What is up, fellow thermonuclear anvers I am at Dana Valley coming at you
with an unplanned podcast video rams because people are mad. Defenses suck. The
game has been made too easy on offensive players. Luca dropped seventy three points
on Saturday. On Friday night, Joel Embiid had seventy earlier in the week,
Devin Booker and Kat both got to the sixties and in losses. The
game is broken. Bring back defense? What happened to this game that I
love? Luka Daci and Joel Embiid are ruining the NBA? Or of offenses
are ruining the NBA, or poor defensive rules of officiating or ruining the NBA.
I mean this with all sincerity and not meant to be a hot take.
Shut what the fuck up? I will have a conversation about whether you
think certain defensive rules need to be changed. You want to bring back hand
checking? That to everyone's solution to this. That's not gonna do anything.
We'll get into that in a second and maybe it'll do something. But hand
checking then in yesteryear was just different. But offenses are the way they are
now, not because of officiating, not because of some of the defensive rules
that have changed. They're this way, this potent because players are so damn
skillful, and I'm getting a little tired of people. One. Here's my
main problem with this is I don't see you want to criticize what kat was
doing in Minnesota. I didn't see the Devin Booker game when he dropped sixty
plus. I saw a huge chunk of that cat game. Yeah, the
shot hunting there was egregious. You want to criticize that and say that's why
these players are scoring so much? Okay, fine, you want to have
a conversation about teams actually having bad defenses, not trying on defense, not
adjusting on defense, not being good enough on defense, or being unfairly officiated,
or seeing how wealth they were able to hand check, like you know,
Joel Embian want to drop seventy or Luka Dan just want to drop seventy
three. I have an issue with you see something like that. I'm gonna
use Lucas as an example, the most recent one where there's not this egregious
shot hunting from him. Yeah, there's like maybe shots he wouldn't have taken.
Some of them were going in though, and then towards the end of
the game when the Hawks were just really hard trapping him, like just going
after him. He was passing up looks when he could have gone to This
was before he eclipped seventy, when he could have been taking these other jumpers
and he wasn't. And so I take issue with we see that, We
see this game that's super that this player doing this absurd shot making with absurd
skill, and it's super entertaining. And it's oh, we only did that
because of the defensive rolls. Their defenses suck. Now, what happened to
this game that I love? And so that's what I'm We see something like
that, and that's my reaction. Now, if you want to have a
larger conversation, which I tweeted something, their jokes and people are inferring,
you know, and that happens on Twitter, I'm gonna be starky. I
get it, they're inferring that. I'm taking one side of it. I'll
have a conversation about the defenses. I just think it's unfair to attribute what
these players are doing to just defenses generally being terrible. You know. Yeah,
Land has been bad on defense this year. That's part of it is
they've leaned into a model where they're just I mean, they have some good
defensive players, but I think the regression of Clint Capella has hurt them.
Having Trey Young on the court at times, yeah he's gonna try hard,
but he's always at a disadvantage. Yes, certain defenses are bad, and
if you have to watch the Hawks, someone point this out on Twitter,
and I agree with them. For eighty two games to get frustrated by their
defense, I get it. It's not like they were just not trying against
Luca though, and so it was really annoying to see that. And my
bigger issue is people just not acknowledging how much more skillful players are on offense
and what that has done to defense is you want to go and say,
looks, this is that they need to bring back hand checking. Shut fuck
up, No, they don't. When they're bringing When they had hand checking,
you had these other defensive rules in place where you effectively had to hard
double, where you couldn't double away from the ball, and it was harder
to provide help that Now, okay, hand checking is not there, but
you have to go up against these really complex defensive schemes, whether it's you
know, they could doub away from the ball. They you know, the
pre switching has made a lot of things more difficult. Or you have these
bigs who were just able to bam at a baio in Anthony Davis what Peake
Raymond Green has done and still can do on certain nights. To say that
defenses generally just suck now is it's, first of all, it's unfair to
the players because there are a ton of great defenders here where you have to
account for so much on the offensive end. And it's not just because rule
changes have been catered to offensive players. We saw the league you know,
get rid of kind of or more rigidly enforced last year. At the beginning,
it was really like the freedom of motion, the unnatural movements, and
then the kind of tapeed off a little bit, but like that that's still
part of it that benefited the defense, and you like, that's one thing
that's going to benefit the defense. And then having like these the defensive three
second role for instance, Yeah, if you want to get rid of that,
I guess we could have a conversation. Or if you want to get
rid of I mean, that's that's fine. But then it's well What is
that going to do to charges which people also want to get rid of,
which is then going to in theory, hamper what defenses can do. And
so I think we skew too far towards one side of Oh, everything was
done to benefit the offense and one flow, speed and offensive highlights are important.
