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Speaker 1: at the volume. Happy Saturday, everybody. Hope all of you
Speaker 1: guys are having an incredible weekend. Well, Day one of
Speaker 1: the NBA Playoffs is officially in the books. We're gonna
Speaker 1: keep it really simple tonight. We're just gonna do it.
Speaker 1: Reactions to all four games in reverse order, starting with
Speaker 1: Lakers Nuggets and finishing with calvs. Magic. You guys know
Speaker 1: the drill before we get started. Subscribe to a brand
Speaker 1: new YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of
Speaker 1: our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason LT.
Speaker 1: That's gonna be important over the next couple of months
Speaker 1: because I'm gonna be doing a bunch of impromptu film
Speaker 1: sessions in the mornings when I have time to kind
Speaker 1: of go over some actual visual examples of the things
Speaker 1: that we talk about at night in the live shows.
Speaker 1: And again, those are gonna be just kind of like
Speaker 1: short notice types of things that don't really plan on.
Speaker 1: We're just gonna do them when we have some time
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Speaker 1: last but not least, keep dropping mailbag questions in the
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Speaker 1: a week during those film session pods during the day.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk some basketball. So, starting with Lakers Nuggets,
Speaker 1: I said before the series in our series preview that
Speaker 1: there were two major dynamics working in Denver's favor. Obviously,
Speaker 1: the first piece is that Yo Kitchen Murray at this
Speaker 1: phase of their careers, are a better duo than Lebron
Speaker 1: James and Anthony Davis, who at this phase in their
Speaker 1: careers are slower, less consistent athletically. Lebron and ad met
Speaker 1: their level tonight. They combined for fifty nine points on
Speaker 1: just forty one shots that twenty rebounds and thirteen assists.
Speaker 1: Nicole Yokitchen Jamal Murray at fifty four, eighteen and seventeen.
Speaker 1: I thought all four of those guys dominated different stretches
Speaker 1: of the game. Obviously, you know, Jo Kic was really
Speaker 1: aggressive in the first quarter, then wasn't super aggressive in
Speaker 1: the middle portion of the game, and then got aggressive
Speaker 1: late right like Lebron. James was super aggressive early in
Speaker 1: the game. Anthony Davis was super aggressive late in the game,
Speaker 1: different phases of the game, different guys in that group
Speaker 1: of four all took over, and really high level basketball
Speaker 1: was being played by those guys. But as I said,
Speaker 1: there are two dynamics that are working in Denver's favor.
Speaker 1: They also have a better rest of their starting lineup.
Speaker 1: Michael Porter Junior and KCP as well as Aaron Gordon,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, are a better trio of basketball players
Speaker 1: than Austin Reeves, D'Angelo Russell and ruiy Haachi Mura. And
Speaker 1: they got completely blitzed in today's game, those three outscored
Speaker 1: the Lakers trio forty three to thirty three. And here's
Speaker 1: the big one killed them on the glass twenty one
Speaker 1: to ten rebound advantage between those three guys and those
Speaker 1: Lakers three. And so I kind of want to start
Speaker 1: with the del matchup because that obviously was the biggest
Speaker 1: swing factor that went against the Lakers last year and
Speaker 1: was my major point of concern coming into this series.
Speaker 1: And one of the main reasons why is that when
Speaker 1: Delo's not hitting shots, because he's also not a good,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of attentive off ball defender, and that's
Speaker 1: such an important thing to be against Denver in particular,
Speaker 1: as soon as you have to take d out because
Speaker 1: when he's not making shots, he becomes borderline damaging as
Speaker 1: a basketball player. You have to bring in one of
Speaker 1: those backup guards, somebody like Gabe Vincent or Spencer Dinwiddie,
Speaker 1: and those guys are just nowhere near the level offensive player,
Speaker 1: and they allowed Denver a lot more leeway with how
Speaker 1: to guard the Lakers. And so I had my eye
Speaker 1: on this matchup coming in and again specifically, there's two things,
Speaker 1: three things excuse me that we're looking at with Delo one,
Speaker 1: can he actually make shots in an environment this physical?
Speaker 1: And what was he one for nine from three tonight?
Speaker 1: Just couldn't make them. Some bad misses in there too.
Speaker 1: That's the thing with Delo, Like he's an outstanding shooter
Speaker 1: that for whatever reason, when the intensity and the physicality
Speaker 1: picks up, the shots just tend to not go in
Speaker 1: decision making. For the most part today, I didn't think
Speaker 1: it was that bad of a decision making making game
Speaker 1: from del had a really bad transition kick ahead pass
Speaker 1: to Ruy Hatchamura took a couple really really tough shots
Speaker 1: in pick and roll that were in the mid range
Speaker 1: and at the rim that I didn't think were good shots.
Speaker 1: But like, that wasn't the worst part of his game today.
Speaker 1: But on the defensive end of the floor, we saw
Speaker 1: that off ball attentiveness. Now again, usually what the Lakers
Speaker 1: have been able to do with del is put him
Speaker 1: onto a pretty limited offensive player and so he can
Speaker 1: kind of roam around and play passing lanes and just
Speaker 1: kind of do the de Lo float around thing. Can't
Speaker 1: do that with KCP. KCP is an extremely active offensive player,
Speaker 1: running his lane and transition, cutting and screening off the ball.
Speaker 1: He's a guy that can hit movement jump shots, which
Speaker 1: requires you to be engaged in lock and trail situations.
Speaker 1: I tweeted out a clip today of a player de
Speaker 1: Lo after literally CACP had already made I think two
Speaker 1: or three threes at this point. A Delo's guarding KCP,
Speaker 1: CACP setting him up for a screening action. Delos not
Speaker 1: paying attention when KCP makes the cut. Delo's just the
Speaker 1: split second late to start his lock and trail. KCP
Speaker 1: breaks free again to hit another shot. Now, it's just
Speaker 1: one game, and Delo has been better in some leverage
Speaker 1: games this year, not the least of which were the
Speaker 1: New Orleans Pelicans game, a team that also brings a
Speaker 1: lot of length and athleticism on the perimeter and can
Speaker 1: cause problems. So again, that dynamic just has to switch
Speaker 1: around the other way. You saw that KCP just flat
Speaker 1: out out played D'Angelo Russell today. That's a matchup that's
Speaker 1: swung heavily in that favor, I in Denver's favor, I
Speaker 1: don't want to go too hard on Ruy. Ruy is
Speaker 1: being put in a really, really difficult spot in this series.
Speaker 1: He's being asked to guard Nicole Yokich. Lebron and Ad
Speaker 1: are basically just leaving him out, hung out to dry there.
Speaker 1: There was a little bit more AD on Jokic in
Speaker 1: the fourth quarter, but for the most part they've just
Speaker 1: kind of let him go down there and get barbecued.
