Chauncey Billups coaching and basketball stuff ONLY!

Billups talking about the ball moving through Nurk. I question this as well.

We watched the last time the team tried this through Nurk. He passes the ball way too lazy and they end up with turnovers. Teams will cruise the lanes looking for Nurk to flip pass instead of Zip Pass. It ends up being the only way nurk can facilitate is through the hand off pass or the wide open shooter. The other issue is he still doesn't make the shot from three enough to warrant enough attention from outside.
You absolutely do not want Nurk trying to make cute passes.
Then you will begin to see him sulk when they start to move away from him and his lazy ways on the court.
Sorry. Not trying to be negative about everything but we all watched this over and over again. We watched the last coach chew him out on the sideline for this. How will Billups change Nurkic? Lets see that happen.

 

he should sulk if they do that to him

like, im supposed to play defense while other motherfuckers dont even try and then im supposed to set screens and do handoffs while other motherfuckers chuck three after three... yeah, that shit wont fly and nurk already said it

terry stotts diminished his role and made him a role player so badly that people will be suprised when they see him killin it next season

 

Going to happen again if he doesn’t improve his play.
Nurkic tries to be flashy and cute with his shots and passes. It rarely ends well. This isn’t on Stotts or Billups. This is on Nurkic. He has to perform or his role will diminish.

 

about Nurkic passing, 82games tracks assists, bad passes, and, maybe most important: assist/bad-pass ratio:

Sabonis:



Vucevic':



Adebayo:



Jokic:



Plumlee:



KAT:



Nurkic:



I'm not against the Blazers trying to give Nurkic a bigger role in the offense. They sure need to develop more options than hoping Dame goes supernova, and CJ pounding the air out of the ball. And Billups may be, in part, motivated to give Nurkic a bigger role because he already knows Olshey won't get him a backup PG or another facilitator

but I look at those numbers while recalling how much all of those other guys participate in the offense, and question if Nurkic's high passing turnover rate will bring as much bad as it does good. And there is also the factor that of those other bigs, the only two that may be worse perimeter shooters than Nurkic are Adebayo and Plumlee....and both of those guys have much better handles and are better at dribble-drives

which brings up, in my muddled mind at least, a couple of other stats: average shot distance and TS% (same order as above):

Sabonis: avg FGA distance 8.4....TS% .581

Vucevic: avg FGA distance 10.1....TS% .540

Adebayo: avg FGA distance 5.7....TS% .608

Jokic: avg FGA distance 10.3....TS% .613

Plumlee: avg FGA distance 3.7....TS% .597

KAT: avg FGA distance 11.4....TS% .620

Nurkic: avg FGA distance 5.3....TS% .533

I'm thinking that a low post offense for Nurkic won't accomplish much for what Billups wants to run. It might actually result in more three's and the biggest factor for making a low post work is a player that is great at finishing near the rim. That's not Nurkic. So then, optimally it would be Nurkic in a high post set...maybe foul line extended, hitting back cutters off of screens.

But Nurkic does not have the perimeter shooting efficiency that most of these other guys have. And looking at his average career shot distance, running more high post will be a fairly significant change in his offense. It would also mean he'd tend to be further from the hoop for offensive rebound opportunities

as I said, sure, why not. But I'm a little skeptical how effective it will be. Also, while I'm all for taking the ball out of CJ's hands more often, I don't think it's a good idea to take the ball out of Dame's hands

 

Pretty hard to diminish the role of someone who for two seasons waived a towel after his leg snapped off, then came back and broke his hand swiping at a ball...Terry Stotts didn't make any of that happen. Nurk feeds off a crowd...when he could play he had some careless foul trouble...Nurk needs a training camp, a crowd and health to get back to beasting....I think he will but the coach didn't bench him...injuries did...if Nurk is pissed about his role he should talk with CJ and Dame....the guys who didn't pass it to him much..fact is Nurk was really rusty joining the team mid season and not in great shape. I think this is his contract season to really play at an allstar level and hope he does...I don't care if he ever shoots a 3 again but I want him to be deadly shooting off the glass in the paint...Nurk wants to be Jokic and he has some work to do to get there...good news is Nurk is only 26

 

The test of a coach is how they rebound after bad loss. Easy to look good after a win.

