Everyone keeps on saying the NBA has now changed from half court center oriented to freestyle fast paced offense. Has it really changed? We'll see in the next few weeks if Spurs can take out the Suns and whether Jazzholes will take out the Warriors. It's the ultimate slow it down half court vs. run and gun. Last 19 years, its always been the defense first team that won the championship. Do you think its likely to change? By change I mean being the Champions and not just a 60 win regular season team.
Of course, no one would ONLY run fast breaks or half court. But I mean the majority of time. Do you see Duncan scoring on fast break dunks? The Spurs want to keep every game in the 80s while the Suns want to shoot in 7 seconds less.
Look at the last few champions -- Miami Heat, Detroit Pistons, San Antonio Spurs, LA Lakers (Shaq days). All had big time half court games led by a dominant front line.
How about a mix of both? While the Warriors did run a lot in their series vs Dallas they also executed their halfcourt offense very efficiently. There's no need to be one dimensional. Even the Heat and Spurs ran the fastbreak when given the opportunity. Doesn't mean they jack up the first open look with 20 seconds left on the clock. Just that they know when to take advantage of their mismatches.
What makes the Spurs great is that they play both ways. They run and gun when it works to their advantage, i.e. last night as they gave up 106 and put up 111. Why does eveyone think they're just a slow it down team? They run more than the Mavs.
a team has to be able to convert in the half court and to control the ball to win. Thats time tested. But a team does need to be able to get easy buckets in transition.
The Suns like to run. But they can also score in half court. They are simply a great offensive team. I don't see why you have to limit the style of offense to win. You score in the most efficient way you can. Now, the problem with the Suns is not their offensive style. It's whether they can play good enough defense to win. The Spurs outscored them last night. This is kind of like the Indy Colts. Everybody knew they were great in offense. But it's when they could also play defense when they went all the way. BTW, defense doesn't win championship. You have to be able to be at least competent in offense to win. JVG's Rockets have so painfully proven this.
The answer is not either one...... The answer is.....BALANCE !!!! A good team can run a bit, and also play the half court game. If you are too one sided.....Houston, Utah, Phoenix, Golden State....you will not win a championship. DD
It's a hell of a lot easier to build a team around defense than fast-paced offense. Having a run and gun team requires all of the following: 1.) Great PG play - if no one else has noticed, great PGs are pretty rare in the league right now. If the Rockets were to play at a faster pace like Les wants, T-Mac would have to play PG. He's the only player who COULD play at that pace (remember Rafer's awful cross-court pass? He didn't even look up before throwing it). 2.) Solid 3pt assassins - Mike D'Antoni mentioned last season that the Suns were most effective when they shot within the first 8 seconds of a possession. The reason run and gun strategies work is because you get your shot off before the other team has a chance to set up on defense. Often, this requires throwing up a lot of 3s. How many times have we seen Nash drive into the lane only to pass it out to Marion for the 3? There's a reason for that. T-Mac just can't get his shot to fall at times. Luther Head has been terrible in the playoffs. Battier's shots haven't always been falling. And Rafer? Give me a break. 3.) Youth and Athleticism - See #2. Yao Ming, Juwan Howard, Dikembe Mutombo will ruin this aspect for the Rockets. There's now way Yao can keep up that sprint all game, and his purpose for being on the team will be lost if he can't post up. He's not as athletic as Stoudemire; he can't be used in the same way. Deke and Juwan just aren't fast enough. And they're old. The only way the Rockets could possibly play up-tempo ball is to make some MAJOR trades. This would require some crazy restructuring - like (I can't believe I'm saying this) trading Yao for (I can't believe I'm saying this) Kevin Garnett and Mike James(I sound like an idiot). The Rockets CANNOT play run and gun ball the way they're built. And if Les forces them to, the only untouchable player on the squad is T-Mac.
Dallas was balanced. Both can win championships. But it's just too hard to build for up-tempo ball if you don't have your last 5 years worth of draft picks.
The Warriors actually don't break that well. They try more often than average, but they're not all that successful running the break. They put a lot of speed on the floor, but it's really so they can penetrate from multiple positions. They execute really well in the half court, and every player on the floor can penetrate, and most can shoot.
It's funny that we lost by 4 points to a better team that we still managed to take to Game 7 (you can say this about the Mavs series 2 years ago also), yet now people think our entire system is flawed. We CAN win with the system we have right now. We CAN win with JVG as the coach. We just need better role players that fit in JVG's system. In other words, we need athletic defenders with length and size. Yao should not be guarding Boozer. He was expected to guard him because our starting PF was Chuck freaking Hayes. Get a PF with size like Jamaal Magloire and who can rebound. I don't want to get a PF via the draft unless we can trade up for a guy like Joakim Noah. We need a PF who can help Yao RIGHT NOW, not someone who is young and needs to gain muscle. Another good perimeter defender would also help against a team like the Jazz that have so many shooters like Williams, Giricek, Harpring, Fisher, and Okur. James Posey would be an ideal addition. T-Mac and Battier can't guard everyone on the perimeter.
And again, unless we become idiots and trade Yao, we're not going to play faster. We SHOULDN'T play faster. No "run n' gun". No "hustle n' flow". No "organized chaos".
Spurs and Pistons do both very well. I think people tend to lump them in as slow down/half court teams but they do run a fair amount. Even the Suns half court game is pretty good this year although they along with GS are run n gun.