What are you, Kofi on Twitter quote of my tweet saying this,
And I thought it was a great point. What highlights are being shared the
most? You want to sit there and pretend to care about the nuance of
defense. I know there are a ton of people in the business, the
Kayas Duncan, Tim Legler, Zach Lowe, Caitlin Cooper, Samson Folk people
in our discord. Go join our discord. You care about the nuances of
defense. You understand the nuances of defense. All those people I name the
people in discorder are going to understand the nuances new defense better than I can.
But you want to watch what even Draymond Green can still do on possessions.
But let's use Rudy Gobert and his mobility this year, or what Anthony
Davis is doing for LA. And you want to say that defenses just suck
in general? There might be some really shitty teams right now. But do
you know what makes defense truly so hard? Players on offense are so much
more skillful. Let's look at the let's look at kind of the defensive three
second thing for a second. How's that you had Tom Thabodeau coming in.
He had like his overload defense and everything, and this forced the three point
evolution changed out a little bit. But also the ability you kind of force
these cross court passes. Players can just do that. Now they could throw
these one headed skip passes across the court. There was Luca had to play
in the seventy three point game late in it. I think it was inside
two minutes of the fourth quarter, so he I don't even know who was
at seventy yet or he had seventy, whatever he had, and he throws
this wicked cross court pass to Tim Hardaway Junior after leaving his feet and having
these defenders in front of him, and it goes right to Tim Hardaway Junior.
He misses. The three players are more skillful in that regard. You
want to look at Joellenbiid. Tim bomb Ten said this on one of the
recent low posts that Joelle Embid is Kevin Durant, that's one hundred pounds heavier,
and it's not. They're completely different players even to attack one hundred pounds,
but he's talking about his shot profile. You have these skilled bigs even
towns, not just the ability to get up threes, but the ability to
put the ball on the floor and attack not from these post up spots.
And yeah, if you implement if you put hand checking back, Okay,
that's gonna maybe people will be really happy because there'll be players that are just
more skilled in the post, which there are still a lot of skilled post
players. By the way, maybe you would have people that are gonna be
able to throw post entry passes, which is a lost lost art I guess
in today's game, do you want if you went back to those defensive rules,
do you want like the spacing back from the nineties, from the early
two thousands? I mean, like, if you're watching on YouTube, you
want this spacing back from the wood? Is this the eighties? Is this
what you want where you have like nine eight to nine guys below the free
throw line at all times? Come on, like, don't pretend that that's
what you want. And if you have nostalgia, admit it. For that
era I just missed growing up, and your I know, I'm mythologizing with
defenses were how tough and hard nosed the game was. Yeah, go ahead
if you want to admit that, that's absolutely fine. Don't sit here and
say that defenses suck and it's two offense heavy at the moment when one offense
sells, it's just clear like them, you know, implementing rules where you
can't really break up fast breaks like that is something that helped the flow of
the game. And it also those are highlights you want to see. But
there's also just the level of skill in these players to get back to what
a Joelle and Beide is doing, what even an Anthony Davis can do,
is largely a play finisher. You mentioned Kat like, this is all just
it's not you know, people were all about small ball at one point,
which the Warriors kind of popularized with the Draymond Green at center switch that they
went to in twenty fifteen whatever it was. But now it's about people still
misconstrued a small ball. There are just these like six nine to seven foot
over looking vigure of Yama. Even look at Christops porzingis these just giants that
are able to play like wings and guards. That is a skill level that
you were not seeing earlier. I'm not gonna pretend to watch the game in
the eighties and the seventies or even the nineties, mostly because I wasn't really
alive or just too young to do it. But like I remember games from
the late nineties, and they were gritty as hell. They could be entertaining
as hell, but it's it's incomparable even in the early mid two thousands to
what we have today, where the game is just so much more I find
it more beautiful. There's there's the spacing element of this too, where defenses
are just like, okay, you can't like you're trying to guard so many
different things that are happening, but within such a much larger space because you
have certain teams are gonna have guys where they have four guys who have the
ability to at all times not just shoot, but they could shoot from long
distances, or they can put the ball on the floor and playmake or attack
the basket. And so we're stretching defenses to the point of breaking, and
they're trying to find ways to adjust. And some of these teams still do
a great job you have. I mean, look at Rudy Gobert this season.
