technical basketball details etc

https://www.nba.com/stats/events/?GameEventID=429&GameID=0022100172&Season=2021-22&flag=1&title=Clarkson%20REBOUND%20(Off:0%20Def:1)&sct=plot

never seen this play before. the pacers used it to break the jazz zone. it's like the elevator doors play but in reverse

this is cool

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2T4bJh165g

Ralph Miller, the coach of the Oregon State Beaver hoops team from 1970-1989 favored a similar heavily pass-oriented offense. I think he cribbed it from Phog Allen. He hated to see his guards dribbling more than twice.

Fascinating video

that was great, thanking u

Ya watched that a couple weeks ago and been telling all my bball friends about it

NEW Breakdown: Ty Lue shows again why he is one of the best X's & O's coaches in the NBA - NASTY ATO counter! pic.twitter.com/U4MAFvOKCd

— Half Court Hoops (@HalfCourtHoops) December 7, 2021

love it

I made diagrams of 34 types of ballscreens, from Angle PnR to Wedge Roll

If you see a pick-and-roll but don't know its name so you can't look it up, try looking for it on this page and hopefully you'll find the right one

Lmk which ones I've left out!https://t.co/aBO1HPCn7T

— Bowser2Bowser (@bowser2bowser) January 21, 2022

that is excellent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RyA_wTOzza4
Alex Caruso talks defense

i want to thank caruso for shaving his head

love that

hes really thinking about the shot clock good stuff

chasing down the origin of the shamgod https://theathletic.com/3139815/2022/02/24/the-unknown-history-of-the-shammgod-crossover-or-as-philly-calls-it-the-pooh-allen

guess nba assistant pooh allen did it on national tv when shamgod was still in high school lol

“If you know Pooh,” Rozier said, “you know he’s going around showing people that clip.”

finally track down the penn coach who taught it to pooh and

O’Hanlon said he doesn’t remember when he first did “The Reach Across.” He was always trying to come up with new moves and discovered this one on his own and never saw anyone do it before him. “I did come up with that,” he said. “I didn’t steal it from anyone.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RN8vvtQ4ir8

whats going on with DSJs shot form? looks like hes fumbling it right before he releases it

Highlights from Dennis Smith Jr.’s private workout this week in Las Vegas in front of several NBA personnel. pic.twitter.com/MiidVmp0uo

— Chris Haynes (@ChrisBHaynes) July 14, 2022

it looks like he's using some wrist action to generate backspin rather than like flicking it off the fingers as one does. definitely a little weird.

looks like hes catching then adjusting so his hand is way on top and to the side of the ball then compensating for that weird placement by thumbing very intensely, good luck man

yeah some sort of pre-shot rotation. takes him so long to set it up yikes.

Former Toronto Raptors center Lucas Nogueira released these team scouting reports on John Wall and Bradley Beal from round one of the 2018 NBA Playoffs.

Why? I don't know. But cool. pic.twitter.com/qGUWz2FbwA

— Quinton Mayo (@RealQuintonMayo) July 27, 2022

i wonder how common it is for teams to include stuff like ppp and ts% in communicating with players

The Bucks have tweaked their approach to pick-and-roll defense this season and the early results are extremely promising - they're taking away all of the juiciest options and forcing teams to settle for more tough shots. https://t.co/k7gm0R1zdi pic.twitter.com/0DNjv3GYnu

— Todd Whitehead (@CrumpledJumper) November 11, 2022

i like those visualizations!

found these defensive mistakes videos which look at more minute details than most breakdowns positioning routes on screens etc and the guy is just bitching the whole time hes really disappointed in the players lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpDYP4Xzkjw

Love that. Luka not shaking the harden comparisons lol. That Javale signing looks crazier by the day. Do they have even a single plus defender on the roster outside of dorian?

hes like harden who shows up in the playoffs

Harden made the conf finals a couple times

he made finals once even but his playoff numbers are bad where luka has killed it, which makes sense to me hardens game has always been a little gimmicky but luka is a flat out baller

omg that defensive mistakes video had me in tears.

it’s like your uncle morty giving you a hard time about your shoes

🚨BREAKDOWN🚨

Steve Kerr added a new ATO set that takes advantage of 3 concepts:

1) Steph Curry's gravity
2) Steph Curry's screening
3) Jordan Poole's downhill explosion

Simple but brilliant play design that makes full use of the team's dynamic offensive weapons.

⬇️⬇️⬇️ pic.twitter.com/FoyQIq0sR8

— Joe Viray (@JoeVirayNBA) November 26, 2022

luka the post god
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hI8wq7vUxoo

lukas a freak

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17H6OaQQ5qY

good one on haliburton, its crazy how much he uses the look away or just keeps his eyes on the rim, its like he can take a snapshot and doesnt even need to look anymore

caitlin cooper wrote a whole thing on haliburtons jump passing https://www.indycornrows.com/platform/amp/2022/8/3/23285985/on-the-aerial-exploits-of-tyrese-haliburton which tyrese actually shouted out on jj redicks podcast

Very cool to hear Tyrese Haliburton give @C2_Cooper a shoutout for the jump pass article on Old Man and the Three. pic.twitter.com/VC4ucmKWH5

— Tony East (@TEastNBA) November 11, 2022

also this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSlCsBgbP-g

caitlin cooper is good af

what is this shot

This is one of the wildest shooting forms I’ve witnessed 😭💀 pic.twitter.com/nbizW4kclM

