Gerald Wallace: Who put the lid on his basket?

[76ciology]

Heading to the 2009-2010 season, this guy was averaging 18ppg 8rpg with 48% from the field. And this season, even before the arrival of Sjax where has a lot of opportunity to score the ball, he's struggling to get his average PPG. He's obviously struggling on the offensive end, and were not talking about shooting from a long range, but even lay-ups.

What's with Gerald Wallace? Do you think he can bounce back?

[BigSlam]

I'd love to see him post up a lot more and use his quick spins/explosiveness to get to the rim.

He's a soild FT shooter now too so the more he gets fouled, the better.

Less J's, more post up iso's.

[ohara]

I'd love to see him post up a lot more and use his quick spins/explosiveness to get to the rim.

He's a soild FT shooter now too so the more he gets fouled, the better.

Less J's, more post up iso's.

Agreed 100%! Now, if he'll just do it.

[BobCatsFoLife]

His shooting has gotten worse for the past 3 years. It is hard to notice because he plays so hard. Back in 07-08 when he pulled up for a 3 pointer I was confident that he would actually make it, but now I have no faith in his 15 footer. Along the line somewhere I believe someone told him to stop working on his jumpshot and just focus on slashing and attacking the basket. He has become one dimensional. No one has to play his jumpshot, which in turn makes his drives to the basket alot tougher.

[e4Nf6]

Crash is an infamous slow starter. He also tends to be hot or cold scoring wise. Because of the rather one-sided nature of his offensive game there are certain match-ups/games where he can drop 35 and certain ones where he will struggle to break double digits.

[misterglover]

I think you guys summed it up but I would like to add that I also think this year more than others he was actually put in a position where he was the "star" of the team. At the beginning of last year he had JRich who was supposed to be the leading scorer & Okafor who while unspectacular could ocassionally post up and get inside baskets, as well as open up the lane for Gerald to cut/slash and get some easy baskets, dunks, lobs... going into this year there he was the guy that was supposed to lead us in scoring & Chandler has absolutely no post game at all except dunking and he's not even doing that on a consistent basis right now. Gerald isnt supposed to be a #1 option he's a great role player, this year he has the ball in his hands on offense waaay too much, if your running plays for him on a regular basis & expecting him to create for himself or others he's not being used right....

[The Bird]

I'd love to see him post up a lot more and use his quick spins/explosiveness to get to the rim.

He's a soild FT shooter now too so the more he gets fouled, the better.

Less J's, more post up iso's.

Agreed 100%! Now, if he'll just do it.

Or if Larry Brown would just do it. I've brought this up several times before, most of my very few posts are about this, why do we not post him up more? He has always been our most efficent low post scorer (well either him or Okafor, I even tried to find out who was better with help from some on here and it was about even they both were efficent low post scorers) Granted I'm sure Diaw is also efficent not going to spend time looking that up but wouldn't it make sense that since Diaw is a fairly decent perimeter scorer and GW is not that on offense GW should occupy the tradional PF position and Diaw the SF? It has nothing to do with his concusions or injuries none of which happened because he was posting, he doesn't have to defend the PF position on D just post up on offense. I just don't get it.

[fatlever]

what is it about LBs offense that seemingly doesnt have a lot of post plays? is that all on ray? or is that a design of LBs offense?

we didnt post okafor up much, but last year under LB he almost never got a post up attempt. diaw and wallace rarely get post ups either. it seems the entire offense is drive and kick, screen and roll or shot clock violation. i'd love to see the ball go inside more.

maybe is a funtion of our poor outside shooting. defenses can sag into the paint since we cant shoot.

[Paydro70]

Well, the Pistons were never really a post-up team, since Ben Wallace couldn't do it and Sheed spent most of his time ranging around... they really were just astonishing jump-shooters (esp. Billups and Rip).

Wallace is in a slump, I'm honestly not that concerned. His shooting will come up, it just might not make it all the way to 48% like last year.

BTW Wallace isn't a particularly slow starter in terms of shooting the ball. In 05-06 and 07-08, his shooting in November was better than the season overall, in 06-07 and 08-09 it was worse. It's just randomness less than a quarter of the way through the season.

[e4Nf6]

what is it about LBs offense that seemingly doesnt have a lot of post plays? is that all on ray? or is that a design of LBs offense?

This is something I've been meaning to make a thread about for a while and have never done.....

I suppose you would call LB's offense a "motion" offense, i.e. Lots of ball movement around the perimeter, lots of PnR, (and screens in general) everybody touches the ball, very PG centric, etc. I don't think this suites our team at all.

Motion offenses are infamous for not getting the ball to players in the post. You have to be a bit patient to work the ball into the post in the NBA, and if you are whipping the ball around the perimeter at 90mph (or running a PnR) there is no time for that.

Philosophically I just don't believe in this kind of thing at all, and DEFINITELY not for us. Jax, Diaw, Wallace, and Flip are our best players with the ball in their hands and we should put the ball in their hands as much as possible. Guys like Chandler and Felton are not as dangerous with the ball in their hands and thus shouldn't get as many touches. IMO, If you run a "motion" style offense in the NBA with the way defenses react, you're going to get a lot of somewhat-open jump shots for your worst shooter, (Crash or Ray in our case) which isn't going to cut it.

If you made me coach of the Bobcats tomorrow, I would cut Rays offensive workload by about 80%, his job would be to bring the ball up the court, give it to Jax/Wallace/Diaw and shoot jumpers when he is wide open, that's it. I don't see what he has done to deserve the amount of time he has the ball in his hands and the number of shots he takes EVERY game.

[BigSlam]

Everything that you just posted e4Nf6 points to why LB had such a hard on for Doc Hibbert.

Seeing Doc in that Princeton type offense that G.Town was running probably made the old man drool.

Guys like Doc, Brad Miller and Duncan etc would probably excell under LB.

[DeeJay]

Well he stepped up against Toronto. 31 points and 13 rebounds.

[tsherkin]

Yeah, well, Toronto didn't exactly back off of him and dare him to shoot Js, now did we? Effing Raptors.