3/29 - POSTGAME | Oklahoma City Thunder (99) - (103) San Antonio Spurs

[Pillendreher]

and gets roasted by davis bertans

I don't know what game you were watching. Bertans made one shot in the 4th quarter. Per stats.nba.com, Melo guarded him for two possessions and that's when he made that one 3. That's it.

The Melo criticism this season is justified, but this game did not get lost by playing him. They had a +14 NetRtG with him on the floor in those 32 minutes. The problem was that they got owned when the starters were on the bench (-84 NetRtG with Russ on the bench in the 1st half, -83 NetRtG with Adams on the bench in the 2nd half). But if you're trotting out 3 guard lineups with two undersized bigmen vs the Spurs, who are playing big, you're asking for it.

[Reign23]

I don't know why melo don't get minutes and touches with the bench squad.. and bd finally has to shorten his rotation.

[Pillendreher]

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[M2J]

Steve Jones seems all over the place. I think for the most part Melo has done a solid job switching all season. He uses his length well vs jumpshooters and moves his feet and forces higher releases on jumpshots by actually attacking the shooting hand. The worst pick and roll switching activity I can recall was the last Houston game where he was against Harden (tough for anybody), and he actually did what he was supposed to do, and crowd Harden's left so he couldn't get a shot of and forced him right (his off hand) into where Adams should've been. Adams refused to be there and Melo got flack for screaming at him.

I HATE THE SWITCHES, especially as a default. I find that teams expect them and there's plenty of time to just get back to your man or at least make them do it again burning another chunk of time off of the shot clock. Primarily because the issue isn't so much Melo/Adams/Grant defending the perimeter (even though Adams could do better at getting out to the jumpshots), but the issue has come when the shot goes up and it's time to rebound or they decide to feed the big man inside and the guards get caught underneath, it's just leading to a foul or another possession for them near the rim.