Expedite

I think that the action under the low post is the best part of basketball.  Under the low post is the center's territory. 

How does Capella compare with Okongwu?

Who is the better center, Capella or Okongwu?  

Are their skills sets similar to each other, or do they have different strengths and weaknesses?

14 hours ago, Diesel said:

POST AI... No.  Not that much. 

Yao Ming was not the best player of his time.   I don't think he was even close.   Not even the best Center of his time.   Again not even close. 

Skill can overcome size and weight.. every day of the week. 

MJ is the GOAT...  Not incredibly tall, not incredibly strong.  He was not a Wilt Chamberlain or a Shaq..  However, he's the GOAT because he was incredibly skilled. 

If you want a lesson on Size and Strength vs. Skill..  Watch Hakeem vs. Shaq in the finals. 

 

What year's finals was this Hakeem vs. Shaq match up?

5 hours ago, AHF said:

Yes.  You will pretty much never see Trae trying to post someone up or trying to defend the low post.  He gets his interior points not through strength but by using his agility and ballhandling skills to get past his man and to the basket.  

The reason I don't think Trae is necessary a great example of a player who is lighter and weaker is because point guards aren't generally expected to be able to physically bully people or to play in the post.  So the fact that he can't do it well doesn't make him stand out from the many other PGs who also can't hold their own in low post situations.  He is lighter and weaker but that stands out less as a guard than it does as a forward or center.

What does "post someone up" mean?

Wouldn't Trae Young be an excellent example of a lighter, weaker player who gets jostled around and cannot hold his position under the low post? Trae weighs only 164 pounds. Trae Young has no muscles to speak of.

15 minutes ago, Gray Mule said:

YES!

According to your profile, you've been a basketball fan since 1950.  That's 72 years!  So you must be very knowledgeable about this. Can you elaborate on how weight and strength matter in basketball?

The first and only entire basketball game I have ever watched in my life was when I watched an Atlanta Hawks game live on November 16, 2022 at State Farm Arena in Atlanta.  So I am no basketball expert.  I have thought a lot about basketball, and I have a theory.

I have a theory that a basketball player's weight and strength might help him in a basketball game, and, conversely, my theory is that a basketball player's very low body weight and/or weak physical strength would limit a basketball player's capabilities.  Here's what I base my theory on:  When basketball players make a running jump to slam dunk a basketball, the bodies of the players on defense frequently end up colliding with the ball carriers' bodies when the defensive players jump up to block the ball carriers' slam dunks.  As a hypothetical example, let's say the ball carrier is 6'8" and weighs 275 pounds, and let's say that the defensive player trying to block the slam dunk is also 6'8" but he is extremely skinny and only weighs, say, 180 pounds.  The ball carrier weighs 95 pounds more than the defensive player.  The 275 pound ball carrier makes a running jump to make a slam dunk.  When the 275 pound ball carrier's body inadvertently collides with the 180 pound defensive player's body in mid-air, isn't the superior momentum of the 275 pound ball carrier going to push the body of the 180 pound defensive player backwards when they collide so that the 275 pound ball carrier keeps flying towards the hoop?  Conversely, if the 180 pound player was the ball carrier making a running jump to attempt a slam dunk, and if the 180 pound ball carrier's body collided with the 275 pound defensive player in mid-air, wouldn't the 275 pound defensive player's body likely stop the 180 pound ball carrier's body from making it to the basketball hoop?  I deduced this theory when thinking about how often basketball player's bodies collide in mid-air when a ball carrier makes a running jump to make a slam dunk.

This is a little bit analagous to me of how weight/strength determines which linemen push the other linemen backwards in football.  

Am I basically correct here that weight would be a factor in basketball due to mid-air collisions when ball carriers make running jumps to slam dunk?

Can anyone give me any interesting anecdotes about how weight alone has helped or hindered NBA players or college basketball players when making running jumps to slam dunk?
 

