Quickly coming to conclusion that Thibs system absolutely needs an elite rim protector to be successful

[KnixinSix]

If you guys remember last year post OG and with either I-Hart or Mitch as our starting 5, our defense was absolutely dominant. We were like 20-5 or something like that.

We have watched this team under Thibodeau for like 4 years now. Its pretty clear (unless Thibs can totally rely on a system outside his wheelhouse and learn to successfully coach it) that his defense needs two things to be really successful and there is no in between. When don’t have enough wing defenders the defense is horrible and when we don’t have an elite rim protector the D also suffers greatly. Last year we hovered around .500 all the way until we got another wing defender to pair with the elite rim protector.

Rose has been very focused on getting Thibs very specific types of players for his system.

Case in point is who we have went after the most in FA. Bridges (who probably hasn't settled in yet) is supposed to be a wing defensive stud and we gave up 5 picks for him. OG we gave up two starters for. Hart we gave up a player and a 1st rd pick for. We also really wanted IHart back. Finally we (which is being proven wrong) believed we could make Towns a better rim protector. He has turned out to be absolutely awesome providing everything BUT the elite rim protection.

Its not that we have to exclusively play one type of style but it is evident at minimum he needs to be able to utilize that defensive system centered around that elite rim protector during stretches of the game.


So in my mind the question we need to ask is:
Do we wait until Mitch comes back or do we feel Precious will provide enough of that rim protecting ability at the 5 vs. a very low BBIQ Sims?

If not do we make a trade soon or do we need to wait for the 6 month trade moratorium before including someone in that trade?

[DaGawd]

i’m quickly realizing the nets fleeced us

[KnixinSix]

i’m quickly realizing the nets fleeced us

Bridges has way too long a track record both offensively and defensively to be some bust. It is obvious this is an acclimation period for him.

Even Brunson doesn't look like Brunson right now.

[NoDopeOnSundays]

The Thunder just won their last two games with 6'6" Jalen Williams at center, and quite literally without a healthy center on the roster. They switch, help and recover, they don't play drop or prioritize protecting the paint at all costs because 2s don't kill you, threes do.


We need a coach that understands player strengths and weaknesses and puts the players in a position to succeed. Instead, we have a dogmatic caveman coach that coaches 1 way only. This team would be better defensively right now if we just switched, it's literally right there, how many times does KAT need to get caught on a switch and defend it well, he's done it every game when it happens because he spent 2 seasons playing PF.

We need a new coach. This has run its course, look at the difference a coach can make, the Cavs look like a different team right now.

[DaGawd]

i’m quickly realizing the nets fleeced us

Bridges has way too long a track record both offensively and defensively to be some bust. It is obvious this is an acclimation period for him.

Even Brunson doesn't look like Brunson right now.

he hasn’t played defense since his suns days and he’s a few years removed from that now. he got too comfortable only playing offense and he’s not going back

[KnixinSix]

The Thunder just won their last two games with 6'6" Jalen Williams at center, and quite literally without a healthy center on the roster. They switch, help and recover, they don't play drop or prioritize protecting the paint at all costs because 2s don't kill you, threes do.


We need a coach that understands player strengths and weaknesses and puts the players in a position to succeed. Instead, we have a dogmatic caveman coach that coaches 1 way only. This team would be better defensively right now if we just switched, it's literally right there, how many times does KAT need to get caught on a switch and defend it well, he's done it every game when it happens because he spent 2 seasons playing PF.

We need a new coach. This has run its course, look at the difference a coach can make, the Cavs look like a different team right now.

This is the conundrum. Do you stick with Thibs knowing you need to run a very specific system (at least part of the time)? Because we do know for a fact his system is dominant when it has the right personnel. Or do you move on to a coach who can potentially succeed without the rim protecting Center and then obviously the unknown of whether you picked a good enough coach or not?

[3toheadmelo]

Me and sham said it for a while now

[NoDopeOnSundays]

The Thunder just won their last two games with 6'6" Jalen Williams at center, and quite literally without a healthy center on the roster. They switch, help and recover, they don't play drop or prioritize protecting the paint at all costs because 2s don't kill you, threes do.


We need a coach that understands player strengths and weaknesses and puts the players in a position to succeed. Instead, we have a dogmatic caveman coach that coaches 1 way only. This team would be better defensively right now if we just switched, it's literally right there, how many times does KAT need to get caught on a switch and defend it well, he's done it every game when it happens because he spent 2 seasons playing PF.

We need a new coach. This has run its course, look at the difference a coach can make, the Cavs look like a different team right now.

This is the conundrum. Do you stick with Thibs knowing you need to run a very specific system (at least part of the time)? Because we do know for a fact his system is dominant when it has the right personnel. Or do you move on to a coach who can potentially succeed without the rim protecting Center and then obviously the unknown of whether you picked a good enough coach or not?

KAT next to a center won't work against the Celtics, like stressing rim protection against a team that takes 50 threes is pointless. The fact we came out and played in a drop against them tells me Tom isn't the man for the job anyway.

