Everything Nick Nurse

[The Great One]

The thing that i love about Nurse is his substitution pattern. You don't know what he's going to do. There's no pattern.

Casey on the other hand has a set rotation. You know that DeRozan will play the first 10 mins of the 1st and 3rd quarters. You know that he will sub him back in with 5-6 mins left in the 2nd and 4th qrtrs. JV will play most of the 1st and 3rd quarters but will not play much in the 2nd and 4th quarters -- doesn't matter if he's playing well.

[ReubenJRD]

I broke down one of my favourite plays last night.

Just impressive how everything just works.

The whole key in this play is the attention Kawhi draws with the ball. Immediately after the screens, Pascal flares to corner, JV rolls, and Lowry sets dropscreen on help defender (Towns). Strong side defender cannot leave because Green is positioned in the corner.

— JR Dongalen (@ReubenJRD) October 25, 2018

[Hotshot]

The thing that i love about Nurse is his substitution pattern. You don't know what he's going to do. There's no pattern.

Casey on the other hand has a set rotation. You know that DeRozan will play the first 10 mins of the 1st and 3rd quarters. You know that he will sub him back in with 5-6 mins left in the 2nd and 4th qrtrs. JV will play most of the 1st and 3rd quarters but will not play much in the 2nd and 4th quarters -- doesn't matter if he's playing well.

Casey was a great motivator and the team was relatively prepared for every game. But his in game management was never up to par, call for plays out of a time outs was usually DD or Lowry running down the clock and bricking the shot lol substitution patterns were predictable.

[DanH]

Surprisingly the only thing Nurse is doing differently from Casey so far is the opposite of what people expected him to do. People thought he was gonna play JV 30mpg and make him a focal point, instead he's had the balls to try Ibaka at the starting 5 instead (in the regular season and it's paying dividends.

Do we know that it's paying dividends? I'd venture to say it is hurting us, but we are so good it doesn't matter.

[slaw]

The thing that i love about Nurse is his substitution pattern. You don't know what he's going to do. There's no pattern.

Casey on the other hand has a set rotation. You know that DeRozan will play the first 10 mins of the 1st and 3rd quarters. You know that he will sub him back in with 5-6 mins left in the 2nd and 4th qrtrs. JV will play most of the 1st and 3rd quarters but will not play much in the 2nd and 4th quarters -- doesn't matter if he's playing well.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Look, Casey's overall approach brought a lot of success to Toronto, so he was doing something right. The problem arose in the playoffs when he couldn't make the necessary in-game, tactical adjustments (or made the wrong ones). Now, that might be related but I'm not so sure.

You can bet that if things go sideways during a losing streak we'll start hearing about players not liking the fact their routine and rotations aren't set in stone, etc.

[slaw]

Do we know that it's paying dividends? I'd venture to say it is hurting us, but we are so good it doesn't matter.

You are wish casting....

[007]

Personally, I'm in favor of JV starting over Ibaka, but I can't complain with the results so far. Once we hit a rough patch we'll see how Nurse responds to adversity, and what adjustments he'll make

[Nilanka]

Personally, I'm in favor of JV starting over Ibaka, but I can't complain with the results so far. Once we hit a rough patch we'll see how Nurse responds to adversity, and what adjustments he'll make

It may not show from the raw block numbers alone, but you can tell there's hesitation on shots around the rim when Ibaka's back there.

[007]

It may not show from the raw block numbers alone, but you can tell there's hesitation on shots around the rim when Ibaka's back there.

Serge has definitely been playing much better than I expected from him. I hope he can keep it up

[The Great One]

There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Look, Casey's overall approach brought a lot of success to Toronto, so he was doing something right. The problem arose in the playoffs when he couldn't make the necessary in-game, tactical adjustments (or made the wrong ones). Now, that might be related but I'm not so sure.

You can bet that if things go sideways during a losing streak we'll start hearing about players not liking the fact their routine and rotations aren't set in stone, etc.

Not a lot of coaches have a set rotation. Casey is one of those rare coaches. Popovich doesn't have a set rotation.

[ReubenJRD]

There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Look, Casey's overall approach brought a lot of success to Toronto, so he was doing something right. The problem arose in the playoffs when he couldn't make the necessary in-game, tactical adjustments (or made the wrong ones). Now, that might be related but I'm not so sure.

You can bet that if things go sideways during a losing streak we'll start hearing about players not liking the fact their routine and rotations aren't set in stone, etc.

You hit it right on the head, and I think Ujiri tackled the issues of the past five years:

- Casey, great regular season coach. Got 100% out of his players as many posters here have mentioned. But, lacked the tactical knowledge and awareness to run set plays down the stretch, make the proper in-game adjustments as you mentioned, and quite frankly, lack of X's & O's to counter the opposition and their matchups. He was also just straight ignorant or oblivious to the problems, like Miles guarding Love, or OG not guarding LeBron, or a 70% Carroll on a LeBron in 2017, or a Luis Scola playing major minutes, or an underutilization of Valanciunas in the low-to-high post, or completely ruining Powell's confidence, etc. etc. fricking, etc. Casey got the best out of his guys, unfortunately, he didn't know how to utitlize his roster like Nurse is doing now, five games in.

