Defense becomes offense - and other things I want to see this year.

[thecampster]

One of the hardest things to teach young players is that defense = offense.

Young players spend their early years trying to go 1 on 1 with each other, figuring out who the alpha scoring dog is. They believe defense is only the ability to block shots. But defense is about staying in front of your man, talking to each other, pushing your man out beyond where he is comfortable, lanes, funneling. Most players don't understand the basic concepts of defense until varsity high school or freshman year of college.

In the game of basketball, the team with the best transition game wins 90% of the time. The formula (offensive transition chances x transition efficiency) - (defensive transition chances x oponent transition efficiency) can be used to determine the winner of almost every basketball game. The reason for this is most team shoot below 50% efg in the half court but are above 70% in transition. So more transition chances than your opponent and efficiency in transition leads to wins. You can go back into basketball history and no one element is more important for determining the winner. So the team that plays the best defense, creates the most transition opportunities and limits their own turnovers/bad shots...wins.  It is really that simple.

Enter Trae Young, one of the best 1v1 offensive players in 20 years. He has been able to single handedly will teams to victory through 1v1 point guard play. But more often than not, we have lost the last 2 years due to a young team committing turnovers and not causing enough.  IMHO, this all starts with Trae Young and the defensive effort we saw in the 1st 2 preseason games. If Trae scores 10 less ppg while dishing 10 assists, I'll consider this season a win if he gives that kind of defensive effort. I'll consider LP the right coach if he can get the young guys to buy in to defense wins games, creates transition, creates easy buckets.

I want to see Trae become more efficient by creating easier opportunities through defense. I want to see us play less half court and more transition. I want less shots in the last 5 seconds of the shot clock and more traps at half court. 

 

I don't want to see fake defense stats like blocked shots. Centers get blocked shots when guards lose their man and allow penetration. For every 1 block there were 5 easy baskets. before it. I want to see long shot clocks on defense and short clocks on offense. I want to see LP pull people for a lack of defensive effort.

 

Basketball stats are pretty consistent. Most turnovers happen in the half court. More half court basketball leads to more turnovers. I want to see more offensive transition from the Hawks and more Defensive half court. IMHO, this all starts with Trae buying in.

[RedDawg#8]

I agree with this.

When people say we need to improve defensively they are glazing over a lot of components.

1. Turnovers. You touched on it a little. If we can protect the ball on offense and limit our turnovers, that reduces the amount of easy scoring opportunities for the opponent. That to me is a huge contributing factor to our poor/porous defense. We are on our heels a lot chasing down fast breaks due to bad turnovers. Protect the ball, make the opponents have to face a set defense. 

2. Transition defense. This is an area LP specifically called out ahead of this season. Even if we protect the ball, if we miss our shot on offense, the opposition has transition opportunities now. We have to do a better job on the run of stopping the ball and getting to a man. We still struggle at this IMO based on the first 2 games. We allow the ball handler to get to the paint in transition far too often. If we manage to stop the ball, we leave deadly shooters wide open. This takes the most awareness and BBIQ if you ask me, and its where we have the biggest learning curve at the moment. Contain the ball handler, protect the lane, find the shooters, make them set up their offense.

3. Half court Defense, I see us being much better in this area overall if we can figure out #1 & #2.

4. Rebounding. Last year was a problem. This year I think we are going to be a problem for other teams. We out rebounded the Magic in both our win and our loss. I see us being much improved. The defensive possession is not over until you secure the Rebound. You can make a team shoot 30% but if they are getting 2nd and 3rd chances they are going to make up for poor shooting with pure volume alone. Again, I feel a lot better about us this year based on what I have seen so far.

[NBASupes]

Trae's skill level is as impressive as his passing talent but I agree, when the young players understand that defense = offense is when they will take another leap. I see Cam already has that. Hunter is still working on it. Kevin and Trae from their preseason is working to improve it. 

@RedDawg#8 said the rest I like the most. Transition defense + long shot misses were a killer to us last year. I would like to see us take a leap in getting back on defense especially Trae and communicating what's going on when going back. I hate that he stares down a long three and the player guarding him leaks out for an open layup. 

Half court defense is about personnel, experience, effort, and scheme. I really like our switching this year. We look legit good at it. Our m2m defense looks rough. I still think we are working through figuring out what's the best system for us long term. One thing I've notice is our bench with the exception of Bruno have been really good at switching thus far. 

Rebounding should be a big win for us. We have seen Hunter take more effort to rebounding better. Cam looks like a rebounding machine on defense. We already knew Capela was an elite rebounder and that JC is an elite offensive rebounder. Trae can rebound for a small PG. We are fine in this area outside of Snell.  

[benhillboy]

On 12/16/2020 at 9:21 AM, thecampster said:

One of the hardest things to teach young players is that defense = offense.

Young players spend their early years trying to go 1 on 1 with each other, figuring out who the alpha scoring dog is. They believe defense is only the ability to block shots. But defense is about staying in front of your man, talking to each other, pushing your man out beyond where he is comfortable, lanes, funneling. Most players don't understand the basic concepts of defense until varsity high school or freshman year of college.

In the game of basketball, the team with the best transition game wins 90% of the time. The formula (offensive transition chances x transition efficiency) - (defensive transition chances x oponent transition efficiency) can be used to determine the winner of almost every basketball game. The reason for this is most team shoot below 50% efg in the half court but are above 70% in transition. So more transition chances than your opponent and efficiency in transition leads to wins. You can go back into basketball history and no one element is more important for determining the winner. So the team that plays the best defense, creates the most transition opportunities and limits their own turnovers/bad shots...wins.  It is really that simple.