I want a coach that will adjust to who were playing, if we had a younger more progressive coach we would have put KAT on Giddey and OG on Vucevic, and had KAT help off Giddey. If you're going to lose the game because Giddey is hitting threes and scoring 20+ so be it, but last night he was a non threat and they guarded him in a way that let the Bulls off the hook. You guard him with your C like teams have done to us with their big on Josh. If the game calls for playing two bigs then do it, but we have a coach that does boiler plate coaching, one size fits all. And that won't work in the end because you need to adjust, especially with how varied teams go about getting their offense now. Yes everyone takes threes but they all do it differently.

[KnixinSix]

Me and sham said it for a while now

Well we also know KAT can play the 4 if need be and the Timberwolves had a pretty defensively dominant team last year with Goebert at the 5 and KAT at the 4 for stretches of the game.

So a team with KAT can work. And either you need a better coach to make it work or you need to run him more often (not necessarily exclusively though) at the 4 with Mitch (or a decent to elite rim protector) at the 5.

KAT has been phenomenal and he is NOT the reason why we are losing.

I really wonder how different this team would have looked had we actually had Mitch to start the season (or if to a lesser extent Precious).

[NoDopeOnSundays]

Me and sham said it for a while now

There's a rim protector on the team, he's hurt, like always. And a poster leaving because his favorite player is hurt and he can't criticize the team is the funniest thing ever.

sham went out in a comical way.

[KnixinSix]

The Thunder just won their last two games with 6'6" Jalen Williams at center, and quite literally without a healthy center on the roster. They switch, help and recover, they don't play drop or prioritize protecting the paint at all costs because 2s don't kill you, threes do.


We need a coach that understands player strengths and weaknesses and puts the players in a position to succeed. Instead, we have a dogmatic caveman coach that coaches 1 way only. This team would be better defensively right now if we just switched, it's literally right there, how many times does KAT need to get caught on a switch and defend it well, he's done it every game when it happens because he spent 2 seasons playing PF.

We need a new coach. This has run its course, look at the difference a coach can make, the Cavs look like a different team right now.

This is the conundrum. Do you stick with Thibs knowing you need to run a very specific system (at least part of the time)? Because we do know for a fact his system is dominant when it has the right personnel. Or do you move on to a coach who can potentially succeed without the rim protecting Center and then obviously the unknown of whether you picked a good enough coach or not?

KAT next to a center won't work against the Celtics, like stressing rim protection against a team that takes 50 threes is pointless. The fact we came out and played in a drop against them tells me Tom isn't the man for the job anyway.

I want a coach that will adjust to who were playing, if we had a younger more progressive coach we would have put KAT on Giddey and OG on Vucevic, and had KAT help off Giddey. If you're going to lose the game because Giddey is hitting threes and scoring 20+ so be it, but last night he was a non threat and they guarded him in a way that let the Bulls off the hook. You guard him with your C like teams have done to us with their big on Josh. If the game calls for playing two bigs then do it, but we have a coach that does boiler plate coaching, one size fits all. And that won't work in the end because you need to adjust, especially with how varied teams go about getting their offense now. Yes everyone takes threes but they all do it differently.

I'm not even saying you are wrong here. But for better or worse if Rose and company are tied to Thibs they will probably wait to see what this team looks like when it has a true 5.

Beating the Celtics will feature a mix of playing a rim protector and then KAT some time at the 4. In fact last year when we still had some health and OG and that rim protector, we destroyed the Celts on their home court.

[DOT]

Me and sham said it for a while now

There's a rim protector on the team, he's hurt, like always. And a poster leaving because his favorite player is hurt and he can't criticize the team is the funniest thing ever.

sham went out in a comical way.

Didn't he do this before, like he made this whole huge deal about he was leaving, then came back a couple months later expecting people to celebrate, only for nobody to really care?

[NoDopeOnSundays]

Me and sham said it for a while now

Well we also know KAT can play the 4 if need be and the Timberwolves had a pretty defensively dominant team last year with Goebert at the 5 and KAT at the 4 for stretches of the game.

So a team with KAT can work. And either you need a better coach to make it work or you need to run him more often (not necessarily exclusively though) at the 4 with Mitch (or a decent to elite rim protector) at the 5.

KAT has been phenomenal and he is NOT the reason why we are losing.

I really wonder how different this team would have looked had we actually had Mitch to start the season (or if to a lesser extent Precious).

The issue with KAT at the 4 is that is all he'll be, there won't be adjustments to teams that he can work against at C, just like we don't ever put out C on the opposing teams worst shooter which is what Mazzulla, Ime, Daigneault, Atkinson etc do. With the rim protection out right now would be the perfect time to experiment with switching more, hedging and recovering to see if it works and be something we have in the bag and can go to. Instead, we get the same old defensive scheme.

We all know what it'll be, and the offense will take a step back by putting another big on the floor.

[Gravy]

KFS podcast said Minny tried to make KAT the center for years and it did not work thats why they had to bring in Gobert.