Speaker 1: And one of the problems there is like he can't
Speaker 1: help you on the glass like that, and Lebron and
Speaker 1: Ad are getting caught in a lot of cross matches anyway,
Speaker 1: where they're getting pulled away from the rint. One of
Speaker 1: the things I talked about during the game for those
Speaker 1: of you guys who follow me on Twitter, like these
Speaker 1: cross matches were like Ad fall down in the backcourt
Speaker 1: and then runs down the floor and ends up guarding
Speaker 1: Michael Porter Junior. Those are totally disastrous because either his
Speaker 1: instincts as a helper bring him into the lane and
Speaker 1: then Michael Porter Junior hits a three over him, which
Speaker 1: happened in this game, or Ad is stuck contesting threes
Speaker 1: are guarding him at the three point line, which leaves
Speaker 1: Ruey and Lebron by themselves underneath the basket to contend
Speaker 1: with Aaron Gordon and Nikola Jokic, which is gonna end
Speaker 1: the same way just about every single time. And this
Speaker 1: is something with Ad where like he falls down a
Speaker 1: lot on layup attempts and it's a grifting thing. Like
Speaker 1: I know, all there's a small I'm gonna reference them
Speaker 1: as a small segment of the fan base because I
Speaker 1: don't necessarily think it's a prevailing opinion among normal basketball fans.
Speaker 1: But there are some people out there that think the
Speaker 1: Lakers get basically conspiracy theory whistle and that the league
Speaker 1: is trying to give them a free throw advantage, and like, really,
Speaker 1: all it is is the Lakers are a defense that
Speaker 1: doesn't commit fouls and then they score almost all their
Speaker 1: points in the pain and they have a bunch of
Speaker 1: guys who are good at grifting, right, Austin Reeves is
Speaker 1: a grifter. Anthony Davis is a grifter. But when you grift,
Speaker 1: there's a downside to it. Anthony Davis, when he takes
Speaker 1: shots around the rim and he falls down, sometimes he
Speaker 1: gets a call and the other team is perplexed and
Speaker 1: they look over the sideline and they wonder what's going on,
Speaker 1: And yeah, obviously that's where it works out for Ad.
Speaker 1: But then when he falls down and he doesn't get
Speaker 1: the call. The Nuggets are extremely good at pushing out
Speaker 1: the other way. Yokic. You can always see Yokic like
Speaker 1: look behind him, identify the ads on the ground, and
Speaker 1: he immediately starts pushing the other way. And if they
Speaker 1: don't get a basket in transition, they get a cross match,
Speaker 1: and then the cross match ends up causing problems. Anyway,
Speaker 1: they had twenty one fast break points in this game.
Speaker 1: They dominated the offensive glass and dominated those fast break situations.
Speaker 1: Those are execution related mistakes, and like, you know, this
Speaker 1: is gonna be something we talk a lot about with
Speaker 1: the Lakers in particular in the series. Denver is the
Speaker 1: best execution team in the league. In my opinion. They
Speaker 1: had just four turnovers in this game. Every time they
Speaker 1: found a favorable matchup that they liked, they immediately looked
Speaker 1: to attack it, even like little things like I noticed
Speaker 1: that when Michael Porter Junior or Jamal Murray would get
Speaker 1: ad on a switch, whether it was in a screening
Speaker 1: action or in transition, those guys just know to get
Speaker 1: a shot up because it doesn't matter if they miss.
Speaker 1: Because the Lakers are such a bad back line rebounding team,
Speaker 1: and you know, like if Lebron is engaged in a
Speaker 1: box out with nikolea Jokic or ruy Hachamura is engaged
Speaker 1: in a box out with nicolea Jokic. Even if you
Speaker 1: happen to keep him ground bound, he's either gonna reach
Speaker 1: over the top and grab it or any other location
Speaker 1: for the rebound is gonna be a favorable situation for
Speaker 1: Aaron Gordon. And so that's gonna be a big thing
Speaker 1: that we're gonna be looking at for the Lakers that
Speaker 1: have any chance to keep this series competitive in the
Speaker 1: long run, they have to execute better. We talked about d'angela,
Speaker 1: Russell and KCP. We talked about cross matches in transition situations.
Speaker 1: It's almost more important for Ad to just sprint back
Speaker 1: every time than anything else that he can get on
Speaker 1: the offensive end, attacking the offensive glass or trying to
Speaker 1: get to the foul line, because again, those are possessions
Speaker 1: that Denver is scoring at an extremely efficient rate. I
Speaker 1: wanted to shout out DeAndre Jordan, you know, so he
Speaker 1: ended up having to come into this game because I
Speaker 1: thought the Lakers came out really well early. They came
Speaker 1: out super physically aggressive. Lebron and Ad were out playing
Speaker 1: Yokichen Murray. In the early portion of the game. They
Speaker 1: were playing super physical defense. Austin Reeves, even though he
Speaker 1: struggled in specific stretches, I thought he did a solid
Speaker 1: job chasing Jamal Murray around. They had control early. They
Speaker 1: got two fouls apiece on both Peyton Watson and Aaron Gordon,
Speaker 1: and so Mike Malon's in a little bit of a predicament.
Speaker 1: He ends up having to go to DeAndre Jordan. I
Speaker 1: thought DeAndre Jordan was really good, setting good ball screens
Speaker 1: and rolling into space. He scored on the roll twice,
Speaker 1: once with a dunk, once with a foul. He held
Speaker 1: up well against Anthony Davis and Iso. This is actually
Speaker 1: ironic because ad in isolation was a huge issue for
Speaker 1: the Lakers last year, and that was something that I
Speaker 1: talked about in our series preview. Jokic I can't remember
Speaker 1: the exact number, but Jokic just like completely put ad
Speaker 1: in jail in one on one situations last year, and
Speaker 1: that was a huge problem. One of the encouraging pieces
Speaker 1: here was Anthony Davis, especially in that fourth quarter run,
Speaker 1: was like going right at nicolea Jokic and scoring relatively easily,
Speaker 1: which is if you're if you're looking for silver lining
Speaker 1: as a Lakers fan, Lebron and Ad looked great, and
Speaker 1: so if you're all you really need is for your
Speaker 1: role players to play better. But again, like this is
Speaker 1: the thing. It's it's so funny. This is the one
Speaker 1: series that I'm watching as a fan, right, Like I
Speaker 1: have a rooting interest in this series for the Lakers.
Speaker 1: All these other series I'm just covering as an analyst, right,
Speaker 1: But like as a fan, I've got my basketball brain
Speaker 1: behind it, right, and all of my experience with the
Speaker 1: game and all of my film study, and I know
Speaker 1: the result, right, Like I know how this movie ends.
Speaker 1: This movie ends the way Tonight ended in you know,
Speaker 1: five or six games, you know as at some point
Speaker 1: over the course of the next couple of weeks, right, So,
Speaker 1: like it's kind of like watching a car crash in
Speaker 1: slow motion when you know exactly what needs to be done,
Speaker 1: but you know that those guys struggle to do that,
Speaker 1: and so like you're hoping for something that can't actually happen.
