Isn’t this up to the coaching staff? We have an excellent former defender, now coach in Nate McMillian who has more than enough tools to teach young Dalton. That being said, I totally agree that along with this, K4 should be doing additional work with other former greats in the off-season. I guess it comes down to the individual’s desire to improve. We have witnessed the all time greats in this department(Jordan and Kobe) as well as those who couldn’t care less( Shaq after his Miami Chip and now Zion).
At the least, and the muscle training staff I assume is on it, similar to Kenzo with don’t forget the “leg days” …. exactly those groups lower body to max whatever he physically capable of doing laterally. And yes for sure if he could find a defensive one on one specialist and pay him well for his time and put in the time over the summer to learn the finer points and the mindset needed it ought to have at least some positive impact on at least that aspect of his D. The team concept has to be drilled in camp and during season and him taking it seriously. I’m sure it all is. He ought to be able to get up to AR’s level at least with his athleticism and greater strength. If the motivation is minutes on the floor.
he shows enough hoop iq on offense in terms of cutting and even some of his passing, so it can't be purely a hoop iq thing (it can be, partially--and the main fix for that is just reps and in-the-moment correction/coaching). i agree that the messaging is always about offense, even here with knecht, most of what we hear about is offensive strategy. i'm pretty sure, however, that dalton knows he won't have the career he wants if he can be played off the floor defensively. it's hard to learn on the fly in limited minutes, and if vando proves able to play going forward and we don't trade rui, giving dalton some burn in the g-league and asking him to focus on defense would be good.
I could be wrong here because I haven’t looked it up, but it feels like the league has all but done away with much time in camp before preseason, and time to practice. It hurts defense more than offense IMO and it’s going to take players longer to improve defensively as they need the reps with their team to drill down certain principals. I think Dalton is going to need to take it upon himself to improve, but problem is the league also pays you more on offensive production than defensive. It incentivizes you to be just good enough to be playable rather than an actual good defender.
I think you’re right …. it’s like 5 days ?? or so after press day and then into the first pre-season game.
i mostly agree, but i will say that i think some guys are starting to make some money based on defense. gobert has made a TON of money while being largely useless on offense, and the defense-only guys like thybulle and vando are starting to make money approaching mle. it's still true that offense-only players are making slightly more, but that pendulum has swung a bit lately, imo
I'm not paying Vando to score. And I'm not paying Knecht4 to defend. Any D is gravy. I'm just glad he seems to be recovering from the rookie wall. Couple of recent 13 point games off the bench with good % is all we need from him going forward for now.
My worry is both being played off the court in the playoffs because they’re not good enough on the other side
I think both are good options to have off the bench in the playoffs. Maybe Knecht won't come through but on the other hand he just might. Neither one is likely to start nor garner big minutes no matter what. Both those guys should be playing about 15-20 max.
There’s plenty of court time available before every single game to work with the assistant coaches. On off days when not traveling, there’s plenty of hours available at the El Segundo facility to get in work. It’s up to the player to dedicate himself to improving.
I’m not talking about the court time with coaches every player gets. They’re specifically missing the full team practices and what you’re describing isn’t an adequate substitute.
To FOJ point, I think what Dalton needs is specific work, which can be gained with a coach, at least on-ball defense. But off-ball offense and defense is probably where he needs to improve the most and that requires a more collective workout. He should be seeing film every minute on a flight. Imagine having Kobe as a consultant for the team, being the film specialist and going throught it with the Reaves and Knechts of this world.
Or, Kobe would work with him for a week and get super frustrated as to why he isn’t getting it and can’t replicate what he can. Kobe’s my favorite of All Time, but I see him as the guy who would only have patience teaching his daughters on the court.
Up and down which is to be expected but I was disappointed that he didn't step up more tonight given that Rui/Gabe were both out Gotta take advantage of these minutes while you still have them because when Rui/Gabe are back...Knecht will not see the floor
Ahah yeah Kobe would get frustrated all the time. But I think that was more the case with '8' Kobe. The '24' Kobe was more mature and he did a lot of workouts with young guys at the time. Kyrie, Tatum, Booker when they were young.
