![]() “You look at our team … I don’t know if there’s a single guy on the team you wouldn’t tell to shoot a three.”ĭonovan Mitchell’s 71-point game in January was met with something approaching a collective shrug. “Everyone’s capable of making open threes, open shots,” Brown’s Celtics teammate Grant Williams added. The game is definitely the more skilled man wins.” “You see point guards getting more and more athletic, bigs shooting the ball, being able to handle the ball, wings being able to do everything. Each position continues to take leaps forward,” Brown said. “I think the league has definitely grown in skill each and every year. From superstars to the last man on the bench, the league is more talented than ever, and coaches are using that talent in increasingly advantageous ways. The problem, at least according to the players and coaches the Guardian spoke with for this story, is that the rule changes have failed to keep up with the increase in players’ skills. In recent years the NBA has cracked down even further on physical contact, especially on the perimeter, with players consistently being called for touch-fouls, giving offensive players free rein to get to the rim and either shoot a layup or pass it out for a three-pointer – two of the most efficient shots in the game. But the biggest arguably came in 2004, when the league wanted to inject some offensive punch, and eliminated the use of hand-checking, which had allowed defensive players to keep opposing ball-handlers in front of them. The NBA has a long history of creating rule changes to alter the product in one way or another. Adding that: “It’s better for the branding and marketing of our league.” It’s become much more difficult to play defense in the NBA now.”īoston Celtics star Jaylen Brown went so far as to say that he thinks “the league has made an emphasis that they want to see more scoring, see more high performances”. I think that the rules have really been geared towards giving the offensive player the advantage. Kerr added: “But I think we’ve just gone a little too far. And I think the league did an amazing job of loosening up the game, creating more freedom.” “I played in the NBA finals in ‘03, so 20 years ago this June, and the final scores were like 72-65, and it was ugly. “I think maybe there’s been an overcorrection to what was happening 20 years ago,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said. And if nothing is done to help defenses, things are likely to continue trending in this direction. Nobody wants to go back to the 1990s when the final scores were in the 70s and the play was slow, cramped and physical.īut has the offensive explosion gone too far? And is defense becoming a lost art? According to some of the most influential players and coaches in the league, the answer is a resounding yes. The consensus is that more offense leads to a better product. Just a few years ago, in the 2015-16 season, the San Antonio Spurs led the league with a 98.2 defensive rating, meaning teams are scoring about 11 more points per 100 possessions against the league’s best defense than they were seven years ago. In fact, the Cleveland Cavaliers lead the league with a defensive rating of 109.6, which would be the worst defensive rating to lead the league in NBA history if the season ended today. Donovan Mitchell’s 71-point game in January was met with something approaching a collective shrug.īut rarely do we talk about the other side of the equation: defense.Īs offense has risen across the NBA, defense has fallen to the wayside, as it has become nearly impossible to get stops without fouling. Meanwhile, players are seeing their stats inflate to the point where it has become difficult to contextualize them, with seven players averaging at least 30 points a game this season. Teams are playing faster than ever, taking more threes than ever, and scoring more points than ever. ![]() The NBA is witnessing an offensive explosion the likes of which we have never seen before.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |