Last night showed why Luka should not be “hidden” on defense. Using him as an on ball defender simplifies that end and gives him help behind if he gets beat. As the low man, Luka is ineffective and it hurts the team defense.
by musash10
@Dallas Mavericks
14 Comments
Luka is a pretty good on ball defender when he has the energy and motivation to try. He’s smart and has great footwork. But he doesn’t seem to play with urgency on that end until we are already behind and trying to overcome a deficit like last night vs the Hawks. I don’t know what it would take for him to play at that level consistently but he’s not capable of it right now, and that’s why he gets hidden on the corner man.
Good freaking luck having him on ball and playing 35 min and running the offense.
Do you understand the energy that takes…doesn’t even matter if you’re Dennis Rodman level conditioning
130 points geg scored on Mavs. You can make videos like that of everybody.
Y’all can circlejerk about Luka being out of shape (which is true to a degree) all you want, but the truth of the matter is this – Luka’s offensive usage rate is so insanely high and he’s forced to give so much of his energy all game long on that end that making him the on ball defender would be insane. It would 1000000% require him to play way less minutes or completely change what he does for over half the game on offense, which would obviously completely change the only side of the court we’re any good on.
Ever notice how guys like Bullock, who just sit in the corner and wait for open threes are sweaty and tired at the end of the game? That’s because they’re giving a ton of their energy to the defensive side of the game. Even if Luka was in the best shape of his life, asking him to be the main on-ball defender and then do anything close to what he does on offense is completely ridiculous
Trae and Murray taking turns trying to hunt Luka down and failing every time proves that Luka’s problem on defense is simply effort. Not that he can’t.
Another case for bad coaching, when your coach tries to hide you because he figures you’re a defensive liability.
He’s hidden on defense because he doesn’t *want* to expend the energy on the defensive end. If it’s best for Luka to focus his energy distribution on his offense (which makes sense, put your energy into what you’re good at rather than what you’re bad at), then it’s on him to actually lock in and have fast mental reactions to other team’s actions. If it’s better for him to be on-ball than as the off-ball lowman, then it’s on him to improve his fitness so he can do so while maintaining his offensive production.
Any way you look at it, Luka’s lack of defensive skillset limits the options the Mavs have to employ. He doesn’t have to take an absurd jump, but he’s got to raise his floor on the defensive end.
This is why i don’t understand why the Mavs don’t take rim protection seriously.
You are the Mavs, you are building around Luka and you don’t see the most important aspect of making Luka work? It has always and will always be rim protection. Blowing your assets on Kyrie instead of a way cheaper Poeltl who’s a mobile 2.16 is front office malpractice.
And even without Luka. Rim protection is critical for every team with championship aspirations. It’s normal. Teams don’t want their main guy to be in foul trouble so they often they just gotta live with letting them get past them but guess what?? YOU MAKE IT DIFFICULT TO SCORE as often as possible.
Even with teams where the main guy is literally someone who protects the rim a lot of the time like Giannis or Embiid. You still see them let dudes go past them all the time cause you gotta stay out of foul trouble but they protect the rim enough to win games.
Mavs however have some weird philosophy where rim protection and rebounds just don’t matter. Instead of protecting the rim at a decent to great rate. They just do it at absolute zero. The offensive benchmarks the Mavs gotta hit to make up for their horrible defensive schemes are unholy. Luka would have to put Wilt numbers on Jokic efficiency on top of the team hitting 45% of their threes to make up for the tragic ass defensive schemes Kidd got them playing.
We need an actual basketball GM. Not a shoe guy. Kidd also has no understanding of what our players need or are bringing to the table. We don’t have an elite roster by any means but Kidd heavily under utilized this roster. We got a 24 year old Luka and a Kyrie Irving and he didnt lose games. He got murdered on like 80% of games since the trade. And against rosters worse than us a lot of the time too. They just had way better coaching.
He is also the best rebounder on the team. So its pick your poison kind of a thing.
It is funny that the Hawks scored on 3/5 possessions that were supposed to be the “good” defense in this video
This probably works if he’s not gassed to death from running offensive plays. They tend to slip by him more often in this case
This is the type of content that this sub needs, great post and analysis OP
He should be hidden but not playing as a big in terms of help D
Luka being your last line of defense will never work. He can hang with slower / stronger offensive players but needs help behind him for everything else.
why doesn’t lebron just dunk it every time?