Speaker 1: There's a certain helplessness and a hopelessness that you feel
Speaker 1: as a fan watching Denver. But honestly, to get that
Speaker 1: type of performance out of DeAndre Jordan. Those are just
Speaker 1: that's just found money in a playoff series. I thought
Speaker 1: that was big time, you know. Getting back to the
Speaker 1: execution thing. One of the things that the Lakers have
Speaker 1: done all season long, and you Lakers fans will know
Speaker 1: exactly what I'm talking about here, is they can go
Speaker 1: through these like three four minute stretches where they literally
Speaker 1: lose their fucking mind, like on both ends of the floor,
Speaker 1: horrible execution mistakes, not sprinting back in transition, giving up
Speaker 1: cross matches, not sticking to the game plan, bad closeouts,
Speaker 1: all this kind of stuff, and then on the other
Speaker 1: end of the floor also losing their mind in offensive execution.
Speaker 1: Do you guys remember the Jamal Murray three, the three
Speaker 1: in the corner. It was a transition play. He was
Speaker 1: in the deep corners, a transition kick ahead. It was
Speaker 1: the one where the pass went got kicked up the
Speaker 1: floor to Aaron Gordon and Lebron was there and kind
Speaker 1: of like funneled him behind the backboard and then Aaron
Speaker 1: Gordon kicked it to Jamal Murray in the right corner.
Speaker 1: D Loo and Austin both quit on that play. They
Speaker 1: were both jogging back and neither of them of them
Speaker 1: were getting matched up. Lebron did his job and forced
Speaker 1: the kick ahead pass into a position where he couldn't score.
Speaker 1: From there, your transition defense has to spread out and
Speaker 1: get matched up. And it's like that, that's not oh,
Speaker 1: we lost because Jokic is amazing. That's not oh we
Speaker 1: lost because Jamal Murray keeps hitting shots. That's you not
Speaker 1: doing your job. And when you don't do your job,
Speaker 1: Denver makes you pay. And then they'll go through these
Speaker 1: rolls on the offensive end of the floor where it's
Speaker 1: like their success offensively comes through five out and horn
Speaker 1: sets and three man actions at the top of the
Speaker 1: key to get the defense into rotation and then playing
Speaker 1: off of each other with your aggregate offensive skill. But
Speaker 1: they'll lose their damn minds and just walk the ball
Speaker 1: up the floor and run a ball screen, and di
Speaker 1: Lo will miss some shot, or Lebron will get a
Speaker 1: switch and take a bad step back three or something
Speaker 1: like that, and like, really, if you zoom out of
Speaker 1: the game. The Lakers stayed really competitive throughout, except for
Speaker 1: a bad stretch in the middle of the second quarter,
Speaker 1: in a bad stretch in the middle of the third quarter,
Speaker 1: but that's what Denver does. They don't stop executing. They
Speaker 1: just keep playing Denver nugget basketball until you let go
Speaker 1: of the rope. And then as soon as you let
Speaker 1: go of the rope, all hell breaks loose and you
Speaker 1: end up in a really bad position. So again, like
Speaker 1: as a fan, it was tough to watch, But this
Speaker 1: is kind of more or less what we expect in
Speaker 1: this series, right, Like Denver is their duo. Like again,
Speaker 1: Lebron and ad were able to match Jamal Murray and
Speaker 1: then Koliokich in a one game setting. Will they be
Speaker 1: able to do that throughout the series? I think that's
Speaker 1: gonna tilt towards Jamal Murray and Nikoliokich over the course
Speaker 1: of the series. Do I think Ruey and DL and
Speaker 1: Austin will have a game or two in this series
Speaker 1: where they outplay the Nuggets role players. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: they'll have a game or two where they do so,
Speaker 1: and when they do, Lakers have a good chance to win.
Speaker 1: But chances are, over the course of the five, six, seven,
Speaker 1: however long the series goes, chances are those dynamics are
Speaker 1: gonna tilt towards Denver. It's not just a one game thing.
Speaker 1: This is what they've been doing all season. Like the
Speaker 1: Lakers have had issues with three four minutes stretches of
Speaker 1: bad basketball that cost them ten points on the scoreboard
Speaker 1: all season long. It's part of their basketball character. It's
Speaker 1: who they are. So again, like we like to pretend
Speaker 1: like this stuff doesn't matter, but it does matter because
Speaker 1: you ended up in a big game here, you threw
Speaker 1: a great punch, you had a double figure lead, and
Speaker 1: you choked it away in a matter of minutes in
Speaker 1: the second quarter. It wasn't like a long drawn out
Speaker 1: Denver run. It was a handful of possessions and the
Speaker 1: game was tied. And like it. Like again, so believe
Speaker 1: teams when they tell you who they are over the
Speaker 1: course of the regular season. So good win for Denver again.
Speaker 1: Expect a couple of adjustments I expect from the Lakers.
Speaker 1: I think they will eventually have Lebron James and Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis take more of than Nicola Jokic assignment. I think
Speaker 1: offensive execution is going to be a big one from
Speaker 1: them too, just in the sense that they're going to
Speaker 1: need to stay into their five out and run action
Speaker 1: and make sure they don't get stagnant and then Lastly,
Speaker 1: I think Darvin Ham's gonna have to make a call
Speaker 1: on nights like tonight when d Lo just doesn't have it.
Speaker 1: You know, maybe you get instead of getting one for
Speaker 1: nine out of de Lo, you get one for four
Speaker 1: out of Gabe Vincent, but he doesn't lose KCP four times. Right, So, like,
Speaker 1: those are the types of decisions that Darvin's gonna have
Speaker 1: to make over the course of the series. You want
Speaker 1: to give Delo another chance, you needd Lo out there.
Speaker 1: He's a swing piece in the series, but if he
Speaker 1: doesn't have it, you gotta pivot, all right. Moving on
Speaker 1: to Sixers Nicks, I saw so much of what I
Speaker 1: liked about both teams in this matchup. Right, Like I
Speaker 1: said in our series preview, the Knicks are the tougher,
Speaker 1: more physical team that has better basketball character. Right, they
Speaker 1: get twenty three offensive rebounds, and they dominate the fast
Speaker 1: breakpoint advantage twenty seven to eleven. What I say about
Speaker 1: the Sixers, they are the more talented team, especially when
Speaker 1: it comes to offensive skill. Well, the Sixers in this
Speaker 1: game had a ninety nine offense of rating in the
Speaker 1: half court and the Knicks had just a seventy seven
Speaker 1: offensive rating. In the half court. So that's right. The
Speaker 1: Knicks lost the half court battle by over twenty two
Speaker 1: points per one hundred possessions. Yet they won the game
Speaker 1: because they absolutely dominated on the margins twenty six to
Speaker 1: eight in second chance points, twenty seven to eleven in
Speaker 1: fast break points. That's a fifty three to nineteen advantage.
