Effort vs Talent - What on earth is Ariza lacking?

brooks - 43.2% (and he's being guarded tougher)
battier - 40.2%
budinger - 39.2% (i guess this is why ariza has the green light, cbud can't make shots consistently either)
lowry - 39.6% (another reason)

seriously, if these guys were forced to play in the halfcourt the whole game, they might not score more than 70 points.

but any of these guys (outside of shane, forgot about him) is better than ariza.

38.2%. do you know how bad you have to be to shoot that bad? and it isn't like ariza is facing defenses geared to stop him. he's getting a lot of open looks himself.

 

i just wish ariza runs the offense more. why can't he do that? why won't adelman tell him to do that?

i just wish he scratches the 1-on-1 play. it's obvious he stinks at it. just run the offense and play within the offense.

some guys just don't have the skills/talents to be a good 1-on-1 player.

 

Damn. Nice response. I still think his gambling does more harm than good but I'm sitting behind a keyboard while Morey and Co. are the professionals so I'll defer to them.

Do you foresee any issues with his gambling when/if Yao is back in the paint? We all know Yao gets caught with a lot of cheap fouls caused by penetrating guards. I always thought that was the value in having guys like Shane and Lowry who make it a point to stay in front of their man. I could see Ariza single-handedly costing Yao entire halves of games by letting his man go by him and picking up cheap fouls on Yao.

 

My problem isn't in his increased aggressiveness, it's when he chooses to reach where he puts himself out of position to recover defensively. His arms seem very long which is I'm sure how he forces turnovers, but when we are already thin inside, his aggressiveness causes a lot more pressure on what little interior defense we have and creates mismatches on help coverage.

I love the idea of him getting more steals through aggression, I'm just not committed to it because of the other problems it causes for the rest of the defense.

 

Some of his steal attempts look very Iverson-esque to me as in nobody in the building thinks he has a chance at getting his hands on the ball. I saw one last night where there was no way he was going to get the steal but he went for it anyway and it ended up with an interior guy (can't remember who) picking up a blocking foul. It was obvious enough that Bullard and Bill both mentioned that it was a very poor decision by Ariza.

 

Like durvasa, I suspect Ariza's gambling on D was by design.

While for many players, the "fundamental" stay-at-home defense that Battier practices may be the better choice, it may well be that, for certain players, like Ariza and Artest, the "aggressive" gambling approach works better for the team.

Yes, it kind of looks bad when Ariza gets out of position due to his gambles, but it also kind of looks bad when, say, Kobe Bryant gets hot drains shot after shot in Battier's face (or blow by him a few times when he tries to direct the drive into a post-defender). It's not to say, however, that either player is defending incorrectly. Each of them is playing the odds. Battier is no less a gambler than Ariza is. Battier is betting that the steal that the reduce shooting % on the contested jumpers will more than justify the steal he didn't go for. Ariza is taking the opposite bet-- that the steals he does get, and the fastbreak points scored off theses teals, more than offset the increase in scoring efficiency caused by failed gambles.

What is the right gamble for Battier may not be the right gamble for Ariza-- just like going for the quick strip is the right approach by Chuck Hayes, but not for Yao Ming. It depends on the player's skill set and what kind of odds they have at each approach.


The optics of things don't tell a whole lot. Teams are going to score even against intelligent defense-- and sometimes in bunches. It's just luck (and the fact that the opposing players have talent, too). And sometimes, things will look ugly for the defense. What I really want to see are some objective measurements-- such as what % of times does Ariza succeed at this steal attempts, what the result is for such successful steals (i.e. Rockets scoring efficiency after an Ariza steal as compared to their scoring efficiency in other situations), how often Ariza fails to steal, and what the result is for such failure (i.e. opponent scoring effciency after failed steals vs. opponent scoring efficiency in other situations).

 

I actually think having Yao in the middle will help Ariza a lot. Yao's size is a big deterrent for opposing players to get to the rim (despite his reputation as a soft defender). Having 7'6 guy in the middle protecting the rim should allow our perimeter players to be more aggressive.

Personally I don't think Yao should be playing much more than 25 minutes a game anyway, so foul trouble really should not be a big issue with him. And Yao has also learned to stay out of foul trouble (that, or the refs started giving him more respect). I'm not worried about that.

 

He is never gonna learn to dribble, he is not coordinated enough. Ability can and is preventing him from acquiring these skills.

 

Good stuff, I agree. THE biggest draw of Ariza is his transition game, on both sides of the ball. His style of defense not only helps to prevent scoring it ignites the break, which is crucial for a team that is limited in 1on1 players. One important thing to watch is what happens when he gambles for steals. When he was on the Lakers his teammates reacted quickly when he was out position, Kobe and Sasha in particular would often switch to his man giving him time to recover to their man. Collectively, they had a better understanding of what everyone would do in these situations. Sure, going for steals puts a strain on the D but if you react accordingly it can be a valuable asset. The rockets tend to put too much of the load on the bigs, something I would agree with if we had Yao/Deke. With Hayes/Andersen the perimeter players need to dedicate themselves to preventing penetration, even if it isn't their man. If Ariza gets beat the nearest player should step in to prevent the penetration, don't leave it to Chuck Hayes at the rim.

Also, anyone who thinks Ariza hasn't improved his offense just hasn't watched him enough before this season. For him to lead any team in scoring at any shooting percentage is an improvement. The guy is not a main scorer but he's being played out of position and is forced to do things he should never be asked to do. His set shooting has improved. When he hesitates, shoots off balance, and off the dribble he doesn't do well.

Everyone is losing their minds for no reason. Some say we aren't moving the ball enough, we aren't running the offense, some players are taking bad shots - I don't think that's it. A huge portion of this team's problem is just good scouting by the opposing teams. In the first few games no one had seen us play, no one knew what to expect or what our weaknesses were. In Ariza's case they've learned to run him off the three point line and and meet him at the rim. From there he'll have to make a play off the dribble. He will never be able to do that effectively, never.

 

One other thing I think I forgot to mention is that opposing player's must respect Ariza's ability to steal the ball. Similar to a big shot blocker, players fear Ariza in the passing lanes and are forced to only make the "safe" pass. It's not just about the steals he gets, sometimes it's the ones he could have gotten.

 

exactly that sums ariza up in a nut shell

 

both i think!

 

basically sums it up.

 

So Budinger shoots 1% higher than Ariza, while taking only "good" shots, means he's a better offensive player?

So Lowry shooting 1% higher than Ariza, while not taking 3s and only taking "good" shots, means he's a better offensive player than Ariza?

How did you come to this conclusion?

 

Do you mean he could be a better all round player or merely a better role player?

He's definitely an outstanding role player who could step up big come the critical time, but he just can't turn himself into a go-to guy that we lack of on our current active roster.