Nick K wrote:LesGrossman wrote:thinktank wrote:
You continue to prove the point that people ignore defense.
No team can keep making shots an entire game.
When the well goes dry you have to defend your way back into the game.
The defense is EXACTLY the solution that creates easy offense during these tough to score times.
Do you get it?
You're absolutely right. We need to learn to get stops at crucial times. Maybe we arent the best defensive team throughout 48 minutes but at least when we see the offense struggles (which will always happen at some point as long as we rely on hero ball) we need to manage it, need to stop the bleeding by really tightening up the defense.
But with guys like Lavine it just does not happen, its very harden like. People talk about him as MVP for years now and yet he plays zero defense, making Steve Nash look like the ultimate stopper, and now this value system floods into young players' minds. Ah, so you CAN be the best in the league without playing defense!
You have to start paying more attention to Zach on defense. You are giving him a bad rap. Zach is inconsistant. That's the big problem. Sometimes he plays lousy D but other times he plays very good defense. He had several good moments in the 4th qtr last night alone. There is not one guy on the team that can't be faulted for bad D. Towns might be the worst.
Listen, last game Jared Dudley blew by him without any visible effort by ZL to get back in front of one of the most flat footed playeres in the league. This game, it was Kyle Korver. I mean, with all due respect to Kyle, but someone with the athleticism of ZL must be able to at least make two, three slides before getting beaten by someone like Korver, 1 on 1 without any screening action. Just stood there. Thats not inconsistent, its zero. What he does is jump at shooters at once in ten tries he will score a block and guys will cheer about his defense when it isnt a good play at all (jumping means you cant box out and will potentially foul, also if it was a fake you open the door for a drive). I also disagree with the notion that noone cant be faulted on defense; of course in this game where the offensive player has the advantage you cant stop guys all the time, even with perfect defense. What we can expect though is understanding of the team defensive concept, good technique (like, sliding, stay below offensive guys' center of gravity, know when to play straight up / ice / hedge and so on), and most of all, TRY HARD. Its actually quite easy to spot: if a guy pretends to play defense - no matter wether ball deny or help - with straight legs you can tell he isnt trying, but rather conserving energy for the other end. I think we can safely say that both Ricky and Andrew give a very good effort on D, and in my opinion Bjelica is also an underrated defender. He isnt very quick but his intelligence helps him to stay in front of even quick small guards because he anticipates their moves well and doesnt go for fakes. I agree that Towns is also very bad on D and so is Dieng.