16 minutes ago, Gray Mule said:

Expedite;  I'll add my welcome to JayBirdHawk's.  Stick around.  We're full of information.  Some of it is even correct!

Thank you jaybirdhawk and gray mule

12 hours ago, Wretch said:

There's different kinds of "spacing."  There's exactly what you're talking about where multiple offensive players are bunched up and too close together.  There's also spacing where you have shooters pulling the defense towards the perimeter creating "space."  In either case, space is referring to the area that the offense has to attack.

Shooters need space to get a clean shot off over the defender.  Midrange shooters/dribble penetration players need space to attack (dribble into) and get to the rim.  Post players need space to operate in to put their size, footwork, and/or dexterity to use.  Defenders are trying to take this space away.  Too many offensive players "bunched together" makes it easier for the defense to guard them and takes away "space" for the ball to move.

Pro players are insanely good at putting the ball in the basket.  I can't stress this enough.  All of them are ridiculously good at it - ALL OF THEM ARE - despite what you hear people on the forums saying about who "sucks."

 

  The best players are so good that multiple defenders are required to guard the "space" they operate in.  For example, if teams only used one player to guard a player like Shaq, LeBron, or Luka every game and gave them enough space...they would score 80 points a night. The same is true for Trae - he is one of these kind of players, despite what you hear from the negative folks. 

Guys like Deandre Hunter or John Collins would score 50 a night if you don't defend them.  If you gave Bogi wide open 3 pointers, he would probably score 100 points a night.  Go watch video of these guys practicing shots with no defense...it's insane how many uncontested shots they can hit in a row.

For elite shooters, the defense has to guard them closely.  They can't have any room (space) to get a shot off.  For guys who are skilled and quick (like Trae and Dejounte), multiple defenders have to hang back and cut them off before they get into scoring position.  If Trae, Dejounte, or even Hunter get anywhere near the basket and get a clean shot off, you can pretty much count it.  The defense *MUST* use multiple defenders, or "help" defenders, to guard their operating "space". 

If the offense is executed accordingly, you can predicted where the defense will have to pull a help defender from.  If and when they do, which is what we call 'committing', the offensive team can move the ball away from the action to get a better shot (if needed).  If done it's right...multiple defenders will be drawn to the "strong side" (where the ball is) and the ball will be move away from them.  The ball moves faster than the players, so by the time the help comes over to cover the attack, the ball is already moving towards an offensive player whose defender has left him to "help" defend the attack. 

If this offensive player is a great shooter (Ray Allen, Luka Doncic, Steph Curry) it's an automatic basket.  The defense understands this, so the "read" the play, and are likely in motion to leave their assigned offensive player (usually prematurely) and "rotate" towards the open shooter to cover.  If the shot goes up, this is called a "close out" - where the defender is running at an open shooter and attempts to prevent a wide open shot.  It's 50/50 here depending on what kind of player gets the ball in this situation and what kind of offense they're running.  If it's Ray Allen or Larry Bird getting that ball, and there's even an inch of space, that ball is going up and probably going in.  This is referred to as "catch and shoot" or "CNS" because the offensive player is just going to catch the ball and shoot it off the pass. 

For context into our conversations here...Trae is the best shooter on this team.  He strokes 30+ foot, HIGHLY contested shots...and sometimes LOGO shots.  If he got wide open catch and shoot opportunities...it would be a nightmare for the defense (moreso than he already is).  But he is always guarded and always has the ball in his hands.  Hence, one of the reasons why SOME of us have been screaming for the front office to bring in someone else that could run the offense and draw the defense.  That's Dejounte Murray...and is also another story...

Anyway, for the average shooter in a ball movement situation, they are going to (or should) pass the ball again unless they have A LOT of space to shoot...this pass will force the same kind of reaction from the defense.  If the defense doesn't respect the next shooter then they don't rotate and they just let that guy shoot (go watch clips of Josh Smith to see this in practical application).  As it were for the Hawks, the only shooter that does not have to be respected in our starting lineup is Clint Capela. 

