Besides health, what issues stop us from winning the title?

malakas · Sep 23, 2015

Well can you give me some other defensive stats that show that Harden is a "bad" defender?

I agree that it is difficult to show individual defense in statistics, but all those stats show is that Harden was part of a good overall team defense last season.

Which goes back to my original point that a good coach can put together a good team defense even with some weaker individual defenders in the lineup.[/QUOTE]

The best is the eye test. Effort, blowing rotations, the defender he's put to defend. (It's no coincidence he is put on the worst).
These stats that are available to us overestimate steals, blocks etc that don't tell the whole story. I'm certain that FO have much better info but they don't release it, one GM called the defensive stats avaialbe to us laughable.
The best we have is the Sports VU defensive tracking.

Just by luck you can read this that is from the Warriors- Rockets WCF and it shows who defended Curry the best. (NOT harden). It is a nice analysis.
http://nyloncalculus.com/2015/06/03/introducing-detailed-sportvu-defensive-tracking/

At least look at the table. I tried to post it but it doesn't show well.

Also when it doesn't come to stars like Harden one of the best is the on/off to see defence.

Play07 · Sep 23, 2015

PF/C depth, mchale immediately brought this up when craig asked him is this the deepest team we've had in yrs at the season ticket holder event.

he was like yeah at guard and wing we are but bigs he seemed like he wasn't so sure what will happen because are young.

Play07 · Sep 23, 2015

smoothie said: ↑

i think the off season moves have addressed most of the weaknesses listed in the poll.

coaching:
i have to give credit where its due. mchale & co. leveled up last season from bad to average. that's all we need with this much talent. could pop have gotten us passed the warriors last year? could he have gotten us more wins with all those injuries? i'd say the team did as good as we could've hoped.

we saw improvements in managing timeouts and game flow, substitution patterns that actually made sense, and good plays out of timeouts. in the playoffs we even saw good game-to-game adjustments... and sometimes even good second half adjustments. in previous years we didn't see any of that.

shooting:
i think the addition of ty will make a big difference in getting more open 3's. i also think that the low 3pt% is due to our style of play: quantity over quality of 3pt shots.

rebounding:
everyone on the team rebounds well for their position except for the PFs. losing josh hurts. dmo isn't a good rebounder, and that's why i think he's best as a 6th man. we do need a big PF who can rebound and defend the 4... it wouldn't hurt if he could hit an outside shot and cost less that $5M and be available for jones/KJ/pick in trade. any ideas?!

ft shooting:
losing josh / joey helps. so long as we have dwight this will always be an issue. the issue for me is capela, jones, and dmo. even if we take dwight out there is no other good FT shooting to bring in. if capela can improve here he will stand the best chance of stealing minutes from dwight. this is what he should be working on all summer. also, as mentioned above, trading jones for an upgrade at PF might bring in another big who can hit a FT.

turnovers:
ty has the second best ast:to ratio, but not only will he help at the point, but he will also help cut down on turnovers for harden trying to do too much, and hopefully lower the number of dwight post-ups which usually result in a turnover. every player improves in this category from ty's addition to the team. also losing josh helps.

defense:
we were about #6 last year... we spent large parts of the season without 2 of our best defenders (dwight / pat). and no one was worried about defense last year because we were #6. most people started worrying about defense when we traded for lawson. but is he any worse than terry? because terry was pretty bad and got us to the WCF. as previously mentioned, i'm only worried about defense at the 4. dmo is a plus defender but poor rebounder. it would be nice to have a PF who can do both.

overall:
a PF who can defend, rebound, and hit a FT would put us in elite company, if not put us over the top. if that guy can also hit a 3, we might end up with the best record in the league. if we are trading jones and KJ to upgrade (those are the 2 biggest contracts without having to move important rotation players), the options are limited with that price and the hard cap... but a couple of interesting options appear:

patrick patterson: would improve our ft and 3pt shooting.
john henson: would improve our defense and rebounding.
meyers leonard: would improve our ft and 3pt shooting... and our rebounding.

portland might be interested in a hometown guy like jones, throw in a KJ for youth and potential and maybe a second rounder or so and we could get a steal of a big guy that fits almost all of our needs. we'd have enough room under the hard cap to take back mike miller for his championship experience and 3pt shooting. don't knock the importance of championship experience... see the difference terry, ariza, and brewer made? plus the size advantage of having 2 mobile 7' PF's who can hit the 3...

go to war with:
dwight-capela
leonard-dmo-harrell
ariza-brew-dekker
harden-miller-thornton
ty-pat-jet
Click to expand...

finally im not the only one who think leanord would be a good fit mchale being here.

him or BASS were the guys ive been wanting on decent contracts. we dont need a star at PF just someone to hit, FT, spread floor, and play decent D

malakas · Sep 23, 2015

leonard is a bad defender tho.

JCDenton · Sep 23, 2015

Last night I dreamed that we were 11-9 after 20 games played. Does not bode well for championship aspirations.

Haymitch · Sep 23, 2015

JCDenton said: ↑

Last night I dreamed that we were 11-9 after 20 games played. Does not bode well for championship aspirations.
Click to expand...

Any chance of a championship aspiration curve after an 11-9 start?

Play07 · Sep 23, 2015

malakas said: ↑

leonard is a bad defender tho.
Click to expand...

he can hit the 3 40% FT 90% & rebound, I would still prefer a vet for playoffs but myers showed up playoffs last year, cant get a all in one PF for a good price.

SPURS
west
duncan
aldridge

Clippers
griffen
smith
D.Jordan

only thing I fear in playoffs are these teams big rotation.

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Besides health, what issues stop us from winning the title?

Assuming we are healthy, what is the biggest issue stopping us from winning it all?

Coaching

3 point shooting

Rebounding

Free throw shooting

Turnovers

Other

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