On a contending team Aminu is coming off the bench. Hot take: To take that next step this team needs an upgrade at both forward spots. What say you, S2?
Chief made 2 of 4 swish3s each in the Nov 18 and 20 games and has shown effective defense in those 2 games, so I disagree. Chief, Nurk, Dame, CJ, Jake, Nik, and Evan had defensive weakness against the Bucks that seem to be at least partly explained by tiredness after a vigorous Knicks game.
Blazers had no legs last night. There on their 5 on 6 game road trip so there pretty tired and it showed it last night. Now going to Golden State that is struggling right not now.
Aminu is what he is. A fine defender with a catapult shot who really can't dribble or pass. Nothing has really changed since he came here. He gets wide-open '3's for a reason and every once in a while hits a few to keep his average up. But you wouldn't teach that shot to your worst enemy's kid....and I don't see his form changing anytime soon.
At least one of those spots. We could get away with one player in the starting unit who is "offensively challenged", but not two.
Exactly. Collins and Nurk have been extremely effective playing together, I don’t understand why they don’t try it more, especially when they don’t hesitate to play Meyers and Collins together.
"Need an upgrade at both forward spots".....and neither of our guards play very good defense. Perhaps we should have seen some of these issues coming then. Teams with length, shooters and who can attack the basket are trouble for this team because Dame/CJ (the first line of defense) aren't even slowing down some of the more accomplished guards, we have the smallest back-court on a nightly basis, both of our forwards need to be upgraded and our center gets exposed by quicker centers who can score and shoot a bit from the outside. Guess we are lucky to be where we are.
The length of our guards is not the problem. Sure if you have "taller" guards who can shoot like Dame and CJ then yes that would be better, but there aren't many who can. The rules of the NBA favor the offense. You need lot of scorers to win. Taller defenders who can't score are worthless because the rules keep them from defending as well.
On most regular season nights, that is certainly the case. But in the Playoffs, you have better rosters. How many Playoff series has it been that it was the other team who had overall bigger guards that were as good or better on offense and better on defense? 3 for sure and in the Clippers series before Paul got hurt, an argument could be made that at best it was a draw. Go back one more and the Grizzlies had the overall better back-court for the Playoffs as well. So that is 5 Playoff series in a row where the strength of our team hasn't had the advantage they have had most of the season. Welcome to the Playoffs where it really matters. Dame/CJ are very good on offense but come time for the Playoffs, that hasn't seen much success and on defense, they have been the worst back-court of any team they have played against in the Playoffs since they became a duo.