(11-15-2019, 04:29 PM)StepBackJay Wrote: I haven't watched a lot of Suns games but it seems like Rubio was the catalyst there. They finally have a competent, real PG at the helm and then it makes their team make sense.
While Ricky is great, I would put Baines on the throne. He is a monster down low on both ends. He brought grit and grind which was what they needed. I think they will be worse when Ayton takes his minutes.
While of course I don't really think we need to blow it up, this team certainly needs more quality players. We don't have cap space in 2020 so hoping that a middle first round pick will be someone capable of putting 20 points per night is a bit optimistic. This means the only chance to improve this team before 2021 FA pipedream is a trade.
Mavs offense (looking at starting five) is like this:
- ball ends up in Lukas hands who plays one on one with either shooting a three, going to the basket or going to the basket and pass. Or
- ball ends up in Lukas hands, who receives a screen so that a little worse defender switches on him and than plays one on one with either shooting a three, going to the basket or going to the basket and pass.
- sometimes, before ball gets in Luka's hands, they pass it around a little but no one really wants to do anything with it, so it eventually ends up in Luka hands
- very rarely they play KP post up, which is 90 % inefficient.
Opponent defensive game plan is extremely simple atm:
- put your best athletic defender on Luka to try and bother him a little before he gets the ball. Luka will receive a series of screens anyway so another guy will have to eventually guard him
- put two guys on KP and Seth and they should not move from them to prevent spot up shots. Our guys don't do much more, so they don't really need to be anything special defensively. They also don't move a lot without the ball, so staying close is not really that difficult
- the remaining two guys not guarding Luka, KP and Seth should remain close to basket, as none of the other 2 Mavs guys is a real threat from three. They need a lot of space to shoot it, so they might be even quick enough to close and put some pressure on the shot or prevent it. If they decide to dribble, it's over 50 % chance of a lost ball
- by remaining close to basket, they are able to effectively take away alley oops after Luka PnR
If Mavs put someone else instead of DFS, the shooting threat remains approximately the same and defense is worse. If they put someone else instead of Seth, shooting is way worse and opponent can close the paint even more. Mavs have no one better to put in instead of KP or Maxi. If they go small, they have problems defensively and nothing improves on the offensive end.
So, if they want to play this kind of offense, they desperately need someone, who can play DFS level of defense, shoot the three in the 40 % range and is capable of creating his own shot if defense closes by to that three point shot from Luka pass. Than this team might actually look good, as Luka and the rolling guy will have much more space or defenders from KP and Seth would need to help leaving those guys more open.
The alternative is, they change the offense and move the ball way more than they do now, move without the ball much more etc.
At this point, there are of course not a lot of players of described qualities available. They were in the summer, but we blew it... Anyway, I am more and more intrigued by CP3 as we would get a legitimate 3-D starter and keep all our bench depth. Gallinari would be great, but I don't think we have the assets. Alternative is to try and get assets for taking bad contracts into remaining TE and for Lee and do something in the summer of 2020. I don't think there are any middle options, as we don't have assets for legit starters.