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Re: Formidable front line

At 07:28 PM 8/19/02 +0200, hironaka@nomade.fr wrote:

Good points, but don't you think the issue is defense not
offense?
Sure, but even just having a big body in the lane could make an amazing difference, even if it's not a particularly ferocious defender. That's been one of my whines for the last several years - that we may not have the world's greatest big men, but we also don't make good use of what we have. Too many times it's been a wide open lane because no one's there vs someone there and not a good enough defender to throw terror into the opponent's heart. Just having a body there slows down the opponent and forces them to adjust. And I have to admit that I'm rather shocked to find myself having some faith (trust me, that's not like me and really DOES shock even myself) in the coaching staff and teammate peer pressure making Vinnie a better defender than he thinks he is. Plus just having another big body will help Battie, both per se and in terms of less wear and tear, and he's likely the better defender anyway. And who knows, maybe Sundov will amaze us all.

Anyway, moving on to a few other points: I'm not going to bother to check your facts because you're usually pretty good about this sort of thing, but as you know well stats by themselves don't really tell the whole story and the same ones can be used to make totally opposing points. Classic case is the Walker jockers over the years who have emphasized his ppg while carefully ignoring the number and type of shots he took to get them, while his haters look at shooting % & number of whots and ignore the ppg.


In reality, as we all probably realize, Antoine averaged
fewer rebounds last season than before (both compared to
the previous seasons 8.9 and his career average).
*shrug* I'm not worried based upon what I saw, because it wasn't for lack of going after them or anything bad like that. My guess is that part of this comes from actually having someone else around who could make shots occasionally and increased rebounding by others. It's the flip side of the debate about assists, where sometimes assist levels are down because of poor shooting by the recipients more than fault by the attempted assistor.


He also slumped to his worst FG% year bar none as a pro
(.394 is twenty points off his previous rookie low), he
fell considerably in assists (5.5 to 5.0), he fell in
steals (1.70 to 1.50), blocks etc. In case you are
wondering, this was despite playing slightly more mpgs
than the previous year.
Yup. In an absolute sense this is an issue. He will never have a high shooting % and I will never be a total fan of his shot selection. But you know, from what I saw, he WAS trying to take it to the hoop a lot more and taking less dumb shots while a fair number of what would have been his good/easy ones were going to others - notably Paul. I hate the 3 myself, but a fair share of the really bad/dumb ones Walker took vs ones that weren't bad (unless you hate the shot in the first place as I do) were ones where he got the ball with the clock running down and HAVING to get something off. In other words, yes I wish he shot better, but despite the % I think issues around his shooting other than % were a lot less of a hindrance to the overall offense than at any other point in his career. Yeah, I wish he'd shoot better and always take smart shots, but no one does it and I have real hope of continued maturity for the first time in his career.


So what gives? If it seems I'm bashing Antoine Walker (my
favourite NBA player), wait until I get to the REST of
the team.

*snort*


But ultimately the difference last year was defense
(hence wins, hence the recognition).

So I reiterate my original point. We fans can talk all
day long about offense or lack thereof, and of finally
having that "third scorer", lowpost threat etc.

But Boston might have a greatly improved offense and
still only win 35 games. Boston has added third scorers
before (Mercer, Kenny).
OK, a couple of points. I agree on the defense, but you still have to score more than your opponents. People have pitched no hitters and lost (where IS Matt Young these days...). While your 3rd scorer analogies don't work IMO because Baker isn't just a third scorer variation on what we already have, as you can argue Mercer and Kenny were. He is a higher % and new type of offensive option, with the inside game that we've lacked. Higher %, more apt to draw opposing team fouls (how many games did we lose by free throw differentials? and IMO our continual outside shooting had a lot more to do with that than quality of refereeing), and all the rest that means in terms of opening up the rest of the offense.


As counterintuitive as it can seem, all the evidence
suggests Boston was successful on defense under
Obie/Harter using a smaller, less traditional power
forward/center lineup. And because Boston was more
successful on defense, they became successful period.

Yup.


The reality is that Obie seems to love Battie as his
pivot guy and Walker as his ultra-versatile power
forward. He loves Eric playing defense at small forward,
until Kedrick can step into that role.

Loves it or it looked like the best of the available options?


The key for 2002-03 is how the three newcomers to
Bostons 8-man rotation (Vin Baker, Sham and Kedrick
Brown) can impact the teams defensive efficiency.
<Chews this over thoughtfully...> Yes, BUT...
Look, I agree that if the make the defense significantly worse that that's more effect than anything they can add on offense, but if they don't do that then their offensive contributions could be the kicker between us not quite being good enough again. Especially if Baker can actually get us going with some post/inside game. That has an effect beyond his numbers - like passing, it becomes contagious and opens things up so that maybe some of our slashers will stop taking dumb outside jumpers and drive more. The effect in fouls is exponential because it's not only the foulshots from thefouls he (and others taking it more to the hoops) draw on the opponents per se, it's the effect this puts on opponent's rotations and who THEY can play that we can't stop and how free their players are to just do their thing. Now if I could only get them to run some classic breaks : )


 I
think well see a bit more versatility with guys playing
multiple positions in every game. But if Kedrick/Eric
give more to team defense than Walker/Baker/Battie, then
the former will get the starting small forward minutes.
To some degree. I think there will be a lot more creative lineups where the minutes aren't so tied to particular slots.


(apologies for a long post)

Beats virtual GM posts of half the length any day IMO : )

Kim