Monday, January 25th, 2010...6:16 am
Small-Ball and Defensive Rating
This is a short addendum to the Rockets/Spurs recap just down the page.
Why does Gregg Popovich like to play small?
As I wrote over the weekend, the Spurs’ forays into small-ballish lineups garner a certain amount of success. But for many fans-those who grew up on a twin towers approach to defending the lane-this doesn’t sit well. Those fans aren’t asking for the return of David Robinson. They’d happily accept a lane clogger after the fashion of Rasho Nesterovic or Nazr Mohammed. Their complaint is not that small-ball doesn’t produce points, or at least that’s not what I hear them saying. Their complaint is that small-ball gives the Spurs a different defensive identity.
How does small-ball factor into the Spurs’ overall defensive play? Stats geeks of the world unite.
The Spurs have gone small with regularity since the start of last season. But their newest offensive wrinkle dates back further than that. We’ve seen, for example, stints of Michael Finley at power forward for more than the last 120 regular season games.
The thought-and one that has proved fairly successful-is that small-ball helps San Antonio generate offense. So far as antidotes go, it makes sense for a team that is notorious for long scoring droughts. And in a league that features the Gasol-trade Lakers and high-scoring squads such as the Suns and Warriors, more offense is needed.
Prior to this offseason, San Antonio didn’t have enough players whom could generate their own offense. Bruce Bowen, you’ll remember, was phased out for this very reason. Their offseason makeover was intended to correct this personnel problem, among others.
But here’s the thing: as the Spurs have increasingly featured small-ball lineups their defense has become increasingly less effective. I’m open to the possibility of a spurious correlation between small-ball and mediocre defensive play, but it’s something for a capable stat geek to investigate. The chronological correlation is hard to miss.
In the meantime, there is this quote from Gregg Popovich:
You got to play a lick of defense if you want to win in this league. Our defense against Utah and against Houston was very poor. 60 points in the second half against Utah and 61 in the second half tonight. That’s not going to win basketball games. It looks like the effort and all that sort of thing is great, but way too many mistakes…not enough focus…not enough execution. We’re scoring enough points to win games. We’re scoring more points than we’ve ever scored in our lives, but our defense is really sub-par and it’s killing us.
But I raise the question with an open mind. An answer to the question of how small-ball effects the Spurs’ defensive play-which, I suspect, the Spurs already have through an in-house statistician-would, for example, inform the Spurs’ trade market deliberations. And many other things aside.
There is also the possibility that Gregg Popovich doesn’t have the confidence in the team’s available bigs, at least not to execute his defensive schemes with great precision. As I mentioned above, the plus/minus data does suggest the Spurs play better small. In this case, small-ball plays the role of the lesser of two evils. But then, that doesn’t satisfy the question of which moves, if any, to make on the trade front. Unless we know if small-ball is capable of complimenting the Spurs’ defensive schemes, we can’t know if a move for Jeff Foster or, say, Marvin Williams is the right path forward. In the case of the former, the Spurs move to correct their personnel issues. In the case of a combo forward, the Spurs embrace playing small and upgrade their overall talent.
9 Comments
January 25th, 2010 at 6:55 am
Small ball has meant adding Bowen in the past and Hill currently. Both fit into the Spurs defensive schemes.
When Bonner rehabs his way into more playing time, I’d expect a bit less small ball.
OTOH, I’d like to see more Ratliff and Mahimni (not necessarily in that order).
January 25th, 2010 at 8:18 am
[...] not a secret that the San Antonio Spurs play “small ball”. It’s hard to do with our prominent frontcourt, but I think the Wolves need to copycat this [...]
January 25th, 2010 at 9:07 am
Small Ball is a necessity due to the NBA changing the rules of the game to prevent a Spurs vs Pistons Finals year after year and the ratings that would come with that repeated matchup.
Ratliff I believe will see minutes in the Playoffs as a change of pace player off the bench.
January 25th, 2010 at 10:37 am
Small ball needs to be separated into 2 areas. How effective vs teams with winning records and how effective vs teams without a winning record.
It appears small ball is effective against teams that don’t have a winning record and aren’t very good. But, vs. good teams, playoff bound teams, small ball appears visually ineffective.
Need to separate small ball into 2 components. Vs winning records and not.
January 25th, 2010 at 10:49 am
An addition to lvmainman’s thought: do many or most of the elite teams include a regular line-up of two good bigs? Might that help explain where small ball hurts us?
January 25th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
The Spurs defense is hurting because they don’t have anybody that can really protect the rim. Sure, Tim still gets his blocks, but the majority of them are against his man and flat footed. He is not the weak side, come out of nowhere, shot swatter that he use to be. So now when teams be us off the dribble, its like a free lane to the basket.
They need an intimidating presence inside, which the rotation does not feature. Theo would help, and maybe he does play in the post season, but a trade would be the better option. Because lets face it, they have a very deep team and trading a couple for 1 upgrade would help some of the bench guys get more regular minutes. This uncertainty is hurting a lot of the guys.
January 25th, 2010 at 3:10 pm
Small-ball is going to get us an early exit in this years playoffs… if we make it that is.
January 25th, 2010 at 4:03 pm
@lvmainman - you raise an interesting point that I’d like to see more data to support or refute. Is it really about above .500 and below? I honestly don’t know. I do know that the various small ball lineups helped the Spurs have 2nd half leads of 21 over the Lakers, 13 on the Mavs, and double digits 2nd half leads @Utah, @OKC and @NOLA. Plus the 25-0 run vs Utah last week and leading by double digits in the 1st half of home games vs Denver and Houston.
Is small ball the primary reason the leads are built? I don’t know though I’m sure it plays a part. As I’ve stated before, this team can out-play teams (good and bad) for three quarters but there is always one quarter where they hit a long dry spell without scoring ,and worse, turn the ball over continuously which feeds quick and easy points for the opponent. Perhaps one solution is to go big once the double digit lead has been built, especially in the 2nd half of games. It seems these leads evaporate within minutes when the team gets in too much of a hurry on the offensive end, which could be slowed down by playing inside-out.
Ultimately this won’t matter unless all players believe that they hang their hat on defense first, regardless of scoring droughts. Along with the communication mistakes, it seems a few players allow their frustrations on offense to cloud their focus on defense. It certainly didn’t use to be that way.
January 27th, 2010 at 7:24 am
[...] so concerns on the defensive end are justified. Stoudemire, though, could alleviate the problems the Spurs have faced when playing small ball, giving the Spurs the flexibility to have the athleticism of small ball, while sporting the two [...]
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