While he’s not the sole reason for the Rockets’ defensive issues, he’s part of the issue. The points can be deceiving because that may include those second unit lineups or other combinations and more information is needed to make an assessment. Defense is always a synergistic product. I don’t agree with the assessment that he’s “terrible” and there’s things he’s good at but he has a lot of physical and defensive acumen limitations. This has been his issue since year 1 although he has improved significantly since.
My thing is one play he's packing someone's lunch and the next he's getting dusted by the other team. Very feast or famine. That's youth though, as much as nobody wants to hear it.
It’s a little unsettling when players drive on him at will with no regard. I find that very troubling. Usually guards turn away from a Capella or Turner or even Porzingis camping in the paint after a screen and roll. But they attack Sengun with reckless abandon.
No. He's never been good at defense. He just has a core fanbase that will make excuses for him. Sengun's been getting singled out by opposing teams
This isn't some individual advanced analytic, I'm not talking about his D-RAPTOR or some other made up calculation. This has nothing to do with what Morey was talking about. This is literally just "points scored while Sengun is on the court." I am not telling you that Sengun is a great defender. But if a player is so hopeless defensively that the other team scores at will every time he steps on the court, as you are suggesting, it would not be possible for the "points allowed" to be better with that player on the court. It's a contradiction. You can tell me you think he's limited, you can tell me you think the other team gets too many easy shots at the rim or whatever, and I would agree with you. But this idea that he's some irreparable liability is provably false.
Yeah, I totally agree. This is my point. I am not trying to say he is some defensive stud. But if he was as terrible as OP (and many others) are suggesting, then it would be obvious from the numbers. We'd see it clear as day in the team defensive rating. We wouldn't be a top 10 defense last year and this year. It just wouldn't be possible. You can look at other really really bad defenders and the teams defensive rating balloons any time they take the court. That doesn't happen with Sengun, and it never has.
I agree somewhat. He improved his def rebounding and effort on dribble drives. But He fouls often because he’s not moving his feet and using his arms to stop players. The Rockets don’t hedge or hard show a lot on screen and rolls and I wonder if that has anything to do with Sengun’s recovery speed. He drops because he’s too slow to switch and will get burned off the dribble from the perimeter. But this gives up mid range shots and also players challenge him in the paint with no respect. His offense was what made it difficult to not play him but that’s tapered off a bit. Surprising to me he couldn’t post up Doncic or Sohan consistently.
yea, it's why I don't really put stock into numbers. It's the same with Jabari. Guys don't fear them on defense and attack them with no fear. If you're going to have Jabari and Sengun as your bigs, you better hope you have an elite offense to offset it. I think it's somewhere in the middle with Sengun, he's not as bad as people say but he's def not good either and closer to the lower end for starting bigs. It's a shame that he's not a stretch 4 cause the Sengun at the 5 experiment clearly isn't working for Ime.
People in this thread don’t understand what they’re seeing on the court, so they’ll frequently make claims that aren’t supported by stats. This in turn causes them to believe stats aren’t helpful. when you show them something that’s mathematically disproves their position, they’ll actually interpret that as evidence in their favor, regardless of what the evidence actually supports. People that believe Sengun doesn’t positively contribute to our team’s defense as currently constructed fall into this category. It’s really not worth arguing with them.
According to NBA.com... This season, there are only 5 centers in the NBA that have a better defensive rating than Sengun (minimum of 25 minutes per game played) Ranking #6 in defense rating for centers doesn't seem like a huge issue to me. Could be much worse. I'm just saying...
Man people counted out Holmgren due to the stick figure build. Dude's killing it. As far as Alpi, he hustles his ass off 100%. If he was 7' with more length, he'd probably be a DPOY candidate.
You better be cooking on the offensive end to make up for bad defense if you are a center shooting 37% that is going to find you a spot on the bench when games are on the line and your team needs stops.
Yes I mentioned as such in my post. The gentleman narrating tends to be a tad hysterical......but I wanted people to hear the criticism of Jalen Green, with Sengun, with Jabari, with Dillon, with VanVleet. Dillon being too close to Draymond when he should have had one foot in the paint, when Van Vleet stayed near the corner 3-point shooter "on the weak side" and Jalen Green split the difference between those two weak side shooters. Udoka can talk until he is blue in the face but it takes our young guys to perform on the court. I'm not a fan of Popovich but I was hoping for more Steve Kerr than Popovich.
The game was lost with all of the threes the Rockets gave up on the perimeter which caused the big deficit in the first place. For some reason Sengun is suppose to guard the perimeter and the paint.
Let's put some labels or distinctions on this list: Player.......weight.........mobility Horford.....240..........scored high in isolation defense a couple of years ago (age concern) Porzingis...240............some what, but good wing span Jokic..........284...........not defensively Embiid.......280............some say good defender (not me) Jarrett Allen...243........good Bam............255............excellent Lively..........230.............good Chet............208.............good #1 seed without heavy C last season (added Hartenstien) Gobert........258............sports247 lists him now as 245. Looks 237 to me. KAT.............248..............slow Sengun.......243...............basketball-reference.com has him down to 235......slow Valanciunas...265............slow Sabonis........240...............fair Nurkic...........291..............slow Notice KAT was traded for Julius Randle.....the experiment last year worked as T-Wolves were high in defense. But point being the T-Wolves noticed it had flaws with both KAT and Gobert.
Defensive rating isn't just based on a players performance. It's also based on who you're on the floor with - both teammates and opposition. For example, currently the 3rd highest defensive rating among all starting guards is Russell Westbrook. Steph Curry is 8th best. Do you believe those to be accurate?