Good defense will recover - that is "read" what the offense is trying to do, rotate in a timely fashion, and close out fast enough to keep the shot from going up.  "Spacing" is the area that the defense has to cover to keep the shooters from getting off a clean shot and the area that players like Trae have to operate in.  Good shooters keep the defense honest and make it difficult to help contain dribble penetration attackers.  None of this works without ball movement...which you hear us complaining about on the regular in here.

There are people in here that understand X's and O's much better than I do...especially after all of the beer and liquor I've had to tonight, but that's the basics of it.  @Diesel can tell you specifically what he meant by spacing.

On a final note, we have two players that will pretty much force the defense to react every time the touch the ball and we have guys around them that give them multiple secondary options. There's quite literally no reason why we shouldn't be a headache for every team in the league.  It's also, IMO, why you'll see us either dominating a team for stretches or storming back from double-digit deficits.

Also...welcome to the Squawk.

Very informative. I learned a lot from your post. Thank you

3 hours ago, AHF said:

Just to expand on this, a player's gravity on offense generally means the threat the other team perceives in them shooting from a given area of the floor.  So the threatening offensive player draws defenders to them because they perceive him as a threat.  If the player doesn't represent a threat, they don't draw defenders and don't have gravity in that area of the floor.  For example, Steph Curry has truly elite gravity because teams need to mark him everywhere on the floor. 

A player like Capela rarely scores from anywhere other than directly under the basket.  So if he is around the rim, teams feel the need to mark him.  But if he ventures anywhere away from the basket then the defense feels like they can completely ignore him (other than making sure he doesn't move back to the basket unmarked).  Since he doesn't attract defenders to him when he isn't under the basket, that is a lack of gravity. 

Capela is unusually limited in his ability to score so NBASupes described it as an "elite" lack of gravity.  A more versatile scorer will attract defenders to them in multiple areas.  On our team, Trae Young has been one of the league leaders in gravity because there is no area of the floor where defenders feel safe to let him go unmarked.

A player's gravity directly affects the ability of others to score.  Players with high gravity draw defenders to them and create more space for others to score.  Players with low gravity make it easy for the defense to give extra attention to other scorers and make it more difficult for them to score.  One challenge for our team this season has been a lack of quality 3pt shooters (we lost two good ones in the offseason and several of our players have started off cold from deep this year) and that ability to leave our shooters more open means the defense can make life more difficult for the team to score inside the 3pt arc.  This has been seen in the success teams have had running zone defenses against us and our struggle to take advantage of the openings in the zone (generally the single easiest way to beat a zone defense is to shoot over it since it tends to give up open looks from 3pt range).

I understand the concept of gravity now and how a player with a lot of gravity will create spacing for other players on his team.

Isn't Trae Young a quality 3 point shooter?

If you've got a team with a lot of guys who can slam dunk well, how does an offense relying heavily on slam dunks usually do against a zone defense?

On 11/24/2022 at 3:38 PM, theheroatl said:

Before anybody even thinks about blaming Trae and DJM let’s consider the albatrosses we throw out there at the 3 and 4 every night.

inconsistency  times 1000

What do the 3 and 4 mean in this context?

I attended the Celtics vs. Hawks game on November 16, 2022, at State Farm Arena in Atlanta. This was the first complete basketball game I have ever watched in my entire life, and I am hooked.  Before this game, I had attended the big leagues of all four of the major team sports in America except basketball.  I only attended this game to make it so that I could have attended the "big leagues" all four of the major team sports in America, but I was unexpected hooked on basketball.

