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idk about most overrated, but you'd have to build a team specifically for him and doing so would not include Dwight Howard. Ball's a bad defender that would need an aggressive hedging big man on the PNR to help conceal some of his defensive difficulties. Wait a minute...

More like Paul Millsap let himself be taken out of the game due to frustration over the refs, beginning at the end of the second quarter.

Sigh, let me say it again, and I'll preface it with I didn't see one minute of actual game action, but it takes two to dance with Dwight Howard getting, or not getting involved. Dwight Howard is not going to receive good post passes from Dennis, or any of the young guards on the team, as that simply is not taught anymore, so do NOT, and I mean NOT bring that up as a problem. But unless Dwight is going to set screens and dive hard to the hole, he's not going to get involved much at all with the starters, unless you play him with Jose Calderon, and THEN he can post up like he wishes, but that has a CATCH, even IF Dwight is HITTING his post shots, it has a history of THROWING OFF THE REST OF THE OFFENSE this year (RE: Cleveland in the last regular season game, he was excellent with his post ups in the second quarter, but what exactly did it lead to in that quarter? Nothing, because before Dennis even returned, the deficit was still already....."drumroll", at least 15-17 points). I did not see this game, but when I see Dwight only getting 6 shots, being 2-6 on them, 1-5 outside of the putback dunk, my assumption is he begun the game being a lazy bum on the PNR, and there was one short video that backs ME up. I'm not going to post it here, but my case in point in that short video is he rolls a little but, doesn't go all the way when Gortat leaves, is NOT in position to receive a pass that would result in a good shot attempt from him (the only shots I want to see him get are catch and layup or catch and dunk), so no wonder Dennis tries to lay it up. He DOES get the rebound, and does NOT kick it out when he gets, it, so its a turnover. You, and Graham would make me think Dennis took something dumb like 22+ shots. The time to criticize is not a game in which he took 16, had 8 assists when the game was somewhat in doubt, 9 in all, and was efficient. The time to criticize is when he isn't efficient and takes 20+ shots.

Here's a hint of how different Dennis was played, although I don't think it's in PNR: Help is received from the big man to make it tough on Dennis, I don't think Dwight is in a good enough position to receive a lob pass despite Gortat helping off in this case that was highlighted, but he gets the rebound and does not kick it out when he's surrounded. The result, missed shot at the rim, then a turnover.

I think you needed to look harder. He was really meaning remove both players from the equation on PNR, now that I am looking at that article. He provided an example like this: Kent/anyone other than Howard PNR defense: seven points on ten possessions. Kent/Howard PNR defense: seven points on four possessions. And said he could go on and on with everyone except Dennis/Dwight. The defense would be worse with Dennis paired with the big, and it would be worse with Dwight paired with the guard.

Here's some tweets from the other side on PNR coverage:

Read my above post but it's an either or situation. Either you let Wall have open jumpers or he blows past Dwight as Dwight doesn't have the foot speed to help and get back on PNR.

The thing is, Dwight doesn't have the foot speed to come out and contest. It's not a good situation either way. Either Dwight doesn't come out and you have an open jumper or Dwight does come out and the PG blows past the big for a layup. You take the open jumper. Along with the Gortat lob. And if you want better, you cut his minutes. Muscala is weak inside, but he actually does what a big needs to do in modern PNR situations on defense. A big needs to be able to come out and get back quickly in the modern PNR. Back on the subject, we've seen recently enough, that it should be in y'all's memories the case of a team trying to take away jumpers, with a better team in Cleveland. Guess how that went? Terribly. LeBron and Kyrie had a layup line vs Toronto in the first two games late last spring. Toronto switched back to the idea of helping inside and getting back and guess what? It worked for two games. The reason it actually worked is they were much quicker with their help inside-get back rotations than Atlanta was.

