Who on OKC should get credit for their ridiculous defense?

[Godymas]

I know everyone believes Wemby is running away with DPOY, and he is individually, likely the best defender in the NBA.

But, OKC’s defense is so far ahead of anyone in the NBA right now, that it feel’s almost impossible to ignore their place in the DPOY race.

To put things into perspective. OKC has a defensive rating of 104.4 which is 6 points ahead of the Detroit Pistons in 2nd place (how about those Pistons btw).

That’s the same gap as the #2 defense at 110.4 to the 19th defense at 116.4. OKC is running away with one of the greatest modern defenses of all time.

They held Luka to 19 points and 35% FG, a guy who is averaging 33. They held Curry to 11 points and 30% FG, a guy that just went back to back 40+ points vs. Wemby/the Spurs. Deni Avdija, who is breaking out and averaging 26 ppg this year, shot 29% against OKC. All his points came from FTs because they were defending the ever loving **** out of him. Your star player is not safe against this defense. They will shoot season lows against OKC. The scary part is, they are missing their second option and All Defensive player JDub.

[ball_takes23]

Wemby, while accepting his DPOY trophy: “Sam Presti, you the real DPOY.”

[EmpireFalls]

The OKC superpower is that everyone, from the starters down to the 9th man, plays elite defense. Everyone is switchable, a plus wingspan, strong, fundamentally sound, and physical. No one makes mental mistakes. They can basically all stonewall guys 1v1 on an island if needed. They rotate extremely well. They leave no gaps. They can pressure the ball or throw different looks. They really don’t have any defensive weaknesses to pick at whatsoever. There’s no unfavorable switches, there’s no lapses in transition, there’s always a hand in a passing or driving lane, there’s always rim protection, there’s always a body.

To score against OKC you have to batter them with size and on the boards AND shoot the lights out (usually with an unfavorable shooter, too)

That’s what a great defense is. It reminds me of the Spurs of the 00s or the 90s Bulls. Sure, they had a great individual player, but what really made the em elite was the totality. If it wasn’t Harper picking up the ball, it was Pippen, it was Jordan, it was Dennis. That’s how playing OKC feels. It’s Wallace demonically guarding your PG, it’s Caruso flying in, it’s JDub switching 1-4, it’s Dort stonewalling any post entries, it’s Chet contesting a 3 then somehow teleporting to protect the rim, Hartenstein grabs the rebound. SGA is probably their “weakest” defender and even he is no slouch whatsoever, witj great hands and more athleticism than basically anyone he matches up against.

[Wingy]

Primarily the players, and Sam Presti for assembling them.

[Triple M]

I think i saw on hoops tonight that thry practically have no drop off on defense when subbing out elite defenders. They can trully go down as one of the greatest teams

[Wolveswin]

I think i saw on hoops tonight that thry practically have no drop off on defense when subbing out elite defenders. They can trully go down as one of the greatest teams

Crazy thing, SGA Supermax doesn’t kick into 27/28 season. Presti may have some tough decisions - but not until then. And before that, I think Presti has another consolidation trade in him. An upgrade to a roster already super talented and super deep.

[bbms]

first mark d and presti. out of the players, that's crazy but i think even if sga is like the 6th-8th best defender on the team, id say sga is the one to give most credit.

the dude delivers 45+ pts/100 on offense and work his ass off contesting everything that goes to the weakside - and the extra pass if needed.

hard to be a role player and not give 120% when your superstar offensive workhorse carries himself that way

sure when chet plays 30+ minutes he looks like thunders's defensive mvp. when caruso and cason checks they're going to wreck games with their defensive playmaking. sure dort is one of the most dominant point of attack defenders. sure jdub is the most versatile defender in the nba. sure hartenstein is an extremely high level defender.

but imo when the defense is so reliant on help defense, swarming and everyone comitting to their small tasks with solidarity, when a guy is supposed to be the weakest link and most preserved legs just does it with the hunger sga does it, i have to give him the biggest credit.

i have a similar respect for ant and tatum in that regard.