I can only remember four specific Hawks players from this game:  Clint Capela, Trae Young, John Collins, and Vit Krejci. Clint Capela stood out for me because he was the starting center.  Trae Young stood out to me because he scored so many points, and Young and Capela seemed to be involved in every play.  John Collins stood out to me because I saw him score some spectacular alleyoop slam dunks in the game.  Vit Krejci only played in about the last five minutes of the game, but Krejci stood out to me because of what I saw him do before the game.  Krejci was warming up before the game practicing shooting three pointer shots.  I saw Krejci swish about 15 three pointers in a row in practice before the game.  Then Krejci bricked a three pointer.  Then Krejci scored exactly 20 three point shots in a row.  

On 11/24/2022 at 10:09 AM, NBASupes said:

 

The best performing Hawk, Clint Capela. As good as Clint has been this year. His lack of gravity is elite. It creates zero spacing for Murray. Where Trae uses Capela as an extention of his body. Murray has shown no ability to do that and it's really limited him offensively. Teams made some adjustments from early in the year on Murray and it seems like he's hit his offensive peak for our personnel grouping. This happened to a degree with Houston, Westbrook just couldn't flow with Capela and they ended up moving Clint to Atlanta for that very reason. 

 

I attended the Celtics vs. Hawks game live on November 16, 2022, and it was the first complete basketball game I ever watched in my life. I was very impressed with how entertaining it was, but I don't understand a lot of the strategy involved in basketball.  So please be understanding of my ignorance.  

Clint Capela started at Center at the Hawks game I attended 13 days ago.  When you say that Clint Capela's lack of gravity is elite, I am assuming you just mean that Capela can jump extraordinarily high.  You say that Capela's lack of gravity creates zero spacing for Murray.  My interpretation of what you are saying is the following:  Capela's ability to jump extraordinarily high creates zero spacing for Murray.  I am totally baffled.  Why would anyone's ability/lack of ability to jump high create spacing for anyone else?  

P.S. remember I am brand new to basketball.  Please be gentle.

On 10/25/2022 at 4:38 PM, Diesel said:

 

I would say that if there was a problem with the offense, it would be spacing.  The bottom line is that we miss Bogi right now.  Not for the first team but for one of our 2nd teams.  

On 10/25/2022 at 4:38 PM, Diesel said:

The lineup of Trae, Holidaze, JJ, and Clint is not one that we should put on the floor a lot because of spacing.  Yall won't say it but I will.. JJ kinda sucks. He's athletic but he does nothing for our floor spacing.  Makes us long for Gallo.   That lineup will have Trae with Low percentage shooting. 

On the first team, DJM and Hunter (when he feels like being aggressive) helps our spacing a lot because we have movement.   The thing is we should be twice as potent because both DJM and Hunter has nice midrange games.   We have gone away from the 1-5 PNR.   Strange, that use to be our bread and butter.  Unfortunately for now, we will go how Hunter goes.   I believe that if there are signs that Hunter is playing aggressively, those will be the games we win.  When he goes into his shell, those will be the games we don't win (for now). 

I heard a lot about OO's jumpshot this summer.  Thus far, he seems to be the same guy he was last year. If he could drain some Frank the tank shots, it would be so meaningful for our second unit.

Somebody has to help Trae with spacing so we wait for Bogi Leader of the Horde to get back right.

 

 

I'm very new to basketball.  I attended the Celtics vs. Hawks game at State Farm Arena in Atlanta on November 16, 2022, and that was the first time I ever watched an entire basketball game in my life.  I was hooked!  Very entertaining.

I've been reading this message board ever since that game thirteen days ago, and a lot of the jargon you people use here confuses me.

Diesel, when you say that "if there is a problem with our offense, it would be spacing", do you mean that if there is a problem with the Hawks' offense, it is that the Hawks players bunch up too much together near the basketball hoop? 

Then you say that on our first team, DJM and Hunter helps our spacing a lot because we have movement.  Do you just mean that DJM and Hunter move away from the basketball hoop more than other players, or are you saying something deeper than that?

Please elaborate.  

P.S.  I have only watched one complete basketball game in my entire life.  So please be understanding of my ignorance. Please be gentle.