Get Over It

Of all the play types you can find in the NBA today -- pin downs, flex sets, dribble hand-offs -- there’s an argument to be made that the hardest thing to guard, especially when you have the right personnel, is the pick-and-pop. As I touch on a little in this Dirk Nowitzki article last season (though Dirk is a different beast), there is just no good way to defend to it. If the big man setting the screen is a knockdown shooter and the guard handling the ball is a threat to score, it seems like any coverage the defense chooses to employ gives something up.

That said, some of the players and coaches I’ve spoken with in the past mostly agree that one defensive tactic may do the trick. Though basketball lingo is not exactly universal, it’s typically referred to as a “show-and-over”, where the big man guarding the screener jumps out at the ball handler -- forcing him to take a dribble or two toward half-court -- while the on-ball defender shoots the gap between his hedging teammate and the screen itself. When executed properly, it looks something like this:

The problem with that coverage, however, is that the whole “executed properly” thing doesn’t happen very often. The problems are two-fold. Most big men, even the more mobile Jason Thompson, don’t fare well when forced to show out against opposing ball handlers and then sprint back to the original man with their back turned. It basically creates a mini-closeout situation where large human beings not used to running at shooters find themselves doing so blindly. On top of that, the on-ball defender has his own awkward recovery angle to deal with as he attempts to get back in front of the ballhandler. Needless to say, it’s a complicated maneuver that sees it’s fair share of instances where the on-ball defender get tangled up with his hedging teammate while the opposing guard ambles into the heart of the defense untouched.

In the Sacramento-Orlando game, the combination of Channing Frye and Victor Oladipo (or sometimes Elfrid Payton) tore apart the Sacramento when they tried this coverage. For the first quarter and a half, Orlando’s guards either got to the paint at will or found a popping Frye on the perimeter. It wasn’t until Kings head coach Mike Malone switched to a less complicated and more conservative “stay attached and under” coverage that they finally slowed the Magic’s pick-and-pop attack.

And this isn’t a referendum on Malone’s decision. As I said before, there are other players and coaches who feel like this is the best solution -- if you can execute it properly --  when facing off against a dynamic pick-and-pop duo. But even when done correctly, it’s rare you see results from deploying this “show-and-over” technique like in the video above. So for NBA coaches, it might be time to get over (bad pun alert) this coverage.

Underappreciated and Underutilized

Arron Afflalo has a very underrated post game. I’m sure I’m not the first person to throw out that thought on the internet either. But for the past few seasons, Afflalo has ranked near the top of the league in terms of post up efficiency, according to Synergy Sports data. His post ups this year for the Nuggets have generated 1.05 points per possession, far better than the team’s overall mark of .928. Despite teammate Kenneth Faried’s improvement on the block over the second half of last season (though he’s regressed this year), the argument can certainly be made that Afflalo is the best post player on a Nuggets roster oversaturated with big men. The problem is, Denver doesn’t seem to deploy him on the block nearly enough.

Part of this is because head coach Brian Shaw’s decision to move away from post ups in general -- a trend that has helped Denver recover from their horrific 1-5 start. But the post ups that should be eliminated are the ones that include Faried, Javale McGee and any of the Nuggets other traditional big men. With Danilo Gallinari back and Shaw employing more lineups where either he or back up big man Darrell Arthur (think Channing Frye-lite) space the floor from the power forward position, shying away from post ups that include Afflalo, (especially when his matchup gives him a size or strength advantage) seems like a disservice to Denver.

Putting Ty Lawson in pick-and-rolls is still the Nuggets best source of offense, but Afflalo’s post game seems to be the team’s next best option for points. In general, the Nuggets seem to be built for inverting their offense -- letting their wings post mismatches while the bigs draw opponents to the perimeter -- instead of trying to force offense from traditional bigs that just aren’t effective post players. Afflalo and fellow wing Wilson Chandler may not remind people of Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant working opposing defenders on the block in ther heyday, but it could provide a boost for a team that floundering in the middle of the pack (the Nuggets are 14th in offensive efficiency in the RealGM rankings) offensively. And for this Denver team to survive in rugged Western Conference, they’re going to need all the points they can get.