Can be said for almost any NBA player. If he gets hot from outside, he's not going to beat us by himself. If we let him in the paint, he gets everyone else involved on top of his own scoring.
Yep, but the only debate now would be, "Is Devin Harris a better backup PG than Mo?" I don't think it would be much of a debate.
I'm loving that the Blazers are going to play the Spurs. If you want to be great you have to beat great.
And you guys also seem to think it's an option giving up the mid-range jumper or layup Last I checked the Blazers are pretty bad at guarding the pick and roll. Teams attack it all the time with a lot of success.
When Mo opts out, chemistry goes out the window. If he's really all that tight with Dame and LA, he'll play out his second year.
I imagine Rick Carlisle will be on the phone tonight with Stotts giving him a lot of helpful advise and insight.
We do have an option. We don't have to defend the pick and roll the same way every time. People attack us with the pick and roll because we give the ball handler a lot of room to work because we always go over ball screens, and our bigs wait in the paint rather than hedging. A guy like Parker, who would rather drive than shoot outside, loves this because it gives him room to operate in a 2 on 1 with a head of steam before he reaches the defender, who is stuck standing still in the paint waiting to react. He makes lots of shots in the paint, and he finds open players when we are forced to collapse. Stotts plays this defense because he hopes players will take contested mid-range shots, but they are often not contested very well because the big is too deep in the paint, and the wing player is behind the play. Parker will just weave around our bigs and fuck up our entire defense. That is why my original post on this matter was to go under more of the perimeter ball screens and try to entice him to shoot longer shots, because he doesn't convert those at such a high rate. If nothing else, it might stagnate their offense a bit if all they do is set a ball screen and watch Parker shoot. If we allow him into the paint at will, he will kill us. He makes their entire offense go by collapsing the defense. But I'm wrong. You win.
San Antonio's offense is so good because they push the ball in transition and have superior ball movement on the offensive side of the floor It's much more than just Tony Parker collapsing the defense