I think is probably gonna be the runaway favorite for Defensive Player of the
Year unless something happens. I've never seen him move like this, even in
Utah when he was winning Defensive Player of the Year Wars. Basically every season
it felt like and there's still skill there. It's not on every team,
it's not present in every player. But let's not try to dilute down these
offensive feats simply because you think that the defensive rules had changed. And I'm
really tired not look. I'll just cop to not understanding enough about I can
appreciate and watch players like Anthony Davis, Draymond Green, bam Adebayo, the
guys you have to watch away from the ball, and even just like some
of Scottie Bares. I talked about this with Sampson Folk, who's made just
real strides on the defensive end because of what he's able to do away from
the restricted area now or what he's able to do as a as a helper.
You look at help defenses now compare to then in the hand hand checking
era, go back and want it just there. The rule changes probably wouldn't
lot like the way that you're helping like that these guys are rotating where they're
coming from the gaps that they're shooting. That's like, I'm not gonna sit
here and say is this the best because one I'm gonna just cop to it.
I don't know enough about you know, the defensive mechanics. And it's
even like the nitty gritty x as and o's. But like you can watch
and see that these players on defense, a lot of them are super skilled.
It's just there are better shot makers who can hit these contested looks.
And the thing that I just take issue too is everyone not everyone. I
want to loop everyone under the same umbrella. Too many people just they automatically
go towards hand checking. What is that gonna stop? Like if you want
to put back hand checking? So then are you gonna bring back the other
defensive rules to where oh, Lebron only has to beat his one guy who
yeah, okay, they could, they could bump him off a little bit,
but Lebron, even at age thirty nine, is a fucking Adonis.
He's gonna get by that guy. And then you're not gonna be able to
since you can only really hard double. If he's gonna get by that one,
you're not gonna be able to help's not gonna be as close, and
that's just gonna make life easier on him. Is that what you want to
see? Like there's gonna be flaws and anything you do. Let's not pretend
that hand checking is just gonna make this like fix everything, or that there's
one rule that would change everything. What do you want to see? And
again, don't tell me bring handchecking back like it's gonna fix everything. And
don't say the game is broken just because there's so much offense when it's not
just because defenses suck. Yeah, there are some defenses that suck. I
think it's the skill of the players. Even look at the this is how
skilled the league is. Look at the gap right now. I think between
the top of the league, even the middle of the league and the bottom
of the league. When you're talking about four hundred and fifty some odd players
being in this league, because the roster spots are weird and there's two way
guys playing, and the talent level is so high, and even the more
casual fans kind of understand like the sixth or seventh or eighth guy on these
rosters and how good they could be. There's that gap, so you're always
going to see this separation. When you see a Luca go up against a
Lineahawks defense, he's gonna torch them and look some of the look Jalen Johnson,
that's some really good possessions early on defensively against Luka Dancic and Luka Johnsons,
which is better because even him is like six eight, six' nine
whatever he is, and he's like very girthy, but his change of cadence,
his ability to hit these wild perimeter shots. And so are you mad
about you know, the three point evolution and the fact that guys can hit
step backs so they're going to pull up from you know, twenty seven plus
feet, Then what are you nostalgic for? Like a different shot selection?