I decided I'd watch highlights, not those right now and I can't because sbnation messes up on mobile for me. My opinion? In the half court Dennis had four or five bad defensive plays, mainly in the first half, three or four on Wall, one on Porter. A couple were pretty stupid. Letting Wall take a mid range shot isn't a bad play. Letting Gortat get lobs isn't a bad play. Its preventing corner three point jumpers and devastating dribble drives. Like it is with Russell, it takes multiple players to guard transition from Wall and multiple players failed yesterday afternoon. Someone needs to man up and get set just outside of the restricted area. Instead you have Millsap letting frustration over the refs take him out of the game, beginning at the end of the second (from what I'm taking, as I didn't see this game). I cannot deemphasize how important it is that Millsap man up, shut up, and completely outplay Morris for the entire game. Like I have constantly said, the only real difference against previous Washington teams included his abilities and ability to really outplay the guy he was facing and now that Morris is there, this has no longer been the case.Even with Teague, the Hawks would lose the backcourt matchup, probably badly. If Millsap lets stupidity frustrate him, the Hawks would have embarrassing stretches like we saw for the third yesterday. Man up and shut up, or get out.

Humphries isn't a good player lmao. *EDIT* Dunleavy playing over a healthy Sefolosha is VERY questionable.

He's that bad against stretch big men.

We've seen this story before... Granted Frye is better but he's not too much better. Millsap likely gives up 10-15 on jumpers to Smith.

Like I said, again, if Gortat isn't in, they replace one stretch big with two. They often play Morris with their bench when the bench comes in. There's no hiding for Millsap in this series, his history says he won't be able to guard Jason Smith either.

So by your flaming hot stance, Millsap and Howard should see zero minutes in the next game and Humphries and Ilyasova should start! Good job! Can't use +/- when one of your boys also stunk at it.

Howard was -21. So it wasn't Howard that made a positive impact either.

Yeah, sure. Cut Millsap's minutes and get stomped by 20-30 or have the PG have an embarrassing 10 turnover performance like the last game in Washington for the next three games. Oh brother, I know Millsap is on your sh**list but both him and Howard had a shameful, embarrassing performance (Millsap mainly on defense) with me taking the temperature on social media and looking at the boxscore. And if Howard had a good performance today, I'd be saying nothing but taking just 6 shots, making only 2 of them, and getting punked by the guy you mentored in Orlando is gutless. Only three players really showed up.

When Gortat isn't playing, Washington plays two stretch big men. Millsap is not escaping a stretch big man no matter what you do, unless you cut his minutes way down. The roles are reversed from 2015 in the individual matchups, the Hawks bigs are likely to get their butts whipped for the rest of the series unless you cut Howard's minutes way down.

Prefacing this with this is not a Howard bash fest, but there really isn't much you can do in this case with Howard not being able to guard stretchy big men. Putting Millsap with the second unit doesn't really work as he's not escaping the stretchy big with the first unit or the second unit.

Like I said on another thread, it takes two to dance with Dwight Howard getting or not getting involved on offense. Unless it's an ISO post up, Dennis is not going to find you in a post up situation as he simply does not know how. He will find you if you set screens and dive hard to the hole or just hang around near the basket, not even looking to post up. From what I saw in a box score, I am assuming that Dwight was lazy and said eff it after the bad start which was overcome shortly after he....ironically left the game. *coughing*

He's right if Dwight Howard continues to play like a gutless fool.

Like I've often said with Dwight Howard not getting involved enough, it takes two to dance. If he's not setting screens and diving hard, he's just not likely to get the ball from Dennis. And if he's not setting screens and diving hard, he should be benched.

I just got back, taking a look at the box score: Looks like game one is the game in which a poor Dwight Howard and poor game by one of the guards is going to happen. When I saw social media when I was on the road, I thought Dennis took something stupid like 25+ shots. No he didn't. 16, good efficiency, and handing out 9 assists is perfect. He didn't even have that many turnovers.

Seriously though, before I hit the road for the next five, maybe more hours, I think what Bud means is if a lineup or set of players works, he'll stick to it and see what happens. He won't play favorites.

I guess its worth giving Hardaway Jr/Millsap+bench lineup a try and seeing how it looks. Dunleavy playing would be a mistake, Calderon can play but him playing more than five maybe six min stretches where he can go all out is a mistake.

I mean a prediction BEFORE the season.