Speaker 1: So like, the reality is for the Sixers that they
Speaker 1: have to kind of remember here is like the toughness
Speaker 1: from the Knicks is not going away. It's their basketball identity,
Speaker 1: it's who they are. So if the Sixers want to
Speaker 1: have a chance to win the series, they absolutely have
Speaker 1: to hold up better on the glass and in transition,
Speaker 1: better box outs, better efforts for contested rebounds, sprinting back
Speaker 1: in transition. Now, one thing I'll say for the Sixers,
Speaker 1: I did think they got a little shook up by
Speaker 1: the Embiid injury there in that late first half situation,
Speaker 1: and obviously it was a deluge of a run from
Speaker 1: the New York Knicks there, but they had a similar
Speaker 1: kind of issue there in the fourth quarter where they
Speaker 1: were getting pushed around. So that's something that they're gonna
Speaker 1: have to deal with. But despite all of that, the
Speaker 1: Sixers did have a fourth quarter lead, it was the
Speaker 1: game plan that burned them. We talked about in our
Speaker 1: series preview that I think that I thought the Sixers
Speaker 1: had to kind of close out short on Josh Hart,
Speaker 1: to try to shrink the floor on Jalen Brunson and
Speaker 1: try to make things tougher on him. And you know,
Speaker 1: Josh Hart this season shot just thirty two point eight
Speaker 1: percent on catch and shoot jumpers, but he made four
Speaker 1: of them in this game, including a couple of massive
Speaker 1: ones late in the game. And so some of that
Speaker 1: is like you just got to tip the cat because
Speaker 1: as part of the game plan, if you start chasing
Speaker 1: Josh Hart off the three point line, that's just gonna
Speaker 1: make things easier for Jalen Brunson. You have to kind
Speaker 1: of hope that over the course of the series that
Speaker 1: that works in your favor. I thought the Sixers generally
Speaker 1: did a good job on Jalen Brunson. I was initially
Speaker 1: kind of annoyed at how often they were giving up switches. So,
Speaker 1: like we talked about this in our series preview, but
Speaker 1: like what the Knicks will do is they'll run a
Speaker 1: guard guards screen at the beginning of the possession to
Speaker 1: get the matchup they like with Jalen Brunson, then they
Speaker 1: will go run the ball screen right, And so what
Speaker 1: they were doing in this game is they were bringing
Speaker 1: up Tyrese Maxey every single time and getting him switched
Speaker 1: on to Brunson, and then Brunson was going to work,
Speaker 1: which was irritating me just because I feel like there's
Speaker 1: I feel like you can get better screen navigation out
Speaker 1: of Kelly Ubray and Nick Batum, and I felt like
Speaker 1: it was just too much of the game plan to
Speaker 1: concede those switches. But then Tyrese Vaxi just did a
Speaker 1: really good job. I think he blocked Jalen Brunson from
Speaker 1: behind with back pressure at least two or three times. Like,
Speaker 1: did a good job, and they shrunk the floor. They
Speaker 1: Embiid when he was on the floor, did an amazing
Speaker 1: job protecting the rim. It was a very good defensive
Speaker 1: effort from Philly in the half court. It was on
Speaker 1: the margins where they lost this game. But easily the
Speaker 1: biggest story of this game in my opinion, was Mitchell
Speaker 1: Robinson induced McBride. So one of the things we talked
Speaker 1: about in the series preview was Deuce McBride being more
Speaker 1: capable of hanging with Tyrase Maxie in terms of his quickness.
Speaker 1: And I showed you guys some clips in the film session,
Speaker 1: if you guys remember, but I also talked about how
Speaker 1: Deuce McBride actually has like a little bit more offensive
Speaker 1: pop than what he gets credit for. And he's a
Speaker 1: guy he's one of those like classic guards who like
Speaker 1: wasn't viewed as an NBA level kind of initiator, but
Speaker 1: was viewed as an NBA level defender, And so his
Speaker 1: role in the NBA was kind of like defensive focused.
Speaker 1: But he is a guard, a guard that has a
Speaker 1: lot of experience doing work off the bounce, and he
Speaker 1: has some of that in his game, and a little
Speaker 1: by a little over the course of the last couple
Speaker 1: of years, you just see, like on any given night,
Speaker 1: you just see a little bit more of Deuce and
Speaker 1: a little bit more of what he can do offensively,
Speaker 1: especially after they traded away everybody in the OG and
Speaker 1: ANDOBI deal, right like that just kind of put them
Speaker 1: in a situation where Deuce had to be more aggressive offensively,
Speaker 1: and he's taken advantage of that. He had some big
Speaker 1: shots in this one, including that big pull up three
Speaker 1: at the middle of the at the top of the
Speaker 1: key there in that fourth quarter run, like and you
Speaker 1: saw it in the minutes Duce played more than Dante DiVincenzo.
Speaker 1: That clearly is the direction that they're looking to go.
Speaker 1: I also thought he did a good job flattening out
Speaker 1: Tyres Maxi Drives. Talked a lot about Tyre's Maxi dribble
Speaker 1: penetration in the series preview. It's one of the biggest
Speaker 1: factors for how I think Philly can keep New York
Speaker 1: in rotation when they get into the half court, and
Speaker 1: you saw that, like, especially in that third quarter run.
Speaker 1: My god, Tyre's Maxi was just dusting everybody off the
Speaker 1: dribble and getting into the lane. But again, when you
Speaker 1: flatten out the drive a little bit, just imagine like this,
Speaker 1: instead of a straight line drive, a little bit more
Speaker 1: of a banana route to get to where you're going.
Speaker 1: That buys time for your back line to actually recover
Speaker 1: and to get into position defensively. And I thought, I thought,
Speaker 1: you know, honestly, like it's gonna be one of those
Speaker 1: things where I think, over the course of the series,
Speaker 1: we're going to see a lot more of Duce McBride,
Speaker 1: either in the starting lineup or just playing more minutes
Speaker 1: and certainly closing the game. As far as Mitchell Robinson goes,
Speaker 1: I thought he was a revel. I want to shout
Speaker 1: out Joel Embiid. I thought he dominated this basketball game
Speaker 1: for the most part, and like you saw it from
Speaker 1: the opening tip, he was being physically aggressive, like he
Speaker 1: made some jump shots, but like he was looking to
Speaker 1: play bullyball towards the rim, which is something we've all
Speaker 1: been begging for with him Beid for a really long time,
Speaker 1: right getting where he wanted to go, having a lot
Speaker 1: of success in that. In that fourth quarter run in particular,
Speaker 1: you saw the advantage that Mitchell Robinson brings in terms
Speaker 1: of his size. So one of the things that I noticed,
Speaker 1: and I'll kind of share this as an example just
Speaker 1: with my experience playing, so like when I'm looking across
Speaker 1: my across the way at a defender and I know
Speaker 1: that I can get a shot over him whenever I want,
Speaker 1: there's a very comfortable feeling I have where I know that,
Speaker 1: like I can at any moment, even if I make
Speaker 1: a move and I get cut off, I can get
Speaker 1: to this pull up jump shot or this step back
Speaker 1: jump shot or this whatever off the dribble jump shot
Speaker 1: to get a decent look over the top. But whenever
Speaker 1: I do play against a really lanky wing someone that
Speaker 1: can actually kind of like provide that contest to where
Speaker 1: I have to get separation to get to my pull
Speaker 1: up jump shot, it changes everything about my approach offensively.
