Should be fun. I think our advantage is going to be that even as good as their POA defenders are they will have to send extra help against Luka and LeBron. If not, they will have huge games, if they do our offense will pick them apart. I'm curious to see how our high powered defense does with them. By then Luka will be unrounded into form.
It built my belief too. I feel 200% more confident in this team now, even without a skilled big center. We should just roll with Jax, who improved a lot having extra playing time, and the rest of the guys doing it by committee. Until this summer, obviously.
I'm glad we have YouTubers that can give us real analysis since espn/TNT can't do that. That video provided great insight.
I hope Redick has counters 'cos the other coaches will scheme against it. As long as he thinks and he does not pace the sidelines hands in pockets like it's recess at the elementary school.
yeah, that's really good. and yes, effort matters here, but the scheme was somewhat different than what ham tried. you have to lean into your strengths, and right now we have mobility and good overall length (even if we lack a stable of bigs). we would have struggled to play this way with a mark williams or kessler, or maybe even AD--because of all the scrambling and recovering you have to do. now, in a playoff series, you can bet malone is going to bleat to the media that we're getting in jokic's way (we are), and so some of the battle will actually be getting the refs to agree with you about who owns space. historically, the officials have favored offensive players in situations where both guys are heading for the same open spot on the floor. i disagree with this idea, and you could see in one of those clips were reaves did a great job making it quite clear that he was clearly already occupying the spot jokic wanted. vando's harassment was definitely rodman-esque, and that clip was played with rodman as the hero, but some fans/analysts/officials might see it the other way. you have to sell it your way, which takes effort. but again, what's on your side is that you're faster than jokic (everyone is). he's stronger than you, but you're faster--press your only advantage relentlessly. anyway, as i said right after the game, jokic/malone will solve this (the variation with mpj in the corner and gordon in the dunker spot is one way, and the screens needed to be moving jokic across the floor and coordinated with perimeter ball reversals, imo). but they won't solve the fact that it's going to make jokic work more on offense in addition to the fact that they simply don't have the personnel to defend us anymore. so the new plan is to just wear jokic out, and i think it's not a bad one, tbh. if i'm malone, i'm probably also just trying to press my advantage--we can't guard murray. they did that a little, but they may want to run less offense through jokic and let him pick his spots. best part is that it's no longer a given that denver has the built-in tactical advantages. malone preened and squawked when he did. he merely chirps now.
Great video and JJ definitely had us ready to play. If I'm being 100% honest though I am one of the people who thought the effort level and body language was just night and day. The main difference I saw was a team that didn't quit after it got hit. None of the slumped shoulders and blank looks that we've seen in multiple games against Denver. This time when the Nuggets cut the lead to one we actually stepped up and didn't fold. We match our game plans with that level of effort and we do have a chance to go far this year.
we only pulled away at the end. It was a nice fight before that, and we didn't back down or back off or fold. We didn't get Hammed either.
Also worth mentioning that KCP was a huge piece for the Nuggets. He was their best perimeter defender and would fight over screens. It doesn't seem like the Nuggets have that kind of player so Jokic has to do more defensively if you can target him. Their defense has sagged from being one of the best in the league to below average with the main key player missing being KCP.
Relieved that Hurley turned us down. Really happy that the FO took the risk to hire JJ. JJ should do well coaching in the playoffs when you can focus all your time on one team and really layer the game plan and adjustments.
I still think he played the Lakers using Woj to increase his leverage. That and his wife seems nutty so it was the best for the Lakers to get someone who is professional and has NBA-ready experience being a respected player. I am salivating at how teams will stop a JJ Reddick prepared Luka-LeBron series for 48 minutes... How do teams deal with that for an entire game let alone a series?
i wanted hurley not because i knew much about him as a coach but simply because i thought it would be nice if we got our top choice for once. i'm definitely glad we didn't! and i was never anti-redick (check the receipts), but he's exceeded my expectations. he has the makings of a very good, long-term coach here. imagine that!
