The Mavs Defensive Struggles Against LAC

[dirkfansince1998]

This guy is good at screaming and drawing circles and arrows on the screen, but has no clue otherwise.

Stopped watching when he proclaimed to let the player drive to the middle as there's help defence. You never open up the drive to the middle, you force offence to the wing and help closes down the zone from the middle (which was late in this case, so the mistake was on the help defender not the onball defender).

In general i think the defensive concept the Mavs coaches want to play is too complex for the players they have on the pitch (or maybe even in general). When it works, it's suffocating, but it regularily collapses resulting in fairly easy points for the opponent. So they should take a realisitc look at the roster and their lineups and determine if they can be coached up or if they need to dump down the system. Playing a system that the players can't execute is bound to fail.

He makes his assumptions based on one style of defense that he seems to favor but doesn't really look at individual team concepts. Still like the videos because you rarely get play by play footage of defensive possessions.

When he complains about Mavs guard (THJ, Irving) camping in the paint he isn't aware of the scheme. Leaving the weak side corner open. Overloading the strong side. Might be a bad scheme. But the players are doing what they are supposed to do.

Same for the DJJ pick and roll situation. Mavs want to ice the pick and roll. DJJ is doing it. He forces PG to reject the screen. Problem is that the guy behind him (Holmes. Most likely due to a lack of reps) isn't in position to slow down the the ballhandler. Not to mention that ice defense has been outdated since Thibs left the Bulls. Worked for the 08 Celtics. Noah/Rose Bulls. But in a league with bigs that can shoot/put the ball on the floor and ballhandlers that can pull up for a jumper at any given moment it is a terrible scheme.