Better Defensively: Alex Caruso or Jrue Holiday?

[mdonnelly1989]

Who's better defensively?

[Special_Puppy]

On a per possession basis, Caruso. Prime Holiday played more minutes though and has way more offensive responsibilities so that sense his defense was more attractive to teams

[Peregrine01]

What Caruso did at the end of game 6 and parts of game 7 made no sense to me. It felt like the guy was omnipresent, appearing everywhere to make a play. It reminded me of Scottie Pippen. I never felt like Jrue was THAT disruptive.

[iggymcfrack]

Top defensive players this year by xRAPM:

1. Caruso -4.6
2. Wembanyama -4.6
3. Draymond -4.2
4. Herb Jones -3.5
5. AD -3.4

[mattg]

What Caruso did at the end of game 6 and parts of game 7 made no sense to me. It felt like the guy was omnipresent, appearing everywhere to make a play. It reminded me of Scottie Pippen. I never felt like Jrue was THAT disruptive.

Let's just be real, Caruso was allowed to commit probably 200+ fouls in those games without being whistled. If refs are going to allow ANYONE to hack, grab, push, and just foul NONSTOP like they allowed Caruso to do, I'd expect them to grade out as the best defensive player in NBA history bar none. By the rule book Caruso should have been fouled out within 5 mins of game 7, go look when he actually got called for his 1st foul. ABSOLUTE INSANITY based on what he was doing that game. Nothing about what Caruso was doing was rule book good defense, basically all stuff that you could never show or use to teach someone how to play defense because they would just get called for fouls and be taken out of the game.

[AStark1991]

Peak Jrue > Current Caruso. Jrue's defense during the 2018 and 2021 seasons in particular was some of the best I've ever seen from the guard position. Caruso is a great defender as well but isn't quite on that same level in terms of individual defensive impact in my opinion.

[ShotCreator]

Jrue has never been on this level.

Always very good, never great, never dominant.

Caruso dominated the Grizzlies and Nuggets series. People are only looking at the end of the Nuggets series and game 7. He completely destroyed Memphis. Blew up countless possessions and changed the feel of the game every time he checked in.


And the beginning of his Denver series was just as dominant as the end.


Jrue was never as aggressive and relentless as Caruso off-ball.


And on the ball, you could actually beat Jrue at times. His recovery ability was phenomenal though. Very unscreenable.

Guys just can’t even get a shot off on Caruso. He made Murray quit in game 7.

[Ice Man]

Top defensive players this year by xRAPM:

1. Caruso -4.6
2. Wembanyama -4.6
3. Draymond -4.2
4. Herb Jones -3.5
5. AD -3.4

AC had the best DBPM in the league, too. That's an interesting stat in Caruso's case, because it says that he was a good but not great defender in his first 2 years at the Lakers, then was elite in Years 3 through 7, and then got even better this season.

As I side note, as a Bulls fan I can attest that this guy gets away with more fouls than anybody else I can recall. It's the defensive equivalent of the whistles than Trae and Jimmy get.

[JLei]

Caruso is likely the best per minute guard in terms of defensive effectiveness we've seen.

Obviously 2 caveats. He plays 20-25 minutes per game and has little offensive role besides spot up in the corner/ occasionally cut.

He can utilize his energy purely on defense and doesn't have a heavy minutes load compared to someone like Jrue.

That said the things he does is pretty special, however defense is an IQ and energy thing. His IQ is off the charts too but a lot of his effectiveness is he's able to give 100% effort because of his role.

[GSP]

Jrue has never been on this level.

Always very good, never great, never dominant.

Caruso dominated the Grizzlies and Nuggets series. People are only looking at the end of the Nuggets series and game 7. He completely destroyed Memphis. Blew up countless possessions and changed the feel of the game every time he checked in.


And the beginning of his Denver series was just as dominant as the end.


Jrue was never as aggressive and relentless as Caruso off-ball.


And on the ball, you could actually beat Jrue at times. His recovery ability was phenomenal though. Very unscreenable.

Guys just can’t even get a shot off on Caruso. He made Murray quit in game 7.

Are you implying Jrue is more beatable on the ball than Jrue? Caruso has never had on ball lockdown defensive showings that Jrue has had against Dame, Cj, Demar, Lavine and Cp3,Book. He was taking turns completely erasing all of those back courts depending on who he was guarding. Caruso actually played against 2 of those backcourts and wasn't near as effective on ball

Watch on YouTube

[Jaivl]

Are you implying Jrue is more beatable on the ball than Jrue? Caruso has never had on ball lockdown defensive showings that Jrue has had against Dame, Cj, Demar, Lavine and Cp3,Book. He was taking turns completely erasing all of those back courts depending on who he was guarding. Caruso actually played against 2 of those backcourts and wasn't near as effective on ball

Watch on YouTube

Agree Holiday is better on ball, but I honestly had a chuckle here. Said stopping "Dame, Cj, Demar, Lavine, (old) Cp3, Book" on ball like that means something lol.

[ShotCreator]

Jrue has never been on this level.

Always very good, never great, never dominant.

Caruso dominated the Grizzlies and Nuggets series. People are only looking at the end of the Nuggets series and game 7. He completely destroyed Memphis. Blew up countless possessions and changed the feel of the game every time he checked in.


And the beginning of his Denver series was just as dominant as the end.


Jrue was never as aggressive and relentless as Caruso off-ball.


And on the ball, you could actually beat Jrue at times. His recovery ability was phenomenal though. Very unscreenable.

Guys just can’t even get a shot off on Caruso. He made Murray quit in game 7.

Are you implying Jrue is more beatable on the ball than Jrue? Caruso has never had on ball lockdown defensive showings that Jrue has had against Dame, Cj, Demar, Lavine and Cp3,Book. He was taking turns completely erasing all of those back courts depending on who he was guarding. Caruso actually played against 2 of those backcourts and wasn't near as effective on ball

Watch on YouTube

Yes. And I’m actually gauging this by how comfortable of a series a very past prime CP3 had against him. Prime CP3 is getting to his spots with absolutely no issue against Jrue. Where Jrue outplayed CP3 was his own offense where he bullied him a bit.

Demar, Dame, Lavine, and CJ all suck at these levels when we’re talking truly elite play.

Jokic does not. And Caruso took Jokic out of a series.

Caruso on a team where he trusts his back end defense to make up for even the smallest step given with his hyper aggressiveness is different than when he was in LA, where I think he played more into the scheme.

He just completely abandons defensive fundamentals at times in OKC. It’s the defensive equivalent of taking tough shots because you’re that good.

It’s what shocked Jokic and took his courage to take risky passes away in the first few games against him.

Jrue can definitely exploit a lower level offensive player, sometimes to extreme degrees like the 2018 WCR1. But, you can get a step on him and against the best you can’t just rely on recovery.

This even goes for peak Kawhi defensively. He didn’t have the best defensive playoffs in 15 and 16 because of this. Thybulle is another recovery guy who loses some impact against PO offenses.

I wish we could’ve seen Jrue against the healthy 21 Nets because he really didn’t face that elite of competition in his career in the playoffs overall.