pepe1991 wrote:I saw in comments that somebody said that Vučević played well ? Did we even watched same game? Even if we ignore his usal pathetic pick& roll defense ,he got abused by Whiteside, played with zero effort, didn't contest any shots and kept his hands down whenever somebody penetrated inside. Best part of his game last night was fact that Ibaka menaged to look worst.
No ,really guys, if your center just allowed 74 points in paint, how da hell you can say he had good game?
To be fair, Gordon was lost , leaving Babbit wide open all the time, Payton and Evan were horrific, they made Waiters and Winslow look like Wall and Beal. Zero guard defense, and usally bad Vučević .
I don't even know, is Dragić that good at this point, or Vučević and Payton are that bad.
I'm one of Vuc's biggest critics but even I can admit that he did a decent job on defense - decent for his standards. He played the angles well, provided help defense as best he could, but he had no rotation help to cover Whiteside, and he's not athletic enough to cover the point and still get back to his man. That's ideally what Ibaka is supposed to help with, but as I pointed out in the offseason, he can't help us when teams are running stretch 4's because he's out on the perimeter and not close enough to provide help on a big under the basket.
Ibaka had a much worse defensive game than Vuc. Ibaka didn't even try to defend the rim when guards and wings penetrated.
That said, I've wanted Biyombo as our starting C since we acquired him for the very reason of having a legit defensive anchor in the game. But you're being too hard on Vuc in this circumstance.
Payton's defense was good. He stayed in front of his man as best he could, and funnelled them to the big. He can't do much more than that.
Gordon's offense was a bit out of control, but his defense was good. When his man got past him it's because he was rotating to provide help D, and nobody rotated to cover him.
