Understandable, only explanation I would have of that is him looking to help get the rebound. (as much sense as that makes) other than that, if my memory serves me right, he tried contesting his fair share of shots. Most that I can remember is him just running past shootings.
Wasn't Lin top 10 in steals this season? Anyways, their per 36 steals numbers are almost identical. Beverley 1.9 Lin 1.8
Yeah those pnrs are tough. You see other Rockets players shading Jackson but they don't want to leave their man to help and give up an open 3. Also Jackson made some great moves and hit some nice floaters.
Jackson was torching us with floaters in the lane. Even made a few over Asik who did everything he could to contest. The free throw line floater can be unstoppable if shot consistently.
Well I think this topic is a little ambiguous. What is a good defender? Bev's stats just tell us he's a little above average in the regular season and was terrible in the playoffs. But its hard to judge defensive ability on stats. Some of the best defenders have poor stats because this is a team game. But I'm sure Beverley hasn't proven himself one way or the other yet. He showed during the season in limited minutes against back-up point guards he is slightly above average (according to DRtg) and in the playoffs as a starter he was terrible (according to DRtg). So we'll have to wait and see. One thing I'm definitely sure about is Beverley's abilities are blown way out of proportion on CF.
There was nobody on our team whom had played with anybody else on our team ever before this season. Who'd think such a scenario would create issues with team defense.
Morey pretty much hand-picked the kid himself. He must like something about him. In any case, Morey has stated numerous times in interviews that there are no publicly available defensive metrics that are any good.
Because they are a much, much, much better defensive team than us. With much better individual defenders as well. How do you not acknowledge this.
No, watch more carefully. In several of the plays it is clear that Beverley is just overhelping - his man does not have the ball so he moves over to cover someone else, often with the intent to play QB spy and intercept if a pass goes that way. Some of these are good examples of team defense vs. steal-hunting. Beverley is not much of a worse offender than many in the league (particularly Harden), but it is interesting to note that a lot of people seem to think he's a fantastic defender when it's clear that, in terms of team defense, he actually gets lost quite a bit and is caught off of his man or overhelping on someone not named Durant who doesn't even have the ball. This is classic ball-watching defense, where instead of keeping his eye on his man he follows where the ball goes and just tries to clog the lane or double-team someone one pass away, when he hasn't noticed that his own man has moved one pass away and he should be covering him instead. In terms of on-ball defense, he has a lot of speed and moves around quite a lot, which is often mistaken for good defense. Basic basketball defense is that you stay between your man and the rim, and you contest the shot. Whether it's his fault or not (I'd say it's 50/50 the defense scheme and his own inclinations) he often depends way too much on his speed to give his man space, and then tries to catch up to him to contest the open shot. Also, watch how well he anticipates and then moves around the pick. Which is to say, he doesn't. He runs straight into it. PNR defense is often predicated on practice and communication, so it's easy to give him a pass, but at the very least he should have the vision to notice that there's a guy nearly 7 feet tall who is in his way and either call for the transition or back off his man (give him the open 20-foot shot we want him to take anyway) and move around the screen. Beverley is a great player for his price, but he's not this fantastic revelation that everyone is making him out to be. He's a pure bench hustler, and contrary to popular opinion does make some serious defensive lapses at times.
Lin gets his steals from gambling on defense by staying in passing lanes. Very different from actual ball pressuring which Beverley actually does.
Make no mistake. I think Beverley was an awesome pick-up by Morey and I love the kid's game, hustle, energy, athleticism and most of all ATTITUDE! But he has a lot to prove...
Good video. But the first two shots show exactly what I was griping about- he makes an attempt to double and then doesn't even make a run at the guy with the ball. In the first one, it's Garcia, who's actually farther away who runs all the way across court to try to alter Jackson's shot. And this video shows another facet of his defense that I didn't find great either- Jackson was able to blow by him time and time again and if he get's picked off he doesn't try to fight through it. I do admit that he made an attempt to get a hand in the face on two of the plays but that was more the exception than the norm for the series. I scoured YouTube trying to find similar videos for Jackson's other games but was't able to so if you see some and want to post them, I'm happy to take a look.
Agree, agree and agree. That's my point. An earlier poster said fans, coaches, scouts and national broadcasters all said that Beverley is a great defender and I just don't think that's true at this time.
Totally agree with you but I stand by my post refuting the suggestion that "Lin's weakness is ballhawking which is precisely Beverley's strength" THAT"S PRECISELY F*** WRONG as I pointed out in my post.
No No No I completely disagree with this. One mistake Lin makes frequently is he watches the ball once the ball gets passed into the post. The player that he defends often cuts into the paint and yet Lin is still watching. And as far as positioning and rotating, Lin is NOT a good in that aspect. On the other hand, Lin is good at getting steals..which might be why some of you think that his team defense is good. He has good ability to read the passers mind and stealing the ball. Don't believe me? Watch this video for yourself and you will see, bearing in mind that this is the last game of the season and defensive rotations has already been practiced many many times. <iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/svrr0HJ4SM8?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> From the 1:01 minute mark onwards
Sorry. Then I agree with you. Bev > Lin on ball pressure for sure. But how the heck does Lin get brought up in every conversation. Isn't this about Beverley's defensive prowess?
But as good as they were, they weren't giving Durant man on man coverage. They're collapsing 2-3 guys on him every time. But yet, they're able to still get a man back on the open shooter better than we did. We were getting beat bad by the open man because they were wide open a ton of times.
Which is why I purposely left his name out of the original post- I don't want it to become another Lin vs thread... My point is that everyone is giving Beverley credit for being a great defender and IMHO he isn't yet.