Speaker 1: Now I almost always have to call in a screening action,
Speaker 1: because why would I try to take an extremely difficult
Speaker 1: shot over a lanky contest when I can try to
Speaker 1: navigate him through a screen to try to get to
Speaker 1: a different spot on the floor. That gap there is
Speaker 1: about the length. If the length isn't there, I'm always
Speaker 1: comfortable because I know it can get over the top.
Speaker 1: If the length is there, it fundamentally changes the way
Speaker 1: you have to approach things offensively. Right, did you notice
Speaker 1: the difference in the Joel Embiid jumpers when Mitchell Robinson
Speaker 1: was on him in the second half. They weren't just misses,
Speaker 1: they were bad misses. Mitchell Robinson's contest was damn near
Speaker 1: at Embiid's release point, significantly bothering him, and he was
Speaker 1: missing him like way short, barely grazing the front of
Speaker 1: the rim. On some of these. Why does that matter,
Speaker 1: Because when Embiid is in those like when he's catching
Speaker 1: at the top of the key in the pick and pop,
Speaker 1: or when he's working in that you know, eighteen foot
Speaker 1: area off of the short roll and he's catching and
Speaker 1: he's jab stepping. Typically what happens the dynamic that he
Speaker 1: runs into with other defenders around the league is the
Speaker 1: guy either is too far off and Embiid can just
Speaker 1: easily jab step to gain his rhythm and rise up
Speaker 1: over the top and knock down that shot at a
Speaker 1: high percentage, or the guy has to pressure because he
Speaker 1: doesn't have the length to bother the shot, so he
Speaker 1: has to bother the shooting pocket. That's when they get
Speaker 1: into issues committing fouls. Right. What gives Mitchell Robinson the
Speaker 1: advantage in this matchup is he can actually play off
Speaker 1: a little bit while also getting a great contest. He
Speaker 1: blocked him beat on a three earlier in the game.
Speaker 1: I showed a clip in a film session a while
Speaker 1: back of a play of him blocking Damian Lillard in
Speaker 1: drop coverage once when he was sprinting back in transition.
Speaker 1: His reach when he gives a contest is freaking insane
Speaker 1: and he can really cause problem there. And so now
Speaker 1: like Embiid is going to have to solve that, and
Speaker 1: he did draw. He drew a foul on Mitch Robinson
Speaker 1: late in the game on a rip through move when
Speaker 1: he just got really physically aggressive. But that's gonna be
Speaker 1: his kind of like chess match that he's gonna have
Speaker 1: to solve Mitchell Robinson. And by the way, this is
Speaker 1: this is part of what it takes, you know, reaching
Speaker 1: where you want to reach as a basketball player. It's
Speaker 1: not always going to be easy. Even the best players
Speaker 1: in the world, they have advantages over the vast majority
Speaker 1: of players in the league, but they end up running
Speaker 1: into a guy or a handful of guys that can
Speaker 1: kind of hang with them physically, and then it becomes
Speaker 1: more of a challenge. Think like Lebron James in his
Speaker 1: prime against Kawhi Leonard or Andre woodall Right, it's like
Speaker 1: these guys can really match up with Lebron athletically, which
Speaker 1: makes it so that he has to work a lot
Speaker 1: harder for his buckets. Right. We've even seen it with Jokic.
Speaker 1: With some of the bigger, stronger centers around the league,
Speaker 1: like Embiid, like use off Nerkic. When there are guys
Speaker 1: that can kind of, you'll kitchen some of his size
Speaker 1: and strength, it just makes the game a little bit tougher, right,
Speaker 1: And so Embiid is running into a challenge here. Mitchell
Speaker 1: Robinson can kind of sort of hang with him physically,
Speaker 1: and so that's the advantage, that's the the swing factor
Speaker 1: that he has to deal with. Right. Deuce McBride can
Speaker 1: kind of hang with Tyres Maxey's speed, Mitchell Robinson can
Speaker 1: kind of hang with Joel Embiid's size. So adjustments for
Speaker 1: Philly moving forward in the series. Philly has to match
Speaker 1: New York's toughness at some level. They can't keep letting
Speaker 1: Josh Hart run rough shot over them for every offensive rebound,
Speaker 1: and they have to make their box out so they
Speaker 1: have to get back and transition all of those details, right,
Speaker 1: But secondly, Joel Embiid has to find a way to
Speaker 1: solve the Mitchell Robinson problem. And again, like I said,
Speaker 1: I think what it's gonna be is physical, physical aggression
Speaker 1: and trying to get him into foul trouble because if
Speaker 1: he can get him off the floor of foul trouble,
Speaker 1: He's had a lot of success against Hartenstein in this
Speaker 1: particular game. All Right, moving on to Suns Wolves. So
Speaker 1: there are two endulums in this series that we're going
Speaker 1: to see swing back and forth. And so I want
Speaker 1: to start with the Suns on offense. If you guys
Speaker 1: remember all season long, I've been talking about with the
Speaker 1: Suns the difference between when they play advantage basketball versus
Speaker 1: when they play one on one or two on two basketball.
Speaker 1: One on one obviously meaning ISO post ups, two on
Speaker 1: two obviously meaning ball screens, right, And they've been really
Speaker 1: good with that this year. Right, they're sixty four percent
Speaker 1: in assist percentage this season. They were fifty seven percent
Speaker 1: in the postseason last year. Obviously they're the data, and
Speaker 1: the regular season's messed up because of the Kevin Durant trade,
Speaker 1: but post All Star Break this year they've been even better.
Speaker 1: They've been at sixty six percent in assist percentage. But
Speaker 1: they had just sixteen assists on thirty three made field
Speaker 1: goals against Minnesota. That's just a forty eight point five
Speaker 1: percent assists percentage. So, like that is the pendulum for
Speaker 1: Phoenix offensively? Are they playing advantage basketball, playing driving kick
Speaker 1: and getting guys close out opportunities or are they trying
Speaker 1: to make tough contests to pull up jump shots over
Speaker 1: elite individual defenders, right, And you saw that today and
Speaker 1: the Stars mostly struggled. Kad was great, but he had
Speaker 1: by far the most favorable matchup, right. Minnesota went with
Speaker 1: Carl Towns on him to start the game. He went
Speaker 1: eleven for seventeen from the field with thirty one points. Right.
Speaker 1: But Bradley Beal was just six for ten with fifteen
Speaker 1: points and Devin Booker was just five for sixteen with
Speaker 1: eighteen points. Right, So that's what that's eleven for twenty
Speaker 1: six for thirty three points. That's just not good enough
Speaker 1: from those two guys, right. I want to shout out
Speaker 1: the Wolves primiitter defenders. I thought Anthony Edwards was incredible.
Speaker 1: I thought Jaden McDaniels did an insanely good job. Nikaile
Speaker 1: Alexander Walker was really good. And then Mike Conley, you know,
Speaker 1: for you know, a guy that doesn't really have a
Speaker 1: reputation as being a quality perimeter devender. I thought he
Speaker 1: defended extremely well in this game. So here's the question, though, Jason,
Speaker 1: you also said in your series preview that Minnesota's game
Speaker 1: plan should be to guard those things one on one
Speaker 1: and two on two, stay home off the ball, and
Speaker 1: bait them into that you are correct. And that is
Speaker 1: absolutely what Minnesota is trying to do. So Minnesota won
Speaker 1: that game plan battle in this particular situation. Right. They're
Speaker 1: trying to make Phoenix make shots tough contested shots in
Speaker 1: one on one and two on two situations. So how
Speaker 1: do you counter that? How do you counter when a
Speaker 1: defense is trying to make you play one on one
Speaker 1: on two on two and stay home off the ball.
