he absolutely just crushed the other team because he kept drawing second defenders and it results in his "other guys" torching a team. Meanwhile...he can do that in another game and the ball doesn't fall. And we'll even see it with Jokic who is no Curry in terms of gravity, but if Murray can't get points off those screens and pick and rolls where Jokic just clears out 2-3 feet of space around him...he made the right play. He crushed...didn't have the impact.
So can we grade/evaluate a guy who creates when his team doesn't capitalize? That's honestly really difficult. I suppose you can create some tools of say value add, assigning value play by play and doing a deep film dive. I'd love to see some work like that done and then we could compare it back against the various RAPM metrics and perhaps we could carve out something. That said...I doubt we can get a team of people to do that for free for us...and I doubt the NBA guys who do that are going to share.
So, we kinda gotta use our eyes and watch where value is coming and accept that when something works exceptionally well, we should just give credit where credit is due.
Oh and I don't think the wolves have the team to beat the Nuggets in a shoot out. I'd be open to being wrong. And if they do...maybe you can replace Gobert if that's the strategy. But again...I don't see it. They have to win on defense. They are going to have to slow the Nuggets getting the ball up court. They are going to have to force turnovers and mistakes. And they'll going to have to find ways to exploit weak shooters.