— NBA Memes (@NBAMemes) December 5, 2022

wild that he is a 10 year vet and shoots like that

never shouldve let him back in

coach nicks dream is coming true

I don't think we're talking enough about how Victor Wembanyama is making floater 3-pointers a thing over in France. He's made multiple of these shots this season, and it breaks my brain every time he does it. Think Luka is the only other person I've seen try this more than once? pic.twitter.com/5T3MhWjit6

— Sam Vecenie (@Sam_Vecenie) January 3, 2023

I know this sounds dumb but if you have the requisite strength and skill etc it doesn’t seem like a bad shot at all

that's a runner not a floater imo

imo its defining trait is that its a one legged shot, which when dirk popularized it with his turnaround people were like wow only dirk what a great shooter but we come to learn its a good shot in many situations so why not from three

Still didn’t seem like a good shot cos youre moving towards the rim vs stationary up and down, adding another factor to screw up the shot. But it could be used to keep the defense off balance to set up other moves I guess

maybe a couple things that could be good about it is the big jump towards the basket is powerful making it an easier shot arms wise allowing for more touch, and also it could open up spots where a traditional jumper wouldnt work step through type moves and so forth, i dont have any idea if guys can hit it at a good enough rate to be worthwhile but i want to see them try

you see guys shoot it sometimes when they dont have time to get a normal shot end of shot clock situations etc so on some level its a thing that makes sense to do

yeah it's probably no worse than the stepback three as far as degree of difficulty; both are using some sort of movement to create space for the shot

all that action to get a contested 30 footer lol

This is a nasty half-court set from the Nuggets. Elbow action out of HORNS flowing into "Chicago" that then flows into Floppy-adjacent staggered downscreens for Bones Hyland. pic.twitter.com/MuqWricjAg

— Joe Viray (@JoeVirayNBA) January 12, 2023

this finals was a great series for my revolutionary theory of the step back three is a bad shot unless youre steph or something maybe but even then why not take an easier shot

classic case of "just bc you can doesnt mean you should" *stares at luka's 32% 3pct*

tatum shot awful all playoffs but managed to not kill the celtics because instead of doing his favorite thing, taking step back threes, he drove the ball

i mean he still took some step backs but not that many, progress!

he led the finals in assists despite the famous passer luka also playing in the series

on one of the pods someone made the point that luka always going left w/ his step back is the kinda thing you can routinely get off in the regular season but once you get 4 rounds deep, that level of granular scouting that every player is put thru, it’s not sustainable to just have a move where you only do one thing. we know this, but watching horford guard luka was a really good example. we know everyone was making a big deal out of luka hitting a step back off his right foot vs gobert … this is prob the sorta thing — whoops this move you use all the time w/o thinking just got exposed in the finals — that should be happening to luka

i actually think there is a good argument for having the step back in one’s playoff bag bcuz sometimes you do need to be able to create a decent shot when you have nothing going on offense. in the recent playoff games where james harden has been really great the stepback features prominently. i think there are some similarities in footwork for luka too in terms of how he gets some midrange jumpers off when teams start to overplay his 3 shooting and driving

iirc luka is also statistically just a lot better at that shot than everyone else. i think the thing that really bothers ppl about the tatum stuff is that the shots rarely go in

heres some numbers from a few years ago not sure where to find the current ones, someone was much better at stepbacks but it wasnt luka lol

Step-Back 3P% (Min. 100 3PA)
1. Steph Curry ......... 47.2%
2. Zach LaVine ........ 36.9
3. Jamal Murray .......36.9
4. James Harden ..... 36.8
5. Dame Lillard .........36.0
6. Luka Doncic ......... 35.7
7. Jayson Tatum ....... 34.6
8. Jordan Clarkson ... 33.3 pic.twitter.com/nsmV9Xw33C

— Kirk Goldsberry (@kirkgoldsberry) May 26, 2021

luka did have his best 3pt shooting year this year 38% compared to 34 for his career but he was prob at least partially just hot, and indeed he was at 32% for the offs

those are some ok percentages but aside from steph theyre not great and more importantly its just the kind of shot that can turn to dust against a good prepared defense an already very difficult shot becomes impossible with a defender in yr face, if you want to take it at the end of the shot clock fine yr already kinda fucked whatever, could also step in and take a long two going towards the basket tho

relatedly in saw a clip of luka taking a catch and shoot three in the finals and it was so bad he just kinda flung it there was no intentional foot work going into the catch he looked confused, his game isnt normal

they also showed him pregame practicing movement catch and shoots where he caught and turned on the move he was miced up telling someone "this is me next year" buddy try the easy ones first why not

start with just moving off ball see what happens

nba tracking data has luka as going 169-421 on step back threes this year which is 40.1%. i don’t see a leaderboard for this stat but obv a big improvement from 2021 and a rate that would’ve been way ahead of everyone in the league aside from steph

in the playoffs this year luka was 38-118 on step back threes which is 32%

in the finals he was 6-28 which is 21%

i don’t think the exact link is working on my phone but if you go to his NBA player page and select “splits” and “shooting” and scroll all the way to “shot type detail” you’ll see it

https://www.nba.com/player/1629029/luka-doncic/

a lot of his game plays off the step back, guys jumping up on him and then he uses that to get in front of the guy and pin him on his back and then he’s going to the rim exactly how he wants etc. you see this happen all the time when he plays. it’s a fine line to where the threat stops being worth it bcuz the shots keep missing but at 40% in the regular season he was far above the red line so to speak. 32% is a diff convo, 21% is not one at all

ah very nice thats a lot of data https://www.nba.com/stats/player/1629029/shooting

it declined from 39% to 34 in the mavs playoff run two years ago which is not that bad but idk i just feel like cant you find a better shot its not only difficult its also static iso offense, i think one reason he does it is compared to how he gets his other buckets its not that tiring