And there are people who think that there's just like a lack of variety when
it comes to NBA offenses. If there's not, it's just like the way
that these players are getting to their shots. Yeah, there might be some
ISO heavy guys, but they're one taking different kinds of shots. They're doing
different things with the ball. But these offenses, even if their shot profiles
look eerily similar. They're going about different ways to get their shots. The
way Oklahoma City plays on offense is so much different from how the Dallas Mavericks
play on offense. It's just it's night on a night and day might be
extreme, but there's huge differences there. And I just don't understand how you
could watch these games, even just choppering in tangentially and be like, this
sucks. This is unlatchable. It's so hard to defense now, not because
of the rules, but because of how skilled the players are. More than
that, even if there are some adjustments you can make, and even Luca
has said it's harder to score thirty playing in Europe than it is here,
there are the rules that go into that. You can play more physical defense.
There's also the goaltending stuff where that doesn't matter. You want to see
that in the NBA. You want to have a conversation about these it's fine,
and you want to school me on while you're not acknowledging this or there's
not this rule Actually hand checking would prevent this. I'm just the hand checking
stuff very quickly. I still believe that lateral movement on the defensive end is
more important than anything right now, which is why some of the most valued
defensive players are guys who are able to switch, hang in space against smaller
players or even just you look at Giannis where there's these predominantly off ball disruptors.
But then you can still have these like you know, Brook Lopez runner
up Defensive Player of the Year last year, but then Mukui lost. He
with Jared Jackson junior, who does everything on defense, And so you're are
you saying there's a lack of just skill where guys aren't being coached defense coming
into the league. I just find that very hard hard to leave. I
really think it has more to do with the skill level of these players on
the offensive end, and it's just it's it's evolved in so many different areas
to where yeah, we were harping on small ball and there are still teams
that you want to get to it and downside at center a little bit,
but a lot of it's just like, no, we want dudes that are
big, but they play like guards and wings there, and so I just
don't I don't want to hear it anymore, especially after performances like you can
play both sides, but you're not some You're not a fucking cool ass edge
lord by telling me that, well, why can't it be both? Why
are you're taking absolute ludism here? It's not absoluteism, it's I want to
be able to appreciate offensive detonations that were not coming unethically, Like we go
back to the ethical hoops that were born from I think that was the Suns
or whatever. Yeah, there were elements of when Karl Anthony Town's one in
the sixties. Okay, it felt like, yeah, they're they're really foreseating
him, he's forcing it. He got benched at one point. I get
it, And you want to talk about that, we can. But like,
what did Luca do? What was the shot hunting that Luka did it?
We're just gonna say the Hawks are so bad on defense, Luca didn't
really do anything incredible. Shut up with that, Like, enjoy this and
you could be egregious like me, where it's like, I just want to
see the offense. I'm here because s Beraheney quote tweeted my tweet with this
as well. I'm here because I want to see someone break break Will's record.
That's being honest about it. If you're sitting here and be like,
I want to see games in the seventies and the eighties again, like not
from the well maybe the errors, but alway some of those offenses like back
then though they were just lighting it up. The spacing is just so different
now. So just say that you want to see a slower game, a
less fluid game. You could say that that you're nostalgic for it. Can
you also maybe admit, though, but perhaps now in the moment, am
I a prisoner, a captive of the moment and mythologizing a little bit of
what we're watching? I'll admit it. Maybe could you also admit though,
that you're mythologizing that defenses are this bad and that it's not really more about
just how skilled the offensive players are. Why can't we all just admit that
I'm just against denigrating using this we just watched with embiding Luka Danci specifically as
a springboard for well, the game sucks today, or it's unwatchable, or
defense are unwatchable. You don't know enough about defense, and even my base
my baseline level of defensive knowledge, you don't know enough about defense. If
you can't watch what some of these teams are doing some of these players are
doing away from the ball basically every single team, and appreciate the level of
skill and complexity that goes into it. And you want to say that three
pointers have ruined the league, or that defenses are just they they're just incapable.