Speaker 1: You have to take advantage of the little tiny windows
Speaker 1: that do materialize. Right, So the way that you avoid
Speaker 1: those those one on one and two v two situations
Speaker 1: is when they're running their screening actions, you do a
Speaker 1: good job communicating switches and pursuing over the top so
Speaker 1: that you don't leave openings right. And when the openings appear,
Speaker 1: you chase them off by closing out right, and you
Speaker 1: quickly close those openings and you get back into your
Speaker 1: one on one situations, and then it's just about not overhelping.
Speaker 1: So if you see guy working downhill or a guy
Speaker 1: rolling and pick and roll, instead of tagging the roller,
Speaker 1: you stay home instead of digging down on the driver,
Speaker 1: you stay home, and essentially you bank on the fact
Speaker 1: that Rudy Gobert and Jade McDaniels or Rudy Gobar and
Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards are going to be able to make those
Speaker 1: into low enough per percented shots. Right. That's kind of
Speaker 1: like the game plan version of it. Right. But even
Speaker 1: when that's happening, and we're gonna do a film session
Speaker 1: on this, I don't know if I'll be able to
Speaker 1: get one in tomorrow, but we'll certainly have a film
Speaker 1: session on Monday, So at some point in the next
Speaker 1: two days, certainly before game two of all these series.
Speaker 1: I'll give you guys some visual examples to demonstrate what
Speaker 1: I'm talking about. But there are openings that do briefly
Speaker 1: kind of appear in Minnesota's defense. Those have to be
Speaker 1: capitalized on every single time. If there's a hedge and recover,
Speaker 1: even if it's only a little bit open, throw the
Speaker 1: swing pass, because even if the defenders closing out, there's
Speaker 1: usually a baked in rip through right hedge recover. He's
Speaker 1: recovering on the let's just say the ball handlers on
Speaker 1: the left wing and the screeners on the right wing,
Speaker 1: and it's Grayson Allen and he sets a brush screen
Speaker 1: and he slips out and the you know on ball
Speaker 1: defender throws a or the Grayson Allen's defender throws quick
Speaker 1: hedge and recovers out. He's closing out on Grayson Allen's
Speaker 1: right hand, so Grayson has to catch and it little
Speaker 1: examples like when Kevin Durant was getting doubled in the
Speaker 1: post on Carl Towns and Jade McDaniels was guarding Grayson
Speaker 1: Allen on the left wing and Grayson Allen's playing that
Speaker 1: stupid back and forth re enter kickout, re enter kickout game.
Speaker 1: At one point, Grayson Allen pump faked, McDaniels jumped out
Speaker 1: of his shoes and Grayson Allen just threw another post entry.
Speaker 1: It's like no, no, no, no, no, that's it. That's it,
Speaker 1: the job is done. He left his feet. You drive now.
Speaker 1: As soon as you drive, you wait for the next
Speaker 1: offender to come up. You make the read. That is
Speaker 1: when the Suns are at their best because they have
Speaker 1: such amazing driving kick talent, and I really do think
Speaker 1: they're the most talented driving kick team in the league
Speaker 1: when they actually play that way. But they get away
Speaker 1: from that too. Frequently, so obviously taking advantage of those
Speaker 1: little openings that show up any three man action that
Speaker 1: causes switching, so like it talks about this with the Lakers,
Speaker 1: but being deliberate about running your sets at the beginning
Speaker 1: of the possession to create those small openings. So like,
Speaker 1: usually when there's a switch, there's usually a small like
Speaker 1: a small gap in time right when the defender switches
Speaker 1: where the new defender on the ball is not quite
Speaker 1: in position to take advantage of it. Those have to
Speaker 1: be quickly taken. Advantage of getting multiple actions in the
Speaker 1: same possession. Those of you guys have followed our film
Speaker 1: sessions have seen when you run action on the strong
Speaker 1: side and then move it around and run action again,
Speaker 1: that second side action is almost always more effective because
Speaker 1: the defense isn't loaded up, it's rotating over as you're
Speaker 1: running the action, versus loaded up as you're running the
Speaker 1: action right, So like, be deliberate about playing with more pace.
Speaker 1: Get the ball across half court, quickly, run something, reverse
Speaker 1: the ball to the other side, run it again, and
Speaker 1: then you'll have a better chance of getting the defense
Speaker 1: in rotation. Lastly, find an entry point. So for instance,
Speaker 1: Kat was on Kevin Durant and Kevin Durant was mainly
Speaker 1: using that as an opportunity to hunt his own shot.
Speaker 1: Totally fine, Katie's super efficient. Those are efficient possessions. What
Speaker 1: I would do is use Kadi on Kat as an
Speaker 1: entry point, use it as a means with which to
Speaker 1: get the defense in rotation. Those double teams like I
Speaker 1: was talking about Grace and Al pump fake get out
Speaker 1: of his shoes, drive the clothes out right Katie using
Speaker 1: those dribble combinations to get catoff balance and then beat
Speaker 1: him off the dribble, get into the lane, draw second defender,
Speaker 1: kick out. Use entry points to get the defense in rotation. Again,
Speaker 1: you've got to generate closeout opportunities for Bradley Beal and
Speaker 1: Devin Booker. They're not going to be efficient enough against
Speaker 1: the top tier perimeter defense talent that Minnesota has. And
Speaker 1: then I want to shout out Rudy Gobert in a
Speaker 1: lot of these two on two situations. So again, we've
Speaker 1: talked so much about the one on one element in
Speaker 1: ball screens. In two on two, Ridy Gobert's ability to
Speaker 1: credibly defend on the ball screen while also we're defending
Speaker 1: the role man is what makes this work. And then
Speaker 1: in a lot of situations when the Phoenix ball handlers
Speaker 1: were dragging the ball screens out, like go Bear, sliding
Speaker 1: with him and switching and then guarding these guys on
Speaker 1: an island, and then they're comfortable, you know, kind of
Speaker 1: just keeping Nurkic off the glass by just kind of
Speaker 1: peeling off and boxing him out. Right, So like that
Speaker 1: that dynamic, it's the bracket coverage that I always talked about.
Speaker 1: And you're not going to find a better bracket in
Speaker 1: the league, then Go Bare and Jaden McDaniels, right, Like,
Speaker 1: those are two of the very best at that specific dynamics.
Speaker 1: So that pendulum is gonna be with Phoenix on offense,
Speaker 1: is going to swing back and forth over the course
Speaker 1: of the series, with Phoenix gets Minnesota in rotation a
Speaker 1: lot and gets really fluid, beautiful basketball, beautiful shots in
Speaker 1: high level offense, or back the other way, stagnant one
Speaker 1: on one and two on two, really tough contested pull
Speaker 1: up jumpers against outstanding individual defenders. Minnesota on offense, the
Speaker 1: pendulum is Anthony Edwards, his playmaking and his pull up shooting.