[Castle Black]

I know everyone believes Wemby is running away with DPOY, and he is individually, likely the best defender in the NBA.

Correct. Spurs have the 2nd ranked Defense with Wemby on the floor. They drop to the 27th-ranked Defense when he sits. He's very easily the best, most impactful defender in the NBA and it's not really close tbh. Teams rarely even shoot in the paint when he's on the floor. He single-handedly changes the entire complexity of the game. Steve Kerr spoke about this after last night's game as well.

With that said, OKC's team defense is just ridiculous. Everyone on that roster can defend. They have great positional size. They all have length. They're all switchable defenders. They're so deep. There's really nothing you can do against them but hope the officials have a light whistle that day so they don't play so aggressively. So while Chet is probably their best individual defender, I don't think one player should get credit. It's their entire team defense that deserves the credit.

[Anderson Hunt]

Having role-players in your rotation like Wallace, Dort, and Caruso is a major, major flex.

A team would be lucky to have one of those guys.

[Blame Rasho]

Having role-players in your rotation like Wallace, Dort, and Caruso is a major, major flex.

A team would be lucky to have one of those guys.

In all honestly, you get a guy like Bruce Bowen at his apex defensively, I don’t think he cracks the rotation with the Thunder with how the game is played now.

[Doctor MJ]

Maybe it missed it, but looking through the posts so far, I see no mentions of coach Daigneault, who maybe the most innovative coach in the game right now.

This not to take anything away from Presti or the players - the proof of the great success of each reinforces each other.

I do think that focusing on Presti’s journey as GM is probably the best starting point at least for me to elaborate more on the prior statement.

Obviously, Presti’s career has been a rocket ship of successes beginning with his rapid rise up the ranks with Pop’s Spurs. Some guys stumble when they leave the mothership, but even having the ability to rise up the ranks within the best run front office in the first place marks you as pretty damn impressive.

Then he goes to OKC where in his first 3 drafts he build the Durant/Westbrook/Ibaka/Harden team - a run of drafting success unheard of - establishing him firmly as the wonder boy of NBA front offices.

But of course, then it goes sideways. It starts with a horrible decision to let Harden go, and then from there things slowly curdle. The team remains great so long as they have their chosen Big, but the vibe is frustrated.

Thus eventually leads to a coaching replacement, from Brooks to Donovan, which is noteworthy for how little it achieved despite Donovan being a pretty clear upgrade in both ethos and logos.

I’d say the immediate lesson there is that oftentimes veteran stars get to a point where they just don’t listen to these “bosses” who get paid far less than they do.

But I’d say that from a perspective of a GM’s ability to hire the right coach, the best you could say about the Donovan hire is that it involved the GM at least trying to someone with guaranteed baseline confidence - which isn’t the highest of bars.

The development of Daigneault within the OKC organization to eventually become coach, by contrast, impressed the hell out of me.

Here you have Presti actually successfully finding a cutting edge coach mind, giving him experience, and seeming to know extremely well what that coach is going to want from future players when his front office team scouts the draft (and low profile free agents).

This then to say: Daigneault becoming as good of a coach as he is under Presti’s patronage is one of the impressive things Presti has in his big bag o’ wins.

I’ll close by just pointing out: This works so long as the players players have the collective cardio to power it and remain bought in.

I feel like the nature of Shai is going to allow some long-term Robinson-in-SA like structure for good listen-to-your coach culture and that’s a big deal, but the style of the team as a whole feels like it’s not a realistic strategy for cores in their 30s.

So between that and the lead aprons of the new CBA, we’ll have to see how much of an extended dynasty can really flourish here, but man, for right now, the whole org is just top notch and that wouldn’t be so if they didn’t have a competitive advantage at coach too.