You want to like even a team that sucks on offense this year and
their spacing can be wonky. Let's use Miami heat where it's just like Eric
Polosher is gonna employ every single thing under the sun, where they've had good
offense in the past with spacing that you would call less than I deal,
where they're just gonna free guys up with flair screens and cuts and the stuff
that they're going to be able to do because his coaching in that case absolutely
matters. Or let's look at what offenses are doing where they're running after age
shots or they're getting the ball ahead so quickly because they have a guy in
Tyres Haliburton who can see the floor so well from everywhere and can throw these
launching passes where even if defenses are set, you're just playing at such a
high speed, or he's throwing these were looking at Luka Doncic's passes specifically that
you can do whatever you want and he's gonna be able to throw that cross
court pass no matter what you do, or that oh all right, well,
what are you supposed to do to stop one guy if they're able to
stretch you with four guys out at once and then a rim runner who's gonna
give you that vertical gravity. The floor balance has changed, and I think
it's made for a better product. Yeah, on offense, but just the
fluidity of the game anyway. And it's made me appreciate watching like defenders who
can be absolutely dominating or defenses that can shut down other teams. But if
you're just gonna sit here and generalize that the product is unwatchable and defenses a
ruined the league, I can't. I just can't get on board with that.
When you look at what some of these, like every so many players
we have right now thrown back in the hand checking era, they just would
have been offensive anomalies and they're not. It's just become the norm. It's
there are and you will see this in the playoffs, and let's use it.
And maybe they skewed two I'm not meaning to, you know, we
go back even further, but Andre Robertson, which is like he became he
was such a dominant defender, but he became unplayable points in the playoffs that
at that era of Oklahoma City Thunder basketball. We saw last year with Cleveland.
And this is not I'm just using an example. Did they not give
him enough of a chance, but Isaacacorro where defenses are gonna be able to
ignore him now in the playoffs. His value changes in the postseason in theory,
I'm not picking on him specifically, and he has gone through stretches and
seasons where he's hit his threes on moderate to low volume very well. It's
just that's the most recent memory of while that player was certainly like yeah,
thed JB. Bicker Staff, Was he too quick with the hook there?
I don't know. And so the fact that shooting and floor balance has become
this important to where I think that you're going to see teams bench shooting liabilities
in the playoffs tells you all you need I know about the skill level of
offenses in general. And the other thing here is and this is like and
by the way, you look at when when the NBA has made some of
these changes that were supposed to benefit offenses. I think when they really started
enforcing like some of the different defensive rules, it was like two thousand and
four whatever it was, you didn't see like the offensive ratings just shoot up
all of a sudden because of those rules. Even now you're not dealing with
like the foul at temp rate. For the average this year, it's kind
of right in line with what we've been seeing over the past decade. Yes,
the offensive rating, I think it's one sixteen point three outside garbage time
the average offensive rating. Yeah, that's really high. Let's see if it
sticks for the entire season. We also a lot of the times, yes,
sometimes it's higher in the postseason. A lot of times we see the
offensive rating average drop in the playoffs. And that would be my other point
on this is and this was a male bad question we had at one point.
I don't know if I ever answered it. What makes postseason the postseason
so much different from the regular season. And it's when you're playing so many
games against different teams three four games in seven nights or whatever it ends up
being, and sometimes they're back to backs. You just can't game plan for
one team the way that you can over the course where you know you're going
to face them up to seven times or at least four, and you're just
able to prep for that with one to two days off in between, and
it's more feasible to practice and the travels easier because you're playing two game sets,
you know, two to two and then yes, there's if it goes
to seven, one, one and one. It's just when you have that
time to dedicate it. So maybe your maybe your problem is the NBA needs
fewer games. That's a conversation we can have. Are for this like it's
there's this is more nuanced than people are giving it credit for. And I
will say, though, what I am very dismissive of is the people that
watch these performances and say, well, why can't why why can't we be
Because I'm this faux intellectual and I think on a higher level than you,
I'm willing to acknowledge both sides and you're not. No, I'm an absoluteist
when it comes to appreciating great performances. And are we seeing more of these
historical scoring outings now more than ever? Sure? What is the what is
the root of why is that happening? Ask yourself? That is it because
that defenses suck or everything's been catered to the offensive players, or is it
more so because these are offensive players that are more skilled in ways that we
didn't see in decades past. Even look at the players that are breaking these
reg like, yeah, Devin Booker six' five dropping sixty, Like that's
kind of the more traditional, like archetype of score. If you were watching
the NBA in the eighties, the nineties, early two thousands, like,
that's what you were thinking, unless you were wanted to post up broots in
there. But also, what Devin Booker can do as a passer is just
like in an off ball mover. That's the other thing, is the off
ball movement in this league in part because of the space. And if you
think that there's not physical defenses being played, look at what Steph Curry has
to do a lot of times when he's pinballing around, and it happens more
in the playoffs because again teams are game planning around him. There's this theory
that there is a softer whistle. You do see on a lot of seasons,
you'll see the foul attempt rate average drop in the postseason. A lot
of that is just better game planning, and so it's maybe it's not so
much defenses suck then, or that teams don't care about defense, that everything's
catered to the offense so much. As well, there's too many games in
the regular season all of that discussion. Do I think if there was sixty
games in a year, do I think that we would have had a week
where we just had what was it, four players scored sixty or more?