Speaker 1: You saw the Phoenix game play early. We talked about
Speaker 1: this in the series preview, when Anthony has the ball,
Speaker 1: they're running a high drop with Nurkic and they're hedging
Speaker 1: with uh with U Banks, and they're tagging the roller.
Speaker 1: They're digging down in driving lanes. They're overloading on Ant
Speaker 1: and basically trying to bait him in to not making
Speaker 1: the reads and settling for bad shots, either driving into
Speaker 1: traffic and turning it over, which he did six times tonight,
Speaker 1: or picking early bad pull up jump shots. Right, that's
Speaker 1: the pendulum. And then with Mike Conley, they're doing a
Speaker 1: low drop, staying home off the ball, trying to bait
Speaker 1: him into being a score, trying to take advantage of
Speaker 1: his lack of aggressions to two very different game plans for
Speaker 1: two very different types of ball handlers. Now, early in
Speaker 1: the game, Anthony Edward struggled, and you saw that on
Speaker 1: the scoreboard as Phoenix was hanging around. He wasn't hitting shots.
Speaker 1: He was turning the basketball over. It was bad, right,
Speaker 1: But this is where it gets weird. The game plan
Speaker 1: is set up to get Ant to settle for bad shots,
Speaker 1: but consistently Ant has made him in the postseason. That's
Speaker 1: where it gets tricky. He's been one of the worst
Speaker 1: volume pull up jump shooters in the league over the
Speaker 1: last few years in the regular season, but he consistently
Speaker 1: turns around and hits them in the postseason. So twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two zero point nine to one points per pull
Speaker 1: up jumper, point one four against Memphis in the playoffs.
Speaker 1: Twenty twenty three, zero point nine to one again over
Speaker 1: the course of the regular season, one point zero nine
Speaker 1: against Denver in the playoffs. This year even worse, zero
Speaker 1: point eight to eight points per shot attempt and pull
Speaker 1: up jump shot situations. Today he was eight for fourteen.
Speaker 1: It came out to one point three six points per
Speaker 1: pull up jumper. He hit three in a row, right
Speaker 1: in Katie's face, Like, there's no game plan for that
Speaker 1: with Ant. If he's gonna hit those, they're not just
Speaker 1: gonna win this series. They have a good chance to
Speaker 1: win it all because part of the thing with An
Speaker 1: is his downhill force is so oppressive that every defender
Speaker 1: is back on their heels. So all he really needs
Speaker 1: to do is kind of do one of these and
Speaker 1: he can get into a pull up jumper. He can
Speaker 1: he can do a step back, he can do some
Speaker 1: sort of fancy footwork, but he really doesn't need to.
Speaker 1: When he's hitting that high hesitation dribble, guys are on
Speaker 1: their heels worried that he's gonna hit the jets and
Speaker 1: get downhill. So he It's like again we talked about
Speaker 1: this Jaylen Williams with the Thunder as well, Like when
Speaker 1: you have real downhill force, it creates really high quality
Speaker 1: pull up jump shots. But for the most part Ant
Speaker 1: hasn't been able to hit them, but he has been
Speaker 1: able to hit them in the postseason. This again, all
Speaker 1: that's relatively small sample, only one series in twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: only one series in twenty twenty three. Obviously only one
Speaker 1: game so far in this series. But I mean, I
Speaker 1: don't from a game plan standpoint, I don't really think
Speaker 1: that a Phoenix can do anything with Ant making pull
Speaker 1: up jump shots. Like I mean, I suppose you can
Speaker 1: go to flat out blitzing to get the ball out
Speaker 1: of his hands, but I mean those are much easier
Speaker 1: reads for Ant to make than the higher level reads
Speaker 1: and a loaded up pick and roll coverage. So what
Speaker 1: does it look like when the pendulum swings the other
Speaker 1: way with Ant? That's when he's kind of like what
Speaker 1: you saw in the first half right like missing those shots,
Speaker 1: missing reads, turning the basketball over. I actually I'll show
Speaker 1: you guys in the when we do some film. But
Speaker 1: Ant was actually reasonably solid making reads in the first half,
Speaker 1: taking advantage of the easy kickout passes that were there.
Speaker 1: Naz Reid hit a left wing three off of a
Speaker 1: guy digging down on him once he made a really
Speaker 1: nice skip pass into the right corner. I think to
Speaker 1: Nikil Alexander Walker for a big three early in the game.
Speaker 1: He had some of those reads go through for him.
Speaker 1: But the bad version of that pendulum is when he's
Speaker 1: not making those reads and when he's missing those shots,
Speaker 1: and not only does that affect Minnesota's offense, but it
Speaker 1: also gets opportunities for Phoenix to get out in transition.
Speaker 1: One last shot out for Minnesota. I thought Alexander Walker
Speaker 1: was amazing on both ends of the floor in this game.
Speaker 1: I obviously finished some spot up plays, but he also
Speaker 1: ran some action for some buckets as well, and then
Speaker 1: defended super well on the perimeter. Big time win for Minnesota.
Speaker 1: That was like their best version of themselves in this matchup,
Speaker 1: just dominating the physical part of the game. In Anthony
Speaker 1: edwards out playing the opposing Stars. Adjustments for Phoenix again,
Speaker 1: play with more pace, run more action, get the ball
Speaker 1: to the opposite side, find entry points, do all those
Speaker 1: little things to get Minnesota in rotation. You want to
Speaker 1: see that assist percentage tick up into the sixty percent range,
Speaker 1: sixty percent using Kevin Durant as an entry point rather
Speaker 1: than as a score. He's got the most favorable matchup
Speaker 1: in the series. He's the guy who's most capable of
Speaker 1: getting Minnesota's defense in rotation. And then lastly, I think
Speaker 1: you kind of have to just trust the defensive game
Speaker 1: plan with Ant and hope you get a better result.
Speaker 1: And especially like when you're on the road, he's just
Speaker 1: got to get one of these in Minnesota. Anyway, all right,
Speaker 1: moving on to Magic Cavs, and then we're gonna get
Speaker 1: out here for the night. So sorry of the game
Speaker 1: was Magic's half court offense. They had just a sixty
Speaker 1: two point seven offensive rating in the half court according
Speaker 1: to Cleaning the Glass. In this game. They were twenty
Speaker 1: first in half court offense in the regular season, so
Speaker 1: that's kind of what they are. Right. As a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, their half court offensive rating was dead last
Speaker 1: out of all twenty teams that made either the playoff
Speaker 1: or the play in tournament. The Magic also got only
Speaker 1: zero point six to four points per jump shot in
Speaker 1: this game. They are twenty fourth in the NBA in
Speaker 1: jump shot efficiency. That was deadline last out of all
Speaker 1: twenty teams that made the playoff or the play And
Speaker 1: so what you saw from Orlando in this game a
Speaker 1: sixty three offensive rating in the half court and zero
Speaker 1: point six to four points per jump shot. That's more
Speaker 1: or less a continuation of a regular season trend with Orlando.