Enter Trae Young, one of the best 1v1 offensive players in 20 years. He has been able to single handedly will teams to victory through 1v1 point guard play. But more often than not, we have lost the last 2 years due to a young team committing turnovers and not causing enough.  IMHO, this all starts with Trae Young and the defensive effort we saw in the 1st 2 preseason games. If Trae scores 10 less ppg while dishing 10 assists, I'll consider this season a win if he gives that kind of defensive effort. I'll consider LP the right coach if he can get the young guys to buy in to defense wins games, creates transition, creates easy buckets.

I want to see Trae become more efficient by creating easier opportunities through defense. I want to see us play less half court and more transition. I want less shots in the last 5 seconds of the shot clock and more traps at half court. 

 

I don't want to see fake defense stats like blocked shots. Centers get blocked shots when guards lose their man and allow penetration. For every 1 block there were 5 easy baskets. before it. I want to see long shot clocks on defense and short clocks on offense. I want to see LP pull people for a lack of defensive effort.

 

Basketball stats are pretty consistent. Most turnovers happen in the half court. More half court basketball leads to more turnovers. I want to see more offensive transition from the Hawks and more Defensive half court. IMHO, this all starts with Trae buying in.

Great post.  I personally don’t hold transition offense in that high a regard (Miami 26th last year, Chicago 6th).   These kids mostly jack threes on em anyway smh.  Now transition D is paramount to controlling pace, which will most likely be slower for a solid defensive squad .  
 

I also can’t discount blocked shots from any position.  Save for a few players I think it’s a great simple indicator to illustrate frequency of shot challenging, just the same as steals measure dribble pressure or deflections measure passing lane closures.  Plus they’re high energy-infusing plays if done by a guard.

I think the 4 Factors are a good barometer/ separator for team success.  That and a teams’ ability to have efficient 3 -level scoring (talking to your Daryl Morey)  

I’m of the general opinion that it’s nearly impossible for players to deviate much from their poor college/ international defensive profiles; there’s such a financial incentive to eschew defense and go all in on offensive improvement.  I hope Trae is a generational outlier in that vein lol.  Having your highest usage player be your worst defender is a passed-down recipe for disaster, ask Daryl Morey again.

Edited December 17, 2020 by benhillboy

[JTB]

I agree with majority that’s said...however transition offense is harder when it comes to being in the playoffs. It will work just fine in the regular season and we should fully utilize getting out on the run vs teams.

but once the playoffs hit!...defenses get back and force you into half court offense a lot. To me as far as the playoffs go (offensively) that is what make and break most teams when trying to put up pts.

 

transition defense is important period regular season and playoffs.

[thecampster]

On 12/16/2020 at 9:21 AM, thecampster said:

One of the hardest things to teach young players is that defense = offense.

Young players spend their early years trying to go 1 on 1 with each other, figuring out who the alpha scoring dog is. They believe defense is only the ability to block shots. But defense is about staying in front of your man, talking to each other, pushing your man out beyond where he is comfortable, lanes, funneling. Most players don't understand the basic concepts of defense until varsity high school or freshman year of college.

In the game of basketball, the team with the best transition game wins 90% of the time. The formula (offensive transition chances x transition efficiency) - (defensive transition chances x oponent transition efficiency) can be used to determine the winner of almost every basketball game. The reason for this is most team shoot below 50% efg in the half court but are above 70% in transition. So more transition chances than your opponent and efficiency in transition leads to wins. You can go back into basketball history and no one element is more important for determining the winner. So the team that plays the best defense, creates the most transition opportunities and limits their own turnovers/bad shots...wins.  It is really that simple.

Enter Trae Young, one of the best 1v1 offensive players in 20 years. He has been able to single handedly will teams to victory through 1v1 point guard play. But more often than not, we have lost the last 2 years due to a young team committing turnovers and not causing enough.  IMHO, this all starts with Trae Young and the defensive effort we saw in the 1st 2 preseason games. If Trae scores 10 less ppg while dishing 10 assists, I'll consider this season a win if he gives that kind of defensive effort. I'll consider LP the right coach if he can get the young guys to buy in to defense wins games, creates transition, creates easy buckets.

I want to see Trae become more efficient by creating easier opportunities through defense. I want to see us play less half court and more transition. I want less shots in the last 5 seconds of the shot clock and more traps at half court. 

 

I don't want to see fake defense stats like blocked shots. Centers get blocked shots when guards lose their man and allow penetration. For every 1 block there were 5 easy baskets. before it. I want to see long shot clocks on defense and short clocks on offense. I want to see LP pull people for a lack of defensive effort.

 

Basketball stats are pretty consistent. Most turnovers happen in the half court. More half court basketball leads to more turnovers. I want to see more offensive transition from the Hawks and more Defensive half court. IMHO, this all starts with Trae buying in.

I need a mod to put a bot on my account. I may say some outrageous things this year. I'm starting to feel very full of myself.

 

Serious note. A good bit of the above is what we are seeing in the 1st two games and I couldn't be happier. Loving my Hawks this year. The defensive effort out of Trae, Huerter, Cam and Hunter has been a serious bump this year and it makes all the difference. Hunter's block last night with attitude gave me flutters like 13 year old girl at a boy band concert. It wasn't the block. It was the confidence and attitude. Hunter's good block that was called a foul. I think that was just ref habit. He knew he was wrong right after seeing Hunter's response. That was a "don't let me end up on Sports Center look from the official".

[kg01]

Watching Hunter and Reddish play defense on the wang is ... (sloooow drag on my cig) .....

...... satisfying.

[Dejay]

5 minutes ago, kg01 said:

Watching Hunter and Reddish play defense on the wang is ... (sloooow drag on my cig) .....

...... satisfying.

As in Red Foreman telling Eric not to wake his mother up because she's 'very tired' satisfying...

[Peoriabird]

Defensive rebounding and limiting live ball turnovers are the key!