I think, unless I'm misremembering, maybe not. But like, what is
the problem with that? Were those games not entertaining for you? Yeah,
if you're a Wolves fan, you're mad that they lost to the Hornets,
and Chris Finch was pissed as hell that Towns was you're punting as much as
he was. But the Timberwolves were also acknowledging, like we knew what Joel
Embiid had that night we were watching, I think said this, so we
wanted to get him the ball. That's cool too. I just I don't
know how you can watch, specifically the Luka Dacics to twelve bead games and
come away thinking that, oh, that's just like this is catered for them
to do that. I think some of the shot selection stuff is you look
at the three point volume, that's gonna be conducive to scoring more so,
it's also conducive to higher variants by the way, but hey, the fact
that we just have a six to eight luka doncis handling the ball like a
guard and being one of the best passers in the NBA and can hit these
ridiculously difficult threes even if they're contested or if they're from super far out like
that also goes into it as well. And so if you want to sit
here and complain about the lack of defense in the NBA, and it's even
there's people I respect on Twitter and still respect just using it to point out
like that defenses have made this easier, or the defensive rules or the offensive
rules have made this easier. I just I call bullshit there. I think
it's I think there are both sides of the ball. You can argue if
rewind thirty years that there are aspects of it that were easier. Where it's
for defenses specifically, I think that yes, okay, they were able to
hand check, but like the fact that defenses now are able to like throw
out different types of help or double teams where they don't have to be hard
on a double teams. That actually benefits to the defense compared to what it
was previously. And I can't remember the exact year that they got rid of
that. It was like a they had trouble in forcing it at first,
and then they really like cracked down on it. They have the defensive when
they got rid of illegal defense, and then they implemented the defense of three
second rule. If you want them to get rid of that, but you
also want them to get rid of band charges, it's I feel like the
other thing here is people just want to be curmudgeonly complainers. It's like they
I just and it's not. Oh they're old and they missed the game.
I think some people have been very I respect the people that are like I
just miss watching that. I'm nostalgic for it. If you're a nostalgic,
I get it. I'm nostalgic for certain things in life that you know when
I was an actual teenager that I know there's no rational my life is better
off because of this, but you kind of missed the element of that.
You want to make that that's fine, but don't pretend like the game is
somehow inferior to what it was, or more compromise than it was. It's
not it's better. It's better than it ever was. It's more complex than
it ever was. And part of that is just I don't know if people
are in their little echo chambers and it's we cover the entire league around these
parts and make it mad that we don't know, like the exact rotation patterns
on a Tuesday night in January, it's the second end of a back to
back and they're missing three of their starters, and this is what would happen
at the four minute mark in the second quarter. That speaks to local coverage
and podcasting, which is really good, but it's also been it's never been
easier to sidestep divergent thoughts, and so like you zero into this and you're
it's harder for you to think outside the box. And I don't think that's
what I'm doing here, where I'm not acknowledging that some of what I say
could be wrong, or maybe I'm just glossing over points. I will admit
that I'm saying that discussion. I hate the idea of having it after a
performance like Lucas or Joellen beads where like that shit was iconic, what I
called shit, That stuff was iconic, and appreciate it if you just want
to be mad about something, which is what people online or a lot of
sports fans want to do, or if it's not the player on their team
doing it. But let's not over generalize things by saying, no, it's
this, or pretend well, I'm actually playing both sides, because what Luca
did was cool, but defense has actually suck. Now, No, you
just don't and I don't understand enough of what's going on on defense. That's
the level of complexity. And there are some I'm not saying other analysts don't
like and the guy's dunk and Kitlyn Cooper Sampson folks like all those great folks,
they understand what they're done. They know the super super nuance of that.
