there are several posters here that are pretty strongly anti-Dame. They have been for years, but the way this season has gone, it gives them more ammunition to go after Dame. Speaking logic to them and adding full context won't change their opinions
Justin Termine and Eddie Johnson where talking about this on NBA radio today. I wish there was DVR for SXM because I didn’t get to finish it. Sounded like they were both hating on Dame a little bit. Saying that he may not be As good as we all thought and that he may not be in the same tear as your LeBron, Steph Curry and KD ext. They were also saying with the new rule changes and the NBA getting a bit more physical is that maybe he’s getting a small taste of what it was like in the 80s and 90s.
So how have the rule changes affected Lillard? I thought they had made the game less physical, not more. Can someone explain this to me?
Curry is running off of multiple screens without the ball, catching and shooting shots in rhythm, generally playing off the ball a lot more. Which is harder to guard. It's a good system if you have the right guys.
Dame gave me second hand embarrassment with the “it’s unacceptable” part Also Dame was 100% one of the players that did “tricks” to get fouls on 3pt shots
He would do a lot of things like throwing up shots when he felt contact, but Dame was never one of the guys who would kick out his leg or fly 10 feet into another player to try to draw the foul. It's like these rules change have gone from trying to stop players from doing unnatural things to try to draw contact to now villainizing anyone who tries to draw fouls in any way, shape, or form.
The Dame hated the new Wilson ball! The whole new rule change this NBA season! Now, please don’t ask why. No one quite knows the reason. It could be his head wasn’t screwed on just right. It could be, perhaps his shoes were too tight. But I think that the most likely reason of all May have been that the opponents were two sizes too tall.
I guess it depends on your definition of “unnatural”. He absolutely was taking threes that he would never take except he felt a man on him, so he would go up and flail. I don’t see it much different than harden driving, feeling a little contact and flailing
I think that's dependent on your definition of "flail" I'm also thinking you're focusing on a very minute total of fouls drawn. How many times did Dame draw 3 foul shots last season? so then, the average was 0.5 fouls per 100-possessions. And that was a team average. Dame wasn't the only Blazer to have drawn those fouls. CJ, Melo, RoCo, Powell, Trent, Simons...all drew some of those fouls last season. So then, what is a reasonable estimate of what Dame drew...somewhere between 0.1-0.2 per 100-possessions?. At 0.2, that would be about 3 FT's every 5 games or so. That would have been 40-50 FT's that he'd have supposedly lost last season under the current rules. He shot 484 FT's so then, say 45 out of 484. That would be a 9.3% reduction in FTA's. But he's had a 54% reduction in FTA's per 100-possessions and a 53% reduction in his FT rate. in other words, whether or not Dame embellished his 3pt FT rate isn't much of a factor here. Furthermore, the simple fact that Dame's FG% at the rim has dropped from .631 to .550 almost guarantees that officials are allowing defenders to get away with a lot more contact to Dame in the paint. That has nothing to do with "flailing" on three's even if Dame had doubled his number of 3pt fouls, there would still be a huge gap in his FT rates. And by last season Dame had become the most feared player for shooting long three's in the league so there would be tighter defense of Dame past half-court and tighter defense always draws more fouls, especially if there was a big focus by opponents on rotating to Dame behind the arc....and that's the case
Interesting article - I agree in that its a combination of things. NBA offense has plummeted to start 2021-22 season, and ... https://www.cbssports.com › nba › news › nba-offense-...