[robillionaire]

it would be nice if we had the ability to play two big lineups or even just spell him for someone who isn’t Jericho sims. Out depth is destroyed. Both our reserves are injured. They found this guy Matt Ryan in the Best Buy geek squad and asked him to play basketball that’s how bad it is

[NoDopeOnSundays]

This is the conundrum. Do you stick with Thibs knowing you need to run a very specific system (at least part of the time)? Because we do know for a fact his system is dominant when it has the right personnel. Or do you move on to a coach who can potentially succeed without the rim protecting Center and then obviously the unknown of whether you picked a good enough coach or not?

KAT next to a center won't work against the Celtics, like stressing rim protection against a team that takes 50 threes is pointless. The fact we came out and played in a drop against them tells me Tom isn't the man for the job anyway.

I want a coach that will adjust to who were playing, if we had a younger more progressive coach we would have put KAT on Giddey and OG on Vucevic, and had KAT help off Giddey. If you're going to lose the game because Giddey is hitting threes and scoring 20+ so be it, but last night he was a non threat and they guarded him in a way that let the Bulls off the hook. You guard him with your C like teams have done to us with their big on Josh. If the game calls for playing two bigs then do it, but we have a coach that does boiler plate coaching, one size fits all. And that won't work in the end because you need to adjust, especially with how varied teams go about getting their offense now. Yes everyone takes threes but they all do it differently.

I'm not even saying you are wrong here. But for better or worse if Rose and company are tied to Thibs they will probably wait to see what this team looks like when it has a true 5.

Beating the Celtics will feature a mix of playing a rim protector and then KAT some time at the 4. In fact last year when we still had some health and OG and that rim protector, we destroyed the Celts on their home court.

The Celtics were 4-1 against us last year, they beat the brakes off a team with big rim runners in the finals and made their rim protection utterly useless with two all time shot creators.

Jrue will guard KAT, Kristaps on Mitch or Precious, Tatum will catch the rollman if they don't switch with White on Brunson. While Kristaps was out Tatum was guarding centers, because they can't do anything with the ball, he made life hell for Lively and Gafford. It wouldn't be any different for our guys.

[NoDopeOnSundays]

Me and sham said it for a while now

There's a rim protector on the team, he's hurt, like always. And a poster leaving because his favorite player is hurt and he can't criticize the team is the funniest thing ever.

sham went out in a comical way.

Didn't he do this before, like he made this whole huge deal about he was leaving, then came back a couple months later expecting people to celebrate, only for nobody to really care?

When we didn't get Donovan he took off only to come back, this is funnier though. The comedic value of leaving because you're mad that they play KAT at C and want to whine about it but cant because your guy being hurt is the reason he's playing C is, it's poetic.

[3toheadmelo]

Me and sham said it for a while now

There's a rim protector on the team, he's hurt, like always. And a poster leaving because his favorite player is hurt and he can't criticize the team is the funniest thing ever.

sham went out in a comical way.

Sham said recently he has personal stuff going on. I don’t think he left cause of Mitch

[NoDopeOnSundays]

it would be nice if we had the ability to play two big lineups or even just spell him for someone who isn’t Jericho sims. Out depth is destroyed. Both our reserves are injured. They found this guy Matt Ryan in the Best Buy geek squad and asked him to play basketball that’s how bad it is

It's a good option to have, but I still don't think Tom is creative enough to make use of it. Like if we had two bigs, Towns would have been on Williams yesterday, when he should be on the worst shooter . We pretty much never did weird defensive matchups when we had Randle, it won't change with KAT.

I agree with playing 2 bigs against certain teams, but doing it right out the against everyone is just as stupid as only playing KAT at the 5 and not switching.

[KnixinSix]

Me and sham said it for a while now

Well we also know KAT can play the 4 if need be and the Timberwolves had a pretty defensively dominant team last year with Goebert at the 5 and KAT at the 4 for stretches of the game.

So a team with KAT can work. And either you need a better coach to make it work or you need to run him more often (not necessarily exclusively though) at the 4 with Mitch (or a decent to elite rim protector) at the 5.

KAT has been phenomenal and he is NOT the reason why we are losing.

I really wonder how different this team would have looked had we actually had Mitch to start the season (or if to a lesser extent Precious).

The issue with KAT at the 4 is that is all he'll be, there won't be adjustments to teams that he can work against at C, just like we don't ever put out C on the opposing teams worst shooter which is what Mazzulla, Ime, Daigneault, Atkinson etc do. With the rim protection out right now would be the perfect time to experiment with switching more, hedging and recovering to see if it works and be something we have in the bag and can go to. Instead, we get the same old defensive scheme.

We all know what it'll be, and the offense will take a step back by putting another big on the floor.

It is entirely possible you are correct but I do think there is a chance it can work as well. Last year's team was pretty darn dominant before the injuries ravaged us. We beat pretty much every top team in the league Post-OG. That is a fact.

We also have a rather large sample size that Thib's teams when they have all the personnel to run that system are damn good.

We all are not happy with our 5-6 start but I can also acknowledge that we have a strong sample size for Thibs system working as well with the right pieces.

Ultimately I think once we have a legit rim protector playing for us (either on our roster or via a trade) you will see :

That rim Protector at the 5 defensively for 20-30 minutes a game. KAT at the 4 15-20 minutes a game and then KAT at the 5 15-20 minutes a game.

You mix it up depending on the matchup and ebb and flow of that particular game.