It is just so much harder to defend offenses, not because the league
is cowtowed to them, but because the players are more skilled than ever,
because the schemes are more the stuff that you do to get guys open away
from the ball with some of these teams, and then there's even if you
want to go to a bait more basic approach where it's okay, this team
is heavy ISO, the fact that these guys can score in isolation when there's
all this help or these traps coming at them, when there are guys who
can all right, even if you force a switch on a pick and roll.
The fact that Rudy Gobert can just hang in space now or if you
don't still don't believe Rudy Gobert can do that, Okay, Well, Anthony
Davis, bam Adebayo, Draymond Green and yeah, those are defensive superstars,
but Lucas an offensive superstar. There's Lucas one of the ten best players in
the game. And when you're looking at like the players that just scored all
these points, Towns might be the outlier when you're looking at, oh,
where do they stand in the hierarchy? They're not a top ten guy.
He's not an All NBA guy right now. One, he's as close as
you get to without it. And also he's a matchup nightmare on offense even
if he's playing the four, because of his size and the things that he
is able to do even in the post, by the way, but also
just being able to face up put the ball on the deck. Like even
doing that in space, by the way, at that size is incredible when
you're able to do it through traffic. And again that game got out of
control. I will have that conversation about that. The Luca game didn't get
out of control, the n Big game didn't get out of control. This
is just the real absolutism is thinking that offenses have it easy and that defenses
do not somehow, or that defenses are just playing worse. In general,
the teams care less about the regular season. I mean, maybe there's more
wear and tear on their bodies because the game is played maid so much more
fluidly and you have to account for so many different things, and you're going
up against these physical specimens. I'm not just talking about strength and size,
but mobility in size that's going to wear on you. Or chasing around these
players who are pinballing away from from the action like a Steph Curry just I
mean, remember when we're tracking prime Klay Thompson like my god, and it's
okay, you don't So if you don't want to see that, you want
to get back to where well, the spacing is just clogged and there's really
no room for them. To move anyway. And if that's what you want,
that's fine, that's not what you That doesn't actually make the game more
esthetically pleasing or more entertaining. That just means you're nostalgic for something that was,
you know, mathematically, functionally not as effective as what we're seeing now.
And so anyone who thinks that the game is unwatchable except for the playoffs,
I'm never gonna get on board with you. And I just think that
people who default to we like there's no hand checking and it's not gonna fucking
change most of this stuff. It's just not. And so if you want
to have a conversation about what could be changed, what should be changed,
what shouldn't have been changed, what brought back is there's stuff we should borrow
from the way that is happening in Europe. I would love to see,
just like get rid of goaltending. I would absolutely love to see that,
Like let's force guys like the stuff that would do to players who are taking
floaters or laying things up instead of dunking. I don't know if DeAndre Ayton
would ever score again, to be honest with you, but that was me,
but like it would make life harder on like a you know, the
floater extraordinary airs there to make harder on Luca with his floaters, and make
life harder on Srey Young with his floaters, Manuel Quickly with his floaters,
although they've been pretty rough since he's been in Toronto. Anyway, I get
it, and I think it's fine. There are gonna be people that just
disagree with me. I'm sure in discord who think that I'm just flat out
ass wholly wrong. I'm only being so forceful here because to not be able.
You don't If you're saying, well, I appreciate what I saw butt,
however, no, then you're not appreciating it. You're using it as
a launching pad to debate something that really just doesn't hold enough merit to me.
