Post#277 » by chefo » Sat Apr 24, 2021 11:10 pm
I'll try to comment on the last couple of pages of comments:
* On Bobby Portis--I haven't watched him with Bucs, but saw most of his games in a Bulls uniform and several in DC and NYK.
For one, both with the Bulls and in NY, Bobby was mostly a bum-slayer off the bench. I don't mean that in a derogative way. These kind of players have their uses. If I have to choose a back-up, aggressive bench big, I'd actually rather have him for 20 min/ game than Lauri.
However, there are reasons why Bobby could never break low 20 minutes per game as a player no matter who his front court partners were, despite his productivity--and that was, at least with us, he was Drew Gooden-level 'trrble on defense. Bobby had incredibly slow feet on D, poor anticipation, didn't know how to rotate, etc. On a young team where everyone sucks that may not be an issue, but here, he played on a playoff team behind Taj and Niko and his lack of basic ability to play man D OR help D stood out like a sore thumb. He didn't get any better under Freddy-boy. If he got better on D this year, that would actually probably make him a heavier minute rotational player. Given that neither the Knicks or the Bucs gave him such minutes probably means that he's still some variation of barely passable defender. Just an assumption on my part. Bobby' also a very short big (perhaps that long neck of his?) because his standing reach of 8'11 is puny for an NBA big, especially one with very heavy feet. For context, Lauri had a 9'2 standing reach as a 17-18 year old in HS.
Secondly, Bobby was a non-entity on other team's scouting reports, at least with the Bulls. There was an entire season here where he was the designated shooter from the opposing team's D. They straight up left him open all game. Not his fault, he made the best out of it, but the moment somebody actually started to game-plan for him (like the Celts in the playoffs) he crapped the bed 'bigly' because back then he was nowhere near good enough to overcome his limitations. He averaged what? Like 5 points per game, after the C's started paying attention to him post game 1?
Thirdly, Bobby was a good shooter from 3 with us as well--but the D isn't afraid of somebody who'll shoot 2 threes a game and make one of them. They could care less. What scares defenses is somebody who can jack up 7-8 and make 5-6, if you get unlucky that day. That's why guys like Niko and Lauri were face-guarded, while Bobby's dude was chilling in the paint no matter where Bobby was on the court. Shooting percentages don't tell the whole story. To add to that, Bobby may be only an inch or two shorter than Lauri, but Lauri has an incredibly quick trigger and very high release point on his shot, and Bobby doesn't. Hence, he can get it off with a guy closing hard on him or already in his face. Bobby can't even take that shot, which is again, no knock on him--most players can't shoot on top of defenders like Lauri can.
* On Lauri--I've said that before--but IMO, it's a combination of Lauri's (lack of) attitude and the Bulls being dimwits about what to do with him, his entire career here. Funnily enough, Freddy boy had him figured out better than every other coach he's had since. Fred was the only coach who let him play. People have kind of forgotten, but there was a reason for the Dirk comparisons. The last month or two of his rookie season Lauri was balling like I haven't seen him ball ever since. He was handling the ball in the P&R. He was shooting mid-range shots over people and making them. He was popping 3s off the dribble. Dude had a long stretch where he was getting benched the entire 4th because he was playing so well (about 20 ppg in roughly 20 minutes per game, if memory serves me right) that he was single-handedly keeping Bulls in games that we were actively trying to lose.
Then, he came back heavier the next year, but still played well, then he came back even more ripped and supposedly 25 pounds heavier compared to him as a rook under Jimbo last year. If you dig up my posts from back then, it was clear to me that the Bulls wanted him to play C, and supposedly told him (and WCJ) to get heavier, but to me that ruined his physical advantages from his early seasons--that he was a quick, fast and athletic 7 footer. Lauri needs to play at 225-228 pounds, IMO, not at 245 because his body obviously can't handle the added weight without losing athleticism.
As for how he's used--sometimes I wonder if the current generation of coaches are so blinded by analytics that they've forgotten 50 years of accumulated hoops knowledge. Yes, if you're trying to post up a guy your size who's a good defender, that's a crappier shot than most. However, a pin down or low post play against a guy who's half-a-foot shorter is NOT a bad play, unless that guy's name is Rodman or Artest. Yes, a contested long two is a crappy shot. But, an open 17 footer is a shot most pros can make at a very decent clip. You don't take that out of the playbook because overall, mid-range shots are a poor outcome.
I am certain that I can design an offense where Lauri can get you Vuc level of points (say 22 ppg) in the same minutes as Vuc, but on 20% fewer touches than Vuc (60 versus 75). Yeah, it will need to have a bit more structure around it than the complete freedom our guys play with currently, but it's not that effin' hard. There's nobody who can convince me that a bunch of grown men who are pros are not bright enough to remember how to execute two/three options on a dozen plays. Just can't buy that. If that's actually the case, it means that the players on the team are functional hoop idiots and you need to ship them out of town on the first flight out.
Some fellow posters think I'm asking the coaching staff to bend the space-time continuum or something. What I'm asking is for people to simply play smart ball, not blindly follow "the system". What I've described is how smart teams used to play when I was growing up and learning to play hoops and how smart teams play now. If you have a big mismatch, you go at it until the other team proves they can stop it. We don't do that and haven't done that in eons. That's what Nick Nurse was referring to with his Lauri comments--they had nobody they could put on him that could stop him and he killed them in his limited minutes. In the Thibs contention years, I remember Pop went at Boozer something like a dozen straight times one game, despite the Spurs running a beautiful motion system otherwise. They scored on most of them. We do not even try to go at the weak link most games.
For Lauri, that means not just chilling in the corner, even though that's what his spot in the system is. It means cutting every time he's guarded by a 6'7 guy, all freakin' game. He shoots 75% at the rim and is actually pretty decent this year at pinning players down. Yeah, nobody outside of Theis knows how to throw a pin-down pass, and Lauri definitely needs to work on not bringing the ball down, but when you can't punish a team for putting a small on Lauri when he's that good near the hoop is a team issue, not a Lauri-alone issue.
If Lauri had Bobby's maniacal drive to jack up a shot every time he touches the ball, and not to give a shyte about offensive schemes and such, Lauri would probably have been an all-star a time or two. As I've noted, Lauri's problem has been and currently is between the ears, and that's what the staff should have focused on solving, both for him and for his teammates, instead of telling him to look like Ivan Drago. Lauri obviously didn't know HOW to play coming here. He's incredibly talented for a 7 footer, and he's made strides on both sides this year, but he still doesn't know how to play and when to dial up his aggression.
If somebody can teach him, they'll get themselves an all-star quality player for what is shaping up to be under $20M per. It's an effin' shame it won't happen here because having cheap production allows your team to overpay for good production somewhere else.