[sashaturiaf]

How overrated is "j-dub" then

They don't need him whatsoever. Any random wing will do in that system and also when the refs let you get away with murder

[Bloodbather]

How overrated is "j-dub" then

They don't need him whatsoever. Any random wing will do in that system and also when the refs let you get away with murder

J-Dub carried their defense as an undersized 5 when IHart and Chet were out last season. He's a special defender in his own right, they're just so loaded defensively that they don't miss a beat when just one or two guys are missing.

[Bloodbather]

I said before last season began that we're potentially looking at the greatest defensive team of all time and picked them to win the title.

One thing some miss about their previous season, IHart and Chet missed quite a bit of time. They won 68 in spite of that. It's a special, special group on the defensive end.

[NoDopeOnSundays]

Presti.


All the perimeter players share the same thing in common, they can guard up in position. Dort, Caruso, Jalen, SGA, they call guard their own positions while Jalen, Dort and Caruso can guard some bigs, SGA can guard 1-3 and switch onto the smaller 4s.

[Mk0]

I know everyone believes Wemby is running away with DPOY, and he is individually, likely the best defender in the NBA.

Correct. Spurs have the 2nd ranked Defense with Wemby on the floor. They drop to the 27th-ranked Defense when he sits. He's very easily the best, most impactful defender in the NBA and it's not really close tbh. Teams rarely even shoot in the paint when he's on the floor. He single-handedly changes the entire complexity of the game. Steve Kerr spoke about this after last night's game as well.

With that said, OKC's team defense is just ridiculous. Everyone on that roster can defend. They're all switchable. They're so deep. There's really nothing you can do against them except hope the officials have a light whistle that day so they don't play so aggressively. So while Chet is their best individual defender, I don't think one player should get credit. It's their entire team defense that deserves the credit.

Not to sidetrack, but Awful Coaching on youtube has a great video about how absolute dogsh#t the Spurs defense is outside of Wemby. It is really telling. It is a great breakdown, you just have to listen to someone literally screaming at the top of their lungs the whole time.

And agreed on OKC's defense. There isn't a single defender to point to, it is literally all of them. Alex Caruso went from carrying the Bulls defense on his back (literally at times) and he a luxury at times (during the regular season, he was crucial in the playoffs)

[sashaturiaf]

Presti.


All the perimeter players share the same thing in common, they can guard up in position. Dort, Caruso, Jalen, SGA, they call guard their own positions while Jalen, Dort and Caruso can guard some bigs, SGA can guard 1-3 and switch onto the smaller 4s.

The refs play an equal parts in this.

Caruso, Dort get away with murder. Id say only Draymond gets more leeway

[tmorgan]

Presti.


All the perimeter players share the same thing in common, they can guard up in position. Dort, Caruso, Jalen, SGA, they call guard their own positions while Jalen, Dort and Caruso can guard some bigs, SGA can guard 1-3 and switch onto the smaller 4s.

The refs play an equal parts in this.

Caruso, Dort get away with murder. Id say only Draymond gets more leeway

The whole “earn your play style” thing has been around the league forever, though. It’s one of the reasons young teams rarely win — and although OKC did indeed win, it was their more established players that were allowed to play rougher.

I say this as a fan of Detroit, another young team that is just starting to get the benefit of the refs allowing their physical style. Lo and behold, we’re good now.

Watch what happens when Ausar (and Amen, for that matter) start getting more leeway. It’s gonna be scary.

[EmpireFalls]

How overrated is "j-dub" then

They don't need him whatsoever. Any random wing will do in that system and also when the refs let you get away with murder

I don’t think he’s overrated just because the team around him is still good. He takes them from being an elite team to a title winner - no way they beat Indy without that 40 ball in game 5 and he provides elite wing defense every minute.

It’s somewhat normal for these dynasty stacked 66 win teams to withstand missing a key guy. The Heatles won a playoff series without Bosh, the KD Thunder could still be the 2 seed without Russ in 2014, the Warriors won multiple playoff series without Curry in their prime etc.

JDub is a great player who raises their ceiling.

[whitehops]

all of them?