Sorry if this is too long.
I was thinking while watching Anthony Davis wreck Slovenia the other day, I've been tempering my expectations for how good I think this team can be on defense. But in terms of defensive talent, there are very few teams who have 3 players who should be as impactful individually as Asik, Holiday, and Davis.
Omer Asik has been an impact defensive player as long as he has been in the league, and the numbers have borne that out. The units he helped to anchor, primarily with Taj Gibson in Chicago, were death to opposing offenses, including a DRTG of 97 in 2010-11, and a ridiculous 92.9 in 11-12 (without him, that dropped to a still-good 100.6.) He then went to Houston, and brought a group with one defensive talent (Patrick Beverly who didn't play much) and several poor defenders to respectability. Without him, opposing offenses scored 110 points per 100 possessions, a sub-Pelicans total; with him, it dropped to a respectable 104. The player he reminds me the most of on that end is Marc Gasol as he's a massive human being who is equally adept at defending the post and using his tremendous sense of positioning, moving his feet, and help defense to keep people out of the paint. Even as a generally sulking player last year with limited burn in the regular season, he made a difference in the playoffs as once he was put on LaMarcus Alridge, he become much less effective, and that change helped to make that playoff series close when Houston was previously being blown out. His rebounding will also be a huge difference for our defense; he has been one of the two or three best defensive rebounders in the NBA, and limiting offensive rebounds, and thus limiting possesions, is something we've struggled with. ICYMI, this is a terrific pictorial breakdown of his defense:
http://www.sbnation.com/nba/2013/10/...ouston-rockets
I especially recommend watching the second video on there. His understanding of defensive positioning, and how to use his body to make things awkward for offensive players is remarkable. He recovers remarkably well for a man of his size, and gives us a legitimate center, for the first time since Emeka Okafor in Monty's first year, who can credibly swarm the pick and roll to the three point line, then recover and make the correct rotations to force low percentage shots. He also gives us a quality rim defender for when teams put ADs man into the pick and roll, something we have sorely lacked. If there was one obtainable player who could single-handedly improve us from a poor defense to an average defense, he was it.
Jrue Holiday has also been a consistent plus defender who passes the eye test, is equally as good at playing up on opposing ballhandlers and playing off ball defense (see him here completely denying Ray Allen in the playoffs when Boston was running motions to free him up). . He plays well through screens has the size and length to credibly switch onto bigger defenders. Defensive statistics are wonky, but one of the better regarded is dRAPM, where he is tied for 5th with George Hill at 1.7 behind Eric Bledsoe (+3.2), Patrick Beverly (+2.5), and Avery Bradley (+2.5). As big as the upgrade from Smith, Stiemsma and Aijinca to Asik should be, the upgrade from Brian Roberts to Jrue Holday is about as big as you can make at that position. Per the eye test, Roberts is among the worst NBA defenders I've seen. He's very small, lacks length, is disinterested off ball, and lacks lateral quickness to stay in front of players. He's a guy you need to hide, and over the course of last year, we played lots of guys we needed to hide, and didn't have a scheme or players who could do that. Jrue Holiday gives you a player who can handle primary ballhandlers at the 1 or 2, switch P&R, and hide Eric Gordon on the weaker of the 2 backcourt players.
Anthony Davis will undoubtedly determine where this defense finishes next year. His counting statistics have been tremendous on that side of the ball, his advanced stats have been underwhelming to terrible. With that said, advanced stats are very limited on defense. He's been asked to do a lot, in a really difficult scheme for big men, as a very young player. But even as the individual big plays (generating a large number of blocked shots, deflections, and steals while fouling at a low rate) have been there, it just hasn't translated to team success. Part of that is that, whether this is Davis' fault or not, we have had a ton of blown rotations. With that said, his play with team USA has been very encouraging. His rotations have been on point, he essentially erases possessions. They've used a scheme where they alternate swarming (e.g. attacking with the big man and recovering) and icing the pick and roll (dropping the big man to catch the pick and roll), and that's a tactic the Pelicans should use. Too often, they've been able to negate AD by putting him in the P&R, leaving us with no quality rim defenders behind the play. If we play more conservatively in the P&R, particularly with Ryan Anderson on the floor with Davis, I think we'd to rotate less to help, we'd foul less, and we'd allow fewer wide open shots.
Regardless, AD is a special defensive player, and we're seeing that in these USAB games. His combination of length, mobility, and coordination is beyond rare. His wingspan is long for the NBA, yes, but guys like Rudy Gobert are even longer. But he plays with the longest functional wingspan I've ever seen, and combines that with being one of the faster players in the league. I'll never forget the play where he came from being out of the frame to block a transition three from Gordon Hayward last year. He was so shocked. I forget who said it, but it was like someone had thrown a 13 foot ladder at him. And he's good for 1-2 plays a game that no other guy in the league can make. There needs to be a point where his obvious talent translates into tangible defensive success, and he has the players around him for that to be this year.
The point of this is that Monty Williams has enviable weapons at his disposal on the defensive end of the floor. You don't need all-NBA defenders at every position on the floor to field a good defense, and in fact the majority of good defenses have employed players widely considered to be poor defenders. The Chicago Bulls last year employed Carlos Boozer and DJ Augustin as starting players on their way to the second best defensive rating in basketball. The Bobcats built the 6th best defense last year essentially around Al Jefferson and a couple of capable wing defenders. The Spurs have been hiding Tony Parker for years. And in the class of average defenses, both the Twolves, Wizards, Suns, Magic, and Blazers built reasonably competent defenses with only 1-2 plus defenders each. My expectations are a defense in the top ten, or at the very worst league average. If we can't make that happen with the talent on hand, barring a string of injuries like last year, I think we need to seriously reconsider our coaching direction. What do y'all expect on defense this year?
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Originally Posted by saintsinNO