 

Thanks for this. It gives us numerical analysis that confirms my gut feeling that any idea of Nurkic being misused is unlikely.

The options are:

1. Billups is an offensive genius that will run a scheme that will make Nurkic a much more efficient offensive player (impossible to tell with him being a first year coach)
2. Nurkic takes a giant leap forward going into year 8 in the league (unlikely)
3. Nurkic is the same player we have seen so far, above average defensively, below average offensively, the team's offense takes a dive with more emphasis on Nurkic in the offense until a correction is made and we return to him being option #4/5 on offense as he is now (likely).

 

If you go by playoffs success, the team was actually at it's best without Nurkic, but with a mobile big (Zach Collins) and Kanter.

We have heard that Dame is excited about playing with a mobile big. There is a good reason for that. The success the Blazers had with Nurkic being a big part of the offense was before the league realized they should just invite him to take low-efficiency shots near the basketball. Once this happened - Terry correctly realized that the offense tanked. Let me remind you that that year the Blazers were #15 in offensive efficiency. They made their money (surprisingly) on the defensive end (#8 in the league) - and Nurkic was a big part of this, but so was Zach Collins and so were Aminu and Harkless.

Nurkic as a big part of the offense has not stood the test of time. Would it be great if it happened? Sure. Is it likely? Not in my opinion.

 

I don't think it's as black and white with Nurk. There's more nuance to this. While his efficiency in shooting around the basket is suspect, he's REALLY streaky. There were games when he first came to Portland when he made all those weird hook shots, and others when he airballed everything. I think a lot of his game has to do with his general mindset. He's also a lot more engaged defensively when he's involved on offense. He was borderline elite at P&R defense before he broke his leg, and I think a lot of his engagement on that end stemmed from the fact that he was consistently getting 10-15 shots and initiating offense from the high post. I think we need to see what Chauncey can do to unlock him.

While he is in his 8th year, he's never had a consistent stretch of play without injuries/trades/etc. I don't think it's THAT unfathomable that he has a career year.

 

That would be great if it happened. If I were the blazers, I would not build on it happening if the goal is to make sure dame is happy.

 

I don't think this will make him the player Chauncey is envisioning but the only thing Nurk has to change to make a huge leap forward in year 8 is his mentality on offense in the paint. If he will just commit to finishing strong every time he's close to the hole and dunking it every time he can (Chauncey can be the catalyst for that change by drilling it into him and holding him accountable when he doesn't) then Nurk becomes a potent scoring option offensively and the pretty good passing big man he's always been... on top of being a great lane clogging big on defense. That's a decent 3rd or 4th best player on a contending team if the parts around him fit that skill set on both ends.

 

I'm not disputing that; I'm also not just accepting it either, especially considering the one time Portland made it out of the 2nd round Nurkic wasn't playing

that assertion seems really subjective and vague, starting with I'm not sure what you mean by Nurkic being "engaged"? Nurkic is not a pick & pop threat. And as the roll man on the PnR, Nurkic was only in the 53rd percentile (for comparison, Gobert was in the 87th percentile).

last year, Nurkic was in the 17th percentile in post-up (Kanter was 68th percentile), which dovetails with the fact he was only 10th on the team in FG% at the rim, tied with CJ. He was in the 15th percentile in put-backs (Kanter 64th percentile; Little 98th percentile). Again, this goes to all the weak shit he throws up around the rim. He also has a relatively low TS% for a big man

then, as a facilitator, among notable facilitating C's he was last in assist/bad pass and 5th on the team assist/turnover. He had an OffBPM of 0.3 last season; Kanter's mark was 2.0. And he was 9th on the team in offensive rating. Portland had an offensive rating of 117.5 when Nurkic was on the floor, and one of 118.6 when he was off the floor