Speaker 1: Halo determines most of their possessions. He's their primary ball handler.
Speaker 1: He had nine turnovers as he's trying to learn how
Speaker 1: to do this on the fly and the playoffs, there
Speaker 1: is a possession in I want to say it was
Speaker 1: in I want to say it was in the third quarter,
Speaker 1: might have been the second quarter, I can't remember, but
Speaker 1: both Wagner brothers were on the court and Palo was
Speaker 1: on the court, and they're all standing at the three
Speaker 1: point line and they're just throwing swing passes back and
Speaker 1: forth to each other, and all the Cavs are just
Speaker 1: closing out short. So there's no advantage because you know
Speaker 1: the advantage is that they're being left open to shoot,
Speaker 1: but they can't shoot, so there's not really anything being
Speaker 1: gained there. And so even when they do look to
Speaker 1: drive and play their bully ball, they're just doing it
Speaker 1: in an insane amount of traffic and it's leading to
Speaker 1: misshots and turnovers. It just Orlando has a major half
Speaker 1: court offensive production issue in this series. Honestly, it's funny.
Speaker 1: I picked against the Calves in the Knixt series last
Speaker 1: year because I thought Brunson would be a better half
Speaker 1: court shot creator than Donovan Mitchell. And it's ironic because
Speaker 1: I picked Cleveland in this series against Orlando because I
Speaker 1: think their half court shot creation is just so so
Speaker 1: so much better than Orlando's. Now on the other end
Speaker 1: of the floor, I thought the Calves did an amazing
Speaker 1: job of baiting Orlando's rim protectors in pick and roll.
Speaker 1: So again, because Orlando went with the look that they
Speaker 1: went with a couple times at the end of the
Speaker 1: season where they went with Jonathan Isaac and the starting
Speaker 1: lineup next to Pala Boncaro and then basically like they
Speaker 1: did some switching, but a lot of times Jonathan Isaac
Speaker 1: and Palo Buoncaro running deep drop coverages like and with
Speaker 1: that deep drop coverage it allows Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell,
Speaker 1: and Karris Lovert to get downhill. And one of the
Speaker 1: things that you saw in this game, did it feel
Speaker 1: like to you guys that the Calves got a bunch
Speaker 1: of dunks on dumpoffs and drop offs and pocket passes.
Speaker 1: Part of the reason for that is they were engaging
Speaker 1: Jonathan Isaac and Pwa Bancaro with their ball handlers close
Speaker 1: to the rim. And once you engage the rim protector,
Speaker 1: the role man becomes open. You have to engage him,
Speaker 1: though if you allow him to split the difference or
Speaker 1: stay home, that puts the onus on the guard to
Speaker 1: actually make a shot. But as soon as you engage
Speaker 1: that rim protector, and you saw a lot of them, Mitchell,
Speaker 1: LeVert and Garland were getting deep penetration, like behind the
Speaker 1: backboard before they would drop it off to Jared Allen
Speaker 1: or Evan Mobley around the rim for a dunk they had.
Speaker 1: The Calves had thirty nine points on forty two pick
Speaker 1: and rolls in this game. They had eighteen points on
Speaker 1: twelve rolls and cuts to the rim. And if you
Speaker 1: remember that was a huge issue last year in the
Speaker 1: Knick series, very different coverage, which we'll get into in
Speaker 1: a second, but they were much more successful in pick
Speaker 1: and roll against Orlando today. Just to juxtapose this for you,
Speaker 1: So again, the Calves ran forty two pick and rolls,
Speaker 1: the Magic ran thirty seven. The Calves got thirty nine
Speaker 1: points out of those forty two pick and rolls including passes.
Speaker 1: The Magic only got fourteen points out of those thirty
Speaker 1: seven pick and rolls including passes for comparison, so obviously
Speaker 1: that was a major issue on a coverage standpoint, though
Speaker 1: I mentioned there's a different coverage. So one of the
Speaker 1: reasons why the series last year with New York went
Speaker 1: south for Cleveland and pick and roll was the Knicks
Speaker 1: brought Julius Randall up to the level of the screen
Speaker 1: every single time. That forced the short role pass to
Speaker 1: Evan Mobley. Evan Mobley was then working downhill with Mitchell Robinson,
Speaker 1: kind of splitting the difference between him and Jared Allen,
Speaker 1: and that two on one was very rarely ending in
Speaker 1: a basket, and so Cleveland's offense fell apart. One of
Speaker 1: the advantages with aggressive pick and roll coverages so high
Speaker 1: drop blitz hedge anything that involves the screen defender coming
Speaker 1: out high. That puts the onus on the short role
Speaker 1: man to be the playmaker. When you run low, it
Speaker 1: puts the onus on the guard to be the playmaker.
Speaker 1: The Cavs guards are good playmakers. The Cavs forwards and
Speaker 1: centers are not good playmakers. And so honestly, that's gonna
Speaker 1: be the biggest adjustment that I want to see from
Speaker 1: Orlando is either, first of all, either just have Paalo
Speaker 1: and Jonathan Isaac switch those ball screens, which they did
Speaker 1: do more of in the second half of this game.
Speaker 1: But I would just be aggressive up at the level
Speaker 1: consistently in all their pick and roll coverages, because that
Speaker 1: actually bates Cleveland into their biggest weakness offensively, which is
Speaker 1: their short role playmaking and scoring. And so again, like that,
Speaker 1: that's kind of a little coverage thing that I think
Speaker 1: that Orlando can do to try to kind of turn
Speaker 1: the tide in this particular series. But shout out to
Speaker 1: Donovan Mitchell, though I thought he was amazing in this game.
Speaker 1: He came out guns blazing. I think he's the best
Speaker 1: player in the series and he played like it today.
Speaker 1: All Right, So there we go, All four games in
Speaker 1: the books for day one. Again, these night time shows
Speaker 1: are gonna be a little more surface level, a little
Speaker 1: bit more kind of big picture. The film sessions will
Speaker 1: be more in the we more in the weeds. I
Speaker 1: may or may not do one tomorrow morning. Keep an
Speaker 1: eye on the feeds my schedule for tomorrow, just so
Speaker 1: you guys know, I'm gonna do an upload after the
Speaker 1: final buzzer of MAVs Clippers. That's just gonna go on YouTube,
Speaker 1: and then we're going with Colin Cowherd after Pacers Bucks.
Speaker 1: So we'll have two shows tomorrow for sure, potentially a
Speaker 1: third in the morning film session. Just keep an eye
Speaker 1: on my Twitter feed. I'll let you guys know if
Speaker 1: we get to that point. All right, guys, that's all
Speaker 1: I have for today, Day one of the books. This
Speaker 1: is gonna be fine. It's gonna be crazy a couple
Speaker 1: of months, but I appreciate you guys rocking with me.
Speaker 1: We're gonna have a good time along the way. I
Speaker 1: will see you guys tomorrow. The volume