Have we been even an average team, defensively, with Lowry in the lineup? Somebody should have the stats on that. If yes, then maybe PG defense is, in fact, that critical to overall team defense. If not, then the problem would appear to go well beyond defense at the PG position. It seems to be that interior defense is far more important than perimeter defense considering that we have two supposed star perimeter defenders in the starting lineup in Battier and Ariza as well as another excellent perimeter defender in Lowry getting 25 minutes per game. As good as Hayes is, he's simply too undersized and limited offensively to be a long-term solution. In other words, it seems that a team is better off with strong interior defenders and poor perimeter defenders than poor interior interior defenders and great perimeter defenders. Of course, it's obviously better to have both good interior and perimeter defense. Theoretically, do you think we would have been a good defensive team this season if we had been starting 3 excellent perimeter defenders in Lowry, Battier and Ariza all season long? Without looking at the stats, my guess is that we are a bad defensive team this season with just about every combination of players that gets significant minutes. If you believe we'd still be a bad defensive team, what does that tell us? Is the absence of Yao, or another big that can protect the rim like he has over the years, a far bigger issue than Brooks' poor defense?
The thing is the rockets pretty much had a max potential offensive game, given our personnel, we could not play much better on offense than tonight. The fact that we were so easily beaten and dismembered means that we will HAVE to sacrifice offense for defense if we want to win games.
There are also outliers and like BucMan said, teams do simply make more shots than usual on some nights. Remember our game against the Bucks? Was there defense really that bad or were we just sinking shots at an atypical rate? Ariza went something like 6-7 from behind the arc and Battier was 6-6. Ariza's had a number of games where he had looks just as good as the one against the Bucks. And I believe the Bucks are considered an above average defensive team. We pounded them and shot 3s like layups that night. It happens. In fact, we were hitting all kinds of shots that night, not just from behind the arc. Having said that, I'm still intrigued to know how crucial PG defense is compared to having a frontcourt that can protect the rim.
44% from the floor. 28% from 3. Yeah, max offense. Well, I'll give you the FT line as 34/42 was quite impressive.
Without any numbers, I'd say having a rim protector is way more important. Why?? The rules are made to help the offensive player and scoring. Having Yao there to go straight up with his length to ALTER shots that the guards give up would make a huge difference. Besides, they will only call a charge on DWill running over Lowry(or other defensive PG) a time or two before they stop calling it.
6 fewer points than Brooks per 100 possessions or 6 fewer than league average? My question is with Lowry in the lineup where does our team rank defensively compared to the rest of the league? I believe I read a post from durvasa or somebody else that we are bad defensively with pretty much every lineup. If that is the case, then maybe PG defense isn't even half as important as having bigs that can protect the paint and the rim. I don't know the answers to these question. I'm tossing it out there for discussion.
Opponents shoot better than normal is one thing, and it could very well be the case, but let them shoot wide open(some real wide open) jumpers all game long is another thing, and that was definitely the case.
Deron's wide open looks usually came from Aaron's reaction to the pick. If he fought to go over, Williams went to the basket. If he went under, DWill took the shot over the top. The rest are a result of what I was saying earlier, the entire team missing rotations and looking out of synch.
I don't know if they measure this sort of thing statistically, but I believe that PG defense is one of the most important and underrated defensive positions in the NBA, specifically because of the shotclock. Two things about PG defense bsides the obvious man to man defense of guarding the opposing player. 1. If you can waste even 2 seconds off the shotclock through pressuring the ball handler before the offensive set begins, that will have a noticeable effect on shooting % since it will leave less time for the opposition to run sets. 2. Since most sets require the point guard to initiate with a pass of some sort, by disrupting that initial pass, making it delayed, or by hedging someone 1 foot further away from the basket, or taking away the primary pass option,etc... it has a cascading effect on the offensive set going forwards.
Were you watching the same game? Sure, there were some wide open shots, but half of them Brooks or Martin had their hand right up in the shooter's grill. The Jazz were just making the shots anyway. As much as I hate Utah, give them a little credit, they had a great shooting night.
Not really sure about that though. Rondo and Billups have proved that they can have as much impact as any shotblocker. The way it is, BBall is about penetration. Your PG can stop the penetration directly with great defense. I think it's about the same though, if you get a great PG defender and a shotblocker in the post, you usually get great team defense. I think the most important positions in great team defense are PG and Center.
What was the % at half time? once again watch the game, don't worry about scrub time or what happened after the dam broke
We did it to the Bucks and they're actually a good defensive team. We're not a good defensive team but tonight was an anomaly, in my opinion. We played a 6-man rotation last night with 3 guys getting over 40 minutes, Brooks playing almost the entire game. I understand that the Jazz played last night, too, but their defense was awful tonight as well, particularly early. I'm not convinced that a Brooks-Marting combo can work or that Brooks will be back next season. What I'm trying to do is gauge the importance of PG defense compared to interior defense and protecting the paint/rim.
It doesn't really matter, because it's all relative to Rockets. Rockets allow 3 more points per 100 possessions when AB is on the court, 6 fewer when Lowry was on the court, that is a big difference.
Points well taken. If perimeter defense is so important though, how can a team that features Battier, Ariza and Lowry getting significant minutes be so below average defensively? Is it all on Brooks? Do the stats point to the fact that without Brooks in the game, we're even a league average defense? If not, what does that mean?
Rockets were at 50% for the first half. I believe 40% from 3 point range. Not earth shattering by any means. Jazz were 68%.
