Well, he got a significant mention anyway in this podcast ranking the best defensive guards in past 15 years. He seemed to fall just outside top 5: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/...sodes/220-the-best-defenders-of-the-183194188 They highlighted his unique style of defense (guarding from beside and often behind the ball handler, using length and anticipation to bother shots, basically a force of chaos for both teams lol). Transcript of just Matisse talk: The third guy in this category for me, Cody is Matisse, thyball. He's just his own category. Well, he's just like, does he play enough minutes? Is he too specialized? Is he? Matisse is also, hard in a sense to rank because I think if you were to look at his regular season. and impact only and how destructive he is. And you say, we're gonna put him in the right situation. And I think Philadelphia was fairly close with Joel Embiid behind him. And you say, you're a coach and you're more comfortable and you say, okay, do your thing, baby. Like just get behind everyone, run around, be chaotic, be nuts. I think his regular season impact would stack up pretty well with any of these guys. I mean, if you look at the metrics we've been talking about in 2021, Matisse was first among guards in estimated plus minus in the entire NBA. He was second overall among all players. In 2022, he was second among guards and third overall among all players. And if I'm remembering off the top of my head, the guard that was ahead of him was either super low minutes or someone who we wouldn't consider a guard, we'd consider him a wing. So basically the exact same thing, like first among guards, top three among all defenders in the league. Where I get more concerned and where I think his career has been interesting so far and it'll be interesting, like really fascinating to see what happens in Portland. I get concerned about a playoff setting where you need to implement certain things, you wanna disrupt what the other team is doing, but Matisse is still in that one mold of like, oh, I'm gonna let guys go by me and then just get crazy. And it's like, I don't know if that's gonna generate quite the same impact. And so when I stack up like, who do I want on a team if part of that like question is lingering in my head, I just, especially with like three or four of these guys, I'm just not sure what to do with him. Yeah, he's on my list. He is not number one though. I'll tell you that he is not number one on my list. And you know, the wrecking ball thing, we've tread this ground so many times, but you know, if you look at any player who's six, six or shorter ever of all time that have played at least a thousand minutes in a. He's the only one ever to average over two blocks and two steals per 75 possessions Basketball index has a statistic called passing lane defense Which is basically like bad pass steals and deflections and they add it together It only goes back to 2017 but thiebel has the top two in those numbers I didn't write this one down, but I know that the NBA shot charts as a dr. Appm for for opposing turnovers You know per 100 possessions when a player's on the court the last three years I both number one there so he causes the most turnovers on the court. He's just Certifiably, maybe the most disruptive perimeter player ever But like you said I had to dock him a little bit because you just like stick him in front of somebody He can get blown by a few times, right? He's kind of just like I think in the video you said this It's almost like he prefers playing from behind on guys. He likes poking it away, but also it is also really effective He just recovers. He's blocking a shot here He just like tell there's a couple plays been rough slowed it down to like half speed and it looks like I'm watching the matrix Cuz he's moving. Yeah at regular speed and everyone else is just like moving. I don't know man Just an unbelievable player you can convince me that I'm a little high on him But I also just can't ignore some of these other things well well here's the issue though It's less about him getting blown by and I think there are many great defenders Who can be weak in an area like that and make up for it everywhere else? Scotty Pippen is one that comes to mind where some of the quicker players he had to defend Could get by him a little more than you wanted or a little more than everyone else But then everything that happens after that in the possession you're actually like oh these aren't the same breakdowns as Just someone being totally flat-footed and space-shotted and you know the deal. It's more like Pippen still slides with them He might peel switch He might actually come in from behind and guard the other you know the big man steps up and Pippen's there So it's not that Matisse has weak feet in certain situations or that he's having these breakdowns to me me the thing with him is that he's almost deliberately getting, like that's his instinct. His instinct is to almost get out of position and create chaos because he's so skilled in that area. But that's an individual thing, right? Then the rest of the team has to make up for it. And I, I believe, um, some of the coaches have been frustrated with that, who have had to coach him before. And maybe that's why you see situations, Cody, where like he's out of the rotation entirely, despite these obviously incredible defensive skills, despite these numbers. And that's where it comes back to playoff stuff for me, where I'm just like, man, is it easy to harness the things that Cody loves about Matisse, that I agree are very real this like matrix like ability to be disruptive. Some of the shot blocking the hands. Um, he's very active chasing you off screens. Like he's, he's a good defender. He's a really good defender. But the question is if we're talking about the best of the best defenders in this category, is that something that makes it easier to have an effective playoff defense than some of the other guys? That's where I get a little bit stuck. I think that's, that's my concern. Okay. And I, I hear all those concerns. I do. I hear all of them, but I also just really highly value all of the other things. And maybe, maybe the reframing of it is like you hear Greg Popovich talking about young Manu Ginobili. And after a while I was like, I just had to learn that I had to let him like go out there and do his dance titles kind of the same way on defense. He's not the same level of brilliance, but it's like the same category of just like, let's just harness this and let's see where it takes us. I'm glad you brought that up because I had that same thought, but to me it's asymmetrical because on offense, you control the ball on defense. You need to work as a unit. And I think the thing that people are concerned with, with Matisse is that he's making it harder for the other four defenders, not, not easier for them. So it still may work for him, right? But in the long run they're concerned about the other. four defenders on the court.
Matisse is a little like Billups' old teammate Ben Wallace, an unorthodox, no-offense elite defender that you kind of have to build multiple aspects of your team around for both offensive and defensive reasons. I don't know that our personnel come close to being an ideal fit--hell, it's quite likely that Dame, Ant, Scoot, Sharpe and Nurk are the top 5 in minutes played until we trade Dame (and probably Ant). Matisse is our only good defender, and his style is just so unorthodox. It feels like if we get the steal, we'll get points in transition. Every other scenario we're getting scored on. It's going to be race to see if we can score 135 points every night. Which, come to think of it, isn't a bad way to tank. It's a lot easier to trade guys when they are having huge scoring nights....
I think we got a steal with Thybulle. I want him on the starting roster defending the best scorer on the other team's starting lineup
Mattise and Shaedon give us two SGs who are just over 6'5" in bare feet. That gives us the size we want at SG, but the question remains .......will one of them have to play SF? Lengthwise that would not be a problem, but weight wise would be my concern. (I think they are both around 201) We need Nas to stay healthy and improve defensively. His 220 frame would help off the bench. If we did trade with Miami, Jaime Jaquez would give us some more size at SF at 225.
I was about half way through the OP when I thought man - Mook is all over the place with this post and I'm trying to figure out what he's trying to say. I then went back to the beginning and saw the Transcript of just Matisse talk: !
Billups zone defense is a bust. All opponents need to do is move the ball away from Thybulle, and the Blazers best defender can't do much to help. I recently read that Thybulle excelled in a 2-3 zone at the University of Washington. But the NBA won't allow a true 2-3 zone, the paint must be cleared after 3 seconds. Add in the best passers and shooters in the world, the open 3 pointers "Chauncey's Zone" gives up has come back to bite Portland on a number of occasions.
