re: Will Wade's excuse for poor defense in the second half of the Kentucky game

quote:

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Some players are morons, plain and simple.

I can remember two guys on my team that simply could not be good defenders. They were simply too stupid. For all the repetition we did, all the drills, all the coaching, and for them to still forget simple things like coming over from the backside when someone goes baseline, or remembering to hedge a pick or allow the defender to go under the pick depending on who had the ball, they simply couldn't remember and react in a timely fashion.

Some guys are just dumb, and there's no amount of coaching that will fix it. What helps in situations where you have an idiot on the defensive side, is when others know what they are supposed to be doing, and communication on the court is constantly happening. That's what's not happening on the court with LSU, and it's why Will Wade is saying this. He shouldn't have to be the guy reminding them of everything. There should be at least 2-3 guys on the court constantly talking and saying what's happening and what to do. One would expect that main person would be Skylar. It's important to have a coach on the court, and it doesn't seem like we have that.

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Generally speaking, you're not wrong. But after three years of poor defense what is more likely? (A) Wade just has had the "misfortune" of three different personnel groups who were ALL morons? Or (B) the way he and his staff are coaching defense is not getting through to the players?

Personally, I think the players are lost in the weeds. We all know that Wade is huge into analytics. And there is no doubt he does a deep dive in to scouting/game planning for every opponent. But maybe he's going too deep to be effective. Or in other words, the players are missing the forest because they are too focused on the trees and it is causing great indecision on what to do.

If you look at the numbers and listen to Wade, you kind of get an idea of his philosphy. There are metrics out there which show two key defensive stats that translate to success in March are 2pt FG defense and the ability to defend without fouling. I bet it would surprise everyone to know that LSU is among the nation's leaders in defending without fouling (top 15). But is that emphasis on not fouling coming at the expense of not defending AT ALL? Perhaps the LSU players are so focused on not fouling that they essentially allowing guys to easily drive by them rather than running the risk of committing a foul? Absolutely you don't want to foul guys and get killed at the FT line. But you also don't want to just give them easy driving lanes, right?