- DeRozan, great offensive talent, but not good enough to get you to the promised land as we've come to know for the past five years. Gave his all, turned himself into one of the most skilled offensive players in the league today after being labelled the rawest prospect in the 2009 NBA draft. Understood positioning, attacking the feet, one-on-one awareness and knowing how to get guys to bite, but he could never comprehend timeliness of a score, creating within an offence, a below-average three-point shooter, and high volume/inefficient.

I definitely credit Casey/DeRozan with what they've done. As a fan, it's been five of the funnest years as a fan, however heartbreaking it's been. I've enjoyed it thoroughly, all the wins, the highlight plays, the loyal quotes from both those men--it's amazing to know the Raptors came a long, long, looooooong way from the days of Jamario Moon, and Landry Fields.

I'm going on a tangent here, but as small sample size as it's been, Nick Nurse has been such a refreshing coach to observe. His demeanour on the sidelines, his words and how he articulates his gameplan, then his player/rotation management, on-court adjustments, set plays, spacing and positioning, it's amazing. Not to mention how elevated it all looks with Kawhi Leonard who is arguably the best player in the Eastern Conference this year.

[DanH]

It may not show from the raw block numbers alone, but you can tell there's hesitation on shots around the rim when Ibaka's back there.

Maybe.

With Ibaka on the court this year, we've given up 33 attempts at the rim per 48, and opponents have converted at 49%. With JV, it's 25 attempts at the rim per 48, and a 48% conversion rate.

Hard to isolate those stats for lineups, but to try to correct for the obvious retort that JV has faced more bench competition this year:

KL+KL+SI: 39 PITP allowed per 48
KL+KL+JV: 30 PITP allowed per 48

Maybe you are right and teams are hesitating to attack the rim with Ibaka in there. But if so we'll need to wait for the numbers to reflect that. They sure don't right now. Which is certainly not conclusive this early - just not a strong early sign that Ibaka is obviously having an impact inside.

[inthepaint]

I broke down one of my favourite plays last night.

Just impressive how everything just works.

The whole key in this play is the attention Kawhi draws with the ball. Immediately after the screens, Pascal flares to corner, JV rolls, and Lowry sets dropscreen on help defender (Towns). Strong side defender cannot leave because Green is positioned in the corner.

— JR Dongalen (@ReubenJRD) October 25, 2018

Loved how Lowry pinned down Towns (who's twice as big as he is) to allow free passage to Leonard on this play. Pretty much took their rim protection away altogether.

Only 5 games, but Lowry seems to be playing with a lot more freedom this year, and with an enhanced on and off-ball court vision. I'm really liking his impact on the defensive paint as well. Always knew how to draw charges exceptionally, but there's an extra peskiness on him harassing the opposing bigs down low while Serge/Siakam/OG force the opposing big to bring it down for dribble before going up. I see that from Green as well.

[ReubenJRD]

Loved how Lowry pinned down Towns (who's twice as big as he is) to allow free passage to Leonard on this play. Pretty much took their rim protection away altogether.

Only 5 games, but Lowry seems to be playing with a lot more freedom this year, and with an enhanced on and off-ball court vision. I'm really liking his impact on the defensive paint as well. Always knew how to draw charges exceptionally, but there's an extra peskiness on him harassing the opposing bigs down low while Serge/Siakam/OG force the opposing big to bring it down for dribble before going up. I see that from Green as well.

It was a great play, and the presence of having Green on the floor really hindered the strong side defence from coming over to get a hand in on Kawhi's attempt to the rim. Nurse loves his off-ball screens and it's working so well now that his wings are consistent perimeter threats.

I feel the freedom isn't just because of Nurse, but having two wings who can shoot and defend. Lowry doesn't have to be the lone perimeter threat offensively anymore, and he doesn't have to bailout his teammates defensively. There's a lot more focus on man-to-man rather than help and recover, which was Casey's philosophy the last few years trying to mask DeRozan. Of the 11-12 guys, Monroe and Miles are the only sub-par defenders on the team, which is also being shown. The team's best player also isn't a minus-defender, instead, it's likely the best perimeter defender in the league. It's a different feel and game out there.

[Truth Teller]

With Nurse, it seems everyone is more responsible with passing and finding open players. Even JV has made some nice assists this season.

With Casey, it was basically Demar or Lowry PnR to find the open player. But this basically turns into 1v1 in the fourth quarter.

I must say that Nurse seems way better at adapting and play calling than Mr. Casey. Also it was laughable that Casey was lauded for his defense.