The offense is flawed

[Nilanka]

Oddly, if true (and it sounds exaggerated) this seems to be somehow working for both offense and defense right now. Number 2 rated offense in the NBA can't be all smoke and mirrors.

I'm sure it was exaggerated, but other than MixxAOR's example above, it doesn't seem like players are ever "disciplined" for mistakes on the offensive end.

[S.R.]

Chuck Hayes on the offense and last night's Atlanta game:
“It’s nothing like what we ran under [Adelman] and it’s nothing like what we ran under Jeff Van Gundy, a lot of left-right, work both sides of the floor,” Hayes said. “We’re going to run sets where our guys can get to their sweet spots for high-percentage shots. We’re going to get DeMar a shot he works on constantly -- he’s a killer from 17 or 18 feet. His footwork is unbelievable, so we get him the ball in space.”

To better illustrate this the-right-shot-at-the-right-spot-for-the-right-guy offense, Hayes cited a moment when Toronto led by 10 with a little more than eight minutes to go in the fourth quarter. With their reserves on the floor, the Raptors ran a pick-and-roll -- the kind of action you see a few dozen times a game from each side, but this one served a specific purpose.

“This gentleman didn’t score all game, but then we run a play for him,” Hayes said, intentionally withholding the name of the player in question. “It was James Johnson. He had Kyle Korver on him. So we play to [Johnson’s] strengths. At his size, he gets the ball at the free throw line. Our spacing allowed him to make that Eurostep and beat the help. He hadn’t scored the entire game until we called that play. He’s not in rhythm, he’s got the flu, he hasn’t put up many shots. But we’re going to give him a shot at his sweet spot. That’s a high-percentage shot for us.”
http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/pos...winning-simply

Of all the talk of schemes and shot selection, this is one of the biggest developments I've noticed for the whole team offensively - their awareness of mismatches and ability to call the right play at the right time to take advantage of something happening on the floor seems to be one of the biggest reasons they score so well, and especially in the fourth quarter when it slows down to a bit more of a deliberate play-by-play flow. Also, all the core scorers have huge balls and are not afraid of anything. Only JV and Ross are still fragile offensively.

I love the Lowry and DeRozan post-ups - they go to those as soon as they have an undersized guard on them. They also get bigs the ball in the post asap after a switch. I remember all those years of yelling at the TV when there was an obvious mismatch on the floor, and the team couldn't even get the ball to the right guy. Then some dunce would jack a bad shot against tight coverage and the whole possession would feel like such a waste. Those days are ovah!!

[KeonClark]

This thread should be put to bed. Offense is not flawed.

[Kuh]

Interesting in reading articles over the past few days. It looks like the offence is very practical: find a mismatch and exploit it over and over, as Doug Smith pointed out they did to Schroeder yesterday.

It makes sense: as a defence-first coach, your biggest nightmare is when the opposition finds a flaw in your defence that they can exploit. That's why Chuck Hayes got thrown out against Memphis in place of Jonas, to stop Gasol exploiting him.

So Casey is running his offence to be a defence's nightmare: find the weakness and ruthlessly go after it, whether with complicated or very simple sets.

[S.R.]

Interesting in reading articles over the past few days. It looks like the offence is very practical: find a mismatch and exploit it over and over, as Doug Smith pointed out they did to Schroeder yesterday.

It makes sense: as a defence-first coach, your biggest nightmare is when the opposition finds a flaw in your defence that they can exploit. That's why Chuck Hayes got thrown out against Memphis in place of Jonas, to stop Gasol exploiting him.

So Casey is running his offence to be a defence's nightmare: find the weakness and ruthlessly go after it, whether with complicated or very simple sets.

That seems like a good way to sum it up. The guards and the bigs can both take it into the post or shoot from 15+ feet. It's almost like the offense doesn't "need" to do any one thing in particular - they just exploit what the defense gives them.

Ex. they can win without the three ball - only hit 4 against Phoenix and still scored 104 points bc Jonas went off against an undersized front line. Then next game they hit 14/29 three's against Atlanta to put up 126. It's always something like that.

Two of the top 5 Drtg's right now are Memphis and the Bucks - both W's. I'm really looking forward to some games against the Spurs, GSW, and Houston (#1-3 Drtg).

[stooley]

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/pos...winning-simply

one of the best offences in the league so far