Or give me something more nuanced than bring back hand checking, or because
offensive players shoot so many threes, bring me something that actually matters, and
then we can have the conversation. But I just I don't like we can
appreciate. I just feel like collectively we should be able to appreciate certain things
we just watched, and the Luca and Embi performances were one of them.
And so and again I respect the people that are just like, well,
I don't really have a problem with defenses, it's it's or the the way
offensive being player r Now it's just like I'm kind of nostalgic for this.
It's all a lot of that, you know what. That's fine. I
respect that you could say that you're still kind of appreciating what you just saw
though, and to use this is a Luca and that's what it really took
off was for some reason, I guess because it was again we saw four
players drop whatever. It was the second seventy point game in a week,
and now we've see more of them. Donovan Mitchell did it. I don't
know. I honestly don't know what. As my second screen goes off in
the background, I was like, don't actually know what kind of incited Well,
let's go after like like, let's have this conversation now, don't mabe
because it was the Hawks defense, like people were tired of watching that.
But again, even name made adjustments. I thought Jalen Johnson did his damnedest
when he found himself on Luca during early in the game, and then the
Hawks were really crowding Luca, forcing the ball of his hands down down the
stretch, and to his credit, he got rid of it a lot of
the time too. He still took some shots for like, but you know
what, when you're on a heater, that's also what you do. It
wasn't at the cat level that it wasn't that Minnesota Charlotte game. And so
I'm just I really I probably came out very angry and curmudgingly myself here.
That's fine because I am this is a ranting, this is raving. I'm
like thirty minutes in and I'm gonna cut this off very shortly, I promise.
I just think that we over and I'll throw myself in here. We
oversimplify so many things, and just this idea that the game is somehow compromised
because defenses aren't allowed to do enough or just defenses suck. Now is it's
incorrect and it's just flat out wrong. And I think it's okay to not
be mad all the time or need to find something to be mad at.
There are a lot of things with this. The officiating is probably an issue
on some level. There are rules at both ends of the floor that would
be good to change. I would probably I don't know if I'm team banned
the charge or not. What would that do to the offensive ratings? It
would probably absolutely skyrocket. I do wish that the kind of unnatural motion of
offensive player was probably more strictly enforced or more frequently enforced. Like we saw
a lot of stuff that was going early I think it was twenty two to
twenty three season, and it was like as it progressively went on, fel
like they got a little bit looser with it. So, yeah, there
are things that I'm having to help, but I'm not gonna use the specific
performance say well, this wouldn't have fucking happened if the league in defenses knew
what they were doing. That's what I take issue with. Let me know
what you think in the comments. Hit the subscribe button on YouTube if you
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can have more discussions like this where I'm sure again, I'm sure that there
are people on discord, and I respect the world that of everyone who's active
in there that are just will disagree with me, And that's fine too,
because I am fine with the difference of opinion. I just don't like when
it feels disingenuous and it's using specific performances to frame it as this larger issue
as if this wouldn't have happened, or it's a symptom of we're gonna take
the way that the Hawks are defending and use it as an example of like
defenses just suck. Like if that's what your takeaway for what the Hawks are
doing defensively, is your indictment of the entire NBA, Like you are you
only watching the Hawks? I mean kudos to anyone who's watching any two Hawks
games. I think Luther on Twitter was the one who said that. To
me, it was like, good man, that must be tough sledding.
I just think we can have that discussion, but we don't need to use
what are just objectively iconic, difficult, absurd performances to do it and to
then diminish those accomplishments. Yes, we're seeing history broken more frequently. It's
not just because offense is so easy. It's because the players on offense are
so bonkers, so complexly, deeply, incredibly good and talented and anomalousts to
era's past. That's why we're seeing these these records broken. And yes,
the shots selection has a lot to do with it, but the fact that
they can make these shots, there's so many guys who can make these types
of shots, Now that's something worth appreciating, I think, So please remember
subscribe. I'm grateful for all the support that anyone who's been here a while
gives us. If you're new, look say you're new around these parts,
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Until next time, and as always, I leave you with the shoutouts
to the one, the only, the indelible, the man who can't defend
anybody, and would have held Luka Doncic to under ten points had he been
a meatic. Frankly,