I get that the theory is that Billups will be able to unlock Nurk's offensive genius with different schemes and emphasis. Maybe it's a good theory. But I don't see anything in the numbers to suggest it's a good idea and I'm not buying the simple assertion that Portland is best when Nurkic is a main offensive option. I don't believe that's true until people can show otherwise or Billups shows otherwise. I'm fine with Billups trying it, by the way...just don't have any confidence the theory will work

 

I've been screaming it for years, run the offense through Nurk ala Jokic and watch the Blazers become a much better team. It's already the stats. The team shoots a higher %. We rack up more assists. Nurk feels more involved so he plays better D. I'm excited that Chauncey has put that at the forefront of the offensive philosophy. You're going to have a bunch of naysayers who say Nurk can't do what Jokic does, but he doesn't have to.

 

Would be great, unfortunately, the numbers prove the exact opposite of that as far as offensive production. Sad, but true.

 

My theory is by changing just a few simple things Chauncey can unlock Nurk... to the point that he is quite a bit better than he's been in the past. Those simple changes are Nurk dunks the ball when at all possible, he always takes the ball strong to the hoop and when he sees a good pass to make he just makes it without getting in the least bit fancy.

That's all it takes IMO and Nurk becomes a much better asset to our team. He ends up near the top of the league as a roll man, he ends up near the top of the league in post ups and he ends up near the top of the league in FG% a TS%. He would also become a more efficient passer and therefore the team would call on him to pass more. That's on offense, on defense he will be a great lane clogging big and it seems he will never be extremely mobile or even mobile enough to cover the perimeter and recover to protect the paint but that's something we can live with. Just like we can live with what seems to be his limited shooting abilities. All by making sure he's surrounded by the right personnel.

If Nurk doesn't change these things in training camp or reverts back to his foolishness once play starts, you don't bench him. Chauncey stays on him about it while Neil quietly shops him because at that point you've got to say "fuck it".

 

again, last season, Portland's offensive on/off rating was -1.1 when Nurkic was on the floor. It was +6.2 when Kanter was on the floor

at the end of the season Nurkic was tied with Powell for 4th on the team in FGA/possession. He was also 4th on the team in usage rate. So, it's not like he didn't have a substantial offensive role. Melo was ahead of him in both and CJ was hogging way too much offense so sure, there's some free space there.

 

Nurk has been playing organized basketball for 15 years. It seems like a tall order to change ingrained habits in just one training camp.

 

When it's as simple as "You have to dunk that!" and "That pass wasn't actually there!" I guess the passing is a little more nuanced but if he's not willing to do the right things there are teams out there that have value for the guy and think like I do that the changes are too simple not to be able to be made.

 

Only once has Nurk gotten more than 30 minutes and 12 shots per game; in the bubble.

In those 8 games:

17.6 PPG
10.3 RPG
4.0 APG
2.0 BPG
1.4 SPG
2.4 TO

Jokic meanwhile has averaged 13 shots and 30 minutes per game for his CAREER.

18.5 PPG
9.8 RPG
6.0 APG
0.7 BPG
1.1 SPG
2.6 TO

The point isn't really even to compare Nurk to Jokic, but to prove that the more he’s involved, the better he is. Big brain Terry never embraced that simple concept. I realize fouls might’ve influenced minutes, but our whole defensive scheme was pretty much the same as our offensive scheme, except instead of Dame save us, it was Nurk save us. Hopefully the new system is a little bit more creative than that and everything isn’t dumped on one guys shoulders.

Billups seems like he has a lot more faith and trust though, so I’m fully expecting a career year for Nurk. He’s definitely got the skill set to be an All-star caliber player.